Exposing graduate students and post-docs to science writing
The Perseids are here! This annual meteor shower is one of the best and brightest, but this year it’s predicted to be even more spectacular. So, if you’re in a dark place tonight, look up. You may see a 4.5-billion-year-old remnant from the solar system burn…
Recently, NASA’s JUNO spacecraft slowed down by 1,212 miles per hour in a carefully coordinated 35 minute maneuver. This slowdown is similar to you slamming on the brakes to stop your car on the highway in 2 seconds. Braking to the exact right speed allowed…
I first heard of the band OK Go when they released their music video for ‘Here It Goes Again,’ which features the band members cruising back and forth over treadmills. I soon discovered that many of their other music videos are equally captivating and involve…
Scientists thrive on “aha” moments— breakthroughs in knowledge that come from careful planning or perhaps fortuitous luck. For a team of researchers led by Josh Lawrimore, a fourth-year graduate student in Kerry Bloom’s lab at UNC, their “aha” moment came about by approaching their research…
Humans need to explore. Not because it is in our DNA – the gene for exploration hasn’t been discovered yet – but because it is essential to our survival and well-being as a species. Scarcity of food and changing weather most likely pushed our ancient…
We like to think of the Universe as static. Our time is very short compared to the age of the Universe. But there are processes in space that happen on the time scales we inhabit. The variation in brightness of certain types of stars allow…
As scientists, many of us have read a paper, been inspired by the glamorous data, carefully followed the methods section in order to replicate the results in our own hands, and failed to validate the original results. I’ve often attributed these issues to my own…