My thoughts on biology, teaching, life, and exploring the living world via the digital one. Only my opinions are represented by these postings, they do not represent the viewpoints of any funding agency or Geospiza, Inc.
I am a microbiologist and molecular biologist turned tenured biotech faculty turned bioinformatics scientist turned entrepreneur. My passion is developing instructional materials for 21st century biology (Geospiza Education).
e-mail digitalbio at gmail.com
October 26, 2006
Category: Humor
Is your precious pup spending an unusual amount of time time hanging around by the pond? Is poochy looking a little green around the gills? Does fido seem a little feeble? My friend you've got trouble. Trouble with a capital "T". What's the canine equivalent to catnip?...
Posted by Sandra Porter at 7:00 AM • 0 Comments •
October 18, 2006
Category: Classic Digital Bio
What ethical issues concern people working in biotech?
Posted by Sandra Porter at 11:47 AM • 1 Comments •
October 16, 2006
Category: Announcements
Time is running out in Tripoli for six nurses and one doctor, under sentence of death.
Posted by Sandra Porter at 7:53 PM • 0 Comments •
October 15, 2006
Category: Genetics & Molecular Biology
Welcome to the October 15, 2006 edition of Mendel's Garden. Join me as we walk through the fields and admire the harvest....
Posted by Sandra Porter at 12:03 PM • 6 Comments •
October 13, 2006
Category: Humor
Yikes, I've spilled some DHMO on my hands! What do I do now? Do you know the truth about DHMO? Look at this web site and tell me if you still want to go swimming....
Posted by Sandra Porter at 4:40 PM • 6 Comments •
Category: Digital Biology Fridays
In last week's episode, your assignment was to think of an interesting plant trait and find a description about a gene, related to that trait, by searching PubMed....
Posted by Sandra Porter at 12:00 PM • 0 Comments •
October 11, 2006
Category: Science education
Is seeing believing or seeing deceiving?
Posted by Sandra Porter at 3:14 PM • 6 Comments •
Category: Classic Digital Bio
No one in a life science-related industry or research lab, in Western Washington, is safe at this time of year. Surely, you're joking! No, seriously, there are teachers and science enthusiasts everywhere looking to sign you up! And don't call me "Shirley." Sign me up? That's right, it's time to prepare for the...
Posted by Sandra Porter at 8:00 AM • 0 Comments •
October 10, 2006
Category: Classic Digital Bio
Why is an eye, an eye and a nose, a nose? Why do different cells create different kinds of tissues when all the cells in a single organism start out with the same set of instructions (aka DNA)?...
Posted by Sandra Porter at 11:41 AM • 0 Comments •
October 9, 2006
Category: Announcements
Mendel's garden in Bruno, CZ, may be too far for physical travel, but you can still imagine what Mendel might have thought if he'd gotten a look at this version of his vision. Maybe I'm taking alliteration a little too far, but that doesn't mean that you have to show any restraint. All you have to do is submit to...
Posted by Sandra Porter at 9:15 PM • 0 Comments •
Category: Science education
typing that is.
Posted by Sandra Porter at 11:00 AM • 1 Comments •
Category: Science culture
To some inhabitants of the ivory tower, industry looks like paradise.
Posted by Sandra Porter at 9:18 AM • 0 Comments •
October 7, 2006
Category: Science education
The blood typing lab, part I. What went wrong? and why? Blood typing part II. Can this laboratory be saved? Those wacky non-major Zoo students are at it again! And this time they drew blood! Mike's undergraduate students learned about blood typing, a common tool of detectives and real crime TV. They did the classic blood typing lab, and by...
Posted by Sandra Porter at 1:36 PM • 2 Comments •
October 6, 2006
Category: Science education
Why not use a scientific approach to teaching?
Posted by Sandra Porter at 11:42 AM • 4 Comments •
Category: Digital Biology Fridays
Many of you might take this for granted, and I know it seems amazing today, but I when first started teaching, our access to scientific literature was pretty limited. I could go to the UW and use Grateful Med to search Medline, but we didn't have anything like it at my college and web browsers, like Mosaic, had yet to...
Posted by Sandra Porter at 2:00 AM • 1 Comments •
October 5, 2006
Category: women in science
Which women do you think should win the Nobel Prize?
Posted by Sandra Porter at 3:02 PM • 6 Comments •
Category: Humor
Viking ships and runestones. It must be seen to be believed.
Posted by Sandra Porter at 12:34 PM • 1 Comments •
October 4, 2006
Category: Miscellany
This may seem strange to anyone who hasn't lived in Minnesota, but when I was a child, kids in my elementary school used to have fist fights when it came to the question of which famous European discovered America....
Posted by Sandra Porter at 4:38 PM • 1 Comments •
Category: Classic Digital Bio
It's a crystalline botanical fashion show.
Posted by Sandra Porter at 2:12 PM • 1 Comments •
October 3, 2006
Category: Science culture
Some of my fellow ScienceBloggers have been hotly debating the role of male science faculty in perpetuating a climate that's chilly and hostile to women. From one end of the ring, we've heard the classic complaint "It's not my fault, I didn't do it." From the other end, we hear: "It is your fault because you're not doing anything to...
Posted by Sandra Porter at 12:02 PM • 5 Comments •
October 1, 2006
Category: Bioinformatics
Welcome to the fourth edition of Bio::Blogs! This is the carnival where we explore topics at the intersection of computing, biology, and sometimes a bit human behavior. In this edition, we consider issues with annotation, agonize over standards, explore the question of whether or not it's possible to tame those wild and wooly computational biologists and make them laugh their...
Posted by Sandra Porter at 4:43 PM • 2 Comments •
DigitalBio RSS feed
