A Canadian shares a page with Bono in People magazine's sexiest men issue but Michael Manga is a reluctant and unlikely heartthrob. He's no rock star -- he works with rocks.
Mr. Manga is an associate professor of earth and planetary science at the University of California in Berkeley and a winner of the prestigious MacArthur Fellowship, often called the "genius awards" in the United States.
When the 37-year-old father of two got the e-mail asking him to appear in People, he said, he was reluctant and hoped the whole thing would blow over quickly.
"I found it all quite funny and very embarrassing," Mr. Manga said, adding that he thought long and hard before accepting the magazine's offer.
"I thought this might be the only science that shows up in the issue, perhaps the only science that shows up in the [magazine]the entire year," he said, explaining why he said yes.
Mr. Manga wasn't allowed to tell anyone about his imminent 15 minutes of fame, not even his family. He said he didn't tell his wife, even when the issue hit the newsstands. She finally got word when her mom called her with the surprising news. That's when the teasing started.
"I don't know what else I could have expected," Mr. Manga said.
Mr. Manga is 5-foot-11 and has long, dark hair. His family background makes for an interesting DNA mix with ties to South Africa, India, Germany and Poland.
He was born in Hamilton, lived in Toronto and Ottawa, and went to school at McGill University in Montreal before heading to the United States to study at Harvard University and the University of Oregon.
He now teaches geodynamics, is planning the research for his fellowship and runs a personal website on such sexy topics as the rheology and dynamics of suspensions, and the continuum percolation theory.
There's no mention of the People appearance on his website, just science information and pictures of his wife and kids. And he said he's not planning to post anything about the magazine -- ever.
He said there has been almost nothing fun about the experience; he's just taken a lot of grief and ribbing from his colleagues. He never reads People and neither did his colleagues -- until now, he said.
"The good thing about the university is it took two weeks for anyone to pick up on it. People here don't read People."
Mr. Manga appears in the Nov. 28 issue alongside the likes of Jude Law, Ben Affleck, Orlando Bloom, Johnny Depp and Colin Farrell.