The Experimentalist

Cancer Is One Worry Elephants Can Feel Free to Forget 

Elephants are one of nature’s biggest improbabilities—literally. Their colossal bodies somehow manage to defy the odds: Despite the fact that their cells outnumber humans’ by a factor of about 100, elephant cancer mortality is somehow only a third of ours.

REDCARPET - MET GALA 2018

“Dr.”

“But are you a man or a woman?”

The Shuri Effect: A Generation of Black Scientists? 

Imagine a brilliant, young, black, female, scientist, with incredible wit, impeccable fashion, and fierceness in battle. There are a zillion things to love about Black Panther, but seeing Letitia Wright embody Shuri floored me. I didn’t realize just how enormous a void such there was in popular culture until I saw it start to fill.

Black Panther blew my mind. Shuri made my heart sing.

Shuri gave the middle finger to her older brother, King T’Challa, at the beginning of the film, but more importantly she gave the finger to every stereotype I’ve been battling. As a young(ish), black, female marine biologist from the magical land of Brooklyn, this character brought me incredible joy. And, if I’m honest, a bit of relief.

“At school I had a teacher that didn’t like me and I didn’t like him. At the end of the year he decided to fail me. The ironic thing is that the topic was chemistry." 

"I have the distinction of being the only Chemistry Laureate who failed the topic in high school!”

Engineers at the University of Maryland, College Park (UMD) have found a way to make wood more than 10 times times stronger and tougher than before, creating a natural substance that is stronger than many titanium alloys.

“This new way to treat wood makes it 12 times stronger than natural wood and 10 times tougher,” said Liangbing Hu of UMD’s A. James Clark School of Engineering and the leader of the team that did the research, to be published on February 8, 2018 in the journal Nature. “This could be a competitor to steel or even titanium alloys, it is so strong and durable. It’s also comparable to carbon fiber, but much less expensive.” Hu is an associate professor of materials science and engineering and a member of the Maryland Energy Innovation Institute.