Episode 28 – Who watches the Watchmen? Scientists Do!

Jennifer Ouellette

Our guest this week is Jennifer Ouellette, director of the Science and Entertainment Exchange.  The Exchange provides entertainment industry professionals with access to top scientists and engineers to help bring the reality of cutting-edge science to creative and engaging storylines.

Jennifer talks to us about her work with the Exchange, in how scientists advise pop culture – including movies like The Watchmen, and TV shows such as Fringe and The Big Bang Theory.

About Jennifer Ouellette
In addition her work with the Science and Entertainment Exchange, Jennifer is the author of Black Bodies and Quantum Cats: Tales from the Annals of Physics and The Physics of the Buffyverse.  Her work has also appeared in New Scientist, Discover, Salon, Symmetry, and Physics World, among other publications.

• Jennifer Ouellette’s Website
• Cocktail Party Physics
• Twisted Physics
• Articles in the Popular Press, Interviews
• Contributing Writer to the Huffington Post
• Oullette’s Essay on “Big Bang Theory” from Symmetry

Science is not something only smart nerdy people do. It’s central to all our lives, and it’s all around us, all the time. Reveling in one’s ignorance of this fact is just — well, kinda sad. (from “Shame on Gawker” post)

Links

• Science and Entertainment Exchange Symposium Slideshow
• Science and Entertainment Exchange on Facebook
• Science Fact, Hollywood Fiction, from the American Institute of Physics
• NSTA’s Blick on Flicks (latest episode: Nuking the Fridge, Odd Magnetism, and Issues with Inertia in The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull)
• David Saltzberg, Professor of Physics and Astronomy at UCLA and science advisor for ‘The Big Bang Theory‘
• USA Today: “There’s a Science to CBS’ ‘Big Bang Theory’
• From Forbes.com: 10 Films that Would Flunk Science Class

Advising Science in ‘Watchmen’

• The Science of Watchmen
• Jim Kakalios, School of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Minnesota
• From Scientific American: How Scientifically Accurate is Watchmen?
• The Science Behind ‘Watchmen’ from Forbes.com
• Getting it Right: Hollywood Collaborates with Scientists to Improve Factual Accuracy

Direct download: LOL28.mp3