Life Science
New Flu Emerges in China
Posted by Wesley Dodson on April 22, 2013 
A new strain of bird flu is circulating in China, and authorities are keeping a close eye on a potentially disastrous scenario. On Aetiology, Tara C. Smith writes that by now, “the microbe may have already become established in the population, adapting to humans stealthily before we were even aware of it.” Greg Laden writes,…
Weekend Diversion: Fluoridated Water: Science, Scams and Society
Posted by Ethan on April 22, 2013 
“Fluoridation is the single most important commitment a community can make to the oral health of its children and to future generations.” -C. Everett Koop Most weekends, I take on a lighter topic, as a way of taking a break from the deep physics, astronomy, and science we share during the week. But every once…
Experimental Biology – Sunday
Posted by Dr. Dolittle on April 22, 2013 The Comparative and Evolutionary Physiology section held their Scholander Poster competition for young comparative physiologists today! It was exciting to see all of the students present their work. Here are some of the highlights: Raffaele Pilla, Dominic P, D’Agostino, Carol S. Landon, and Jay B. Dean from Molecular Pharmacology and Physiology, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL.…
Experimental Biology – Opening Ceremony
Posted by Dr. Dolittle on April 21, 2013 As always, the opening ceremony for the American Physiological Society at the Experimental Biology meeting was awesome! The food was probably the best I have had at these meetings, which along with the fun band, probably explains why it was jam-packed with Physiologists eager to kick-start this meeting. I am looking forward to the Scholander…
Coelacanths are unexceptional products of evolution
Posted by PZ Myers on April 20, 2013 The coelacanth genome has been sequenced, which is good news all around…except that I found a few of the comments in the article announcing it disconcerting. They keep calling it a “living fossil” — and you know what I think of that term — and they keep referring to it as evolving slowly The slowly…
Friday Cephalopod: No, you’re not safe anywhere
Posted by PZ Myers on April 19, 2013 It’s a big image, so it’s going below the fold.
Graaarh, physicists BIOLOGISTS
Posted by PZ Myers on April 18, 2013 Graaarh, physicists I thought physics was the most hubristic scientific discipline of them all, but I may have to revise that assessment. Last week I was sent another of those papers published in archiv, the physics repository, making grand pronouncements about evolution, and I made the mistake of simply dismissing it on twitter — it…
House-eating snails?
Posted by Dr. Dolittle on April 18, 2013 Giant African land snails, like the one pictured above, are reportedly “one of the world’s most destructive invasive species” as they not only consume over 500 plant species, they can actually eat stucco (apparently a good source of calcium). Therefore, I am sure you can imagine the damage they are causing in South Florida where they can…
Transparent Recruitment Charade
Posted by Martin R on April 17, 2013 2009. University of Lund publishes the PhD thesis Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning in Created Agricultural Wetlands, dealing with biological diversity and ecosystem services in ponds in the agricultural landscape (and commented on here). 2013: Same department advertises a post-doc in the field “Biological Diversity and Ecosystem Services in Ponds in the Agricultural Landscape”. Because in…
No more Dan Markingsons
Posted by PZ Myers on April 17, 2013 A few weeks ago I gave a talk in Seattle in which I pointed out that science is not sufficient to define moral behavior. A substantial part of that talk was a catalog of atrocities, such as the Tuskegee syphilis experiment. I said that in purely scientific terms, that was a good experiment; if the…
