A chance meeting with a stranger on an airplane has a huge impact on Melanie Knight's life, and Joshua Adams-Miller has never seen college in his future, until he receives encouragement from an unexpected source.

After getting hit by a car, Ph.D. student Reyhaneh Maktoufi must navigate the recovery and paperwork as an immigrant from Iran, and when scientist Danielle Lee travels to Tanzania to study pouched rats, she finds she's more of an outsider than she'd expected.

Adam Selbst competes with tigers for the attention of his mother, and weighed down by the burden of leadership as she supervises the construction of a telescope, Erika Hamden finds comfort in an unlikely spot.

As a child, TC Waisman is told that she is on the autism spectrum, but her mother refuses to accept the diagnosis, and growing up, Craig Fay develops strategies to hide how terrible he is at math.

Zoology student Devon Kodzis's strategy of attracting boys with fun animal facts proves difficult, and away from her boyfriend for grad school, Meisa Salaita starts to fall for a chemistry classmate who's her complete opposite.