The Blog
A rubella-based murder mystery
In 1943, Hollywood star Gene Tierney, radiant at 23 and expecting her first child, volunteered at the Hollywood Canteen to lift the spirits of servicemen. Days later she contracted German measles — rubella — a seemingly mild illness that proved devastating. Her daughter, Daria,...
Read MoreThe Naming of Exoplanets
Last September when I was in Oslo, I sat next to Thierry Montmerle at the banquet hosted by the Norwegian Science Academy. He was the general secretary of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) which had just announced the NameExoWorlds contest to crowd-source names for 20...
Read MoreCurtailed Careers of Women in China
Women enter the workforce the same time as men but they typically take some time off during their child-bearing years. Instead of being allowed to stay on longer to compensate, they have to step down sooner in China. Women scientists retire at 55, while men...
Read More
Tengo poco Sanskrit
I was born into a Tam-Brahm family, which is short for Tamil Brahmin -- through no fault of mine I hasten to add! An ancestor of mine was in fact a Hindu priest in Tamil Nadu. You can expect people from such families to...
Read More
The Making of Life In the Death Zone
Starting in the early 1970s, two German boys—one from the East, one from the West—with binoculars around their necks spent their teenage years pacing either side of the insurmountable Iron Curtain, the “death zone,” looking for birds. Today, the former pen pals are striving to...
Read More
The Universal Correspondent
Those were the days when I was struggling to establish myself as a journalist. They used to call me Universal Correspondent since I had no authority to represent any particular publication. Still, I was busy from morning till night, moving about on my bicycle or...
Read More