The Birds, the Bees and the Platypuses

Michael Gross has been writing about science full time for the last eight years and as a night time hobby for the previous seven. From his treasure troves, he now presents his favourite science stories from these 15 years.
What are the attractions that make him revisit a topic or reread an article again and again? Often, it's the sheer craziness of wildly unexpected findings or grotesquely oversized challenges. In other stories, there is a sexy element or an unexpected insight into the human condition. And sometimes, when reporting new and future technologies, the author just can't help thinking: »cooooooool!« So here are more than 60 crazy, sexy and cool science stories for you to enjoy.

Autorentext
Michael Gross, born in 1963, began studing chemical engineering in Karlsruhe, but moved to chemistry at the univeristies of Marburg and Regensburg. After his Ph.D. in physical biochemistry he worked seven years at the Oxford Centre for Molecular Science in the field of protein folding, including studies of Alzheimers and Parkinsons diseases. Since 1993 he started with science journalism and wrote many popular science books (Life on the Edge, Travels to the Nanoworld, Light and Life, Astrobiology), some of them in German and English language. He is now writer in science at the Birkbeck College, London, and a regular contributor to several prestigeous journals and magazins like Chemistry World, Current Biology, Chemistry and Industry, The Independent, Nature, New Scientist, Spektrum der Wissenschaft, Suddeutsche Zeitung and many more.

Inhalt
CRAZY -
WEIRD AND WONDERFUL TALES FROM NATURE AND SCIENCE
Tardigrades can take the pressure
Magic bullets from the desert
Asparagine and old lace
Peptides shielding our skin
Health warning: your body may be unstable
All together now
So where is most of the universe?
Cell jet printers
A frizzled inhairitance
How to eat without a stomach
Astronomy helps spotting whalesharks
Talk to your protein
Ancient protein survives in our eyes

SEXY -
OFFIAL: PEOPLE ARE THE WEIRDEST CREATURES ON THIS PLANET: SORRY, PLATYPUS
Read my lips
A matter of taste
Let your love glow
Jacobson's molecules
The science of the Simpsons
Elusive treasures
Eggs and sperms and rock n' roll
A Cuban success story
Cupid chemistry

COOL -
WELL, HUMANS MAY BE WEIRD, BUT THEY DID DEVELOP SOME COOL TECHNOLOGY
Crystallographic antibodies
Dip-pen lithography
Traffic-light proteins
A cool receptor
Biotronics: a collision of continents
The one-atom quantum computer
Twist and twirl
Multi-purpose DNA
Diatoms
Nature's warning signs
All on one chip
Platinum stories
Nanowires plugged into nerve cells
Aptamer sensors
Hairy ball theorem untangles chemical problem