Dr. John Conkling is a university chemistry professor and a past executive director of the American Pyrotechnics Association. In this wide-ranging interview, Conkling reflects on how the field of pyrotechnics has changed over time and reveals that innovations often come from amateurs who, like him, simply love to experiment with fireworks.

With booming noises and captivating visual displays, today's pyrotechnic productions offer something to appeal to almost everyone's taste. Thanks to advances in color mixing and other changes in their chemical makeup, fireworks have become brighter, more colorful, and more vivid over the past thirty years. In addition, computers are now programmed to control launch sequences, enabling displays -- although generally shorter than in the past -- to be jam-packed with rapid-fire shell bursts and timed to match musical selections. What's in store for the future of pyrotechnics? Conkling suggests that the next advances in pattern shell design may be complex shapes and fully formed words that light up the sky.