Someone is coming up the stairs toward me. Even though we’re both wearing masks, I hold my breath, do-si-do sideways and squeeze past him while being careful to avoid contact with the railing. Am I a little paranoid? Perhaps. Or maybe COVID-19 is pushing us all closer...

No matter how good a detective you are, there are some things you simply can't see (with the unaided eye), such as: Bacteria Your forehead Your chin (unless you're this guy) Actually, life is full of blind spots, once you start looking for them. For starters, everyone...

As COVID-19 forces many science classes into the home, teachers and parents are left wondering, "How safe are home science experiments?" For three families in Bethesda, Maryland, the answer to that question, tragically, was "not safe enough." One year on New Year's...

In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, many schools, colleges and universities have been forced to make a breakneck switch to online instruction, which opens up its own Pandora's box of challenges: Where do I start with online science education? How does a remote class...

In the November 18 issue of the journal Nature, husband and wife team Dana Ménard and John Trant paint a troubling picture of lab safety in academia today. Despite advances in scientific knowledge, the article reveals, the level of safety in academic laboratories...

Dr. Ian Malcolm: How do you know they can't breed? Henry Wu: Well, because all the animals in Jurassic Park are female. We've engineered them that way. In the 1993 classic Jurassic Park, that's how all the trouble begins. Later, the scientists are shocked to discover...

“The funeral of William Eastman Spandow . . . will be held in the Chapel at 11 o'clock this morning.” This was the introduction of the obituary given by the Columbia Spectator in 1922 on the unusual death of a 24-year-old chemist. The obituary describes a shocking...

Labs vary from place to place and even within the same academic institution or industry. A high school science lab has different requirements from a commercial testing lab. This variety can make it difficult to come up with a standardized set of rules. While there is...

You have some great lab safety posters laminated and mounted strategically around the lab. Great! Problem is, after a few months, people get used to seeing them and don't notice them anymore. Your shiny new posters might as well be wallpaper. Here's an idea you may...

In 1998, a small group of field techs were collecting groundwater samples in the wilderness area near the former Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant in Colorado when they were surprised by a pickup truck tearing through the field toward them, leaving behind a cloud of...