Life Sciences
emjohnson | July 6, 2010Image: via PZ Myers
PZ Myers has a new post condemning Discovery Institute ideologue David Klinghoffer's recent post connecting Darwin to the eugenic policies of Hitler. He trots out some of the same points that have been refuted time and again.
Darwin elaborated a picture of how the world works, how creatures war with each other for survival thus selecting out the fittest specimens and advancing the species. In this portrait of animal life, man is no exception. Any animal that strives to preserve the weak, as man does, is committing racial suicide. "Thus the weak members of civilized…
clock | July 5, 2010The list is growing fast - check the submissions to date and get inspired to submit something of your own - an essay, a poem, a cartoon or original art.
The Submission form is here so you can get started. Under the fold are entries so far, as well as buttons and the bookmarklet. The instructions for submitting are here.
You can buy the last four annual collections here. You can read Prefaces and Introductions to older editions here.
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A Blog Around The Clock: What does it mean that a nation is 'Unscientific'?
A Blog Around The Clock: My latest scientific paper:…
grrlscientist | July 1, 2010tags: vultures, Gyps species, conservation biology, endangered species, veterinary medicine, toxicology, physiology, evolutionary biology, pharmaceutical chemistry, epidemiology, mathematical modeling, researchblogging.org,peer-reviewed research, journal club
Only thirty years ago, tens of millions of White-rumped Vultures, Gyps bengalensis,
were flying the skies of Asia. They are now classified as Critically Endangered.
Image: Marek Jobda / rarebirdsyearbook.com [larger view]
A zombie is another name for The Walking Dead -- those who are lifeless, apathetic, or totally lacking in…
ejohnson | July 1, 2010Late Wednesday evening, a terrible disaster began to unfold in the ScienceBlogs universe: word emerged that a zombie attack was taking place in our bloggers' homes. While the attack was believed to have begun somewhere in the southeastern United States, with patient zero Scicurious, it has now spread across the continent and even as far as Martin Rundkvist in Sweden. But even while in pursuit of human brains, the zombies are still dedicated to the mission of communicating science—in this case, getting the word out about the real science of zombiekind. To read up on how zombie epidemics spread…
clock | July 1, 2010As this is a Zombie Day on scienceblogs.com, here is a re-post of one of my old post about one of the coolest parasites ever (from February 04, 2006):
I am quite surprised that Carl Zimmer, in research for his book Parasite Rex, did not encounter the fascinating case of the Ampulex compressa (Emerald Cockroach Wasp) and its prey/host the American Cockroach (Periplaneta americana, see also comments on Aetiology and Ocellated).
In 1999, I went to Oxford, UK, to the inaugural Gordon Conference in Neuroethology and one of the many exciting speakers I was looking forward to seeing was Fred…
clock | June 30, 2010There are 30 new articles in PLoS ONE today. As always, you should rate the articles, post notes and comments and send trackbacks when you blog about the papers. You can now also easily place articles on various social services (CiteULike, Mendeley, Connotea, Stumbleupon, Facebook and Digg) with just one click. Here are my own picks for the week - you go and look for your own favourites:
Bermuda as an Evolutionary Life Raft for an Ancient Lineage of Endangered Lizards:
Oceanic islands are well known for harboring diverse species assemblages and are frequently the basis of research on…
grrlscientist | June 30, 2010tags: birds, ornithology, Common Raven, Northern Raven, Corvus corax, animal behavior, animal culture, aggression, dominance hierarchy, social groups, social conflict, post-conflict behavior, consolation, empathy, researchblogging.org,peer-reviewed research, journal club
Common Raven, Corvus corax, showing off at Bryce Canyon National Park, USA.
Image: United States National Park Service (Public Domain) [larger view]
Humans have long tried to distinguish themselves from other animals on the basis of characters that are perceived to be unique, such as tool design and use, planning for the…
clock | June 28, 2010The list is growing fast - check the submissions to date and get inspired to submit something of your own - an essay, a poem, a cartoon or original art.
The Submission form is here so you can get started. Under the fold are entries so far, as well as buttons and the bookmarklet. The instructions for submitting are here.
You can buy the last four annual collections here. You can read Prefaces and Introductions to older editions here.
============================
A Blog Around The Clock: What does it mean that a nation is 'Unscientific'?
A Blog Around The Clock: My latest scientific paper:…
jgoldman | June 28, 2010She: "What are you writing about?"
Me: "Cognition in cold-blooded animals."
She: "Hot."
Most people who study cognition focus on mammals or birds. But I hope I've convinced you that other animals are important to investigate as well. One research group at the University of Vienna likes cold-blooded critters. Turtles and lizards and such. They argue:
Reptiles, birds and mammals have all evolved from a common amniotic ancestor, and as such they are likely to share both behavioural and morphological traits. However, this common ancestor lived around 280 million years ago and so it is equally…
jgoldman | June 27, 2010
Figure 1: Mountain lion kitten.
From my good friends at LAist:
Since 2002, biologists having been tracking and studying the movements of mountain lions in the Santa Monica Mountains, Simi Hills and Santa Susana Mountains to better understand how they live surrounded by development.
A total of 19 pumas have been tracked during the study, including the three kittens. Currently, nine are being tracked via GPS or VHF, which makes it the largest number of lions being tracked at the same time.
The three kittens are exciting for scientists as the unconfirmed father could be P12 (P stands for Puma,…
grrlscientist | June 27, 2010tags: Birdbooker Report, bird books, animal books, natural history books, ecology books
Books to the ceiling,
Books to the sky,
My pile of books is a mile high.
How I love them! How I need them!
I'll have a long beard by the time I read them.
~ Arnold Lobel [1933-1987] author of many popular children's books.
The Birdbooker Report is a special weekly report of a wide variety of science, nature, environment and behavior books and field guides that currently are, or soon will be available for purchase. This report is written by one of my Seattle birding pals and book collector, Ian "…
pharyngula | June 27, 2010Scientists and atheists do something that many believers find repellent: we shatter their perception of their relationship to the universe. And understandably, they don't like that.
Most religious people in the West have a very specific model of the way the world works that is based on our cultural history as the progeny of nomadic herdsman, and that still resonates strongly with all of us — the father-child relationship, the patriarchy. We have a wise leader who guides us all, punishes us when we stray, offers largesse to those in his favor, and unites the whole tribe in common cause. Those…
gregladen | June 26, 2010I've reposted this once already, but it is so important and cool .... we're going to do it again. (And by "it" I mean the research, not this post!)
The perfect bird family tree ...
... is certainly still in the future. But we have seen a step in that direction in a new paper, coming out this week in Science. This research applies intensive and extensive genomic analysis to the avian phylogenetic tree. The results are interesting.
This paper is summarized in a number of locations, most notably here on Living the Scientific Life. Here, I will summarize it only very briefly. However,…
clock | June 25, 2010There are 28 new articles in PLoS ONE today. As always, you should rate the articles, post notes and comments and send trackbacks when you blog about the papers. You can now also easily place articles on various social services (CiteULike, Mendeley, Connotea, Stumbleupon, Facebook and Digg) with just one click. Here are my own picks for the week - you go and look for your own favourites:
Arboreal Ants Use the "Velcro® Principle" to Capture Very Large Prey:
Plant-ants live in a mutualistic association with host plants known as "myrmecophytes" that provide them with a nesting place and…
clock | June 24, 2010There are new articles in four PLoS journals today. As always, you should rate the articles, post notes and comments and send trackbacks when you blog about the papers. You can now also easily place articles on various social services (CiteULike, Mendeley, Connotea, Stumbleupon, Facebook and Digg) with just one click. Here are my own picks for the week - you go and look for your own favourites:
Mammalian Sleep Dynamics: How Diverse Features Arise from a Common Physiological Framework:
The field of sleep physiology has made huge strides in recent years, uncovering the neurological…
laelaps | June 24, 2010
The nearly complete skeleton of a Steller's sea cow (Hydrodamalis gigas) - it is missing bones from the wrist and hand. From Woodward, 1885.
It did not take long for the last remaining population of Steller's sea cow to be driven into extinction. Discovered by the German naturalist Georg Steller around the Bering Sea's Commander Islands in 1741, this enormous and peculiar sirenian became an easy target for Russian hunters. By 1768, it was gone. (The marine mammal would not be scientifically described until 1780, and today it is formally known as Hydrodamalis gigas.) Yet, despite the clear…
tetrapodzoology | June 24, 2010
Over the weekend my family and I visited Amazon World Zoo Park on the Isle of Wight. I saw tons of new stuff and had a great time, but what might have been my favourite creature is one that would have been all but ignored by the vast majority of visitors. I'm talking about the Matamata Chelus fimbriatus*, a bizarre South American river turtle that is as amazing in biology and behaviour as it is in appearance. Amazon World had two of them...
* The name is sometimes written (incorrectly) as Chelus fimbriata.
Matamatas are freakishly weird: they've even been referred to as "one of the…
hrynyshyn | June 23, 2010"I thought I better come see the bears because the next time I am in this country they will be all gone."
-- Polar bear tourist in Churchill, Man.
Ecotourism. Sounds so responsible, or least, non-exploitative. But let's face it: Anyone who flies long-distance to get close to some endangered piece of nature at risk from climate change is doing their bit to push those species that much closer to extinction. A paper published recently in the Journal of Sustainable Tourism tries to quantify the irony. "The carbon cost of polar bear viewing tourism in Churchill, Canada" (Subs req'd) looks at the…
clock | June 22, 2010Tuesday - when four out of seven PLoS journals publish new articles. As always, you should rate the articles, post notes and comments and send trackbacks when you blog about the papers. You can now also easily place articles on various social services (CiteULike, Mendeley, Connotea, Stumbleupon, Facebook and Digg) with just one click. Here are my own picks for the week - you go and look for your own favourites:
Coordinated and Cohesive Movement of Two Small Conspecific Fish Induced by Eliciting a Simultaneous Optomotor Response:
In animal groups such as herds, schools, and flocks, a certain…
laelaps | June 21, 2010
A restoration of the tiny trilobite Ctenopyge ceciliae. From Schoenemann et al, 2010.
The first time I can remember seeing a trilobite, it wasn't in a museum case or a book about prehistoric animals. It was on card 39 of the gratuitously gory Dinosaurs Attack! card series, a horrific vignette depicting four of the invertebrates crawling over the bloodied face of their hapless victim. (No indication was given as to how the "flesh-eating worms", as the card identified them, had subdued the man.) The card was entirely fiction, of course, but it still fit in with the image of trilobites as mud…