blue sky research - Fresh Lime Soda

Quasiparticles do the twist

Jul 19, 2025 5 min read

Physics often involves hidden surprises in how matter behaves at the smallest scales. A fundamental property in physics is angular momentum, which describes how things spin or rotate, from planets all…

On the 2024 Nobel Prizes and the Rosalind Lee issue

Oct 10, 2024 6 min read

Analysis Science blue sky research Gary Ruvkun Matilda effect Matthew effect microRNA Newcomb Cleveland Prize Nobel Prize Nobel Prizes physics Rosalind Lee science communication Victor Ambros

The Nobel Prizes are a deeply flawed institution both out of touch with science as it is done today and with an outsized influence on scientific practice at the most demanding levels. Yet these relati…

Review: 'Oppenheimer' (2023)

Jul 28, 2023 7 min read

Culture Science atomic bombings blue sky research Edward Teller George Kistiyakowsky J. Robert Oppenheimer Kenneth Bainbridge Leslie Groves Lewis Strauss Los Alamos Manhattan Project nuclear weapons Oppenheimer Robert Serber Trinity test Vannevar Bush

Oppenheimer was great. I really liked it. I don't have a review as much as some notes that I took during the film that I'd like to share. But before diving into them, I should say that I got a…

Reimagining science, redux

Mar 19, 2021 6 min read

Science billion candles blue sky research Hoshangabad Science Teaching Programme Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research Mukund Thattai nation building Nobel Prize science and society Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar

This article on Founding Fuel has some great suggestions I thought, but it merits sharing with a couple caveats. First, in narratives about making science "easier to do", commentators give…