Published by Kate at August 28, 2009 12:17 pm under Story
At 3pm tomorrow you could drink your afternoon pick-me-up coffee at your local cafe OR you could head to the ABC Cafe on Harris Street to interrogate a medley of research scientists.
Your choice.
Drink one with a "geek" tomorrow and learn about their world of research
A robot designer, an indoor air pollution expert, a games researcher, and a professor of Integrative Physiology – among others – will be there to answer your questions. It’s called ‘Speed meet and greet a geek’ and, to get you started, we’ve begun the interrogation of two “geeks” here.
So read up and think of a question to really stump them!
Published by Kate at August 27, 2009 8:01 pm under Story
By Fiona MacDonald
A few weeks ago my friend complained she was struggling to lose weight. “All I eat or drink is Boost Juice three times a day!” she whined. When I explained fruit juice is low in fat but is also full of sugar, she was horrified. It was then I started to wonder if a science degree was necessary just to understand how to take care of our bodies.
Especially when people out there are making these creations!
We generally know not to trust advertising, but when it comes to “healthy” products it’s hard not to get sucked in.
[WARNING: if you're not prepared for images of hooks through skin, please don't click]
Hooks, tattoos, blood, electrocutions, muscle control and phantom limbs? Oh – and did I mention pain?
Nope, that's not a pitchfork. Image: Mat McCosker's iPhone
These are the reasons we are in a long looping queue for entry to the Powerhouse Museum. Pain is fascinating and a night where the science behind the agony is de-mystified is too good to miss.
A Powerhouse rep is working her way down the queue, getting people to sign release forms. Wait, release forms? I’m sure it’s a legal thing — but it’s also a good way to raise anticipation levels!
Published by Kate at August 26, 2009 10:23 am under Story
By Kate Hennessy
After the Science of Choice talk last night at UTS, my friend Tim and I chanced a visit to the Science of Cocktails. We’d seen a sign indicating its whereabouts while enjoying a pre-lecture G&T at The Loft Bar a few hours before.
That's a great night, right there
The Science of Cocktails was a private, pre-booked affair but when the spirit of scientific enquiry burns bright, who’s to resist?
Published by Kate at August 25, 2009 12:15 pm under Story
By Heath Raftery
You are currently participating in a mighty event.
When it is over the world will have moved 2,000 kilometres through the solar system. Mankind will have expended around 30 million megajoules just staying alive and added about four billion grams of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere in the process. Approximately 14 hectares of forest will have been cut down and more than 100 people will have died.
Bead, ribbon, staccato, fork, Ground-to-cloud, Cloud-to-cloud, sheet, heat, dry, rocket, positive, ball, sprites, blue jets, elves. The many kinds of lightening. Image: wikipedia
The Earth will be hit by lightning 6,000 times and there’s not a thing you can do to stop it.
Published by Kate at August 24, 2009 4:35 pm under Story
Alex Serpo
Alex Serpo likes particular particles in precise positions. He’s pretty sure that right now Heisenberg is playing chess with Schrödinger in the afterlife.
Let me tell you a secret. In every scientist there is an anarchist. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. What all scientists have in common is they really, really like to break things.
Published by Kate at August 23, 2009 6:23 pm under Story
By Jon Lomberg
Jon Lomberg imagines a future where humans have colonised Mars.
A few centuries from now, Mars might be a bustling frontier. If our species can survive there, it will spread slowly, pushed by the spirit of scientific inquiry, or the urge to explore. Landing sites will turn into bases and eventually into communities.
Mars
Mars has as much dry surface area as the Earth. Even aided by satellites, it will take a very long time to explore the planet. Meanwhile, all the unmanned landers and rovers from earlier missions will still be where they were centuries before, buried in sand perhaps.
On Saturday August 15, Live Futures 2020 brought scientists, designers and innovators together at the UNSW COFA Campus in Sydney. The theme was “futures” and Dr Saul Griffith, who encompasses all of these professions, called in via Skype to discuss the future of energy.
It was a tremendously thought-provoking presentation; and I captured some of the highlights below…
Published by Kate at August 21, 2009 2:01 pm under Story
By Kate Hennessy
After a fortuitous encounter at the Eureka Awards dinner on Tuesday, Professor Bryan M. Gaensler leapt on a brilliant opportunity. But first: watch this.
Physics professor Gaensler had a tutorial scheduled the next day about the challenges of portraying science and astronomy in film. He planned to use 1996 movie ‘Contact‘ (starring Jodie Foster) as his primary example.
Over dinner, however, Gaensler discovered that the gentleman to his left was none other than ’space artist’ Jon Lomberg.
From 1995-1997 Lomberg worked on the Warner Brothers film as Astronomical Visual Consultant. He designed and story-boarded many of the film’s astronomical animation sequences, including the famed three-minute zoom out from Earth that opens the movie (here again on QuietTube) – the very sequence Gaensler planned to show students the next day.
Sensibly, Gaensler’s first question to Lomberg was “What are you doing at noon tomorrow?”
