Hi, welcome to today's r/science discussion panel! Like AMAs, the goal of discussion panels is to bring exciting, timely topics in science to reddit and have discussions led by subject area experts.

The difference between AMAs and discussions is that discussions will happen much less frequently and will always be led by a team of scientists so that we can hear multiple expert perspectives and answer many more questions. As with our AMAs, discussion posts will be posted in the morning to allow topics and questions for the panel to come in ahead of the panelists arriving to participate. Also, similarly to our AMAs our moderation of these events will be extremely strict, so please make sure you read and follow our rules in the sidebar. Thanks, and we hope you enjoy this new series!

If you have scientific expertise, please verify this with our moderators by getting your account flaired with the appropriate title. Instructions for obtaining flair are here: reddit Science Flair Instructions (Flair is automatically synced with /r/EverythingScience as well).

As a reminder, it is never ok to ask for (or give) medical advice on r/science.