James Kakalios

James Kakalios is the Taylor Distinguished Professor in the School of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Minnesota, where he has been teaching since 1988. His research projects in experimental solid state physics range from the nano to the neuro. In 2001 he created a Freshman Seminar course at the University of Minnesota entitled "Everything I Know About Science I Learned from Reading Comic Books." When the first Spider-Man film was released in May 2002, media attention about this class inspired him to write The Physics of Superheroes - now in its Spectacular Second Edition. He was the science consultant for the Warner Bros. film Watchmen. In Feb. 2009 he filmed a video on The Science of Watchmen for the University of Minnesota's youtube page which, to date, has been viewed over 1.6 million times, and in Sept. 2009 won a regional Emmy award and in 2010 was nominated for a Webby. His latest book - The Amazing Story of Quantum Mechanics - explains the basic quantum physics principles behind the laser, transistors, light emitting diodes, computer hard drives and magnetic resonance imaging. He has been reading comic books longer than he has been studying physics.