How to make cement with bacteria
A North Carolina startup uses bacteria to grow "biocement" bricks to avoid the hefty fossil fuel consumption needed for normal cement.
Archive
A collection of 14227 issues
When Edward Gorey bought and lost a mummy's head
A recording of Edward Gorey recalling when he bought (and lost) a mummy's head. Drawn and animated posthumously by Gorey himself. (Presumably with some assistance from the still-living Benjamin and Jim Wickey, who created the segment for an upcoming Gorey documentary.)
March 20, 2017
Caste-consciousness divides a burgeoning Delhi music scene. / Bandcamp “[That era] is over.” John Waters declares Midnight Movies, like his Pink Flamingos, dead. / Vanity Fair Burying their cattle, ranchers call wildfires in Kansas, Oklahoma, and the Texas panhandle their Hurricane Katrina. / New York Times TMN’s Rosecrans Baldwin is sent
March 18, 2017
“The prime minister will be woken, if she is not already awake, and civil servants will say ‘London Bridge is down’ on secure lines.” A fascinating and tender look at how the British government and public institutions war-game scenarios for the death of Queen Elizabeth II. / The Guardian
How to carve a mouthpiece for a trumpet
How a Bach Stradivarius trumpet is made is interesting to watch. But how the mouthpiece gets carved by machine, seen above, is riveting.
March 17, 2017
On Irene Kuo, the New York chef and writer who introduced America to cooking Chinese food yet died nearly unknown. / Food52 And people say the Rooster is rough: Norman Podhoretz, king of New York intelligentsia, continues to pick fights. / New York Times “There are more sets of bananas than there
Malcolm Turnbull is killing the Great Barrier Reef
The destruction of Australia's Great Barrier Reef, whose health is a canary for the wellbeing of oceans at large, is some 30 years ahead of schedule, according to a new study. Meanwhile, the country's conservative prime minister has used Australia's green-friendly international image
March 16, 2017
Sessions revives “just say no” as part of his anti-drug policy, despite its lack of success the first time around. / The Washington Post GOP claims it’s not targeting Planned Parenthood, but PP is the only provider that would be defunded by Trumpcare. / Rewire Sen. James Inhofe, famous for
Nick Kyrgios is the non-fan's favorite tennis player
You don't need to be a fan of tennis (in fact, probably better not) to enjoy the play of Australia's Nick Kyrgios, as seen above at America's other, better Grand Slam Indian Wells this week. Known for being rude, hot-headed, prone to not
Climate science denier populates the EPA with his former aides.
Sen. James Inhofe, famous for asserting that the existence of snow refutes climate science, is now populating the EPA with his former aides. Or, in the words of an oil executive, “The Inhofe brigade has landed, secured the beach and is moving inland with precision as well as speed.”