I get irritated when I go shopping. More and more scientific jargon appears to be making its way onto the labels of products, and in many cases it is misused and doesn’t make sense. I’m a scientist, I use jargon all the time and I don’t have any problem with...

With the National Broadband Network (NBN) beginning to be rolled out across Australia, at an estimated cost of $35.9 billion, the general public is quite rightly wondering what they will get for their buck. Well, having just attended the Digital Outreach conference this week I can say from the education...

I am not ashamed to admit this, but for the last 12 years of my life, I have wanted nothing more than to be able to toss some Floo powder in a fireplace and walk through that beautiful green flame to the land of Harry Potter. With the last installment...

This is a significant weekend for science. At 1.25am AEST Saturday, Space Shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to be launched into space for the 33rd and last time. As I was reading up on facts for a post about the final launch of Atlantis, I found out that it is also...

As most readers are aware, working with gifted children offers its own challenges when it comes to science. Our approach to any child, gifted or not, is to work with what they can do rather than concentrate on their particular age. Having supplementary material on hand is the best insurance...

Earlier this week, we had a close shave. An asteroid passed by the Earth at just 12,000 km. The distance between the Earth and the Moon is roughly 400,000 km. That is really, really close. The asteroid was between 5 and 20 km in diameter and probably would have burned...

There is a large population of Terrapin Turtles living in the marshes near JFK Airport, and every year they migrate to nearby sandy areas in Jamaica Bay to lay their eggs – and there just happens to be a runway in the way. A runway at a very, very busy...

Chile’s Puyehue Volcano began to erupt on June 4 of this year, and despite being 10,000 km away from the eastern states, wreaked havoc on Australian and New Zealand air travel. How did the cloud of ash manage to travel so far? The answer is trade winds.

As part of our Renewable Energy workshop today, I was asked why we can’t use the steam produced by the evaporation of liquid nitrogen to power a turbine and generate electricity. The short answer is economics –the amount of energy that would be produced by using liquid nitrogen to power...

A bet is a bet! We were playing around with Facebook and Karin suggested that if we got 50 “likes” by the end of the business day the Sydney staff could slime me. Of course I couldn’t resist the challenge :)

Again we're heading out west for the 'Science in the Bush' series for the Australian Museum. As we headed out we couldn't help but stop and see the sites on the way...

Beginning in 2007, NSW rolled out millions of dollars of video conferencing hardware to NSW public schools through the Interactive Classroom Project. So how can rural and remote schools gain access? Read on...

Always wanted to participate in the Search for Extra-terrestrial Intelligence (SETI)? How about donating some of your computing power at your school, office or home to the SETI project! Find out more on how your humble computer could help contribute...

What is your local school doing for this year's theme? Here are some easy ideas that can be run in class!