In the midst of egg-rolling as well as face-painting, story-telling, yoga demonstrations, and performances by Elmo and Willow Smith, AAAS volunteers offered games and activities to help children learn about how their bodies work at the annual White House Egg Roll.

In the culture of research science, there’s a focus on the frontier, a premium on solving unsolved problems. But Paul Anastas, known as the father of green chemistry, urged scientists in a presentation at AAAS to revisit old problems and re-solve them in cleaner, more efficient ways.

Across science, in areas ranging from agriculture to light-bulb design and pharmaceutical development, science-driven improvements conceived in past decades often have come with high cost to the environment and sometimes human health, Anastas said.

The U.S. State Department is deeply committed to international science cooperation through negotiated agreements and less formal engagement to address top priority issues such as climate change and health, Assistant Secretary of State Kerri-Ann Jones told AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellows.

The AAAS Board of Directors has adopted a statement on the human right to the benefits of science, pledging to help get scientists more involved in an ongoing global effort to clarify the meaning of that right.

The right to enjoy the benefits and applications of scientific progress was first internationally recognized in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948.