Category: Curiosities of Nature

Meet the Sunda Flying Lemur

Photo Credit: Norman Lim, National University of Singapore
Photo Credit: Norman Lim, National University of Singapore

The Sunda Flying Lemur (Galeopterus variegatus) is not a lemur AT ALL (but still a primate). It looks like part eyes-too-far-apart squirrel and part kite. This crazy thing glides like nobody’s business from tree to tree all night long eating up fruits, leaves and flowers. The skin flap that allows the animal to glide is called a patagium and when the limbs are stretched to pull it taut this creates a parachute-style extension.

This Southeast Asian superstar, animal-kite hybrid is able to glide across the span of 100 meters while its own body length is just under 40 cm (not counting the tail)! 100 meters……just repeat it to yourself again….yeah that’s incredible. Continue reading “Meet the Sunda Flying Lemur”

STEM Flame War!

Image courtesy of Brookhaven National Laboratory
Image courtesy of Brookhaven National Laboratory

It’s not often that you find a number of online comments on a scientific journal’s website. It’s even rarer to discover something that is bordering on a scientist flame war (complete with requests for evidence!). Colin Macilwain asserts in a recent editorial in Nature that he thinks programs to encourage STEM education are a spectacular waste of money. Now this particular stance is already going to incite some backlash. He says that all the overlapping programs are wasting money and that making more scientists will just depress wages by flooding the market.

What ensues in the comments section is a debate over whether increasing scientific literacy for all is important in today’s society and whether there is truly a shortage of qualified scientists to fill open positions. I was excited to see so many scientists engaged in discussion of STEM policy and with well articulated opinions on the subject. Not everyone agrees on the ultimate goal of STEM education, whether it be to raise the level of science literacy universally or to increase the number of students who go on to careers in science. As it is, there is a glut of biologists who are struggling to find employment, though I think fields like computer science may not be experiencing the same problems. I personally, don’t agree with Macilwain, but I think more scientists should be thinking about science and society and participating in the discussion. Science literacy for all!

The Desert of Lost Shells

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Photo Credit: Josh Witten (CC BY-NC-SA)

With apologies to Howard Andrew Jones; but I am at the beach and could not resist.

Special NIH Fund for Cutting Edge Science

rally for researchFrom the outside, the NIH is a huge sprawling pit of bureaucracy that somehow manages to fund science across the entire spectrum of biomedical research. From the inside, I’ve discovered that there are branches and offices, of which most scientists are totally unaware. In addition to the 27 institutes and centers that make up the NIH, there is a special office dedicated to cutting edge science, risky ventures, and cross-disciplinary collaborations. The NIH Common Fund coordinates research that involves at least two institutes or centers and tries to help remove the roadblocks that keep basic scientific discoveries from moving to the clinic.

I had no idea this office existed and some of the projects they are funding are pretty exciting. There is a single cell analysis project focused on developing the necessary technology and creating workshops to train scientists to use these new techniques. There is also a project to systematically characterize genetic knock-out mice in order to have complete characterization of knock-outs of all genes in the mouse. The mice have all been generated and now the Common Fund is paying for characterization of all the mutant mice. This would be a huge resource for both labs using mice as a model system and those looking to follow their gene of interest into a vertebrate model organism.

The Common Fund puts out requests for applications for all sorts of interdisciplinary projects and the forefront of scientific research is visible in their current efforts.

 

Insurance Industry: 4 on Dubiosity Scale

Contrary to political posturing, there are more than two positions on the climate change issue. There are political conservatives who accept anthropogenic climate change, but prefer using market forces to address the problem. These individuals rate a 4 on my Dubiosity Scale (1 is the most dubious).

According to an article in the NY Times by Eduardo Porter, the US insurance industry may also rate a 4. It accepts the scientific consensus position, but is reluctant to engage in political squabbles, because the threat of punitive regulation is a bigger risk than increased payouts due to worsening weather:

Yet when I asked Mr. Nutter what the American insurance industry was doing to combat global warming, his answer was surprising: nothing much…Instead, the focus of insurers’ advocacy efforts is zoning rules and disaster mitigation. – Eduardo Porter

Porter summarizes the position of a 4 on the Dubiosity Scale in his last sentence:

And that’s the best hope for those concerned about climate change: that global warming isn’t just devastating for society, but also bad for business. –Eduardo Porter

But, what happens when the issue is so politicized that the market forces are responding to the politics and not the market?