Archive for category Science Fandom
Quick link dump: Med History, GMO Fearmongering at the Atlantic and SciFi (literary and realized)
Posted by Grg in Grg's Reference, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Today at the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas, Pete Diamandis announced an X-Prize for a tricorder-like device. The X-Prize Foundation is one of those organizations that make me proud of humanity.
Emily Willingham deftly dissects an awful attempt by a writer for The Atlantic at turning a cool scientific discovery into a “Frankenfoods” fear fest. Emily sums up the science in question — findings on how little bits of rice RNA can have an affect on our genes — in these passages :
A study from a Chinese group led by Chen-Yu Zhang of Nanking University and published in Cell Research, has uncovered the fascinating result that when people eat rice, they can absorb microRNAs (miRNAs)–tiny sequences of RNA–from the rice into the blood. These rice-originating miRNAs turn up in blood and tissues of people who eat rice and…here’s the kicker…one type of rice miRNA interacts with human proteins that are responsible for removing LDL (“bad” cholesterol) from the blood (!). It’s the first report of plant miRNAs ending up in people by way of diet and the finding that at least one of them alters an important process in the body.
{A bunch of cool stuff you should read cut out.}
Researchers have discovered myriad ways that miRNA influences human development and disease, and these discoveries open the way to using that information to cure disease. But all of the miRNAs investigated thus far in people have come from people themselves, either present for normal functions or overabundant and linked to disease. The flashy take-home from this latest rice study is, We can pick up these tiny regulators from what we eat…and they can interfere with the functions of proteins we make.
She then goes into The Atlantic author’s illogical leap attempt to turn into a cautionary tale of genetically-modified food. I understand (via her Twitter handle) that she’s updating the piece. I look forward to following the tale.
Oh, where were we? History, yes! NEJM is 200 years old and they’re celebrating with a cool site and timeline.
Science Fiction magazines (like all genre literary magazines) are suffering what are probably unsustainable drops in readership, which makes it curious to see that MIT’s consumer-friendly Technology Review has just announced its own Skiffypub: TRSF. I know you can find Analog and Asimov’s in “e” versions, but I’m shocked neither has an Android or IOS app. Its not like they cater to savvy geeks or anything.
Why I don’t go in the water: Yeti Crabs
Posted by Grg in Don't Go In the Water, Dumb thoughts, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Thursday, January 5, 2012
Here’s a great reason why I won’t be sleeping well tonight: Yeti crabs. They look like giant, slightly fuzzy, ticks.
The little octopus is just adorable, though, in an entirely Cthulhuesque way.
Also, why I read EarthSky.org: they’re good about linking to published sources. Handy! Considerate!
Awesome parasite tricks
Posted by Grg in Grg's Reference, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Friday, September 9, 2011
While waiting for a photographer to set up this morning, I read a nifty PLoS ONE paper on parasitic wasps from some Czech researchers that might add a few good parasite examples to your cocktail party conversation bank. The chief example, of course, is the larva of the wasps themselves, who force their spider hosts to build the sort of snuggly web-den that they would normally do as they are preparing for winter. The researchers gather that the larva get the same advantage from the winter webs as the spiders do, namely protection from weather and predators. Then, presumably, the larva eat their hosts from within. Eh, don’t feel too bad. Unless you are a big fan of spiders, Neottiura bimaculata and Theridion varians are not the sort I’d hesitate to squish. But maybe that’s just me.
Interestingly, both spiders make different kinds of winterized webs, where N. bimaculata creates a dense wad of webbing while T. varians builds a cupola-like structure. So, despite the fact that the hosts are two distinct species who build two distinctly different types of webs, the wasp larva effects them in more or less the same way, presumably by tinkering with the same winterizing mechanism (yay evolution!).
The paper’s intro also provides a few good examples, which I’ll just paste here for reference:
Many parasites and parasitoids have evolved remarkable strategies to manipulate the behavior of their hosts in order to promote their own survival and reproduction [1], [2]. The behavioral manipulations described include altered phototaxis, changes in locomotion, and the alteration of foraging and defensive behaviors [2]–[19]. The most fascinating manipulations are those that lead to unnatural host behaviors. The parasitic trematode, Dicrocoelium dendriticum Rudolphi, forces its intermediate ant-host to move up onto blades of grass during the night and early morning. This action increases the ingestion of infected ants by grazing sheep, the final host [3]. Mermithid nematodes induce their terrestrial arthropod hosts to commit suicide by jumping into water, after which the hairworms desert the host to spend their adult stage in their natural habitat [8].
Behavioral manipulations often result in the induction of innate behaviors. Acanthocephalan, Polymorphus paradoxus (Connell & Corner), evokes evasive behavior in the amphipod intermediate host, Gammarus lacustris Sars, which is then eaten by ducks [4]. The braconid parasitoid, Glyptapanteles spp., makes their caterpillar host behave as a bodyguard of the parasitoid pupae [15]. The caterpillar stands bent over the parasitoid pupae and violently lashes out at approaching predators, resulting in reduced predation of parasitoid pupae.
Evidence for benefits of the host manipulations for the parasitoid has been gained from several host-parasitoid systems [9]–[12]. But there might be also costs involved. This has been rarely studied. Maure et al. [13] investigated bodyguarding of the braconid pupae, Dinocampus coccinellae (Schrank), by ladybird Coleomegilla maculate Timberlake. Laboratory experiments revealed that duration of bodyguarding suppressed predation by lacewings but also decreased the parasitoid fecundity.
You can find the entire article here, for free, because PLoS ONE is awesome like that.
The Second (Third? Fourth?) Coming of the Golden Fleece Awards
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, Grg's Reference, Rant/Rave, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Thursday, June 2, 2011
Why? Because research often sounds funny. Really. Why else would Palin attack fruit fly research? For the ignorant, it sounds pretty damn frivolous. For the rest of us, its pretty embarrassing to watch.
Now I’m not saying that there’s not waste in government, or even waste in research funding. There probably is. In fact, I’m willing to go as far as say–without any evidence at hand one way or the other–that there probably is waste in federal research funding. Someone, somewhere at the National Science Foundation or National Institutes of Health, is funding a research program that they know, in their heart of hearts, will not advance the human body of knowledge one iota. Shocking, I know.
If only Coburn was actually pursuing something like that. No, he’s doing what Proxmire and others did before him, searching through the reams of research grant summaries produced by places like NSF to pick ones that sound silly or frivolous. Its easy enough to do, but will just as likely backfire on you. Again, ask Palin.
You can also ask Mark Sanford. Before Mark was a governor and a famed Appalachian explorer, he was a Republican Congresscritter of the Revolution of ’94 sort. In 1998, he played the same Golden Fleece game, searching the abstract databases of the National Science Foundation (which had become freely online) for funny-sounding award summaries.
To be honest, I did the same thing. I interned in the NSF’s Office of Legislative and Public Affairs (OLPA, which I always liked to say as Opa! They learned quickly to keep me away from the dishes.) As a pioneer in open-access government-type stuff, NSF put all their approved grant information online, which was pretty keen in the 90s. As an intern, I was not encumbered by a particular PR “beat” and was given free reign to cover whatever I found interesting, as long as the professional public information officers didn’t mind. I scanned through the award listings and came up with cool stuff like “supermassive” black holes and “doppler on wheels.”
Sanford did the same thing and came up with a remarkable rant on federal funding for ATM research. He wanted to slice almost $200 million from the budget, citing waste on ATM research and other silly things. Only he (or his staffer) didn’t bother to read beyond the headline, if they did, they would have realized that the award abstract referred to Asynchronous Transfer Mode, the switching technique that made your lightning fast dorm room ISDN connection so much faster than your parent’s Compuserve account. Cue the sad trombone. (Side note: Sadtrombone.com is apparently defunct so I’ll do it myself: Wah wah wah waaaaah.)
In fairness to Republicans, it was Sanford’s Michigan colleague Vern Ehlers who pointed out Sanford’s error, quashing the budget hack. (Check out this little note in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.)
Even more recently, Rep. Adrian Smith of Nebraska, tried to play the Golden Fleece game. Last year, Rep. Smith called for folks to search through NSF’s award database to find other funny-sounding stuff like:
$750,000 to develop computer models to analyze the on-field contributions of soccer players and $1.2 million to model the sound of objects breaking for use by the video game industry. Help us identify grants that are wasteful or that you don’t think are a good use of taxpayer dollars.
Of course, both projects were taken drastically out of context. the soccer study was really a look at smart-swarming, that is how teams can come together to collaborate on complex problems. The “sound of objects breaking” was created for the study of how to recreate realistic noises in a virtual environment, say for search-and-rescue or the military, perhaps? Again, its a bit of irony. The NSF attempts to be responsible with our money, showing us precisely where the dollars are going, only for some political hack to come along, take the work out of context, and use it to further his own political agenda.
Oh, bother.
NSF, which only spends about 5 percent of its budget on administrative costs*, is getting nailed by political hacks for a) openly posting its award information (which is probably mandated by now) and b) funding scientists who often use imprecise or “clever” language in their award application titles and abstracts.
So, Coburn, you want to cut waste? Fine, but realize that federal funding for research is the backbone of our economy. Every new technical advance, therapeutic drug, surgical technique, material and technology we’ve seen in the last 50 years owes its very existence to agencies like the NSF and NIH. Every step forward we’ve made in medicine, technology and industry began in some academic laboratory with government dollars. Research funding is every bit a part of our infrastructure as our roads and bridges (which could also use a little bit of money now that I think of it).
Maybe you could take a little fiscal pride in that Tom, my friend, and a little less happy-dancing over the amount of farm subsidies your rake in for Oklahoma each year.
The fact is, NSF and NIH subject grant applications to peer review. That is, the agencies gather teams of scientists to review the grant applications made by other scientists. The NSF was started that way nearly 60 years ago as a way of making a science of science funding, whereas scientific projects would otherwise be funded through political largesse and budgetary earmarks. In other words, its the opposite of pork.
Money is scarce–only about 1 in 10 grants are ever given funding–so the pressure is on to fund high-impact, low-risk work. (If anything, there is a good argument to be made for funding high-risk work, but that’s not what I’m ranting about today.) Grants that get funding rarely get funded on the first go-around, and a lot of work goes into making sure the money is spent wisely. Note: I can’t think of anywhere else in the Federal government where people work so hard to make sure that taxpayer money is spent well. Correct me if I’m wrong.
Further reading:
(An interesting essay regarding a recent American Association of Anthropology kerfluffle that’s tangentially-related.)
* Best proof I can find is here, a report from 4 years ago. I admit, its a little outdated, but I’ve got work to do…
Why I don’t go into the water: Jellyfish with both “medusa” and “gigantica” in their Latin names should be avoided on principle
Posted by Grg in Don't Go In the Water, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Friday, December 10, 2010
But looking up info on oarfish, I came across Mark Benfield‘s work at Louisiana State University. He’s working with oil and gas industry ROVs — submersible robots — to study wildlife. Hey, its the least the industry could do. No, seriously, the very least.
Last spring, Benfield published the first account of Stygiomedusa gigantea, a giant jellyfish, in the Gulf of Mexico. They aren’t trawler-eating big, but they are still fairly huge. They are apparently fond of grabbing onto underwater structures — such as pipelines or oil rigs — to use as a base for feeding. See, the oil industry is providing a valuable service!
Discover Magazine interviewed Benfield last month. Cool, shudder-inducing vid:
Why I don’t go in the water: the Oarfish of the ocean depths
Posted by Grg in Don't Go In the Water, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Friday, December 10, 2010
The awesomely named Serpent Project — a painfully labored acronym “Scientific and Environmental ROV Partnership using Existing iNdustrial Technology” lets scientists use ROVs run by oil and gas companies in the gulf. The fossil fuel industry in the Gulf of Mexico didn’t quite have the best spring and summer, evah!, so it is understandable that this didn’t get much press. Also, its about a long, disgusting fish monster.
Still, someone took Dr. Mark’s video and set it to Holst’s Neptune the Mystic, which is as appropriate as it is satisfying.
These guys can grow up to 56 feet long, which is frighteningly impressive.
Also, Dr. Mark also captured footage of a ginormous pulsating jellyfish that ought to put the fear of Cthulhu into you, if nothing else does. Next post.
The Question and Answer Book of Space: About Astronauts
Posted by Grg in Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Wednesday, November 24, 2010
The suit adds a few inches, but renders your arms useless, I'm afraid.
Many men and women, too, in this country would like to be astronauts. But who are we kidding? Men. Big men of science.
Again, like young Werner, below, note the dress and posture. Right hand up, slacks pressed with the force of a thousand colliding suns. Less casual this time, as noted by the darker sports coat and the dangling left hand. This is a man of serious cheekbones and disposition. The sort of man we need to strap to the top of a rocket and let fly. He could use the release, metaphorical or otherwise.
Why I don’t go in the water: More on Squidworm
Posted by Grg in Don't Go In the Water, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Who lives in your nightmares under the sea? SQUIDWORM WIGGLYPANTS!
Ugh. All wiggly and covered in its nasty little appendages. That’s not a proper worm, its the embodiment of an entry mid-way through the “S” section of the Lovecraftian bestiary. Of course, its only about 10 centimeters (about 4 inches) long, but it has, like, 10 of these little arms.
Squidworm was discovered 2,800 meters (about 9200 feet) beneath the Indian Ocean, thanks to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute for Finding Tiny Awful Things (EDIT: I mentioned this earlier), who found it using one of their handy submersibles. Which one? the MSNBC article I linked from doesn’t say. Bad MSNBC.
Moreover, the MSNBC folks categorize this as a missing link, which gets my hackles up some. Not only does “missing link” rank along with “holy grail” as my least favorite science cliche, it isn’t a missing link. Missing link implies transitional fossil. This is real, this is now. To what are we proposing squidworm as link between, Greg asks in a spit-flecked bit of poorly structured sentence? A worm and squid? Annelida and Mollusca? (Same thing, just getting fancy.) Can’t blame MSNBC too much, of course, as they were quoting a researcher who was looking for a way to say that these critters represent a branch of the evolutionary tree (ugh, talk about bad science cliche) where worms could move between the mud and the sea above — in that bit of the deep water known as the benthic (great word) zone.
Fortunately, you can read the scientific article in Biology Letters (if you happen to have access) which states that they used the awesomely-named Max Rover, Global Explorer, which sounds more like a PBS Kids series about a globe-trotting canine than a deep sea submersible. Max Rover isn’t part of Woods Hole, but apparently a system run by a company called Deep Sea Systems, presumably a WHOI-related contractor or something.
The Biology Letters article muses on how squidworm has managed to evade detection:
The relative inaccessibility of the deep sea has left most of its vast spaces unexplored, so discovery of new species is seldom surprising. The unusual morphology, large size, numerous observations (16 within seven dives), behaviour and phylogenetic position of T. samae are however a surprise. How could such an animal evade collection until now? We believe that the immense volume of deep, pelagic habitat, the difficulty of sampling deep demersal communities and T. samae’s ability to swim away from towed observational or sampling gear probably all contributed to its long seclusion.
The lead researcher on the project author on the study, Karen Osborn of UC, San Diego/Scripps Oceanographic Institute, previously published the discovery of a species of ocean worm that used bioluminescent bombs to evade predators. Squidworms, bomber worms…what hath Karen wrought open mankind with her insatiable thirst for the damnable horrors of annelida?
On yet another tangent, Karen’s lab website is found at spineless.ucsd.edu/ — Spineless! How freakin’ precious is that?
Update: I switched lead researcher to lead author, because I honestly don’t know if Karen was the lead on the overall project, but she was certainly the lead author on the paper.
Why I don’t go in the water: even more nasty things ‘neath the sea
Posted by Grg in Don't Go In the Water, Rant/Rave, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Monday, October 4, 2010
Still, I’m creeped out.
This critter, below, for example is a squidworm. The forward tentacles are there, I’m sure, to rape your mind.
Apparently, squidward squidworm was identified during a 2007 expedition to the Celebes Sea, near Borneo.
From the expedition’s chief scientist, Larry Madin:
When we got down nearer the bottom with the ROV, we encountered the most unusual and unfamiliar animal of all. When we first spotted it, people watching the video called out “squid,” “no, shrimp,” “maybe a fish,” “I think it’s a worm.” It did turn out to be a worm, but like nothing we had ever seen before. A worm almost 10 centimeters long, swimming with a row of paddles formed from stiff bristles, and with 10 long, writhing tentacles coming out of its head. No wonder we thought it could be a squid! We did end up calling it the “squidworm.” We think it may be an undescribed species, but none of us are experts on polychaete worms, so we’ll have to wait until a real specialist can tell us more about it.
The Question and Answer Book of Space: Earth
Posted by Grg in Science Fandom, Science/Geek, Vintage science on Tuesday, September 21, 2010
The Earth, of course, is much too close to the moon, or vice-versa, I’m not sure which. And both are much nearer to the sun, unless it is in the process of exploding in which case the Mercurians and Venusians have already had it. The Earth is 93 million miles or so from the sun and, as everyone knows, of course, the moon is exactly one helvetica away from the Earth, roughly 238,857 miles.
Still, it does well to set up the whole vast loneliness of space thing, which is a bit much for a kids book written in the midst of the space race. Figure this, between the book’s first printing, 1965, and this edition, 1970, Americans had already witnessed two landings and were beginning to scan the dial to see what else was on TV.