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The boy who played with fusion : extreme science, extreme parenting, and how to make a star  Cover Image Book Book

The boy who played with fusion : extreme science, extreme parenting, and how to make a star / Tom Clynes.

Clynes, Tom, (author.).

Summary:

"How an American teenager became the youngest person ever to build a working nuclear fusion reactor. By the age of nine, Taylor Wilson had mastered the science of rocket propulsion. At eleven, his grandmother's cancer diagnosis drove him to investigate new ways to produce medical isotopes. And by fourteen, Wilson had built a 500-million-degree reactor and become the youngest person in history to achieve nuclear fusion. How could someone so young achieve so much, and what can Wilson's story teach parents and teachers about how to support high-achieving kids? Here, science journalist Tom Clynes narrates Taylor Wilson's extraordinary journey--from his Arkansas home where his parents fully supported his intellectual passions, to a unique Reno, Nevada, public high school just for academic superstars, to the present, when Wilson is winning international science competitions with devices designed to prevent terrorists from shipping radioactive material into the country. Along the way, Clynes reveals how our education system shortchanges gifted students, and what we can do to fix it." -- From publisher description.

Record details

  • ISBN: 9780544085114
  • Physical Description: xv, 303 pages : color illustrations ; 24 cm
  • Publisher: Boston : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, [2015]

Content descriptions

General Note:
"An Eamon Dolan book."
Bibliography, etc. Note:
Includes bibliographical references (pages 285-295) and index.
Formatted Contents Note:
The digger -- The pre-nuclear family -- Propulsion! -- Space camp -- The "responsible" radioactive boy scout -- The cookie jar -- In the (glowing) footsteps of giants -- Alpha, beta, gamma -- Trust but verify -- Extreme parenting -- Accelerating toward big science -- Heavy water -- Bright as the sun -- Bringing the sun down to earth -- The roots of prodigiousness -- The lucky donkey theory -- Twice as nice, half as good -- Atomic travel -- A champion for the gifted -- A hogwarts for geniuses -- A fourth state of grape -- Heavy metal apron -- Birth of a star -- The neutron club -- A field of dreams, an epiphany in a box -- The father of all bombs -- We're just breathing your air -- The superbowl of science -- Scotch tape.
Subject: Wilson, Taylor, 1994-
Gifted boys > United States > Biography.
Fusion reactors.
Nuclear fusion.
Genre: Biographies.

Available copies

  • 3 of 3 copies available at Sage Library System. (Show)
  • 1 of 1 copy available at Columbia Gorge Community College. (Show)
  • 1 of 1 copy available at Columbia Gorge Community College Library.

Holds

  • 0 current holds with 3 total copies.
Show Only Available Copies
Location Call Number / Copy Notes Barcode Shelving Location Circulation Modifier Status Due Date Courses
Columbia Gorge Community College Library SCIENCE CLYN 2015 (Text) 39705000007590 Main Collection Available -


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