Sci/tech tidbits in and around New Hampshire
Monarch butterflies are doing well this year, but they’re not out of the woods
This year is proving to be a good one in New Hampshire, if a slightly puzzling one, for the most iconic of all butterfly species – and sorry, Karner blue, but we mean the monarch butterfly. “It’s been a fantastic year for monarchs. People keep bringing containers of...
Portland gets airport bragging rights over Manchester
Portland, Maine, and Manchester, N.H., don't have as much of a rivalry as they should. Both are the biggest cities in their similarly-sized state (both are "queen cities", the term for a state's biggest city that isn't the capital), and they're just close enough but...

Take *that*, expensive textbooks!
It's been a very long time since I was in college - cue jokes about papyrus scrolls and how math class was easier then because only 8 numerals had been invented - but I still remember how annoying it was to shell out big bucks for the "new edition" of Paul Samuelson's...
Study says non-mathematicians can see beauty in math
The concept of mathematical beauty fascinates me - and lots of other people, as the long wikipedia article demonstrates - because it's such a mix of opposites, the very quantifiable with the very non-quantifiable. There's no question that some math work produces a...
Put hemp in your concrete (or is it cement? I always get them confused)
I think I'm going to have a Science Cafe NH later this year on the topic of building materials and carbon sequestration. I suspect most of it will cover modern lumber technology like cross-laminated timber, since we have so many trees, but I'd like to find a panelist...

Why do we send 1,500 animal teeth to Montana every year?
It's not easy to tell the age of a wild animal. That's why New Hampshire sends 125 bobcat canines, 500 deer incisors, 100 moose incisors and 800 bear premolars to a really funky lab in Montana every year. Yes, you want to know more, which is why you will click right...
If you want to help build a real airplane, some kids need you
Students at the Manchester School of Technology are building an actual airplane, but they need volunteer mentors to help students build the airplane, a two-seat RV-12iS light sport aircraft. "Our student plane-build project has received solid financial support, but...
The ocean is coming – what should we do?
New Hampshire has the shortest coastline of any state bordering an ocean but it's still long enough and has enough development that sea-level rise and erratic storm surges will cause gazillions of dollars in damage down the road. So what should we do? A new report has...
The lowly culvert can be exciting
I've long been fascinated by culverts, those zillions of pipes that carry small waterways under roads - writing about them (e.g., here) so much that one editor at the Monitor makes jokes about my passion. Culverts interesting because they're a perfect example of...

That’s what a flat roof should look like
The day has long gone when "building unveils solar array" is much in the way of news - but I'll make an exception for Dover High School, which installed a rooftop array so big that it increases the state's (admittedly small) solar capacity by 1.5%. You can see the...