Life Sciences
laelaps | May 30, 2008The probable role of fossils in giving rise to myths and legends has been recognized since the 19th century, but it has only been recently that the connection between giant bones & footprints and mythology has been appreciated as a subject worthy of detailed study (see The First Fossil Hunters, Fossil Legends of the First Americans, and American Monster). It should be kept in mind, however, that there are modern legends just as there are ancient ones, and even during the age of major discoveries some fossils still seemed to throw support that the ancient world was inhabited by giants and…
evolgen | May 30, 2008Phylogeny Friday -- 30 May 2008
Research on animals in under attack throughout the world. Animal rights activists not only stage rallies against animal testing, but they also engage in criminal behavior. They vandalize property, sabotage experiments, and terrorize researchers. How can scientists fight back?
Michael Conn and James Parker have written book documenting the animal rights issue from the scientists' perspective (The Animal Research War). Conn and Parker have also briefly described their position in the FASEB Journal. Here is how they summarize their book:
This book is a personal…
clock | May 29, 2008U.S. Reporters Often Do A Poor Job Of Reporting About New Medical Treatments, Analysis Finds:
Most medical news stories about health interventions fail to adequately address costs, harms, benefits, the quality of evidence, and the existence of other treatment options, finds a new analysis in this week's PLoS Medicine. The analysis was conducted by Gary Schwitzer from the University of Minnesota School of Journalism and Mass Communication.
Sedentary High School Girls Are At Significant Risk For Future Osteoporosis:
Significant numbers of female high school athletes and non-athletes suffer from…
laelaps | May 29, 2008Even though my brain was a bit heat- and math-addled by the time I got home from class last night (I spent all day at a baseball game the organization I work for took us out to and then spent the time between 6 and 8:30 PM in math class) I still managed to add a few more historical tidbits to my book. (I didn't expect to get so sunburned at the ballpark. I seem to have developed a strange sort of countershading where my arms are red on top and white on the bottom.)
The first new section I added dealt with some of the earliest discoveries of fossil humans in Europe, particularly the "Red Lady…
tetrapodzoology | May 27, 2008
Observant readers might have noticed the several recent references to 'big news in a big journal' coming soon, or on 'how a Tet Zoo article evolved into a peer-reviewed technical publication'. Yes, not all of Tet Zoo is idle nonsense written for fun; at least some of it results in actual peer-reviewed result: you know, the stuff that's made me the fulfilled, famous, financially successful person I am today. And long-time readers might recall the threat, from way way back in April 2006, that 'Why azhdarchids were giant storks' represented '... the better part of a paper on the subject [of…
gregladen | May 27, 2008 A very large Azhdarchid shown with a human for scale. Azhdarchids were pterosaurs (flying reptile-like creatures) of the Cretaceous. These included some gigantic critters with up to a 10 meter wing span, but also some little ones (2.5 meters or so). Most reconstructions of these flying animals have them skim-feeding across the surface of bodies of water, grabbing near-surface animals with their beaks.
A new paper in PLoS criticizes this view suggesting that there is very little evidence in support of it, and offers an interesting alternative interpretation of Azhdarchid morphology.…
clock | May 27, 2008There are 48 articles published this week in PLoS ONE, something for everyone. Read, note, comment, blog about and send trackbacks... Here are some of the titles I found cool:
Evidence of Authentic DNA from Danish Viking Age Skeletons Untouched by Humans for 1,000 Years:
Given the relative abundance of modern human DNA and the inherent impossibility for incontestable proof of authenticity, results obtained on ancient human DNA have often been questioned. The widely accepted rules regarding ancient DNA work mainly affect laboratory procedures, however, pre-laboratory contamination occurring…
edyong | May 27, 2008In the X-Men comics, the superhero Wolverine is armed with three sharp claws on each arm. They extend through the skin of his hand, and the resulting wounds are closed by up his superhuman ability to heal. Now, in a bizarre case of life imitating art, scientists from Harvard University have discovered that a group of African frogs use similar weapons.
The frogs defend themselves with sharp bone claws on their hind feet but to do so, the animals have to drive the claws through their own skin. It's an extreme defence that is completely unique in the animal world.
The clawed frogs belong to a…
sa smith | May 26, 2008
This is a repost from the old ERV. A retrotransposed ERV :P I dont trust them staying up at Blogger, and the SEED overlords are letting me have 4 reposts a week, so Im gonna take advantage of that!
I am going to try to add more comments to these posts for the old readers-- Think of these as 'directors cut' posts ;)
Poor Behe. Its a hard-knock life, for kooks. Another HIV-1 paper came out today that utilized the evolution of Vpu to make their experiments work better. So I thought Id better move this post over so you all could enjoy it again :)
August 2, 2007, over six months ago, I…
tetrapodzoology | May 23, 2008
I was saddened to learn today of the recent death of elephant researcher and conservationist Prof. Yeheskel (or Hezy) Shoshani: he was severely injured in what is thought to have been a terrorist attack in Addis Ababa (where he worked) on Tuesday 20th May, and died in hospital on Wednesday 21st. Two other people travelling on the same minibus were killed in the same attack and nine others were injured...
I had never met nor corresponded with Prof. Shoshani but have always been a great admirer of his excellent work. He was a giant in the world of elephant research and made an immense…
clock | May 22, 2008Some Like It Hot! Structure Of Receptor For Hot Chili Pepper And Pain Revealed:
You can now not only feel the spicy kick of a jalapeno pepper, you can also see it in full 3D, thanks to researchers at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.
Early Life Exposure To Cats May Reduce Risk Of Childhood Allergies And Asthma Symptoms:
A study released by researchers at the Columbia Center for Children's Environmental Health (CCCEH) at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, shows that cat ownership may have a protective effect against the development of asthma symptoms in young children…
clock | May 22, 2008From November 01, 2005, a review of a review...
Here is a nice article in Washington Post - Ecological Niche May Dictate Sleep Habits - about the adaptive function of sleep.
It addresses some of the themes I am interested in.
First, the unfortunate fact is that sleep was initially defined by researchers of humans, i.e., medical researchers. Inevitably, the (electrophysiological) definition of sleep was thus saddled with unneccessary anthropocentric elements that for decades hampered the study of evolution of sleep.
I was present at the meeting (here in Biotechnology Center in RTP) several…
edyong | May 21, 2008
The era of genetic sequencing has revealed as much about the ties that bind us to other animals as the differences that set us apart. Often, comparing the genomes of different species shows that large changes in body size, shape and form are not mirrored by similar changes at a genetic level. New adaptations typically come about through small changes that redeploy existing genes to different ends, rather than raw innovation.
Snakes are an exception. A new study by Todd Castoe and Zhi Jiang at the University of Colorado has shown that the lifestyle of serpents is so unique that some…
tetrapodzoology | May 19, 2008
Well done and thanks to everyone who had a go at identifying the mystery skull, and congrats to TJ, Jorge Velez-Juarbe, Mark Lees and others: it was indeed a glyptodont, specifically a glyptodontine glyptodontid and, most specifically of all, Glyptodon clavipes. So much for posting the answer on Sunday night - I've been busy but, if you feel in need of a good, lengthy Naish article you can always nip over to SV-POW! and read the piece I recently produced on theories about sauropod pneumaticity. There's an awful lot that you could say about glyptodonts: their armour, tails, limbs, and limb…
evolvingthoughts | May 19, 2008
If scientists working in biology or a related field like psychology want to get attention, they will say something like this: Darwin was wrong, or made a mistake, or is insufficient to explain X, where X is whatever they are researching. It makes them seem to be proposing something important, because everybody agrees Darwin proposed something that changed our way of looking at life and ourselves. If we are saying he was wrong, a "paradigm shift" cannot be far behind...
So a paper entitled "Darwin's mistake: Explaining the discontinuity between human and nonhuman minds" is a surefire…
grrlscientist | May 18, 2008tags: researchblogging.org, Aves, Psittaciformes, Pseudasturidae, parrots, Palaeogene, Eocene, Denmark
An artist's impression of the parrot-like bird, Mopsitta tanta, dating back 55 million years. The fossils indicate that parrots once flew wild over what is now Norway and Denmark.
Image: David Waterhouse [larger view].
A team of researchers, including a former postdoctoral colleague of mine, recently described fossils from two Lower Eocene parrot-like birds that were discovered in Denmark. The analysis of the fossils reveals that one of the ancient parrots, named Mopsitta tanta, is the…
laelaps | May 16, 2008I'm sorry to say that things with Rutgers are still a mess, but the spring semester is over and now I've got about three months to work on some of my projects. There's a lot I want to do, but most importantly I want to become a better writer and photographer. Towards that end I have set a few goals for this summer, and even though I've stated them before I thought that I would re-iterate what I want to accomplish;
#1) Finish my book. - I haven't added anything new to my book in a long time, mostly because final exams were much more of a priority. Now that I have much more time to devote to…
tetrapodzoology | May 15, 2008
Despite efforts, there just hasn't been enough time (yet) to get Tet Zoo to properly reflect the balance of diversity within Tetrapoda (I blame the charismatic megafauna). And among the many groups that have been totally under-represented here are the snakes: one of the most speciose (over 2700 species) and abundant tetrapod clades. It'll take a long time before snakes are fairly represented at Tet Zoo, and what I'd like to do here is talk briefly (relatively speaking) about a very obscure and poorly known group of really weird little burrowing snakes, the scolecophidians. The... what?
Three…
edyong | May 15, 2008Hi folks,
I'm working on a large feature and I want to break the back of it over the weekend. So as a ittle bit diversion, I wanted to share with you two awesome videos that I took last weekend of gibbons moving with characteristic and incredible agility at Thrigby Hall Wildlife Gardens in Suffolk. Gibbons were one of the highlights of David Attenborough's Life of Mammals, and I was utterly captivated by footage of them monkeyi... er.. apeing about in trees, swinging through the canopy at high speed. (There's a second video and some commentary after the jump)
This style of movement, known…
clock | May 15, 2008The first in a series of posts on circadian clocks in microorganisms (from February 23, 2006)...
Many papers in chronobiology state that circadian clocks are ubiqutous. That has been a mantra since at least 1960. This suggests that most or all organisms on Earth possess biological clocks.
In the pioneering days of chronobiology, it was a common practice to go out in the woods and collect as many species as possible and document the existence of circadian rhythms. Technical limitations certainly influenced what kinds of organisms were usually tested.
Rhythms of locomotor activity are the…