NCSWHAT

NCSWA Newsletter, October 2005

Editor: Jane Stevens, jsteven@mmjourno.com

These are reputedly real answers to questions on science tests:

• The pistol of a flower is its only protection against insects.
• Equator: a menagerie lion running around Earth through Africa.
• Rhubarb: a kind of celery gone bloodshot.
• The skeleton is what is left after the insides have been taken out and the outsides have been taken off. The purpose of the skeleton is so that there is something to hitch the meat to.
• The body consists of three parts - the brainium, the borax and the abominable cavity. The brainium contains the brain. The borax contains the heart and lungs, and the abominable cavity contains the bowels, of which there are five - A, E, I, O, and U.

-- Science One-Liners

RICHARD RHODES AT SELL-OUT DINNER MEETING

At the full-to-capacity September NCSWA’s dinner meeting, Pulitzer Prize winner Richard Rhodes described how he started out as a writer by interviewing card-shop owners for in-house articles at Hallmark then moved into feature writing for Playboy Magazine. Writers tend to “move sideways” into what becomes central to their careers, he said. His book, The Making of the Atomic Bomb began with a failed attempt at a novel and ended with several prestigious prizes, plus an acclaimed successor, Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb. Besides paring down a 1,500-page manuscript into an accessible book, Rhodes said a big problem was finding money to support himself during the years he needed to research atomic energy and the Manhattan Project. He urged would-be book writers to do as he did and find a way to the grant world, a world that helped him write many of his 20 books, including four novels. Rhodes also explained how his experiences drew him to science writing. Science can be bleak, he said, but because it must be supported by evidence, it shows we are “part of a universe that will survive us.”

Rhodes, who lives with his wife in Half Moon Bay, gave a disarmingly honest talk about his work and his life. A major theme running through his books is human violence, a topic he was drawn to in part because of abuse he suffered as a child. Writing about the roots of violence, which was sometimes emotionally difficult, has led him to be hopeful about the ability of communities to understand and control it.

In addition to writing books and feature articles, Rhodes has been a visiting scholar at MIT and Harvard and worked as a host and correspondent for public television’s Frontline and American Experience. He has received grants from the Ford Foundation, the Guggenheim Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

NEWS ABOUT MEMBERS

NCSWA has a new board member: Monya Baker is a science writer based in San Francisco. Her articles have appeared in The Economist, Nature Biotechnology, New Scientist, The Scientist, MIT's Technology Review, Wired, and elsewhere. She was a staff writer for the Acumen Journal of Life Sciences throughout its print run. Before becoming a writer, Monya taught high school biology, chemistry, and mathematics. She switched careers when she realized that she enjoyed writing lesson plans more than teaching them. Monya has a B.A. in biology from Carleton College and an Ed.M. from Harvard University. She is a former AAAS Mass Media Fellow.

Joe Devney was elected to a third term as president of the Berkeley chapter of the Society for Technical Communication.

Chuck Hurley, a NCSWA member in the 1990s, died May 2 at the age of 82. A former reporter who later served as press aide for Democratic politicians including Alan Cranston, Phillip Burton and George Miller, Hurley’s last job was as a press officer for the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. For more information about Hurley’s life, see the obituary in the San Francisco Chronicle.

David Schwartz announces his latest science/math picture book for kids, If Dogs Were Dinosaurs (ages 6-10), which debuted Oct. 1. It received a starred review in Kirkus. The reviewer wrote:
 “For his newest exercise in math without tears—unless you count tears of laughter—Schwartz invites readers to imagine how much food a dog the size of a T. rex would eat, how big the Earth would be if the Moon were a marble, how long a tongue would be if taste buds were as big as rose buds and similar ramifications for germs the size of gerbils, hair as thick as spaghetti, kayaks the size of cruise ships, a submarine sandwich as big as a submarine and more. . . And, to prove that it's not all just free-range imagining, Schwartz closes with actual numbers, step-by-step calculations, notes on iffy assumptions (for instance, a 14,000 pound dog would eat a lot, but not 350 times as much as a 40 pound one) and related problems to solve. Math didn't used to be this much fun—it's almost unfair.”

For more information, to order, or to find out about his presentations at elementary schools, see his website, or email him at david@davidschwartz.com.

Jane Stevens’ latest Web project is “Managing California’s Resources”, a series of multimedia stories about California farmers and rural landowners who are leading the way in sustainable land and water management. The site was put together by two people: graphic designer Val Griffith and Stevens.

NCSWA board member Suzanne Bohan released a health book in June,  published by Sourcebooks and called "50 Simple Ways to Live a Longer Life." The book, which she co-authored with Glenn  Thompson, her husband, has been profiled in numerous media outlets, including an interview on KGO's Pete Wilson Show and a news feature in the Marin Independent Journal.

NEW MEMBERS

Bruce Schaar is a research associate at Stanford University's Department of Biological Sciences. He wrote his doctoral dissertation on cell division at the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, and conducted post-doctoral research at Stanford on the migration of neuronal stem cells during brain development.

He writes: "I am joining NCSWA to learn more about how I can implement and improve the communication skills that I learned as a basic life science researcher in order to reach a broader, less specialized audience."

Kathryn Saussy is a student at San Francisco State University.

Rebecca E. Skinner is an independent scholar and former Stanford post-doc (in the School of Business) currently trying to publish various pieces of her Ph.D. dissertation into a book project, which consisted of a study in the foundation, expansion and commercialization in the 1980s of AI computing.

Wendy Wolfson moved to Oakland from Boston in June. She has worked as a science and technology writer for publications such as Chemistry and Biology, the Lancet, Informationweek, New Scientist and others. She is currently an editor at the Combustion Research Facility at Sandia National Laboratories in Livermore.

Jessica Porter, a Ph.D. candidate at UC Berkeley, is a third-year graduate student in the Berkeley Biophysics Graduate Group and is currently managing editor of the Berkeley Science Review.

Johanna Bogulavsky is a freelance medical writer who moved from New York City to San Francisco. In New York, she worked as associate medical director at a communications company.

Rabiya Tuma also moved from New York, where she was active in SWINY [Science Writers in New York]. She’s looking forward to meeting writers and editors out here.

Bruce Koepp has 30 years of experience in surgical and autopsy pathology, as well as teaching and writing. He is looking for an opportunity to present disease study to interested members of the general public.

Debra Jacob recently moved to San Francisco from Hilton Head, S.C., where she was director of public relations for Anderson Communications Group. During her career, she has written about engineering and technology advancements for Carnegie Mellon University's Engineering College, Bayer Corporation's Polymers Division, Society of Automotive Engineers, Inc., pair Networks, Maya Design and many other technology companies. She is a native of Pittsburgh, PA.

Shannon Seaberg is a student at San Francisco State University.

Susan Brown is now freelancing while she looks for a job. She reluctantly resides in southern California and would be happy to migrate north again for a permanent position and the opportunity to attend more fun NCSWA events.

Karen Marcus , who is expecting to receive her M.D. soon, lives in Pleasanton and lists Medicine/Health and Life Sciences among her areas of expertise.

Yolanda Harvey, a MODIS technical writer/editor at Science Systems and Applications, has five years experience in science and technical writing, and an MA in professional writing from Carnegie Mellon University. She’s interested in all areas of technology and science.

 Ina Roy-Faderman has a B.A. and M.D. in Human Biology from Stanford University, and her Ph.D. in Philosophy of Science from UC Berkeley. She's a former faculty member at the University of Pennsylvania, and is "slowly transitioning into science writing -- decided it was time to commit!"

Sanhita Dixit, a post-doctoral scholar at UC Davis, is interested in taking science to the public. While doing her Ph.D., she took part in the BASF science-writing contest and won a consolation prize. She hopes to build on her scientific background and is interested in writing about scientific research and results for the general public.

Suzanne Leigh is a freelance medical writer based in San Francisco.

Catherine Ann Jones is a biotechnology manufacturing specialist from San Francisco State University. She writes, "I've worked in biotechnology for five years. I'm now looking for a career shift into journalism and writing."

Camille Mojica Rey rejoined NCSWA. She’s a Santa Clara-based freelance writer specializing in medical/health/life sciences news.

Freelance writer/editor Dan Littman is rejoining NCSWA after a lapse of several years.