clock | September 5, 2006The adventures continue. It's like Steve Irwin, but without the cameras.
Last Leg
(of Shennongjia)
27 August
Watched some made-for-TV movie (in English!!) with the chick from the TV series "Weird Science" and the movie "King Pin." My plan for the next few days was to go to Pinqian for 3 or 4 days, depending on luck, returning to Muyu on the 31st because the 1st was Xiaoli's birthday. Then we'd go to Caiqi (Tai chi) for a day, followed by one last visit to Dalongtan to check on the tin.
For the most part, whenever I am in Shennongjia I am at the mercy of Linsen and/or Xie Dong. Linsen was…
clock | September 5, 2006
Hypotheses leading to more hypotheses (from March 19, 2006 - the Malaria Day):
I have written a little bit about malaria before, e.g, here and here, but this is my special Malaria Action Day post, inspired by a paper [1] that Tara sent me some weeks ago and I never got to write about it till now.
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In a journal called "Medical Hypotheses" Kumar and Sharma [1] propose that jet-lagged travellers may be more susceptible to getting infected with malaria. They write:
Rapid travel across several time zones leads to…
clock | September 5, 2006
First in a series of five posts on clocks in bacteria (from March 08, 2006)...
As I stated in the introductory post on this topic, it was thought for a long time that prokaryotes were incapable of generating circadian rhythms. When it was discovered, in 1994 [1], that one group of prokaryotes, the cyanobacteria, possess a circadian clock, the news was greeted with great excitement. This was the first definitive demonstration of a circadian clock in a bacterium (I intend to revisit the E.coli saga in a later post).
All three hypotheses for the origin of the circadian clock suppose that it…
clock | September 5, 2006This guy has some deep unresolved issues wiht sexuality. Overheated or overexcited? The link may or may not be Not Safe For Work, but it is most definitely Not Safe With Breakfast. Don't complain I didn't warn you!
clock | September 5, 2006Carl Feagans made this for my blog:
Make your own at the Vinyl Record Generator.
clock | September 4, 2006If you are interested in the pros and cons of cannibalism in praying mantises, you should check out the latest Carl's post and article on the topic.
clock | September 4, 2006"Once you have the testes, you really don't need the rest of the male... I feel really bad about that... it's been my protocol to euthanize the males and take their testes."
...spoken by Jenna's Dev-Bio prof.
clock | September 4, 2006Sterotypes, Sellouts, and Winning the Meme Wars by Sara Robinson
The Beltway Freemen by David Neiwert
Dr. Bob Has The Map by Sara Robinson
clock | September 4, 2006They are certainly familiar to anyone who has ever had a Creationist troll, a global-warming denialist troll, AIDS-HIV connection denialist troll, AR troll, DDT-is-banned troll, etc....
(Hat-tip: Bitch PhD)
clock | September 4, 2006This article looks into the possible causes of the recent crash in Lexington.
clock | September 4, 2006Chris Chatham of Developing Intelligence blog wrote an excellent summary of the controversy over dolphin intelligence and adds his own thoughts on the matter, with which I agree:
In conclusion, there are countless reasons to doubt that dolphins are "dumber than goldfish," or indeed that popular musings about dolphin intelligence have been inaccurate. Of course, as Cognitive Daily points out, it is clear that they don't have human-level intelligence - whatever that may mean. On the other hand, Manger has developed a new theory about the evolution of the dolphin brain; unfortunately, any…
clock | September 4, 2006Lance, Matt and Tom write on MSM misunderstaning of blogs, and on old posts that keep on giving. What are your old posts that keep getting links and comments months and years after they disappeared into the depths of archives? For me it is definitely this one.
clock | September 4, 2006If you need ideas how to help various science-related causes, Nick has collected a lot of information you can use.
clock | September 4, 2006Learn more about Seed's ScienceBloggers in the latest part of the periodic system series.
clock | September 4, 2006Power Emerges From Consensus In Monkey Social Networks:
Research on communication typically focuses on how individuals use signals to influence the behavior of receivers, thus primarily focusing on pairs of individuals. However, the role communication plays in the emergence of social structures is rarely studied.
In a new paper from The American Naturalist, Santa Fe Institute researchers Jessica Flack and David Krakauer study how power structures arise from a status communication network in a monkey society. Power structure is important because it can influence the complexity of interactions…
clock | September 4, 2006Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter, died yesterday after a freak accident while filming a documentary. He was impaled by a stingray through the chest. RIP.
clock | September 4, 2006From November 28, 2005, a post about teaching...
There has been literally an explosion of new knowledge about malaria in the last ten years or so. It is an amazing disease. Looking at all the new findings coming out almost every week makes me salivate because of...teaching! Malaria is a fantastic case-study to keep mentioning over and over again throughout the course. Let me backtrack for a moment....
I teach general biology to adult non-science majors at a community college. It is a speed course, lasting only eight weeks. In eight meetings, one has to deliver an enormous amount of material…