Weekend Diversion: One for the Experimenters

"My idea of perfect happiness is a healthy family, peace between nations, and all the critics die." -David Mamet

As a theorist in physics, most of my research time is spent looking for errors in painstaking calculations, writing and running simulation code, and trying desperately to connect some very abstract concepts to potential observables in either experiments or the Universe.

But for experimentalists, the key difficulty is always some variation on one unifying theme: getting good data. That's why this weekend, I'm proud to bring you a fantastic takeoff of Daft Punk's Get Lucky by the University of California at San Diego's Neuroscience Department: Get Data.

I often have a hard time getting 100% on board with science parody videos, but this one totally worked for me, and anyone who's ever been a science grad student can relate to the long (thankless) hours, I'm certain. If you need a glossary for terms appearing in the song that you may not know:

• Patch Clamp - a lab technique in electrophysiology to study the opening/closing of ion channels in individual cells, such as neurons.
• GCaMP - genetically encoded calcium indicators, which allows you to monitor neurons without the use of electrodes.
• PCR - Polymerase chain reaction, which is a molecular biology technique that allows you to generate a buttload of copies of a single piece of DNA.
• Neuron / PLoS ONE - More prestigious / less prestigious journals suitable for neuroscience publishing.
• SfN - the Society for Neuroscience, the professional organization for those studying brains, spinal cords and neurons.
• BEAST MODE - Really? Click here.

And I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did. Thanks for creating this, 123comicbro, have a great party, UCSD Neurosciences, and thanks for bringing the video onto my radar, RealClearScience! Have a great weekend, and I'll see you back here during the week for more about the Universe!