Photo by Tony Hitchcock
Welcome! I’m a physicist, science writer, public speaker, educator, and frequent wearer of jaunty hats. I love the wonderful Universe we inhabit — black holes, galaxies, planets, and marvelous zoo of particles, with all the ways they interact — and if I can convey some of that love in my writing, I have done my job.
My Writing Portfolio page contains a complete list of my publications; the “Recent Posts” list in the sidebar links my most recent articles. Since 2011, I have contributed over 300 articles to 30 separate publications, including: Slate, Mosaic, Ars Technica, The Daily Beast, Symmetry, Undark, and many more. My work has also appeared in print in Popular Science, Smithsonian Air & Space Magazine, SIAM News, and Physics World . My science comics with artist Maki Naro have been published in the premiere nonfiction comics site The Nib, and will be collected in a book titled Who Owns an Asteroid? , scheduled for 2020 publication.
- Email: MatthewFrancis@GalileosPendulum.org
- On Twitter: @DrMRFrancis
- LinkedIn profile
- My resume (PDF format)
- My curriculum vitae (PDF format)
I’m also available for interviews, podcasts, public speaking engagements, and other activities.
BOOKS! BOOKS! BOOKS!
Preliminary cover for “Who Owns an Asteroid?” by Maki Naro and me.
With artist Maki Naro, I’ve written a series of nonfiction science comics for The Nib. Now, we’re turning those comics — along with material never before published! — into a book entitled Who Owns an Asteroid? Comics on Science and Society. We’re crowdfunding the project through Unbound, a UK-based publisher. The Who Owns an Asteroid? page has all the information, including preview pictures and a number of rewards you get for various levels of pledging.
I also contributed a chapter to the anthology Midwest Architecture Journeys from Belt Publishing , which will be available on October 15, 2019 (and available for preorder until then). My chapter covers the quirky architecture of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, more commonly known as Fermilab.
Representative writing samples
- What is life? (feature article in Mosaic Science)
- Penguin Spotting, and Other Cool Satellite Tricks (feature article in Air & Space Magazine)
- What City Ants Can Teach Us About Species Evolution And Climate Change (feature article for Undark)
- “Life, uh, finds a way”—Applying lessons from evolution to go to Mars (feature article for Ars Technica)
- The Dawn of a New Era in Science (news feature in The Atlantic on the detection of gravitational waves by LIGO)
