From commanding the space station to being unfit to drive a car
By The Canadian Press - Thursday, May 16, 2013 - 0 Comments
LONGUEUIL, Que. – Until a few days ago, Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield was responsible…
LONGUEUIL, Que. – Until a few days ago, Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield was responsible for making sure the International Space Station stayed on course.
Now that he’s back on Earth, he can’t even drive a car for the next few weeks.
It’s been an intense adjustment period for the 53-year-old astronaut who described Thursday how, after months of floating in weightlessness, he’s suddenly grappling with the painful effects of gravity.
“Right after I landed, I could feel the weight of my lips and tongue and I had to change how I was talking,” Hadfield told reporters during a video news conference from Houston.
“I hadn’t realized that I learned to talk with a weightless tongue.”
The latest health update by Raffi Kuyumjian, his flight surgeon, said Thursday that the three-time space visitor was starting to show noticeable improvement in his walk and equilibrium.
But Hadfield was not ready to put the pedal to the metal. Kuyumjian said it usually takes about three weeks before a returning astronaut can drive a car again.
When Hadfield spoke to reporters, he said his body felt confused and banged-up by the effects of gravity after his long duration visit.
He said he had to make a conscious effort to keep his head aloft. That he was dizzy. And because the callouses were gone from his feet, his footsteps felt like walking on hot coals.
A first trip to the gym was excruciating, he said, because it felt like two people had jumped on him when he was trying to move on a mat.
Things were so different in space.
”My body was quite happy living in space without gravity,” he said.
“(It’s) a very empowering environment where you can touch the wall and do somersaults, where you can move a refrigerator around with your fingertips and never worry about which way was up.
”Well, that all changed when our Soyuz (capsule) slammed back into the Earth. And my body is catching up with the change. And so the symptoms are dizziness. It’s like when you come off a ride at the CNE or something.”
Hadfield returned to Earth on Monday night and was flown to Houston to be reunited with his wife and to undergo tests and debriefings.
Hadfield also announced that his use of social media, which earned him an international audience, won’t end with his return to Earth.
He had 20,000 Twitter followers when he blasted off with Russian space colleague Roman Romanenko and NASA astronaut Tom Marshburn on Dec. 19, 2012. This week back on terra firma, Hadfield was hovering around one million followers.
Hadfield said the point of using social media was not to gain fame — but to teach people about space exploration.
“It is just too good an experience to keep to yourself,” he said. “And the more people that see it and understand it, the more the benefits of space exploration will roll back into daily life for all of us.”
Hadfield added that it felt rewarding to receive a message from someone who said he didn’t even know Canada had a space program, until he saw Hadfield’s tweets.
There were major changes at the Canadian Space Agency while Hadfield was gone.
While Hadfield was circling the globe every 92 minutes, Steve MacLean quit as head of the space agency and was replaced earlier this year by interim boss Gilles Leclerc.
But Hadfield wouldn’t say if he was eager to take over the top job at Canada’s space agency.
“I’m nowhere near even thinking about that yet,” said Hadfield, who is Canada’s oldest active astronaut, when asked if he wanted to be the next CSA president.
“Ask me again in a few months. For now, I’m still trying to stand up straight and I have to sit down in the shower so I don’t faint and fall down.”
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NOW Magazine is so, so wrong about space
By Peter Nowak - Thursday, May 16, 2013 at 4:46 PM - 0 Comments
Every now and then someone comes along and criticizes space exploration – and inevitably makes a fool of themselves in the process. Add NOW Magazine to the list.
The Toronto alt-weekly trashed both Commander Chris Hadfield and space exploration in general as PR-seeking glory hounds and wastes of money, respectively, in a piece that ran this week.
Hadfield – the first Canadian commander of the International Space Station – of course returned to Earth on Monday evening, but not before posting a video of himself performing David Bowie’s Space Oddity… in space. That capped off a 146-day stint aboard the ISS that was punctuated by frequent tweets, photos and even an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit.
Hadfield’s return couldn’t happen “too soon,” according to the article, since he was wasting so much time conducting public relations for himself and space agencies in general, rather than actual scientific research:
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Back from space, Hadfield is feeling the weight of the world
By Kate Lunau - Thursday, May 16, 2013 at 1:57 PM - 0 Comments
Mikhail Metzel/AP
In space, Chris Hadfield had the superpower of weightlessness. Back on Earth, he’s like an old man—shuffling his feet, feeling dizzy, and suffering aches and pains, he told reporters gathered at the Canadian Space Agency (CSA)’s headquarters in Montreal today, his first press conference since landing in Kazakhstan after a five-month mission to the International Space Station, where he became Canada’s first space commander.
“We’re tottering around like two old duffers in an old folks’ home,” Hadfield joked about himself and fellow astronaut Tom Marshburn, who was on the mission with him. Still, he seemed happy to be home.
Speaking from NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, where Hadfield and Marshburn are undergoing extensive rehabilitation to build back their bodies after life in zero gravity, Hadfield spoke frankly about the physical challenges he’s facing. His openness was unsurprising for an astronaut who’s become such a celebrated communicator.
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‘My body is catching up with the change’: Chris Hadfield on his painful return to gravity
By The Canadian Press - Thursday, May 16, 2013 at 10:32 AM - 0 Comments
Astronaut hosts first press conference since return to Earth
Mikhail Metzel/AP
LONGUEUIL, Que. – Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield says his body feels confused and banged-up by the effects of gravity after a five-month stay in space.
After floating around weightlessly for months, suddenly, he needs to keep his own head aloft. He feels dizzy. And because there are no callouses on his feet anymore, he says, he feels like he’s walking on hot coals.
A first trip to the gym was excruciating, he says, because it felt like two people had jumped on him when he was trying to do a situp.
”My neck is sore and my back is sore,” Hadfield told a news conference from Houston on Thursday.
”It feels like I played a hard game of rugby yesterday or played full-contact hockey yesterday and I haven’t played in a while.”
Hadfield returned to Earth on Monday night after his stay aboard the International Space Station — a trip that included a period as commander of the orbiting station. Continue…
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Back on Earth, Chris Hadfield is grappling with gravity
By The Canadian Press - Thursday, May 16, 2013 at 12:42 AM - 0 Comments
CSA update on astronaut’s health reveals long list of temporary problems
MONTREAL – Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield is having a hard time getting around on terra firma after spending five months floating around the International Space Station.
Raffi Kuyumjian, the Canadian Space Agency’s chief medical officer and Hadfield’s flight surgeon, says the three-time space traveller currently feels like an old man.
The CSA issued an update on the health of the 53-year-old space veteran Wednesday, two days after his return to Earth.
Kuyumjian described some of the temporary problems Hadfield is dealing with as he readjusts to gravity. They include shuffling his feet when he walks, soreness in his back, difficulty walking around corners and sometimes even bumping into corners.
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How spaceman Hadfield’s sons pushed him to social-media stardom
By Peter Rakobowchuk, The Canadian Press - Wednesday, May 15, 2013 at 5:57 AM - 0 Comments
‘It was an amazing human adventure,’ astronaut says
MONTREAL – Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield may have become a worldwide Internet sensation with his dramatic photos, tweets and musical performances from space.
But it took some convincing by his two sons to persuade him of the importance of social media in the first place.
His conversion began several years ago — long before Hadfield’s mission to the International Space Station, which ended with great fanfare this week.
He initially balked when his sons began preaching the merits of Twitter and Facebook more than three years ago.
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Chris Hadfield: Good Morning, Earth!
By Kate Lunau - Tuesday, May 14, 2013 at 10:03 AM - 0 Comments
On the iBooks Top 10: A behind-the-scenes look at the man and his mission
Astronaut Chris Hadfield is back on Earth after five months in space.
The first Canadian ever to command the International Space Station (ISS), Hadfield has opened a window into life in space as never before, inspiring millions to closely follow his mission. Maclean’s marks his return with a new ebook that gives an exclusive, behind-the-scenes look into Hadfield’s mission.
Since launching aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft on Dec. 19, and even before then, Hadfield has been an enthusiastic Twitter user (his followers number 913,000 and counting). And yet his responsibilities stretched far beyond the songs, videos, photos and messages he shared from space. He and his crew have performed more than 130 science experiments on this mission. Crewmates Tom Marshburn and Chris Cassidy completed a five-hour spacewalk to fix a dramatic ammonia leak aboard the ISS, with Hadfield as their spacewalk choreographer. In one week, the crew finished a whopping 71 hours of research, setting a new record for the Station.
In September, Maclean’s reporter Kate Lunau travelled to NASA’s Johnson Space Center to shadow Hadfield. She was the only Canadian print reporter to attend, and watched Hadfield, Marshburn, and Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko as they trained for what would become the mission of a lifetime.
For the first time, Chris Hadfield: #GoodMorningEarth brings together her reporting and never-before-seen photos from NASA, as well as Hadfield’s Twitter diary, photos, and more.
Chris Hadfield: #GoodMorningEarth includes:
- A behind-the-scenes look at Hadfield’s training at NASA’s elite astronaut facilities
- A chronicle of Hadfield’s journey as told by his tweets
- Dozens of his best landscape photos of Earth
- A glimpse into some of the science experiments—which total more than 130—that Hadfield and his crew performed aboard the Space Station
- A collection of Maclean’s writings on Canada’s first space commander
“By using the technology that’s available now, we can really make this experience alive, in real time,” Hadfield told Maclean’s earlier this year, from the ISS.
“When I look out the window and see something magnificent go by, I can immediately broadcast it, and people can ride along with me.”
Chris Hadfield: #GoodMorningEarth shows just what an incredible ride it has been.
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Chris Hadfield: ‘Back on Earth, happily readapting to heavy pull of gravity’
By macleans.ca and The Canadian Press - Monday, May 13, 2013 at 1:09 PM - 0 Comments
Video, tweets and photos of the astronaut’s return
- For all our Chris Hadfield coverage, click here.
- And check out our latest ebook on iTunes: #GoodMorningEarth: Chris Hadfield by Kate Lunau.
Hadfield’s final photo from space: “Spaceflight finale: To some this may look like a sunset. But it’s a new dawn.”
Safely home – back on Earth, happily readapting to the heavy pull of gravity. Wonderful to smell and feel Spring.
— Chris Hadfield (@Cmdr_Hadfield) May 14, 2013
Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who became a worldwide sensation thanks to his tweets, musical performances and stunning photos from the International Space Station, was back on the ground Monday night.
Hadfield touched down in Kazakhstan on a Russian Soyuz capsule which was also carrying Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko and NASA astronaut Tom Marshburn — the same pair the Canadian astronaut blasted off with on Dec. 19, 2012.
During his five-month mission at the International Space Station, the 53-year-old space veteran became the first Canadian to command the orbiting laboratory.
The cramped Russian space capsule carrying Hadfield and his two space companions tore into the atmosphere before a parachute opened, slowing its descent until it hit the ground with a hard thud.
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Hadfield returns home as Attawapiskat evacuates
By Nick Taylor-Vaisey - Monday, May 13, 2013 at 9:05 AM - 0 Comments
AP/Dmitry Lovetsky
Chris Hadfield blasted off into space on Dec. 19. When he was settling into his new digs on the International Space Station, Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence was a little over a week into her protest on Victoria Island, and the Idle No More movement that loudly demanded respect for aboriginal rights was in its mainstream infancy. At the time, I wrote that Hadfield and Spence, united by their respective citizenship and maybe not much else, “represent the breadth of the Canadian experience.”
Six months later, Hadfield boasts 800,000 followers on Twitter, a medium he transformed into a photo album from on high, a window into his space-borne laboratory, and a way for the masses to chat with an astronaut. To call him a boon for the Canadian Space Agency, which could use a good-news story as it faces an uncertain future, would be understating the situation somewhat. Hadfield took his country’s space program on his shoulders, made space cool, and returns a bona fide hero. In other words, he nailed it.
Meanwhile, Spence’s community faces evacuation. Attawapiskat is among 10 northern Ontario communities that are in the midst of seasonal flooding, a not unfamiliar fate that sees hundreds of residents moved to places like Thunder Bay, Fort Frances and Cornwall. Spence has faded from the public eye, for better or worse, and her people are back in the news not for their activism—but for the same misery they seem to face, year after year, just for living where they live.
Once again, the breadth of the Canadian experience.
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Chris Hadfield packs for home
By The Canadian Press - Monday, May 13, 2013 at 5:29 AM - 0 Comments
MONTREAL – After tonight, astronaut Chris Hadfield might become a more typical social-media user…
MONTREAL – After tonight, astronaut Chris Hadfield might become a more typical social-media user and start posting pictures of mundane subjects — like food.
The Canadian space veteran is scheduled to return to Earth this evening after a five-month stay on the International Space Station.
The astronaut best known for having shared stunning pictures from space says what he’s really looking forward to now is the aroma of a rich cup of coffee, and other such delights.
“One of the things I miss here is the smell of food,” Hadfield said during his final news conference from space, last month.
“The rich aroma of a coffee or the smell of something that’s in the oven and the textures of food,” he said.
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@Cmdr_Hadfield: ‘Time to rev up the Soyuz, home tomorrow’
By macleans.ca - Sunday, May 12, 2013 at 1:00 PM - 0 Comments
Chris Hadfield set to hand over command of International Space Station
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Spacewalk needed to fix ammonia leak on International Space Station
By Emily Senger - Friday, May 10, 2013 at 11:27 AM - 0 Comments
Astronauts on the International Space Station are preparing for an unscheduled space walk to…
AP/Dmitry Lovetsky
Astronauts on the International Space Station are preparing for an unscheduled space walk to fix leaking ammonia, which is used to cool the power panels on the station.
While Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who is currently commanding the station, won’t be one of two people doing the spacewalk, he will be assisting from inside. Astronauts Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn are preparing for the walk.
“The crew is not in danger, and the station continues to operate normally otherwise,” NASA said in a press release issued Thursday. “Work is underway to reroute power channels to maintain full operation of the systems normally controlled by the solar array that is cooled by the suspect loop.”
Crews discovered the leak after they saw small white flakes floating away from the station Thursday, says NASA. Using cameras and data from ground crews, members of the International Space Station were able to determine that the rate of the ammonia leak was increasing. Continue…
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Canadian kids sing along with Chris Hadfield as he prepares to return to Earth
By The Canadian Press - Monday, May 6, 2013 at 1:42 PM - 0 Comments
TORONTO – Astronaut Chris Hadfield broke into song in his last video chat from…
TORONTO – Astronaut Chris Hadfield broke into song in his last video chat from space, with scores of Canadian students providing backup vocals.
The popular space man — who tweets and strums his guitar while orbiting the planet aboard the International Space Station — sang his support for music education.
Students from across the country tuned in via web link and many joined Hadfield in singing the theme song for the Music Monday campaign, which he co-wrote with Barenaked Ladies frontman Ed Robertson.
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Chris Hadfield’s Earth Day? Out of this world. (Check out the photo evidence.)
By macleans.ca - Monday, April 22, 2013 at 5:55 PM - 0 Comments
Noted in space: ‘One touch of nature makes the whole world kin’
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Question from orbit: Where is spring?
By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 4, 2013 at 5:33 PM - 0 Comments
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Chris Hadfield tells school kids he hopes there will be more Canadians in space
By Terry Pedwell, The Canadian Press - Friday, March 15, 2013 at 7:00 PM - 0 Comments
OTTAWA – Astronaut Chris Hadfield mesmerized a group of schoolchildren Friday as he held…
OTTAWA – Astronaut Chris Hadfield mesmerized a group of schoolchildren Friday as he held a question-and-answer session from space, moderated by Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his wife Laureen.
Flying above the earth at 7.71 kilometres per second, Hadfield appeared to relish the chance to describe for his young audience what it’s like to live and work in space.
“Does Canada look like you would expect it to from space?” asked Darcy McRae, 11, of Kanata, Ont.
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Chris Hadfield’s space photos — mapped
By Emily Senger - Friday, March 15, 2013 at 12:05 PM - 0 Comments
Nova Scotia teacher plots out the Canadian astronaut’s photos from space
A geography instructor at a Nova Scotia community college was so impressed with Chris Hadfield’s photos from the International Space Station that he has combined them into one single, interactive online map.Hadfield, who became the first Canadian to command the International Space Station on March 14, has been a prolific social media user since arriving on the station. He has tweeted hundreds of awe-inspiring images from his orbit around Earth. The map allows users to see where each photo is on Earth and to click through to view the photo and read Hadfield’s comments.
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Newsmakers
By Emily Senger - Thursday, March 14, 2013 at 6:00 PM - 0 Comments
Dennis Rodman’s next trip, Chris Hadfield gets keys to the spaceship, and Russia’s evil dancer heads to court
Marcos Brindicci/Reuters
When life imitates art
Bolshoi Ballet star Pavel Dmitrichenko, famed for his portrayal of villains on stage, claimed from a Moscow court last week that while he sanctioned an attack on Sergei Filin, the company’s artistic director, he did not expect his hired thug to throw acid in the man’s face. Asked whether he wished to apologize to Filin, Dmitrichenko defiantly replied: “For what?”
They should write a song about it
Taylor Swift often laments her tragic love life, but Swift’s fans are all too happy to shower her with adoration. Now it seems not all of their messages are making it into the pop princess’s hands. A Nashville resident, Kylee Francescan, reportedly found stacks upon stacks of unopened letters addressed to Swift and covered in glitter, photos and stickers behind a school dumpster. When the local news team investigated, Swift’s people said the mail was likely mixed up with another batch of fan mail destined for the recycle depot. With Swift receiving “thousands of fan letters everyday,” it seems her problem may be too much love, not the opposite.
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Chris Hadfield takes command of ISS: ‘We’re going to put some miles on it’
By macleans.ca - Thursday, March 14, 2013 at 5:30 AM - 0 Comments
Astronaut becomes first Canadian to command International Space Station
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Chris Hadfield ready to take command of the International Space Station
By Kate Lunau - Tuesday, March 12, 2013 at 9:23 PM - 0 Comments
‘Tonight Kevin hands me the spaceship’s keys,’ astronaut tweets. (And here’s how he spent his final day NOT in command)
It’s official: Canada will soon have its first-ever commander of the International Space Station. On March 13, after spending decades preparing, astronaut Chris Hadfield takes control of the ISS.You’ll be able to watch a livestream of handover of the ISS here around 5 p.m. ET.
Even for an astronaut, Hadfield’s career has been remarkable. On previous missions, he became first Canadian to operate the Canadarm in orbit; the first Canadian to float freely in space; the only Canadian ever to visit the Russian space station Mir. None of those milestones captured the public’s attention—and not just in Canada, but around the world—as much as his commandership of the ISS.
Hadfield, who arrived on the Space Station Dec. 21, has been using Twitter and other social media to share his experience with millions at home. And while other astronauts have used Twitter (the first live tweet from space was sent in 2010), none have been as prolific, or as enthusiastic, as Hadfield. “Chris is putting a lot of effort into this,” Jeremy Hansen, one of Canada’s newest astronaut recruits, recently told Maclean’s. “He’s a busy guy on orbit, and tweeting isn’t factored into the daily plan.” Marc Garneau, the first Canadian to fly in space, agrees that Twitter has made space more accessible than ever. ”It’s incredible,” says Garneau, who was campaigning for Liberal leadership, and is a tweeter himself. “I wish it had existed on my last flight.”
Hadfield finds any spare moment (and there isn’t much free time for astronauts on the ISS) to share snippets of his life—an observation about what he had for breakfast, or a photo of Dublin from space, or Havana, or Vancouver. With the help of his son Evan, who’s become his unofficial PR person on the ground, Hadfield recently did an “Ask Me Anything” on Reddit. He’s released a song from low Earth orbit. He’s participated in countless interviews and chats with schoolkids and the press. Kathy Bolt of NASA’s Johnson Space Center was the Chief Training Officer on Hadfield’s mission, and has spent years working closely with him to help him prepare. “Chris has got a gift for public speaking,” she tells Maclean’s. “He’s been doing it for so many years in his role with the astronaut office here, representing Canada.” And he’s expected to keep it up at least until he returns to Earth, in mid-May.
Hadfield decided he wanted to be an astronaut at age 9, when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon. Since then, he’s worked to be in a position to command what he calls “the world’s spaceship.” As he takes over the ISS, millions will be watching.
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Cmdr. Chris Hadfield’s special delivery
By macleans.ca - Sunday, March 3, 2013 at 5:15 PM - 0 Comments
Care package c/o the ISS: Fruit, notes from friends, peanut butter
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@Cdmr_Hadfield hits halfway mark of mission: ‘Need to check my space To-Do list’
By macleans.ca - Saturday, March 2, 2013 at 7:45 AM - 0 Comments
[View the story "@Cmdr_Hadfield marks the halfway mark of his mission" on Storify]
@Cmdr_Hadfield… -
Big news on dark matter? Soon, scientists promise. Real soon.
By Kate Lunau - Monday, February 18, 2013 at 12:45 PM - 0 Comments
Kate Lunau’s latest from the AAAS Meeting, on the mysterious stuff that makes up 25 per cent of our universe
NASA
Kate Lunau is in Boston covering the 2013 annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), where some of the world’s finest brains and celebrities of science meet to mix, mingle, and share their latest and greatest ideas. On Feb. 14-18, she’ll give you a sneak peak into the current research—everything from dinosaurs to neutrinos, from stem cells to extreme weather, and all sorts of sorts of stuff in between. Follow her on Twitter: @katelunau, #AAASmtg
The International Space Station isn’t just home to astronauts like Canadian Chris Hadfield, who’ll assume command in a few weeks’ time. It’s also an orbiting laboratory: hundreds of experiments are done there, looking into everything from human health to colloids. The ISS holds a $2-billion particle physics detector, called the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, which is searching for signs of exotic stuff that makes up our universe, like dark matter. Big news might be coming soon. At the AAAS Meeting, Nobel laureate and AMS principal investigator Dr. Samuel Ting promised that the first results from the AMS detector should be published in two or three weeks’ time. “It will not be a minor paper,” he told a crowded room of reporters.
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Astronaut Chris Hadfield beams down replies during Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’
By The Canadian Press - Sunday, February 17, 2013 at 7:40 PM - 0 Comments
Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield has beamed down responses to users of a popular social…
Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield has beamed down responses to users of a popular social media website while circling Earth on the International Space Station.
Hadfield used a laptop to field questions sent up Sunday from users of the website Reddit in the “Ask Me Anything” discussion, which drew more than 2,000 queries and comments.
He says the scariest thing he’s seen in space was a large meteorite burning up in front of him, sending a “shiver up my back” as he imagined the “lump of rock” hurtling towards the station instead.
Hadfield told one user a space mutiny was not going to happen, since the shared scientific goals of the station crew “keeps mutinies to a minimum.”
He says he often loses track of which way is “up” in the station, and told one terrestrial questioner that if his daughter wanted to be an astronaut she’d have to stay fit and smart by eating her greens and doing her homework.
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New worlds, brain machines, feathered dinosaurs and the Higgs boson
By Kate Lunau - Thursday, February 14, 2013 at 2:33 PM - 0 Comments
Kate Lunau is on the ground at the world’s biggest science fest
Kate Lunau is in Boston covering the 2013 annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), where some of the world’s finest brains and celebrities of science meet to mix, mingle, and share their latest and greatest ideas. On Feb. 14-18, she’ll give you a sneak peak into the current research—everything from dinosaurs to neutrinos, from stem cells to extreme weather, and all sorts of sorts of stuff in between. Follow her on Twitter: @katelunau, #AAASmtg
Photo by Kate Lunau
As I landed in Boston bright and early this morning, and hopped on the subway to the Hynes Convention Center (host of this year’s meeting), I was gripped by a familiar feeling—one I remember from covering this event last year, too—the fear of missing out. The AAAS is the world’s biggest general scientific society, and their annual meeting is a scientific smorgasbord. Over the next few days, thousands of researchers, journalists, engineers, teachers and policy-makers will be here to talk about their work. The program is as thick as a paperback novel. How to attend all the sessions that have already caught my eye?
There are a few I know I’ll be attending: like one on exploring other worlds, and what they can teach us about our own; and another on brain-machine interfaces. There’s a talk on whale evolution, and another on China’s feathered dinosaurs—especially interesting given the newly discovered Yutyrannus huali, a massive feathered cousin of T. rex. (As we now know, feathered dinosaurs weren’t just in China; last year, Canadian paleontologists found them in Alberta, the first time we’ve seen such a thing in the Americas.) Another session, on science at the International Space Station, should be interesting given that Canada’s own Chris Hadfield is about to take command. And, of course, the Higgs boson, the so-called “God particle,” makes an appearance on my list, too.
It’ll be an exciting few days in Boston, soaking up some of the biggest ideas in science. Follow me @katelunau and check back at Maclean’s for the latest.
