Following up on Buddhini Samarasinghe’s knockout mouse post (http://goo.gl/DjWewM) which you should read but I know most of you read it already, here’s a mouse that will knockout scorpions and centipedes. The grasshopper mouse (Onychomys torridus) is an awesome fighter. Besides howling at the moon, they can block the pain from some types of venom.
Nociceptors are sensory neurons that are associated with pain. They used to be called pain receptors but we know now that they are involved with sensing more than just pain. Some venoms bind to the sodium channel in nociceptors, causing intense pain (among other things).
The unique thing about the grasshopper mouse is that it has a mutation that actually uses the venom to block pain, i.e. block the transmission of the signal from the nociceptor to the brain. Now that’s pretty cool.
Hero shrew (Scutisorex somereni): put your back into it
I stumbled onto this amazing story browsing through the BlinkFeed on my HTC One via The Verge http://goo.gl/MQEo8h
Imagine something weighing thousands of times your weight, standing on you? The hero shrew can handle that. I usually don’t like to quote articles in their entirety. However, this is way out of my area and I like the version from The Field Museum news feed.
Over a century ago, explorers in the Democratic Republic of Congo noted a strangely large and hairy shrew – that’s right, a shrew. When they commented on the shrew to the locals, they were told, “We wear this animal as a talisman around our necks, so that we will be invincible.” The explorers, confused as to how such an animal could be thought to make a person invincible, watched in amazement as a full-grown man stood on the back of the shrew for over five minutes, and the animal walked away, unharmed!
Thus, the shrew came to be called the Hero Shrew. Just this week, Field Museum scientists and international collaborators identified a new species of Hero Shrew – the mammal with the most bizarre backbone on Earth.
Its name? Thor’s Hero Shrew.
The remarkable spine of the Hero Shrew is unique among mammals, in that the lower vertebrae are both wider and longer, than those of other mammals. This gives the animal extraordinary strength! In fact, the unique vertebrae of the Hero Shrew make the spine up to four times more robust than other mammals. It’s no wonder the authors gave it a name that invokes Thor, the god of strength in Norse mythology!
Until now, there have been no other species of the Hero Shrew, and the spine has been an enigma to scientists, because it provides no known advantage to the animal. Now, however, scientists suggest that these shrews may position themselves between the trunk and leaf bases of Palms, and use their unique spine to pry the leaf base away from the trunk and gain access to grubs that are otherwise hidden from predators.
The specimen now residing at The Field Museum is a holotype (meaning the single physical example of this particular species that was originally used in its identification), so scientists around the world will use this very shrew as the golden standard for any future research done on this species.
The third image is an example of a hole left behind from a Rhinoceros beetle larvae in a palm tree http://goo.gl/sSYPYy
Based on the hypothesis, the hero shrew would wedge itself on the opposite side of where that hole is (of course the hole wouldn’t be there as the shrew would want it when it’s still a larva).
Thanks Fadia Lekouaghet for sharing this post and introducing me to Caleb Charland’s art. In grade school, kids are shown how to make a circuit with a lemon or tomato but this is better way to get the point across and get kids interesting in science.
See the explanation of how it works in the comment by Fernando J. Rodriguez
#ScienceEveryday
Originally shared by Fadia Lekouaghet
What if pictures begin as simple questions…
Caleb Charland is a photographer that captures the everyday physical phenomena which we never think about in a unique and inspiring way.
The photo below is one of his works. it shows an *Orange Battery*.
The photographer uses still-life arrangements, for instance, apples and potatoes as an electrical source for the lamp that illuminates the resulting photograph. In this image he used the orange’s natural wedges as the cells for the battery, which were held up-right with an armature of small wooden skewers.
Thanks Kee Hinckley for posting this. I’m often debating with various conspiracy theorists on G+. Whether it’s big pharma conspiracies or Monsanto/anti-GMO conspiracies, this video helps put the anti-science proponents in perspective. When people use big pharma as an argument against a lot of the biomedical science that I post about, it does two things. First it insults people like me that spend their careers using science to fight things like cancer. When conspiracy theorist say things like “big pharma has a cure for cancer but it’s more profitable to keep the cure secret”, it implies that I, along with my colleagues, are bumbling idiots or unscrupulous scum. Well I’ve said many times, big pharma must have the wrong address for me because I drive a VW. I wish I knew who is cashing my checks from big pharma.
Secondly, the conspiracy theory card is a cop-out. It’s very difficult to argue against because the conspiracy theorists just negates everything you say because you are part of the conspiracy. It’s very convenient and lazy.
My favorite quote from the video is:
Once you’re forced to hypothesize whole new technologies to keep our conspiracy possible, you’ve stepped over into the realm of magic. It demands a deep and abiding faith in things you can never know.
and knowing vs. believing is very powerful.
Kee Hinckley posted the mobile link, which is why I didn’t reshare his post. However his comments are also worth sharing.
This video has a very important lesson for people who believe every government conspiracy theory out there.
You don’t have to watch the whole thing, although he does an excellent job of showing how the technology available in 1969 was incapable of faking a moon landing. But watch the last two minutes (11m and on). There he explains why it matters that you don’t fall for conspiracy hoaxes. Because yes, the government does lie, and that makes it even more important that you have the critical skills to distinguish the real problems from the made up ones. When your conspiracy theory starts relying on faith (whether in technology, ridiculous numbers of secret organizations, or anything else) you’ve crossed the line.
I’ve been busy with visiting family for the 4th of July holiday. You’ve probably noticed my stream is stagnant. Since I don’t have time to write up a decent post, I’ll piggyback on Buddhini Samarasinghe’s excellent post.
G+ is a great place to meet people with similar interests. I’ve heard several times that FaceBook is for keeping in touch with people you already know and Google Plus is a place for meeting people you don’t know, who have similar interests. For me that’s Science. I’m a scientist and I’ve had the pleasure of becoming friends with other scientists here that share a passion for science and science outreach.
Whether it’s curating ScienceSunday, posting about science on our own, or fighting pseudo science/anti-science, there is a group of real scientists that work hard on this endeavor. Counteracting the sensationalizing of science is part of what we do.
Thanks Buddhini Samarasinghe for an excellent post that I agree with wholeheartedly. Here’s my favorite post for dealing with a cancer story that was blown out of proportion.
Two years ago, I signed up to G+ and was thrilled to discover so many scientists and science advocates on here – I found my kind! From those early days, we built a community, from the ground up, made of people who were passionate about communicating science and battling anti-science. Over time, we gained enthusiastic support from the public, and our followers on G+ grew, along with the engagement we received from the content we produced. Fascinating topics, insightful discussions, the occasional swatting of the pseudoscience troll, these were all things that brought us closer together. Pages and Communities sprang up, all with the common goal of science outreach and public education and I am so proud and happy to be a part of that. To that end, ScienceSunday and Science on Google+: A Public Database are excellent resources for any newcomers.
As a scientist, communicating science comes with a responsibility to be honest. When I write a science post, I do it because I read a paper that made me go “wow, that is so cool! I want to share that with people!”. My goal is not to hit What’s Hot, or to get more followers, or to become popular, or to increase a Klout score or whatever. I don’t care about those things because they are side effects.
Because of this, I don’t sensationalize my posts to become popular. I strongly feel that the science I write about is already pretty damn sensational. I don’t need to lie to you, the public, to make you excited about it, because I hope that my science writing skills can translate the jargon from the research so that you are excited about the science itself.
Sensationalizing scientific discoveries is patronizing. It implies that you, the public, is too stupid to understand or care about the science, and I need to deliver it in a form that you will consume easier. This is lazy, and ultimately doesn’t really educate anyone about the scientific discovery; it just spreads misinformation.
Sensationalizing science also leads the public to have false expectations about the science. A sensationalized title such as “Scientists Have Grown a Fully Functional Liver from stem cells” might hit What’s Hot, but is an outright lie. It leads the public to expect ‘fully functional livers’ to be made available to transplant candidates within months and years, whereas the reality is far from the case. This is not the fault of the science, or the scientist.
Misinforming the public to popularize science does not popularize science; it hurts science. The science out there is already so amazing, we don’t need to make it something it’s not. I understand that it’s not easy for everyone to always read the original paper and understand it, let alone convey the findings in a manner that the public can understand, but sensationalizing it to make people take notice is disingenuous and lazy at best, and harmful and detrimental to our collective goals of science outreach at worst.
If you have me circled, I won’t lie to you. I will do my best to share the research that I think is exciting, in a jargon-free manner that I hope you can understand, and be available to answer any questions you might have about it, or find other scientists who could answer you. You can expect to read about things like radioactive bacteria shrinking tumors (http://goo.gl/FhPeM), the evolution of snake venom proteins (http://goo.gl/qZHcF) or how a compound in breast milk could be used to treat MRSA (http://goo.gl/RQGv5) if I am in your circles. I am here to communicate science and to make you as excited about it as I am. I don’t need to sensationalize something that is already sensational.
Thanks Tommy Leung, Rajini Rao, Hedwig Pöllöläinen and Brian Koberlein for inspiring this post. It’s something that was on my mind for quite a while, and you guys were awesome catalysts 🙂
Steve Mould explains that magenta or pink is created because we only have 3 different cones for color vision: red, green, and blue. It’s not surprising that most tv’s and photographs use the RGB colormap, i.e., only combinations of red, green, and blue.
In my research we often use different color spaces. I’ve mentioned RGB (red-green-blue). Some journals ask for figures in CMYK (cyan-magenta-yellow-black). But have you heard of CIE L*a*b* (CIELAB)? It’s an interesting color space. It can be helpful for image segmentation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lab_color_space
I have a hard time doing #Caturday but my friend Mz Maau suggested I add some kittens to my stream. I hope this jerboa is cute enough.
This one was caught in Afghanistan. Jerboa hop like kangaroos as you could guess. They use their long tail for balance while moving and for stability while standing. They can move as fast as 15 mph or 24 kph. Because they live in the desert and they have large eyes, you can guess that they are nocturnal. They are solitary and build permanent burrows; one for winter and one for summer.
The only interesting science tidbit I found, outside of the Wiki, is that they have a high level of vasopressin in their brains relative to other rodents. Vasopressin is a hormone involved with two things, vasoconstriction (closing of blood vessels) and retention of water. Being a desert animal, the later makes sense.
It does matter, Alijah should not have been in ICU
This story is precisely why I and other pro-science friends on G+ are relentless against anti-vaxxers and anti-science. You might ask why anti-science. This article clearly makes the case why I am against anti-vaxxers. From the article:
“If you google vaccines you get a lot of pros and a lot of cons, and you start to read all the cons and they start to weigh on you and you start to believe all the things that are said.”
“It looks like a fifty-fifty argument.”
Williams says that he was influenced by stories he read on the internet that the MMR (Measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine was linked to children developing autism; that they contain mercury and aluminium and that vaccines are promoted by drug companies purely for profit.
The reason that I’m against anti-science is many-fold. I’m a scientist and I have a passion for science and research. Anti-science people also tend to be conspiracy theorists. Herein lies the connection. The mentality that anti-science and conspiracy theorists spread can be the seed for doubt when it comes to important issues like vaccination. People think that it’s a personal decision, it’s not. Here’s a great article by Liza Gross, Doubt and Denialism: Vaccine Myths Persist in the Face of Science
Herd immunity, in addition to not seeing kids like Alijah suffer, is another reason to vaccinate. If you have a minute, really just 60 seconds, and you want to learn what herd immunity is Herd Immunity – One Minute Medical School
I often hear people claim that big pharma must be paying me off. Another real offensive comment that I often hear is that big pharma has a cure for cancer but they are sitting on it because it’s more profitable for people to be sick. I spend countless hours doing cancer research. The idea that my work and my colleagues work is futile because big pharma already has the answer is insulting, infuriation, and just stupid. I drive a VW, by the way. So I guess big pharma has been send my money to the wrong address.
h/t Kee Hinckley
I’m very serious and passionate about science and fighting anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists. If you want to read more.
There is a lot of concern about the decline in bee colonies. As most people know, if there are no bees, then many crops will suffer as they need the bees to pollinate them.
Wenfu Mao, Mary A. Schuler, and May R. Berenbaum, from the University of Illinois, recently published in PNAS that feeding high fructose corn syrup, as honey is taken away from bees, might be contributing to Colony Collapse Disorder. Since the 70s, corn syrup has been given to bees in colonies as their honey is harvested from them. Mao et al found that the bees immune system was stronger when exposed to p-coumaric, an enzyme that turns on detoxification genes. It’s found in pollen walls.
Reference:
Researchers find high-fructose corn syrup may be tied to worldwide collapse of bee colonies
Most of the focus has been on neonicotinoids, which are a class of neuro-active insecticides chemically related to nicotine. Pyrethroid is a compound used in commercial insecticides that is similar to pyrethrum, which is the active ingredient in Chrysanthemum flowers. Chrysanthemum flowers were used to kill lice for centuries. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrethroid
In this article by Frazier et al, they explain how neonicotinoids aren’t the sole problem. The amount of neonicotinoids found does not add up.
This is in contrast to pyrethroids which were found in 79.4% of samples at 36-times higher amounts than the neonicotinoids, on average.
Pesticides and Their Involvement in Colony Collapse Disorder
Researchers at UC Berkeley are studying ancient Roman concrete in an effort to come up with a durable, yet green concrete. Shipping was instrumental to the expansion and sustainability of the Roman Empire. Using volcanic ash and seawater, the Romans developed concrete that has withstood the harsh marine environment for over 2,000 years. Scientist used the Advanced Light Source at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) to look at fine structures in the Roman concrete for the first time.
Roman concrete has a smaller carbon footprint because the modern cement (Portland cement) burns calcium carbonate (limestone) and clays at 1,450 deg C while lime used in Roman concrete requires only two thirds of that.
If Roman concrete is so good, why is it not still used? As the Roman Empire declined, the need for shipping and therefore the need marine concrete diminished. Also, modern concrete takes a fraction of the time to cure, compared to Roman concrete.
Edit
I should have defined what concrete is. Concrete is a composite material, made of “filler” (e.g. pebbles) and a binder (cement). So what is cement? More importantly, what is Portland cement, which is mentioned in the article and is the most common type of cement used. Portland cement is calcium silicates mixed with aluminum and iron containing clinker phases. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portland_cement). So what are clinker phases? Clinkers are balls of sintered (baked) material made by taking a mixture of materials and heating them with very high heat. So the big difference between Roman concrete and modern concrete is really the clinker, not so much the filler. Also note that Roman concrete does not use steel reinforcing bars (rebar), so modern concrete has much higher tensile strength.
