Given that Clairmont was a vampire, I sincerely hoped delayed gratification was something he was good at. Some argued that al scholarship is thinly veiled autobiography. I opened a new browser window to view an anatomical diagram and locate which bit of the brain was at issue. He'd made several major breakthroughs related to the role that neural mechanisms play in delayed-gratification responses, al of which involved the prefrontal cortex. Much of it was beyond me, but Clairmont seemed to have made a scientific and medical reputation at the same time by studying how the brain's frontal lobe processes urges and cravings. After clicking a box to sort the results by date, I was provided with a snapshot of his intel ectual history.

Matthew Clairmont might not have much of a presence on the Internet, but he was certainly active in the scholarly literature. I had no luck imagining what Clairmont's user name and password might be and was refused access to anything at al after my sixth incorrect guess.įrustrated, I entered the vampire's name into the search engines for scientific journals. Anything useful hinted at on the main pages was hidden behind passwords.

The Wikipedia article was no help at al, and the Royal Society's site was no better. Clicking systematical y through the terms, I final y found him on a page dedicated to the 'frontal lobe,' though there was no additional information. There wasn't a single reference to a physician, however, only a lengthy list of research interests. I typed 'John Radcliffe Neurosciences' into the search box and was led to an overview of the department's services.

There hadn't been a hit for Clairmont at the hospital, though the affiliation was on his card. Oxford clearly had a different attitude toward privacy. On Yale's Web site, a visitor could get contact information and a complete vita for practical y every member of the faculty. Matthew Clairmont was one of those faculty members who didn't like to post any information-even academic information-on the Net. I clicked on the faculty Web page and snorted. On the Internet, below an unrelated link to a murder mystery and the unavoidable hits from social-networking sites, a string of biographical listings looked promising: his faculty Web page, a Wikipedia article, and links to the current fel ows of the Royal Society. I fished it out, propping it up against the screen. Why would a scientist of Clairmont's caliber want to see an alchemical manuscript-even one under a spel -so much that he'd sit at the Bodleian al day, across from a witch, and read through old notes on morphogenesis? His business card was tucked into one of the pockets of my bag. After dinner I sat down on the sofa by the sitting room's dormant fireplace and switched on my laptop.

A discovery of witches book 5