Category Archives: Uncategorized

Strange Ice

Posted on February 8, 2013 by

My long-delayed new talk “Strange Ice” is coming up next week. Though you will find it in every refrigerator in the world, ice is a materials so strange that it breaks almost every rule in our textbooks. Yet its very … Continue reading →

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Fleur de Geek

Posted on November 8, 2012 by

People are starting to notice the rather ludicrous shirts some of us are wearing. I blame Mark Mio and Jim Al-Khalili for this. What really amused me last summer was to go to a big family lunch in Italy and … Continue reading →

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More on gloves in the lab

Posted on September 11, 2012 by

A few days I wrote about my worries about students wearing disposable gloves in the lab. I started discussing it with colleagues in the department, including several who sit on our safety committee. One of the comments that came out … Continue reading →

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Why do we wear disposable gloves in Chemistry labs?

Posted on September 3, 2012 by

Do you wear disposable gloves in the lab? Our undergraduates wear them even when building spectroscopes out of cardboard boxes and sticky tape, let alone handling solutions. Our graduate students, working in the research labs use them all the time … Continue reading →

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More about Perkin’s Triangle

Posted on July 3, 2012 by

A long time ago I wrote a column about the Perkin Triangle.  The device, named after William Perkin Jr., the son of the man who invented mauveine, is used by chemists to collect multiple fractions from a distillation. When I … Continue reading →

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Short videos about Silver and Gold

Posted on June 22, 2012 by

In the run up to Wellcome Elements tonight we have a couple more videos about silver and gold. A little electrochemistry that helps you at home: And another one about how to dissolve gold using mercury and aqua regia. Only … Continue reading →

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A Short Video about Tin for Wellcome Elements 2012

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rh8yWyuoL2A

In preparation for the hi-jinks on June 22nd at the Wellcome Collection, here’s a short brain dump of why I think tin, element number 50, is one of the most remarkable elements around.

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Video | Posted on June 19, 2012 by | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Wellcome Elements – Gold Silver Copper and Tin

Posted on June 18, 2012 by

It’s 2012 and Hugh Aldersey-Williams and I have been co-curating another unique one night only event at the Wellcome Collection, Euston Road London on Friday 22 June 2012 from 7 – 11 pm. If the last two metals don’t immediately … Continue reading →

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‘Tis the season to spell Turing!

Posted on June 1, 2012 by

Last year, my seven year old son got interested in the idea of codes. He heard about Alan Turing and we went to the Turing Museum at Bletchley where he read the story of the capture of an Enigma machine … Continue reading →

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Hot Hot News – Capitalism is a Scam

Posted on April 3, 2012 by

The Financial Times and the Stock Exchange have long been the gold standard in economic data, underpinning the belief that capitalism and free enterprise are the optimum route to personal and national enrichment. Over the years a whole industry has … Continue reading →

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