Sci/tech tidbits in and around New Hampshire
A place (maybe the only one in NH) where you park backwards at an angle
There are certain topics that get everybody riled up – politics, religion, which way to hang the toilet-paper roll. And parking. Especially parking. Everybody hates parking but everybody wants more parking, and they want it a specific size and shape. It’s risky to...
Birth dearth addendum: It would be OK if we just used less, but …
In response to my column last week celebrating (despite the many drawbacks) a global trend of smaller families, some readers and callers said that the real solution to planetwide environmental destruction is for each of us humans to consume fewer resources, rather...
If Lyme disease designed a mammal to spread itself around, it would design the white-footed mouse
Great story by the Washington Post (reprinted in the Bangor Daily News here) about why the white-footed mouse is such a prolific carrier of Lyme disease: What makes the mice such excellent carriers? Lax grooming habits. Passive immune systems. Endless offspring that...
The ‘baby bust’ is going to be a disaster. It’s our only hope
The most hopeful change in human society that has occurred during my lifetime – a change that must continue if our grandchildren have any hope of a decent life – is really bad. It’s bad economically, bad socially, even bad culturally. But if you love your kids like I...
They’re going to test a moth that eats an invasive weed I hate, hate, hate
Pardon a personal rant, but for more than a decade my family has been fighting an invasive weed known as black swallowwort. It's a vine that grows up from the ground and tangles everything; when we bought our property it had filled one field to the point that it was...
NH bitcoin machines to shut July 31 (for a bit) because of a complex dispute over forking
As I've noted several times, New Hampshire is one of the hotbeds of retail bitcoin usage thanks largely to the ultra-libertarian Free Staters. I believe we have more public bitcoin vending machines per capita than any state. For a short period s of July 31, however,...
N.H. infected with way more malware than any other state, claims anti-malware company
Companies that make software to fight malware issue lots of alarming press releases about malware and I take them with a grain of self-serving salt. But here's one that tweaked my Granite State interest: Computer users in New Hampshire were three times as likely to...
Dartmouth on list of 100 top patent-producing colleges
Dartmouth College is on the National Academy of Inventors’ top 100 list of universities worldwide granted U.S. patents in 2016, marking the fifth consecutive time the College has made the top 100 since the list was launched in 2012. More details are here.
“Beaming” a neurologist into the ambulance can help stroke victims
Catholic Medical Center in Manchester has started a program in which neurologists can have a two-way telepresence in ambulances carrying stroke victims to the hospital. Manchester Ink Link, an independent news organization started by longtime local reporter Carol...
It’s surprisingly complicated to figure out how good (or bad) it is to burn wood for power
It has always seemed obvious to me that it would be good for battling climate change, as well as good for local jobs and taxes, if tree-filled Northern New England created more electricity and heat by burning wood rather than burning coal, oil or gas. After all,...
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