Today's guest is Laurie Winkless. She's a physicist, a science writer and she's the only person I know who's actually made writing about friction interesting. You could say she's a science friction writer...
She’s appeared everywhere from Forbes to Wired to BBC, and she has written two books. Oh and she won a scholarship to do some training at NASA. As you do.
I am very excited to talk about her transition from scientist to science communication and why she thinks that's so important.
In this episode she shares:
- Her background and how she got into physics
- What actually is a PhD and if she'll ever get one
- What science communication is, how she got into it and why we need more people in it
- Why she brings creativity into her job and why sexism prevented her from doing it earlier
- Her (brilliant) books and what you should know about them
- How she wrote her first book
- Her very interesting favourite friction fact.
- One science myth that she wishes would die
- What shark inspired swim suits are and why they help swimming
Key Quotes
“Most of the noise that we hear on the roads is not actually from the engines it’s from the interaction between the tyre and the tarmac.”
“So much of the universe is defined by the interaction between surfaces.”
“I think sometimes people are afraid to be a bit weird.”
More about Laurie
Find her via her website or on social media.
And don’t forget to head to our Instagram for a chance to win one of her signed books.
You can get involved with the podcast online too of course.
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