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From Hawaii to Santa Cruz to the Philadelphia suburbs, in living rooms, churches and festival tents, similar gatherings — called community sings, or singalongs — draw together the average-voiced and bring old songs into common memory. If there is a natural opposite to gold-plated pop irony and faceless file sharing — music as the American majority knows it in 2008 — this is it. These meetings are earnest, participant directed and person to person: a slow-going, folkish appreciation of American vernacular culture.

Option 2: A recent Live Science article explored the connection between sexual attraction and microbes. Read the article and answer this question: What are the advantages and/or disadvantages of incorporating microbial composition and immune system type into dating profiles?

Valentine's Science: How Mouth Germs Shape Attraction

By Tanya Lewis

February 14, 2015

Choosing the best mate this Valentine's Day just got sort of creepy: Accumulating research suggests that in addition to good looks, charm and intelligence, a person's body bugs may also play a role in love.

The human body is home to 100 trillion microbes, known collectively as the microbiome. In fact, bacterial cells in the human body outnumber human cells by a ratio of 10 to 1. In recent years, scientists have found that these communities of organisms are crucial for human metabolism and immune system function.

"So it shouldn't be surprising that [the microbiome] has effects not only on metabolic processes, but on the way we look at things ... and even in sexual attraction," said Dr. William Miller, a retired physician, evolutionary biologist and author of the book "The Microcosm Within: Evolution and Extinction in the Hologenome" (Universal Publishers, 2013).

Kiss of life

Scientists are starting to discover just how big a role these tiny tenants play in human lives. For example, microbes may be invisible musicians in the complex orchestra of human attraction. "We are being supplied by a number of hidden cues we just didn't realize were there," Miller said.

In November 2014, Dutch scientists published a study in the journal Microbiome that found that couples have similar microbial communities in their mouths, and a 10-second kiss can transfer up to millions of bacteria.

In that study, researchers gave 21 couples at the Artis Royal Zoo in Amsterdam questionnaires about their kissing habits, including how often they kissed in the past year and how much time had passed since their last intimate kiss. Then the researchers swabbed the couples' mouths to determine the bacterial makeup on their tongues before and after a kiss.

The more often the couples kissed, the more alike their oral microbial communities were, the researchers found. In addition, the couples' tongue bacteria were more alike than those in their saliva.

In the same study, the researchers asked one member of each couple to drink a probiotic yogurt containing the "marker" bacteria Lactobacillus and Bifidobacteria, before engaging in a 10-second kiss with their partner. When the scientists sampled the mouth bacteria of the person who didn't drink the yogurt, the amount of these marker microbes had tripled, amounting to about 80 million new bacteria.

But there's more to the story. The bacteria on the top of the couples' tongues were more similar to each other than to those of strangers, but this similarity did not correlate with the frequency of kissing. Instead, the couples probably share similar microbes because they have similar lifestyles, living environments or genetics, the researchers said.

I odor you

Bacterial inhabitants aren't the only unseen forces at play in human attraction. Other studies have found that people are more attracted to others with immune systems different from (and complementary to) their own.

In a 1995 study in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, Swiss researchers had male students wear the same T-shirt for two consecutive days, without deodorant, and then asked female students to smell and rate the odors of the shirts without knowing which men had worn them. The women favored the shirts from men whose immune systems were most different from their own, the researchers found. This makes sense from an evolutionary standpoint, because choosing a mate with a different immune system would have made the couple's offspring more likely to survive infections, Miller said.

Given how much scientists are learning about the hidden forces that govern sexual attraction, could humans' microbial composition and immune system type someday make it onto dating profiles?

"When you think about this deeply, the answer is, 'Why not?'" Miller said.

Option 3: For years, engineering and business visionaries have dreamed of vehicles that will transform urban transportation: small cars, folding cars, shared cars, and so on. A new project by research scientists at MIT is developing a self-driving electric vehicle that would be almost constantly in motion. The Persuasive Electric Vehicle (PEV) would drive itself or passengers around the city using bike lanes and wouldn’t ever need to be parked, and it would be lightweight and low cost.

Read the article below that outlines some of the project details and write an essay that answers the following question: what are some of the ways that this type of vehicle could impact a dense urban area?

A Vehicle for the Future

by Julie Barr

Slice of MIT

October 26, 2015

Image shows the PEV package delivery system (left) and personal transportation (right).

What do you get when you take three wheels, an electric motor, and autonomous capability? An entirely new vehicle that could revolutionize the way we live—at least that’s the vision of research scientist Kent Larson and Michael Lin SM ’07, SM ’10 and the Changing Places group in MIT’s Media Lab. The group created the Persuasive Electric Vehicle (PEV) as part of a strategy aimed at reimagining how we’ll live in denser cities of the future. The PEV includes shared properties similar to Hubway and the ride service capabilities of Uber, but the vehicle’s autonomous capability sets it apart. “We’ve come to realize that the ideal mobility in the city combines three features,” says Larson. “Shared use, electric drive, and autonomy.”

The vehicle is designed to autonomously travel to a given pickup point where the passenger is located, traveling within bicycle lanes. When the PEV reaches the passenger, they have the ability to operate the vehicle with the electric motor or pedal to their destination. The vehicle is also designed for package delivery, with a roof that secures around the vehicle. “For systems like Hubway, nearly 50 percent of the operation cost is distribution, moving the bikes based on demand,” says Lin. “Since the PEV can move autonomously, it can travel to the customer. And the package delivery aspect of the system offsets the demand influx as packages can be delivered in off-peak travel hours.”

The PEV has been in the works for several years, developed as a collaboration between the Media Lab, AeroAstro, and Megacity Logistics Lab. “It was 2006 when we first talked about shifting automobiles from product to service and people thought we were crazy,” says Lin, who has been working in the Media Lab off and on since 2005 while he was earning his master’s at MIT. Today, the PEV chassis and autonomous modules are fully designed and a prototype was built for the Media Lab’s members’ week (October 26-30) and 30th anniversary (October 30).

With a complete prototype, roll-out could be just months away. The PEV has many sponsors eager to test the new technology, including an air force base in Taipei, Taiwan.

Option 4: The U.S. Department of Agriculture recently gave its approval to two varieties of apples that are genetically modified to resist turning brown. Read the article below and write an essay that answers the following question: what are the advantages and/or disadvantages of genetically modified apples?

Apples modified to resist browning receive federal approval

Associated Press

February 14, 2015

WASHINGTON (AP) - Don’t expect to see them too soon, but they could be coming to your local grocery store - two types of apples genetically modified to resist turning brown after they’re bruised or sliced.

The development could boost sales of apples for snacks, salads and other uses.

Arctic Golden and Arctic Granny Smith are being developed by a Canadian company, Okanagan Specialty Fruits Inc. of Summerland, British Columbia.

The Agriculture Department gave its OK on Friday - saying the apples aren’t likely to pose a plant pest risk and or have “a significant impact on the human environment.”

The first Arctic apples are expected to be available in late 2016 in small, test-market quantities.

It takes apple trees several years to produce significant quantities, so it will take time before the genetically-modified apples are widely distributed.

“We can’t wait until they’re available for consumers,” said the company’s president and founder, Neal Carter.

Apples brown quickly after they are cut open and exposed to air. The browning-resistant varieties are considered especially desirable for use as pre-sliced apples, in fruit salad and salad bars, and in the manufacturing of juice.

The company said it is working on developing other browning-resistant apple varieties as well.

The nonprofit Center for Food Safety questioned whether browning-resistance will mask apples that no longer are fresh. The Environmental Working Group said the government’s decision to allow marketing of the apples shows the need for mandatory, clear-labeling of genetically modified foods.

The Food and Drug Administration is not required to approve genetically engineered crops for consumption, but most companies will go through a voluntary safety review process with the FDA before they put them on the market.

Option 5: The following article focuses on a micro housing unit that can be installed inside a single parking space. Read the article and then write an essay that answers the following question: What are some of the advantages OR some of the disadvantages of this design concept?

These Parking-Spot-Sized Micro Homes Will Turn Parking Garages Into Mini-Cities

Fast Company

Adele Peters

April 10, 2014 |

If you live in a city, your future apartment may be inside a parking garage. Yesterday, a team of designers from Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) unveiled prototypes of new studio apartments called SCADpads—tiny units that each fit inside a single parking space.

Why build in a garage? Overcrowded cities are struggling to find places to build affordable housing, and since fewer and fewer people are driving cars, maybe it’s a natural step. Already, most parking garages are only used about half of the time, and they tend to be located near downtown areas, exactly where many people want to live.

"Parking decks are a building type that’s often overlooked, but it may actually be the next frontier for adaptive reuse," says Christian Sottile, dean of the SCAD School of Building Arts. "When we think about the impacts of demolition and reconstruction, we can either watch these existing assets sort of grind their way into obsolescence or we can enable them to evolve into other things."

Over the last 10 months, dozens of students worked on every aspect of the design—from architecture, furniture, appliances, and textiles, to interactive features, like a smart lighting system that turns on lights automatically when someone comes home and dims when they’re ready to go to sleep.

Each unit is fully equipped with a kitchen, bathroom, and a flexible living space that can be used for sleeping, eating, working, or play. "They’re entirely self-sufficient—it’s small living with no compromises," Sottile says. The three prototypes, currently installed in a parking garage on the SCAD campus in Atlanta, were also designed with private outdoor spaces that take advantage of the parking deck’s view of the city skyline.

The installation also includes a community garden, lit with a daylight-harvesting system installed on the roof, and a maker space where the apartment’s occupants can 3-D print specific accessories for their new home. Three students will be testing them out by living in them for the next three months.

"SCADpad is designed by millennials for millennials," says Sottile. "And that provides this really interesting laboratory for experimentation. You’ve got this enormous population group—78 million plus—and 88% of them want to be in an urban setting. Affordable, efficient housing is important to them, along with mobility, and not being tethered to a car, and having collaborative living environments."

The apartments could be used anywhere across the country, since parking spaces are a standard size. Installation at a larger scale would be easy, Sottile says, since it would require little modification to existing garages.

It could quickly add new housing in prime areas. The garage where the three prototypes are now, located in midtown Atlanta, could hold 300 to 400 units. SCAD has calculated that making the switch to housing could double revenues for the owner of a parking garage while still providing studios that cost 40% below the median rent in major urban markets.

"It’s the kind of project that’s thinking about what's next in terms of urban housing and reuse of existing assets, but it’s also an immediate solution," says Sottile. "You’ve taken sort of the underdog building and given it the chance to compete. There’s a beautiful story about preservation here and not making the mistakes we made 50 years ago when we demolished buildings to put up parking decks."

Don’t forget to write your full 750-word essay below. Make sure to give your essay a title.