Matt Shipman

Dec 8, 2010

Milk, Bread, Researchers: Stocking Up On Disaster Experts

September 11. The Gulf oil spill. Earthquakes in Haiti and Chile. The 2004 tsunami. Given the stakes involved, you would think that research into hazards and disasters (H&D) would be teeming with hordes of young scholars, trying to improve our understanding of how people prepare for (and respond to) catastrophic events. And you’d be wrong.… 

Dec 6, 2010

Dispatches From The North Pole: The Science of Santa’s Sleigh

Editor’s Note: This is the second in a series of occasional dispatches from Dr. Larry Silverberg, a researcher at NC State who is leading a visiting scholars program at Santa’s Workshop-North Pole Labs (NPL). Dr. Silverberg is an expert in unified field theory and is accompanied by four other mechanical and aerospace engineers: Drs. Mohammad Zikry… 

Dec 3, 2010

NASA’s Arsenic Thingy: What It Is, Why It Matters

In case you missed it, NASA announced Dec. 2 that researchers have discovered the first organism that can survive and reproduce using arsenic – an extremely toxic element. First things first: it is NOT extraterrestrial and they did NOT find it. They sort of created it. That said, it’s still incredibly cool. In short, a… 

Dec 1, 2010

Why You Would Put A Radar In Your Shoe

When I was a kid, I thought it was pretty cool that Maxwell Smart had a phone in his shoe. That’s old hat these days, but researchers have now developed more advanced podiatric technology: the shoe radar. And, yes, there’s a practical reason for it. Why would you put a radar in your shoe? To… 

Dec 1, 2010

GPS Not Working? A Shoe Radar May Help You Find Your Way

The prevalence of global positioning system (GPS) devices in everything from cars to cell phones has almost made getting lost a thing of the past. But what do you do when your GPS isn’t working? Researchers from North Carolina State University and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) have developed a shoe-embedded radar system that may help… 

Nov 30, 2010

Dispatches From The North Pole: The Science of Santa’s List

Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series of occasional dispatches from Dr. Larry Silverberg, a researcher at NC State who is leading a visiting scholars program at Santa’s Workshop-North Pole Labs (NPL). Dr. Silverberg is an expert in unified field theory and is accompanied by four other mechanical and aerospace engineers: Drs. Mohammad Zikry… 

Nov 29, 2010

Food Fables: Learning Food Safety From Unhappy Endings

Stories have long been used to teach people about the consequences of their actions – just ask Aesop. A new study finds that storytelling is also a critical component when it comes to teaching kitchen workers the importance of food-safety practices – and hopefully saving lives. But the researchers behind this study are telling stories… 

Nov 29, 2010

NC State and IBM Researchers Discover New Way to Patch Holes in The ‘Cloud’

Researchers from North Carolina State University and IBM have invented a way to update computer systems packaged in virtual machines in a computer “cloud” – even when those programs are offline. 

Nov 19, 2010

Hey, Dit Dots! A Coastal N.C. Vocabulary Quiz

It has been said that England and the U.S. are two nations divided by a common language. But you don’t have to travel overseas to find English words and phrases that are virtually impossible to decipher to outsiders. The coastal region of North Carolina is home to a host of terms that make little sense… 

Nov 17, 2010

Thanksgiving Science: Tryptophacts and Tryptophantasies

I was looking for an excuse to write about Thanksgiving science when a friend posed this question: “Can tryptophan be extracted from a turkey and then be injected directly into a human vein via syringe?” Answer: no. But that raised some other interesting questions, like, what is tryptophan? And if tryptophan doesn’t make us sleepy… 

Nov 15, 2010

How A New Probe May Save Your Life (Or, At Least, Your Bridge)

If the 1970s version of Battlestar Galactica had included water cannons, they would probably have looked like the ISEP (In situ Scour Evaluation Probe). But, unlike Battlestar Galactica props, the ISEP can save lives, and money, by helping to maintain the safety of key infrastructure such as bridges and dams. At issue is something called… 

Nov 15, 2010

New Sensor Allows On-Site, Faster Testing For Scour Assessment

Researchers from North Carolina State University have developed a sensor that allows engineers to assess the scour potential of soils at various depths and on-site for the first time – a technology that will help evaluate the safety of civil infrastructure before and after storm events. Scour, or erosion of soil around structures due to… 

Nov 10, 2010

Sci/Med Writers: Are We Part Of The Problem?

Research is an incremental process, and there are precious few “Eureka!” moments when an idea springs forth fully formed, unfettered by qualifiers and questions that muddy the waters. As a result, those of us who write about science and medicine often take pains to ensure that we do not overstate research results. We use our… 

Nov 10, 2010

Researchers Find Cancer News May Contribute To Confusion About Cancer

New research from North Carolina State University shows that most online news stories about cancer contain language that likely contributes to public uncertainty about the disease – a significant finding, given that at least one-third of Americans seek health information online. 

Nov 9, 2010

Discussing Sci/Tech Risks Hurts Consensus Efforts

Thomas Jefferson once wrote to John Adams that, “Truth between candid minds can never do harm.” But times have changed, and new research shows that discussion of the risks and benefits associated with emerging science and technology actually hurts efforts to build consensus on those issues. A paper published this month by Risk Analysis finds…