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Massive asteroid may have kickstarted the movement of continents
Earth was still a violent place shortly after life began, with regular impactors arriving from space. For the first time, scientists have modelled the effects of one such violent event – the strike of...
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Life and Lemons: Follow-up on 'the' conversation
I told you we would get back to Dr. Ego Tistical…This isn't really about Dr. Tistical specifically, but the medical doctor (as opposed to nurses, EMTs, etc.) profession in general. Based on my...
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Why do religious people have more friends?
It’s a fairly well-attested fact that religious people tend to be happier, to be more socially engaged, and to have more social support. Well, there are nuances depending on the country you look at,...
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Ferns have it made in the shade
Here's a great bit of research just reported by my colleague Emily over at the No seeds, no fruits, no flowers: no problem blog. Everyone knows that ferns grow well in the deep forest shade, but this...
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Fire Burn and Caldron Bubble: A chemistry set for the iPad
From BlueCadet's design for the appRound about the cauldron go;In the poison'd entrails throw.Toad, that under cold stoneDays and nights has thirty-oneSwelter'd venom sleeping got,Boil thou first i'...
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Learning mosses at SOBEFREE
At the end of March I attended the SOBEFREE foray with amateur and professional bryologists from across California and beyond. I highly recommend attending this foray, especially if you live in...
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Iowan proclaimation calls for prayer and humble repentance
Dear Pastor Grandstand (Branstad or something like that),Thank you for your invitation to join in thoughtful prayer and humble repentance, but for what exactly? Yes, your proclamation was for Iowa,...
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Scientists pinpoint when harmless bacteria became flesh-eating monsters
Written with Declan Perry Bacterial diseases cause millions of deaths every year. Most of these bacteria were benign at some point in their evolutionary past, and we don’t always understand what turned...
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Magical modular furniture
#MIT #design #furniture #technology #Milano Transform is a magical, modular furniture developed by MIT: The work is comprised of three dynamic shape displays that move more than one thousand pins up...
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Rule of 6ix has moved
If you are looking for more virological-related blogging head over to postdocinvirology as Rule of 6ix is no more. I have decided to slightly alter my blogging outlet to reflect the evolution of my...
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Vitruvian Geology – Leonardo da Vinci and the Realistic Depiction of the...
Leonardo da Vinci studied rocks and landscapes not only to improve the realism of his paintings, but also in an attempt to understand how the earth works. Leonardo was obsessed with water, which he...
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Cell preps for RNAseq are all done
I'm pretty sure that I've now done all of the cell preps for our big planned RNAseq analysis, more or less as diagrammed in the previous post. Instead of a cya knockout mutant as a negative control...
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A new mutation causing hypercompetence
I described last month how we were revisiting on old hypercompetent mutant whose causative gene was unknown. I rechecked its phenotype and prepped DNA to sequence, from both the original EMS-induced...
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Much ado about very little: office art
Our local newspaper sounded the outrage about a relatively minor government official who bought “over $1000 of art” for their office. Now there are several things wrong here, so let’s look at them in...
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Spot the human artifact - on Mars!
Human artifacts are just so easy to distinguish from natural objects. But still this is kind of cool. See if you can spot the human artifact in this image of Mars' surface before you enlargen the...
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Tadpole plasticity triggered by dragonfly nymph predation (video)
Professor Rick Relyea from the University of Pittsburgh gave a fascinating seminar today: "Phenotypic Plasticity: Stress-Induced Changes in Behavior, Morphology, and Life History of Aquatic...
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Walt Disney at Dawson Lake
This poem was written by James McGowan and read at a memorial service in celebration of this life. In a real coincidence, Mrs. Phactor called the poem to my attention today, the day that the second...
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Education, breastfeeding and gender affect the microbes on our bodies
Trillions of microbes live in and on our body. We don’t yet fully understand how these microbial ecosystems develop or the full extent to which they influence our health. Some provide essential...
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Turning to God for reassurance in the face of wonder
‘Agency detection’ – seeing purposeful minds at work behind seemingly random events – is a powerful human instinct that is thought to play an important role in the generation of religious beliefs....
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Gardening the hole day
TPP is bushed, tired, not politically inept. Yes, hole not whole, because that's what he did today; TPP dug holes. That's the bloody trouble with new shrubs, they need holes. And when you take down 5...
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