The delightful dung cannon.

Well I've posted about a few people who blend science and art, but I like to do it too! So here's a little drawing I did of one of the fastest living things on the planet... the fungus Pilobolus, colloquially known as the "Dung cannon", which shoots its capful of spores at mind-boggling speeds. I drew this as a card submission for the Phylomon project - think Pokemon meets biology/ecology education.

I "drew" my inspiration from two places:
1) Time-lapse photography videos of Pilobolus crystallinus made at Cornell University (like this one here).
2) The PLoS One paper that documented Pilobolus keinii expelling its spores using super high-speed photography (watch this awesome video of it).

According to the authors, the spore-expulsion speeds documented for P. keinii and the 3 other fungi (Ascobolus immersus, Podospora anserina, and Basidiobolus ranarum) are the fastest accelerations (of any kind... bird, cheetah... rocket ship?) known in nature!

Happy accidents, in Art and Science

Blobs of ink spill over the page.. and out of the shadowy pool emerge visions of tubing and syringes, veination, neurons, and pulsing organs. Vesna Jovanovic described a while back how she came to create her Pareidolia series of images, like the one below, out of randomly spilled ink.

Art and science both usually require a process of study, synthesis, and imagination to generate great new ideas - visionary new hypotheses, experiments, or masterpieces. But the haphazard nature of Vesna's inkblot creations remind me of another way that great scienctific discoveries have oft been achieved - by happy accident.

Most people have heard the story of penicillin's discovery. Absent-minded scientist (Alexander Fleming) leaves bacterial cultures out unprotected, returns to find a fungus has invaded, surrounded by a bateriocidal ring of death. But there is also the story of Constantin Fahlberg, who discovered the sweet properties of saccharin by contaminating his meal with hands still dirty from the lab (presumably then returning to the lab to taste his coal tar extracts and figure out which one was so delicious). And Percy L. Spencer was set on the path to create the modern microwave oven after a magnetron (a component found at the heart of radars) melted the chocolate bar in his pocket. And many more...

Read more:
discovery top 10 accidental inventions
popsci top 10 accidental science
Vesna Jovanovic

Science-Based Medicine

For those with ADD, the condensed-soup version of my previous post.

Read this blog:
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/

Science-Based Medicine (note: should there be any other kind?)

So, I have fallen off the horse that I once so valiantly declared I would ride fast and true... the horse of science journalism. Maybe I haven't fallen off, so much, but taken a detour called grad school. And while I have never before been bombarded with so many amazing ideas, ripe fodder for my blog, I have also never been so busy.

My dilemma is this: I refuse to write about something (usually a current popular and controversial science/health issue) without doing sufficient research on the subject that I feel I can write an educated, unbiased, and hopefully enlightening commentary. This usually takes me a long time... and extra-curricular time has been in short supply lately.

So let me present you with a blog that does just what I would like to, and that has the man-power and credentials to back itself up. Science-Based Medicine is a blog written by a number of physicians and scientists, who identify controversies in health and medicine (eg. vaccine safety, alternative medicine), and thoroughly research the subjects and do an excellent job of detangling the myths and pseudoscience from the well-founded science. To be fair, the odd article does exhibit the author's contempt for pseudoscience and crankery, but in the end, the facts speak for themselves.

Props to the crew of SBM... I wish everyone would read this blog!

http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/

Monkeying around at the beach

Feeling the summer heat? Heading to the beach? Bringing your favourite cool, refreshing beverages with you? Watch out for the alcoholic monkeys!



As you can see from the video, alcoholism isn't unique to humans. Maybe these guys should be the next organism I study for my fetal alcohol exposure research... any excuse to do a research project in the Caribbean!

To boldly go where most young Ontarions have gone before...

I have recently become the proud owner of an Honours Bachelor's of Science degree in Biomedical Toxicology. And with this degree in hand (or on the wall), I have traveled from Southern Ontario to the mecca of the Canadian youth... British Columbia.

But, unlike many, I have not come to pick fruit or live in a camper van on the west coast of the Island, while the spray of the ocean tickles my face and the breeze of freedom tousles my hair. Here, at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, I have begun my Master's of Science degree in Medical Genetics. Here, I hope to bring new light into the fields of epigenetics and fetal programming. And here, I hope to conduct research that, partnered with the various hospitals and research centres in Vancouver, will contribute something translatable and tangible to diagnostic or therapeutic medicine.

Here, I begin my next adventure in science!

A Short History of Medicine

A Short History of Medicine: "Doctor, I have an ear ache."

2000 B.C. - "Here, eat this root."
1000 A.D. - "That root is heathen, say this prayer."
1850 A.D. - "That prayer is superstition, drink this potion."
1940 A.D. - "That potion is snake oil, swallow this pill."
1985 A.D. - "That pill is ineffective, take this antibiotic."
2000 A.D. - "That antibiotic is artificial. Here, eat this root!"

What are we going to be laughing at in the future about today's medicine?


From: Medical Jokes and Milestones of Medicine

An aspiring science writer's pledge

A friend and I were discussing blogging yesterday, and he commented that I should write more often on my blog. I agreed with him, whole-heartedly, but explained to him the difficulty I face. My problem is this; the more zealous I am about an interesting subject that I would like to write about, the more afraid I am that I haven’t learned enough about the many facets of that subject to be able to write about it without bias.

I have a tendency to preach about the value of recognizing your own bias. Or at least, I would like to preach about it, because I think it is important. As such, I am petrified of my own bias… I am certain that it will sneak into my fingertips when I’m not looking and type itself into existence on my blog, only to be caught by a reader stopping by for a dose of my blathering. Of course, there is no escaping bias, no matter how hard we try. Everyone ultimately has an agenda (usually to live, preferably in a world that best suits one’s interests and needs), and a person’s actions and words will come to represent the goals therein. I haven’t yet figured a way out of that one.

What I can do, however, is devote myself to incessant inquiry when I decide to write about a subject, especially one that stirs many people to passion. I hereby declare that I will do everything in my power (or in that chunk of my free time that I have chosen to spend researching and blogging) to look at every possible side of an issue (or, umm, all the ones I can think of) before defending one side over another. I will set aside my own prejudices, and seek out the prejudices of the parties I am investigating. I will form my opinions based on verifiable empirical evidence whenever possible, well-educated guesses when they are probable, and not-so-educated guesses only when they are particularly comical. So rest assured, dear reader, that when I am writing here, from now on, I will certainly have done my homework (unless, of course, the dog ate the parts that I didn't like).

Brains vs Beauty - Who will take on Jenny McCarthy?

Thanks to Oprah, Jenny McCarthy has been given a media platform from which she can parade as a person educated in science, and tell the world her views on autism, medicine, and nutrition. Jenny has no legitimate education in these fields, and all of her information appears to be from her own biased experience with her son, the alternative health pseudoscience gospels of the internet, and whoever provides evidence corroborating what she has apparently already chosen to believe. She promotes the dangerous and fallacious argument that vaccinations can cause autism, with such deceptive quotes as,

"Autism is not primarily a genetic disorder, but caused by vaccine-related toxins (including mercury, aluminum, ether, anti-freeze, and human aborted fetal tissue) and pesticides."

A little perspective on what truth (aluminum salt preservatives) is mixed with lies (anti-freeze, aborted fetal tissue?!) in this statement can be found here, thanks to the American Academy of Pediatricians.

While it may have once been considered a real concern that childhood vaccines cause autism, the only scientists who are still chasing the tail of this notion are not worthy of being called scientists (“scientists” of the same ilk as those who persist in denying that HIV causes AIDS). This is NOT an issue being hotly contested in the scientific community, or swept under the rugs of big pharma, as the Jenny McCarthys would have you believe.

But to paraphrase Jenny, her son is her science. Who can argue with such sound evidence as that? Let’s remember here that the ability of the human mind to believe what it wants to believe is immense, particularly when such powerful emotions as motherly love are at play. Bias is a dangerous beast – especially when a person firmly believes that they are not biased (everybody has biases, and acknowledging them is the first step to circumventing it!).

Why am I concerned? Jenny is an attractive and charismatic woman, who is clearly a passionate mother. This automatically endears her to an audience, and if that audience is not well-informed on the subjects she preaches to begin with, they will likely be influenced by Jenny’s heart-wrenching account of her own passionate battle to find a cure for her autistic son. The opposite side of the story (the side backed by good scientific evidence) is often poorly represented, as on Oprah, by a dry statement read out by the host on behalf of an absent expert. What we need is a real debate in front of the audience, with equally charismatic and attractive proponents of real science sitting in the seat next to the Jenny McCarthys of the world.

Who will answer that call to arms?


Some great blogging about the vaccine manufactroversy:
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?cat=36

Carl Sagan - Critical scientist, profound philosopher, and inspirational teacher

"In our tenure on this planet we've accumulated dangerous evolutionary baggage, propensities for aggression and ritual, submission to leaders, hostility to outsiders, all of which puts our survival in some doubt. But we've also acquired compassion for others, love for our children, a desire to learn from history and experience and a great soaring passionate intelligence, the clear tools for our continued survival and prosperity. Which aspects of our nature will prevail is uncertain, particularly when our visions and prospects are bound to one small part of the small planet Earth. But up there in the Cosmos an inescapable perspective awaits. National boundaries are not evident when we view the Earth from space. Fanatical ethnic or religious or national identifications are a little difficult to support when we see our Earth as a fragile blue crescent fading to become an inconspicuous point of light against the bastion and the citadel of the stars."

- Carl Sagan, Cosmos: A Personal Voyage (1990), Episode 13: Who Speaks For Earth?

About Carl Sagan
Official website
Quotations

Our Living Universe

If we were looking for signs of life elsewhere in the galaxy, we sure weren't looking for this! This photo of the "DNA Nebula" at the centre of our own Milky Way Galaxy is old news (NASA 2006), but remains captivating. Is this the DNA of our living universe?

Considering Darwin's 200th birthday just passed, I thought it's nice for us to remind ourselves how precious life as we know it is. Life is beautiful, be here now and cherish every moment!

If you Believe it, you can Be it

"The Brain that Changes Itself" is changing my life. For the first time in my life, I truly believe that I can become whatever I set my mind to... literally. Whoever said you can't teach an old dog new tricks got it very, very wrong.

This book, by the psychoanalyst, psychiatrist, and researcher Norman Doidge, M.D., is about neuroplasticity. In it, the reader begins to understand how we learn, what teaches us to focus, to remember, and to engage with our world. It shows us the incredible power that the mind has to overcome the odds stacked against us, whether it is our genetics, a stroke, or a crippling childhood trauma. Our brain has the ability to change both its structure and its function, to become faster and stronger, if only we can find the right way to teach it.

My mission: build myself a better brain.

Read about it here: http://www.normandoidge.com/normandoidge/MAIN.html
WATCH IT! here: http://www.cbc.ca/documentaries/natureofthings/2008/brainchangesitself/

Visualizing Science

I had a fantastic science teacher, Mr. Rees, in high school. He made it apparent to me that an unfortunate divide exists between the general public and the scientific community when it comes to understanding scientific concepts. David Suzuki, Carl Sagan, Stephen Hawking, and other great names, have devoted great efforts to bridging this gap and helping people appreciate science.

Now, I give you Felice Frankel...

Felice Frankel is a Senior Research Fellow at Harvard and research scientist at MIT, working with scientists to make spectacular, and communicative, images of their work. Working with researchers to create these images, she found that having them draw images for her improved not only her understanding, but improved the researchers ability to communicate their concepts. Enter "Picturing to Learn", a collaborative project she is heading that challenges undergraduate students in the sciences to draw illustrations that can explain a scientific concept to a different target audience, for example a high school student.

Science is increasingly involved in every aspect of our lives... without a fundamental understanding , everything from our cell phones and pharmaceuticals to our brains and babies is just a black box.

Images:
Ferrofluid photographed by Felice Frankel (Top)
Student Illustration of a Particle in a Box (Bottom)

A Quantum of Perspective

Having a hard time comprehending how small a nanometer is? Think of it this way...

Imagine the length of one nanometer as the length of one second. The proportion of one nanometer in one meter is equivalent to one second in almost 32 years!

Size Does Matter

Have you ever found yourself struggling all day with writing a paper, then finally you get a good, hard, half hour of work done and nothing feels better? Then have you ever woken up with drool on your study notes, only to find that your productiveness was a dream?

Welcome to my paper on the Toxicity of C60 Fullerenes! To be fair, I'm actually have a great time with this assignment... I can't remember the last time I found a subject as fascinating as nanotech and nanotoxicology. Nanoparticles are generally defined as a compound that is less than 100 nm in at least one dimension. To put it into perspective, 1/1000 of a metre is a millimeter... 1/1000 of a millimeter is a micrometer... and 1/1000 of a micrometer is 1 nanometer. That's 0.000000001 metres, aka very small.

My paper is devoted to the highly variable toxicity exhibited by fullerenes with different functional groups attached to their surfaces. C60 (pictured above) is basically a soccer-ball shaped frame upon (or even within) which a variety of compounds can be bonded. They have lots of promising applications, especially in medicine for imaging and drug delivery, but little is known about their toxicity. Some are good, some are bad, some go back and forth depending on their mood. Let's hope the toxicologists and regulators can keep on top of the technologies!

Be sure you'll be hearing more from me about fullerene derivatives, nanowires, quantum dots, and other cool things from the world of the very small!

Introductory Talks/Tox

So here I am... why? Partly because I have a poor memory, and a blog to look back upon will no doubt help me piece together the story of my life. Partly because people who I think are cool and who I want to be like do it. But mostly because I have papers to write and I am procrastinating. And as those papers are about Toxicology, in one or another of its many manifestations, my blog starts of with a picture of my newest friend, Xenopus laevis, aka the South African clawed frog (and soon to be happy member of my family!).

The species Xenopus laevis rose to public fame as the notorious killer meat-eating cannibalistic invasive species that has terrorized the native fish, amphibians, and invertebrates of the southern States. But more notably, it is also a model for studying the teratogenicity of chemicals (teratogen = substance that disturbs the development of an embryo or fetus). FETAX, or the Frog Embryo Teratogenesis Assay – Xenopus, involves incubating frog embryos with the desired chemical, and over a period of four days evaluates effects such as lethality, malformation, and growth reduction. The assay can be used not only for isolated chemicals, but for evaluation of complex cocktails, such as pulp mill effluent or soils. So the next time you see a member of Xenopus laevis, say thank you for their contribution to science. Unless you are in California... then send them to the great big stagnant pond in the sky.

Images were taken by me in my undergraduate Medical Toxicology lab at the University of Guelph.