As we bid farewell to 2015, and ramp up for the New Year, here’s a look back on the hottest SciTech Connect articles of 2015:

The Bounty of Nothingness: New Opportunities
By Gary Gladysz

We may think of empty space as nothingness – space that’s perhaps waiting to be filled with something useful – but scientists and engineers know that the voids are intrinsically valuable. They can fortify structures to make them stronger without burdening them with weight. Read more…

The Chemistry Behind Beer Flavor
By Leen C. Verhagen

Beer is one of the most widespread and largely consumed alcoholic drinks in the world. The total world’s beer production amounts to about 1.7 billion liters. It is a complex alcoholic beverage, containing numerous flavor-active compounds over a wide range of concentrations. Read more…

The Real Biology of “Star Wars” Midichlorians
By Mark Hom

The George Lucas Star Wars saga spans multiple generations of characters (and fans), seven movies to date, and future sequels that will apparently extend the series into infinity. Star Wars is deeply rooted in the world’s popular culture. But what is the underlying theme of Star Wars? Here are some flawed possibilities. Read more…

Fifty Shades of Prey: Using Thermal Imagers to Survey Animals in the Wild
By Kirk J. Havens

One reason we, as authors, had for writing this book is to clear up long standing and fairly pervasive misunderstandings regarding the use of thermal imagers in the field. One common misunderstanding that has persisted is that a snow-covered background is preferred for aerial surveys of mammals. Read more…

Health Check on an Ailing Planet
By Scott Elias

As the human population has tripled in the last 60 years, Earth has suffered greatly from the ever-increasing demands we’ve been making on the planet’s resources. We have developed the technology to over-fish the seas, cut down the rain forests and convert all but the most inhospitable landscapes for our own use. Do we have the wisdom to slow down our consumption of natural resources before it’s too late? Read more…

Food Waste Recovery: Time for Industrial Implementation
Charis Galanakis

Until the end of the 20th century, disposal of food wastes was not considered as a matter of concern. In the 21th century, escalating demands for processed foods have required identification of concrete directions to minimize energy demands and economic costs as well as reduce food losses and waste. Read more…

Beyond Einstein’s Brain: The Anatomy of Genius
By Mark Hom

When Albert Einstein died in 1955, his brain was removed, weighed and measured, preserved in formalin, photographed, and sectioned for microscopic study. Although we often think of technological breakthroughs as coming from corporations or industry sectors, ideas come from individual brains. Read more…

Truth and Empiricism in Chemical Engineering
By Sean Moran

I have written An Applied Guide to Process and Plant Design in order to address the shortcomings of Chemical Engineering Education. These shortcomings have become so entrenched that academics now think that their mistaken approaches are superior to those of real engineers. Read more…

Distributed Generation and Implications for the Utility Industry
By Fereidoon Sioshansi

 Distributed Generation and its Implications for the utitlity industry, with rapid changes taking place mostly on the customer-side of the meter, including distributed generation (DG) from rooftop PVs and storage in the form of EVs, are affecting the upstream utility infrastructure, revenues, operations and ultimately the utility business model. Read more…

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Happy Holidays, everyone! Here’s to a wonderful New Year!