Two more gems from The Best American Scientific Writing 2007, both about molecular biology being applied to something unexpected, and both from Discover Magazine. First, molecular paleontologist Mary Schweitzer uncovers soft tissue in 65-million year-old T-rex fossils. You can imagine the huge uproar the media raised, running the gamut from whimsical (“Now we can create (More…)
Posts from September 2008
Sep 5, 2008
Rapid Zombie Movements
I woke up at 5am this morning after an intense zombie chase around a lake and through a scary old house. I tend to forget my dreams after going back to sleep in the middle of the night so I decided to jot down some notes for this one. Last night’s rapid eye movements sound (More…)
Sep 4, 2008
Thursday Comic Relief
Joel Stein from Time has come up with a more equitable alternative to the controversial Olympic medal count ranking: In my system, overall points would be weighted by how popular the sport is, as determined by television ratings. You got a bronze in the gymnastic floor competition? That’s 100 Olympic points. You nailed a gold (More…)
[Audio clip: view full post to listen] Under Mao Tse-tung, the country used a basic but effective network of so-called “barefoot doctors”. But since the introduction of sweeping economic reforms in the past two decades, everything has changed. The reforms have brought new wealth but the collapse of many local clinics and free services mean (More…)