My scientific specialty is chronobiology (circadian rhythms and photoperiodism), with additional interests in comparative physiology, animal behavior and evolution. I am not an MD so I cannot diagnose and treat your sleep problems. As well as writing this blog, I am also the Online Discussion Expert for PLoS. This is a personal blog and opinions within it in no way reflect the policies of PLoS. You can contact me at: Coturnix@gmail.com
There are 10 new articles published Friday night and 8 new articles published tonight in PLoS ONE. As always, you should rate the articles, post notes and comments and send trackbacks when you blog about the papers. You can now also easily place articles on various social services (CiteULike,…
We have recently covered interesting reproductive adaptations in mammals, birds, insects, flatworms, plants and protists. For the time being (until I lose inspiration) I'll try to leave cephalopod sex to the experts and the pretty flower sex to the chimp crew.
In the meantime, I want to cover…
The fourth post in the series on entrainment, originally written on April 10, 2005, explains the step-by-step method of constructing a PRC.
After months of applying light pulses to your animals you are ready to analyze and plot your data. You will print out the actographs (see how in the post "On…
Hypotheses leading to more hypotheses (from March 19, 2006 - the Malaria Day):
I have written a little bit about malaria before, e.g, here and here, but this is my special Malaria Action Day post, inspired by a paper [1] that Tara sent me some weeks ago and I never got to write about it till now…
The third post in the series on entrainment, first written on April 10, 2005, starts slowly to get into the meat of things...As always, clicking on the spider-clock icon will take you to the site of the original post.
In the previous post, I introduced the concept of entrainment of circadian…
One of the things which danger does to you after a time is, well, to kill emotion. I don't think I shall ever feel anything again except fear. None of us can hate anymore - or love.
- Graham Greene
This post is perhaps not my best post, but is, by far, my most popular ever. Sick and tired of politics after the 2004 election I decided to start a science-only blog - Circadiana. After a couple of days of fiddling with the templae, on January 8, 2005, I posted the very first post, this one, at…
This is the second in a series of posts on the analysis of entrainment, originally written on April 10, 2005.
The natural, endogenous period of circadian rhythms, as measured in constant conditions, is almost never exactly 24 hours. In the real world, however, the light-dark cycle provided by the…
I am now going to make you a gift that will stay with you the rest of your life. For the rest of your life, every time you say we've always done it that way, my ghost will appear and haunt you for twenty-four hours.
- Grace Murray Hopper
A January 20, 2006 post placing a cool physiological/behavioral study into an evolutionary context.
There are two main hypotheses - not mutually exclusive - for the adaptive value of having a circadian clock. One is the Internal Synchronization hypothesis, stating that the circadian clock serves…
There are 19 new articles published last night and 22 new articles published today in PLoS ONE. As always, you should rate the articles, post notes and comments and send trackbacks when you blog about the papers. You can now also easily place articles on various social services (CiteULike,…
From Quail Ridge Books
Quail Ridge Books & Music
hosts author
Sheril Kirshenbaum
for a discussion of her book
UNSCIENTIFIC AMERICA: HOW SCIENTIFIC ILLITERACY THREATENS OUR FUTURE
Thursday, July 23 at 7:30 pm
Climate change, the energy crisis, nuclear proliferation -- many of the most urgent…
The series of interviews with some of the participants of the 2008 Science Blogging Conference was quite popular, so I decided to do the same thing again this year, posting interviews with some of the people who attended ScienceOnline'09 back in January.
Today, I asked Bob O'Hara of the Deep…
As you know, I gave two lectures here in Belgrade. The first one, at the University Library on Monday, and the second one at the Oncology Institute of the School of Medicine at the University of Belgrade. As the two audiences were different (mainly librarians/infoscientists at the first, mainly…
As the Universiade is happening in Belgrade right now, the city is full of young people from around the world and there is a lot of cool stuff in town, including a variety of clay figurines emerging out of asphalt:
Going into more and more detail, here is a February 11, 2005 post about the current knowledge about the circadian organization in my favourite animal - the Japanese quail.
Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica), also known as the Asian Migratory Quail, are gallinaceous birds from the family…
Better to strive and climb, And never reach your goal, Than to drift along with time - An aimless, worthless soul, Aye better to climb and fall Or sow, though the yield be small, Than to throw away day after day And never strive at all.
- Grace B. Hinkey
This is an appropriate time of year for this post (February 05, 2006)...
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So, why do I say that it is not surprising the exposure to bright light alleviates both seasonal depression and other kinds of depression, and that different mechanisms may…
The series of interviews with some of the participants of the 2008 Science Blogging Conference was quite popular, so I decided to do the same thing again this year, posting interviews with some of the people who attended ScienceOnline'09 back in January.
Today, I asked Stacy Baker, everyone's…
This post was originally written on February 11, 2005. Moving from relatively simple mammalian model to more complex systems.
I have previously described the basic properties of the circadian organization in mammals. Non-mammalian vertebrates (fish, amphibians, reptiles and birds) have more…
When teaching human or animal physiology, it is very easy to come up with examples of ubiqutous negative feedback loops. On the other hand, there are very few physiological processes that can serve as examples of positive feedback. These include opening of the ion channels during the action…
The series of interviews with some of the participants of the 2008 Science Blogging Conference was quite popular, so I decided to do the same thing again this year, posting interviews with some of the people who attended ScienceOnline'09 back in January.
Today, I asked Stephanie Zvan of the Almost…
I asked last year. And several other SciBlings also asked last year.
And now the fashion is starting again, I see. It started with Ed, and was picked up by DM and Sci. So, let me ask again:
Identify yourself in the comments. Even if you've never commented before, speak up. Who are you? Do you have…
