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
This February 06, 2005 post describes the basic elements of the circadian system in mammals.
The principal mammalian circadian pacemaker is located in the suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN) of the hypothalamus. The general area was first discovered in 1948 by Curt Richter who systematically lesioned a…
There have been 19 new articles Monday night and 11 new articles Tuesday night 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, Mendeley,…
If you really read this blog 'for the articles', you know some of my recurrent themes, e.g., that almost every biological function exhibits cycles and that almost every cell in every organism contains a more-or-less functioning clock. Here is a new paper that combines both of those themes very…
I gave a talk about Open Access at the University Library in Belgrade yesterday (listen to the audio here and see some pictures here).
I was just on TV a couple of hours ago, on Studio B - I talk fast so I had time to promote PLoS, Open Access, blogs and tomorrow's lecture at Oncology Center at the…
As you may have noticed, I am quite fascinated with the earliest beginnings of my scientific discipline, which was almost entirely involving research on plants. The most famous story from that early period is the construction of a Flower Clock by Karl Linne, the father of taxonomy.
So, of course I…
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 Katherine Haxton of the…
This post from February 03, 2005 covers the basic concepts and terms on entrainment. This is also the only blog post to date that I am aware of that was cited in a scientific paper.
Let's now continue our series of Clock Tutorials with an introduction to some phenomena (and related terms and…
On the way back from the Mainau island to Lindau island, we were entertained on the ship by a balloon magician. He started out with balloon molecules. Kind of a nifty way to demonstrate why you can write with graphite and not with a diamond.
I am not sure the magician was aware that Dr.Kroto was…
You probably realize by now that my expertise is in clocks and calendars of birds, but blogging audience forces me to occasionally look into human clocks from a medical perspective. Reprinted below the fold are three old Circadiana posts about the connection between circadian clocks and the…
Scientia Pro Publica #7 is up on Greg Laden's blog
Carnival of the Green #187 is up on Plant a Tree USAâ¢
Carnival of the Liberals #94 is up on Submitted To A Candid World
A couple of German bloggers and I went to see the Butterfly House on the Island of Mainau. They had good cameras with lenses that allowed them to take extreme close-ups. I had to do with a little pocket camera, but a few pictures turned out decent enough to show:
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 Miriam Goldstein of the…
I wrote this post back on February 02, 2005 in order to drive home the point that the circadian clock is not a single organ, but an organ system comprised of all cells in the body linked in a hierarchical manner:
In the earliest days of chronobiology, the notion of circadian organization was…
A brief interview with one of the young researchers attending the Lindau Nobel conference - Jennifer Murphy from the University of California, Los Angeles, USA
Once upon a time a man dragged his father from their house and as they reached a tree his father cried Stop! I did not drag my own father past this tree!
- Gertrude Stein
A brief interview with one of the young researchers attending the Lindau Nobel conference - Ghada Al-Kadamany from Jacobs University in Bremen, Germany
As we mentioned just the other day, studying animal behavior is tough as "animals do whatever they darned please". Thus, making sure that everything is controlled for in an experimental setup is of paramount importance. Furthermore, for the studies to be replicable in other labs, it is always a…
A brief interview with one of the young researchers attending the Lindau Nobel conference - Jan Wedekind, formerly of University of Barcelona, Spain, and now with IRIS:
As I was traveling, I only briefly mentioned the brand new and exciting paleontology paper in PLoS ONE - New Mid-Cretaceous (Latest Albian) Dinosaurs from Winton, Queensland, Australia that was published on Thursday. Bex has written an introduction and will post a Media/Blog coverage (of which…
The island of Mainau has been designed, decades ago, as a gigantic garden, natural preserve, and a model of sustainability. Thus, animals roaming the island are exceptionally fearless of humans. For this picture, taken during lunch on the island, all I needed to do was extend my camera-hand, while…
Friday was a special day at the Lindau Nobel conference. The official program was over but, instead of letting us all go home, the organizers did something better - a day trip on a boat to the island of Mainau where, while still under the influence of the proceedings, the participants had a chance…
I wrote this post back on January 23, 2005. It explains how clock biologists think and how they design their experiments:
So, are you ready to do chronobiological research? If so, here are some of the tips - the thought process that goes into starting one's research in chronobiology.
First, you…
