Recently (Sep 28, 2017), I had the pleasure of speaking at a Science Cafe. I did not know what a Science Cafe is before being asked to give a talk at one! They are, in fact, scientific events that happen in public places. The goal is not to give a lecture but rather the hope is to have an informal discussion about a scientific topic.

This was not the first time I spoke for general audience but this was the first time I did it in a restaurant and surely it was an exciting experience! The turnout was good. There were a few ASU physics folks, a high school chemistry teacher, a family with their beautiful kids and some ASU undergrads!

My talk was about glasses. How do we make glass? Why do glasses have such properties? What are the way to make better glasses? I made sure I am showing people tons of pretty pictures with minimal text, and of course no equation! In particular, I wanted to show them how glass is part of our lives, from art to our cell phones, from cookware to scientific research!

At the end, people asked me questions, some of them really hard!

One thing I wish I was more prepared for was about units and scales! When I was asked about atom-thick glasses, someone asked me how thick is that? And I dropped the ball and said nm! So they asked me how much is a nanometer? and it took me a good 10 seconds to come up with a intuitive answer. So an advice for my future self: learn some intuitive ways to related units and scale to everyday life. How much is 1K? 300 times less than boiling point of water! How much is an angstrom? 1000 times smaller than a needle tip!