Up Front: Made at CPP
From the Sketchpad to The Crystallography Lab
The Cal Poly ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½ science community brought professor and student together — not as lab partners, but literary partners.
Chemistry Professor Chantal Stieber and fourth-year biology student Justine Wong unite art and science in a children’s book, written by Stieber and illustrated by Wong.
Published in 2025, “X-Ray Crystallography Adventures! Cat & Elephant's Sugar Crystal Mystery” features a cat scientist and elephant baker making a birthday cake and going on an adventure to a crystallography lab.
“I love art and science,” Wong says, “and would do anything that combines the two.”
As a child, Wong liked drawing the human body and was fascinated by illustrations of anatomy and surgery techniques in medical books. This sparked her dream of becoming a medical Illustrator, where she could communicate health related ideas through highly detailed visuals in textbooks, research papers and more.
Through networking with the CPP science community, she met Stieber, who was looking for someone to illustrate her children’s book. Stieber always wanted to write a children’s book, especially after having children of her own. The book would be her opportunity to introduce complex ideas in a fun, age-appropriate way.
It wasn’t long before the pair began meeting regularly to conceptualize, write and illustrate. In their first collaboration, the cat scientist and elephant baker learn more about the crystal structure of the shiny sugar.
“Crystals are something that kids like — shiny things — so this book was a good way to get them excited about science,” Stieber says.
The entire process was highly collaborative, with page-by-page storyboarding and multiple drafts. Stieber and Wong also incorporated story feedback from fellow scientists, parents, and of course, children.
“At first I thought it was going to be a boring book about cakes,” says a third grader involved in the process. “But then they go into a lab, and it gets really cool and we learn about crystals, X-rays and stuff.”
The book is available for purchase online, and 50% of profits support Cal Poly ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½’s Crystallography Co-op. In addition, a grant from the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation helped Stieber distribute 300 free copies to crystallographers doing outreach with kids around the world.
Stieber and Wong hope to translate the book into more languages and publish a second book.