Honest Scientists

Oh, Buzzfeed.  You slay me.  This top 17 list appeared in my Facebook feed last week and I was laughing so hard.  It's all true.

I'll make a few ammendments:

1. Behind moneywall?  Or an interestwall.  Sometimes you just don't want to wade through reading the whole paper and you just ask your boss which paper says what you want.  They rattle it off and you blindly copy it down.

2. Or it was the only dye we had.

6. And post doc kept an unintelligale notebook.  In fact, all scientists do.

9. Yup.

13. Fisher Scientific owns everything except my life.  That is owned by the NIH.

Enjoy!

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kmallikarjuna/how-to-science-as-told-by-17-overly-honest-scientists

Philadelphia women and specific bacteria

Here's a very interesting article concerned the infection rates of MAC = mycobacterium avium complex.  It seems to be found most commonly in healthy, post menopausal, white women of higher socioeconomic status.  Oh, and in the Philadelphia area.  Doctors don't know why, but they're trying to figure it out.

http://www.newsworks.org/index.php/homepage-feature/item/54911?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=FBWHYY773

What's wrong...

... with this picture?

Read more here!  LINK

Glass Microbiology

Luke Jerram is an artist who creates sculptures and installations, as well as live projects.  His most recent collection, entitled "Glass Microbiology" was recently purchased by The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.  He has created glass replicas of the viruses HPV (human papillomavirus), HIV (human immunodeficiency virus), and influenza in addition to the parasite that causes malaria, and an E. coli bacterium.  Scientists know what these microscopic organisms (yes, I'm going to choose to call a virus a living entity) and are widely discussed in the scientific world.  However, these pieces of art now bring this information to a wider group of people.  They're beautiful!

Luke Jerram's Glass Microbiology site: http://www.lukejerram.com/glass/

Article about his work: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2276348/Glass-Microbiology-Luke-Jerrams-delicate-deadly-viruses-recreated-blown-glass.html#axzz2KBDwXso2

E. coli bacterium

Close

What are you doing on February 15th?  I know what the asteroid 2012 DA 14 will be doing - coming within 18,000 miles of Earth's surface.  It might sound far, but it's actually closer to us than the moon and some satellites. 

The asteroid is believed to be about 45 meters (~ 148 feet) in diameter, but will not be visible to the naked eye.

Check out its path and more information at NASA's Near Earth Object Program here: http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news174.html

Many small objects come close to Earth every year.  To give you a flavor of what is really going on in space, here's an article from TIME magazine discussing this very topic: http://science.time.com/2013/02/05/duck-close-shave-with-an-asteroid-coming/

The asteroid Mathilde, taken by the

NEAR spacecract on 6/16/97

Remembering Columbia

Tomorrow, February 1st, will mark ten years since Space Shuttle Columbia broke into pieces over Dallas, TX while returning from a 16 day mission.

It's always the question - do you remember where you were when it happened?

I can't remember what city I was in, but I do remember being in a hotel with my husband.  We had been arguing over something until CNN caught our eye.  The news station was showing clips of debris flying through the air that looked like comets.  Of course the story harkened back to the Challenger explosion of 1986, not only in incident but also in timing: Challenger was lost on January 28th, nearly 17 years before.  So ominous.

Wayne Hale worked for NASA for 32 years.  He's been the Space Shuttle Program Manager, Space Shuttle Program Deputy and Space Shuttle Flight Director.  He was involved in Columbia's mission and was waiting on the ground at the Kennedy Space Center with many other VIPs when the shuttle disintegrated.  He wrote a blog while working at NASA, but has since started his own that is unaffiliated.  His new series, called Ten Years Later, is quite moving and full of personal details concerning this fateful mission and the lessons we all have learned from it.

I highly recommend reading it: http://waynehale.wordpress.com/

It was my dream to work for NASA as a child.  I saw the Challenger explode when I was in second grade.  My teachers had rolled in a TV to show us the live launch because they thought it was going to be amazing.  These moments have stuck with me since then and I'll take a moment tomorrow to remember the seven astronauts who did not come home.