I realized that not everyone who reads this blog may be cognizant of the funniest, nerdiest webcomic on the planet. So today I am correcting that problem. xkcd (www.xkcd.com) finds the humor in math, science, and geek pop culture. Research can be an incredibly serious academic pursuit, and it’s important to be able to step back and be entertained by it every once in a while. xkcd a good reminder that science is both fun and practical. And not only is the webcomic generally hilarious, but the associated blog is great too. For example, an entry from last week discusses a very funny real-life use for complex math. Please … explore and enjoy!

Just like the fearless founder of this blog I am a huge Mets fan. I love baseball, and recently I’ve been absolutely awed at the advances being made in quantitating every aspect of the game. High-tech cameras in ball parks have enabled detailed measurements of every pitch. Not only can you measure pitch speed, but also location and flight path. You can follow horizontal and vertical movement of the ball from the pitcher’s hand to the catcher’s glove. The technology that does this is called PitchFX, and if you watch baseball on TV you may be familiar with some of the graphics that use it. But I am not the only person who finds it most useful for analyzing pitcher’s performances.

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The best part of being a scientist is when I read articles like this and feel proud to be part of the same community. According to a WIRED magazine article, “scientists report that they’ve created a contact lens that can deliver a high concentration of antibiotic at a constant rate for more than 30 days.”

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Hi everyone … I am very excited to be making my first post to the Science Life blog. I’m Eric, a newly minted (and as yet unemployed, so you may be seeing a lot of me) Immunology PhD. I read a lot of news, and I find myself both fascinated by interesting viewpoints and dismayed by idiocy and ignorance in approximately equal proportion. I hope to rave and rant (respectively) about these types of news in the future, but today I discovered an article ABOUT ignorance.

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