Author Archives: Stephen

A molecule of life and death

Posted on August 6, 2010 by Stephen

Walter Clement Noel was famous in the wrong circles for the wrong reasons. He died in Grenada in 1916 aged just 32. Over fifty years later, in the first decade of my life, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was far and … Continue reading →

Posted in History of Science, Protein Crystallography | 18 Comments

Attention: remarkable

Posted on July 26, 2010 by Stephen

I came across this today and found it quite remarkable. I’m not going to say anything more right now but, if you have a minute, test yourself with this short video. No questions just yet – just take a look. … Continue reading →

Posted in Science | 28 Comments

Reach for the Styles

Posted on July 21, 2010 by Stephen

I read an article by Matthew Reisz in Times Higher Education last week about the strained writing style of academic publications and it really got my goat. Don’t get me wrong — it’s a good piece and makes some valid … Continue reading →

Posted in Communication | 42 Comments

Warm words but cold, hard choices ahead

Posted on July 10, 2010 by Stephen

Yesterday morning I was at the Royal Institution to hear David Willetts, the UK Minister for Science, outline the new government’s policy on science. His speech comes at a time when the government is issuing all sorts of warnings about the parlous … Continue reading →

Posted in Science & Politics | Tagged | 4 Comments

Nerds and Words (about science)

Posted on July 6, 2010 by Stephen

Nerds Many of you will already have seen this because I have been promoting it shamelessly on twitter. But this is the video of the talk I mentioned in a post back in March that my daughter Eleanor gave on … Continue reading →

Posted in Fun, Science | 30 Comments

Urgent new priority for UK science

Posted on June 28, 2010 by Stephen

In a dramatic move today, the Government responded to an unprovoked attack on scientists from Guardian writer Simon Jenkins by announcing radical new priorities for UK science. Revealing the policy shift, science minister David Willetts said*, “We have to re-purpose … Continue reading →

Posted in Fun | 14 Comments

Science and the importance of cheese

Posted on June 21, 2010 by Stephen

Week two of “I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here!” is now upon me. This week the evictions start, so the competition is hotting up. I had meant to get around to writing a blog-post about week one, but … Continue reading →

Posted in Communication, Scientific Life | 43 Comments

Before the Deluge

Posted on June 13, 2010 by Stephen

It starts tomorrow. The floodgates will open and will not close again for two whole weeks. I mean of course that “I’m a scientist, get me out of here!” starts tomorrow morning. I have signed up to submit myself for … Continue reading →

Posted in Communication | 18 Comments

Inflation

Posted on June 9, 2010 by Stephen

This is, to my mind, a quite astonishing report about Nature Publishing Group (NPG) hiking its proposed 2011 journal subscription charges to the University of California (UC) by 400%. (NPG is the company that runs the Nature Network blogging platform). … Continue reading →

Posted in Open Access, Scientific Life | 71 Comments

Something for the weekend

Posted on June 5, 2010 by Stephen

Wunderkind of audiovisual media that I am, I confess to being rather late in getting around to this one. Even I hesitated at the narcissistic self-absorption of it. But as a blogger, I must learn to overcome such hesitations. Here, … Continue reading →

Posted in Communication, Science | 11 Comments

A MAD day

Posted on June 2, 2010 by Stephen

This is a quick one. The internet’s not working terribly reliably at home so, in case you missed it on Twitter, Facebook or Friendfeed, here is a short film about what myself and some of my group got up to … Continue reading →

Posted in Protein Crystallography, Scientific Life | 18 Comments