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For the November edition, we explain how you may unknowingly be a victim of food fraud, how Canadian artificial intelligence will soon launch to the Moon, and how winter tires really work.

Introduction Diverse perspectives in science, technology, engineering and math are crucial to supporting innovation and building trust between the research community and the public. This requires us to look outside of our organizations and think about how we can best support the innovation potential of other communities within Canada and ensure our work is reflective of multiple worldviews. Indigenous Peoples, including First Nations, the Métis Nation and Inuit, have been major innovators since

For the September edition, we explain how mathematics is an indispensable tool for space exploration, how honeybees are masters of geometry, and about the unbelievable uniqueness of a shuffled deck of cards.

Hello, my reading friend, and welcome to this third part of our article on the total solar eclipse of 31 August 1932 – a part you were very keen on last week. So, you can store the pitchforks and torches. Yours truly would like to be able to tell you that everything went swimmingly on that day in August 1932, in the middle of the afternoon, but the reality was quite different. Clouds darkened the sky in a good part of the Québec zone of total darkness, from Parent in the North to Magog in the

Hello, my reading friend passionate about astronomy. Would you like to continue without further delay this presentation devoted to the solar eclipse of August 1932? Wunderbar! Before undertaking that reading exercise, allow me to identify some of the eminent British researchers en route to Canada aboard the Canadian liner SS Montcalm operated by Canadian Pacific Steamships Ocean Services Limited for the purpose of observing said eclipse. Yes, the ones you saw on the photograph above a few

The ear phonautograph was a macabre instrument. It was built by Alexander Graham Bell and Clarence J. Blake in 1874, and used a surgically-removed human ear—a skull fragment, ear canal, ear drum, and ossicle bones—to visually “write” sound waves. It worked like this: the surgically-removed ear was first attached to the top bracket of the instrument by a bolt driven through the skull fragment. It was then tightened in place with a thumbscrew. When a user spoke into the mouthpiece, located behind

Hello, my reading friend. To be precise, hello. Yours truly’s long association with the wondrous Canada Aviation and Space Museum in Ottawa, Ontario, leads me on this day to pontificate on a subject of a highly celestial nature. I must admit that I am not an umbraphile / eclipse hunter. This being said (typed?), a total solar eclipse is definitely a sight worth seeing. Indeed, I seem to recall seeing a partial annular eclipse in Ottawa, in May 1994, but I digress. A solar eclipse or, more

Hello there, my reading friend. You caught me in the middle of something. I will be right with you. […] Hello there, again. Are we ready to complete our examination of the stellar career of Canadian astronomer Carlyle Smith Beals? Wunderbar! Well, Beals, his spouse and their daughter left British Columbia in early November 1946. The First Assistant at the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory, on Little Saanich Mountain, north of Victoria, British Columbia, was beginning a new career at the

Ave, mi amice qui legit, salve. Quid agis hodie? Gaudeo te audire quod bene facis. Do you not love the sound of Latin in the morning, my reading friend? Increasingly accurate online translators allow inadequately educated boors like yours truly to sound, well, civilized / couth / cultured. When they work properly that is. A case in point. What is a proper translation of the word several in French? Plusieurs or quelques? My tiny mind consistently gravitates toward quelques, because it is