clock | March 10, 2009Karen Ventii, a former SciBling and now a science writer, wonders:
As a medical writer, I've noticed that most medical writers I meet are female. A quick Google search using the keywordsâ "freelance medical writerâ" produced seven female and three male writers (approx. 2:1 ratio) from the first 10 eligible results.1 While it is difficult to draw statistically relevant conclusions from such a small sample size, it certainly implies a trend.
The American Medical Writers Association is the leading professional organization for medical communicators, with over 5,500 members from around the world…
clock | March 10, 2009The next edition of this fantastic carnival will be hosted by Zuska:
The first Diversity in Science carnival, created and hosted by DNLee of Urban Science Adventures as a Black History Month Celebration, was a great success. Thanks to everyone who contributed!
Now it's time for our second round, which will be hosted right here at Thus Spake Zuska. Naturally, since it is March, our focus this time around will be a Women's History Month Celebration! The theme is "Women Achievers in STEM - Past and Present" and we are asking you to profile a woman in some field of science - your own or maybe one…
clock | March 10, 2009I know, I know, I've been traveling so I've been remiss at highlighting the best new articles over the past few days. In the meantime, we published 25 new articles on Friday night, 29 new articles last night, and 30 new articles tonight in PLoS ONE. So, there is a whole lot of them to check out, and as always, I will showcase below some of the stunningly good ones and some I personally am interested in. 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 (…
clock | March 10, 2009Could not resist....
Network Features of the Mammalian Circadian Clock:
The circadian clock is the biological clock found throughout the body that coordinates the timing of molecular and cellular processes on a 24-hour rhythm. It is composed of numerous transcription factors that feed back and control their own expression. To explore how the clock functions in the face of genetic perturbations, we disrupted its function by knocking down gene expression of known clock genes in a dose-dependent fashion. We measured the expression of clock genes following knockdown and constructed perturbation-…
clock | March 9, 2009I wake up every morning determined both to change the world and have one hell of a good time. Sometimes this makes planning the day a little difficult.
- Elwyn Brooks White
clock | March 8, 2009Radio is a medium of entertainment which permits millions of people to listen to the same joke at the same time, and yet remain lonesome.
- T. S. Eliot
clock | March 8, 2009Daytime Sleepiness Provides Red Flag For Cardiovascular Disease:
Clinicians should be alert to patients reporting "excessive" day time sleepiness (EDS), says the European Society of Cardiology, after a French study found healthy elderly people who regularly report feeling sleepy during the day have a significantly higher risk of dying from cardiovascular disease.
Virtual And Real Worlds: Two Worlds Of Kids' Morals:
Children's moral behavior and attitudes in the real world largely carry over to the virtual world of computers, the Internet, video games and cell phones. Interestingly, there are…
clock | March 7, 2009The individual woman is required ... a thousand times a day to choose either to accept her appointed role and thereby rescue her good disposition out of the wreckage of her self- respect, or else follow an independent line of behavior and rescue her self-respect out of the wreckage of her good disposition.
- Jeannette Rankin
clock | March 7, 2009You may remember when I wrote this recently (check out the useful links within):
The Conyers bill (a.k.a. Fair Copyright in Research Works Act, HR 801), is back. Despite all the debunking it got last time around, and despite the country having more important problems to deal with right now, this regressive bill, completely unchanged word-for-word, is apparently back again. It is the attempt by TA publishers, through lies and distortions, to overturn the NIH open access policy. Here are some reactions - perhaps Rep.Conyers and colleagues should get an earful from us....
Then, Lawrence Lessig…
clock | March 7, 2009The Lulu.com page has already been viewed 1160 times, 30 blogs linked to it so far (see the bottom of the announcement post for the list), a very nice number of books (not tellin', sorry) has already been sold, and review copies are on their way to American Scientist, The New Scientist and Seed (I am also expecting a call from Nature as they reviewed the previous two anthologies as well).
The book was the homepage Buzz on Scienceblogs.com the other day - see this for photographic evidence. And the Discover Magazine highlighted it in their March issue - see this.
The guest editor for 2009 will…
clock | March 7, 2009Yup, it's tonight.
If you were around here a few months ago, the day after the Fall Back day, you probably read this post.
Disregarding the debate over rhetoric of science, that is probably my best, most detailed explanation for what happens to our bodies on those too strange days of the year - Spring Forward and Fall Back day.
Spring Forward is much more dangerous, so be very careful in the mornings next week, especially on Monday. Take it easy, get up slowly, be a little late for work if you can afford it. Life and health are more important than a few minutes of work and being punctual on…
clock | March 7, 2009And now I have to travel from this:
to this:
I'll go to the airport in a t-shirt, get dressed on the airplane, and disembark in full Arctic gear! Then reverse the process on the way back.
clock | March 7, 2009Carnival of the Arid #2, the blog carnival about deserts, is up on Coyote Crossing.
Related to lack of water is, well, lack of water and how it affects people, leads to wars over water, etc. So for the World Water Day on March 22, the blogosphere will write about transboundary water. Send your entries to Daniel for this one-off carnival (or is this more properly called Synchroblogging?).
clock | March 7, 2009From SCONC:
Tuesday, March 24
6:30-8:30 pm
Science Cafe, Raleigh: Gene-Environment Interactions
EPA statistician and geneticist David Reif discusses the interplay between our genes and the environment. What does our shared evolutionary history have to do with common, complex diseases? How might genetics shape differential susceptibility to the multitude of chemicals--both manufactured and natural--present in the environment? How do modern lifestyles impact the evolutionary process? Tir Na Nog, 218 South Blount Street, Raleigh, NC, 919.833.7795
RSVP to katey.ahmann@ncmail.net
clock | March 7, 2009The latest Change of Shift is up on The Nurse Practitioner's Place
The Teaching Carnival is back after a long hiatus. The Teaching Carnival 3.2 is up on Planned Obsolescence
And start writing and submitting your posts for the next Praxis, on March 15th 2009, at The Lay Scientist, and for The Giant's Shoulders on March 16th at The Evilutionary Biologist.
clock | March 7, 2009How Moths Key Into Scent Of A Flower:
Moths need just the essence of a flower's scent to identify it, according to new research from The University of Arizona in Tucson. Although a flower's odor can be composed of hundreds of chemicals, a moth uses just a handful to recognize the flower.
Naked Mole Rats May Hold Clues To Successful Aging:
Naked mole rats resemble pink, wrinkly, saber-toothed sausages and would never win a beauty contest, even among other rodents. But these natives of East Africa are the champs for longevity among rodents, living nine times longer than similar-sized mice. Not…
clock | March 6, 2009There is a remedy for all things but death, which will be sure to lay us out flat some time or other.
- Miguel de Cervantes
clock | March 6, 2009Liz Allen writes today:
One snowy weekend in January 2008, I was lucky enough to attend the Science Blogging Conference (co-organized by Bora Zivkovic our Online Discussion Expert) in NC where I networked with the great and the good of the scientific communication world. PLoS distributed free T-shirts at the event and, not surprisingly, I was warmly greeted wherever I went.
In one session, I listened to a young health care worker based in a remote location expressing her frustration about how difficult it was for her to access any content because of her unreliable internet connection and I…
clock | March 6, 2009Those of you who have been following the science blogosphere for a while may remember that excellent old blog Down to Earth which, sadly, went dormant back in 2006.
I am happy to announce that Daniel Collins has now started a new blog, focused on water, hydrology and other All Things Wet, at Cr!key Creek (with the cool sub-heading: "Water cycle meet Media cycle"). One to check out and bookmark!