Picks

ChemEd X contributors and staff members are continually coming across items of interest that they feel others may wish to know about. Picks include, but need not be limited to, books, magazines, journals, articles, apps—most anything that has a link to it can qualify.

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pick
The God Delusion
// Friday, December 1, 2006 • Hal Harris
Unless you teach in a religiously-sponsored school, religion probably plays little role in your teaching of science. However, the "prior knowledge" of your students includes some decidedly non-scientific, religion-inspired viewpoints that ought to be taken into account.
The Rock from Mars: A Detective Story on Two Planets
// Thursday, November 2, 2006 • Hal Harris
If you've been reading Hal's Picks for a long time, you might remember something about this rock, ALH84001, because the publication in Science of the paper that announced evidence in a meteorite that life had once existed on Mars was my Pick back in August of 1996. The article was controversial, as you might expect.
The Darkening Sea (Annals of Science)
// Wednesday, November 1, 2006 • Hal Harris
You may remember Elizabeth Kolbert as author of the extensive New Yorker series on climate change that was Hal's Pick in May of 2005. She also wrote about the ways in which ice core samples disclose the history of the atmosphere; that article was Hal's Pick in January of 2002.
The Periodic Table: Its Story and Its Significance
// Sunday, October 1, 2006 • Hal Harris
A copy of the Periodic Table of the Chemical Elements hangs in virtually every classroom in which chemistry is taught, and it represents one of the great accomplishments of science. I can think of no other such concise and profound consolidation of scientific knowledge.
Fuels Gold
// Friday, September 1, 2006 • Hal Harris
The search for replacements for oil and natural gas is heating up, as the price of oil rises. No alternative is getting more attention than biofuels - which in the US means ethanol from corn or biodiesel from soybeans.
American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer
// Saturday, July 1, 2006 • Hal Harris
I am old enough to remember the 1954 hearings in the matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer, but I was too young to understand that there was more to this story about a supposed Communist in the nuclear weapons program than was being reported in the Los Angeles newspapers of the time.
The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster
// Thursday, June 1, 2006 • Hal Harris
What are the consequences of allowing irrational ideas into the science classroom? If you are willing to rely on faith instead of reason to come to conclusions about nature and our origins, then there is no reason to stop with Intelligent (sic) Design.
Department of Food Science - The Search for Sweet: The tricky technology of sugar substitutes
// Tuesday, May 2, 2006 • Hal Harris
In 2005, the average American consumed about 140 pounds of sugar, which is about 50% more than the average German or Frenchman and nine times as much as the Chinese (see Hal's Pick for December, 2005). We also consumed about twenty four pounds of sugar substitutes per person, which translates to even more sweetness than the natural substance.