clock | November 6, 2009Current Status of a Model System: The Gene Gp-9 and Its Association with Social Organization in Fire Ants:
The Gp-9 gene in fire ants represents an important model system for studying the evolution of social organization in insects as well as a rich source of information relevant to other major evolutionary topics. An important feature of this system is that polymorphism in social organization is completely associated with allelic variation at Gp-9, such that single-queen colonies (monogyne form) include only inhabitants bearing B-like alleles while multiple-queen colonies (polygyne form)…
clock | November 5, 2009I have often been downcast, but never in despair; I regard our hiding as a dangerous adventure, romantic and interesting at the same time. In my diary, I treat all the privations as amusing. I have made up my mind now to lead a different life from other girls.
- Anne Frank
clock | November 5, 2009
Here are the submissions for OpenLab 2009 to date. As we have surpassed 470 entries, all of them, as well as the "submit" buttons and codes and the bookmarklet, are under the fold. You can buy the 2006, 2007 and 2008 editions at Lulu.com. Please use the submission form to add more of your and other people's posts (remember that we are looking for original poems, art, cartoons and comics, as well as essays):
10 days of science: Astronomical art: Representing Planet Earth
2020 Science: Hooked on science - ten things that inspired me to become a scientist
A Blog Around The Clock: On Being a…
clock | November 5, 2009
I'll be briefly on the Skeptically Speaking radio show tomorrow night at 8pm Eastern, introducing ScienceOnline2010. You can listen live here.
clock | November 5, 2009Follow me on Twitter to get these, and more, in something closer to Real Time (all my tweets are also imported into FriendFeed where they are much more easy to search and comment on, as well as into my Facebook wall where they are seen by quite a different set of people):
Global warming worries drive biofuels research
Research participants have a right to their own genetic data
Time to talk periods
RT @maninranks: Idea for TheRTP: Recent Imagine Science film festival in NYC. Why not here? Replay theirs? Do our own?
Another post on distributed science v. open source science: Distributed…
clock | November 5, 2009Having difficulties following the flood of blogging here on scienceblogs.com? Well, it just became much easier. Go to this page and find the widgets with all sorts of feeds: the Select feed, the Channels feeds and all the individual blog feeds. So, if you want my feed, you click on the Blogs (A-C) tab, find my blog, click on 'Share', click on the 'Install outside Netvibes' tab, then choose where you want to download it. Then pick the way you want it to look (there is a pull-down menu with several choices, as well as several colors to choose from), copy the widget code and paste it into your…
clock | November 5, 2009The 123rd Congregation of the Skeptics' Circle is up on Blue Genes - Science news
clock | November 5, 2009
As you know you can see everyone who's registered for the conference, but I highlight 4-6 participants every day as this may be an easier way for you to digest the list. You can also look at the Program so see who is doing what.
There are three parent-child pairs coming to the conference in January and all three have been here before:
John and Sam Dupuis are a father and son. John is the Head of the Steacie Science & Engineering Library at York University and a SciBling, blogging at Confessions of a Science Librarian. I interviewed John last year after the 2008 conference. His son Sam…
clock | November 5, 2009Boom 'n' Doom: Volcanoes, North Carolina and North Carolina Volcanoes
November 18th; Acro Café on the fourth floor of the Museum of Natural Sciences
8:30-10:00 am with discussion beginning at 9:00 followed by Q&A
Volcanic activity half a world away can affect us in our own state. When Indonesia's Mount Tambora erupted over about 4 days in 1815, the resulting debris cloud led to the "Year Without Summer" in 1816, which was marked by massive crop failures from Europe to North…
clock | November 5, 2009There are 22 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:
Improvements of Sound Localization Abilities by the Facial Ruff of the Barn Owl (Tyto alba) as Demonstrated by Virtual Ruff Removal:
When sound arrives at the eardrum it has already been filtered by the…
clock | November 4, 2009If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.
- Anne Dudley Bradstreet
clock | November 4, 2009Last night we went to see Leonard Cohen at the DPAC in Durham. What to say? He's the Legend. Still, at this age, full of energy and spunk. And everything was done to perfection - the set, the lighting and the slow dance of the backup singers had, together, a hypnotic effect. Three hours passed like nothing - I could have stayed another three (and that would still not exhaust all of his greatest hits).
I was too far away to take good pictures with my iPhone, but I took these two, just to show the light changes. There were some quite magical light effects as some moments including those making…
clock | November 4, 2009Follow me on Twitter to get these, and more, in something closer to Real Time (all my tweets are also imported into FriendFeed where they are much more easy to search and comment on, as well as into my Facebook wall where they are seen by quite a different set of people):
More on science journalism: Mind the spin - muttering on about spin and some suggestions.
How the Internet Enables Intimacy
The temporary web - "Twitter makes us forget"
Behold the human search engine
As usual, the press gets it all wrong
Lashing out at Latisse® and Latisse®: Tell me more about my eyes.
Journalists have…
clock | November 4, 2009The neighbors in Southern Village (here in Chapel Hill) are wild about Halloween, many making elaborate decorations of their houses for it (often more elaborate than for Christmas). The business on The Green also get into the spirit and put fun and scary dolls or scarecrows or other objects in front of their stores. These are often quite well designed as well. This year, we really liked this sign-post, showing the way to other businesses (e.g., Lumina Theater, Weaver Street Market, Harrington Bank, etc.) - click on buttons to see large:
clock | November 4, 2009Dog Genome: Teaching Scientists New Tricks
November 17th; 6:30-8:30 pm with discussion beginning at 7:00 followed by Q&A
The Irregardless Café, 901 W. Morgan Street, Raleigh 919.833.8898
This year, roughly 66,000 people will be diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, while another 22,000 will be diagnosed with cancers of the brain. In parallel, our pet dogs also suffer from a range of similar spontaneous cancers. For thousands of years, humans and dogs have shared a unique bond--breathing the same air, drinking the same water, and living in the same environment. During the 21st century…
clock | November 4, 2009As you know you can see everyone who's registered for the conference, but I highlight 4-6 participants every day as this may be an easier way for you to digest the list. You can also look at the Program so see who is doing what.
Dorothea Salo is an academic librarian in Wisconsin who blogs on The Book of Trogool. She tweets as well. At the conference, Dorothea will co-moderate the session "Scientists! What can your librarian do for you?" and teach a workshop "Repositories for Fun and Profit".
Peter Lipson is a physician in Michigan. He blogs on White Coat Underground and Science-Based…
clock | November 4, 2009Follow me on Twitter to get these, and more, in something closer to Real Time (all my tweets are also imported into FriendFeed where they are much more easy to search and comment on, as well as into my Facebook wall where they are seen by quite a different set of people):
The future of news is entrepreneurial
Tribune Co. papers rewiring for experimental week without AP
Politicians Use Social Media to Bypass the Press Corps
The first great mammoth
Welcome to ScienceOnline2010
Worth Watching - three great eco movies for the weekend.
The End of Impact Factors as a Measure of Research Quality…
clock | November 4, 2009There are 14 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:
Experience Matters: Females Use Smell to Select Experienced Males for Paternal Care:
Mate choice and mating preferences often rely on the information content of signals exchanged between potential partners…