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On the Highways and in the Hedges: Kate Furbish’s Botanical Century.
In 1870, botany in the state of Maine was an underdeveloped and precarious thing. In the 1670s, John Josselyn had published a brace of...
Dale DeBakcsy
Jun 17
102 views
The Ice Woman: Mary Engle Pennington’s Revolutionary World of Refrigeration.
In the early 20th century, buying and consuming food of any sort in an urban center was a fraught proposition, particularly in the days...
Dale DeBakcsy
Jul 8, 2024
357 views
Our Endogenous Retroviruses, Ourselves: The Life and Legacy of Anna Marie Skalka
In 1970, everybody knew, or believed they did, how the flow of genetic information in a cell works. The Central Dogma of genetics...
Dale DeBakcsy
Apr 27, 2023
2 views
Jeanne Baret: The Two Stories of the World’s First Woman to Circumnavigate the Globe.
Told one way, the story of Jeanne Baret is an essentially inspiring tale: a woman born a peasant, raised with the expectation of seeing...
Dale DeBakcsy
Apr 27, 2023
258 views
Return to Nature: Stella Brewer and the Science Of Chimpanzee Rehabilitation.
Our interactions with our closest relatives in the animal kingdom, the chimpanzees, have rarely been entirely honorable. We dress them up...
Dale DeBakcsy
Apr 27, 2023
77 views
Neuroembryology in Wartime: Rita Levi-Montalcini and the Discovery of Nerve Growth Factor
It is 1942, and Allied bombs are raking the city of Turin, wreaking a thudding vengeance for Il Duce’s cynical alliance with Nazi Germany....
Dale DeBakcsy
Apr 27, 2023
16 views
Fearless Symmetry: Dorothy Wrinch and the Founding of Mathematical Biochemistry
By attempting everything, Dorothy Wrinch ended up accomplishing nothing. For half a century, this was the standard final verdict on the...
Dale DeBakcsy
Apr 25, 2023
90 views
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