Join us November 12 at the Pen and Pencil Club, the nation’s oldest press club, for an evening with Paul Halpern, a physicist at the University of the Sciences and author of Collider: The Search for the World’s Smallest Particles. 
He will be discussing how physicists have sought the most fundamental building blocks of the universe using increasingly powerful particle-smashers and culminating in the Large Hadron Collider, soon to restart in Europe. He will address the hopes and fears surrounding the world’s largest and most powerful scientific instrument.
The event will start at 7PM, hope to see you there!
Penn and the Mutter Museum invite you for a tour of the Mutter’s main collections of human medical anomalies, which includes a full skeleton of Harry Eastlack, the most well-known case of FOP (fibrodysplasia ossificans progressive). FOP is a rare disease in which connective tissue gradually turns to bone. Eastlack began developing the disease at 10 and, by the time of his death in 1973 at the age of 40, his entire body (except for the lips) had turned to the bone. By his request, his body is preserved for science at the Mutter. Following the tour, join us for a boxed dinner and talk by Penn’s Fred Kaplan, the world’s leading expert on FOP, and Eileen Shore, whose lab discovered the gene for FOP in 2006. (Greg’s recommended reading: Atlantic article)
We will gather at 6:00 in the lobby of the Mutter for the tour, which will last about an hour, with lecture and dinner to immediately follow. Please contact Karen Kreeger at karen.kreeegr@uphs.upenn.edu or 215-459-0544 if you plan to attend because we need to get a count for dinner. Watch this spot for updates.
We’ve arranged a behind-the-scenes look at the new Hadrosaurus exhibit at the Academy of Natural Sciences ,
beginning with taking the world-renowned paleontologist Ted Daeschler to dinner. We’re planning to meet at Aya’s Cafe at 6pm. If you can’t make dinner, but would still like to take the tour, meet us at the Academy at 7:15 (big building at the circle, full of dinosaurs and stuffed dead things…can’t miss it, really).
Either way, please let me know if by Monday you plan to attend, so I can make reservations. higreg(at)gmail.com
Hello, on a whim, I decided to upgrade to the new WordPress software. Turns out that was a bad idea. I had to trash the site and start over again.
I’ll add the old stuff back on over the next day or so. Apologies for the inconvenience.
Greg
UPDATE:
Mostly restored. Unfortunately, we’re missing more links than Lucy (Australopithecus joke, ha!).
UPDATE2:
Added a new mascot, what do you think?
He’s from an old illustration for The Ugly Duckling.
I figured if New York can have SWINY, “swiney,” and DC can have DCSWA, “duck-swa,” then why can’t we be PASWAns?
(Humor me, it has been a rough afternoon.)
Greg
