The Best Australian Science Writing 2014 (39 page)

‘Survival in the city' by Nicky Phillips was originally published in the
Sydney Morning Herald
on 27 April 2013.

‘Planet of the vines' by William Laurance appeared in
New
Scientist
, 5 October 2013: © 2014 Reed Business Information – UK. All rights reserved. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency.

‘Is there room for organics?' by James Mitchell Crow was first published in
Cosmos
, February 2014.

‘This. Here. Now. The climate catastrophe' by John Cook was published in
Anne Summers Reports
, issue 5, December 2013.

‘Weather and mind games' by Tom Griffiths was published in
Griffith Review 41: Now We Are Ten.

‘Weathering the storm' by Peter Meredith was published in
Australian Geographic
, July 2013.

‘Firefront' by Ian Gibbins was published in
The Inflectionist
Review
, 2014 (2) <
www.inflectionism.com
>.

‘Antarctic ice: Going, going …' by Nerilie Abram was commissioned for
A Curious Country
, edited by Leigh Dayton for the Office of the Chief Scientist, 2013.

‘They're taking over! The jellyfish move in' by Tim Flannery was published in the
New York Review of Books
on 26 September 2013.

‘From Alzheimer's to zebrafish' by Michael Lardelli was first published in
e-Science Magazine
, Faculty of Science, University of Adelaide, July 2013.

‘Joseph Jukes' epiphanies' by Iain McCalman is extracted from his book
The Reef: A passionate history
(Viking/Penguin, 2013).

‘Popular mechanics' by Gareth Dickson was published in the
White Review
<
www.thewhitereview.org
> as part of the shortlist for the journal's 2013 short story prize.

‘The CAVE artists' by Dyani Lewis was published in
Nature
Medicine
, March 2014.

‘High-tech treasure hunt' by Sarah Kellett was published in
The
Helix
, <
http://www.csiro.au/Portals/Education/Programs/Double-Helix-Science-Club/The-Helix.aspx
>, February 2014.

‘The carnivorous platypus' by John Pickrell appeared in
Australian
Geographic
, January/February 2014.

‘The eye in the sand' by Rebecca Giggs was published in
Meanjin
, 72:4 (2013), MUP, edited by Zora Sanders.

‘The now delusion' by Michael Slezak was the cover story in the 2 November 2013 issue of
New Scientist
: © 2014 Reed Business Information – UK. All rights reserved. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency.

‘Reached by committee, nineteen eighty-three' by Paul Magee appears in his book,
Stone Postcard
, John Leonard Press, 2014.

‘Material of the future' by Lisa Clausen was published in
The Good
Weekend
on 20 January 2014.

‘Pitch fever' by Trent Dalton appeared in
The Weekend Australian
Magazine
, 6 April 2013.

‘Uniquely human' by Thomas Suddendorf is extracted from
The
Gap
, Basic Books, 2013.

‘The pet-keeping species' by Peter McAllister was published on
Cosmos
online <
www.cosmosmagazine.com/cosmos_online
> on 31 March 2014.

‘Penis size may be driven by women (Oh, and it matters …)' by Rob Brooks was published in
The Conversation
on 9 April 2013.

‘Eleven grams of trouble' by Frank Bowden appeared on
Inside
Story
on 18 March 2014.

‘TB and me: A medical souvenir' by Jo Chandler was published in
The Global Mail
on 12 June 2013. Some material has been updated in this piece.

‘Massimo's genes' by Leah Kaminsky was commissioned for
Griffith Review 41: Now We Are Ten
and also sparked an episode of
Australian Story
screened in October 2013.

‘Life, the universe and Boolardy' by Richard Guilliatt was published in
The Weekend Australian Magazine
on 12 October 2013.

‘Liner notes,
Voyager
Golden Record' by Meredi Ortega won the inaugural
Australian Poetry
Science Poetry competition in 2013 and was published online at <
www.australianpoetry.org
>.

‘Beyond the “Morning Star”' by Alice Gorman appeared on
The Conversation
on 3 October 2013.

‘The oldest known star' by Bianca Nogrady was published online by ABC Science <
www.abc.net.au/science
> on 10 February 2014.

‘The quantum spinmeister: Professor Andrea Morello' by Stephen Pincock was published online by
Cosmos
on 3 March 2014 and in the April/May issue of the magazine.

‘Here be dragons' by Vanessa Hill was originally published on the CSIRO Newsblog on 7 January 2014.

In 2012, NewSouth Publishing launched a new annual prize for the best short non-fiction piece on science written for a general audience. The Bragg UNSW Press Prize is named in honour of Australia's first Nobel laureates, William Henry Bragg and his son William Lawrence Bragg. The Braggs won the 1915 Nobel Prize for physics for their work on the analysis of crystal structure by means of X-rays. Both scientists led enormously productive lives and left a lasting legacy. William Henry Bragg was a firm believer in making science popular among young people, and his Christmas lectures for students were described as models of clarity and intellectual excitement.

The Bragg UNSW Press Prize is supported by the Copyright Agency Cultural Fund. The winner receives a prize of $7000 and two runners up each receive a prize of $1500.

The shortlisted entries for the 2014 prize are included in this anthology.

The Bragg UNSW Press Prize for Science Writing

2014 Shortlist

Frank Bowden
Eleven grams of trouble

Jo Chandler
TB and me: A medical souvenir

Peter Meredith
Weathering the storm

James Mitchell Crow
Is there room for organics?

Stephen Pincock
The quantum spinmeister:

Professor Andrea Morello

Winners announced in November 2014 at

Judges of the Bragg UNSW Press Prize 2014

Professor Merlin Crossley

Professor Suzanne Miller

Professor Fred Watson

Ashley Hay, editor of
The Best Australian Science Writing 2014