Sid Perkins

Freelance Writer

Sid is a freelance science journalist. He lives in Crossville, Tenn., with his wife, two dogs and three cats. He specializes in earth sciences and paleontology but often tackles topics such as astronomy, planetary science, materials science and engineering. 

 

In 2009, Sid won the Award for Distinguished Science Journalism in the Atmospheric and Related Sciences from the American Meteorological Society. And in 2002, he shared the American Astronomical Society’s Solar Physics Division’s Award for Popular Writing on Solar Physics. Sid’s writing also appears in Science, Nature, Scientific American, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Science News.

All Stories by Sid Perkins

  1. Tech

    ‘Smart’ sutures monitor healing

    Coatings added to the threads used to stitch up a wound let researchers use electrical signals to monitor a wound’s healing — even one covered by a bandage.

  2. Materials Science

    Beetles offer people lessons in moisture control

    Taking tricks from a beetle, researchers are designing surfaces that collect water from the air or resist frost buildup.

  3. Tech

    Clear, stretchy sensor could lead to wearable electronics

    Researchers have combined plastics and metal to make a transparent, stretchable sensor. It could soon find use in touchscreens, wearable electronics and more.

  4. Tech

    Concrete science

    Teen researchers are exploring ways to strengthen this building material, use it for safety purposes and use its discarded rubble.

  5. Tech

    Helping MS patients get a grip on things

    An Irish teen has invented a device that helps people with multiple sclerosis address the “clenched fist” symptom that afflicts most such patients.

  6. Fossils

    Identifying ancient trees from their amber

    A Swedish teen’s analyses of a sample of amber may have uncovered a previously unknown type of ancient tree.

  7. Tech

    Teen offers technology that could help brain surgeons

    It can reproduce plastic models of the precise faulty vessels that need fixing. Now doctors can see them, hold them and practice on them long before they pick up a scalpel.

  8. Health & Medicine

    Common plant could help fight Zika virus

    A teen discovered that extracts from leaves of the San Francisco plant (Codiaeum variegatum) kill larvae of the mosquito that helps spread the Zika and dengue fever viruses.

  9. Tech

    Where did that turbine blade get smacked?

    A new technique can help engineers figure out where a bird or other object collided with a wind turbine or other whirling blade.

  10. Tech

    Control a computer with your tongue

    Thousands of severely paralyzed people could venture into cyberspace with the use of this new tongue-controlled computer mouse. It was developed by a teen.

  11. Tech

    Teens invent way to keep floodwaters out of subways

    Two New York teens have designed an inexpensive subway grate to block floodwaters from getting into subway tunnels.

  12. Health & Medicine

    Teens take home huge awards for their research

    Top three prizes — adding up to $175,000 — are a small fraction of the approximately $4 million just handed out at the 2016 Intel International Science and Engineering Fair.