FiveThirtyEight's The Collectors

Ethan Welty and Caleb Philips are looking to solve world hunger and change the functionality of city agriculture by showing that sometimes there's a large diversity of food available to anyone globally-all we need to do is look.

Dana R. Fisher, sociologist, is studying how citizens engage with the democratic process. By analyzing protests, Dana hopes to uncover the state and evolution of the general populous' political dissent and satisfaction outside of the bipartisan system.

A bee is not a bee. A bee is part of a 30,000-member colony, all of whom are working together. And the 2.5 million colonies in the United States are helping to provide us with $18 billion dollars worth of food—one in every three bites we take comes from bees.

Meet Peter McGraw, humorist and psychologist, who has traveled the world to decipher the universal properties of humor. After completing his journey, Pete has embarked on a new project: improving peoples’ lives by making them funnier. Follow Pete as he shadows his first subject: “Patient Zero.” By studying social behavior and analyzing comedic intentions, Pete will test his new methods to make Patient Zero a funnier guy. But, is sense of humor something we’re born with, or can it be taught? Perhaps Pete will change Patient Zero’s life, one joke at a time.

Meet Nolan Gasser, Musicologist and Architect of the Music Genome Project. Nolan has dedicated his life to music – composing, analyzing, and leading the research behind the global music radio phenomenon, Pandora. With over 500 unique genes across 7 genres, the music genome project is the most extensive categorization of music to ever exist. Now, with the knowledge Nolan has collected, he is seeking to create data-driven music therapy to help patients who are battling cancer.

Meet Chris Hudalla, an analytical chemist fighting to make medical marijuana a legitimate source of therapy for chronic illness. Using the most cutting-edge technologies in the world, Chris analyzes and evaluates the quality and integrity of marijuana samples from around the New England area. Despite his selfless efforts – in a society that criminalizes marijuana use, Chris often finds himself battling the law. Follow Chris as he helps his patients and caregivers get the medicine they need.

Is there an answer to the epic four-year drought that has befallen California? It may be found in the rings of trees studied by Dan Griffin, the subject of this piece in ESPN Films' Collectors series. By using trees as history books and tracking precipitation patterns, he is able to predict what's going to happen and advise water management experts. As bad as the drought is, Griffin has one piece of good news: "We still have time to act." But as this film also shows, we don't have time to be complacent.