Knoxville '82: Where Miscellany Thrive
worldsfair | November 2, 2010Sorry it's been a bit quiet here lately. Things have been busy at the museum, and I've also been writing in other places. In particular, These days I'm a guest blogger at Boing Boing, and on top of that, I'm also having fun starting a children's novel.
This novel has a mouthful of a title, Lizzie Popperfont and the Collider Whale Tale, and it's been partly inspired by my time here at the Natural History Museum. More importantly, there's going to be an underlying and subtle narrative that asks, "What happens to society and culture when only self interested elites are aware of the…
worldsfair | September 24, 2010
Just a quick note for you Brits out there (and specifically Londoners I guess). Tonight (Sept 24th), the Natural History Museum is hosting a "Science Uncovered" evening, whereby scientists and staff from various departments will be on hand.
As well, there will be a place where cocktails can be purchased, which will probably make all the sciencegeek talk all the more lively than usual.
Plus, if you have some biodiversity or fossil flavoured artifact you want looking at, this is also a good time to pop by and show the item off to a panel of experts (they will be manning a sort of "Antique (…
vlicata | September 23, 2010The laws of thermodynamics are empirical laws - they were not derived from some first principles of the universe: they were derived by doing thousands and thousands of experiments, and then coming up with some relationships that could quantitatively explain all those experiments.
In biological thermodynamics, we are at the beginnings of trying to define a similar set of "laws of biothermodynamics" - in this case we want relationships that connect thermodynamic quantities (ÎG, ÎH, ÎS, ÎCp) to functional or structural information about the biomolecules themselves. Nobody has anything that…
vlicata | September 16, 2010Scienceblogs is promoting the writing of "Science 101" general topic posts all through the "back to school" month of September. So, here is the first in a multi-part series on Heat Capacity in Biology:
Heat Capacity in Biology 101: What is it?
Heat capacity is basically a proportionality constant. For any substance, the heat capacity tells you how much the temperature of the substance will change when you add a specific amount of heat.
Here is an absolutely beautiful schematic illustration of the difference between a small heat capacity and a large heat capacity (from a website on the…
vlicata | August 30, 2010Wow! Either it's an odd coincidence, or the Latisse marketers are highly vigilant monetizers, because in less than 24 hours after I posted yesterday's rambling little piece about the eyelash wonder drug, a tasteful little ad for it showed up on the Scienceblogs homepage (cue spooky music now). Robot voice: "Oh yes, I will go buy Latisse now." I will try it on my cats, because I have always thought that cats with long eyelashes are wickedly beautiful.
But, Latisse, your ad says "ask your doctor about Latisse" -- I'm a bit disappointed. How could you pass up such a ripe possibility for pun…
vlicata | August 29, 2010The existence of the drug Latisse is clearly a harbinger of the end of modern civilization, in more ways than one, but it is also intensely fascinating and creepy. When I first heard of it, about a year ago, I really thought it was some sort of satirical article about the current status of big pharma and their slow but steady drift towards more (and more profitable) "lifestyle" medications. But no...it's frickin' real! Its original use was (is) to control glaucoma, but it was noticed that a side effect of such treatment was long and luxurious eyelashes. So, since about the beginning of…
vlicata | August 7, 2010Our lab has a new paper coming out this week in the Journal of Molecular Biology (JMB):
The Glutamate Effect on DNA Binding by Pol I DNA Polymerases: Osmotic Stress and the Effective Reversal of Salt Linkage
I'm going to talk about a few highlights here, but if you actually want the full article, say so in the comments or email me directly and I'll send you a reprint, because unless you or your university has a subscription to the Journal of Molecular Biology, you'll only be able to see the abstract.
The paper comes primarily from the Ph.D. dissertation of Daniel Deredge and osmotic stress…
worldsfair | July 28, 2010
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This video of a talk I gave at Northern Voice got completed whilst I was away. Anyway, if I remember (I'm one of those people who can't stand seeing themselves on video or hearing themselves on audio!), it's a pretty decent overview of what the Phylo project is all about, as well as general thoughts on things of that nature worth pursuing. Here's the byline that was given with my speaker profile:
David Ng describes Phylo, a cool trading card game to teach biodiversity. A study showed that children could easily identify and describe a large number of Pokemon characters…
worldsfair | July 27, 2010O.K. It's been a while since I last posted, but I do have a good excuse. I've been on the road with my family for the past 5 weeks, and have just settled in London. I'm here because I am about to start a half year sabbatical, and to give you a sense of where I'm working, here are a few picture hints (note that it's not, as my Son thought for a while, Hogwarts).
Here's the "foyer" (img link):
Here are a few of my "office" buddies, just down the hall (well, several halls actually). (img link)
And it's also a place where I can have a chat with Charles Darwin himself (he's in the white chair…
vlicata | June 30, 2010This just in from the upcoming edition of The Journal of Zombie Studies. A must have experimental checklist for any Faculty Senate Subcommittee on Monitoring of Upper Administrative Activities.
Experiment: Administrator A was asked why he/she is paid such a high salary, even though he/she has not: 1) published a scholarly work in many years; 2) presented work at an academic or scientific conference in many years; or 3) taught a course in many years. Administrator A made a low groaning noise and then answered: "I contribute a lot to this university." Conclusion: Possible zombieism.…
worldsfair | June 23, 2010(Well, actually 6 since the first ad below is just a bit of fun...)
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JOB POSTING: "IT'S ONLY A MATTER OF TIME"
This is a call for outstanding candidates to apply for a tenure track assistant professor position within the context of the Michael Smith Laboratories at the University of British Columbia. The successful applicant is expected to work in areas of interest to current faculty members, to interact with related groups within our network and to have demonstrated ability in producing research material of excellent quality and interest.
Due to the competitive nature of this process,…
worldsfair | June 10, 2010
Speaking of robots: you might be interested in the types of "deep thoughts" they have.
worldsfair | June 2, 2010
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Most people know that Google's informal tagline is "Don't be evil." In fact, that phrase comes with a little background, nicely described at Wikipedia:
"Don't be evil" is the informal corporate motto (or slogan) of Google,[1] originally suggested by Google employees Paul Buchheit and Amit Patel at a meeting. Buchheit, the creator of Gmail, said he "wanted something that, once you put it in there, would be hard to take out," adding that the slogan was "also a bit of a jab at a lot of the other companies, especially our competitors, who at the time, in our opinion, were…
worldsfair | May 31, 2010
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A while back, I was trying to think of phrases that "sound pleasant but are actually maybe bad" and I remember one of the silly ones I thought of was:
Hummer coming through.
Get it? "Hummer," as in a person who hums (yes, I know - kind of lame). Just for the record, this post is about the car not people who make sounds with their mouths closed.
Anyway, this subject came up because recently I read that the Hummer will be discontinued, and also I was surprised at how seeing a Hummer (the car) on the road really kind of bothered me. In fact, I could not help but assume…
worldsfair | May 22, 2010
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Happy Biodiversity Day!
Well, it's been about 5 weeks, and the Phylo project is close to 100 cards, all ready for free printing. As well, a set of rules is now available that is polished enough to go through some beta testing.
Today, we even have an "Oil Spill" card, and I'd like to invite people to leave comments on what text should go on this particular card. Is it too lenient right now, or too harsh? We're really hoping that as the project progresses, the comments on the site will ultimately guide what needs to go on (or off) the cards.
In fact, while I'm making…
worldsfair | May 21, 2010
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Yesterday I noticed that the web was a buzzing over two things in particular. One being the news of Craig Venter's work on a proof of principle example of producing a synthetic organism, and the other being the unveiling of London's 2012 Olympic mascots.
Venter's work certainly is an achievement - particularly in the technical realm. The accomplishment of synthesizing a piece of DNA that big (nevermind that the code was derived from digital infomation) and then putting it inside a DNA-less cell, in manner where all appears well is actually quite the kudos. Add to that…
worldsfair | May 20, 2010
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I recently read this great post on the Terry blog, whereby Elysa talks about preconceived notions of success and how a person's profession may relate to that. In particular, she used the example of Anne Wintour, the celebrated editor-in-chief of Vogue magazine, who by any measure is "successful," but because that success is rooted in "fashion," there are many who may not acknowledge her work as significant.
"they find what I do very amusing." Anna goes on to describe her siblings and their respected career paths- a brother who works to find housing for those who can't…
worldsfair | May 17, 2010
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Original article can be found at our Science Scout site.
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(Acronyms used: SSBFME = Science Scout Badges Free Market Economy)
So... It's been a few years since the Science Scouts were born, and (at last count) we have received over 300 emails from various Indian or Chinese Embroidery companies looking to "offer their badge making services." Finally, we're now of mind to finally lay out a game plan for the selling and obtaining of these Science Scout badges, physically.
And basically, we're going with the free market model - specifically the SSBFME.
In other words, if…
worldsfair | May 11, 2010Last Friday and Saturday, I went to Northern Voice 2010, a gathering of 500+ individuals intent on absorbing everything that a "Personal Blogging and Social Media Conference" can muster.
And I must say, that it was a treat to be there - not only because it had a nice friendly, informal vibe which makes for great learning opportunities, but also because I was fortunate enough to be a speaker.
My first slide
Specifically, I had a chance to tell folks about the phylo project; the awesomeness of mutualistic relationships (a.k.a. the squid and the bacteria); the beauty of the scientific method;…
vlicata | May 2, 2010While driving to the Astrobiology 2010 Conference last week, I and a graduate student from my lab briefly discussed Stephen Hawking's recent declaration that humans should try to avoid contact with what would surely be hostile aliens. It seemed odd to be attending a conference where a primary aim is finding extraterrestrial life while the news media and the blogosphere was reverberating with Hawking's hawkish alien opinions. What really made the whole situation even more odd, however, was the almost total absence of any reaction to, or even general acknowledgement of Hawking's remarks at…