Life Sciences

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Review: In Search of Memory

Memory, like consciousness, eludes analysis. Nobel Prize–winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel, the subject of this subtly layered documentary by Petra Seeger, took the approach of reductionism to figure it out.
Mind-altering. Seriously.
By PETER KEOUGH | April 23, 2010

Review: The Sun

No sun is in sight in the beginning of Aleksandr Sokurov’s look at the last days of divinity for Emperor Hirohito.
The shades close for Emperor Hirohito
By PETER KEOUGH | March 26, 2010

Ken Miller just can’t win

What’s an honorable man to do?
Brown biology professor attacked by Darwin-hating fundies and leftie atheists alike
By DAVID SCHARFENBERG | March 05, 2010

The Bicycle Feat

In the corner of the lab of Shire Human Genetic Therapies in Cambridge, you'll find a guy with DEVELOPMENT SPECIALIST written across his lab coat, unassumingly purifying proteins.
Jungle Fever
By MARIANNA FAYNSHTEYN | February 19, 2010

Séance

Rachel Berwick's art is concerned with conjuring ghosts — in particular the spirits of creatures or peoples near extinction or already died out.
Rachel Berwick conjures ghost birds in Zugunruhe
By GREG COOK | December 11, 2009

Hot for teacher

MECA faculty re-imagine the natural world and play with nostalgia
MECA faculty re-imagine the natural world and play with nostalgia
By ANNIE LARMON | December 04, 2009

Elite Restaurant

Some meals can bring you back vividly to your childhood, perhaps because your sense of smell and long-term memory are centered in adjacent areas of the brain.
Eggs, coffee, and salty conversation
By MC SLIM JB | November 13, 2009

Holy landscape!

Ken Burns worships America's spiritual resource
Ken Burns worships America's spiritual resource
By CLIF GARBODEN | September 25, 2009

Have a nice future

Blake Butler rains gravel and glass
Blake Butler rains gravel and glass
By NINA MACLAUGHLIN | September 11, 2009

Weathering the weather

Sweltering summer heat is finally upon us, along with how-to-keep-cool considerations.
Going Green
By DEIRDRE FULTON | August 07, 2009

The insult zoologist

Don Rickles, insult comic
Big Fat Whale
By BRIAN MCFADDEN | May 29, 2009

Review: Goodbye Solo

So far in his brief career, North Carolina native Ramin Bahrani has tapped into the greatest naturalist filmmakers and come back the richer.
Optimistic cabbie meet cranky codger
By PETER KEOUGH | April 17, 2009

Brain strain

Those of us aching for a 300-page treatise about the crippling implications of the "build your own scramble" at Local 188 won't, at first glance, find a great deal of solace in Jonah Lehrer's second book, How We Decide.
Jonah Lehrer on neurological warfare and picking a cereal
By CHRISTOPHER GRAY | April 10, 2009

9. Levi Johnston

It's true that this barbaric puck slapping dingbat, who jammed his unsheathed stick in Bristol Palin's crease, made the last presidential race that much sexier. But now that his semen has manifested into an actual child who will further desecrate the ear
It's true that this barbaric puck slapping dingbat, who jammed his unsheathed stick in Bristol Palin's crease, made the last presidential race that much sexier. But now that his semen has manifested into an actual child who will further desecrate the earth with Sarah's genes, we're closing down the fan club. Bonus unsexy points for kicking her to the curb – even though as loyal Republican-haters, we thank him for illustrating all of our best arguments against social conservatism.
By Boston Phoenix Staff | March 26, 2009

Exploring deep within

Hannah Holmes, the Maine-born, Portland-dwelling science writer, naturalist, and friend to all animals has turned her lens deeply inward in her latest book, The Well-Dressed Ape: A Natural History of Myself .
Animal instinct
By JEFF INGLIS | January 07, 2009

Where the wild things are

Venture out into the waters and woodlands of New England, and there's a chance you'll bump into "Champ," America's own Loch Ness Monster, who allegedly plies the muddy ripples of Lake Champlain.
As our planet edges closer to the apocalypse, the escapist, fantasy world of cryptids is suddenly coming to life
By MIKE MILIARD | January 07, 2009

Thanaphobe

Novelist Julian Barnes is a brilliant writer, but he’s not self-revelatory.
Julian Barnes considers the abyss
By AMY FINCH | December 22, 2008

Could algae be the answer for Rhode Island’s heating needs?

Scot Comey believes old mills in places like Pawtucket can be turned into incubators for strains of algae that can be grown without sunlight and turned into home heating oil.
Weird Science
By CARROLL ANDREW MORSE | September 10, 2008

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2

Like Sex and the City: The Movie, Sanaa Hamri’s continuation of the journey of a pair of jeans that magically fit four girls of disparate genes feels tailored for the small screen.
Disjointed, sketchy, and saccharine
By BRETT MICHEL | August 05, 2008

Rage against the machines!

We’re on the cusp of a perilous era. Our pitiful carbon bodies are evolving much slower than the silicon and steel gizmos we’re inventing. And the guys in the lab coats and pocket protectors are starting to worry we’ve opened Pandora’s hard drive.
Could robots take over the world? In many ways, they already have.
By MIKE MILIARD | May 21, 2008

Good to great

Harrity attributes the reverb’s warmth to the location of the recording, but there is also a collective consciousness here.
Dead End Armory offer treasures by the ounce
By SAM PFEIFLE | May 07, 2008

Springtime for Darwin

There are two stories, and two stories only.
The wars of evolution are louder than ever. What Ben Stein, Bad Religion, and a physics professor from Quincy can tell you about where you came from.
By JAMES PARKER | May 07, 2008

Biolab follies

In the beginning — way back in the fall of 2003, when the “War on Terror” was still young — the notion that anything could derail the Boston University biolab seemed absurd.
How did BU's research facility go from slam dunk to almost sunk?
By ADAM REILLY | April 07, 2008

The problem with the Pope’s new list of deadly sins

The pope recently declared obscene riches, pedophilia, and causing social injustice as three of the newest deadly sins.
Morality
By MARY ANN SORRENTINO | April 02, 2008

Less is best

González possesses the will power and the patience to dig into each of his songs until he has exhumed its bleeding heart.
The spare science of José González
By SHARON STEEL | March 04, 2008

Learning not to kill

This article originally appeared in the February 27, 1998 issue of the Boston Phoenix.

New techniques mean that medical students can learn without killing animals. So why won't BU get with the program?

By SARAH MCNAUGHT | February 28, 2008

Senses come alive

Are Jay-Z’s synapses wired to express supreme confidence?
Did art prove science before science did?
By CHRISTOPHER GRAY | February 13, 2008

You light up my litter tray

Lines upon learning that South Korean scientists, by manipulating a fluorescent protein gene, have produced cloned cats that glow in the dark.
Could be verse: poetry ripped from the headlines
By JAMES PARKER | December 19, 2007

They shall not pass gas

Lines upon learning that scientists have recently isolated methane-mitigating microbes in the intestinal lining of the kangaroo, and plan to replicate them in cattle to reduce the emission of “cow-created” greenhouse gas
Could be verse: poetry ripped from the headlines
By JAMES PARKER | December 12, 2007

Last man standing

In his 1954 novel I Am Legend , Richard Matheson conjured up a terrifying scenario: a man-made plague has killed most of humanity.
Once a cautionary tale about human folly, has the doomsday myth become just more fun and games?
By PETER KEOUGH | December 12, 2007

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