Suzanne

Bedtime stories

suzanne — Sat, 02 May 2015 04:51:55 GMT

Things I didn't realize we're going to become bedtime stories until I became a Mama. (An ongoing list)

* the nativity story

* the time I broke my elbow and Theresa took me to the hospital accompanied by a very young Morgan.

* driving home from college one day in the snow and getting the car stuck in a ditch. And how Papa Brooks and our brothers used the Bronco to pull me out.

*Mary and Joseph's flight to Egypt with a young Jesus (I decided that Jesus didn't like riding camels and complained the whole way. I will be annoyed if this keeps me out of heaven.)

* Driving accross country on my honeymoon, stopping to see random things (Morgan seems perplexed by the Corn Palace) and the van breaking down.

Funny Scientists - Friday and Saturday at AAAS

suzanne — Sun, 15 Feb 2015 04:37:12 GMT

I always underestimate how tired I get during this conference. The scientists continue to be amusing, but over the past couple days I've been going to some pretty heavy and intense panels that didn't include many laughs. But I found you a few chuckles.

I wish I could have stayed long enough to get amusing quotes from the Active Seti: Is it Time To Start Transmitting to the Cosmos? panel. All I have in my notes from the first speaker (who was in favor of, by the way) was a note to myself. "ET? Really, you're showing us a slide of ET?"

----
Exoplanets: New Worlds Aplenty

"Fermi's theorem is telling us that the Milky Way is not packed with Romulans or Klingons."

"I was asked to give a talk titled "Is Earth in the Habitable Zone?" which meant I could give you a very short talk." "I hope so."

Humans are Intent Detectors: Implications for Society

[on American's feelings toward nationality of immagrants] "We like Canadians more than ourselves. I have theories about that. Canadians are just like us - but they don't start wars."

"Cold-Competance includes researchers and scientists. But at least we're higher than lawyers."

[showing an image of a wealthy guy next to a yacht] "What if I said that this was his second or third yatch. Yep. But what if I said, "Look how close he is to the edge of the dock?" [laughter] Just one little step back... I don't want him to die, just get a bit wet."

"On a plane someone asks me where I'm from, and I've done the research. If I say Princeton - they hate me. If I say New Jersey - they pity me."

"Ooohh, that's a good question. Oh, you weren't asking what I thought you were."

Integrity of Science

I said, "So you want me to ask my TAs to sign their names to a lie, then I need to sign my name to a lie then we'll turn the lie in to the state of Iowa and they'll turn it into money. Do you realize this is an ethics course?"

"Sure it's sleazy and disgusting, but it's not misconduct." "Wait - really?"

Audience question - "So when is the report coming?"
"Oh god."
"I knew this would come up."
"This year?"

Plenary: The Online Revolution: Learning Without Limits

"How do you give feedback to 5,000 students when you don't have 500 TAs?"

Lessons from the Ebola Outbreak: Response and Responsibility

"Come to the microphone with questions. If you don't... I will."

"As an employee of NIH, I'm not allowed to lobby for funds. But, if were asked what I would do with more funds - I can tell you that."

(note, this next one isn't really funny. But it was such a serious panel that it drew nervous dark humor laughter. It was said by the Médecins Sans Frontières representative.)

"We get money when Ebola is in the news. We get Ebola in the news when a health worker gets infected. So maybe we need a US Health carer to get infected in order to raise money now."

Science During Crisis

comment from audience: "But your "going rogue" is what some call a whistle blower..."
"That is a good point and I'm going to let Marsha explain the difference."

Geoffrey Nunberg, The Science of Grammar and Vice Versa

"Or: We don't need No Stinkin' Linguists!"

(Note, one of the themes of the conference was big data, so Dr. Nunberg decided to do an entire topical lecture on a linguistical analysis of whether "data" is plural or singular. The conclusion? It depends.)

"The country spent 3 months laughing when the president asked to clarify what the definition of "is" is. When to a linguist that is a perfectly good question to spend a career on."

"Anecdotes are not data - but data can be an anecdote."

"I mean, what the heck is a big datum?"

"In early autumn we comment on the foliage - beautiful trees aren't they? But at the end of the fall we're raking leaves. We don't ever rake foliage."

Question from audience, "What about datum, should they be datum points?"
"Datum disapeared from the English language in about 1871. We need to accept this."

Innovations in the Family: New Structures, New Challenges

"I've got adopted children. Hell, I've got adopted, biological, step, lesbian, transgender, and gay kids. I've walked the walk here."

Question about lag in change of policies led to: "Because we elect too many conservatives. I didn't mean to say that. But it's true."

Scientists are funny. Thursday at AAAS

suzanne — Fri, 13 Feb 2015 06:44:48 GMT

It's AAAS weekend, which means I'm posting my traditional "scientists are funny" posts.

-------------------------
Scientists communicating challenging issues

Moderator Introduces panel "in the order in which the wisdom shall be received"

Talking to journalists - "I've gotten good at giving an answer to the question I wish had been asked instead of the question they did ask." (Noah)

"There are very few people who have to worry about what the effect of being the next Carl Sagan will have on their careers." (Noah)

"Research on researchers indicates that they are willing to use wikipedia, but are not willing to admit to their colleagues that they use wikipedia." (Noah)

-------------------

Public engagement for scientists.

"To start I want to complicate the ideas or in worse language, problematize it."

"We try to decide where, when, and how many scientists to deploy" (Liz)

"I invited myself to give sermons in local churches..." (Nalini)

[project] "received attention from a variety of prestigious publications from CNN to Playboy. Most of which was appreciated by the plan administrators." (Nalini)

"COASST - where people get to walk along the beach and play CSI with dead birds" (Heidi)

Anthony -
"Some scientsts beating on my door wanting me to write press releases. Others would see me walk down the hall and run."

"I'm going to skip that slide, it has a typo and it annoys me." (anthony)

"If you have a swim group- get into that boys' locker room and talk about ocean acidification - they're obviously interested in water!" (Nalini)

"I didn't start my prison program because I wanted to start a national program. I wanted people to help me grow moss . i needed people with a lot of time on their hands. Hey! Prisoners!" (sustainability in prisons network.) (Nalini)

"We'll take a question from Sean who is about to receive the young scientist award. [clapping].
"Well I better think of a better question now."

--------------------
Trellis Software basically

Suzanne's chat to her family and JJ.
"Do I care about AAAS's new collaboration software?"
"No."
"Would I like some coffee and a cupcake?"
"Gods yes, show me your software."

SKM snark - so scientists complain about too many profiles, passwords, and UIs. Oh - so you decided the obvious solution was to make another one?

question from older female scientist holding a cupcake, "So can anyone join this? I've got some real weirdos at my university. I don't know if any of you have weirdos. But I've got'em"
[answer from panel]
"So even Jr. Einstein could join....?"
"Yes. Jr Einstein could join a public group."

--------------------

President's address.

Host - Philip Sharp trying to introduce Janet Napolitano

"We're also lucky to have Janet Nepa,...pola..ti... I will get that someday."

"I'd Like to welcome Janet napol...latiti..? Shoot. "

"So now please join me in welcoming Janet napoleonati? Oh never mind."

-----

President Fink's presentation was awesome.

[Clears throat, arranges notes. looks up at audience and pauses.] "Hi."

Speaking of what came to be known as junk DNA. "Well you could give it a name that defies explanation. You could call it dark matter. But that's been taken."

Without a definition of the gene that includes DNA that codes non-protein producing RNAs... Geneticists sleep like ... babies. They wake up every 2 hours crying.

Psychology, Marine Science, and Fluid Mechanics - Oh my.

suzanne — Mon, 05 Jan 2015 23:29:23 GMT

It's a busy day at Annual Reviews - here are copies of some of my notes.

Posted AR-Psych 66 this morning - If I were forced to pick a favorite it would have to be Smallwood's "Science of Mind Wandering: Empirically Navigating the Stream of Consciousness." Apparently there has been an increase in research about mind wandering, and the article also discusses the related idea of mindfulness which is more often found in meditation techniques. I've seen a couple articles recently about education research in the effects of teaching mindfulness meditation to young children in school to help teach them how to focus. (Which I think is awesome.) I like the explanation here: "When the mind wanders, attention drifts from its current train of thought (often an external task) to mental content generated by the individual rather than cued by the environment. Often the thoughts that occur during mind-wandering experiences are described as task unrelated...."

----
I'm also very fond of this one: "Perspectives on Culture and Concepts" gave me some of my favorite new words. I've already used them in conversations about science fiction.: Folkbiology, Folkpsychology, and Folkphysics. I specifically am fond of folkphysics, which was very helpful in a recent comic book discussion. Folkphysics is the "intuitive or everyday understanding of physical events, bounded objects, and substances." These ideas are important to the article because of the way different cultures understand physical (biological or psychological) events. It's a marvelous article.

----
Marine 7 also posted today. I've seen many documentaries about the ecosystems around sunken shipwrecks, and I've seen the stories about ships (and other large objects) being purposefully sunk to provide habitats. But this volume includes an article about the ecosystems that occur around dead whales , or as they call it in the article "whale-fall." "Whale-Fall Ecosystems: Recent Insights into Ecology, Paleoecology, and Evolution" by Smith et al. I was surprised to hear how long this research has been going on: " The fate of sunken whale carcasses has been the subject of scientific speculation for at least 80 years, and hints that whale falls harbor an unusual fauna first appeared in the taxonomic literature more than 150 years ago. Nonetheless, whale-fall ecosystems were not recognized until the discovery in 1987 of a chemolithoautotrophic assemblage on a balaenopterid skeleton in the deep sea off California, which unexpectedly resembled the recently discovered communities at hydrothermal vents and cold seeps..." Very nifty.

----
Also there is an article about Fjords! Straneo's "The Dynamics of Greenland's Glacial Fjords and Their Role in Climate." I didn't point this out simply because I wanted an excuse to mutter "fjord, fjord, fjord" under my breath. I haven't read this one completely yet, but climate change has change the way scientists look at the fjords, " Rapid mass loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet has sparked interest in its glacial fjords for two main reasons: Increased submarine melting of glaciers terminating in fjords is a plausible trigger for glacier retreat, and the anomalous freshwater discharged from Greenland is transformed by fjord processes before being released into the large-scale ocean." (fjord, fjord, fjord.)

----
And finally - AR Fluid. I've been waiting to talk about Clanet's "Sports Ballistics." for a long time, so I'm going to jump right in. I think the best way to start is to simply give you the abstract: " This review describes and classifies the trajectories of sports projectiles that have spherical symmetry, cylindrical symmetry, or (almost) no symmetry. This classification allows us to discuss the large diversity observed in the paths of spherical balls, the flip properties of shuttlecocks, and the optimal position and stability of ski jumpers." The first figure has pictures of a soccer ball, a shuttlecock, and a ski jumper. It's a great article looking at how these objects move through the air. I was impressed by the introduction which points out that the tradition of physics looking at sports equipment is a long and noble one, including a quote from Newton in 1671 about tennis balls.

Fourth Street - Book List 2014

suzanne — Tue, 24 Jun 2014 22:36:39 GMT

Cross-posted to 4th_st_Fantasy.

The not-so-long-awaited 2014 Fourth Street book list is now up. But before you click on the link please skim over my notes and requests.

1. There seems to have been some confusion over whether or not I was keeping a book list this year. I was, but when I heard about the list on the white-board I also got confused and didn't arrange for coverage for panels I had to miss.

2. I was providing child-car for my daughter during two of the panels ("Originality and Micro-genre" and "Influence, Tropes, and Prior Art.") If you happened to note any books mentioned during those panels, or if you have a picture of the whiteboard please let me know about them and I'll happily add them to the list.

3. ~~There were 8 books that showed up on the board in between panels and I'm not 100% sure where they belong. If you know for sure let me know so I can file them correctly.~~ Mystery Solved!

4. There were a couple of books that I either couldn't decipher fully from my notes, or couldn't find the right book. Please help me fill in the blanks!

A. Panel: "Suspension of Disbelief" someone mentioned a short story by David Brin - I didn't catch the title.

B. Panel: "Suspension of Disbelief", blame it on bad handwriting. I have "Murder in [indecipherable] 6" and no author.

C. I don't have any books mentioned in the different panel "process of Revision." Is that right?

D. ~~One of the unknown books I couldn't find: "Golden Age: Comic Book Culture Heroes." Help!~~ Solved! This was a different panel suggestion.

5. I want to try something different this year. I have a section on the page called "Books that should have been mentioned but weren't." Were you sitting there trying to remember the title/author during a panel but couldn't quite bring it to mind? Did you only think of the perfect book on the plane home? Let me know and I'll add it to the list.

https://sites.google.com/site/4thstreet2014/

Fourth Street quotes - Sunday

suzanne — Mon, 23 Jun 2014 15:16:00 GMT

Panel: Advice from young writers

"I'm Fade and I'm a little distracted because there is a tiny spider crawling around up here - but I think we're okay."

"The stamp of approval is when I feel comfortable talking about writing rather than just asking questions." - Fade

"I have a question for the panelists and its liable to make you uncomfortable - suck it up." - Steve asking for advice.
"...Steve, set us small /accomplishable/ tasks please." - Ginger

"Therefore when you're using someone else's culture as your zombies..." Miriam (I'm unsure of the attribution here - let me know if I got it wrong.)

"Steve, I do see you but your questions are big and long so I'll go somewhere else first." - Ginger
"My what is big and long?" - Steve

Panel: That's a Different Panel aka Revision

"Don't fail, or we'll eat you alive." - Scott

"I'm just the moderator so I don't have an opinion. But hypothetically..." Scott

"I was hoping for 7 more minutes - maybe a song and dance..." - Scott
[Bear and Max begin a lovely rendition of "Hello my baby, hello my darling...." joined by the rest of the panel and part of the audience.]

"If I did the Raymond Chandler thing and started using cigarettes as commas..." Max

"An hour on a page - if its the right hour and right page - can save your book" - Max
"But no pressure." - Bear

"So the metric for measuring the value of revision is like measuring the quality of orgasms?" - Audience member
[silence]
"No!" - Skylar

Mark your calendars! Fourth Street 2015 - June 26-28!

Fourth Street Con Quotes - Saturday

suzanne — Sun, 22 Jun 2014 04:28:32 GMT

Fewer quotes in my notes today for some reason. I should also note that I missed the first panel, "Originality and Micro-genre" due to baby care shift.

Panel: The Influence of Anxiety

"Everything is black and dark and isn't even slightly romantic" - Scott

Being aware of things that are stressing you is not something humans are good at. - Stella

"No, I didn't know that eating turnips three times a day would turn me into a mental paragon!" Scott
"Note to self... prescribe more turnips" Stella

Panel: History as Trade Secret

History is not narrative, we write history around small pieces of narrative.

Panel: Crafting the Sentence and Paragraph

"We'll start the introductions on the far right" - Steve
"I am NOT the Far Right" - Bear
...
"Well, now that you've been introduced to /those/ two" - Abra

"Lets try this again. Bear, what makes a good sentence?"- Steve
"Omit needless words" - Bear, smiling not at all innocently

Panel: In and Out of Frame

"Tried for "ohh, creepy girls" but triggered "what happened to the black people!"" - Marissa

"Did you get pushback? This was published as Fantasy, right?"-Marissa
"Well, this was published as "Oh shit, we bought two books and this is what she turned in." - Skylar

"Do your misdirect as "it's cheese, it's cheese, don't you want cheese? And by the way it's also a spaceship." I really didn't get any sleep." - Liz

"Oh, its a M. Night Shyamalan movie. I bet it's about sentient walruses." - Marissa

[also sometime during this panel Marissa started ranting about the failings of a certain book. During this, Bear walked up to the whiteboard and under the "That's another panel" list wrote: "Marissa rants about books!" This was followed by Tim adding "in funny voices!"]

Panel: Shifts in Historical Narrative

"It will fool you into thinking that no one knew anything before the 18th century" - Max
"Before coffee came to Europe." - Caroline

"I do my best writing when I'm in jail." - Max
"Hmm. No wireless." - Caroline

Fourth Street Fantasy Quotes - Friday

suzanne — Sat, 21 Jun 2014 02:09:43 GMT

This is a post with quotes (funny and mildly serious) from my notes during the Fourth Street Fantasy Convention. I think Scott Lynch came up with the best definition of this convention today: "Nothing is too small for Fourth Street - we're 150 cats looking for yarn."

Panel: Gesticulation, Body Language, and Communication

"I'm Jon Singer and I'm the last person to introduce myself on this panel - unless we drag up someone from the audience."

"Hello, I'm tall and you're purple, and that's all you'll ever find out about us." - Scott Lynch

"That's why people invented smiley faces and emoticons - because we desperately needed them" - Jon Singer

"This is why writers drink so heavily."

"This is the nerdiest thing that will have been said so far on this panel..." - Scott Lynch

"I agree with whatever Jon Singer said" - Scott
"Oh, the danger..." - audience member

[regarding the white board] We just let Steve write whatever he wants up there - it keeps him happy.

From book in Gregory McGuire's Oz series: "The nun made gesture that Nuns should never ever make."

"This leads us to adverb country - some adverbs put weight on gestures that they can't bear. Such as "He nodded evilly." How does one /nod/ evilly? Sagely, Singerly, yes. Evilly?" -Scott Lynch

Someone on panel: "shook his wrist evilly"
Roughly half of the audience, including me, put down what they were doing and shook their wrists experimentally - some making evil faces.

"What is the universal gesture for uranium 238?" - Scott Lynch

"Even cultures you didn't just make up have trouble communicating with gestures!" Theresa Mecklenborg

"If I [puts hand to ear] they know I didn't hear what they said. But if I asked, "What was that?" they thought I was challenging them." - Elise

"Freshly unconscious people do wierd things." Scott Lynch

"Food fights always have a place in every story." Dana

"Nothing is too small for 4th Street - we are 150 cats looking for yarn" - Scott
"Somebody tweet that" - Bear

"If Mike Ford were here he would write a story where all of the dialogue was in direct opposition to the gestures." - Elise
"It would be mildly impenetrable, though brilliant, because he had a morbid fear of being obvious." Jon Singer.

Panel: Suspension of Disbelief

In my scrawled notes I have this title written as "Suspicion of Disbelief" which I also think is awesome title.

"I was a voice major. I don't need a microphone." - Felicia

"Vampires - they can do all this other stuff but the moment they /sparkle/..." - Catherine

"I can handle suspension of disbelief in magic, but not in economics!" - audience member

Audience members trying to decide who was being called on: "You!" "No, you!" "Seriously you, I was just doing my hair."

"You could blow up the partheon today with a squid..." -Ginger
"I'd read that story!" - audience member

"Why should I believe in your FTL engine when you don't know how to handle a weapon?" - Brust

"There is a writer's trick... a cheap writer's trick... a cheap-ass writer's trick... if it doesn't work just plunk a lightshade on it and call it a lamp." - scott lynch

"I don't know about the technical stuff - but I do expect the writer to have interacted with another human at some point." - audience member

Wow. That was meta.

suzanne — Tue, 01 Apr 2014 03:39:45 GMT

I just ducked out of my first class of "Religion and Science" to conduct my nightly prayerful IVF injection ritual.

(Estradiol numbers from my morning bloodwork were good and higher than expected at 117. So I'm in the stirrups first thing tomorrow 7:45am followed by more bloodwork.)

Suzi car broken!

suzanne — Mon, 24 Mar 2014 03:37:32 GMT

Brooks and I bought a new car today, and introduced Morgan to it this evening. She pronounced "Suzi car nice!" Other reactions:

"Suzi car beep!" (Pushing buttons on the key.)
"Peek a boo wheel!" (Pulling the cord to reveal the spare tire.)
"Papa in Suzi car!" (Andres climbing into trunk)

However the peace didn't last. I asked Brooks to remove the dealership license frames, and Morgan quite happily watched. "Brooks tool! Brooks fix!" But when the frame came off, Morgan became hysterical!

"Oops! Back, put it back! Suzi car broken! Broken! Books fix!" Cries of "Suzi car broken" continued while she clutched the frame and we tried to calm her down. Finally ending with "Suzi car broken... Morgy mama milk."

She snuggled into Theresa utterly baffled that we had broken Suzi's nice new car and weren't upset about it.

Update

suzanne — Sat, 15 Mar 2014 22:52:52 GMT

Past time for a fertility update. When I left off in November we were looking forward to beginning stims. Alas there was a large cyst on my right ovary. So we waited for that to go away. Then there was a simple cyst on my right. So they put me on low-dose birth control pills to try to suppress me. (We also finally triggered a period as I had been without one for five months.)

Though I did get the worst period ever, my body revolted and I sprouted four cysts in defiance of all known medical beliefs. So now I've been on high-dose birth control pills for two weeks trying to get the cysts to go away and my ovaries to shut the &$!* up already.

I'm miserable, so they must be working, right? Incredible fatigue, headaches, crankiness, emotions, and I'm even more introverted and people-wary than usual. Whee.

Thank gods for my anti-depressants.

The introversion upswing means that while good wishes and virtual hugs are welcome, offers of in person contact will probably just increase my stress. I'll take care of the migraine today, but I refuse to feel this way tomorrow. Be warned spare room---I'm coming for you ... Soonish.

Sunday funnies from AAAS

suzanne — Mon, 17 Feb 2014 04:56:46 GMT

Technology for Astronomy

"Its the The Advanced Technology Large Aperture Space Telescope, or AT LAST, we're very good at acronyms in this business."

Tyson - "Of course that isn't a posed photo of Hubble - you can't be a true astronomer unless you make observations while holding a pipe."

"When I tell this at Google, they yawned. But they woke up when I got to the next bit." (speaking of the LSST which will be taking 3.2 giga pixel images every 18 seconds for 10 years.)

"We think we'll detect at least 4 million "golden" galaxies (similar to our own.)"
With the follow up from the audience, "We need more astronomers"
"Yes, and that doesn't seem to be following Moore's law."

---------
Suffocation of Marriage
by Eli Finkel

"The kiss goodbye - go directly to work - what we called a traditional marriage. Which was actually only a type of marriage for 10 minutes in 1952."

"Everyone, and yes I mean you, want to become our own special unique butterfly."

After telling a story about being an outsider watching a group of people at a club and feeling lonely - "Then suddenly you start asphixiating! Do you think "Boy, I'm lonely. Or "Boy, I'd like to breath? If you're lonely and starving you'll find food first."

"Am I saying that marriage is no longer an economic decision? I'm not stupid... so no."

"Please don't ever say again that we're asking more of marriage than ever before, and please, please, please don't say that I said that."

"We tried to recruit people who were likely to break up soon. That was hilarious. Every time someone in the study got dumped the lab would do a happy dance."

Question: What about the effects of children on marriage?
Immediate answer, "Children are disasters. Tell you what though, grandparents are awesome. Don't have kids, just have grandparents."

----------
Resilience of aging

Mroczek: "Two minutes left? Ok, I'll skip this, and this, and well thats boring anyway. I'm sorry to lose that... wait we'll do it, I'll just sum it up - "Chill out - Live longer.""

Cacioppo - Speaking of feeling alone while surrounded by people, "An American soldier in full armor walking through Kabul - that's actually worse than high school."

Friday funnies from AAAS

suzanne — Sun, 16 Feb 2014 02:36:46 GMT

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How to Rebuild Informed Trust in Science

"Lay people sometimes have trouble discriminating between science experts and quacksalvers" Rothmund

"If you've never searched for the video of Abe Lincoln doing Gettysburg address with powerpoint...you should do that." Lewenstein - frustrated with technology

"this leads to science cafes, science on tap... depends on which beverage you prefer"

"Thus, like all researchers, especially those with funders in the audience - Hi! - we need to do more research."

"Now that I'm on your eye level, I'm more like you and you'll trust me more. But because your scientists, now that I've told you that - you'll be more suspicious of everything I say. I'm okay with that."

---------
Susan Lederer: the Living and the Dead

Breakdown on newspaper stories about people willing their bodies to science in the early 1900s, "79% Male, 19% Female, 1% not stated, and 1% NA. That NA was a chicken. I forgot to tell my graduate student to leave out the chicken."

"But then Prohibition lowered the supply of bodies - there were fewer unidentified drunks in alleys."

"This is a med student receiving a certificate for participating in medical research. he was hung from a telephone pole, kept unconscious for 11 hours, and every day for 2 weeks at 1 pound of raw liver.... her /earned/ that certificate."

"It didn't hurt the ratings that the mortuary doctors were Dr. Sly and Dr. Grimm."

---------
Saturday: Extremities of the Universe

"So that means that the people sitting in the back of the room look slightly younger than those in front." (The Junior Academy was siting in the back.)

Kolb on looking for dark matter at CERN: "Looking for an invisible needle in a haystack"

"Now, remember back in 6th grade when you learned about quantum fluctuation"

Olinto, "I'll stay close to the microphone so those younger people in the back can hear."

"So High Energy Physics is the slopesliding of particle physics, while particle physics is the snowboarding of science."

"In the sequel, Gravity II, you'll hopefully see the Cream and Caley on the side of the ISS"

"The array is in Argentina - wonderful meat by the way. If you're a vegetarian....I would not recommend you go."

"This is the Ice Cube - down at the South Pole - not very far from here."

Bauer: "They have to be clean, so they are clean and shiny looking. So are the researchers but you can't tell because they're always dressed in those coveralls."

Chou - on the Holometrists "Reality is 2 dimentional and we may be holograms - so that's a little distressing."

----------

Alan Alda of M.A.S.H fame told me to say hello to my mother. So Hi mom!

Introducing Mr. Alda, talking about his Flame challenge. "What is Flame? What is time? Why Chicago in February?"

Alda - "It was a real conversation based on my real ignorance - and ignorance is wonderful if it comes with curiosity"

"But look how normal I look while I check my notes on my phone."

"Homo Sapiens Sapiens communicated. With the Neadrathals what happened in cave 12, stayed in cave 12."

"So I asked my teacher, "what is a flame" and she said "oxidation." Thats like calling it a different name, What's a fmale? Oh that's Fred."

One of the kids judging the flame competition to a physicist , "It's good to be funny, but you don't have to be silly. We're 11, not 7."

Friday at AAAS - the funny bits

suzanne — Sat, 15 Feb 2014 05:24:44 GMT

I realized a while ago that I can't go to 10 solid hours of science lectures, type up all my notes, and retain my sanity. My brain needs down time. Immediately after making the decision to type up the quotes, but leave the full sessions until when I get home, all the tension left my neck and my spine cracked. I feel better now.

This isn't a funny bit, but it was awesome and I wanted to share. Kim Stanley Robinson was on a panel today talking about the relationship between science, scientists, and science fiction. I've never met him before, and he was striking me as a very grim and sober type. Then one of the other panelists said that he didn't see any reason to send humans to Mars, everytime one of the Rovers sent back a picture he felt like he was there.

I'm sitting in the front row, directly in front of Mr. Robinson and happened to be looking at him when this comment was made, and he just lit up the room. He grabbed the mike and enthusiastically said, "I spent 10 years looking at the Viking pictures of Mars. Everytime I see a new picture from one of the Mars rovers I'm so very happy and amazed." I caught his eye and we both grinned at each other.

Now the funny bits

From the Astronomy session "From Dust and Gas to Disks and Planets"

"Shall we turn the lights down?" "YES" "Well that's as close to unanamious as the scientific communitity ever gets. - Mark Adams.

VLA appreas in several movies - Contact, 2012(?), in Terminator they blew it up - which we weren't happy about - I told you that I shouldn't try to tell jokes."

Question "Why the emphasis on finding more like our own planet, shouldn't we just observe everything we can?" "yes, but I want an astrobiology grant...."
- Jonathan Williams

Laura Perez on trying to determine how larger particles form and keep from being fragmented: "It seems hopeless in a way, but we're sitting on a planet so the problem must have been solved."

Bergan talking about the chemical spectrum data he will be showing: "I'm not going to be showing you pretty pictures because I'm the one who has all the actual data."

"And you see in this lovely little region... this is the methane saying "Hi! I'm here!"

Wilner: "This one is about 10 times the mass of our sun and the other is about 1/2 of the mass. But other than that - they're very similar. Kind of."

Question: Can you detect the debris disks in the solar systems we know about? "You'd have to be very patient - its beyond even a grad student life-time."

-----------
Heinrich Jaeger's session "Granular Matter: From Basic Questions to New Concepts and Applications" (Condensed Matter Physics is awesome.)

Talking about the Kepler discover in the 1600s: "We finally know this in 1998. Well you laugh but the mathematicians didn't prove it until 1998."

Later in the questions: Where is the mathematical proof of this?
"The math people are doing a heroic job. But I'm an experimental physicist - they are way behind me. If you want the math proof, wait 200 years. They'll get it by then."

------------
Where's my Flying Car? Science, Science Fiction, and a Changing Vision of the Future

Lawrence Krauss on technical difficulties: "It's leaving the zone of the professional and veering into the bad stand-up comedy."

"Every time Jean Luc Picard says "engage" he's committing suicide. If you want to travel at 1/2 the speed of light - well you're in trouble."

"Tons of people have signed up for 1-way trips to Mars - and there are a lot of people we'd like to send."

"I meant to get a ballon (to explain worm holes), but I forgot. But that's okay, we're in a hotel so I got ... something else. And it's better because it won't burst."

"If the time-travel worked, you'd come out in empty space. There would be a perfect moment of exhilaration, then. Well."

"You can send 200 robots to Mars for the price of making a movie about sending Bruce Willis to Mars."

David Grinspoon: "I want to assure you that I'm not an avatar."

"No, the real reason we'll go to Venus is because people are like cats."

On Star Trek's earth-like planets: "I'm skeptical that you can just transport down and breathe the air - and I definitely wouldn't eat the fruit."

Kim Stanley Robinson " Because I'm speaking at the AAAS, I did a calculation myself. Me! An English major!"

"So, the aliens are bopping around the galaxy - Not the universe mind, but the galaxy. I'm a realistic SF writer."

On needing to share the microphone: "We'll share, I just hope it doesn't fall into the Black Holes created by the condom."

"Once you're dead, you're dead. i don't get the whole freezing head thing. It's one of the SF things - like scientology - that's somehow escaped into reality as a scam."

---------
Steven Chu - How discovery and Innovation Can Meet our Energy Challenge

Thank you for that introduction - It was short and that is so great."

On the dubious rationale behind e-cigarettes "We just figured out a way to inject heroin into your veins without needles! No more HIV, no more hepatitis - this is great!"

"I have the distinction of being rejected in more fields of science than anyone else in the world."

"My friends asked, knowing what you know now, would you have agreed to be Secretary of Energy? Well, there were some irritating moments."

AAAS Thursday - the long notes

suzanne — Fri, 14 Feb 2014 05:43:09 GMT

I was an overactive note taker today. Hopeuflly tomorrow my session notes will get shorter (and stay interesting.)

Also note these are unedited and typed from my notes while watching the Olympics. There are typos and grammatical mistakes that I don't have the time to fix right now.

Communicating Science: Engaging with Journalists.

Cornelia Dean - Moderator from the New York Times introduces the panel theme of change. Each of the four panelists have won three Kalvi awards (for excellence in science journalism - once you've won 3, you're no longer eligible.)

First up was Carl Zimmer from the NYT and "the Loom" blog. (as well as many books, though I want to point out that he authored "Science Ink: Tattoos of the Science Obsessed.) He starts by talking about Hawking's paper that he posted three weeks ago on ArXive. He had an idea, wrote up a two-page PDF and sent it out to the world - well the physics world. It was quickly picked up by Nature and other journalists. Ten years ago this would have been submitted to a journal, peer reviewed, and only reported on under embargo until publishment. (Heh, I just typed "punishment.")

Every part of the process has changed. Hawkings may or may not publish the paper, the discussion is functioning as peer review right now.

Another change that is gaining momentum is post-publication peer review. I disagree a bit with Zimmer that the comment fields on PubMed (and other places) are effective peer review - but he does seem to be right about post-publication gaining momentum, even to the extent that some organizations are trying to figure out a way of quantifying those comments - comparable to citation ranking.

Zimmer likes that he can now hear clear fast responses to new theories and that there are many more papers than there were. "I can do more than calling people up and hearing them grumble off the record." He ended by noting that there are risks, an active community doesn't mean the reactions are valid. There needs to be trust and accountability.

---
Next up is Lee Hotz from the Wall Street Journal - who has apparently been to the South Pole four times. His title was "Perspective of a Media Survivor." He said that technology hasn't changed the substance of science reporting, but has changed the procedure from begining to end and certainly sped it up. Called it the "centrifuge of media technology."

Noted that he woke up this morning and listened to NPR's Morning Edition streamed out of Bismark North Dakota, "And the traffic in Bismark is really, really, bad this morning."

He noted that more mobile usage has produced more appetite for news, but we still seem to look to the traditional sites - NYT, and of course his WSJ (skm - may be a bit biased on this score.) But of course with the economy lately the number of reporters and science sections has dropped remarkably. Many media centers (including newspapers and tv) are looking towards easy and less expensive stories such as sports, weather, and traffic. Number of produced story packages has dropped by 50% since 2007 while interviews are up more than 30%. Live coverage of events is also way down.

He worries that we are losing the filter of traditional media and will be overwhelmed by unfiltered sources. From his tone of voice- he thinks that is bad. Though notes that non-profit news sites are silling some of the gaps - especially investigative reporting.

---
Paula Apsell from NOVA had a different perspective than the print I'm more familiar with. She talked about how there are now more choices on TV, but even on the "science stations" overall less science instead highlighting what she called adrenaline journalism.

Overall her online viewers are much younger than NOVA's traditional viewer and they are looking for much different content. She noted that they didn't care about premiere dates, most headed straight for the online achives and only 3% are coming from other NOVA prgrams - instead most were searching. NOVA was also surprised that unlike television views the online watchers weren't concerned with length - equally interested in short and long formats.

"Is this an extinction event for NOVA?" But there is an audience there for thoughtful content - if you can produce it, people will come looking for it. There is lots of pressure for ratings that can overwhelm the quest for substance. But don't dumb ddown the content.

---
Last up was David Baron representing public radio (PRI). He mainly talked about the different kind of storytelling on radio in science news. Stories are personal tales - a much more meandering style than traditional reporting that just conveyed results. The new style (as in American Life, and Radio Lab) is more narrative arc, finding "drama in human lives while along the way learning science." It's the story of the science rather than just presenting the conclusions. I have a marginal note about the worry that we'll lose technical knowledge while getting absorbed in the story.

---
Followed by a brief discussion about long form journalism and how surprised they all were that people are indeed reading long form on mobile devices leading to a resurgence of the form (now with added pictures and video.) Possibly because of the convienence of having the mobile with them all the time. Its easier to create soap operas of science instead of dealing with difficult data and details. And news is getting shorter and longer, but losing the middle range - in all formats.

The big take away from this discussion was that long form reporting demands good if not excellent writing "bad narrative stories are sprouting like weeds."

--- Now the questions.
Do the cut backs change the coverage?
Lee - Not in "quality journals" (probably speaking of his WSJ) . He did go on to note that what was once called science/medical journalism has been related as "consumer health." He noted that WSJ's most forwarded column ever was about "How to clean ears of ear wax....don't laugh if you forwarded it."

The moderator noted that the NYT refused to give her the usage numbers on specific topics because of fears that they would bias her as the science editor. Paula noted that the topic is all important and many of the science tv stations have resorted to "TRasH (Transparent Rating Seeking), Weather Porn, and Stupid Adventures."

Lee from the WSJ notes that the users resources are now in play, going directly to the source of the news on their own and generating their own commentary - citing the Curiosity landing. (1.2 Billion tweets, 17 million FaceBook posts, and 3.2 million viewers.)

Carl Zimmer notes that those measurement numbers are good for science and speak to the "general public's" fascination with science.

Question: How do we ensure accuracy of information, should we consider something like the european media center or an embargo?

The panelists all had negative reactions to the idea of the media center. Carl Zimmer said he was suspicious of governments having that much control over the spin and said it was "almost paternalistic." To which Lee chimed in with "I don't think its /almost/ paternalistic, it's insulting. also noting that people in journalism will make fun of others who use press release quotes.

Paula noted that she once had a wrong fact in a broadcast program (noted to Lee that it was pulled from the WSJ), the source called her and claimed to have been misquoted. She claimed it was because of the pressure to put content online before it was fully cooked. " I don't believe anything anymore. I mean the /Wall Street Journal/ let me down."

Lee of course had to reply, "OK, now I feel obligated to step in..." which led to an interesting discussion on errata and I learned that journalists are apparently eager to learn about mistakes so they can correct the record as quickly as possible - "We will correct an error - no mattter the cost -- bu you have to let us know we made them." Lots of resentment for scientists who notice mistakes but don't tell the journalists.

Communicating Science: Engaging with Public Events

Moderator (Ben Lillie from the Story Collider): "I guess we're ready to get engaged, how about we all get engaged to Kishore, he won't mind."

"How do you meet the public, how do you talk to people who don't have the technical background, how do you keep a laptop on a podium without a lip?" He talked about how he realized after a while as a researcher that he loved science, but he didn't love doing it. So instead he started organizing science publicity and fairs.

Most usefully I think he noted that there isn't a gereral public. but rather mutually overlapping subcultures. Of course he came to communication theory from physics and noted that "There is a long tradition of theoretical physists walking into a new field and assuming they can solve all the problems. I'm one of them."

He turned the stage over to Rabia Mayas from the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry who mostly talked about how to connect with school-age audiences. She began by noting that she was surprised "I found, along with all of you, that I'm engaged to Kishore." "If you haven't been to MSI, well you're here in Chicago and your plane is going to be delayed after the conference so you should come see us. I'm sorry, that was mean. Probably true, but mean."

"I'm not going to call my staff out, but if you have questions they are sitting in this area of the room (gestures at a specific grouping of seats.)"

What I found most interesting about her talk was a note about Robert Tie - a UVA researcher whose research has found that a child's grades in classes (middle or high school) is not the strongest predictor of the child going into a STEM career. Rather its the out of school connection to science - or personal connection to a scientist- that was a much stronger predictor.

That along with her comment that "You don't have to have a PhD to be a scientist" led into her description of the kids asking questions at a recent career day event at the museum, "What does your day look like? What classes did you take? Do you have a girlfriend? That question is /always/ asked. Apparently scientists aren't supposed to date."

Kishore Hari (who I'm apparently engaged to as well) went next - talking about the his experience running the Bay Area Science Festival. "I was told I love science by my father as a child, but I fell in love with science at a AAAS meeting during a science cafe." He spoke about connecting with adult audiences.

He feels very strongly that there is a perception that the public is ignorant and doesn't care about science, but he has found that to be wrong. (I will note again though that he's coming from the Silicon Valley and I'm not surprised that his events are always crowded.) He went on to tell several stories and show pictures about his experiences, of which this is my favorite:

So it was a science cafe lecture about neuroscience in a LGTB bar, and this is a nun. Well, nun-ish. This is a transvestite nun of perpetual indulgence with a cigarette in one hand, a glove on the other and touching a human brain. Seriously, if you've never been to San Francisco, you should really come visit. We don't have snow.

Next up was Amy Rowat from UCLA who teaches sciences with food. Most impressive to me was a public even called "Science of Pie" in which they had to formulate a hypothesis and test it - using apple pies. The participants were high schoolers I think (maybe undergrads) and the public was invited to taste the pies. It was judged by teams of scientists, chefs, and food critics. (Scienceandfood.org)

The discussion and questions led into some interesting topics. Why bother getting people excited about science if Congress and government don't care? Does public engagement have a chance to increase funding? The general consesus of the panel was that funding was not their concern - they wanted to bring science into culture - help people understand the role science plays in their lives. Not an ivory tower situation, but real and immediate.

"If people believe science is part of their life hopefully they'll understand that a vote to fund it could improve their lives."

A question from a teacher at the local teacher's college prompted a discussion about the importance of failure to science. And another surprising bit of psychological research - students of all ages are more engaged and have more long-term interaction with science, if their experiments initially fail. Something that works on the first try is boring.

Rabiah noted that her museum designs experiments with risks in them, and don't stop them from failing. They also prompt their visiting scientists to talk about their failures - and not just the minor ones - but the major costly ones. Celebrate and highlight the risks - and especially the creativity needed.

A question about science fatigue - are you only engaging or attracting the nerds - do you have a self selecting group? "The notion of fatique is something that keeps me up at night.... wow that is one of the strangest sentences I've ever said." - Kishore

Ben Lillie talked about wanting to give people a sense of ownership - The way people are enthusiastic and involved in their music or a TV Show. "I want science to be part of the culture."

A question about citizen science brought up enthusiasm but a frustration that the projects aren't going further. They want to know the results. Rabiah noted that these projects are good hooks for those who are already interested and think science is awesome. But for other communities interest and awesome-ness are luxuries that they don't have time for. Instead for them the hook should be "How does science help me get a job? Feed my kids better food?"

Kishore mentioned more community science projects - like monitoring air and water quality. Scientists should go to communities and ask "what do you want to know" and teach them how to find answers and solutions.
</lj-cut

AAAS - Funny bits day 1

suzanne — Fri, 14 Feb 2014 05:22:45 GMT

I need to remember not to take so many notes! Today was the pre-AAAS meeting technically and it was very meta with the theme of "Communicating Science." Funny things ahead.

Engaging with Journalists.

"I can do more than calling people up and hearing them grumble off the record."
Carl Zimmer (New York Times, and author of "Science Ink: Tattoos of the Science Obsessed.")

Lee Hotz from the Wall Street Journal noted that he woke up this morning and listened to NPR's Morning Edition streamed out of Bismark North Dakota, "And the traffic in Bismark is really, really, bad this morning."

Paula Apsell (producer of NOVA) on the difference between her television and web (or netflix) audiences: "Our television audience is, in general, smart, rich, and old."

Lee Hotz: Our most forwarded article was "How to clean ears of ear wax"....don't laugh if you forwarded it.

Paula noted many of the science tv stations have resorted to "TRasH (Transparent Rating Seeking), Weather Porn, and Stupid Adventures."

Paula talking about a mistake in one of her broadcasts that originally came from another news source: "I don't believe anything anymore. I mean the /Wall Street Journal/ let me down." Lee of course had to reply, "OK, now I feel obligated to step in..."

Engaging with Public Events

Moderator (Ben Lillie from the Story Collider): "I guess we're ready to get engaged, how about we all get engaged to Kishore, he won't mind."

Also: "How do you meet the public, how do you talk to people who don't have the technical background, how do you keep a laptop on a podium without a lip?"

And: "There is a long tradition of theoretical physicists walking into a new field and assuming they can solve all the problems. I'm one of them."

Rabia Mayas from the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry: "If you haven't been to MSI, well you're here in Chicago and your plane is going to be delayed after the conference so you should come see us. I'm sorry, that was mean. Probably true, but mean."

And: "I'm not going to call my staff out, but if you have questions they are sitting in this area of the room (gestures at a specific grouping of seats.)"

On questions at a recent career day event at the museum, "What does your day look like? What classes did you take? Do you have a girlfriend? That question is /always/ asked. Apparently scientists aren't supposed to date."

Kishore Hari from the Bay Area Science Festival: "So it was a science cafe lecture about neuroscience in a LGTB bar, and this is a nun. Well, nun-ish. This is a transvestite nun of perpetual indulgence with a cigarette in one hand, a glove on the other and touching a human brain. Seriously, if you've never been to San Francisco, you should really come visit. We don't have snow."

Also from Kishore - on science fatigue: "The notion of fatique is something that keeps me up at night.... wow that is one of the strangest sentences I've ever said."

If you're feeling brave, I'll be posting the full notes and serious bits in a few minutes. But it's rather long. Why can't I take fewer notes? Oh, right. Then I wouldn't pay attention.

Prepare for Science!

suzanne — Wed, 12 Feb 2014 23:12:23 GMT

I have arrived at the AAAS meeting - which is in Chicago this year. Brace yourselves for 5 days of very enthusiastic science posts!

In the meantime, I have begun my conquering of Chicago.

I have been out on a ramble and discovered that the body of water they call a lake is /still/ way too big to share the name with Claytor lake back home.

Cold weather is awesome, as is snow. I've gone far too long without a sharp biting wind in my face and snow in my hair. (I may have accidently snow angel-d.)

Millineum Park still exists and is still awesome. I'm glad I didn't bring my camera on this ramble --though I do have several shots in mind for later.

I found a nice organic/local corner market and have picked up supplies for breakfasts and snacks.

Continuing in the recent trend of "the view out my hotel window" started by Cathy and Brooks... here I am in Chicago. Rather colder than Cathy's and much more urban than either.

More Science!

suzanne — Fri, 24 Jan 2014 23:49:36 GMT

I promise I'll get around to posting about other things here soon. Okay, maybe promise is too strong of a word. I do seem to be falling into the habit of writing shorter posts, and those tend to go onto G+ and/or Facebook. Alas. I've found myself missing the LJ community recently, the longer posts and the community of people in my friends lists. I'm planning on spending some more of my time here, though it may have to be once-a-week catch up sessions.

In the meantime, my job continues to produce fascinating articles! (These weren't all posted on the same day though....)

Annual Review of Pharmacology and Toxicology Volume 54

For me, one of the wonders of pharmacology is how we use toxins and poisons as medicine. Titles such as Masuyer's "Engineered Botulinum Neurotoxins as New Therapeutics" still take me by surprise sometimes. Of course most people are familiar with this toxin from the coverage of Botox injections (which is /even stranger/ to me.) I liked the way this article goes into some of the history of how the toxin was discovered and the different strains that are common around us. I had known a little about it, but wasn't expecting the vast
numbers of strains that are available!

On the other hand of surprise - I'm always disappointed to discover how little we know about certain things. For example, Ke's article "Pharmocometrics in Pregnancy: An Unmet Need." Very little drug development research includes pregnant women - for obvious reasons really. Nobody wants to administer a drug when it could potentially harm a child! The down side is that we have very little information about how medicine and over-the-counter treatments can affect pregnant women. One reaction is to simply stop taking medication of course, but as the introduction for the article rightly points out: " cessation of drug therapy during pregnancy for the treatment of serious clinical conditions is not possible as it may be detrimental to the health and well-being of the pregnant woman and therefore her fetus."

So those two articles are on my reading list!

Another article that struck my fancy was Horn's "Antiparasitic Chemotherapy: From Genomes to Mechanisms." Chemo for parasites? That seems a bit extreme to me. But my skim of the article revealed that it's focused on malaria and sleeping sickness. Was I the only one who never realized that malaria was caused by a parasite? Dude. With that information in hand, it was a fabulously interesting (and slightly horrifying) article. As a side note, after reading through Pharmtox, I now feel like a pathetic whiner for complaining about my
cold.

Next up is Entomology! On to the bugs!

Annual Review of Entomology Volume 59

This may seem a bit too self-evident, but just in case I like to issue this warning...the figures in entomology contain images of bugs and spiders. While proofing Ento I would often find myself returning to it and being slightly startled by the large bug on my screen. That may just be me though. I'm actually okay with most insects if I know they're there, but can be easily startled by them if I don't. It's the spiders that are going to get me in the end I think. *shudders*

In truth though, I am fascinated by spiders and really enjoyed reading Hormiga's article "Systematics, Phylogeny, and Evolution of Orb-Weaving Spiders." Well, when I say "enjoy" I really mean appreciate. Like a good horror movie or something. Just because I'm convinced that spiders belong outdoors and that any spider indoors is poisonous and trying to eat me doesn't mean that I can't be appreciative of them. The introduction didn't do much for my unease, "Ubiquitous, diverse, and exclusively predatory, spiders (Araneae) are among the largest animal groups and the dominant arthropod predators in most terrestrial ecosystems. About 44,000 spider
species have been described to date." But I found myself fascinated by the descriptions of web building.

Another article of interest is Ayasse's "Chemical Ecology of Bumble Bees" mostly because it introduced me to the wonderfully-named cuckoo bumble bees. "The 27 species within the subgenus Psithyrus, known as cuckoo bumble bees, lack a worker caste and live as social parasites in colonies of other bumble bees. Female cuckoo bumble bees are always reproductives that invade the nest of a social species in late spring and exploit host workers, which care for their progeny." How awesome is that!?

My favorite new word for this volume comes from Dickinson's "death Valley, Drosophila, and the Devonian Toolkit." From the acronyms and definitions I present to you stigmergy: the process by which a complicated behavior sequence emerges from a chain of simpler stimulus-evoked actions. I keep looking for a way to slip it into conversations with limited success.

From the same article I learned about stripe fixation: a robust visuomotor reflex in which a flying animal steers toward a conspicuous vertical stripe or edge. Apparently this is a /very/ strong reflex in most insects. We do know they use the strips for navigation, but we're not sure why. "During this entire sequence, which Gotz calculated to require over 32 million wing beats, the flies steered continuously toward the stripe. These experiments document both the durability and the stamina of flies as well as the absurd saliency of vertical stripes... Stripe fixation is such a ferociously strong reflex in D. melanogaster and other insects that it is difficult
to imagine it does not serve some kind of ethological function—but what is it?"

Another interesting idea comes from Denlinger's article "Mosquito Diapause." (diapause, another new word referring to a "period of arrested development that can occur during any stage of insect development." The growing insect just... pauses to before starting to grow again.) The idea I found myself investigating was the maternal effect "the common case in which the mother receives the environmental signals that result in the programming of diapause in her progeny." So something happens to the mosquito which changes how quickly
her offspring hatch and develop.

The rush of the new year is over now that Ento has posted. So we get some breathing room up here to recover before Medicine posts.

Annual Review of Medicine Volume 65

The articles that interested me the most in this volume of Medicine sound as if they may have been lifted from Economics, or possibly Political Science. There has been a lot of talk this year about health care of course, and it was interesting to see read our authors' take on the subject. Of these, Gordon's "Delivering Value: Provider Efforts to Improve the Quality and reduce the Cost of Health Care" contained what I think was the best summation: "Health care today is characterized by a cacophony of opinions, large volumes of data, huge
constituencies with frequently conflicting perspectives, and heightened tensions, owing to health care's life-and death significance to individuals and the importance of its costs to the nation's economy. The process of change will be neither quick nor simple, but, as this review shows, it is gaining momentum."

Another articles that caught my eye was Difede's "Evidence-Based Treatment of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder." (I don't know if there is more interest in PTSD these days, or if I'm noticing the articles more often.) Difede re-introduced me to the concept of translational research: "in which preclinical research findings inform the development of new treatments, and it refers to the dissemination of new treatments to the community to encourage the use of the new health practices and treatments." I was particularly interested in the section about treating PTSD as an emotional learning disorder and it was fascinating to read about it from the medical side.

So much of my reading is from the Psychology perspective that I tend to overlook the physical damage caused by the "mental disorders." This may be why the other article on my reading list is Currier's "Depression as a Risk Factor for Cancer" which lays out some of the physical stresses caused by depression. Another topic in Medicine that I'm following pretty closely is the ongoing debate on how new genetic information changes the way we approach our health. In this volume there is Boycott's "Identification of Genes for Childhood Heritable Diseases" and Caskey's "Adult Genetic Risk Screening." Hopefully I'll find time to read them more closely this weekend!

Annual Review of Pathology Volume 9

The ever fascinating Pathology comes with the usual warning - there are some illustrations in this volume that can be unpleasant to stumble upon.

Speaking of unpleasant illustrations a quick look at Bastian's article on "The Molecular Pathology of Melanoma" will convince you to give up the tanning beds and stock up on sunscreen. This article makes it pretty clear that childhood sunbathing isn't the only factor in melanoma and often the problem begins in areas that aren't directly damaged by the sun. Not recommended beach reading this one, but it's on my reading list regardless.

For reasons close to my own neck, Tomer's article on "Mechanisms of Autoimmune Thyroid Diseases" was the first article in this volume to catch my attention. While I don't have Graves or Hashimoto's, any look at how thyroid problems develop is going to make it to the top of my list. While most of the science in this article is /way/ over my head I did learn some new information from skimming it: "Autoimmune responses target the thyroid more frequently than any other organ. The prevalence of the autoimmune thyroid diseases (AITDs)
Graves' disease (GD) and Hashimoto's thyroiditis (HT) is estimated to be 5%. The prevalence of subclinical disease manifested by the production of antithyroid antibodies without clinical disease (considered a biomarker of genetic susceptibility) may be even higher."

Mavragani's article introduced me to an intriguing new disease - Sjogren's Syndrome - in which the immune system attacks and destroys the glands that produce tears and saliva. The authors note in the introduction that "it is considered a rather benign disease" but point out that it does seem connected to other types of autoimmune disorders, "such as lupus, rheumatoid arthritis and systemic sclerosis." So that gives me some cheerful weekend reading!

I'm going to start posting these as they come in I think - so these posts won't be quite so long.

Four volumes, one day

suzanne — Sat, 04 Jan 2014 07:16:33 GMT

As many of you know, I work at a small scientific publishing house. My primary responsibility is to prep, proof, and post the final online files for all of our (48) journals. Today was the new year rush. Four journals to post in one day. Thud now. Thought y'all might like to hear about the interesting things I found.

Annual Review of Psychology Volume 65
I think Psychology is a great opener for the new year. But as always I could possibly be biased - you should take a look and decide for yourself!

I had a lot of fun with Jetten's "Deviance and Dissent in Group Norms" especially in the acronyms and definitions. I am particularly amused by the concept of positive deviants: "individuals who deviate by contributing more to the group than the average group member." It's easy to forget that deviants are anything that veer away from the average or norm - we're just more likely to think about the negative ones.

I was also intrigued by the discussion of imposterism in the article, "Impostorism is a particular form of deviance and involves individuals breaking group norms by passing themselves off as genuine group members even though they do not meet key criteria for group membership. Impostorism allows people to cross what are normally impermeable group boundaries (e.g., gender, race, or class) and is a way to obtain access to groups, professions, or classes that could not be legitimately claimed otherwise." It's also good for undercover police work.

Another definition that caught my eye was in Oishi's "Socioecological Psychology." Social ecology: natural and social habitats, including physical, interpersonal, economic, and political environments. Another idea that makes perfect sense, but I had never seen from that angle before. I like the idea that our habits and politics are as part of our ecology as the buildings in which we live. I'm going to use it in a sentence at the next gathering I attend to see how many of my friends look at me funny.

If you are interested in getting strange looks from your friends, I recommend Allman's "Properties of the Internal Clock: First- and Second-Order Principles of Subjective Time." (I'm also amused that in the table of contents this appears in the section "Timely Matters." Beautiful and subtle wordplay there - well done. There are a lot of interesting ideas in this article and it seems particularly relevant at the start of the new year. We're very aware of time passing, "oops, I have an appointment." But I'm glad we also have science, philosophy, and Doctor Who to remind us that we don't really understand how time works at all.

I really like the concept of subjective time, especially when my own subjective time doesn't match up with the "real" time. For instance most of us only came back to work yesterday. That means today is Tuesday, correct?

Before I run off to tackle the next volume (It's going to be a busy day - brace yourselves!) I have to say a few words about the autobiographical article for this volume, Sternberg's "I Study What I Stink At: Lessons Learned from a Career in Psychology." This is a long quote, but I really loved his approach to this topic.

"Quite simply, in my career, I have generally gotten inspiration by studying things in which I failed. I started studying and writing about intelligence because I did poorly on IQ tests as a child; I started thinking about creativity at a point in my career when I ran out of ideas; I started writing about love when my love life was not doing well; I wrote about thinking styles because of experiences I had had where my way of thinking and learning seemed not to match teachers' expectations; I started studying wisdom because I had given bad advice to a student; I started studying leadership because I most unfairly and grievously lost the election in grade 5 for the vice-presidency of the student council to a kid whose speech was far worse than mine (so I thought); and so forth."

I'll have to keep that in mind while struggling with Statistics later today. Onwards!

Annual Review of Marine Science Volume 6

I have to start out with this volume's biography. Not an /auto/ biography, sadly, but I was charmed and touched by the explanation in the preamble: "He passed away in autumn of that year, before he could start this project. As a group of André's mentees and close collaborators, we were given the privilege to present a synthetic description of his contributions to optical oceanography. This article is our testimony to the highest recognition of André's scientific achievements and legacy and the highest appreciation for all he taught us both scientifically and at a broader human level." That is a wonderfully touching tribute.

Puig's "Contemporary Sediment-Transport Processes in Submarine Canyons" wins the prize for keeping me grinning all the way through. I kept trying to parse submarine as the mechanical navy vessel instead of the description of depth that it is. That made section headings like "Large Submarine Slope Failures" rather startling. Also "documented 30 submarine cable breaks."

In all my studies of water, and the articles I've read about whale communication and the like, I never managed to notice how noisy the oceans must be and how much of what we know about it comes from sound waves. I'm now thoroughly fascinated and will certainly be reading Wilcock's "Sounds in the Ocean at 1-100 Hz" more closely this weekend. From the Abstract and introduction:
"Weather-related sounds result from interactions between waves, bubbles entrained by breaking waves, and the deformation of sea ice. Earthquakes generate sound in geologically active regions, and earthquake T waves propagate throughout the oceans. Blue and fin whales generate long bouts of sounds near 20 Hz that can dominate regional ambient noise levels seasonally. Anthropogenic sound sources include ship propellers, energy extraction, and seismic air guns and have been growing steadily."

Two more quick notes before I turn my attention towards Statistics. First Clarke's "El Nino Physics and El Nino Predictability" offers some insight into weather patterns. Maybe by re-reading it I can say something intelligent about the weather someday. Also there are some really pretty figures in McKinnon's article, "Tropical Marginal Seas: Priority Regions for Managing Marine Biodiversity and Ecosystem Function."

Alright then. Two down, two to go. On to Statistics!

Annual Review of Statistics Volume 1

Ah, the joys of a new series! I must admit that I wasn't thrilled about Statistics when I first heard about it. I have mixed memories of statistics from high school and college - although I survived the classes through pure stubbornness, I never really understood what I was doing. It was unexpected to find myself so charmed and excited about this volume.

There is a very nifty introduction to the series written by the series editor Stephen Fienberg. I especially enjoyed all the definitions of statistics he lists from other sources. As he sums it up: " The good news is that these answers overlap considerably and have many words in common. The bad news is that they do not lead us to a simple answer." His short history of the field is excellent, and I found a lot that sparked my brain. For example in one of the section headings I discovered the concept of "Political Arithmetic." I think that's a wonderful phrase, and another that I'm eager to drop into casual conversations. (You know, that may be why I don't talk much.) For the equation wary, I should note that not only is Fienberg's introduction great, it also doesn't contain any math.

As good as the introduction is, I think I my favorite definition was in Embrecht's "Statistics and Quantitative Risk Management for Banking and Insurance." "Statistics is precisely what has to straddle the shouting world of mathematical logic with the whispering one of practical reality." I applaud whatever shouting or whispering that inspired this volume to open with the introduction and finish with this article. Really nice bookending for me.

My favorite article has to be van Dyk's "The Role of Statistics in the Discovery of a Higgs Boson" simply because I'm such a big fan of the Higgs. I also love the way the abstract reads like an adventure novel, "This tool kit was put to the test in a 40-year search that culminated in the discovery of a Higgs boson. This article reviews these statistical methods, the controversies that surround them, and how they led to this historic discovery."

I found myself smiling through this volume, even as I proofed the math (and there was a /lot/ of math). From Keiding's "Event History Analysis" I discovered "time-dependent confounding" in Figure 7. What a great phrase. Another was found in the early figures (Figures 1-3 in this article crack me up.) " Unidirectional illness-death model."

I also laughed at Erosheva's title: " Breaking Bad: Two Decades of Life-Course Data Analysis in Criminology, Developmental Psychology, and Beyond."

But overall what really impressed me was the remarkable breadth of topics. Nuclear Physics, Neuroscience, Climate change, Genetics, Biology, Criminology, Politics, Ecology, Biophysics, and Banking are the ones I find just skimming the table of contents. I'm sold.

Next up is Fluid!

http://www.annualreviews.org/toc/fluid/46/1Annual Review of Fluid Mechanics Volume 46

My interest in Fluid Mechanics goes back to college, for various reasons, so I am a bit biased. (I sometimes claim that I don't have favorite journals, but that is a lie.)

My absolute favorite article is Guyon's "Taking Fluid Mechanics to the General Public." From the introduction: "We do not limit this review to science museums or popular scientific books and will explore, in a more general fashion, different situations in which fluids are encountered and in which there is an opportunity to introduce concepts dealing with them. This includes both cultural and technical activities." There are water fountains and tips on how to observe water in nature. Experiments to do with children, or just because.... In the acronyms and definitions I also found this pointer: "Society for Industrial Archeology: US association that preserves industrial heritage and promotes public presentations of the past, present, and possible future of the sites."

Awesome. I heartily recommend going to check out this article - if only to look at the pictures of amazing water fountains! (I'm currently trying to convince my husband to build me a replica of one of them on our back patio. No luck yet, but I'll keep you posted.)

Speaking of the general public and their appreciation of fluid mechanics, we have Wei's "The Fluid Dynamics of Competitive Swimming." Yep. From the introduction: "These questions point to the importance of technique in swimming and why so much research goes into identifying the so-called perfect stroke. Without even being aware of the existence of Profs. Navier and Stokes, a world-class swimmer inherently uses fundamental fluid dynamics principles to produce high thrust with minimum drag." It's an entertaining read even for casual swimmers.

Hmm. What else fits this theme? How about Choi's "Aerodynamics of Heavy Vehicles." Heavy vehicles in this case largely means tractor-trailers and other large trucks that often drive long distances. Looking at them it's easy to think they're simple big boxes on 18 wheels. But a lot of testing and research has gone into reducing drag and improving gas mileage. And it makes a bigger difference than you'd think, "one can achieve approximately 4% fuel savings by a 20% aerodynamic drag reduction at an operating speed of 105 km h−1 for a tractor-trailer weighing 36 tons"

Other amusing tidbits:
Spedding discusses magnetically disturbed turtles in "Wake Signature Detection" (Figure 9 in particular.)

Candel's "Dynamics of swirling Flames" Not only is it an interesting article, it contains a section heading that could easily be a band's newest single: "Excitation of the Flame by the Helical Mode"

Next up is Pharmtox. But that's not till Monday.

Four volumes in one day. Thud now.

Lol my thesis

suzanne — Sat, 28 Dec 2013 08:25:35 GMT

Everyone should know about this site. Everything on it is awesome! (Or maybe I'm really sleepy. Hard to tell at this point.)

(Whatever the plural of thesis is) summed up in one sentence.

Science article on The Hobbit

suzanne — Tue, 17 Dec 2013 01:45:45 GMT

The christmas editions of some science journals are a bit more.... relaxed. I thought this article in the Medical Journal of Australia might be of particular interest. It theorizes that the "evil" characters in The Hobbit are suffering from severe vitamin D deficiencies.

More research is needed.

The hobbit — an unexpected deficiency by Joseph A Hopkinson and Nicholas S Hopkinson

Morgan creates a car for our cat Beatrice.

suzanne — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 06:20:07 GMT

Morgan puts box on floor and points.
"Meow, bahx, caarh, bop!" (Dearest cat, if you'll please ascend to the top of the box I'll pretend it's a car and push you around the foyer on it. Then I'll stop and bop you on the nose.)

Beatrice: "mrowr. Meow." (That sounds lovely dear small child, but you will promise not to bop my nose too hard, correct? For I have no desire to nip your delicate hand again, nor endure your tears.)

Morgan: "nose, bop, meow." (Like the touch of a feather on the surface of a still mountain lake, so I will bop your nose my dear.)

Beatrice, as she climbs the box: "meows mrowr." (Then let us begin.)

And where was Julie you may ask? In the closet. Quiet. (Is she gone yet?)

cleaning out my closet: a self analysis

suzanne — Sat, 30 Nov 2013 01:59:25 GMT

Today I cleaned out my closet and unpacked my winter clothes. I've lost some weight, and decided this would be a good opportunity to discard old/unworn/too-big clothes. I (re)discovered some rather strange things about myself in the process.

For someone who claims not to care about clothes and spends the majority of her time in t-shirts, jeans and long skirts, I have an astonishing amount of clothes. Of course this is why I was being ruthless and getting rid of things that no longer fit and I hadn't worn in a while. My car is currently loaded with four(!) full trash bags to donate somewhere tomorrow.

That's just embarrassing. I think part of it is that I'm really good at finding good sales, and like many people who grew up poor I find it difficult to resist a good deal. That wouldn't be a problem except I hate trying on and returning things that I don't like or that don't fit. This is a bad combination that I need to fight.

I really love sweaters. /Really./ Perhaps it's an unconscious manifestation of my love of winter. Perhaps I'm under the delusion that Silicon Valley is going to be hit by a cold snap of epic proportions any day now. No wonder I spend much of the winter complaining about being too hot.

I also love turtleneck sweaters in general, but I apparently have a dark purple turtleneck fetish. I tossed out two that were woefully big, and still own 6 in various weights. I'm toying with the idea of wearing purple turtlenecks to work for a full week to see if anyone notices.

Morgan and the cats: an epic saga of hide and seek

suzanne — Wed, 13 Nov 2013 01:32:08 GMT

After Morgan's nap and snack, we looked through the photos on my iPad and talked about babies and cats. I then asked if she wanted to go to the park.

Morgan said: Shoes! and so we put on her socks and shoes. But when we got to the door I said something about the park and she said: "No. Mrowr!" I explained that it was too far for her to walk to my house and if she wanted to visit the cats we'd have to take the car. At this point she ran back to her bedroom and started pulling on the door of her closet where her car seat is stored and said "Caaa. Mrowr."

So we went to visit the cats. What ensued, my friends, was an hour long game of hide and chase the cats around the house. Well mostly chasing Julie, Beatrice quite happily followed along once she realized that Morgan was in possession of the bag of kitty treats (called Doggie-Mrowr). We looked under beds and in closets until I managed to quickly shut the bedroom door sealing /both/ cats in with me and Morgan.

I thought this would be the end of the game, we had sucessfully corraled both cats, petted them, and celebrated with happy dances/stomps. (And gave them treats. Morgan taste tested one and claims that it's "Mmmm.") In the course of petting both the cats we also had the stunning realization that cats /also/ have noses. So we played a couple of rounds of my nose, your nose, cat's nose. Beatrice was tolerant, Julie was not.

However, somewhere in the pursuit Morgan had became convinced that there was actually a /third/ cat somewhere. So we had to go back through the house checking all of Julie's hiding places looking for it.

I distracted her from the invisible third cat with refridgerator magnets (which are awesome) and a short but passionate debate over whether two of the magnets depicted otters or doggies. It was then time to head back to her house, so we had to re-chase down the cats to say goodbye. After again looking for the invisible third cat, Morgan was finally convinced to call a general "Bye-bye Mrowr!" to the house and go outside.

Where she promptly was distracted by a neighbor's pumpkin.

Here we go again - a new round of IVF (and fertility posts)

suzanne — Fri, 08 Nov 2013 23:52:10 GMT

I know I've been pretty quiet recently, but that's going to start changing soon, at least on the fertility front. We originally planned on only doing one IVF cycle, but we had anticipated having enough eggs/embryos to freeze and make multiple attempts. After my last cycle Dr. A pointed out that given the low number of eggs retrieved the fact that we ended up with embryos at all was encouraging and she thought we would have much better luck with a different protocol.

We went through my blood-test results and looked at how I responded to the last cycle with her. Then we went did some research on the new protocol she recommended and had some discussions. We decided to try the new protocol - a decision that was further cemented by new blood results a few weeks later showing that my thyroid had fallen severely out of whack (I was hyperthyroidic! TSH at 0.13!) and my vitamin D levels weren't rising. So we took some time to get that worked out.

So the fertility filter will be picking back up in the next couple of days. If you would like to be taken off (or added on), just let me know in the comments.