I’ve always had an interest in the myriad ways art and science intersect: not surprisingly, Leonardo da Vinci is a hero of mine. Few arts have been altered more by advances in science and technology than music, a point made by New Scientist’s Technology Blog recently when it listed five milestones in music technology (and …
Tag: science
Another three weeks’ worth of Futurismic posts…
…which should actually be a longer list than this, but I’ve been too busy to post as often as I’d like. Still, it’s not a bad crop: UCLA researchers design nanomachine that kills cancer cells It’s not molecular manufacturing, but you can see it from here: To sleep, perchance to dream (suspended animation) A world …
Just the flax, ma’am
Download the audio version.Get my science column weekly as a podcast. Last week I wrote about converting agricultural residue such as wheat straw into bio-fuels. But there are other uses for some crop residue. Take flax straw, for example. For most flax growers that phrase immediately provokes the Henny Youngmanish riposte, “Please!” That’s because flax …
A vaccine for Ebola?
They’re about to start testing one in humans that has proved effective in non-human primates. keep your fingers crossed! This caught my eye because I wrote a book on Ebola a few years ago.
Spinning straw into liquid gold
Download the audio version.Get my science column weekly as a podcast. Rumplestiltskin, in the famous fairy-tale, has the knack of spinning straw into gold. We can’t do that–but we are learning to spin straw into something just about as valuable: biofuel. Sure, you can make ethanol out of corn or wheat, but in a hungry …
Mind-reading machines
Download the audio version.Get my science column weekly as a podcast. I’m a hard-line skeptic when it comes to the topic of ESP (extra-sensory perception). I don’t believe in telepathy, precognition, telekinesis, or people bending flatware just by looking at it. That said, I’m pretty confident that in the near future mind-reading will be possible. …
Science fiction architecture
Download the audio version.Get my science column weekly as a podcast. Once upon a time, I took a vocational aptitude test in high school guidance class. By that time I already had a pretty good idea I wanted to be a writer–specifically, science fiction writer–and yet, writer did not show up very high on the …
Odd craters on Mercury
They’ve found some very odd craters on Mercury, some with dark halos, which they at least have a tentative explanation for, and one they cannot explain at all: Superficially, the bright patch resembles an expanse of ice glistening in the sun, but that’s not possible. The surface temperature of the crater at the time of …
Why is winter the flu season?
Scientists may have finally figured out why there’s a “flu season,” why flu is so much more prevalent during the cold months: Dr. Zimmerberg and his colleagues found that at temperatures slightly above freezing, the virus’s lipid covering solidified into a gel. As temperatures approach 60 degrees Fahrenheit, the covering gradually thaws, eventually melting to …
A month’s worth of Futurismic posts…
I’ve been remiss! Here are links to my last month’s worth of posts over at Futurismic (which now, by the way, is once more publishing science fiction!): A touchless computer interface Scientists create dynamic holographic display Star Wars meets Lara Croft on stage in Fight Girl Battle World The search for life on Europa begins …
Hemophilia: stopping the bleeding
Download the audio version.Get my science column weekly as a podcast. To receive these columns weekly by email, just provide me with an email address at edward(at)edwardwillett.com or in comments. *** A few years ago, I wrote a children’s book on hemophilia, an inherited condition in which the blood fails to clot properly. Which meant …
Popcorn
Download the audio version.Get my science column weekly as a podcast. *** There’s been a lot of attention paid to the movies this past week due to the various awards handed out between old clips of previous awards being handed out that aired on TV Sunday night. Which got me thinking about the food that …
My latest live walk and vlog
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