Clones, gay penguins, climate doubters and going off the grid

What a week! First, several of my long-in-the-works features finally appeared. Second, I got to write about some fantastic current news items.

I'll start this week's list with my two Extinction Countdown blogs for Scientific American, the second of which is a great follow-up on a story I originally did just over a year ago:

Brazil Plans to Clone Its Endangered Species

Controversial Toronto Zoo Penguins Not Gay after All?


Next up, a whole bunch of stories for Mother Nature Network, including two of those features I mentioned:

Going off the grid: Why more people are choosing to live life unplugged [This was probably my most popular article of the week]

What if climate-change doubters held a debate and nobody came? [This one earned me some nice hate mail.]

Undercover video depicts abuse at Butterball turkey farms

Galapagos to poison 180 million rats

Smartphone app could help save Australian Aboriginal language from extinction

Can you trust online product reviews and ratings?


And finally, here's this month's feature for Today's Engineer. I'll follow this up next month with a look at nuclear engineering careers outside of the power industry:

Career Focus: Careers in Nuclear Energy


That should give you enough to read for your next few lunch hours. More next week!

Whale discovery, bad news for coffee and a surprise appearance by Charles Darwin

What a week. The election and hurricane Sandy combined for a one-two punch of stress. Most of my friends and clients live in storm-ravaged areas, so I have spent a lot of time lately worrying about them, digging up information through my thankfully functioning Internet connection, and trying to stay connected. It hasn't always been easy. I still have one or two friends without heat and at least one client without email. What a modern society we have in this country!

Anyway, although a few of my articles didn't see print last week as planned, quite a few more still made their way into the world. Here's the list, starting with my Extinction Countdown articles for Scientific American:

Amazing: Rarest Whale Seen for First Time in History, but Not at Sea  [This was my most-read SciAm article of the past year!]

Last 500 Ethiopian Wolves Endangered by Lack of Genetic Diversity


Next up, a whole bunch of articles -- many of them climate-related -- for Mother Nature Network:

Charles Darwin gets 4,000 write-in votes in Georgia election

More researchers join effort to control stink bugs organically

Climate change threatens your morning cup of coffee

Satellites could help predict volcano eruptions

Staten Island desperately needs underwear

Climate change could have devastating effect on India's monsoon season


That's it for this time around. A few extra, storm-delayed articles should appear this coming week, along with my usual batch of stuff. Make sure to follow me on Twitter for the latest links as they go live!

Species discoveries, glowing tides and inspirational spider webs

Monday morning again. It feels a bit odd that only one of my articles last week touched upon Hurricane Sandy, which devastated so much of the northeast and affected so many of my friends, family and co-workers. But even when one story dominates the news, other tales remain to be told. And there must have been a hunger for non-Sandy news because all of these stories had more than the usual number of readers.

We'll start this week's run-down with my two Extinction Countdown articles for Scientific American:

9 New Tree-Loving and Endangered Tarantula Species Discovered in Brazil

New Lizard Discovered in Australia, Threatened by Incoming Housing Development

Mother Nature Network kept me more than busy last week, and these articles touch upon at least six fields of science:

First all-carbon solar cell made with nanotubes and buckyballs instead of silicon

Will San Diego's tides glow blue again this year?

Michael Bloomberg endorses Barack Obama, 'a president to lead on climate change'

Europe's oldest prehistoric village found in Bulgaria

Vision evolved 700 million years ago, researchers find

Spider webs and gecko feet inspire potential pain-free bandage 

That last one was also reprinted by the Huffington Post.


In addition to the above, I turned in my next feature for Today's Engineer (and I'm deep into my next one for them), I have three features pending at Mother Nature Network,  Monday's SciAm article is already queued up waiting for an embargo to lift, and I am plugging away on two new features for Lion magazine. I'm so busy that my fingers have worn the letters off of seven keys on my keyboard. I guess it's a good things I'm not a hunt-and-peck typist!

More next week -- or follow me on Twitter for the latest headlines as they happen.

Komodo dragons and five other new articles

Well, it's Monday morning and most of the East Coast is embroiled in Frankenstorm Sandy. Or at least, I presume they are. I'm typing this up on Sunday afternoon in anticipation of Monday-morning posting.

So, if you haven't lost power and found yourself under a foot and a half of water, here are this week's six new articles for Scientific American and Mother Nature Network. (If you are without power, well then, that's the big problem with online publishing, innit?)

Female Komodo Dragons Die Young, Housework to Blame

Habitat Loss, Misinformation Spur Chimpanzee Aggression

Amtrak promises high-speed trains in Midwest after successful test run

Who goes there? Rare Yosemite owls studied via sound

Smoking apps promote cigarettes to kids, say researchers

Doctor-assisted suicide goes to ballot in Massachusetts

For all I know, I'll be without power myself before too long. That's why I spent all weekend working away, making sure that several assignments were awaiting my editors in their in-boxes on Monday morning. Of course, now I have to hope that they have power, too.

This is all climate change's fault, of course, which is why I keep writing about environmental stuff.

Anyway, more next week...

Rhino poaching, Apple controversy and Russia's bad smoking habit

Wow, after last week's long list of publications, this week's five new articles almost feels like a letdown. But all of these articles attracted huge numbers of readers, generated discussion and had an impact. For a journalist, things don't get much better than that.

So, first up in this week's link parade are my two Extinction Countdown articles for Scientific American:

Rhino Poaching: An Extinction Crisis

Cost to Prevent All Future Extinctions: $11 per Person?

The "cost to prevent" article was also reprinted by Mother Jones.


The rest of this week's articles all appeared at Mother Nature Network, where my editor always finds a wide range of topics for me to cover:

Panda: It's what used to be for dinner in prehistoric China?

New Apple MacBook gets EPEAT Gold certification, but critics cry foul

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev vows smoking ban by 2015


That's it for this week, but I already have at least seven new articles in various stages of completion and lots more on the horizon. So stay tuned, there's lots more ahead.

Rediscovered species, Engineering careers, Ocean crusaders, French weirdness and more

Wow. It's almost hard to believe how many articles I published last week. This was one of those weeks when working on a combination of breaking news stories and features resulted in a whole bunch of stories coming out at the same time.

Meanwhile, readership on all of this articles was way above average. It helps when the world gives you interesting stories to tell!

So without further ado, here are this week's articles, starting with my two Extinction Countdown posts for Scientific American:

Solenodon: ‘Extinct’ Venomous Mammal Rediscovered in Cuba after 10-Year Search

(This was also reprinted by the Huffington Post.)

Last Wild Siamese Crocodile in Vietnam Found Strangled to Death


Two long-in-the-works engineer-related features came out this week, the first of which appeared in the IEEE publication, The Institute:

IEEE Trains Preuniversity Teachers in India 

...and the second of which appeared in IEEE-USA's Today's Engineer:

Career Focus: Defense Industry STEM Jobs


Wrapping it up, here are this week's articles for Mother Nature Network, a mix of interesting environmental and science stories:

Plastic power: Aviator plans intercontinental trip using plastics for fuel

Scientists dash hopes for dinosaur cloning

Why are French bees producing blue and green honey?

TerraMar Project launches to celebrate and protect the world's oceans

New Mexico and other states face a new crime trend: Grass thefts

Ketamine could rapidly treat depression, study finds


Well, that's it for this time around. I'm sure this coming week won't be quite so publication-heavy, but I'm working on a huge batch of new articles that will probably all see publication in one big clump again some time in the next month. We'll just have to wait and see how it goes.

Life-saving dung, MacArthur geniuses and other goodies

Happy Monday! It's time for my weekly compendium of the previous week's articles. Just in time for you to delay the start of your work week!

Last week brought five new articles, plus one reprint. Let's start, as I usually do, with my Extinction Countdown articles for Scientific American:


Italy Faces Invasion of American Killer Squirrels

Dung from Critically Endangered Kakapo Parrots Could Save Endangered Plant

In addition, my recent Extinction Countdown article on Conservation Drones was reprinted by Mother Jones.


Mother Nature Network had my write about a few innovators this week, including two geniuses and one, um...

Innovative astronomer Olivier Guyon named a 2012 MacArthur 'genius' fellow

Marine ecologist Nancy Rabalais receives $500,000 MacArthur 'genius' grant

'Algae Opera': Singer grows edible algae with her breath


I have a bunch of new long-in-the-works articles pending publication this month -- maybe even this week -- so stay tuned to my Twitter feed for announcements as they go live.