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My scientific specialty is chronobiology (circadian rhythms and photoperiodism), with additional interests in comparative physiology, animal behavior and evolution. I am not an MD so I cannot diagnose and treat your sleep problems. As well as writing this blog, I am also the Online Discussion Expert for PLoS. This is a personal blog and opinions within it in no way reflect the policies of PLoS. You can contact me at: Coturnix@gmail.com

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Chronobiology:
Category: Academia
Last week, my SciBling Jason Goldman interviewed me for his blog. The questions were not so much about blogging, journalism, Open Access and PLoS (except a little bit at the end) but more about science - how I got into...
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Posted by Coturnix at 11:09 AM • • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Chronobiology
Blame 'Night of the Living Dead' for this, but many people mistakenly think that zombies are nocturnal, going around their business of walking around town with stilted gaits, looking for people whose brains they can eat, only at night. You...
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Posted by Coturnix at 8:00 AM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Chronobiology
Whenever I read a paper from Karl-Arne Stokkan's lab, and I have read every one of them, no matter how dense the scientese language I always start imagining them running around the cold, dark Arctic, wielding enormous butterfly nets, looking...
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Posted by Coturnix at 1:52 AM • 10 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Chronobiology
I am not the only one on ScienceBlogs.com to write about circadian rhythms, sleep and (non-visual) photoreception. Over the years, my SciBlings have written about these and related topics as well. Here is a sampler - go and dig for...
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Posted by Coturnix at 8:48 PM • • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Chronobiology
Victor Bruce, a lecturer emeritus in biology at Princeton who conducted advanced studies for more than 25 years on the built-in cycles governing natural rhythms like the sleep-wake cycle, has died. He was 88. Bruce, who despite a background in...
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Posted by Coturnix at 7:42 PM • • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Chronobiology
If you ever glanced at the circadian literature, you have probably encountered the statement that "circadian rhythms are ubiquitous in living systems". In all of my formal and informal writing I qualified that statement somewhat, stating something along the lines...
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Posted by Coturnix at 11:41 AM • 7 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Animal Behavior
Most people are aware that social insects, like honeybees, have three "sexes": queens, drones and workers. Drones are males. Their only job is to fly out and mate with the queen after which they drop dead. Female larvae fed 'royal...
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Posted by Coturnix at 3:18 PM • 14 Comments •
Category: Sleep
Nice four articles: The Gears of the Sleep Clock By Allan Pack: When people have trouble sleeping--such as, in extreme cases, shift workers--those problems are not always rooted in disturbances in circadian rhythm, argues the University of Pennsylvania's ALLAN PACK....
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Posted by Coturnix at 7:22 PM • 1 Comments •
Category: Chronobiology
Yup, it's tonight. If you were around here a few months ago, the day after the Fall Back day, you probably read this post. Disregarding the debate over rhetoric of science, that is probably my best, most detailed explanation for...
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Posted by Coturnix at 7:26 PM • 1 Comments •
Category: Chronobiology
The 2009 Gordon Conference on Chronobiology is all molecular, and it is tough to get in anyway. It would be nice to go, but I don't see how I can get invited and/or funded....
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Posted by Coturnix at 1:03 PM • 2 Comments •