SciencePunk
Festival fan art of Brian Cox
Posted by Frank Swain on March 11, 2013 So last summer I ran a quiz at the Secret Garden Party festival in Cambridgeshire. For the picture round, teams had to submit their best drawing of hearthrob scientist Professor Brian Cox. Here are some of the entries.
Silent alarm: a battery-powered bell which has rung inaudibly for 173 years
Posted by Frank Swain on March 11, 2013 A whimsical thing: the Oxford Electric Bell, pictured here, is a battery-powered device that has been running (almost!) continuously since it was built in 1840. A clapper on a pendulum rocks from side to side between two metal spheres, driven by electrostatic forces. The bell is powered by a pair of mysterious batteries, the composition of…
Skull by Tim Biskup
Posted by Frank Swain on March 1, 2013 I’m rather taken by Tim Biskup’s work, especially his skulls. I think this design appeared on a limited edition Poketo wallet (the only type I buy) some years back, but I missed out on getting one. For shame. For more of his latest work, see the Design Collector blog.
Delineating journalism
Posted by Frank Swain on February 26, 2013 
During the First World War, an enterprising British field medic named Sgt James Shearer unveiled a machine that promised to revolutionise medicine. Shearer’s “Delineator” was a small wooden box that had an aperture at one end and a crank on the side. Clicking the shutter and winding the arm produced a small drawing of a…
Implanted bionic eye allows the blind to see again
Posted by Frank Swain on February 20, 2013 
Researchers at the Institute for Ophthalmic Research at the University of Tübingen have restored vision in blind patients using tiny retinal implants embedded in the eye. Nine patients were chosen because they had all suffered hereditary diseases where the retina had degenerated to the point of blindness, but left the remainder of the visual pathway intact.…
What’s behind these secret marks on postage stamps?
Posted by Frank Swain on February 17, 2013 Recently, I noticed something strange about the postage stamps on my mail. They have a glossy coat that can only be seen at certain angles. Written in this glossy ink are the words ROYAL MAIL over and over again, like a watermark. But there’s something wrong. Can you spot it? Look at the second line…
Meteor hits Russia’s Ural region, hundreds hurt
Posted by Frank Swain on February 15, 2013 Pretty wild news this morning – a meteor shower over the Central Russian cities of Yekaterinburg and Chelyabinsk has caused hundreds of injuries and damaged buildings. It is not connected with tonight’s (very!) near-pass of asteroid 2012 DA14. Thanks to the prevalence of dashboard cams in Russia, there’s some amazing footage already circulating. The web’s resident…
Reading for writers: who should science writers read to improve their own work?
Posted by Frank Swain on February 12, 2013 Following some conversations with fellow writers over the weekend, I’ve been thinking critically about writing – both my own and that of others. When I first started writing about science, it naturally stemmed from reading the work of very good science writers, and true to form my first steps were wholesale imitations of these people.…
Super-hydrophobic coating is super-weird
Posted by Frank Swain on February 11, 2013 Witchcraft! It reminds me of the “plasma polymer” coating developed some years ago by DSTL, Britain’s defence research organisation. I wonder if the technologies are related?
On outreach
Posted by Frank Swain on January 26, 2013 “The problem with the London sci-comm crowd,” a friend once smiled to me, “is that they can’t invite their mates to the pub without giving it a title and calling it outreach”. That jest has been on my mind lately, as many among us fret over the future of the UK’s oldest science outreach organisation,…