sb admin
Posts by this author
by Pete Galvin
You never learn much from a "wired" confirmation hearing, and that was true yesterday at the hearing for Cass Sunstein to be director of OIRA. Only three Senators bothered to come (apart from his former student, now the Senator from Minnesota, who introduced him before…
Early Sunday morning (May 10), I read a news brief from WSAZ reporting that seven workers had been rescued from a flooded underground coal mine in Gilbert, WV, after being trapped for 32+ hours. As I combed the web for further details, I was struck by the…
Compact fluorescent lightbulbs save energy, but the mercury in them has to be handled with lots of caution â and thatâs not always the case in the Chinese factories that manufacture a large share of the bulbs. Michael Sheridan Reports for the Sunday Times (UK):Â
In southern China, compact…
So I'm trying to simplify things in real life as I think I am suffering from information overload (among other things).
First task was to clean up my Facebook friends. From here on, it's family, colleagues and (usually graduate) students. Folks I know only in virtual space are likely to have gotten…
One trait of a good reporter is providing facts---facts that may make us uncomfortable, but ultimately force us to ask "is this really true?"  That's what happened to me on Friday when I read the Charleston Gazette's Ken Ward's piece Solis plays fast and loose…
By Myra Karstadt
Peanuts, pistachios, peppers (maybe tomatoes too), spinach, spicesâ¦â¦â¦.The list of produce recalled due to bacterial contamination gets longer, and baleful glances are cast at the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN- say siff-san), the part of FDA charged…
by revere, cross-posted from Effect Measure
The spate of swine flu articles in The New England Journal of Medicine last week included an important "Perspective, The Signature Features of Influenza Pandemics â Implications for Policy," by Miller, Viboud, Baliska and Simonsen. These authors are…
Turns out that yesterday I posted my 2000th post here at Scienceblogs without even noticing it. Heh!
Back in December 2006 I referred to Francis Beckwith as an ID supporter. This resulted in he informing me that he "has never been much of fan [of] design arguments, ever [and that his] interest in the debate focuses on the jurisprudential questions involving the First Amendment and what could be…
PZ has the tale of Larry, Moe, Curly, and Eagletosh. Worth a read.
Well. A month has flown by, the lease is up, and the SB landlord is banging on the door to get the keys back. Something about an explosive new tenant needing the place. Supposed to be a blast.
So here it is. My final Photo Synthesis post, fitting in one last ant before the blog really takes…
Although these two ants in northern Argentina look like they're ignoring each other, they are in fact doing just the opposite. This end-to-end confrontation is an intense chemical duel. What's particularly interesting about the image is the juxtaposition of two different defense systems.
At left…
In a Montana courtroom earlier today, a jury returned a ânot guiltyâ verdict in the government's case against W.R. Grace and three of its executives. It's widely known that W.R. Grace's actions contaminated the entire town of Libby, Montana with asbestos, and that hundreds of Libby residents have…
By Kas
What happens when Founding Fathers question the existence of the system they helped to create? No, not those Founding Fathers. Here weâre referring to William D. Ruckelshaus and J. Clarence âTerryâ Davies, two of our environmental policy champions and USEPA bricklayers. …
Two male Rhagoletis walnut flies joust on an artificial walnut in a lab cage at the University of Arizona. What's an artificial walnut? It's a painted ping pong ball. As long as the ball is the right color and shape, the flies apparently don't mind.
Biologist Jeremy Davis uses these flies to…
We were delighted in March when President Obama issued a memorandum on scientific integrity, stating, âScience and the scientific process must inform and guide decisions of my Administration on a wide range of issues.â The memorandum gave the director of the White House Office of Science and…
During today's confirmation hearing for M. Patricia Smith as Solicitor of Labor, Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) referred back to last week's Senate hearing on "Meaningful Roles for Victims and Their Families." The dialogue went as follows:Â
00:72:30
Senator Murray:Â…
Oecophylla longinoda - Weaver Ants
St. Lucia, Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa
Technical details:
Lens: Canon 35mm f2.0 lens on a 12mm extension tube
Body: Canon EOS 20D dSLR
Flash: Canon MT-24EX twin flash, hand-held for backlighting.
Settings: ISO 400, f/13, 1/160 sec
by revere, cross-posted from Effect Measure
Breathing easier, may be an apt phrase for an almost audible collective sigh of relief. So far, the incipient swine flu pandemic is not extremely nasty. Is this perhaps premature? The world's premier scientific journal, Nature, and many flu scientists,…
Here's some exciting news. Starting Monday, our Photo Synthesis host will be the multi-talented Steve Jurvetson. Steve will tell you that his main thing is rockets, but a bit of snooping about reveals that he's also a closet myrmecophile. But really. Who isn't?
I'll continue posting through…
Over the next week, two Senate committees will hold confirmation hearings on senior Administration officials who could play key roles in worker health and safety policy. First, the Senate HELP Committee will meet tomorrow (May 7) to consider the nomination of M. Patricia Smith for…
A few days ago I noticed the search term "Malagasy Mystery Ant" showing up in the stats for my other blog. This puzzled me, as it wasn't a phrase I was familiar with. So I googled it.
All mentions of the term trace back to a caption in the New York Times slide show from last week. Goodness. I…
Today, the CDC reports 403 confirmed cases of H1N1 (the flu formerly known as "swine") in the US, and the WHO reports a total of 1124 cases in 21 countries. There have been 25 deaths in Mexico and two in the US.
The increase in numbers is largely due to cases that had already been…
By Angene Johnson
After a recent dinner at my uncleâs house in Virginia, I finally had a chance to look at the March edition of National Geographic on my train ride back to Foggy Bottom (Washington, DC). Â As I flipped through the front of the magazine towards this monthâs cover article, on…
A Crematogaster ant is held up by a kleptoparasitic Milichia patrizii ant-mugging fly.
Last July, while wandering about the coastal forests of St. Lucia in eastern South Africa, I happened across an intriguing scene half-way up a spiny Acacia trunk. Some diminutive gray flies were pestering a…
by revere, cross-posted from Effect Measure
There have been questions in the comments about where the CDC estimate of 36,000 to 40,000 influenza related deaths a year comes from. It's a figure I've used a number of times here to say generally that regular old seasonal influenza may be a mild…
Orthodera ministralis - Garden Mantis (immature)
Melbourne, Australia
Technical details:
Lens: Canon 100mm f2.8 macro lens
Body: Canon EOS D60 dSLR
Flash: Canon 550 EX, bounced off white paper above mantid
Settings: ISO 100, f/19, 1/200 sec
University of Maryland Law Professor Rena Steinzor called for fundamental changes to the role of OMB's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) in federal regulatory review, at a House Committee hearing held on April 30. The Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight…
Most of my blog reading this week has involved swine flu; feel free to add non-flu-related links to other worthwhile blog posts in the comments. (More flu links are welcome, too.)
First, a few numbers: CDC has confirmed 141 cases in the US; Mexico reports that it has 358 confirmed cases; and the…