When my parents were first dating, they spent a lot of time going on bird-watching dates. They would trek through the woods on hikes armed with a copy of a National Audubon Society’s field guide, trying to name the birds they saw. Today, that same book rests in one of our kitchen drawers, right by the window that looks out onto our various [...]
Our brains govern our every muscle movement, from reaching out for a cup of coffee to competing in the Olympics. But when something goes wrong with the way the brain transmits messages to our muscles—most often, this is due to a stroke or an injury to the spinal cord—we lose muscle function, a condition called paralysis. Back in 2004, a study found a [...]
I love collecting old books. My favorite piece of my collection by far is a grammar book from the 1800s. It’s nearly falling apart and held together by unraveling twine. On the inside, you’ll find doodles from its original owner, Agnes. She wrote her name in large, antique cursive and even played tic-tac-toe in the margins. When I flip through the pages, I [...]
In high school, I took two different chemistry classes. Although I found the subject interesting and looked forward to every lab, the most advanced thing I ever did with chemicals was conduct experiments with hydrochloric acid. As one might expect, professional chemists attempt and accomplish a lot more than that. As a matter of fact, chemists around the world haven’t just been working [...]
Reading can be a challenging task for people with print disabilities, but an online library is trying to change the situation. With over 450,000 titles, Bookshare is the world’s largest accessible online library. For people who have difficulty with traditional print materials due to any visual impairments, physical disabilities or learning disabilities, the library provides various functions that make reading accessible to all. [...]
I’ll admit it: I’m no math lover. It never made much sense to me. I couldn’t wrap my head around the numbers and shapes in a textbook. I know I’m not alone in this, and there are plenty of people in the classroom who still ask the math-skeptic’s mantra: When will we use this in the real world? One museum in New York [...]
One of the more exciting prospects about moving to Boston was the chance to live in a seaside city. Boston has been a port city since the colonial period, when it was a hub of shipyards and bustling maritime trade. Although Boston has an extensive seaside past, San Francisco has perhaps an even greater presence of marine history. As a matter of fact, [...]
An old toy has made a major comeback—in virtual reality. Last year, the toy manufacturer Mattel teamed up with Google Cardboard, Discovery, National Geographic, Vuforia and Littlestar to bring View-Master, a 1939 stereoscope toy that shows 3D images from slide reels, right into the twenty-first century. The makeover expanded what the original version made possible, which was to peer into a whole new [...]
When I was applying to colleges, I remember looking through lists of scholarships, and eventually deciding that most just weren’t a great fit for me. It was simpler to take out loans than to spend so much time searching for the scholarships that were right for me. This isn’t a unique problem. Scholarships that are a good fit are often hard to find. [...]
The hardest I ever remember laughing happened pretty recently. A friend of mine and I were walking down Boylston Street this past spring, observing people on Segways and seguing into a discussion about the strangeness of spelling and pronunciation in the English language. Somehow, the word bologna ended up being pronounced “buh-LAWG-nuh” with a bizarre pseudo-accent. I’m not sure why I found what my friend said [...]