Hiya, Nerds! Are you ready for the one-two punch of the best nerdy way to end a week? That BIG first punch is our next Nerd Nite on Thursday, March 13 at LIVE (102 S. First)! Doors open at 6:30 pm, talks start at 7 pm and, as always, there’s no cover charge! (And then that second punch is Pi Day the morning after! Make your crust on 3/13, put it in the fridge, go to Nerd Nite, then bake your Pi on 3/14…what could be better??)
To begin, You’ll Shudder to Learn the Origin of Your Phone’s Shutter Sound (Well, maybe it won’t frighten you, but it’ll be illuminating.) Photo-Geek John Heider will lead his fellow Nerd Nite Nerdlingtons through a concise history of the genesis of the iPhone’s camera shutter sound effect, its analog basis, the sound engineer that grabbed it from the 35 millimeter film world, its initial intended use and how it’s probably the most-heard cell phone sound in the world.
John is a 37 year veteran of the photography business having started in the days of 35 mm film and darkrooms and now uses exclusively digital technology as he got tired of breathing the corrosive fumes of film developers. Due to that excessive chemical exposure he now believes that birds are A.I. generated and that his cat Pickle is the duly elected next president of the United States.
Then, we’ll go From Lead to Gold: How Alchemy and Computer Wizardry Create Better Drugs with Thanh Lai. There’s a reason why medicinal chemists are often referred to as “drug hunters” — it’s because the process of developing drugs feels like a literal hunt! Countless years and $$$ are spent testing hundreds of thousands of molecules to find the perfect drug in the haystack. But what if we can speed things up a bit with some computers and a little magic? Tune into how we revive the ancient art of alchemy to develop your favorite medicines!
Thanh is a fourth year Biophysics graduate student who loves frogs, cooking for people, and learning Spanish (hola). There was a distant time in his life when he wanted to be a lab chemist…until the day when his lab professor le gritó for flushing E. Coli down the sink. And when he contaminó his professor’s chemical reagents with his bare hands. And when he rompió his lab partner’s glassware. Anyways, Thanh does all of his work on a computer now and has yet to be a danger to his environment since (or so he thinks).
Closing it out, it’s time to watch out for Billboard Bandits. They estimated that 167 billboards were cut, chopped down, or chainsawed to the ground along highways surrounding Ann Arbor. The Canadian Black Velvet whiskey billboard atop the Main Street Party Store was the target of a separate attack. Hear tales of local billboard banditry from The Book of Ann Arbor author Richard Retyi.
Richard wrote The Book of Ann Arbor: A Very Serious History Book and is co-creator of the companion podcast Ann Arbor Stories. He works in marketing, so he thinks billboards are swell, but he also enjoys chaos, so dismantle the machine!