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The author of Skulls in the Stars is a professor of physics, specializing in optical science, at UNC Charlotte. The blog covers topics in physics and optics, the history of science, classic pulp fantasy and horror fiction, and the surprising intersections between these areas. -
Category Archives: Personal
Keene and SanGiovanni bookstore fundraiser!
In the midst of work and travel, I happened to see that fantastic horror authors and amazing people Brian Keene and Mary SanGiovanni are raising funds to open a bookstore specializing in horror, sci-fi, and basically everything weird! They wanted … Continue reading
Posted in Horror, Personal
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A hiatus
My apologies to all, but I’ll be taking a brief hiatus from the blog. My kitty Zoe went in for a broken leg four weeks ago, and today we learned that the surgery wasn’t successful, and she’ll need to have … Continue reading
Fundraising for Zoe’s leg surgery
This morning, my senior kitty Zoe somehow managed to break one of her front legs. She’s incredibly spry for her 17 years of age, and still jumps up and down from the bed and couch all the time, and presumably … Continue reading
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“Deterministic vortices evolving from partially coherent fields” in Optica!
Some exciting personal and optics news: I just had a paper published in the prestigious journal Optica with my student Wenrui Miao and my colleague Yongtao Zhang on “Deterministic vortices evolving from partially coherent fields.” The paper is open access, … Continue reading
Posted in Optics, Personal
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16 years of Skulls in the Stars!
Just a quick note that I’ve been blogging now for 16 years, as of today, as WordPress reminded me! It’s wild that 16 years is almost 1/3 of my life that I’ve been writing this blog, and no plans to … Continue reading
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Invisibility talk at Natural Sciences at Raleigh!
Wanted to announce that I’ll be doing a Science Cafe at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences this coming Thursday, August 17th, at 7:00 pm! It will be both an in-person event as well as a livestream on YouTube, … Continue reading
Posted in Invisibility, Personal
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Me on science writing in Optics & Photonics News!
A couple of months ago, the folks who run Optics & Photonics News at Optica, the optical society, asked if I could write a post for their “careers” blog about my path to writing popular science books. Well, the post … Continue reading
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Two new reviews of Invisibility!
Yesterday was quite the day for book reviews for my book on the history and science of invisibility! First, James Gleick wrote a very nice and thoughtful review of the book for the New York Review of Books; a screenshot … Continue reading
Posted in Invisibility, Personal
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70% off of Invisibility on Audiobooks.com through end of July!
Just a quick note: I lost track of this announcement when I first got it: my Invisibility book is 70% off in audio form at Audiobooks.com through the end of July. If you’ve been keen to get a copy in … Continue reading
Posted in Invisibility, Personal
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Interview about Invisibility at Ars Technica!
A little more book news to tide the blog over until I write some new physics posts: around the time the book first came out, I was interviewed by Jennifer Ouellette for Ars Technica about the book, and that interview … Continue reading
Posted in Invisibility, Personal
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Skulls in the Stars 