2020 Science Archives
Here you’ll find all the currently existing posts on 2020 Science, in reverse date order. Feel free to browse through them, or if you’re looking for something specific, use the search box below.
Emerging technologies and sustainability: What’s risk got to do with it?
Question: What do you get if you place some of the leading thinkers and practitioners in the fields of technology innovation, risk and sustainability in the same room for two days? Answer: one whopping headache! Not because of the confusion and...
Contagion, plausible reality and public health: In conversation with Larry Brilliant
Blockbuster movies aren't usually noted for their scientific accuracy and education potential. But since its release last week, Steven Soderburgh's Contagion seems to be challenging the assumption that Hollywood can't do science. The other day I...
Cool science: The Charlie McDonnell Effect
There's been quite a bit of chatter about the "Brian Cox Effect" in the UK recently, as interest in science seems to be on the rise. But I haven't heard anyone talking about the "Charlie McDonnell Effect". Maybe it's because Charlie appeals more...
Define nanomaterials for regulatory purposes? EU JRC says yes.
Cross-posted from The Risk Science Blog: In a recent letter to the journal Nature (Nature 476; 399), Hermann Stamm of the European Commission Joint Research Centre Institute for Health and Consumer Protection (JRC-IHCP) defended the need to define...
The public and peer review literature: Pearls before swine?
This morning I sat down with my 14 year old son and asked him what area of science caught his interest especially. He answered "the future of space exploration". We carried out a search on the Web of Science for "future + space + exploration", and...
“Social Media makes us more”
Following on from my post a couple of days ago on teens and social media, I wanted to post this highly eloquent response to some of Susan Greenfield's remarks about social media and society. It's from Francisco of the YouTube collab channel...
Social Media messed-up teens reveal all
Is social media messing up today's teens? Adults, it seems, love to pontificate on the benefits and ills of emerging internet-based communication platforms on young people. But how often do they bother to listen to the teenagers they claim to be...
Is the UK facing a second generation brain drain?
In 2000, I moved to the US with my wife and two children to take up a research job here - becoming part of the migration of science, technology and engineering expertise out of the UK. Eleven years on, my kids want to go back to the UK to...
Want to know about teens and social media from the horses mouth? Watch this space
If you are a teen who uses YouTube (or know of one - maybe even your own teenager), please think seriously about posting a response to this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SC2UaAkkG_A (You can also watch it directly on YouTube here). Over on...
What was worrying us about nanotechnology safety seven years ago?
In 2004, the first International Symposium on Occupational Health Implications of Nanomaterials was held in Buxton in the UK. Seven years later, I'm preparing for a discussion panel at the fifth meeting in this very successful community-led series...
Would You Lick Jam Off An Old Man’s Foot? and other important science questions
Would You Lick Jam Off An Old Man’s Foot Or Drink Toilet Water For An Hour? Can you explain how gravitons can escape a black hole? Or do you have a good answer to the question "why are people annoying?" This is just a sampling of some of the more...
Frying your brains on information overload: Old perspectives on a new issue
Living online is changing our brains - at least according to Baroness Greenfield in an interview posted today by New Scientist. Leaving aside questions over the extent to which Greenfield's concerns are driven by misapprehension or plausibility,...
The science of VidCon – Connecting with Science & Engineering through YouTube
Where I cover science at this year's VidCon YouTube convention, take a look at science and engineering more broadly on YouTube, and suggest that for next year's VidCon the organizers should bring together some of the leading science projects on...
I’m a scientist… what the heck am I doing at VidCon?!
This week my teenage kids are dragging me of to the premier YouTube event of the year - VidCon. I was foolish enough to agree to chaperone them, and now I have two days in LA immersed in a sea of one thousand YouTube celebs, fans and wannabe's....
Seven challenges to regulating “sophisticated materials”
The materials that most current regulations were designed to handle are pretty simple by today's standards. Sure they can do some nasty things to the environment or your body if handled inappropriately. And without a doubt some of the risks...
Radiation-Crazed Zombies in Anti-Vaccine Hand-Washing Health Scare – Possibly
OK so it's a slightly misleading title, but I did want to draw your attention to the rather splendiferous Risk Science Blog. When I took over as Director of the University of Michigan Risk Science last year, I wanted to find ways of connecting...
Nanotechnology – has the UK dropped the nano-ball?
I must confess to being rather saddened this morning to read Roger Highfield's New Scientist blog on the state of nanotechnology in the UK. Hot on the heels of reports that the company Nanoco is threatening to leave Britain for more fertile...
Don’t define nanomaterials – new commentary in Nature and an early draft
One of the problems with publishing in journals like Nature is that it can get a little pricey for people to read your work if they (or their organization) don't subscribe. For instance, if you want to read the commentary I've just had published...
A nanotechnology regulation hat trick from the US federal government
It must be Nanotechnology Regulation week in Washington DC. Yesterday, two federal agencies and the White House released documents that grapple with the effective regulation of products that depend on engineered nanomaterials. In a joint...
Responsible development of… Unobtanium?
I thought I'd post this spoof presentation for the fun of it on the responsible development of "unobtainium", which seems to have some remarkable similarities with some other emerging technologies: If you're a little mystified, blame David Berube -...
The ultimate rules list for accepting speaking engagements
I think I might have just accepted one speaking engagement too many! After years of patiently bearing the brunt of my grueling travel schedule, my wife Clare has finally put her foot down. Sorry folks - if you want me to speak at your meeting,...
International Standards Organization guidelines for evaluating nanomaterial risks – are they any good?
In June 2005, the chairman and CEO of DuPont, together with the President of the Environmental Defense Fund, co-authored an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal titled “Let’s Get nanotech Right”. The piece called for broad multi-stakeholder...
Australian Education Union advises against using nanoparticle-based sunscreens in schools
Last week, the Victoria branch of the Australian Education Union (AEU) passed a resolution recommending that "workplaces use only nanoparticle-free sunscreen" and that sunscreens used by members on children are selected from those "highlighted in...
A new look for the US National Nanotechnology Initiative
A few weeks ago, the US National Nanotechnology Initiative website - www.nano.gov - underwent a much-needed facelift. The NNI's web portal was creaky when I was part of the Initiative several years ago now. And it's somewhat ironic that the...
Optogenetics and mind control – on the borders of the plausible?
Tomorrow, I will be speaking at the Marshal M. Weinberg Seminar on Optogenetic Manipulation of the Brain at the University of Michigan - not a subject I must admit that I am that familiar with. Fortunately, there are other speakers who will be...
Peer review in a pool of one
Exploring new ideas, messing around with disciplinary boundaries, making unusual and innovative connections - surely that's what cutting edge research is supposed to be about these days? Certainly it's something many researchers aspire to - at...
Social media and science communication – the backup video!
Yesterday I have the rather odd experience of opening the media140 meeting on the impact of social technologies on science communication in Brisbane Australia - from my basement in Michigan, USA. Skyping into the meeting, it was hard to tell...
Regulating emerging technologies – Science & Public Participation top a new White House set of principles
Cross-posted from The Risk Science Blog: Back in 2007 the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) issued a set of "Principles for Nanotechnology Environmental, Health and Safety Oversight" (no longer available on the OSTP website...
James Gleick’s Chaos – the enhanced edition
In 1987 I got my Bachelor of Science in physics, Prozac was launched in the US, and James Gleick published Chaos. I don't think the middle one has any bearing on the other two. But the first and last are tentatively linked because, despite being...
Larry Brilliant: Enabling sustainable humanity through getting serious about risk
I've occasionally been accused of thinking big when it comes to Risk Science. So I was rather chuffed to hear former Executive Director of Google.org Larry Brilliant out-big me on every point as he delivered the 10th Peter M. Wege lecture here at...