Bust out your planners, calendars, and PDAs (if you are throwback like that), it’s time to mark your calendars for the HMNS events of this week!

Last week’s featured #HMNSBlockParty creation is by Tracey (age 8).

Want to get your engineering handwork featured? Drop by our brand-new Block Party interactive play area and try your own hand building a gravity-defying masterpiece. Tag your photos with #HMNSBlockParty.

Lecture – Tracking a Killer: The Origin and Evolution of Tuberculosis
Tuesday, Feb. 2
6:30 p.m.
In 2014, tuberculosis (TB) surpassed HIV as the leading cause of death from infectious disease. TB has long been a scourge of humans; however, exactly how long has been debated. In this lecture Anne Stone examines the evolutionary history of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacteria that causes TB, focusing on the distribution of TB strains in humans in order to understand their relationships, assess patterns of pathogen exchange through time, and investigate how TB adapted to humans and other animals.
Sponsored by The Leakey Foundation.

Lecture – The Planet Remade: How Geoengineering Could Change the World by Oliver Morton
Thursday, Feb. 4
6:30 p.m.
The risks of global warming are pressing and potentially vast. The past century’s changes to the planet-to the clouds and the soils, to the winds and the seas, to the great cycles of nitrogen and carbon-have been far more profound than most of us realize. The difficulty of doing without fossil fuels is daunting, possibly even insurmountable. To meet the urgent need to rethink our responses to this crisis, a small but increasingly influential group of scientists is exploring proposals for planned human intervention in the climate system.

In the United States for a special lecture tour, Oliver Morton will explore the history, politics and cutting-edge science of geoengineering that may provide solutions, as well as address the deep fear that comes with seeing humans as a force of nature, and asks what might be required of us use that force for good to combat global warming.

Special Exhibition: Biodiversity in the Art of Carel Pieter Brest van Kempen Closes Friday, Feb. 7
HMNS at Sugar Land
Brest van Kempen’s meticulously executed paintings in rich jewel tones explore the variety of nature and attest to the artist’s belief that chief among nature’s hallmarks is its diversity. This widely acclaimed exhibition consists of 50 original paintings and preparatory sketches inspired not just by the beauty of the subjects, but also by their fascinating ecology and habitat.