Pondering Pikaia

Just in time for bikini season...

2009-04-26T11:30:00.000-05:00

Statistics are like bikinis. What they reveal is suggestive, but what they
conceal is vital.

- Aaron Levenstein

GRF!!!

2009-04-10T08:35:00.002-05:00

The NSF has finally ended the suspense....I got the fellowship!!!! Woo hoo!!!!

Ok, now I will take my immature celebratory whooping offline....but yay!!!

"Scheduled Maintenance"

2009-04-05T10:46:00.002-05:00

So, the NSF's GRFP page has a notice that the site will be "unavailable Sunday, April 5 from 5:00PM ET until 12:00AM ET on Monday, April 6 for scheduled maintenance."

Maybe this could this be an indicator that they're uploading the awardee information. Or am I just being hypervigilant? Last year the winners of the grant were posted on the 1st, so I have been in a state of constant anxiety waiting for the announcement this year. I should have taken it for granted (no pun intended, I promise) that the year I apply will be the one in which everything is delayed . . . but maybe the maintenance message is a cryptic light at the end of the tunnel? We shall see tomorrow. . .

Chrysocyon Baby Pictures

2009-03-31T18:54:00.009-05:00

I am putting together the PowerPoint version of my honors thesis to present at our undergrad research forum next week, and so am scrounging Google images for maned wolf pictures. They have miserable reproductive success in captivity (details in the thesis!), so there aren't too many pictures of pups, but this one absolutely melted my heart and I have to share:

Poor kid looks like he already knows his species is on the brink. And look at that little tail! Bless his heart . . .but I think the next one wins the prize . . . who knew your offspring's ears make good toothbrushes?

And some human raised pups:

And one last one, now we know how their legs get so long, baby yoga:

(Image 1 credit, Image 2 credit, Image 3 credit, Image 4 credit)

GRF Season

2009-03-28T18:30:00.002-05:00

The graduate school search has been inching along over the past few months. I applied to about five schools, visited three, and am now down to deciding between my top two choices. As with everything else in the country these days, finances and funding issues are unfairly large factors as well. I applied for the NSF's Graduate Research Fellowship grant back in November, and after months and months of patient waiting, notification season is upon us. Awardees are supposed to be receiving their letters over the next week or so.

I have been putting the little red flag up on my mailbox every day, even though I have no outgoing mail, just so I can tell at a glance when the mail has been delivered. But even when I see the mail has been delivered, I wait all afternoon and make myself complete the day's list of work and writing goals before actually checking it, just in case the letter has come, because I know that once I recieve the news, for better or for worse, I'll be too worked up to accomplish anything for the rest of the day.

At this point I'm not even really having anxiety over the fellowship itself, the main concern is that this award pretty much determines which school I'll be attending in the fall. I would like to know, already! But I am stuck in neutral as far as decision-making until I get word on the GRF.

So, that is the current status on my quest to become a graduate student. I have found a really great job for the summer, but am holding off on blogging about it until it is 100% certain, still waiting for all the paperwork to go through.

Pondering Pikaia has been neglected recently, I intend to be a better updater in the near future. In case you missed the announcement earlier this year, science news and research blogging has moved to Endless Forms over at the Nature Network, and PP is going to be more of a chronicle of my (hopefully) continuing progress through the world of academia.

Meanwhile, is anyone else awaiting notification about the GRF? Any stories about the experience from people who have applied in the past?

Darwin Tweets?

2009-02-09T19:11:00.005-06:00

So, yesterday Bora and I had fun joking about what Charles Darwin would have been like on Twitter. We came up with some hypothetical yet reasonable ideas:

Me: @arwallace Damn!
and
Bora: @rowen next time I'll block you!

Today I thought of a couple more:
@agassiz i can has barnacles?
@huxley down, boy
@drgully i'd like to see you try the wet wrap for a change!*

So, in honor of Darwin Day on Thursday, I thought it would be fun to solicit more ideas, make up your own Darwin tweets and post them in the comments! Remember Tweets must be 140 characters or less.

(Note: Someone has actually created Twitter accounts for both Darwin and Wallace, but they haven't been too active as of yet, and I trust the creativity/absurdity of Pondering Pikaia readers to get the creative juices flowing!). EDIT: it has come to my attention that there are two accounts for Darwin, the one I originally found was charles_darwin, but cdarwin is a good one, active and informative too!

*Dr. Gully was the physician at Malvern, a medical resort where Darwin frequently sought treatment for his various infirmities and ailments. The treatments were decidedly unconventional, involving exposure to cold showers, being wrapped in cold wet sheets, etc etc.

ScienceOnline09 Conference Update

2009-01-17T21:29:00.006-06:00

I thought that last year's ScienceOnline conference was great, but this year has had even more sessions, more people, and more fascinating topics. (I got a huge kick out of Henry Gee's summary in poetry form). I missed the evening banquet tonight because of a slight emergency back home that I needed to handle, but the day was jam-packed with tons of blog goodness. I haven't been liveblogging, but I do have a review of the talks I attended today:

First up: Blog-To-Book, moderated by Dave Munger and Tom Levenson. Dave and Tom told us about the role that blogging has played in their experiences with writing print books, and we discussed various issues involved in writing for books vs blogs. Some of the items mentioned were adjusting for a different audience, changing the structure from reporting to truly telling a structured story, and some discussion of why some bloggers want to try writing books. Is it because we feel our writing isn't truly legitimized by blogging, is it for fame and fortune, was it the writing goal even pre-blog? Does blogging help a writer to narrow down their interests for the book, or is it a diversion of time and effort? Someone (can't remember who, sorry!) drew the analogy that a blog entry is to a book what a YouTube video is to a feature film. Overall a very interesting discussion.

Next: Transitions: Changing Your Online Persona as Your Real Life Changes, moderated by ScienceWoman and PropterDoc. I was very interested in this one, as I am approaching graduate school and contemplating how the transition between schools, advisors, and projects will affect my blogging. There was lots of good discussion about pros and cons to being anonymous, how to maintain an online presence without detriment to family/career, and other related topics. Some issues of the difference between the experience of men vs women were given a lot of time, as were the generational overhaul that seems to be slowly coming around, as newer professors can seem to be more comfortable with the idea of blogging than older advisors.

My last session of the morning was Teaching College Science: Blogs and Beyond, moderated by Andrea Novicki and Brian Switek. I am currently a UTA for freshman Honors Organismal Biology, and hope to attain a faculty position some day, so I made sure to attend this one. There were many ideas presented on the advantages and challenges to using blogs in college classrooms. They can be great ways to engage reluctant learners or students who are more comfortable expressing themselves in writing than speaking up in class. Also, it's a great way to present supplemental material and encourage students to delve into the subject matter further in a less regimented, more exploratory way. It could become unwieldy for large classes, though, and there are also privacy issues. Overall, however, the ideas for innovative strategies and beneficial results were very encouraging.

After lunch came the session in which I was a panelist: Blogging Adventure: How to Post from Strange Locations. The other panelists were Kevin Zelnio, Rick MacPherson, Meredith Barrett, Talia Page, Karen James, and Vanessa Woods. We started off with an interactive simulation of blogging in the field, complete with flashing lights, pinching bugs, and pen-stealing anglerfish. If the whole blogging thing falls through, we should set up an amusement park. Then we all shared our stories of blogging from the field, and talked about technical challenges, time constraints, and other obstacles to updating from remote areas. We also talked about why blogging from the field is important: it helps to maintain a connection to the outside world and update family and friends, gets people interested in science, and provides a social context for scientific research. I currently have a proposal under review for my master's thesis, but if it comes through I will have a brand new adventure blogging opportunity in the coming year...stay tuned!

Finally, I attended How to Become a Paid Science Journalist: Advice for Bloggers, moderated by Tom Levenson and Rebecca Skloot. This included lots of great advice on how to pitch ideas to magazines, the importance of remaining aware that editors will judge your writing from any and all of your blog posts, etc.

So, that was my day! Keep in mind that there are four concurrent session in each time slot at this conference, so there is much more going on than one person can relate! Keep an eye on Bora's blog aggregations of the conference updates of writers from all across the science blogosphere.

I have had a great time, but tomorrow I am fleeing these arctic temperatures and heading back to Alabama. I've had a great time meeting and trading ideas with so many people this weekend, and I'm already looking forward to the 2010 conference!

In Which I Venture North for Blog Fun

2009-01-16T17:16:00.001-06:00

This morning I rode the arctic blast northwards, and I am here in Raleigh. I took a look around NC State earlier today (I am currently on the hunt for grad schools), but my main purpose for being here is the ScienceOnline 2009 blog conference! I had a fantastic time last year, and am looking forward to even more interesting sessions and people this time around. I will be on the panel for the Blogging Adventure: How to Post from Strange Locations session tomorrow (Saturday) at 4:30, where we will discuss issues involved in blogging from remote locations while doing field research. If anyone else on NN (or any other science blog network!) is in town for the conference, keep an eye out for me!

(Cross-posted to EF)

Barking Cats are Sexy

2009-01-11T12:33:00.004-06:00

[EDIT]
I finally resolved my formatting issues over at Endless Forms, so this post has been moved over there, where I had originally intended to publish it. Click here to check it out!

Formatting Problems

2009-01-11T12:28:00.004-06:00

For anyone who has been monitoring Endless Forms, I apologize for the lack of activity. I have a drafts of posts queued up, but for some reason I can't get any of my hyperlinks in the text to work. The publishing server at Nature Network has a different formatting style than Blogger, which I've been following exactly, to no avail. I put links the first two posts, and they worked just fine, who knows. I think it may be an issue of having links with too many symbols, etc in the address. I'm seeking help for the problem, and until I figure it out I'll just put posts on here, then move them over to EF when I un-bug it.

Small comfort?

2009-01-08T15:09:00.002-06:00

A quote I am trying to keep in mind, as I approach a milestone in my career and my life spirals into an endless succession of application after application:

"Successful scientists are generally recognised at a young age. They go to the best schools on scholarships, recieve their postdoctoral training fellowships at prestigious laboratories, and publish early. None of that happened to me."
~Julius Axelrod (winner of a Nobel Prize in 1970 for his work on nerve cell communication)

(Note: This is NOT implying that I am unhappy with any schools or programs that I have attended/applied to so far, I definitely don't feel like I've had to "settle" for anything inferior, but the statement still gives hope that even if I do mess something up, all may not be lost in the end...)

Spring Semester

2009-01-06T23:17:00.002-06:00

I was convinced that spring classes were staring this Thursday, but around 9:00 tonight I discovered they actually start tomorrow morning. Oops! And senioritis begins . . . ;) I have been in phone/e-mail/face to face contact with tons of people this week, both faculty and students, I guess the starting date is just considered common knowledge so it was never brought up, still not sure how I managed to misinform myself. I had planned to get a lot of stuff done on my last 'free' day tomorrow, including some major housekeeping efforts, errands, and writing fresh material for Endless Forms. Now I have classes all morning and will have to shift Charlie's morning vet appointment to the afternoon. Hopefully I will be able to squeeze in at least some of my previously planned tasks, though.

I can't complain about the semester too much, because it is my last one here at Auburn. Time flies! I moved around so much when I was a kid, Auburn is the first place I have ever really become so attached to that I truly feel homesick for it when I am away. You can't beat the weather, either, it is the first week of January and we were somewhere around 75 degrees today. No matter where I go to graduate school, it will be farther north than here, I will miss Alabama "winters." ;)

Now time to put the blog away, since it is apparently a school night.

Big Changes for 2009

2009-01-04T22:37:00.002-06:00

Things have been awfully quiet around here for the past few months. I was gone most of the summer, and had an unbelievably intense fall semester. I was forced to put blogging on the back-burner for a while, and have had tons of guilt over the fact that the past few months have had little more than occasional check-in posts with promises for more activity in the ill-defined future. BUT I did indeed survive the semester, and I am just now catching up on all my sleep, (three weeks into the holiday break!). So, back into blogging, full steam ahead!

In several of my most recent posts I have hinted that I had a big announcement coming up, and I thought that revealing the news would be a good way to start off 2009: I will be moving my science news/research reporting to a new blog over on the Nature Network, Endless Forms. You can read the inaugural post here, let me know what you think!

I am not abandoning Pondering Pikaia, though! Like I mentioned in my NN post, I plan to keep this blog going for commentary on grad school, research, and other issues relating to life as a developing scientist. The more subjective stuff will be here, the more objective reporting will be over at Endless Forms.

So, things will be different around here in 2009 (and beyond), I'm pretty excited, I hope my PP readers will come over to visit me at Endless Forms*!

*I am still iffy on the new name, ...read the first post on that blog for it to be explained, does anyone especially hate/love it, or have suggestions for a better one?

There Were Legs and Antennae Everywhere...

2008-12-08T23:21:00.009-06:00

So, for any aspiring entomologists, here is some sage advice, from the "I Learned It the Hard Way" files:

No matter how much your dog thinks he is "helping" with your insect collection, when you combine 80 pounds of canine klutz with a box full of fragile, meticulously arranged and labeled invertebrates, catastrophe will inevitably ensue.

Especially try to avoid allowing said catastrophe to happen under these conditions:

The collection is worth 100 out of 150 points for your final lab grade.
The collection is due within 48 hours.
It is too cold and late in the season to find new bugs to replace the smashed ones.

There were legs and antennae everywhere . . . it is incredibly disheartening to have to literally suck up your grade with a vacuum cleaner. . .

The situation can be helped if you happen to have sufficiently nerdy friends, who may have random insect specimens sitting around their apartments. I never thought the words "I know I have a Pentatomid around here somewhere..." could ever be so beautiful.

Take home message: German shepherds are wonderful at many things, but entomology ain't one of them.

Can you tell he knows he's in trouble?

Last Minute Lunacy

2008-11-30T11:51:00.003-06:00

Is it January yet?

Coming up for air...

2008-11-16T18:08:00.004-06:00

So, this semester has stretched me beyond imagination, but the load is slowly but steadily lifting, and it appears that there is a light at the end of the tunnel! I have had a minimum of two exams every. single. week. since the beginning of September, with a paper or presentation due nearly every week as well, and at least two or three events for various organizations. Oh yeah, there is also my honors thesis, and then the whole applying for grad school thing....I just submitted one mega-application for funding, and I have a few more in the works. There is still a lot to be done, but I'm finally able to come up for air at least once in a while!

I truly cannot complain, though, because I really feel strongly about all of the things I am involved with (especially our chapter of the Society for Conservation Biology), and my classes (mammalogy, herpetology, entomology, plant-animal interactions, and a directed readings course in anthropology) are all a blast. I have just TWO assignments left, one short reading critique and a 20 page paper. Finals will be the least stressful time of this semester, actually, because by that time all of my assignments, presentations, etc will be behind me.

I have learned a lot of things in my classes this fall, but the most important thing I have taken away is renewed confidence in my career plans. I have been teaching a freshman class this semester, and I truly love it. I like sharing information on things that I am passionate about, and I like getting people engaged with new ideas and activities. Nothing makes me happier than seeing the wheels turning in a student's head as they pick up and process new information. I know that teaching freshmen is often seen as a chore, but I really like working with the "newbies." I have been a peer mentor for incoming freshmen through the Honors College for three years, and I never get tired of seeing people develop through their first year, it's amazing. They come in a little anxious, a little unsure of where they fit in, but very motivated to get involved and engaged in things. It is incredibly rewarding to get to act as a mentor to people as they start to search for their niche in the big wide world. My plan all along has been to pursue a faculty position, to combine research with teaching, and my experiences this semester have definitely helped me to assure myself that this is something I will be happy doing.

Next semester I'll get even more experience with teaching. (Plus, I will actually be getting paid for it in the spring!). This fall I am co-teaching a conservation biology-themed "success strategies" class with a professor, and a lot of what I do is mentoring and getting people involved in different organizations and events, lots of facilitating, etc. I have gotten to do things like designing assignments, finding readings, writing tests, etc, but there isn't much lecturing in the class, the curriculum is more based on projects and guest speakers. Next semester, though, I will be a teaching assistant for the freshman Organismal Biology course, I cannot wait! This will give me the chance to do more actual teaching, while still doing the mentoring stuff. And I'll be doing three sections instead of one, which will be great, because I really, really love working with people, I am endlessly fascinated by seeing how different individuals learn and process information in a million different ways. Maybe that's why I seem to have fallen in love with teaching, it's like a constant game trying to figure out how to explain information so that person X, Y, or Z "gets" it.

So, I know things have been slow around Pondering Pikaia lately, I have never before had a schedule that was so incredibly heavy. I had to move my alarm clock from my bedroom to my computer room, because it has become the routine for me to just work until I fall asleep on my desk. I have been itching to blog about several things, and I have a HUGE announcement to make soon, so I appreciate you bearing with me for this last home stretch of the semester. . .

Election 2008...

2008-11-04T22:30:00.000-06:00

HOORAY!

Social Clocks: How do cave bats know when it is dark outside?

2008-10-20T22:58:00.003-05:00

Earlier this year, Bora graciously allowed me to guest post on his blog. The post has now been nominated for the 2008 Open Lab science blogging anthology, so here it is for any Pondering Pikaia readers that missed it over at A Blog Around the Clock back in April:

Casinos on the infamous Vegas "strip" spare no expenses when it comes to extravagant decorations and architecture. You can find everything from indoor gondola rides to full-sized pirate ships that are sunk in mock-battles multiple times each day. One thing that you might notice, however, is that these massive, opulent buildings almost always lack windows in the rooms where major gambling activity takes place. The massive interior rooms echo with the bells of slot machines and the soft buzz of cards being dealt at hundreds of tables all throughout the day and night, and after several hours inside one of these caverns of opulence it is easy to forget what time of day it is supposed to be. That, of course, is the point: if you aren't able to keep track of the passing hours by subtle cues such as the angle of the sun, casino managers hope that it will keep you (and your money) around for longer periods of time.

Fortunately, whether you are a high-rolling VIP showing off your Rolex or a more budget-minded tourist playing the quarter slots with your trusty plastic Aquatech strapped to your wrist, chances are you have some way to tell time even when you are sequestered from typical environmental day length clues. Other mammals, however, don't have the luxury of mechanical time instruments. If even a few hours inside a windowless casino is enough to distort our natural perception of time, how do other mammals manage to keep regular daily rhythms?

Obviously, most mammals do not hang out in windowless casinos, and thus are able maintain circadian rhythms using external cues such as day length and temperature. Bora recently gave an excellent primer on mammalian circadian clocks, definitely check out that post for detailed information on how these rhythms are regulated.

Light cycles are crucial for proper circadian clock calibration, but some animals live in large, isolated places that lack both sunlight and slot machines. The most notable cave mammals are bats, the winged wonders of the mammal world. The idea that all bats are caves-dwellers is actually a misconception. Many bat species roost in trees, buildings, or "bat houses" put out by helpful humans in areas where natural forest roots have been destroyed. Studies have shown that day length is the most common factor regulating bats' daily activity cycles. Foraging strategies and diet specialization seem to have an impact on what time of night specific species emerge from their roosts. Insectivorous species often begin foraging a bit before true sunset, in spite of exposing themselves to increased predation risk, in order to take advantage of the peaks in insect activity at dusk (Jones and Rydell 1994). Fruit eating bats can afford to sleep in a little, because their "prey" isn't likely to go anywhere between dusk and full darkness, so it's not worth risking increased predation by diurnal or crepuscular predators. Thus, being able to detect the rising and setting of the sun is crucial for these bats to regulate their activity cycles.

While many common species of bats never even venture into caves, some species do indeed roost in large caves that are entirely devoid of light. Without being able to see when the sun rises and sets, how do these little guys maintain regular circadian rhythms?

The most extensive studies of the circadian rhythms of cave bats have focused on Hipposideros speoris, Schneider's roundleaf bat, which is native to India and Sri Lanka. Back in the 1980s, a group from Madurai Kamaraj University did some fascinating work to determine how these bats are able to tell when it is time to leave the cave for foraging each night (Marimuthu et al. 1981). Within the cave roost, bats are isolated from both light and temperature fluctuations, so the researchers sought another explanation for how they calibrate their circadian clocks. They did this by capturing some of the bats within a large colony of H. speoris, then putting them in holding cages inside the original cave, to observe their activity patterns in situ without ever letting them access a chamber of the cave that could give them external light or noise cues.

So, what did the Cave Cage experiment tell us? Surprisingly, it appears that social interactions are the key. The bats were observed to become mildly active within the cave well before the sun went down, and they spent some time grooming and flitting around within the roost chamber. Some of those bats ventured in between the roost chamber and into an outer portion of the cave, "sampling" the light. Once adequate darkness set in, all of the bats (not just the "samplers," left the cave to forage. The caged bats also increased their activity in sync with the rest of the colony, even though they were unable to "sample" the outer chambers. The researchers concluded that the bats' circadian rhythms were entrained by social cues. Bats could have been responding to the noise of the wingbeats of the first bats to leave the cage, or there could have been active vocal signaling. Pheromones could also come into play, if specific hormones are released by "samplers" as they prepare to leave for foraging, signaling the rest of the colony that it is time to leave.

One question that immediately crossed my mind was how the bats know when to start stirring around in the first place, It seems probable that the nightly emergence "sets" their clocks so that they're properly entrained to wake up slightly before sunset, using hormones such as melatonin to control the length of their sleep cycle. These are largely tropical bats, so day length does not vary much throughout the year, allowing them to have a fairly constant interval of sleep in between returning from foraging in the morning and waking up in the evening.

The group also observed activity patterns of captive bats kept inside a cave after exterminating all of the other bats that roosted there (not the most conscientious field method, but not quite as terrible as it sounds: it was a small bachelor roost and only two bats were killed). They found that bats that were isolated from conspecifics displayed "free run" activity cycles that were significantly less than 24 hours long. Thus, it appears that the bats use social cues from other colony members to time their outflight.

There is no information on whether the same individuals are "samplers" each night, although that would be a fascinating study. While social cues do appear to play a large factor in determining the circadian rhythms of H.speoris colonies, sunlight is still a factor: the "samplers" couldn't determine the time of day without sunlight available for sampling. The researchers did a follow-up study a few years later that shows that both light and conspecific communication are necessary to maintain accurate cycles. This time, they illuminated a cave around the clock (Marimuthu and Chandrashekaran 1983). Being exposed to constant light, with conspecifics resulted in free run cycles longer than 24 hours, as opposed to the shortened cycles displayed by isolated bats in constant darkness, showing that light cues facilitated by social communication appear to entrain the circadian clocks of these bats.

So, it appears that some bats depend upon social cues to help regulate their circadian clocks, with a few individuals in the colony serving as light "samplers" and alerting the other bats when it is time to emerge for nightly foraging. They still depend upon light cues for regulation, but the significant factor is that only a few actually see the light levels before emerging each evening, the rest rely upon social cues to tell them when it's dinner time and entrain their internal clocks.

(Image credit)

References:

Jones, and Rydell. 1994. Foraging strategy and predation risk as factors influencing emergence time in echolocating bats. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B. 345: 445-455.

Marimuthu, G.S. and M.K. Chandrashekaran. 1983. Continuous light inside a cave abolishes the social synchronization of the circadian rhythm in a bat. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology. 12: 321-323.

Marimuthu, G., S. Rajan, and M.K. Chandrashekaran. 1981. Social entrainment of the circadian rhythm in the flight activity o fthe microchiropteran bat Hipposideros speoris. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, 8: 147-150.

What the Economy Means for the Environment

2008-10-12T10:47:00.003-05:00

It has been a rough couple of weeks for the economy, as America's credit crisis has set off into a stomach-turning domino effect rippling over the globe. This is a time to be concerned about politics, legislation, regulation, etc. There is little question that this event will--to an as yet undetermined degree--reshape our economy, both in how it is run from the top and in how we participate in it from the ground up.

We are entirely justified in being concerned and focusing our attention on this right now, but it is important not to lose awareness of other important issues. We might only be able to focus on one crisis at a time, but it doesn't mean that they still don't exist in tandem. Definitely check out this article from CNN, discussing whether the current market crisis will have a detrimental impact on movements toward greening our lifestyles and, yes, the economy. It's hard to justify concern about carbon emissions to a person who is facing losing their job and home, surely they have more important things to worry about than hugging trees, right? Gas prices are nosediving, so is it really worth the effort to establish infrastructure for alternative energy sources?

People can quickly lose sight of the fact that our food production, critical natural resources such as water and fuel, and many other necessities are tied up in responsible environmental policies, and we would be very, very mistaken if we let these things slip through the cracks. This isn't "tree-hugging," it isn't discrediting the needs of people over nature, it is just common sense. Unfortunately, when people are in panic mode (or, often, even when they're not), common sense is regrettably scarce and uncommon.

Snip from the article:
First, tie environmental rescue to economic recovery, by "greening the bailout," as columnist Tom Friedman of the New York Times has put it. As the new Administration — whether Democratic or Republican — searches for ways to stimulate the economy, green infrastructure spending could be the way to go. More money for high-speed rail, tax credits for new solar systems, increased federal funding for renewable energy — these are policies that might not only help stimulate a flagging economy, but directly contribute to slowing the growth in America's carbon emissions. (Not to mention promoting green jobs at a time when unemployment is on the rise.) The challenge will be tactical: convincing Americans that curbing climate change is as much about overhauling a failed economy as it is about limiting carbon emissions. That message didn't get across during the debates over Lieberman-Warner; the next President and Congress will need to do better. "Addressing greenhouse gases and addressing the economy are all part of the same problem," says Barbour. "This is absolutely a top priority. It can't be postponed forever."

Read the whole thing.

Where the Heck Have I Been?

2008-10-01T18:09:00.010-05:00

As you might have noticed, there has been a drastic decline (ok, almost a halt) to activity on Pondering Pikaia over the past few weeks. I can guarantee you this is not due to a loss of interest on my part, or to lack of material, it all comes down to simply not having anywhere near enough hours in the day. I have started my senior year here at Auburn, and have an unbelievable amount of stuff on my plate this fall. I miss sleep! Sadly, I've had to do major prioritizing (sometimes it feels more like triage), and I can't let myself lag in studying or other activities, so the blog has had to slow down. I am not gone, though! I am taking awesome classes this semester and am learning many cool things that I want to share, time is the main constraint.

So, what kind of stuff could possibly keep me away from my precious blog? Off the top of my head: co-teaching a freshman conservation biology class, working as a tutor through the Academic Services department, acting as president of Auburn's chapter of the Society for Conservation Biology, education coordinator for another organization and general member of two more, being a student recruiter for the honors college . . . oh yeah, and then there's that whole part about taking classes, sort of why I'm here in the first place. This semester I am taking Mammalogy, Herpetology, Entomology, Plant-Animal Interactions, and Issues in Ecotourism. Plus I am applying to grad schools, trying to organize my C.V., writing grants to get money so someone will actually take me on as a grad student, etc etc...it looks like that whole process is going to involve flurries of activity and meeting deadlines followed by the most excruciating waiting periods I have ever dealt with in my life! I know it's just part of the process, but it doesn't make it any less stressful when it's your future on the line...I'm also plugging away on my honors thesis the scope of which has increased greatly due to a fortunate series of events over the past couple of months.

One side-rant regarding classloads: science majors are extremely cheated on hours. I'm class/lab 30 hours a week, but I'm only earning 18 credits because they don't give full hours for lab time. It's a good thing I love what I do! Also, it beats paying tuition on all those hours.

So, things are just a tad crazy right now. But I do have some cool topics lined up as soon as I have some spare time! Also, Ken Miller, the author of Finding Darwin's God and one of the key witnesses at the Dover trial, came to give a seminar last month and I got a chance to attend a small breakfast with him the next day, that was interesting and I still want to share my impressions. Next week Richard Leakey is coming, and I get to attend a similar Q&A breakfast with him, can't wait for that! Plus, I am going on some awesome field trips this semester and have cool field pictures to share.

I guess the general message of this post is to please hang with me, I am working my hardest and will give Pondering Pikaia some TLC as soon as it is possible!

Candidate's Science Positions in This Week's Nature

2008-09-29T12:31:00.002-05:00

Just a head's up, the latest edition of Nature (September 25) has a special feature on the upcoming U.S. election and its implications for national science policy. Apparently McCain declined to respond to the journal's request for comments, but Barack Obama has extensive replies to their questions about the most important science issues facing the world today. For comparison's sake, editors have summarized what is known of his positions on the topics addressed by Obama. The piece is a great summary of the candidate's positions, definitely a must-read. There are other articles in this week's edition that provide further analysis of the election and the candidates. If you don't have access to Nature and would like a copy of any of the articles, please comment or e-mail me and I'll send you a pdf. Also, due to space constraints not all of the questions could be included in the print edition of the journal, the additional ones (including discussion of emission targets and climate change) can be read on the website.

Remember to check out ScienceDebate2008 as well!

Palau Specimen News in PLoS ONE

2008-08-31T22:42:00.009-05:00

Earlier this week I flubbed on reporting about a report from Science Daily that highlighted new research showing that an early island population of humans were not dwarfed, as was first thought, but were within the average size range for modern humans. I mistakenly indicated that the fossils in question were the Homo floresiensis specimens. Actually the study, published in PLoS ONE, was on the Palau specimens that were previously thought to represent a small-statured population of humans, a prime example of insular dwarfism.

The new paper strongly contradicts the original claims that the Palau people were significantly smaller in stature than average modern Homo sapiens. The original paper was also published in PLoS ONE earlier this year, this is a great example of how online, open access publishing allows quick turnaround and public dialog about issues like this. Fitzpatrick et al assert that the individuals were not below the normal height range for humans. They provide evidence of faulty assumptions and analyses in the original description of the specimens, and also present data from additional fossils is also consistent with the conclusion that the Palau fossils represent average-sized individuals. This is a major change from Berger et al's original claims that were trumpeted by the media, an issue that Fitzpatrick et al address bluntly:

"While some may see the Berger et al. paper as being so egregious that few will take it seriously (and as such, does not necessitate the lengthy response we have presented here), we feel that it is extremely important for the scientific community and laymen alike to be fully aware that the data described by Berger et al. is fundamentally flawed and does not mesh with the known biological and archaeological data from Palau. "

This is definitely a fascinating turn of events, it will be interesting to watch how it plays out in the future. This does not mean that insular dwarfism has never occurred in humans: despite bickering about their place in the hominid family tree, the small stature of H. floresiensis specimens is not in question (although it seems like everything else about them has been questioned!). The new study, however, does a pretty tidy take-down of the original claims about the Palau population. It will be interesting to follow the story and watch for future publications by the authors on both sides of this issue!

Berger LR, Churchill SE, De Klerk B, Quinn RL 2008 Small-Bodied Humans from Palau, Micronesia. PLoS ONE 3(3): e1780 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0001780

Fitzpatrick SM, Nelson GC, Clark G 2008 Small Scattered Fragments Do Not a Dwarf Make: Biological and Archaeological Data Indicate that Prehistoric Inhabitants of Palau Were Normal Sized. PLoS ONE 3(8): e3015 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0003015

Swim, swim, swim!

2008-08-24T16:51:00.002-05:00

Praxis: The "Life in Academia" Blog Carnival

2008-08-17T09:09:00.002-05:00

I just wanted to bring everyone's attention to a great new blog carnival that debuted this month: Praxis, a collection of posts covering a wide range of experience, viewpoints, and advice relating to life in academia. I'm kicking the grad school hunt into high gear this fall, so I am consuming as much information about academia as I can possibly take in, I was very excited to see this new carnival! Bora hosted the first edition, there is some great material there!

I was pleasantly surprised to see that one of my updates from Belize was included! I was glad I could contribute a "bugs and mud" fieldwork perspective, lots of people have the misconception that scientists just hang out in labs all day, wearing white coats and peering into microscopes. The Praxis carnival seems like a great way to learn about broad range of experiences and opportunities within the field of academic science.

Make sure to monitor the Praxis blog and check out the hosting schedule so you don't miss upcoming editions!

You knew it was coming...

2008-08-15T22:13:00.006-05:00

As I've discussed before, I hope to pursue carnivore conservation and ecology in my grad studies/future career. Due to the field research opportunities I've had during my undergrad years, though, I have developed a strong love for bats. I think they are pretty damn cool, as a matter of fact. I don't think I will end up doing bat research "when I grow up," but they are a great hobby, truly incredible animals.

Of course, whenever I go anywhere I have to bring back pictures of the local bats; long-time readers should take that for granted by now. ;) I had high hopes for my batting prospects when I went to Belize--the name of the research station was Las Cuevas, "the caves." None of the research groups there at the time were studying bats, so I didn't get the chance to do any netting. The only thing I would change about the entire trip would be to have some mist nets (yes, I'd use my one wish to get some nets instead of erasing that nasty bacterial infection, that's how cool tropical bats are!). If wishes were horses . . . or horseshoe bats, for that matter . . .

The good news, though, is that I still managed to get some good chiropteran sightings. We did some exploring in the largest cave and discovered some roosting Hairy-legged myotis (Myotis keaysi). I don't think the bats were quite as thrilled as I was when we stumbled upon them, but they struck some good poses nonetheless (sorry for the picture quality, these were taken while balancing on slippery rocks in a pitch-black cave, but the nightshot did at least a decent job):

I will have more Belizean wildlife pictures periodically, but the bats had to be one of the first to be get the spotlight!