Winter is Resurgent, and so is Nerd Nite

Wednesday, May 28
7:30pm until 10:30pm localtime

Bottom Lounge (Upstairs)
1375 W Lake St, Chicago, IL 60607

WELL HAI THERE, CHICAGO!


We’ve been staying extra hours at the lab, but now it’s time to get back on the Nerd-Horse!
We’ve got totally rad* talks from three of our own, and we’re stoked to be putting them onstage at the large, excellent UPSTAIRS space at Bottom Lounge. In additions to sweet, sweet knowledge, you can get great beers and food at this joint!

Here’s the lineup:

 

The Urban Jungle

by Seth Harper

Have you ever looked at a weed growing out of a sidewalk crack and thought to yourself, gee, I wonder what this weed can teach me about life? No, of course not. Nobody thinks dumb stuff like that. But smart folk like you may have at least wondered what that weed is called, where it’s from, and why it’s so ding-dang good at growing out of sidewalks. Or maybe just you want to know how to kill it. That’s okay, I’m not here to judge. I’m just here to dispense a healthy dose of sweet, sweet botanical knowledge about the flora of the urban cosmopolis.

Seth Harper is a Horticulturist at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum. He also writes books, smokes cigars, and is an all around swell guy, allegedly.

Goldilocks and the Extrasolar Planets

by Bo Jayatilaka

Sometimes a planet’s orbit is just right. Find out what the goldilocks zone (or, more boringly, the circumstellar habitable zone) is and why it’s the key to all life as we know it (hint: it’s not just the porridge). While we’re at it, we explore whether the entire universe was once a habitable zone. And, as an added bonus: a tally of the known (habitable?) planets in our galactic neighborhood!

Bo Jayatilaka is not the kind of doctor who can fix broken bones. He’s the other kind. The science kind.

Leeches, maggots, and ants – Oh my!

by Monica Metzler

Sometimes the wide gap between torture and therapeutic medicine is a narrow crack, or missing altogether. We’ll gawk at the gory horrors of ancient medical practice, and talk about why some are making a comeback today. Monica, founder of Illinois Science Council, is a huge proponent of science here in Chicago, and supremely grateful to be be alive in the Post-Anesthesia Age. You should be, too.

* Slang gets/will-had-gotten a little dated, from all the work on my time projection chamber. Sorriness.