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grrlscientist | October 2, 2009
Image: wemidji (Jacques Marcoux).
Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est (And thus knowledge itself is power)
-- Sir Francis Bacon.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) was just published recently at Lab Rat. This edition is entitled Scientia Pro Publica -- 12th edition.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) is a traveling blog carnival that celebrates the best science, nature and medical writing targeted specifically to the public that has been published in the blogosphere within the past 60 days.
The host for the upcoming 5 October edition will be me. To send your…
gregladen | October 1, 2009At first, the three "suspicious packages" were "possible bombs." Then they were "incendiary devices" (a bomb that makes fire). Then, they were "potentially dangerous." They said "if this is a hoax, it's a good hoax" and at roughly the same time "we have no idea what these are."
Now, they are "inert" and presumed to have been some kind of joke.
The U.S. Postal Inspection Service said they will pay a reward of up to $10,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person responsible for placing the suspected explosive device at the Princeton Post Office. *
Those words…
mspringer | October 1, 2009One of the nice things about energy is that there's many, many different forms of it. There's many, many different ways to convert between those forms.
Yesterday we discussed the problem of turning the energy in sunlight into electricity via the circuitous route of sunlight to electricity (in a space solar panel) to microwave beamed down to earth, to electricity in a field of antennas. The advantages are continuous operation and high collection efficiency, and of course the disadvantage is the truly head-spinning cost.
Solar panels on the earth's surface are also expensive, not always very…
gregladen | October 1, 2009Edition number 15 is at Pleiotropy. Go and visit it and then visit all the sites it points to!
ddobbs | October 1, 2009
September 30, 2009
Canada: "An epidemic of confusion"
Via the Globe and Mail, Caroline Alphonso writes: Provincial flu strategies all over the map. Excerpt:
Two provinces and a territory have split ranks with the rest of Canada's health authorities in their fall immunization plans, sowing public confusion and raising questions of whether Canadians are being offered the safest options.
The hodge-podge of vaccination strategies comes after a controversial, unpublished study suggested that people under 50 are twice as likely to contract the H1N1 virus if they have received a seasonal…
cwilcox | October 1, 2009We all love it when our work is appreciated, and as a grad student, that doesn't happen nearly enough. On the plus side, the wonderful bloggers at Mauka to Makai have noticed my little blog and have given me a Kreativ Blogging Award!
They put me in the ranks of Deep Sea News, Malaria, Bedbugs Sea Lice and Sunsets, and Living the Scientific Life - which, while I hardly deserve, certainly boosts my ego for the day. So, THANKS!
Be sure to check out all of the blogs they awarded!
gregladen | October 1, 2009Apparently, these papers will be available for OpenAccess later this afternoon. While they are important in the details they provide (and I'm VERY happy to see them coming out), they are not surprising or earth shaking, with respect to our overall understanding of human evolution.
The paper will describe the usual mosaic of features of modern humans and apes in an upright, bipedal early hominid. This places a well described version of an "Australopith" pattern of walking pattern (which some people say is very modern, other say is very not modern, but is really just it's own thing neither…
gregladen | October 1, 2009For the last several years, the conservative religious right wing has been effective in winning over the hearts and "minds" of a large percentage of the American people. They've even managed this in areas that make no sense. Tort reform. Health care reform. Unions. Across the United States, working class people are embracing policies in these areas that will ultimately, over the medium and long term, do them great harm.
Read this Brilliant Essay at Quiche Moraine Dot Com!
cortex | October 1, 2009I've written before about the powerful mental benefits of communing with nature - it leads to more self-control, increased working memory, lower levels of stress and better moods - but a new study by psychologists at the University of Rochester find that being exposed to wildlife also makes us more compassionate. Nature might be red in tooth and claw, but even a glimpse of greenery can make us behave in kinder, gentler ways.
The study consisted of several experiments with 370 different subjects. In each experiment, people were exposed to either natural settings (pristine lakes, wooded…
apalazzo | October 1, 2009This is the fourth year that I update this list of potential winners. A warning, the list is highly biased towards basic biomedical research. In addition, some of the prizes may be more appropriate for the Chemistry prize.
We'll start with my favorite, Membrane Traffic. This finding is one of the most basic discoveries in cell biology. The two obvious winners would be James Rothman and Randy Schekman.
Intracellular signaling may win. Tony Hunter could get it for phospho-tyrosine, Tony Pawson for protein signalling domains, and Allan Hall for small G-protein switches. Maybe Lew Cantley for…
sciencepunk | October 1, 2009Blogging is on the back burner at the moment as I'm currently relying on pay-per-mb internet. It's like the dark days of dial-up. Anyway, in the mean time, enjoy this weird apple, which appears to be a chimera (the result of two genetically different individuals fusing very early on in development).
There are lots of examples of this strange mutation around - take a look at this half-blue lobster, for example. Some humans are chimeras - the result of non-identical twins fusing in womb. Their organs can have different origins - skin might have a different DNA makeup to their reproductive…
gregladen | September 30, 2009... works. So I had to fix the kitchen sink. This is what I did in the kitchen yesterday:
Kitchen Sink Strainer
The reason that I mention this is that I wanted to tell you that Ask the Builder has the best info, in this case, of the places I checked out.
And in case things get tough and you need to let out some steam, do this:
Drywall Removal Tips
Don't make rookie mistakes when tearing out your dry wall!!!!
gregladen | September 30, 2009Depending on what your view was, originally, of course. I've got a review of the piece published in PLoS here at Surprising Science. Where I am blogging for this week and next.
mspringer | September 30, 2009In theory I like solar power a lot. There's a lot to be said for energy that falls from the sky for free for as long as we care to use it. But actually getting that energy to do useful work in an economical way. Solar panels are expensive and not terribly environmentally friendly to produce, and sunlight is only available during the day and only to the extent that the sky is clear. Getting energy to use during less sunny periods requires either lots of excess capacity during the day along with storage facilities, or alternate generation methods. The first is wildly uneconomical, the…
grrlscientist | September 30, 2009
Image: wemidji (Jacques Marcoux).
Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est (And thus knowledge itself is power)
-- Sir Francis Bacon.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) was just published recently at Lab Rat. This edition is entitled Scientia Pro Publica -- 12th edition.
Scientia Pro Publica (Science for the People) is a traveling blog carnival that celebrates the best science, nature and medical writing targeted specifically to the public that has been published in the blogosphere within the past 60 days.
The host for the upcoming 5 October edition will be me. To send your…
gregladen | September 30, 2009Princeton, Minnesota, about five miles north of Zimmerman and thirty or so miles north of me, is the site of a rather odd event. Three "suspicious packages" were found around town, one by the post office, one at the high school, and one at the public utilities building.
The schools are being closed, and the packages are being investigated. I'm trying to find out if this happens to be homecoming week in Princeton...
UPDATE: Yes, it is homecoming week...
cortex | September 30, 2009Over at Mind Matters, we've got a wonderful new column on the cognitive benefits of falling in love by Nira Liberman and Oren Shapira. It turns out that serious romance - but not short-sighted lust - leads us to think in a more abstract manner, attuned to the subtle connections that we often overlook. (Of course, sometimes it's important to ignore these remote associations, which can be a distraction.) The end result is that subjects cued to contemplate love are significantly better at solving insight puzzles, while subjects primed with thoughts of lust excel at logic puzzles:
Love has…
gregladen | September 29, 2009Which is better, Cats or Dogs? From a religious perspective, that is.
The Best of Me Symphony, a blog carnival.
And get your Godless LOL's here.
gregladen | September 29, 2009For those of you in the Twin Cities area:
Bell Museum of Natural History Upcoming Events
Through October 4, 2009
Exhibit - America's Best Idea: A Photographic Journey Through Our National Parks
Take-your-breath-away photos of America's national parks by famed photographer Stan Jorstad.
Thursday, October 1, 2009, 5:30 to 6:30 p.m.
Exhibit Walkabout - Exploring Our National Parks
Join local experts on how each national park captures the essence of its geographic location.
Thursday, October 1, 2009, 10 to 11 a.m.
Family Program - Wolves: A Howling Good Time
Two- and three-year-olds and their…