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As all of you know, the recent earthquake and tsunami in the Indian Ocean have caused an amazing amount of damage and it’s unfortunately likely that waterborne diseases like cholera and malaria will cause more disaster. Even though reports are coming in more quickly now, photos often say more than words: DigitalGlobe and WaveOfDestruction.org.

So far, [...]

I probably read 30-40 books a year in my free time, and they usually don’t involve much in the way of science (though the occasional sci-fi page-turner is fun). My mother sent me a reader’s copy of How to Clone the Perfect Blonde by Sue Nelson and Richard Hollingham this fall to review for the [...]

The New York Times science section just had an article on Ms. Shirley Corriher and her continuing chemistry/cooking experiments. (Well, now she’s moved on from CookWise and focusing on baking.)

Yes, there’s an enormous amount of chemistry in cooking–but does this explain why many of the chemists I know are also good cooks?

I finished up a reader’s copy of Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking recently. I think the media blitz is just beginning (the book will come out on January 11th)–there’s also a recent FastCompany review/profile.

Silly me, I’ve been writing research papers and neglecting my blog. But others have evidently found it anyway. Nice to see there’s a considerable amount of coverage of science and nanoscience.

This semester at Cornell, I’ve heard two talks that I really liked–both from non-scientists. I discussed one earlier and still need to continue that frame [...]

This December, as a postdoc, I’m not:

writing a dissertation teaching or grading
taking classes and exams

But you can literally feel that strange combination of stress, caffeine, and procrastination just by walking around campus. It somehow permeates the atmosphere–and whammo, I have two papers to write by Friday! How did that happen?