X-ray crystallography explained for researchers of ion channel structure & function who don't themselves employ X-ray crystallography...
In one slide: (Source: Across the Bilayer)
Source: Across the Bilayer - November 25, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
X-ray crystallography explained for researchers of ion channel structure function who don't themselves employ X-ray crystallography...
In one slide: (Source: Across the Bilayer)
Source: Across the Bilayer - November 25, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
X-ray crystallography explained for undergraduates...
In one slide: (Source: Across the Bilayer)
Source: Across the Bilayer - November 25, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
@$#% my daughter says: where Sauron's Ol'dear went wrong...
The Eye of SteveThe topic of this morning's breakfast was criminal psychology as it pertains to The Lord of the Rings. More specifically, the question the Wee'Un #1 presented to the table for consideration was this: Why did Sauron's mum call him Sauron*?The thrust of her ensuing thesis was that anyone with a name like Sauron was pretty much guaranteed to turn out a bad egg. There was room for argument both ways, but we all agreed that had Sauron actually been named Steve things would have been very different.My daughter was of the opinion that Sauron would probably have turned out alright had he been a Steve. I disagreed a...
Source: Across the Bilayer - November 21, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Tags: Parentage Source Type: blogs
A retreat in the right direction...
h/t DrugmonkeyThe word on the street is that the NIH is thinking of trimming some of those Big Science pet projects. Choice quote:But many of the structures produced by the PSI, which were based on theoretical models, turned out to be irrelevant to biological functions, counters Gregory Petsko, a crystallographer at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts. If the PSI’s budget had instead funded a few hundred individual investigators, each competing to work on specific structures, they probably would have come up with more relevant proteins, he says. He is thrilled that the programme is shutting down. “Put a stake...
Source: Across the Bilayer - November 18, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Tags: Science Source Type: blogs
Your humble servant forgot to mention...
Fig 1. Spider venom activating chick ASIC1, which responds by absolutely refusing to conduct Ca2+...that he was in Nature last year. Here's the article. Yep, impressive, eh? Certainly, reader you can buy me a pint next time we meet. Make mine a Ringwood 49er.Wait, what's that you say, hmm?Oh, no, no, dear reader, I'm not to be found among the authors, no. You've got to scroll down a wee bit...That's right, keep going...Bit further...Down, down, down...That's it, past the references...and...THERE!You see! A ha! What do you make of that, then?"We appreciate assistance in the initial characterization of the ac...
Source: Across the Bilayer - November 15, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Tags: IonChannels Science Source Type: blogs
!liaf
Forgot to put CaCl2 in my buffer t'other day for a set of Ca2+ imaging experiments.I'm losing my touch... making foolish mistakes... maybe I just gotta face it,I'm Too Ozzel For This Shiznit Fo' Shizzle (Source: Across the Bilayer)
Source: Across the Bilayer - November 7, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
Un-PC Coco meets PC...
Worth a watch just to hear Coco bagging on the WASD-dependence of PC games and Europeans. "Is this a European game? 'Coz Europeans... man, they blow sometimes." (Source: Across the Bilayer)
Source: Across the Bilayer - November 5, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
Wait, what did you say?
The audience at a public reading of, "The Riot Act", by DadMadam, let me be frank. Let me be earnest, honest, but most of all, let me be forthright.I have been known, on occasion... to curse.But I understate the issue.For I have been known to wax so lyrically - sometimes, I like to think, almost poetically - in the arena of invective as to rouge the cheeks of the saltiest sailor. It is a not uncommon affliction of my people, who have a tendency to use curses in lieu of punctuation, or in order to imbue individual syllables with the desired emphasis (there are no accent marks, such as the umlaut, in the English language, ma...
Source: Across the Bilayer - October 28, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
South on 56, East on 3...
My first words in St. Louis were uttered on the plane as it came into land. In hindsight, I'm not proud of them. They were, in this order, "Wow, everything's so green" (I expected Missouri to be like Arizona), and "What the hell is that!?" (few people t'other side of the pond have ever heard of The Arch). True story.I remarked to a student last week that I missed Big City life.But yesterday, while on a Sunday drive down to Tupper Lake to visit The Wild Center with the ankle-biters, I was listening to the following tracks and thinking... meh, maybe it wasn't such a bad trade after all.In addition to the natural beauty, the ...
Source: Across the Bilayer - October 23, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
More worthwhile reading...
Eventually I'll aggregate all this under a single post and link to it in my header, but I came across another thought-provoking article on the subject of sexual harassment. This one is from Katie Roiphe, a professor at the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University who writes for Slate. Roiphe delves deeper into the complexities that commonly underlie the sorts of colleague relationships that can evolve into a situation precipitating inappropriate and, ultimately, unwelcome behavior.The piece recounts the sexual harassment controversy that led to professor of philosophy, Colin McGinn,...
Source: Across the Bilayer - October 21, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
Gravity, sex, and harassment...
George in a much better sci fi movie than Gravity (i.e. Solaris)Gravity sucks. Yeah, I know, I'm probably the millionth person to blog that, but it's still true. That movie sucks so comprehensively that Sir. James Dyson wants to patent it. Sure, the film looked pretty, but beyond that? The script script was terrible. The dialogue was completely underwhelming, and I don't think there was a line of subtext that went unspoken. The paper on which the script was written was probably thicker than the depth of the two main characters, which proved beyond the efforts of both George (I can call him George because by Holly...
Source: Across the Bilayer - October 18, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
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After two consecutive - and obscenely lucky - deadline reprieves for this infernal review I'm co-authoring, I now learn via Drugmonkey that the NIH has pushed back the October 25th application deadline into November somewhere.I guess I have Boner and his buddies to thank for that. Cheers fellas.I'm feeling a bit more chill, now...... well, at least until the I get within one week of the next deadline and still haven't made any progress, which seems to be the running theme of this semester. (Source: Across the Bilayer)
Source: Across the Bilayer - October 18, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
Sexual harassment in science: them data is startin' to look significant
So, although not strictly related to the events I mentioned earlier, the blog editor of Scientific American has now been accused of sexual harassment. He has issued an apology and has not refuted the Monica Byrne's testimony.Some linkage offered without much comment for now, I just want to aggregate some relevant material for my own reasons if nothing else. It's sort of in chronological order starting with Scientific American's earlier controversy in re the censorship of Karen Stollznow's testimony regarding her own experiences with sexual harassment.1) Prominent skeptic Karen Stollznow's article describing her e...
Source: Across the Bilayer - October 16, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Source Type: blogs
Parents embarrassing their children as teenagers is just payback, really...
Called out.Scene: Father and daughter are in the kids section of the library perusing the DVDs.Daughter: Oh, what about this one Daddy?(Daughter pulls out a case for one of those generic knock-off movies that barely even pretends to originality.)Father: Nah, that's just some rubbish generic knock-off that barely even pretends to originality.(Daughter dejectedly replaces DVD, her wee child brain beginning to synthesize the complex irony underlying her father's ability to be an insufferable snob, even regarding children's books and telly entertainment)Father: Eff-tee-dubya, Z! "Tangled" is in this week, you wanted to see tha...
Source: Across the Bilayer - October 14, 2013 Category: Medical Scientists Tags: Parentage Source Type: blogs
