Earth & Environment, Science & Technology, Society & Culture

Weird Penn State — A Halloween Night at Our Museums

Leave a comment

Penn State’s museums are full of the majestic, the sublime, and the awe-inspiring. There, on display for all of us to see, are artifacts of science and objects of art that remind us of humanity’s ability to turn skill and knowledge into things of beauty and understanding.

These museums are also filled with something else that, for the most part, only human beings can produce and that, without a doubt, only human beings can appreciate: the really, really weird.

Just in time for Halloween, I’d like to take us on a trip to some of Penn State’s museums and find the best examples of Weird Penn State. As turns out, finding the really, really weird is really, really easy.

We’ll start our weird adventures at the Palmer Museum of Art, Penn State’s premier arts resource for the University and surrounding area.  Continue reading Weird Penn State — A Halloween Night at Our Museums →

Earth & Environment

Bringing an Eco-Friendly Message to the Green Mountain State

Leave a comment

It may not come as a surprise that the “Green Mountain State” of Vermont is considered one of America’s greenest regions, in terms of its carbon footprint, energy efficiency, and air quality.  If our Research On The Road trip to Vermont earlier this month is any barometer, let’s add bees to the list of things that matter deeply to Vermonters.

ROTRVermontThursJPEG Continue reading Bringing an Eco-Friendly Message to the Green Mountain State →

Earth & Environment

Into the Wilds

Leave a comment

A Bactrian camel, a rhinoceros and an onager walk into a bar… well, not really, but close.

bactrian camel
bactrian camel

Last week I attended the National Association of Science Writers meeting in Columbus, Ohio.  Ohio State hosted this meeting which is a mix of workshops on practice and sessions on cutting-edge science.  On the last day there was a field trip.  We drove 90 minutes east from Columbus and turned into a road that would have looked more comfortable in Colorado.  After a bit of meandering, we arrived at the entrance to The Wilds, a non-profit conservation park located on the site of a former coal strip mine.

First, we met Eastern Hellbenders and found out why they are called “snot otters.”  When they get scared, they excrete slime through their skin.  The Wilds has a program of raising and returning to the rivers and streams in the wild these reclusive amphibians.  Continue reading Into the Wilds →

Science & Technology, Society & Culture

Penn State’s Hidden Treasures: David Bohm’s Path of Infinite Potential

1 Comment

David_Bohm_Sigma_Pi_Sigma_card

When David Joseph Bohm arrived at Penn State in 1936, he was taking his first academic baby step on a journey that would place him in the pantheon of the greatest theoretical physicists of the 20th century.

Bohm, a son of a Wilkes-Barre furniture store owner who also served as the town’s part-time rabbi’s assistant, would later work with some of the leading minds in physics. He studied under Robert Oppenheimer at the University of California, Berkeley. Later, he was a protege of Albert Einstein, working closely with him at Princeton University. The partnership between the two was so close that some scientists speculated that Einstein considered the Penn State grad to be his successor.  Continue reading Penn State’s Hidden Treasures: David Bohm’s Path of Infinite Potential →

Society & Culture

Hitting the Oregon Trail

Leave a comment

As association conferences go, the University Research Magazine Association’s annual meeting is at the “exceptionally good” end of the spectrum.

I think the winning formula may be an international mix of longtime colleagues who share advice and resources throughout the year; an influx of new members who keep us on our toes with fresh ideas; and a rotating conference location, allowing us to take turns hosting and our showing off our parent institutions and publications.

For instance, Penn State took its turn in 2008. (Acclaimed PSU geologist and climate change researcher Richard Alley gave a memorable presentation.)  We’ve been hosted in Maryland by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, we’ve met up in Evanston and Chicago (check out the blog post!) when our meeting was sponsored by Fermilab and Northwestern University, and in Binghamton, New York last year, just to name a few.

461077_10151420119427215_2129811487_o
Some URMA members (including this author, third from right) pose in front of the Corning Museum of Glass which we toured as part of our 2013 conference.

Continue reading Hitting the Oregon Trail →