In the final installment of May’s “scientists who sci-fi” series, Jocelyn and Bradley are joined by Dr. Diandra Leslie-Pelecky, who takes us along on her journey from high-school dropout to condensed matter physics Ph.D., nanotechnology researcher, and NASCAR physicist. Diandra tells us how she made the decision to step away from academia to become a full-time writer of genre-bending scientific nonfiction and fiction works, and how her “speculative fiction” approach explores the social, cultural, and ethical aspects of scientific advances that are already underway or are likely to come to fruition in the near future. The friends also discuss how an engagement with storytelling can help scientists to become not only better communicators but also better thinkers.

You can find Diandra on Twitter @drdiandra. You can also learn more about her amazing work on her website at https://www.drdiandra.com/ and at the links below.

The Physics of NASCAR:
https://www.amazon.com/Physics-Nascar-Science-Behind-Speed/dp/0452290228
https://www.vox.com/2016/2/19/11065240/daytona-500-2016-nascar-200-mph-physics-drafting-strategy
https://youtu.be/bbMCypdr-I4

Science Saturday: She's Got a Ticket to Ride (Jennifer Ouellette & Diandra Leslie-Pelecky):
https://youtu.be/cZmf5nS_xrw

“Physics is a Survival Skill”: https://youtu.be/rxKLAh977HY

Biomedical Applications of Nanotechnology: https://www.amazon.com/Biomedical-Applications-Nanotechnology-Vinod-Labhasetwar/dp/0471722421

Further reading:

“Narrative Style Influences Citation Frequency in Climate Change Science,” PLOS ONE: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0167983


Digital Storytelling Lab@ Columbia: http://www.digitalstorytellinglab.com/

The Story Grid: https://storygrid.com/books/


“A biomimetic eye with a hemispherical perovskite nanowire array retina,” Nature: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2285-x

Nanodiamonds & nanoparticles for cancer treatment: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5253274/
https://phys.org/news/2015-01-nanodiamonds-chemoresistant-cancer-stem-cells.html

The End of October: https://www.amazon.com/End-October-novel-Lawrence-Wright/dp/0525658653