Ice Worms, Magic Mushrooms, Redback Spiders and Lobotomies: Communicating Science contains 43 articles about scientific subjects by 14 new writers from Science and Writing, an upper-level course in the Professional Writing and Communication Program at the University of Toronto at Mississauga.

With articles about poison dart frogs, performance enhancing drugs, lobotomy, magic mushrooms, ice worms, human genetics, cone snails, marathon running, redback spiders, gender identity, autism, penguins, spinal bifida and traumatic brain injury, this collection offers models of lucid, engaging, research-based writing.

These writers bridge the gap between the culture of science and the wider culture of educated and curious readers. Science, even for the intelligent and highly educated, seems to happen in forbidding and remote territory we fear.

Good science writing guides us there.

The Science of Writing Collective includes:

Monica Chatrath
Sara Angel Herrche
Katherine Jones
Karen Phung
Sharlene Sarfi
Ashish Seth
Mélanie Sindrey

Articles include:

Selections from "Lobotomy"
by Beth Dennis

Selections from "Performance Enhancing Drugs"
by Ben Fong

Selections from "Poison Dart Frogs"
by Sharlene Sarfi

Selections from "Psilocybin"
by Ashish Seth

Selections from "Ice Worms"
by Chun-Lan Lin

Selections from "Genetics"
by Andrea Huston

Selections from "Distance Running"
by Sherisse McLaughlin

Selections from "Sexual Cannibalism in the Redback Spider"
by Karen Phung

Selections from "Gender Identity Disorder"
by J. J. Deogracias

Selections from "Autism"
by Geoff Thomas

Selections from "Adélies"
by Lauren MacNeil

Selections from "Spina Bifida"
by Susan Guenther

Selections from "Cone Snails"
by Jaclyn Davis

Selections from "Traumatic Brain Injury"
by Isabelle May-Parker

National Library of Canada Cataloguing in Publication Data

Toronto: Life Rattle Press, 2011
Ice worms, magic mushrooms, redback spiders and lobotomies: communicating science
Collected and edited by Guy Allen with the University of Toronto Science Writing Collective
1. Technical Writing.
2. Science News.
3. Series (Life Rattle new writers series 1200-5266)
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-1-927023-00-6
T11.I25 2011          808.06'66          C2011-905934-7