Secret Science Club presents Ocean Researcher Vicki Ferrini, TUESDAY July 16, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

Dive! Dive! Secret Science Club takes the plunge with Ocean Researcher Vicki Ferrini, TUESDAY July 16, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

Mountain ranges longer than the Andes. Trenches alive with extreme animals. Tectonic plates that grind and pull, creating earthquakes, volcanoes, and tsunamis. The seafloor never fails to surprise and amaze. Yet 80 percent of our ocean floor is still terra incognita. Indeed, there are better maps available of Mars. Vicki Ferrini wants to change that.

 

Dr. Ferrini studies and explores the ocean - from its darkest depths to the emergence of new volcanic islands. Her goal? Creating a map of the entire ocean floor and understanding the geological processes that create its mind-blowing features. Through ocean expeditions, underwater robotics, data analysis, and visualization, Vicki Ferrini is uncovering a never-before-seen blue world.  

 

Before & After  

--Dive into the Deep Blue Sea, a beguiling cocktail from Davy Jones' Locker 

--Groove to sea shanties, surf music, and whale song

--Plunge into the sea-salty Q&A

 

Vicki Ferrini is an ocean researcher at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and an affiliate professor at the Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping. Her research focuses on using mapping techniques to understand the volcanic and tectonic processes that shape the seafloor. She has been on more than 20 ocean expeditions mapping everything from coastal waters to deep-sea environments. Her research has been featured in the BBC News, Popular Science, Newsweek, and Atlas Obscura.  

 

This undersea edition of Secret Science Club meets Tuesday, July 16, 8PM @ the Bell House, 149 7th St, Brooklyn (between 2nd and 3rd avenues). Subway: F or G to 4th Ave, R to 9th St.

Doors open at 7:30PM. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. Just bring your smart self!

SPECIAL EVENT! Secret Science Club presents a rare & riveting screening of "The Cleaners," PLUS Internet Law Professor Kate Klonick, SUNDAY, June 30, 2PM @ the Bell House, $10

“A neon-lit documentary shot like a noir thriller”

Secret Science Club presents a special screening of THE CLEANERS, with Social Media Researcher Kate Klonick (live!), SUNDAY, June 30, 2PM @ the Bell House, $10

Delete ... Ignore ... Delete … Ignore… Someone is out there censoring your social media feed.

THE CLEANERS enters the shadowy world of human content moderators, hired by tech giants like Facebook and Google to do “digital cleaning.” They sift through and remove what they deem as inappropriate content on the internet, thereby influencing what people see and think all over the world. But who are they? Who makes the rules the digital cleaners enforce, and what are the consequences? The Cleaners charts social media’s evolution from a shared vision of a global village (and LOLcats) to today’s dangerous stew of fake news, online extremism, and outrage. “A movie of the moment.”—The Verge

KATE KLONICK starts us off with a mini-lecture on the perils of policing social media.. Dr. Klonick is an assistant professor at St. John’s University School of Law, and an affiliated fellow at Data & Society, New America, and the Information Society Project at Yale Law School. Her research focuses on law and technology, as seen through the lens of cognitive and social psychology. Most recently she has been studying and writing about private internet platforms and how they govern online speech. Dr. Klonick’s work has appeared in the Harvard Law Review, Georgetown Law Journal, New York Times, Atlantic, Vox, Slate, and The Guardian.

 

BEFORE & AFTER: Sunday afternoon cocktails (try Klonick's Tonic!), delicious bites, and door prizes!

Tickets: Advance tickets are available for purchase here.

This cinematic edition of the Secret Science Club meets Sunday, June 30 at 2 pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave; R to 9th St. 

Doors open at 1:30 pm, 18 and over, $10.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

SPECIAL EVENT! Secret Science Club presents a mind-blowing screening of “The Creeping Garden” PLUS Swarm Scientist Simon Garnier, SUNDAY, June 16, 2PM @ the Bell House, ALL AGES, $10

Secret Science Club presents a special screening of The Creeping Garden, one of the coolest & trippiest indie documentaries out there. PLUS Swarm Scientist Simon Garnier gets this cinema party started with a mini-lecture on some surprisingly smart life-forms. 

BEFORE & AFTER: Sunday afternoon cocktails & mocktails, delicious bites, and door prizes!

THE CREEPING GARDEN is a real-life sci-fi movie, exploring the extraordinary world of plasmodial slime molds as revealed through the eyes of scientists and startling time-lapse macro-cinematography. A movie about slime mold? You betcha! These curious organisms are the new stars of biologically inspired art & design, emergence theory, computing, and robot engineering. THE CREEPING GARDEN is a “cinematic cabinet of curiosities that will leave you giddy and delirious with wonder.”

SIMON GARNIER is director of the Swarm Lab and professor of biology at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. He researches robot swarms, army ants, and socially networked slime molds to learn how intelligent collective behaviors (and not so intelligent ones) emerge in groups. Dr. Garnier has been a featured scientist on Science Friday, the Guardian technology video series, National Geographic, Scientific American, Mashable, and The Verge.

Tickets: Advance tickets are available for purchase here.

This cinematic edition of the Secret Science Club meets Sunday, June 16 at 2 pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave; R to 9th St. 

Doors open at 1:30 pm. ALL AGES! $10.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Secret Science Club presents Social Psychologist Daniel Yudkin on the “Moral Mind,” TUESDAY, May 28, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

Right or Wrong? From playgrounds to politics, what is “moral” can be different for different people. Social psychologist Daniel Yudkin dives deep into the moral mind, in-groups and out-groups, the high costs of enforcing the rules, and how it all relates to human cooperation. Dr. Yudkin asks:

--How do humans determine what is morally right and morally wrong?

--Are we born with a moral compass? How early in life do we develop a sense of justice?

--How do group memberships influence moral judgments?

--Does social psychology offer any hints for navigating our current political climate?

Daniel Yudkin researches social & moral psychology at Yale University’s Crockett Lab, where he investigates how people assess & influence their surroundings and how transformative experiences change people’s values & behaviors. He is associate director of research at More in Common, a nonprofit devoted to using social science to understand the roots of political divisions. Dr. Yudkin’s work has been featured in the New Yorker, Atlantic, Washington Post, New York Times, and on CNN. His essays have appeared in Scientific American and the New York Times.

BEFORE & AFTER

--Imbibe our morally ambiguous cocktail of the night, the Right Amount of Wrong

--Groove to harmonious beats

--Stick around for the scintillating Q&A

This edition of the Secret Science Club meets Tuesday, May 28, 8 pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave, R to 9th St.

Doors open at 7:30 pm. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. Just bring your smart self.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Secret Science Club & the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation present the 2019 Lasker Public Lecture with Cell Biologist Elaine Fuchs, MONDAY, April 15, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

The skin is the largest organ in the human body, and it’s a pretty amazing organ, too. When you move, your skin stretches and springs back. When you get a scrape, it heals. Old skin cells are constantly shed and new cells replace them. In fact, every 2 to 4 weeks the outer layer of your skin is completely regenerated—thanks to a reservoir of stem cells in your epidermis.

The skin’s ability to self-renew has long fascinated cell biologist Elaine Fuchs. She has spent her career researching the skin’s stem cells and how their basic biology can be used to create new therapies and cures.

At the next Secret Science Club, Dr. Fuchs asks: What are stem cells? How do they make and repair tissue? What is the role of stem cells in cancer? How can stem cells be used in regenerative medicine?

Elaine Fuchs is the Rebecca C. Lancefield Professor of Mammalian Cell Biology and Development at The Rockefeller University and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Her groundbreaking contributions to skin and stem cell biology have been recognized with multiple awards and honors, including the National Medal of Science, the March of Dimes Prize, the L’Oreal-UNESCO Award, and the E.B. Wilson Prize from the American Society of Cell Biology.

BEFORE & AFTER 

--Sample our cocktail of the night, the Skin Deep

--Shimmy to pluripotent grooves

--Stick around for the scintillating Q&A

This edition of the Secret Science Club, the 2019 Lasker Public Lecture in honor of Al Sommer, is sponsored by the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation. The Foundation works to foster the prevention and treatment of disease and disabilities by honoring excellence in basic and clinical science, educating the public, and advocating for support of medical research.

The Secret Science Club featuring Elaine Fuchs meets Monday, April 15, 8 pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave, R to 9th St.

Doors open at 7:30 pm. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. Just bring your smart self.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Secret Science Club presents Primatologist & Best-selling Author Frans de Waal, MONDAY March 18, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

Secret Science Club presents Primatologist and Best-selling Author Frans de Waal on the Fascinating World of Animal & Human Emotions

With rigorous science and riveting storytelling, Frans de Waal jumps off from his new book, Mama’s Last Hug: Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us About Ourselves.

Drawing on decades of research, Frans de Waal delves into the inner lives of animals, showing that humans are not the only species with the capacity for love, revenge, guilt, hope, pride, and empathy.

Frans de Waal discusses facial expressions, the emotions behind human politics, the role of feelings in survival, as well as “depressed fish, empathetic rats, envious monkeys,” and the chimpanzee Mama, whose dying farewell to her longtime caretaker provided the inspiration for de Waal’s latest book. 

The takeaway is one of continuity between humans and other animals and the many ways in which species are connected via evolution, physiology, and brain chemistry.

Frans de Waal is director of the Living Links Center at Yerkes National Primate Research Center and professor of primate behavior in the department of psychology at Emory University, He is the author of numerous best-selling books, including Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?, Our Inner Ape, The Age of Empathy, Bonobos, and Chimpanzee Politics, as well as over 150 scientific papers, and essays in the New York Times, Science, Nature, and Scientific American. 

BEFORE & AFTER

• Hot off the presses! Snag a signed copy of Frans de Waal's new book, Mama’s Last Hug
• Groove to wild tunes & try our cocktail of the night
  
• Stick around for the scintillating Q&A

This edition of the Secret Science Club meets Monday, March 18, 8PM @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave, R to 9th St.

Doors to the performance space open at 7:30PM. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. (We're expecting a big crowd, so consider arriving early. First come, first served!)

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Secret Science Club presents Microbiologist & Ebola Researcher Kartik Chandran, MONDAY, February 25, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

Ebola is one of the most lethal viruses on the planet. Fifty to ninety percent of Ebola patients die once infected, and over 500 have succumbed in the current outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Microbiologist Kartik Chandran knows the Ebola virus well. He compares it to a clever thief that picks molecular locks, breaks into the body’s cells—and then wreaks havoc. And yet… despite Ebola's virulent nature, some untreated patients manage to fight off the infection and survive. Why?

By discovering exactly how Ebola breaks into cells in the first place and working with engineered antibodies from the blood of Ebola survivors, Kartik Chandran and his team are on their way to defeating the deadly virus—and developing a potential cure for all Ebola strains.

At the next Secret Science Club, Dr. Chandran takes on Ebola and other emerging viruses. He asks:

--How do viruses like Ebola take over healthy cells?

--How did Ebola make the jump from wild animal hosts to human populations?

--What molecular mechanisms and experimental therapies are scientists deploying to fight Ebola?

Kartik Chandran is a professor of microbiology and immunology at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and the Harold and Muriel Block Faculty Scholar in Virology. He has conducted groundbreaking research on the molecular warfare between cells and invading viruses, and works to harness that research to develop antiviral treatments, focusing on filoviruses, such as Ebola virus and Marburg virus, and hantaviruses, such as Sin Nombre virus and Hantaan virus. Dr. Chandran and his research have been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, The Atlantic, and National Geographic, and on BBC news, MSNBC, and Through the Wormhole.

BEFORE & AFTER

--Imbibe our cocktail of the night, the Outbreak of Love (drink in the love—and pass it on!)

--Groove to infectious beats

--Stick around for the scintillating Q&A

This edition of Secret Science Club meets Monday, February 25, 8 pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave, R to 9th St.

Doors open at 7:30 pm. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. Just bring your smart self.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Secret Science Club presents Evolutionary Biologist & Explorer Evon Hekkala, THURSDAY, January 17, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

Secret Science Club goes WILD with biologist & explorer Evon Hekkala

Evolutionary biologist Evon Hekkala has searched for man-eating crocodiles in Madagascar, mined museum collections for DNA in ancient animal mummies, and discovered “extinct” creatures surviving right under our noses. Her goal? Uncovering the mysteries of evolution and finding rare, cryptic, and lost species and saving them from oblivion. 

At the January edition of Secret Science Club, Dr. Hekkala discusses:

--genetic sleuthing and the origins of rare species

--trekking through fossil-filled caves in search of a lost (and gigantic) crocodile

--using museum specimens to understand how species respond to climate change

--why crocodile specimens hung in the shops of ancient alchemists ... hmmmmmmm

Before & After 

--Groove to untamable tunes

--Sink your teeth into the Q&A

--Sample the Death Roll, our mean-and-green cocktail with a twist!

Evon Hekkala is a wildlife researcher & evolutionary biologist at the American Museum of Natural History and a professor of biological sciences at Fordham University. Her research has been featured in the New York Times, Atlantic, Forbes, and New Yorker, and on the National Geographic channel.

This edition of the Secret Science Club meets Thursday, January 17, 8 pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave; R to 9th St.

Doors open at 7:30 pm. Please bring ID: 21+.  No cover. Just bring your smart self!

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Science Is Coming! Support Secret Science Club as We Launch Our 2019 Season

Donate to SSC's New Year's pledge drive and support Secret Science Club 2019.

No matter the season, Secret Science Club is a place where science rockets into the night and shines.

This year Secret Science Club has gone on an amazing, curiosity-fueled ride, presenting public talks on astrophysics, microbiology, brain science, paleontology, robotics, climate & environmental science, the genome, and more. We want our 2019 season to be even more awe-inspiring and science-filled!

Please join us in celebrating science as a vital part of culture & public life and standing up for science as we head into the future.

To make a donation and support Secret Science Club 2019, visit our secure pledge page. You can get cool pledge prizes, too (T-shirts, totes, secret SSC swag, and more!). For those of you who don't want pledge rewards, click here for faster check out.

Thanks to all the brilliant scientists who presented at SSC this year, the amazing people at the Bell House, our talented friends at Symphony Space, our kind & dedicated volunteers and advisors, and our wise partners at the Albert & Mary Lasker Foundation, the Metropolitan Opera, EST/Sloan, and the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs. And thanks to you—our indomitable, wonderful, ever-curious audience members.

Cheers to everyone for supporting SSC's mission! Happy holidays!

Secret Science Club is a program of Science Live Productions, Inc, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization, and your donations are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by law.

For more information, contact secretscienceclub[at]gmail.com

It’s a Wonderful (Quantum) Life, Secret Science Club presents Physicist & Author Chad Orzel, WEDNESDAY, December 12, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

Holly Jolly Physics Finale!

Raise a glass to all that’s weird and wonderful in our world with Physicist & Author Chad Orzel at the Secret Science Club’s holiday edition!

Quantum physics is often thought of as abstract, exotic, and a little bit freaky. While classical physics gives us sensible laws governing the macroscopic world—why a ball rolls downhill and how a plane flies—quantum physics gives us particles that are actually waves, “spooky” action at a distance, and Schrodinger’s unlucky cat. The subatomic world is a shifty, uncertain place. But never fear, physicist Chad Orzel is here to unpack the quantum weirdness.

At this holiday edition of the Secret Science Club, Dr. Orzel jumps off from his new book Breakfast With Einstein to explore the quantum phenomena that animate our everyday reality. Don’t miss a nanoparticle of this awesome talk!

Before & After 

--Groove to entangled tunes

--Stick around for the cosmic Q&A
--Try our subatomic cocktail of the night, the Uncertainty Principle (once you drink it, anything could happen!)

Chad Orzel is a professor of physics at Union College, a pop-science writer, and the co-creator of a series of TED-Ed videos on quantum physics that have been viewed millions of times. He is the author of four books, including the best-selling How to Teach Quantum Physics to Your Dog and his latest Breakfast With Einstein: The Exotic Physics of Everyday Objects (named one of the “Best Science Books of 2018” by the Times of London).

This holiday edition of the Secret Science Club meets Wednesday, December 12, 8pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. in Gowanus, Brooklyn (between 2nd and 3rd avenues). Subway: F or G to 4th Ave; R to 9th Street.

Doors open at 7:30 pm. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. Just bring your smart self!

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Monday, November 19, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE! Secret Science Club & the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation present the 2018 Lasker Public Lecture with Developmental Biologist Ruth Lehmann

Our bodies—and the bodies of all animals—are fascinating and complex. The human body is made of over 35 trillion cells, and there are hundreds of different types: Brain cells, Blood cells. Muscle cells. The list goes on. All are essential to our living, breathing, functioning selves. But among those cells, there is only one kind that is considered “immortal:” the germ cells. Formed in the embryo, these all-powerful cells produce the eggs and sperm that carry our DNA, and allow us to keep on grooving, generation after generation.

At the next Secret Science Club, biologist Ruth Lehmann explores the mysterious lives of cells and their role in reproduction.  She asks:  What’s up in the embryo? How and when do germ cells form? In what ways are these “immortal” cells radically different from other cells in the body? How do germ cells get romanced into making eggs and sperm? Is there a matchmaking molecule?

Ruth Lehmann is a developmental biologist at the NYU School of Medicine, where she is Director of the Skirball Institute of Biomolecular Medicine, Chair of the Department of Cell Biology, Laura and Isaac Perlmutter Professor of Cell Biology, an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and Director of the Lehmann Lab. The author of over 150 scientific papers, Dr. Lehmann is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

BEFORE & AFTER 

--Sample our cocktail of the night, the Germ of an Idea 

--Shimmy to everlasting tunes

--Stick around for the scintillating Q&A

This edition of the Secret Science Club, the 2018 Lasker Public Lecture in honor of Al Sommer, is sponsored by the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation. The Foundation works to foster the prevention and treatment of disease and disabilities by honoring excellence in basic and clinical science, educating the public, and advocating for support of medical research.Yay!

The Secret Science Club featuring Ruth Lehmann meets Monday, November 19, 8 pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave, R to 9th St.

Doors open at 7:30 pm. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. Just bring your smart self.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Secret Science Club presents “The Riddler” with Puzzle Master & Author Oliver Roeder, Tuesday, October 16, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

We’ve got your number! Come celebrate math, logic, and probability at the next Secret Science Club.

Puzzle master, game theorist and FiveThirtyEight columnist, Oliver Roeder shares the tricks to statistical thinking and every-day math, while beguiling us with puzzles from his new book, The Riddler.

Before & After

--Try our calculating cocktail of the night, the Double Down

--Groove to music of the spheres

--Stick around for the quantum Q&A

-- Snag a signed copy of Oliver Roeder's new book, The Riddler: Fantastic Puzzles from FiveThirtyEight

Oliver Roeder is a senior writer and puzzle editor at FiveThirtyEight, where he explores numbers in the news and presents brain-stretching math and logic puzzles. He holds a PhD in economics with a focus on game theory. Previously, he ran the quantitative research team at NYU’s Brennan Center for Justice. The Riddler is his first book.

This sequential edition of the Secret Science Club meets Tuesday, October 16, 8 pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. in Gowanus, Brooklyn (between 2nd and 3rd avenues). Subway: F or G to 4th Ave; R to 9th Street.

Doors open at 7:30 pm. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. Just bring your smart self!

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Secret Science Club presents Biologist and “X-Lab” Director Joao Xavier, Wednesday, September 19, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

When Antonie van Leeuwenhoek first saw bacteria through a microscope in 1683, he was amazed—tiny “animalcules” invisible to the naked eye were all around us. No one had known. Yet they were legion. Centuries on, major microbial mysteries are still being uncovered and continue to amaze….

At the next Secret Science Club, we dive into the world of one-celled organisms with modern-day micronaut Joao Xavier. At his “X Lab,” evolution happens virtually overnight—and microbes grow faster, stronger, and stranger.

More than a mere curiosity, the evolution, ecology, and social behavior of these "wee little beasties" could have major implications: One of the microbes Dr. Xavier studies, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, is considered one of the 10 most dangerous antibiotic-resistant bacteria on the planet. Knowing how these social microbes evolve, form communities, and “talk” to other cells could lead to new treatments for deadly infections.

Joao Xavier is a computational biologist, associate faculty member, and director of the “X Lab” at the Sloan Kettering Institute, the experimental research arm of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. He uses computer models and experiments to research social interaction and evolution in disease-causing bacteria, biofilms, the ecological processes and metagenomics of gut microbiota, and how cancer cells interact with noncancerous cells. A recipient of a New Innovator Award from the National Institutes of Health, he has been a featured scientist in the New York Times, Quanta, and Wired.

Before & After

--Try our (r)evolutionary cocktail of the night, the (Microbial) Resistance

--Wiggle to grooves that wriggle!

--Stick around for the scintillating Q&A

This experimental and “prettily a-moving” edition of the Secret Science Club meets Wednesday, September 19, 8 pm @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave; R to 9th Street.

Doors open at 7:30 pm. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. Just bring your smart self!

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Secret Science Club presents “Beyond Jurassic Park” with Paleontologist & Ant-ologist Phillip Barden Tuesday, August 28, 8PM @ the Bell House, FREE!

At the next Secret Science Club, bugged-out paleontologist Phillip Barden talks about prehistoric "vampire ants from hell" and the evolution of social insects.

He asks: What do 100-million-year-old amber fossils tell us about the history of life? How are new imaging techniques such as X-ray based CT-scanning revolutionizing our understanding of species—both living and extinct?

Phillip Barden is an evolutionary biologist and assistant professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. He researches social insects, the fossil record, and comparative genomics. His field research has taken him to Australia, India, and Guyana. His work has been featured in the New York Times, Smithsonian Magazine, LiveScience, and New Scientist.

Before & After

--Sample our Cretaceous cocktail of the night, the Amber Alert

--Groove to tunes from lost worlds

--Stick around for the scintillating Q&A

This fossil-friendly edition of Secret Science Club meets Tuesday, August 28, 8PM @ the Bell House, 149 7th St. (between 2nd and 3rd avenues) in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Subway: F or G to 4th Ave, R to 9th St. 

Doors open at 7:30PM. Please bring ID: 21+. No cover. Just bring your smart self.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Secret Science Club is on hiatus for the month of July. 

We'll be back at the Bell House in Brooklyn on Tuesday, August 28. See you then!