Robert's Random Science Facts

Help for your weekend…

2010-04-16T10:12:00.006-04:00

Happy Friday!

Sorry I have not been posting. Things have been crazy busy and I’m taking a little blogger’s vaca. Don’t you worry your pretty little face, I’ll be posting again soon.

In the absence of my posts, I recommend you get a hobby (real housewives of NYC reference). Better yet, go out this weekend and find a nice, upstanding boy or girl (or in-between – I don’t judge. You do you) and have a wholesome weekend with them. Here are some pickup lines you can use:

Can I be your enzyme, because my active site is dying for a chemical reaction

If I were an enzyme, I’d be DNA helicase so I could unzip your genes

You’re so hot, you denature my proteins

Hey hottie! Will a little more alcohol help catalyze this reaction?

I want to work on your leucine zipper with my zinc fingers

If you were oxygen, I would totes be an alkali metal so I could get in you and explode!

Are you an alpha-carbon, because you look susceptible to backside attack

How would you like my endoplasmic reticulum: smooth or rough?

You remind me of telophase – I just can’t stop looking at your cleavage

I’d go down on your concentration gradient

Yup, its confirmed. I’m a nerd.

Have a great weekend, everyone! xoxo

Raindrops keep fallin’ on my head…

2010-04-06T15:05:00.006-04:00

If you haven’t seen the new show on the Discovery channel (narrated by Oprah), “Life”, you need to fix that ASAP. It’s produced by the same people that made “Planet Earth”. The last episode I saw was on amphibians and reptiles, where I discovered a tiny lizard I now love.

The Brazilian pygmy gecko (Coleodactylus amazonicus) is one of the smallest lizards on earth, at only about half an inch long. Evolution probably made these geckos small to protect them from predators and competition, but in doing so it opened them up to a whole new dilemma of survival: drowning.

The pygmy gecko can be found in the tropical rainforests of South America – not exactly the driest places in the world. One minute the gecko could be sitting on a leaf, just enjoying the warmth of the sun and, without warning, a raindrop can slam into that leaf and send the gecko plummeting towards the ground. Before the gecko even knows what happened, it finds itself in the middle of a puddle trying to stay above water. Let’s not forget that when you are 2 cm long, a puddle seems like one of the Great Lakes.

Many geckos must have drowned before evolution stepped in and solved this survival problem with a simple solution: waterproof skin. This gecko can float.

The skin of a pygmy gecko is highly hydrophobic (the scientific word for waterproof). This skin paired with the gecko’s tiny size and weight allows it to float on top of water. They are even able to walk on water. They are much faster on land, so jumping into a puddle is not the ideal way to escape a predator, but hey, at least they won’t drown.

Happy Easter!

2010-04-01T14:39:00.005-04:00

It’s impossible to think about Easter without thinking about Peeps. These chewy chicks and bunnies are some of the most iconic Easter figures. For the past decade, Peeps have been the number one (non-chocolate) Easter candy. I don’t like them, but I guess a lot of people do. They come in 6 colors (yellow, pink, lavender, blue, orange and green) and in 2008 yellow tulip Peeps joined the shelves next to their bunny and chick cousins (the first time a new design has been released since 1950).

There is something about these artificial masterpieces that has captivated the imaginations of scientists. It has been found that Peeps are a seasonal organism. They are hyper-sensitive to both hot and cold temperature extremes. Despite their sensitivity to temperature, they are highly adapted and will not dissolve or degrade when submerged (actually, they float) in water, acetone, sulfuric acid (strong acid) or sodium hydroxide (strong base). A Peep did, however, dissolve in phenol after sitting for almost an hour. No matter the substance or how long the exposure, scientists have yet to be able to dissolve the eyes of a Peep.

Check out this website to see images of the Peeps while they were being tested, as well as images of a surgery separating quadruplet Peep siblings that were attached at birth!

Like several other organisms in the wild, Peeps have evolved and acquired a defense mechanism to protect from being preyed upon by predators. Similar to a pufferfish, when a Peep is exposed to a high stress environment, it will grow in size. Appearing larger and more impressive can help ward off predators. And what is more stressful than a microwave? When you put a Peep in the microwave it will blow up in size and the mechanism for this exaggeration of physical proportion in response to stressful stimuli is well understood.

Well like all other living organisms, Peeps are comprised mostly of water. A microwave sends out its electromagnetic radiation at a wavelength (approximately 10^-6 meters) that is perfectly absorbed by water molecules. As the water absorbs the radiation it gains energy. More energy makes the molecules start to bounce around and heat up. In addition to water, Peeps contain high levels of marshmallow, which in turn contains lots and lots of air bubbles. As the water heats, the air will also start to heat up and heating air expands. The air will expand and before you know it, you have a giant peep in your microwave.

It’s a great defense mechanism that totes works – most people don’t eat the giant Peep.

Happy Easter, everyone!

And it didn’t end the world by making a giant black hole!

2010-03-31T15:35:00.005-04:00

In the 1970s, three physicists, Peter Higgs, Robert Brout and François Englert, sat down and tried to figure out how the universe began. It had just been discovered that magnetism, electricity, light and some radioactivity were all different expressions of the same force know as the electroweak force, but in order for this theory to work, the particles carrying the force must have no mass (they know this because they did fancy-pants math). Particle physics proves that these particles do have mass, so Brout, Higgs and Englert came up with the idea that maybe all particles had no mass right after the Big Bang. As the universe cooled, an invisible force (Higgs field) formed with these non-mass particles (Higgs boson). Any particle that came in contact with these forces gained a mass. The longer they interacted, the more massive they got. If they never interacted, they never got a mass. In theory this works great, but scientists have still never seen the Higgs boson (aka: the God Particle) – well, not yet…

I don’t know about you, but that hurts my head when I try to understand it. I’ll throw it out there again, I am not a physicist. That means I am really not a particle physicist. But in the wake of the huge news yesterday (and a request from a friend), I want to talk about the European Organization for Nuclear Research’s (CERN) Large Hadron Collider.

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is a $10 billion piece of equipment that is 17 miles around (spanning the border of France and Switzerland), roughly 300 feet underground and operating at -271.3°C (that is just a little bit above absolute zero – the temperature at which molecular movement is theorized to stop). This machine is the product of thousands of scientists, all hoping it will uncover the answers to some of physics craziest questions: what is the “God Particle”, why is there no more anti-matter, what is dark matter, are there other dimensions in the universe, and how did the Big Bang work?

This is all highly theoretical science and it is very easy to get lost in the jargon and complex physics. I want to just give you a basic idea of what is actually going on.

The LHC is a giant ring comprised of two tubes. Each tube contains a single beam of particles traveling (each tube in an opposite direction) nearly at the speed of light (0.999999991 times the speed of light) in a freezing cold, ultrahigh vacuum. The particles (Hadrons) used are protons and iron ions (charged iron) because of their size, charge and ability to prevent decay and loss of energy as they travel. The beams are guided along the track by powerful magnets: 1232 dipole magnets (15 meters long) bend the beams and 392 quadrupole magnets (5–7 meters long) to focus the beams. Each magnet is super cooled with liquid nitrogen and liquid helium.

The two tubes intersect at 4 places along the track, allowing for collisions. The energy released from a head on collision between two beams is equal to the sum of both beams. Basically, when these two beams smash into one another at such high speeds, they release so much energy that temperatures can reach more than 100,000 times hotter than the sun!

There are 6 experiments (6 socialized machines) constantly recording data from each collision. These are intense machines. Some are over 7 stories tall and can still record time to the billionth of a second and distance to the millionths of a meter. With over 600 million proton collisions a second, about 15 petabytes (15 million gigabytes) of data gets generated a day! Obviously they have some impressive computer systems to back all of this equipment up with.

Yesterday the science world was amazed when, for the first time, beams of protons were hurled around the LHC, smashed into one another and released an energy of 3.5 trillion electron volts (7 times higher than ever created before)! Trust me, that’s AMAZING!

All that sounds great and is super exciting, but what does this mean for the everyday person? Nothing really. But this is still some awesome stuff to learn!

As much science as I could deal with today

2010-03-29T22:35:00.000-04:00

I mean, the song is called "Biology"...

Just a rainy friday...

2010-03-26T10:47:00.008-04:00

Happy Friday, everyone! I don’t know about you, but this has been a loooong week for me. I am so ready for the weekend. Since I am a little blah today (boo to the rain) I figured why not try something new again. Anyone that knows me knows that I adore art and art history. Here are some famous paintings that highlight science…

The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp, Rembrandt
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606-1669) was a Dutch painter and one of the most famous artists of all time. In this painting, Rembrandt shows off his impeccable realism and untouchable skill in oils. Dr. Tulp (in the hat) is explaining the anatomy of the arm to other doctors (all of which are real doctors that paid to be included in the painting). This painting is a recreation of a real autopsy performed on Aris Kindt, who was hanged for robbery in 1632. The muscles and tendons show in this picture are perfectly anatomically correct. It is still unknown how Rembrandt gained his anatomical knowledge.

The Astronomer, Johannes Vermeer
Vermeer (1632-1675) was another master of Dutch painting. In this work he shows an astronomer looking over the globe, maps and, obviously, the bible. It is believed that the man in the painting is Anton von Leeuwenhook – the Father of Microbiology. Leeuwenhook made vast improvements on the microscope and was the first to describe single celled organisms.

An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump, Joseph Derby

A Philosopher giving a Lecture on the Orrery in which a lamp is put in place of the Sun, Joseph Derby
Joseph Wright of Derby (1734-1797) has become one of the most famous British painters and is accredited with being the first artist to capture “the spirit of the Industrial Revolution”. His paintings captivate and pull the viewer into the drama. He was known to push away from the artist norms and standards of the time and these two paintings show this – there are no mythical or historical figures here. Notice his use of candle light to illuminate his subjects.

The Gross Clinic, Thomas Eakins
Thomas Eakins (1844-1916) was an American artist who studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts as well as the Jefferson Medical College. He studied human anatomy and had a passion for scientific realism.

Sucks to be Pluto

2010-03-25T14:17:00.005-04:00

The moment I finished the space odyssey, I began getting grief about not including Pluto. Sorry friends, but Pluto is not a planet. Sure it used to be, but it was downgraded. Like most other scientists I have to agree that it doesn’t deserve to be in the same class as bodies like Jupiter and Saturn.

The International Astronomical Union (IAU) is who started the drama around Pluto. They are the big shot organization that controls how we think about space. They are also the ones with the authority to name heavenly objects.

The drama started in January 2005 when Eris (official name: Eris 136199) was discovered. Eris was found orbiting out past Pluto in the Kuiper Belt. It was determined to be 27% more massive than Pluto. NASA started calling Eris the tenth planet and got excited about the high probability of finding more planets, but the IAU had something to say about that.

In August 2006, the IAU held a meeting in Prague and passed Resolution 5A. This resolution established guidelines to determine if something is a planet or a dwarf planet.

To be a planet, an object must:
1. Orbit the sun
2. Be large enough to produce enough gravity to make itself (mostly) round
3. Clear the neighborhood around its orbit

To be a dwarf planet, an object must:
1. Orbit the sun
2. Be large enough to produce enough gravity to make itself (mostly) round
3. Not have cleared the neighborhood of its orbit
4. Not be a satellite (moon)

All other objects (i.e. comets, asteroids, etc) are classified collectively as “Small Solar System Bodies”.

Pluto is tiny (only about 70% the size of our moon), but it is able to meet requirements one and two of being a planet. The problem lies in requirement three. Pluto orbits in the Kuiper Belt (basically the same thing as the asteroid belt, just a little larger. It starts right outside the orbit of Neptune). A true planet would have cleared the belt out of its orbit, but Pluto did not.

Picture from http://www.mathiaspedersen.com/

Just like that, Pluto got its planet card revoked. Our solar system only contains 8 planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune). In Resolution 6A, Pluto was officially named a dwarf planet as well as the prototype for a new variety of trans-Neptunian objects, which (according to Resolution 6B) will be called “Plutonian Objects”.

Now Pluto gets to hang out with the other dwarfs, like Ceres and Eris.

Whatever, I would rather hang out with them anyway!

On Wednesdays we wear pink!

2010-03-24T10:30:00.005-04:00

I’m on a little Mean Girls kick today. I woke up thinking about the movie for some reason (don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining) and have now decided, in honor of the rules of the cafeteria, to post about wearing pink on Wednesdays. Bring on the flamingos…

There are 6 flamingo species (4 species found in the US), all in the genus Phoenicopterus. These pretty birds are socialites and live in large colonies. They can be found at the top of the Andes Mountains, all the way down to the tidal flats of the Caribbean.

One of the most distinctive features of a flamingo is its color. Flamingos are born white, but turn various shades of pink (anywhere from a light/pastel pink to deep crimson and vermilion).

[Reader: scratches head and thinks, “Robert, but why are flamingos pink?”]

Well let me tell you!

Flamingos are filter feeders. They will wade out into the water and lower and tilt their heads, allowing their bill to be upside-down under water. After stomping their feet a few times to stir up the mud, the flamingo will swish its head side to side to get the murky water moving through its bill. A pointy tongue acts like a piston to help circulate the water within the bill. Small hair-like structures called lamellae line the bill and filter out food from the water. Flamingos like to eat things like brine shrimp, algae, plankton, insect larvae, etc (small stuff). Anything too big or too small or that doesn’t seem appetizing is filtered through the lamellae and then pushed out of the bill.

Eating a lot of algae and plankton means that flamingos are taking in a lot of carotenoid proteins, mainly beta-carotene (the protein also found in carrots) and alpha-carotene. Once ingested, these chemicals are broken down in the liver. The byproduct, in flamingos, is a pink chemical that can be dissolved in fats and deposited in growing feathers. The amount and types of algae eaten are what affect how light or intense the color is. That’s why flamingos found in different locations vary in color.

This is similar to the reason people can start to turn orange if they eat enough carrots.

No matter where the flamingo lives, it wants to be the brightest one in its colony. A good, solid, intense color means that flamingo is well fed and happy – the perfect mate and parent.

A Little Hump Day Treat

2010-03-24T10:02:00.002-04:00

I’m putting up another post in a few, but I wanted to share this website…

Just in case you ever wanted to know how much you would weigh on other planets

I’m Blue, Oh Ohh, Oh Ohh…

2010-03-23T13:34:00.002-04:00

Who doesn’t love learning about a fun genetic disease? And what is more fun than a disease that can turn you blue?!

Hemoglobin is a protein found inside your red blood cells that allows your cells to bind and carry oxygen. Kind of a super important protein. In mammals, 97% of a red blood cell is hemoglobin. A hemoglobin molecule is made up for 8 subunits: 4 protein subunits and 4 iron containing subunits (hemes). The heme groups are what bind, carry and release oxygen molecules. Of the 4 protein subunits, there are 2 types: alpha-globin and beta-globin. A gene called “hemoglobin, beta” (HBB) is what tells the body how to make the beta-globin subunit.

Methemoglobinemia (beta-globin type) is a rare genetic disorder of the blood. Individuals with methemoglobinemia have a few mutations in certain parts of the HBB gene. These mutations cause the body to produce an atypical version of the beta-globin subunit. When this odd version joins the other subunits to form a hemoglobin molecule, it doesn’t join together properly and ends up forming a slightly different protein, hemoglobin-M.

Hemoglobin-M does not interact with the heme groups properly and ends up inhibiting their ability to bind oxygen as well as normal. Poor binding means less oxygen being delivered throughout the body.

We all know that oxygenated blood is red (visualize your arteries, blood dripping from a cut, etc.) and deoxygenated blood is bluish in color (think of your veins). Less oxygen in the bloodstream will make the blood blue as it moves through the body, causing the skin and other membranes of a person with methemoglobinemia to look blue.

A person inherits methemoglobinemia from their parents. It is an autosomal dominant trait. Autosomal means it is not sex-linked (not on an X or Y chromosome); the mutation can come from the mom or dad and will affect both sons and daughters. Dominant means that it only takes one copy of the mutated gene to have the condition. If both parents are blue, there is a very slim chance any children will be normal colored (the best being a ¼ chance if the parents are both heterozygous carriers).

There is not really a treatment to fix this condition, but as long as the person doesn’t mind being blue they will be fine. Most people with methemoglobinemia live very normal lives. The most famous case of methemoglobinemia was the Blue Fugates of Kentucky. After emigrating from France in 1820, Martin Fugate married Elizabeth Smith of Kentucky. They had 7 children and 4 of them popped out blue. Being in the backwoods of Kentucky, the kids obviously married other locals and eventually started inbreeding. The whole area started turning blue. Three blue Fugates were still alive in the 1980s.

Ancestors, Hear my plea, Help me not to make a fool of me…

2010-03-22T13:50:00.003-04:00

The other day, while having a sushi date with one of my favorite followers (and favorite people in general), I realized how surprised I am that I’ve become a fan of wasabi. I told you last week how I despise spicy foods, but for some reason I love a little wasabi mixed with soy sauce on a yellowtail roll. In honor of my new found love, here is a post dedicated to wasabi.

Wasabi (Wasabia japonica) is a plant that is closely related to mustard and horseradish. Native to areas along the cold fresh water streams of Japan, the wasabi plant is a very finiky grower. Under even the most ideal conditions, farmers have a tough time getting large yields. Being native to Japan means it obviously grows best there, but high demand has brought wasabi farms to the US. In the US there are very few places that have the proper climate and landscape to support growing wasabi. Most North American production occurs in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina.

That dollop of wasabi you smear on your sushi is actually the wasabi root after it has been ground down to a paste. Well, that’s what you would be eating if you were eating real wasabi. With demand for wasabi so high and crop production so low, wasabi is expensive! Most restaurants (even really bougie ones) only offer real wasabi to people upon request. What you get on the corner of your plate is a mixture of horseradish, mustard and food coloring.

But now down to the part of wasabi I think is the most interesting - it’s really good for you!

Wasabi contains chemicals known as isothiocynates that are known to help fight cancers, especially breast and prostate cancer. Wasabi also has natural antibacterial properties. A bunch of studies have been conducted and report that several varieties of bacteria known to cause food poisoning cannot survive in the presence of wasabi. Companies are now even throwing around the idea of using wasabi extracts in antibacterial products like soap. I obviously totes support!

And when you think about it, it’s really not a bad idea to throw some antibacterial wasabi on raw fish you’re eating for dinner.

Name That Embryo!

2010-03-19T14:58:00.012-04:00

It’s Friday and it’s SO beautiful outside that I am having a hard time focusing. That means today is the perfect time to try something a little different…

Embryogenesis is the process of embryo formation that starts with the fertilization of an egg with a sperm. I have mentioned before that the process from fertilized egg (zygote) to baby organism is extremely complex. I will get more into that another time (when I can focus and not think about happy hour).

Just know that all animals start as a single cell and go through this process. Since everyone starts as only one cell, it is crazy when you start looking at early stage embryos. No matter how different the final animal is going to look, they all start out looking very similar.

So here is a fun little game for a Friday afternoon! Try to see if you can figure out what animal each embryo is going to develop into. The answers are in the comment section.

Quick Note: For some reason I am having a hard time numbering these images. Don’t be stupid and just assume the top image is #1, the picture under that is #2… you get it. And to help you, I put a hint at the bottom. Try doing it without the hint first (it makes it more amusing).

Yeah, told you it’s not easy to tell organisms apart at this stage in life. It may help (probably not) a little knowing the organisms I am using. Above (in no particular order) there is an Elephant, Human, Cat, Dog, Lamprey, Snake, Mouse and Turtle.

Spicy just like hot sauce, Careful, you might burn it up…

2010-03-18T15:12:00.001-04:00

I’m not a fan of spicy food. I don’t mind a jalapeno every so often on some nachos, but I am definitely not the person to ask for extra spicy salsa at Chipotle. My dearest friend, on the other hand, does not feel the same way. It’s hilarious to watch him down some extra spicy tacos and then break into a sweat. Obviously we got to thinking about why people sweat when they eat hot foods…

Perspiration (sweat) is a fluid comprised mostly of water, with a small percent (0.1-1%) of solute (things dissolved in it; i.e. chlorides, iron, sodium, potassium, zinc, etc.). This fluid is produced by specialized cells in the skin and drips out of the sweat glands of all mammals. The body uses sweat as a way to regulate temperature (thermoregulation). As sweat evaporates off of the skin, it sucks up some energy with it and has a cooling effect. When you eat spicy foods your mouth feels hot, but your body temperature is not actually increasing, so why would you sweat?

Spicy foods contain chemicals that stimulate nocciceotors (pain sensors) in your mouth. These sensors are responsible for detecting pain and sending a signal to your central nervous system (the brain) telling it to fix the situation. Capsaicin (a chemical found in chili peppers) is known to affect these receptors.

When you eat a pepper the capsaicin will dissolve in your saliva and find its way around your mouth, attacking every nocciceotor it passes. Capsaicin can actually confuse the nocciceotors in your mouth into thinking that the body is getting hot because of some intense stimulus. To prevent damage from overheating, your brain (the hypothalamus in particular) responds by turning on the sweat. Before you know it, your head is dripping wet.

Very simple and straightforward.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

2010-03-17T09:57:00.005-04:00

An Irishman is never drunk as long as he can hold onto one blade of grass to keep from falling off the earth.
~ Irish Saying
In honor of St. Patrick and my Irish roots (that’s right, I’m really Irish), let’s talk about the most famous plant associated with this drunken holiday: the four-leaf clover.

The shamrock (specifically the White Clover, Trifolium repens) is a national symbol for Ireland. It is a small plant that is native to Europe, but can now be found across the northern hemisphere. Clover is commonly grown as a delicious option for grazing animals because of its high protein content and its ability to grow in such a wide range of conditions. If you’re into organic farming this is a great plant to grow because of its ability to fix nitrogen and naturally prevent soil leaching.

Clovers have been symbolic to the people of Ireland since the ancient Celtic tribes. The druids (Celtic priests) revered the plant because of its three leaves and their beliefs around the power of the number three. When St. Patrick came to Ireland, it is believed that he used the shamrock to explain the holy trinity. Like a shamrock, God is comprised of the holy trinity (the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit); three things that come together as one and come from the same stem. Today the shamrock is seen more as a good luck symbol rather than for its religious affiliations. Three-leaf shamrocks are great and all, but the money is in the four-leaf variety.

Four-leaf clovers are associated with good luck almost globally. The Druids were the first to begin the association with luck (three is lucky so four must be luckier). They used it to help keep away evil spirits. The Christian church tied luck to the four-leaf clover by saying that Eve carried one with her as she was expelled from the Garden of Eden. Irish people have given each of the four leaves a meaning: the first leaf represents hope, the second represents faith, the third represents love and the forth represents luck.

In actuality these lucky symbols are just abnormal plants. The scientific community is still out on what exactly causes a shamrock to turn into a four-leaf clover. It could be caused from a very rare recessive genetic mutation. Being recessive means that if a four-leaf clover mates with any other clover other than another four-leaf version, its offspring will be the normal three-leaf variety. The mutation may be caused during plant formation and may even be caused by environmental factors. Several genes are responsible for leaf formation (we know this based on studies of leaf formation in similar plants) and more than one influence is likely. It may be a combination of all of these explanations. Whatever it is, it keeps these clovers at a ratio of 1 four-leaf clover for every 10,000 three-leaf clovers. Good luck finding one.

I say don’t bother and just have another beer.

Robert’s Out of This World Space Odyssey: Neptune, The Final Planet

2010-03-16T14:11:00.001-04:00

Neptune is the 8th and outermost planet in our solar system (Pluto is no longer a planet and we will talk about that another time), orbiting 2.8 billion miles (4.5 billion kilometers) away from the sun. That makes Neptune far enough away for people on Earth not to be able to see it without a telescope. Even then it just looks like a fixed star. If you remember an older post, you will know that since Neptune is hard to see from Earth (impossible without a telescope), it is actually the first planet discovered using math. Two astronomers working in the mid-nineteenth century, John Couch Adams and Urbain Le Verrie, both realized that the orbit of Uranus was not as predicted – something with a large gravitational force must be altering it. It must be another planet. On September 23, 1846, Neptune was discovered and named after the Roman god of the sea (the international community of astronomers didn’t like naming the planet after Le Verrie).

Neptune is roughly 4 times bigger than Earth and is comprised mostly of hydrogen, helium, water and silicates (the stuff you make rocks out of). Like its sister ice giant, Uranus, Neptune has an inner rocky core (about the size of Earth), surrounded by a liquid layer that blends into layers of thick clouds. These clouds whip around the planet, sometimes at speeds greater than the winds on Jupiter. The clouds contain methane, which provides the planet’s brilliant blue color.

Being the farthest from the sun also means taking the most time to complete an orbit. One full year (a complete orbit around the sun) on Neptune takes 165 Earth years. One day on Neptune (full rotation around its axis) lasts 16 hours 7 minutes.

Neptune has 6 thin, hard to notice and non-uniform rings. It also has 13 identified moons. Triton is the largest moon and is the only major moon in the universe to orbit a planet in the opposite direction the planet rotates. It is believed that Triton started life as a comet orbiting the sun. One day it got a little too close to Neptune and before it realized what was happening; it got sucked into orbit by Neptune’s gravity and became a moon. The surface of Triton is the coldest known place in our solar system, coming in at a bone chilling -390°F (-235°C).

And that’s it. You have now learned a little something about all of the planets in our solar system. I hope you enjoyed our lovely little space odyssey!

Robert’s Out of This World Space Odyssey: Uranus, Haha, You Said Uranus

2010-03-16T09:20:00.002-04:00

You better grab a parka and some hot chocolate, because we have arrived at the ice giants.

At a distance of 1,784,860,000 miles (2,872,460,000 kilometers) from the sun (a distance that takes light almost 3 hours to travel), Uranus is orbiting though the suburbs of our galaxy. Discovered by astronomer William Herschel in 1781, Uranus is the first planet discovered since ancient times.

When you talk about the orbit of Uranus around the sun, you are starting to really talk about a distance to travel. One year on Uranus (a full orbit around the sun) takes 30,685 Earth days or a little more than 84 Earth years. Most people don’t even live that long. One day on Uranus is a little faster than an Earth day, only taking 17 hours 14 minutes. What is fun about the rotation of Uranus around its axis is that this plant basically rotates on its side. Scientists believe during formation something about the size of Earth smacked into Uranus and knocked it onto its side. Being tipped on the side means that for the majority of the Uranian year only the poles receive light and leave the rest of the planet in the dark. To make the rotation even better, like Venus, Uranus rotates retrograde (east to west) – you know, just to be different.

Uranus is a ball of gas and liquid about four times the size of Earth. Due to its distance from us, there is a lot of speculation about the composition of Uranus. It may have a solid rocky core, about the size of Earth, surrounded by a liquid sea full of dissolved ammonia. Above this sea would be layers of thick water clouds stocked full of frozen ammonia crystals. Topping the atmosphere off are blue-green clouds comprised of frozen methane crystals. Similar to the other gas giants, Uranus is probably a planet covered in high winds and violent storms.

William Shakespeare wrote in a Midsummer Night’s Dream, “Sweet Moon, I thank thee for thy sunny beams; I thank thee, Moon, for shining now so bright.” Astronomers liked that line, so they decided to name the moons of Uranus after Shakespeare’s characters. All of the moons orbit the planet in the same way it rotates (the orbits look like they go up and over then back under the planet, versus around it like our moon). Oberon and Titania are the largest moons (they are also the king and queen of the fairies). Miranda is the smallest and innermost moon and is also the most unique moon in the galaxy. It has a cavern 12 times deeper than the Grand Canyon. Uranus has 27 identified moons and more are expected to be found.

We know there should be more moons because something needs to explain the extra gravity being provided to help hold together Uranus’ rings. Yup, Uranus has rings too. An inner ring system found in 1977 and an outer ring system found in 2003. In 2007 it was observed that the outer rings are really brightly colored. See, look, 2007 – that is not long ago. There is still so much to learn about the planets!

Robert’s Out of This World Space Odyssey: Saturn, The Diva

2010-03-15T14:13:00.003-04:00

When Galileo was just sitting on his balcony, having a lovely glass of limoncello, nibbling on a cannoli and looking into the havens through his telescope, he saw the 6th planet from the sun. This is the last planet anyone on Earth will be able to see with a naked eye. As Galileo sketched the planet, he noted two spheres on either side of the main body. He drew them on as handles attached to the planet and assumed this planet must be a triple-bodied system. Not until Dutch astronomer Christiaan Huygens came along in 1659 did the world realize that this planet was actually surrounded by thin rings. Now Saturn and her rings is the most recognizable planet in our solar system.

Saturn (named after the Roman god of agriculture) is the second largest planet in the Milky Way. Much like Jupiter, Saturn is a gas giant comprised mostly of hydrogen and helium, with a possibility it may have a solid rocky core. Saturn has earned the title of least dense planet. It is 1/10 the density of Earth and 2/3 the density of water. If you could put Saturn in a giant bucket of water, it would float.

This ball of gas can whip around the sun once every 10,759 Earth days. That means one year on Saturn is equal to 29.5 Earth years. One day on Saturn (a full rotation around its axis) takes 10 hours 39 minutes – just a little slower than Jupiter.

The weather on Saturn is also comparable to Jupiter. Saturn has layers of various gasses at different temperatures that give the presence of colorful cloud bands covering the planet. High winds keep the clouds moving.

Everyone knows Saturn because of her rings. Rather than one giant ring, Saturn has a system of rings that rotate around the equator and never touch the planet. Narrow ringlets of ice and rock particles (ranging in size from a grain of sand to the size of a house) come together to form the 7 major rings of Saturn. The particles are believed to come from asteroids, comets and pieces broken off of Saturn’s moons. The rings rotate at various speeds and can reach widths of almost 180,000 miles (300,000 kilometers) across. They may be wide, but they are not thick – they vary from 660 to 9,800 feet (200 to 3,000 meters). In some places the rings may only be as thick as a tall person. There are also several gaps in the rings, with the largest (the Cassini Divide) being 4,800 kilometers (3,000 miles) wide. This gap is caused by the gravitational force of one of Saturn’s moons, Mimas.

Saturn has 53 naturally orbiting moons. The moons are all uber interesting – some actually orbit right in the middle of the rings creating gaps. The largest of all the moons is Titan. Titan is the second largest moon in the galaxy (it’s bigger than mercury). It has a strong gravitational force and alters the orbit of some of Saturn’s other moons. Titan is the only moon in our solar system with an atmosphere. What makes its atmosphere even more interesting is that it is 95% nitrogen – the same as Earth’s early atmosphere. Studying Titan could teach scientists how the Earth formed billions of years ago.

Robert’s Out of This World Space Odyssey: Jupiter, The Big Boy

2010-03-15T11:36:00.003-04:00

Bring on the gas giants! And what better one to start with than the biggest planet in our solar system, Jupiter.

Jupiter is a big boy. In fact, it is so big that it Jupiter and its moons are basically a mini solar system within our own. When I say big, I mean big (compared to the other planets). It would take over 1,000 Earths to make something the size of Jupiter. Being so big makes it easy to see from Earth with the naked eye. Jupiter will be the second brightest planet in the sky (second to Venus). Because of its size, the ancient Romans named this planet after the king of their gods, Jupiter (the Greeks called it Zeus).

There is very little (if any) solid material on Jupiter – it is a giant ball of gas and liquid. It is comprised mostly of hydrogen and helium (more similar to the sun than the Earth), but there may be a very small solid metal core. If Jupiter was 80 times larger, it actually would have become a star and not a planet. Being so large also means it is the most massive (heaviest) planet, but since this weight is primarily Hydrogen and Helium (the two lightest elements), it is not very dense.

It takes this ball of gas 4,333 Earth days (about 12 years) to orbit around the sun. Jupiter can make one full rotation on its axis in 9 hours 56 minutes. That is faster than any other planet. Spinning so fast makes the center of Jupiter bulge out such that the diameter of the planet 7% larger at the equator than at the poles.

The average temperature of Jupiter (taken at the level we would consider ground level and also where any life would be, if there is any) is 70°F (21°C) – that is room temperature on Earth. Other than pleasant temperatures, the weather forecast on Jupiter calls for clouds and wind. The clouds are made of different chemicals that provide Jupiter with its fun colors. The high clouds of frozen ammonia are white and the darker blue clouds are found below them. The Great Red Spot is this planets most distinguishable beauty mark. It is a swirling spot of gas that is big enough for three Earths to fit inside of it. It really doesn’t move much and can shift colors from opaque to deep red (the color comes from small amounts of sulfur and phosphorous mixed with the ammonia crystals).

No giant planet wants to travel alone and Jupiter is no exception. This planetary rockstar has picked up a bunch of moons – 62 to be exact. The largest four, the Galilean moons (they were discovered by Galileo) are Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. Jupiter is so big that it even has enough gravity to hold a comet in orbit.

A little known fact to most people is that Jupiter also has rings. That’s right, take that Saturn, you’re not the only one! Discovered in a picture taken by Voyager 1, the rings of Jupiter encircle the planet right around the equator. Jupiter has 3 faint rings that are made of tiny partials (similar to the size of particles in cigarette smoke). The main ring is around 20 miles (30 kilometers) thick and has an outer edge approximately 80,000 miles (129,000 kilometers) from the center of the planet.

Happy Pi Day!!

2010-03-13T19:02:00.002-05:00

We need to take a quick break from the journey through space to give a giant Happy Birthday shout-out to pi!

Pi (π) is a constant used to describe the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. Pi is an irrational number, meaning that its decimal goes on forever with no pattern. This fantastic number has been calculated out to over 1 trillion decimal places!

π = 3.1415926535897932384626433832795028841971693993751058209 7494459230781640628620899862803482534211706798214808651 3282306647093844609550582231725359408128481117450284102 7019385211055596446229489549303819644288109756659334461 2847564823378678316527120190914564856692346034861045432 6648213393607260249141273724587006606315588174881520920 9628292540917153643678925903600113305305488204665213841 4695194151160943305727036575959195309218611738193261179 3105118548074462379962749567351885752724891227938183011 9491298336733624406566430860213949463952247371907021798 6094370277053921717629317675238467481846766940513200056 8127145263560827785771342757789609173637178721468440901 2249534301465495853710507922796892589235420199561121290 2196086403441815981362977477130996051870721134999999837 2978049951059731732816096318595024459455346908302642522 3082533446850352619311881710100031378387528865875332083 8142061717766914730359825349042875546873115956286388235 3787593751957781857780532171226806613001927876611195909 2164201989380952572010654858632788659361533818279682303 0195203530185296899577362259941389124972177528347913151 5574857242454150695950829533116861727855889075098381754 6374649393192550604009277016711390098488240128583616035 6370766010471018194295559619894676783744944825537977472 6847104047534646208046684259069491293313677028989152104 7521620569660240580381501935112533824300355876402474964 7326391419927260426992279678235478163600934172164121992 4586315030286182974555706749838505494588586926995690927 2107975093029553211653449872027559602364806654991198818 3479775356636980742654252786255181841757467289097777279 3800081647060016145249192173217214772350141441973568548 1613611573525521334757418494684385233239073941433345477 6241686251898356948556209921922218427255025425688767179 0494601653466804988627232791786085784383827967976681454 1009538837863609506800642251252051173929848960841284886 2694560424196528502221066118630674427862203919494504712 3713786960956364371917287467764657573962413890865832645 9958133904780275900994657640789512694683983525957098258 2262052248940772671947826848260147699090264013639443745 5305068203496252451749399651431429809190659250937221696 4615157098583874105978859597729754989301617539284681382 6868386894277415599185592524595395943104997252468084598 7273644695848653836736222626099124608051243884390451244 1365497627807977156914359977001296160894416948685558484 0635342207222582848864815845602850601684273945226746767 8895252138522549954666727823986456596116354886230577456 4980355936345681743241125150760694794510965960940252288 7971089314566913686722874894056010150330861792868092087 4760917824938589009714909675985261365549781893129784821 6829989487226588048575640142704775551323796414515237462 3436454285844479526586782105114135473573952311342716610 2135969536231442952484937187110145765403590279934403742 0073105785390621983874478084784896833214457138687519435 0643021845319104848100537061468067491927819119793995206 1419663428754440643745123718192179998391015919561814675 1426912397489409071864942319615679452080951465502252316 0388193014209376213785595663893778708303906979207734672 2182562599661501421503068038447734549202605414665925201 4974428507325186660021324340881907104863317346496514539 0579626856100550810665879699816357473638405257145910289 7064140110971206280439039759515677157700420337869936007 2305587631763594218731251471205329281918261861258673215 7919841484882916447060957527069572209175671167229109816 9091528017350671274858322287183520935396572512108357915 1369882091444210067510334671103141267111369908658516398 3150197016515116851714376576183515565088490998985998238 7345528331635507647918535893226185489632132933089857064 2046752590709154814165498594616371802709819943099244889 5757128289059232332609729971208443357326548938239119325 9746366730583604142813883032038249037589852437441702913 2765618093773444030707469211201913020330380197621101100 4492932151608424448596376698389522868478312355265821314 4957685726243344189303968642624341077322697802807318915 4411010446823252716201052652272111660396665573092547110 5578537634668206531098965269186205647693125705863566201 8558100729360659876486117910453348850346113657686753249... You get the point.

It's commonly shortened to 3.14, which is why Pi Day is celebrated on March 14th.

Happy Pi Day!

Robert’s Out of This World Space Odyssey: The Asteroid Belt, Where They Teach You to Hate Dinosaurs

2010-03-12T14:34:00.001-05:00

It’s time to say goodbye to the “Earth-like” rocky planets of the inner galaxy and move on to explore the gas giants. If you really were traveling from Mars to Jupiter, you would run into another major component of our galaxy: the asteroid belt.

The asteroid belt (the main belt) is an area of the solar system between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter that contains over 4,000 named asteroids that are just orbiting the sun (there are millions of asteroids total). The vast majority of the asteroids in our solar system can be found in the belt. That’s great and all, but if you don’t know what an asteroid is, then you probably do not care.

An asteroid is basically leftover material from the formation of our solar system about 4.6 billion years ago. Sometimes referred to as minor planets, asteroids are nothing more than pieces of space rock. These rocks are leftover because when Jupiter finished forming, it had such an affect that the material between it and Mars stopped forming as well, leaving us with the asteroid belt.

Asteroids are irregularly shaped and covered in collision marks. They all orbit the sun and even rotate – although it looks more like they are just tumbling along. They vary greatly in size. Ceres is the largest and is roughly 952 kilometers (592 miles) in diameter. This monster asteroid is said to contain 1/3 of the total mass of all asteroids. Others are not even a mile in diameter. The smallest asteroid ever discovered is barely 20 feet across. Some of the larger asteroids have small moons orbiting them. Several pair off (sometimes in groups of three) and orbit each other as they orbit the sun.

Getting through the asteroid belt isn’t a big deal. It is such a large space and the asteroids are typically rather small (in comparison to other things in space). If you took every asteroid in our solar system and put them together, you wouldn’t even be able to make something the size of our moon.

The asteroids within the belt are all unique and are classified into three main categories based on their composition. S-Types (stony) are made up of iron, nickel and silicates, M-Types (metallic) are made of metallic metals (i.e. nickel and iron) and C-Types are made of silicates and clay (these are the most common).

Jupiter is a big boy and has a ginormous gravitational field. As it orbits it is able to alter the belt and send some asteroids flying out of the belt in random directions throughout the galaxy. When an asteroid is sent our direction it is referred to as a near-Earth asteroid. Scientists are always tracking these crazy rocks. A near-Earth asteroid that collided with the Earth is believed to be what killed the dinosaurs.

Robert’s Out of This World Space Odyssey: Mars, Who Earth Would Borrow a Cup of Sugar From

2010-03-12T11:55:00.003-05:00

Wave to Earth as we pass by on our way to the next planet: Mars!

On a dark night, with a good idea where to look, you can see Mars from Earth. It will look like a bright red dot in the night sky. The ancient Romans named this planet after their god of war and destruction because of its blood red color.

Mars is Earth’s closest neighbor – only 33,900,000 miles (54,500,000 kilometers) away at its closest. Although not the smallest, Mars is no giant. It is about half the size of Earth. The planet does have a very thin atmosphere that is thick enough to have some clouds and weather patterns. The average temperature on Mars is -80°F (-60°C), but can range from -195°F (-125°C) at the poles to around 70°F (20°C) at the equator. Mars has a similar solar day to Earth that lasts 24 hours 39 minutes 35 seconds long. A year on Mars lasts 687 Earth days and is complete with seasons (thanks to a lovely tilt on the axis).

Just like all of the other rocky planets, Mars is covered with volcanoes, valleys, large continents, rocks, blah, blah, blah. Mars is famous for its color, which it gets from its dirt. The soil on Mars contains lots of iron-rich minerals which provide the lovely rust color. Unlike the other rocky planets, Mars does not have a magnetic field. So if you ever get lost there, don’t bother with a compass.

Accompanying Mars through its cosmic voyage are its two moons (satellites): Phobos and Deimos. Named after the two sons of the god Aries (the Greek version of the god Mars), these two moons are not exactly what you think of when you think of a moon. They are very small (Phobos is the largest with a diameter of 17 miles and then Deimos with a diameter of 9 miles) and irregularly shaped. In space, things become round because gravity pulls of them. These two moons are too small to have their own significant gravitational force. Although still debated, it is believed that these moons were actually asteroids that came a little too close to Mars and got stuck in orbit around the planet.

I would hope that all of you have at least heard about the missions to Mars. The world is very interested in studying our closest neighbor. Finding water on the surface of Mars was a huge deal and hints that life may be possible on this planet.

Robert’s Out of This World Space Odyssey: Venus, Earth’s Sweltering Sister

2010-03-11T10:32:00.005-05:00

The odyssey continues with Venus! Holding the title of Earth’s twin, no other planet is more similar to Earth then Venus. Named after the Ancient Roman goddess of love and beauty (because of its beautiful and bright appearance in the night sky), Venus is similar to Earth in size, mass, magnetism and composition. It is also the closest planet to the Earth. At its closest, Venus is only 23.7 million miles (38.2 million kilometers) away from you.

Orbiting the sun in almost a perfect circle (remember that the planets orbit in an elliptical shape), a year on Venus lasts 225 Earth Days. The ancient Mayans tracked Venus’ orbit and used it to create their calendar. One day (one rotation) on Venus takes approximately 243 Earth days. Combine those two numbers with some fancy-pants physics and math and you will figure out that one lunar day (sunrise to sunset) on Venus is about 117 Earth days long. To make that long day a little more fun, Venus decided to switch it up a little and rotate on its axis retrograde (east to west). Earth rotates prograde (west to east). That means on Venus, the sun rises in the west and sets in the east. If Earth did that, I wonder if they would change TV show times and make the Eastern Standard Time an hour earlier.

Above all else, the trait Venus is most known for is how hot this sassy little siren is! Venus has a thick atmosphere (actually, the densest in the universe) mostly comprised of carbon dioxide and clouds of sulfuric acid. Doesn’t that sound lovely? Heat from the sun gets trapped inside the atmosphere causing surface temperatures on Venus to soar well above 470°C (880°F). Venus is a great place to study global warming due to green house gasses. And what better to add to temperatures hot enough to melt iron then hurricane force winds and acid rain?

Giant clouds containing sulfuric acid whirl around the outer atmosphere of Venus at 360 kilometers (224 miles) per hour. The lower the clouds, the slower the wind. One the surface, wind speeds are estimated to be gentle breezes. In addition to the clouds pouring down sulfuric acid rain, they also produce lots of lightning.

If you can get past the intense weather, the surface of Venus is mostly large, flat, smooth plains. The plains are dotted with thousands of volcanoes. There are also 6 mountain ranges on the planet and a few impact creators.

If you want to see Venus, just look into the night sky – it will be the brightest thing you see. Like Mercury, it will creep across the face of the sun (a transit) twice within roughly a century. The transits occur close together and the next one will be June 6, 2012.

Robert’s Out of This World Space Odyssey: Mercury, the Littlest Planet

2010-03-11T09:41:00.002-05:00

Let the exploration of the Milky Way Galaxy commence! I posted about stars a few weeks ago, so now let’s talk about the planets! I heart all of the planets equally so we'll just talk about them in order, starting with Mercury...

Mercury is the small planet right next to the sun. It is the smallest planet in our solar system (about the size of Earth’s moon), but is the second (to Earth) most dense planet. Being dense basically means it is really heavy for its size (science people are cringing at this definition, but it works, so back off!). Mercury is the closest planet the sun. At its closest it is only 28,580,000 miles (46,000,000 kilometers) away from the sun’s surface. Being so close to the sun means daytime temperatures on the surface of this tiny planet reach a sweltering 430°C (800°F). Mercury does not have an atmosphere (atmospheres are like a big blanket - they can hold in warmth and keep out space trash) so a night on Mercury usually plummets to around -180°C (-290°F). Imagine dressing to go out for dinner.

Mercury is named after the Ancient Roman god, Mercury. Mercury (the god) was the FedEx god who could get places the fastest with his super-fly winged shoes. The name is fitting since the planet Mercury orbits the sun faster than any other planet. One year (a full rotation around the sun) takes Mercury 88 Earth days. A day on Mercury (one full rotation around the axis – an imaginary line running through the center of the planet) is 59 Earth days long. Since it is going around the sun so quickly, but rotating so slowly, it takes 176 Earth days to have 1 solar day (to go from sunrise to sunset). Isn’t that kind of bizarre?

Being so small and close to the sun makes seeing Mercury a little difficult. Thirteen times a century, Mercury will pass in front of the sun and people on Earth will be able to see the planet (this is called a transit). The next time we can do this is May 9, 2016.

In 1974-1975 the US space probe, Mariner 10, did flybys of Mercury and provided people on Earth with the first up close images of the planet. Basically, it looks like our moon – it’s full of craters and mountains created by comet and meteor impacts. Radar imaging done in 1991 shows that despite being so hot, the poles (which stay cold) may contain frozen water. NASA has the Messenger probe aimed at Mercury now. The probe did flyby pictures in 2008 and 2009. Messenger will settle into orbit around Mercury in 2011 and study the planet’s composition and magnetic field for a year.

Get Excited for Tomorrow!

2010-03-10T18:30:00.002-05:00

Throwing it back to when Pluto was still a planet...

A pair of genes that fight just right, and the radio up…

2010-03-10T11:49:00.011-05:00

"The capacity to blunder slightly is the real marvel of DNA. Without this special attribute, we would still be anaerobic bacteria and there would be no music." ~ Lewis Thomas

Alright friends, it’s time to get another bio basic under your belt. Let’s talk DNA. It is constantly referenced in everyday life (and in this blog) and it is important to know at least the basics (I took an entire class on DNA – the science world knows a LOT! I’m keeping it basic).

Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA) is the basis of life. Every living organism, from single cell bacteria to humans, has the exact same basic structure of DNA. It is a long strand (polymer) of repeating units called nucleotides. A nucleotide has a backbone made up of a phosphate group and a sugar (a 5 carbon sugar called 2-deoxyribose). Hanging off of the sugar is one of four bases: adenine, guanine, cytosine, and thymine. These are the A, G, C, T that you remember hearing about in high school. This basic structure (a phosphate, a sugar and a base) makes up a single nucleotide. The nucleotides are then strung together to make a long chain of nucleotides by having the phosphate of one nucleotide bond with the sugar of another (creating a very strong phosphodiester bond – my favorite type of bond). To stabilize itself, DNA forms a double stranded molecule that twists around itself in a helix. The bases of each nucleotide will form hydrogen bonds with matching bases until there is a double stranded helical structure.

Dig deep and try to remember… A pairs with T and G pairs with C…

The order of these bases is what is important. There are a lot of proteins that are able to read DNA and turn the code created by the bases into proteins that can create living things. Everything you are made of and how you look and function comes from your DNA. The same is true for all living organisms. Ninety-nine percent of all human DNA has the same order of bases. The remaining 1% is what makes each person a little different from the next.

DNA is tiny, but it is super long. It will end up coiling itself up to save space. I mean, it does need to fit inside the nucleus of almost every cell in your body (I won’t go into mitochondrial DNA). In humans, DNA coils up and forms linier structures called chromosomes. We have 22 pairs on non-sex chromosomes (autosomal) and one pair of sex chromosomes (X and Y). The chromosomes come in identical pairs because that is what your body needs to have when it copies the DNA before a cell divides. DNA replication – that’s a whole other post.

When you talk about all the DNA in an organism, you are referring to the organism’s genome. The human genome contains around 3 billion base pairs. There are about 20,000-25,000 genes in the human genome, meaning that only around 2% of the 3 billion base pairs actually code for known things. The rest is random DNA or Junk DNA. Yup, that really is the scientific term for it, Junk DNA. It is not really “junk” and may/probably has a function, but scientists just don’t know what that function is.

DNA has a lot of other fun aspects to it. For instance, bacterial DNA comes in circular, not liner chromosomes. Organisms that live in more extreme environments often have higher G-C base pairings in their DNA. Guanine (G) binds with Cytosine (C) using three hydrogen bonds (compared to Adenine (A) and Thymine (T) using two) making it stronger and harder to break apart. DNA can come in a variety of helix types and has major and minor grooves which serve several functions… I could go on and on…

I think this is a good start to DNA. It should help demystify this crazy little double helix inside of you!

Roses are red, violets are blue…

2010-03-09T14:21:00.003-05:00

It is such a pretty day outside – spring is finally on its way! The flowers are getting ready to start blooming and I am going to share with you a tidbit of information about tulips.

Tulips have been one of the most desired flowers throughout history. The flowers came to Europe in the mid-16th century and became uber popular in the Netherlands where they were a luxury that showed status. In the early 17th century the Netherlands actually went through a period of economic boom and collapse called Tulip Mania. The cost of tulips and their bulbs skyrocketed (around $2,500 a bulb) and then crashed – almost taking the entire Dutch economy down with it and leaving the region in a deep depression. Out of all the tulip colors, the ones most prized were the multi-colored varieties. These were special tulips, but first, a little tulip science…

Tulips (from the genus Tulipa) are flowers from the family Liliaceae (the lily family). They are perennials; meaning they will grow and flower in the spring and summer, die off in the fall and winter, but live and repeat this cycle for at least 2 years. Some species are even able to grow in the snow. They start life a bulb (just a modified seed) and grow to be anywhere from 5-24 inches tall.

Tulips can come in almost any color you can think of, but like I said before, most people have always wanted the multi-colored varieties. Obviously these are the rarest and therefore can be the most expensive. Little did people know that these flames, bars, feathers and streaks of colors on the tulip are actually caused by a virus.

The virus was identified and named in the early 20th century: The Tulip Breaking Virus (TBV). TBV is a potyvirus (a virus that only affects plants) that was carried from tulip to tulip via tiny plant eating insects called aphids. Aphids were common little pests in European gardens. The virus would get transmitted into the tulip and inhabit every cell of the plant, however it would only manifest in the outer layers (epidermis) of the colored petals. The virus would cause breaking of the color pigments, allowing a lighter color to show through. Sometimes the virus would cause the color pigments to intensify, creating darker streaks of color. Despite being pretty, infected plants were smaller, weaker and did not live as long.

Luckily the virus has basically been eradicated and commercial tulip growers can now genetically modify and selectively breed the plants to get the same look.

Kiss me goodbye, I'm defying gravity…

2010-03-04T10:50:00.002-05:00

Witches are found in almost every culture of the world and date back to the beginnings of civilization. What’s crazy is that many of the traditional witch images and stereotypes are actually rooted in science; my favorite example being how witches fly on broomsticks.

Early Modern period Europeans believed a witch could disguise their magic wand as a broom or even temporarily hold spirits within their broom. Most importantly, witches used their brooms to fly across the night sky, conducting evil and getting to their Sabbath. Although there were accounts of it prior, the first officially reported case of a witch flying on a broomstick was in 1453. It’s crazy, but it actually is possible to fly on a broomstick – kind of…

One part of broomstick lore that has seem to been forgotten by popular culture is that before riding the broom, a witch first had to cover it in a flying ointment. There are several recipes recovered for the ointment and all contained several herbs that were stocked full of alkaloids (carbon compounds with nitrogen in them) including atropine and scopolamine. By heating some toxic plants found in the Solanaceae family and adding some animal fats, a nice little oil could be made. This totally organic oil was actually highly hallucinogenic.

These are very odd ingredients to be using – the plants were known to be toxic by ingestion. No normal villager would actually go out to find them, let alone make anything with them. Reports of witches boiling these crazy ointments, comprised of bizarre and poisonous plants and animal fats, are where the images of a witch’s cauldron come from.

The broomstick was coated in the ointment and used as an applicator to the body. Although the ointment was toxic by ingestion, it was slowly absorbed across the skin making it safer. A witch riding a broom covered in this brew would end up getting it all over themselves. As it absorbed across the skin, the witch would begin tingling (the magic must be kicking in) and would start hallucinating – complete with out of body experiences. As they jumped and ran around on their broom, they would feel as though they were flying high. Well, they may not have been flying, but they sure were high. Imagine how creepy it is to see people today hallucinating – now imagine how scary it would have been if you saw this as a non-scientific thinking early European. You would think it was the devil’s magic.

There are even a few accounts of witches using the boom as an applicator to the “lady cavern of no return”. The thin membranes would have absorbed the oil faster and the tingling sensation would have been pleasurable. A few noises from the pleasure and, just like that, you have the stereotypical witch’s cackle!

Thanks to the scientific properties of some indigenous plants, humans were able to create an entire vision and culture of witches!

Now I am going to listen to the Wicked soundtrack on repeat for the rest of the day.

Let’s All Just Get Along!

2010-03-03T11:55:00.004-05:00

It's time for Bio 101 - let's talk about symbiosis (mainly because I am constantly trying to reference it in other posts). Symbiosis is a very straightforward topic, but it is still really interesting when you find examples of it in nature.

Symbiosis is a term used by biologists (specifically ecologists) to refer to the close and often life-long interactions between two or more different species. These relationships can occur between any living thing and examples are found everywhere.

Symbiosis is divided into three specific types of relationships: mutualistic, commensal, and parasitic.

Mutualism is a relationship where both (or all) species involved benefit from the relationship. Remember yesterday's post – I told you how we have lots of bacteria living in our colon? Well our relationship with these bacteria is a mutualistic relationship. The bacteria help us break down and digest food. In exchange we provide it a safe and happy home with plenty of food and water. We are both gaining from this partnership. By far the most popular example of mutualism is between sea anemones and clownfish. Clownfish have evolved an adaptation that makes them immune to the stings of the sea anemone. When a clownfish needs to hide from a predator, it can swim deep inside the anemone for protection. In exchange, the clownfish protects the anemone from its predator, the butterflyfish.

Commensalism is a relationship where one species benefits while the other species is not affected (positively or negatively). An example of this is the relationship between the cattle egret and grazing animals. As horses, cows, sheep and other livestock trample over fields feeding, they tend to stir up a lot of insects. Knowing this, the egret follows herds of animals and eats all of the insects they stir up into the air. The egret uses the livestock for an easy dinner and the livestock leave unaffected.

The last relationship is parasitism. This is when one species benefits at the expense of another. This is a tricky relationship because parasites need to be careful that they are not so damaging that they don't allow reproduction of their own species before they kill their host species (a parasite doesn't always kill its host). Parasites also have to be smart because no species is going to just allow itself to be exploited. Parasites need to be able to handle fighting off immune responses and other protective mechanisms of the host species. A popularly known human parasite is the tapeworm. Ugh, worms gross me out so I am not even going to talk about them.

Scientists did what scientist do best and broke down these main categories even more, but this is the basics. A nice easy little hump day treat!

It’s Not Science – Get over It

2010-03-03T11:40:00.001-05:00

Good morning, friends!

To start, I want to say thank you to every single one of you for reading and following my blog. If you asked me three months ago, I would have never imagined how much I really do enjoy blogging! It has gotten to the point I feel awkward if I don’t post during the day. And ask any of my friends; whenever we are out and about, I am constantly coming up with ideas to blog about (I have a great running list on my phone). These posts really keep me excited about science and remind me how amazing the natural universe really is - I hope they do the same for you!

I have set a goal for myself to get at least 10 new followers a month, so please help me by telling your friends about your favorite posts.

Remember that I am always open to suggestions about post topics! Just shoot me an email at roberts.random.facts@gmail.com.

Also, today I became a member of the 20 Something Bloggers. This is a network of bloggers who are all in their twenties. There are some great blogs you can access from their site, so take a look.

Finally, I just want to give snaps to the District! Today is the first day gay couples can apply for a marriage license in DC! What a great way to kick off the spring wedding season!

Thanks again to all of you for reading, following, and commenting on my posts. It really does mean a lot to me!

xoxo

Someone Crack a Window!

2010-03-02T11:48:00.004-05:00

Happy Tuesday, friends! Today’s post is one of my best friend’s favorite facts and will be one of yours too if you enjoy a second graders humor. It is also something you will always remember and think about…

Why is your colon shaped the way it is?
As always, let’s start with the basics…

The human colon is a key part of the digestive tract and is present to remove excess water and salts from your solid waste. There are four portions of the human colon (the ascending colon, the transverse colon, the descending colon and the sigmoid colon) and when you take those four sections and add the rectum and cecum, you get the large intestine. The large intestine is a little shy of 2 meters long. Chyme (contents of digestion) comes into the colon already striped of the vast majority of its nutrients and water. As muscle contractions (peristalsis) move the chyme along, it comes in contact with your body’s lovely supply of gut bacteria that help turn the chyme into feces (that’s the scientific word for poop – just in case you didn’t know). The feces will move into the rectum, which will fill and stretch until nerve endings on the internal recto-anal sphincter tell the body it’s time to hit up a bathroom. A sphincter if like a valve – it can open and close to allow things to move through or not. Your internal sphincter is involuntary (meaning you cannot control it), but thankfully your external recto-anal sphincter is voluntary. As a baby you learn to control this sphincter to regulate when you should get rid of your last meal.

Another byproduct of digestion is gas production. Gas can build up in your body in lots of different ways: forming from the breaking down of food, swallowing air, production by the bacteria in your colon, etc. This gas is known as flatus and is a mixture comprised mostly of nitrogen and oxygen. Just like chyme, flatus is passed through the colon via peristalsis and when it hits that internal sphincter, nerves send messages to the brain that it is time to crack a window. Luckily, just like with feces, flatus can be controlled with the external sphincter.

Basic anatomy and physiology, done - back to the question: why is it shaped the way it is?

If you look at a cross section of your colon (the majority of your large intestine, really), you will see it is not just a hollow tube. It would look more like a scrunchie (with wavy edges that are able to stretch, creating an irregular internal tube appearance) rather than a straw (with smooth internal edges and a constant diameter). This is for a very simple reason.

As peristalsis moves the flatus and feces through your large intestine, it is going to move at different rates and eventually run into each other. The irregular shape and ability to stretch helps allow the gas to move around and past the feces. If it were shaped like a smooth, rigid tube, the gas would build up behind the feces and create lots of pressure. The gas would push the feces through the colon too quickly to be properly processed. That pressure would also be very painful and trying to hold it in would probably be a waste of time. Worst of all, it would also mean every time you passed gas, you would go #2 too. Thanks to evolution, you can release gas and still hold in your #2 until you can get somewhere to get rid of it.

Kind of a gross post, but think about how impressive the body is to figure out that it needs to be designed this way!

And the next time you make a stinky, you are totes going to think about this post.

The Birdcage: A Story of Queens in Feathers

2010-03-01T15:51:00.006-05:00

Today’s topic was a request by my cousin. Despite my deep hatred and fear of birds (yes, I hate them - like, hate hate hate them), I love her enough to do a post about the Birds of Paradise.

I will say that if I did have to pick a bird to like, these would win.

Birds of Paradise is the common name given to 38 species of birds that are all members of the Paradisaeidae family. The majority of these species (34 of the 38) can only be found on New Guinea and its closely surrounding islands. These birds are similar in anatomy and diet to their ugly step-cousin, the crow, but what sets them apart are their looks and attitude. The Birds of Paradise are the divas of the avian world.

Varying greatly between species, Birds of Paradise come in almost neon colors. These are some pretty birds, with everything from brightly colored and elongated feathers (referred to as streamers) to enormous head plumes and fans. The males are usually the brightest and most ornate so they attract the ladies. Girl birds are not that shallow though – they need more than looks.

Male birds will spend a large portion of their time trying to impress the super critical females. A boy will clear away large areas to serve as a stage and then gather an audience of girl birds to come watch him perform. He will spend hours dancing around, showing off his feathers and showing how fast he can run. These shows are meticulously rehearsed and perfect by the time an audience is here. Good thing because the females are not a nice audience – they will leave if they don’t like the show. This male obsession with getting all pretty and then performing is why Ed Scholes of New York’s Museum of Natural History refers to the male Birds of Paradise as drag queens. And we all know that makes me like these birds a little more.

So why did evolution make bird drag queens?

Looking pretty and showing off to attract a mate is nothing out of the ordinary, but these birds take it to a whole other level. No other animal puts this much energy towards being flashy. This much attention on superficial things takes away from energy that could be spent on getting food. The shows put on by the males for the females do not even demonstrate what a good nest builder, food gatherer or protector the male is. Not to mention, performing in the middle of a wide open stage in an elaborate costume is a giant, “come and eat me” sign to predators.

This wouldn’t fly anywhere but New Guinea. It’s a classic, “location, location, location!” The birds of paradise live in a paradise. The island of New Guinea may be swarming with countless species of birds, but there are no mammal predators that want to eat them or compete with them for food. With no need to worry about finding food or protecting themselves, the birds have more time to look pretty. Sexual selection began favoring the prettier birds because being attractive became important to these species. Being a Bird of Paradise is as tough as being a model at fashion week in Paris – only the prettiest survive. If you think about it, finding a mate based on looks and not having to worry about survival skills is a lot like human dating.

So from one diva to another, keep dancing you sassy feathered queens!

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water…

2010-02-26T11:29:00.004-05:00

Jellyfish are some of the ocean’s most graceful swimmers. I personally think watching them swim is very soothing. All jellyfish are found in the phylum Cnidaria (meaning they are not fish at all and are actually closely related to coral), but come in lots of diverse species that can be found at every depth of every ocean on the planet. Some species even live in freshwater. They are relatively simple organisms with no specialized digestive, circulatory, nervous or respiratory systems. These fragile animals (they are 98% water) have a fun life cycle with two distinct stages...

… I’ll keep the background information to a minimum (look it up if you’re interested) and get to the more interesting part…

When you think of jellyfish, you are probably not thinking about their lifecycle. You are actually envisioning how scary it would be if you fell into the middle of a bloom of jellies (more than one jellyfish = a bloom) and got stung to death! Hopefully that will never happen to you, but if it did wouldn’t you want to know how they were stinging you?

Members of the phylum Cnidaria have specialized stinging structures called cnidae (the phylum is named after these structures). When you think of a jellyfish, chances are you are imagining a species with a specific type of cnidae called a nematocyst.

Warning: I am going to talk about 2 different things: nematocyst and nematocyte. I won’t bring up the nematoblast. Just try to keep them straight.

All along the tentacles of a jellyfish (and in some species, a few other places) are specialized cells called nematocytes. Inside these cells are the long, hollow, tubular nematocysts; all coiled up and covered in barbs. Now let’s say you are swimming and you happen to brush your leg up against a jellyfish. This is what happens…

First, by coming in contact with the tentacle, you touched a small hair-like structure (cilium) that acts as a trigger. Once triggered, the trapdoor to the nematocyte cell (operculum) will spring open and allow the nematocyst to fly out at you. Like a glove with a finger inside out, the nematocyst will pop out while twisting. This twisting motion, coupled with a forceful discharge and sharp barbs, will drill through your skin. Thousands of nematocysts can be fired into your skin within an instant of a second. Once in you, the barbs will keep the nematocysts embedded in your skin and also serve as the deposit sites of the jellyfish venom. Depending on the species, this venom may be an issue.

The toxins are not well studied and their effects range from bursting surrounding cells, to rupturing red blood cells, to shutting down the central nervous system. Stay away from the venom of a Sea Wasp or Portuguese Man-of-War.

The nematocyst remains in the victim, so jellyfish are constantly making new ones. It takes about 2 days.

It is unknown how jellyfish actually fire their nematocysts with such force. It only takes 2 milliseconds to fire these little spears with around 140 atmospheres of pressure.

Flippin' your fins you don't get too far, Legs are required for jumpin' dancin'...

2010-02-25T16:19:00.008-05:00

For Valentine’s Day, I went with a friend to see Disney on Ice. It was magical. Obviously all of the princesses were there including Ariel (the little mermaid for you morons that don’t know who that is). In honor of Ariel, I am going to post about real mermaids today. OK, really they are just humans born with a birth defect that makes them look like mermaids.

Sirenomelia (mermaid syndrome) is a super rare (1 in 100,000 live births) congenital birth defect where the newborn’s legs are fused together, appearing to look like a mermaid’s tail. Sirenomelia is not a genetic disorder and occurs randomly. A mom can have tons of healthy children, then a child with this disorder and go on to have more normal babies. The exact cause is not certain, but there are two main theories.

The first is the theory of caudal regression syndrome. Under this explanation, sirenomelia is caused by the failure of the cells within the caudal mesodermal axis. This includes a failure of both axial and intermediate mesodermal cells… just kidding (that was a line from a paper I wrote in an embryology class about sirenomelia). Basically this theory just says there are problems with the developing baby’s cells and therefore the cells end up developing improperly.

A second possible cause of sirenomelia is the vascular steal theory. Babies born with sirenomelia are usually from pregnancies associated with the presence of only a single umbilical artery (there should be two). This one umbilical artery is believed to “steal” blood supply (and thus oxygen supply) away from the developing embryo, mainly the lower (caudal) portion. Not enough oxygen means poor development.

Those born with sirenomelia suffer from a lot of other complications besides just fused legs. Most are born with messed up bone structures (lubrosacral and pelvic bone abnormalities), kidney development failure (bilateral renal agenesis), a malformed rectum (anorectal atresia) and malformed or completely absent boy/girl parts (agenesis of the external genitalia). These are serious complications and often lead to death within 2 days of birth. Depending on the severity of the condition and availability of health care, surgery may be an option to survive sirenomelia. There are only four known cases of children with sirenomelia living into childhood.

Talk about a welcome to the world!

2010-02-24T20:49:00.004-05:00

Giraffes (Giraffa camelopardalis) are some of my favorite animals and have been since I was little. There are a lot of fun facts about the worlds tallest land species, like how they only have 7 vertebrae - the same number as all other mammals (including humans). What I think is most amazing about this species is how they come into the world.

After a girl giraffe meets a boy giraffe and they fall in love and call the giraffe stork, the girl giraffe will spend around 15 months pregnant. Then one day, a baby giraffe will start popping out - literally, it just starts popping out of the mom. The mother will deliver her baby while standing to prevent squishing the baby. Just like all other mammals, the mom will push until gravity takes over and pulls the 1.8 meter tall (6 foot) baby out. The baby giraffe will enter the world in free fall.

The newborn will fall 1.5 meters (5 feet) to the ground - basically landing on its head. Then the embryonic sack will burst. At this point momma giraffe bends over and starts nudging at and licking her newborn to make sure it is alive. Mom will also start making the baby giraffe try to stand. The newborn will be able to stand and walk within the hour. In nature this helps protect the baby from getting attacked and eaten by predators.

Tell me that is not an intense way to enter the world!

Here is a great clip I found, but I will warn you, this is an actual giraffe birth. It is not that gross, but maybe not watch this while eating.

‘Cause I’d get a thousand hugs, from ten thousand lightning bugs…

2010-02-24T09:25:00.002-05:00

I don’t know about you, but I’m over this winter. And now we have more snow coming to DC tonight – bleh! I am so ready to be sitting outside at Screen on the Green on a warm, humid night, with a lovely little picnic, some wine and my amazing friends! The next time you are doing something like that outside in the summer, point out the fireflies around you and then inform everyone with you how and why fireflies create their light…

Fireflies are actually nocturnal (roam the night) beetles (in the order Coleoptera) and are sometimes referred to as lightning bugs. There are approximately 2,000 species of fireflies around the world, but no matter where you find them, all of them create their light using a process called bioluminescence. In the abdomen of fireflies there are specialized light-emitting organs. Within these organs can be found an enzyme called luciferase. Luciferase mixes with another enzyme (luciferin) and if oxygen is also present, some basic (but too technical for this post) chemistry occurs and then, voila, the firefly has a butt that is glowing! Very simple mechanism: two enzymes and oxygen. Uric acid containing cells in the abdomen act like mirrors and help reflect the light out and away from the firefly’s body. Although scientists know how the light is made, it is still unclear how fireflies regulate the light.

Each species of firefly has a unique flashing pattern that they use to attract a mate. Depending on the species, the flashes can range from quick flashes to long light burst. Some species of tropical fireflies can even get together and synchronize their flashes. While still a baby (larval) firefly, the flash is a way to keep away predators.

To be completely fair, I have to say there are a few species of firefly that are diurnal (they roam about during the day and night) and most of them do not produce any light. Why would you if you lived during the day? The ones that do still produce light tend to stay in the shade of trees.

Totally unrelated, but still a fun fact: Female fireflies deposit their eggs underground. When the larval fireflies hatch they stay underground and eat worms and slugs by injecting them with a numbing solution. When they grow into adults they eat pollen and nectar and some stop eating altogether.

Back since the days of old Methuselah, Everyone loves the big bambooz-a-ler…

2010-02-23T15:54:00.003-05:00

I’m not much of a plant person, but every so often I learn about a plant that definitely deserves snaps.

Methuselah is the oldest known living (non-clonal) organism in existence. It is 4,842 years old! It was germinated (popped out of its seed) in 2832 BC!

Helpful clarification: A non-clonal organism means that it was created sexually and not just the product of asexual reproduction where all offspring are genetically identical to the parent (i.e. bacteria).

Methuselah is a Great Basin Bristlecone Pine (Pinus longaeva) that is named after the biblical figure, Methuselah that was said to have lived for 969 years. For being so old, Methuselah is still happy as can be – growing and thriving and still producing seeds. If you want to see Methuselah – good luck! It is happily growing in the “Forest of the Ancients” in California’s White Mountains, but the exact location of the tree is being kept a well guarded secret to prevent stupid people from messing with it.

I don't care what people say, I still love the sport!

2010-02-23T11:51:00.004-05:00

In honor of the Olympics I am going to talk about one of the major natural phenomena that almost all of the winter athletes have to take into account: friction.

Friction is a force resisting motion of solids, liquid layers and elements in contact. Basically, friction is the force opposite of motion. When you think of friction, you are probably thinking about kinetic friction. This is the friction created by two objects when moving relative to each other. A specific type of kinetic friction is fluid friction. This is when a solid object moves over/through a liquid of gas. Friction is created because of charge particles.

Flashback: Every object is comprised of little tiny itsy bitsy molecules that have charges.
Molecules have a nucleus with a positive charge (protons are positive and neutrons are charge neutral) and the nucleus is surrounded by negatively charged electrons. Most molecules end up have an overall net charge of zero, but charges can change.

When two objects move past one another, their charged particles are passing one another. You should know that two opposite charges do not like one another. When charged particles are forced past other charged particles, resistance (friction) and heat (thermal energy) is created. Need a visual? Rub your hands together. They don’t just slid past one another easily (friction) and they will start to warm up (thermal energy).

That was a nice little intro into friction, but trust me, after taking physics you will learn there is a LOT more to friction (actually, I feel like I say that in almost every post – I guess just know I am giving you very basic foundations of scientific knowledge in these posts). Now I want to apply it to one of my favorite winter sports: curling.

In curling, a person pushes their stone down the ice in hopes of knocking the opponents stones out of the way and landing closest to the center of the target - very simple concept, but lots of physics to think about.

After the stone is released, friction between the stone and the ice will cause the stone to gradually slow until it stops. To reduce this friction, the ice of curling matches is not smooth. It is sprayed with water to create a surface with lots of tiny ice bumps. This reduces the amount of ice surface area the curling stone will come in contact with and thereby reduces the amount of friction the stone will encounter. Sweeping the path in front of the stone creates friction and the thermal energy (heat) actually smoothes and softens the ice a little (about 1.5 degrees) to help guide the curling stone. Until very recently people thought the ice being swept in front of the stone actually melted – thermal imaging cameras destroyed that theory a few months ago. The sweeping actually only softens the ice.

Researchers were hired by the Canadian government to study the physics of curling (they released the data above) and I would love to tell you more of the results they found, but the Canadian government has them under confidentiality contracts until June 2010. Canada really wants gold this year!

Here is a link to a video with footage of the thermal imaging cameras: http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2010/02/05/f-tech-physics-curling.html?ref=rss

Well maybe if Kathie Lee was selling it to me...

2010-02-18T22:57:00.001-05:00

Are people really this stupid?

2010-02-18T13:41:00.004-05:00

Last night while taking a break from the Olympics and watching Will and Grace, I saw two back-to-back commercials that really annoyed me…

The first was for Lysol’s new, *touch free* antibacterial soap dispenser. Apparently every kitchen needs one to prevent the spreading of germs. Ok, stop and think for a second – stopping the spread of germs on a bottle of soap. Besides the fact I cannot stand when people use the word germ (that will be another post), the biggest issue I had with this commercial is that you are about to wash your hands! Who cares if “germs” get on the soap pump – anyone that touches it is going to wash their hands anyways!

The second commercial was for antibacterial Windex. Who the hell needs their windows to be free of bacteria? Am I missing something? Do people lick their windows every so often? Not to mention, what bacteria (that will bother a human) can actually survive and grow on glass? It is not exactly an ideal place to live and find nutrients. I acknowledge that Windex is a multi-surface cleaner, but has anyone taken the time to read the fine print? It claims Windex kills 99.9% of common household germs, but then there is a “‡”. What this double dagger then goes on to tell us (if you go to the website) is that 99.9% means 7 bacterial species. And to kill 3 of those 7, including salmonella and E. coli, you need to spray it on the surface until wet, allow it to sit for 5 minutes and then wipe clean. Who does that? No one!

This is true for almost all of the products that claim they kill 99.9% of common household germs. They only kill a few types of bacteria and most of the time they don’t even do that because people do not use the product correctly. Oh yeah, and don’t forget that most diseases are actually viral and are therefore not even affected by antibacterial products.

UGH! Sorry, that was a little bit of a vent/rant, but this is just a topic that really bothers me. What should you take out of this (besides the obvious – don’t buy those two products)?

You don’t need to use antibacterial soap. Soap is a very simple molecule to understand. To save you boring chemistry, just know that when soap is in water is able to encapsulate dirt, oil and bacteria. It basically forms a little bubble around the particles. Once encapsulated, it can easily be rinsed off and down the drain. Regular old soap, by its very chemical nature, is antibacterial! The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that antibacterial soaps are pointless and the best thing a person can do is wash with ordinary soap and warm water. But people are scared of bacteria so companies got smart and started marketing antibacterial soap.

To make something antibacterial manufacturers will add other chemicals, usually triclosan. Triclosan will kill bacteria, but only if left on the surface for around 2 minutes. Who takes that long to wash their hands? Some bacteria have also been reported to have become resistant to triclosan and antibacterial resistance is a HUGE issue. If you have soap that contains triclosan – throw it out! Soaps can also add alcohol or small amounts of phenol to kill bacteria, but these types of soaps really should be reserved for people in medical and bioresearch fields.

He got big ego, such a huge ego...

2010-02-16T15:35:00.008-05:00

A dear friend of mine (who is also about to become a year older) found these pictures for me. I'm a visual kind of guy so obvi I love them!

The first couple images are straight forward...

Sirius (a fairly close star) is the brightest star in Earth’s night sky. Pollux is 34 light years away and is the brightest star in the Gemini constellation. Arcturus is the second brightest star visible from the northern hemisphere (3rd brightest overall) and is the brightest in the constilation Boötes.

Rigel is a blue supergiant that is the sixth brightest star in the sky. It is the brightest star in the constellation Orion. Aldebaran is an orange giant star that is the brightest star in the constellation Taurus. It is 65 light years away from us. Now for the big boys…

Betelgeuse is a red supergiant and is one of the biggest stars known to be in existence. It is 640 light years away and is the second brightest (second to Rigel) star in Orion. Based on lots of complex math, Betelgeuse has a diameter estimated to be around 1000 times that of our sun. Betelgeuse is expected to become a supernova (see my past post about stars) within the next 1000 years. When this happens it will be so bright that it when people look up at the night sky from earth, it will be brighter than the moon!

Antares is also a red supergiant that is 600 light years away. It is the brightest star in the constellation Scorpius. This star is HUGE with a diameter of around 1,600 times the size of our sun. If you replaced our sun with Antares, it would eat up the inner planets and have its outer border between Mars and Jupiter.

What’s crazy is that there are almost certainly even bigger stars that we have just never seen!
If that doesn’t make you feel small and humble to the universe, you have an ego problem!

And here is the website the pictures are from, if you're interested: http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/9LspdV/www.rense.com/general72/size.htm

This one blows my mind!

2010-02-03T10:27:00.002-05:00

This girl, who does not even have a vagina, performed oral sex, got stabbed in the stomach and then got pregnant because sperm got into her abdominal cavity while doctors were fixing her stomach. How crazy is this?!

I told you how hard it actually is to get pregnant (that’s a way back post) – This is just crazy!

Here is the link to the story at abc news:
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Wellness/incredible-sperm-survived-oral-sex-knife-fight-impregnated/story?id=9732562&page=1

Charlie the Unicorn!

2010-02-02T10:45:00.003-05:00

Sorry sorry sorry!! I know I said I was going to post yesterday, but then I got swamped at work and just didn’t have the time. But today is a fun post. It’s about unicorns!

Well, actually it’s about the unicorn whale, the Narwhal.

The Narwhal is a cute little whale (if 3,500 lbs is little) found in the Atlantic and Russian portions of the Arctic. The most conspicuous feature of these animals is their large tusks. Inuit legend claims that one day a woman was hunting whale. She tied the rope to her harpoon around her waist and after harpooning a large Narwhal, she was pulled into the freezing water. She was transformed into a Narwhal herself and her long twisted hair became the tusk. Cute idea. Besides the obvious issue with the story, tucks are also only found on male whales.

So a tusk, huh? Of course I am going to ask a scientist’s favorite question: why?

First, what is this tusk? It is actually a left-spiraled incisor tooth that projects from the left side of the upper jaw. They are usually between 2-3 meters long (7-10 ft) and weigh about 10kg (22 lbs).

The most obvious reason for the evolutionary purpose of these tusks is for sexual bravado. A bigger tusk makes you a better man because you can fight with it and it looks pretty. This would mean that the tusk is important in creating social hierarchy within the group and would determine social ranks. Usually when this is the case, an animal uses its “bravado tool” – it shows it off or fights with it. The Narwhal has never really been seen fighting with its tusk. It hasn’t even been seen using it as a tool to break ice.

Recent studies by a Harvard professor found that the tusk is covered by millions of highly sensitive neurons. These neurons act as the whale’s environment detector. They are able to detect changes in temperature, pressure, salinity and water particle concentration. These are all things that are very important to survival.

The science community is still not sold on the sensor theory as the sole reason for these tusks. I think it is a little of everything - classic, “my rod is bigger than yours and I can feel things with it.”

Sorry, I was a little MIA

2010-02-01T10:02:00.001-05:00

Hi friends!

I have to apologize for not posting last week – I know, I suck. For a bunch of reasons, I just needed to take the week off and focus. But don’t fret, I am still going to post and keep this blog updated with lovely little science tidbits. I’ll have a post for you a little later today.

Look! I know some physics!

2010-01-27T19:43:00.001-05:00

I totes had a case of the Mondays

2010-01-25T16:23:00.005-05:00

Hi everyone – Happy Monday!

Sorry for the late post, but I was just very busy today and I am still recovering from my weekend in NYC. Here is a very quick, basic and fun fact:

The San Andreas fault runs north-south through California. It is about 800 miles long and is the fault that causes so many earthquakes out there (reason #5454687 why I will never move to the west coast). This plates on either side of this fault slip past each other (right-lateral strike-slip) and actually move about 2 inches every year. This movement has gone on since the earth was created and will not be stopping any time soon. That means in about 15 million years, LA and San Fran will end up merging into one another.

And here is a little more info for you...
(I need an accent - it always makes a person just sound smarter)

“Still Hungry for a Cure!”

2010-01-21T11:08:00.003-05:00

Good morning friends! I hope everyone is having a lovely day! Today’s post is going to be about another interesting genetic disorder: Prader-Willi Syndrome (PWS).

Every human has lots and lots of DNA. All of you DNA is packaged up ever-so-carefully by your cells and stored in coiled bars known as chromosomes. Humans have 23 chromosomal pairs: one set from your mom and one set from your dad. Problems with your chromosomes can lead to some major problems in life. And this is the case with Prader-Willi Syndrome. PWS is caused by a problem on a person’s 15th chromosome. Several of the genes on the chromosome from the mom are disrupted and turned off (science jargon: silenced due to imprinting) and/or some of the genes on the chromosome from the dad are missing (deleted). The genes messed up are ones associated with regulating appetite. This is not a disorder created by one little DNA slip-up – a bunch of things are missing. The majority of time these chromosomal issues happen randomly at the time of conception. Very rarely will a parent pass this mutation along to another child. PWS is considered a rare disorder, but a very common rare disorder. Anywhere from one in 12,000 to 15,000 children are born with this disorder.

Ok, so a screwed up 15th chromosome… but what is PWS?

People living with PWS are never full – really, they are always hungry. A flaw in the part of the brain (hypothalamus) that controls hunger makes these people constantly looking to eat. They can become consumed with thoughts of food and eating. PWS also creates a metabolism that requires a lot less calories per day than a typical person. Needing fewer calories coupled with always being hungry can be a very dangerous and potentially fatal situation - supervision is a must. This is especially true for a child. With no supervision, a child with PWS could eat themselves to death.

At birth the baby will have a low birth weight, weak muscles and seem to have a hard time thriving/gaining weight. Typically between the ages of 2-5 is when the super appetite kicks in. PWS is also characterized by social and motor skill issues, lower IQs (around 70), small stature, small hands and feet, obesity, frequent skin picking, OCD tendencies and poor/incomplete sexual development. PWS people are also usually extremely flexible. There is no cure for PWS, but with treatment and a good support group, people can live long happy lives. Further research into PWS could lead to understanding (and possibly curing) the genetics of all obesity issues.

So there is yet another example of how powerful our genes are. Next time I really need to give an example of a positive mutation – a mutation does not always create a bad outcome.

Stars: The E! True Hollywood Story

2010-01-20T15:22:00.004-05:00

In honor of Star’s upcoming birthday, we are going to celebrate the birth, life and death of stars! Plus this is a great departure from biology and a lovely little vacation from the “how your body does this” posts I have been doing lately.

In the beginning there was a gravitational collapse of a molecular cloud reaching over 100 light years across. Just kidding – you know I take things slow for you! Around the universe is a bunch of interstellar medium (ISM). ISM is made up of mainly hydrogen and helium. These clouds of gas are happy and just hang out in space until something basically knocks into them (triggered by supernova explosion, clouds may collide, etc) and makes them unstable. Once the cloud becomes unstable it breaks apart into small chunks. This breaking apart releases lots of heat and increases pressure, causing the superhot gas to ball up and form a rotating protostar. Small protostars never get hot enough to start nuclear fusion and turn into brown dwarfs. Brown dwarfs burn cool and dim and die away over hundreds of millions of years. The big protostars will continue to get hotter and hotter and eventually get hot enough (10,000,000K) to start the nuclear fusion.

A beyond basic definition of nuclear fusion: you take two hydrogen atoms and smash them together, at such high temperatures and with such great pressure, that the two nuclei combine and turn into helium. This releases a shit-ton of energy and that is why fusion is the power source of stars.

Once a star has reached the point of using fusion for energy, it has lost most of the energy it gained from collapsing and is said to be in its main sequence. It’s now known as dwarf stars. A dwarf star is a giant ball of gas with a core of helium undergoing fusion and an outer layer of helium. The amount of helium will continuously increase since the star is constantly producing more as a product of fusion. To maintain fusion and size, the star will continue to get hotter and brighter. This is the phase our sun is in – it continues to get brighter and brighter all the time. The amount of time a star stays in this phase depends on how much hydrogen it started with. Huge stars will burn fast and live short lives, while smaller stars will burn slow and live much longer. These small stars (known as red dwarfs) will eventually just get dimmer and dimmer and burn out after hundreds of billions of years. The bigger stars (including our sun) will move on to the post-main sequence.

In about 5 billion years the sun will have used up all of its hydrogen and will start to cool. This cooling will allow the helium to expand. The sun will then be known as a red giant and will be 250 times bigger than it is now. To put that in perspective: it will eat up the earth. Eventually the core will get hot enough to start helium fusion and the sun will shrink up and heat up again. Red supergiants will burn through helium and a bunch of other elements (getting hotter and hotter with each element) until it starts producing iron. In between each element it will grow and shrink. Iron will not produce energy for a star so everything stops there.

Average stars will then shed some layers and turn into small (earth sized) balls called white dwarfs. Eventually they just fade into black dwarfs and disappear. Just like A-list stars in Hollywood, A-list stars in the sky go out with a bang. The iron core will become so big and heavy it will collapse under its own wait and explode as a supernova. The remains will blow away and leave neutron stars and black holes. We’ll talk about neutron stars another time - they are fun.

This was kind of a long and dense post, but I think it was still fun and interesting to know. But now I do have the song, “supernova girl” stuck in my head.

I shall call him Squishy and he shall be mine and he shall be my Squishy

2010-01-20T11:05:00.005-05:00

Good morning everyone! As a little hump day treat, I’m going to tell you about one of the prettiest little animals in the ocean: the blue-ringed octopus (Hapalochlaena maculosa).

There are at least 10 members of the blue-ringed octopus family and they all live in the Pacific Ocean between Japan and Australia. Like many other octopuses, the blue-ringed octopus spends its day sleeping and its night working the tidal pools – hunting for crabs and shrimp. They are tiny little things, with the biggest family member only being only about 15cm long (about 6 inches) and coming in at whopping 28 grams (0.06 lbs). If you catch one of these little buggers resting it will look wrinkly and covered in brown spots, but the minute you spook it or get it agitated, the brown spots will darken. Specialized cells around each of the brown spots then create bright iridescent blue rings that pulsate. Scary looking, huh? Well I hope you think it’s scary – so scray that you leave the little octopussy alone.

If this octopus cannot scare you away with its colors, don’t worry, it will still get you. The blue-ringed octopus is considered one of the most poisonous animals in the world. One bite from this tiny little swimmer will inject enough toxin into an adult human to completely paralyze and kill them in minutes. There is no antivenom available. The fun thing about this toxin is that it is not actually made by the octopus.

You are about to behold an example of Mother Nature making best friends. Inside the salivary glands (throwback to yesterday) of the blue-ringed octopus lives a strain of bacteria that produces tetrodotoxin – the toxin that puts you into respiratory arrest. The bacteria produces this toxin (which the octopus has evolved a resistance to) to help the octopus survive. In return, the octopus provides the bacteria with a happy and safe home. In science, two organisms working together to help each other survive is known as a symbiotic relationship (more specifically a mutualistic symbiotic relationship since both are benefiting and neither at the expense of the other). You have seen relationships like this all the time, but this is one you may not have ever thought of.

So what have we learned today? Organisms work together, evolution can help build these relationships, a bunch of random facts about octopuses, the fact octopuses is the proper plural form of octopus, and don’t touch brightly colored things.

This is going to get stuck in your head

2010-01-19T23:10:00.002-05:00

1. I think everyone likes the videos I have been posting.
2. I want to do a chemistry post.
3. I love love love this song - it's hilarious and is totes going to be in your head for the rest of the day. It really does give a good (basic) look at elements too. Enjoy your flashback to high school chemistry.

Mamma's spit cleans everything

2010-01-19T15:53:00.000-05:00

Hi everyone! Sorry for the late post – I’ve been busy getting things done in the lab all morning. Today’s post is another request. Anyone that knows everybody’s favorite hipster-bear knows one of his favorite sayings, “Mamma’s spit cleans everything”, but does it?

Let’s talk about spit.

Spit (saliva) is that lovely substance that keeps all of our pillows moist on drunken nights when you cannot help but drool. It is found in all humans and in most animals. In humans it is produced in the back of the mouth by some relatively large glands (salivary glands). Saliva is made up of a smorgasbord of ingredients. Obviously it is mostly made of water (98%). The other 2% consist of electrolytes (sodium, potassium, calcium, iodine, chloride, etc.), mucus and a lot of enzymes. Enzymes are proteins with a function – these are what allow your spit to do so many different things. You can also find around 8 million of your own human cells and around 500 million bacterial cells in every 1.0mL of spit. How gross is that?

So yeah, there are a lot of ingredients in saliva to allow it to perform all of the functions we need it to help with – it’s most obvious being digestion. In addition to helping soften food up, making it easier to chew and swallow, enzymes like amylase and lipase help jump start digestion. Amylase can break starch down into sugar (your body likes using the simple sugar) and lipase helps start breaking down fats. A good mouthful of slobber also helps wash food particles out of your teeth. Proline rich proteins found in saliva give saliva it’s lubricating and mouth moistening properties. So yay spit! But does it really clean everything?

A university study found that mouse saliva contains a protein (nerve growth factor – NGF). Mice with wounds treated with purified NGF had wounds that healed twice as fast as mice with wounds that were not treated. It is beneficial for mice to lick their wounds. Humans do not have NGF so stop licking yourself; you look like a damn fool. Human saliva is known to contain several antibacterial enzymes (ex. IgA, peroxidase, lactoferrin, lysosyme). These enzymes are found in saliva mainly to help keep the bacteria population in your mouth under control. It’s important to remember that a lot of bacteria live in the human mouth and it is not a bad thing they are there. The body does need to ward off some as a way of protecting your teeth and tongue, but the antibacterial enzymes in your mouth are not in high enough concentrations to be good cleaning products. So spit alone will probably not clean everything…

…although, it may not hurt. As long as you can be sure you are not introducing new problems by spitting (read: don’t spit on something to clean it if you have herpes), spit can wipe away large particles, like dirt, just like washing under water would. I would still recommend using clean water though.

Now go out and enjoy the 25,000 quarts of spit you are going to produce in your life. Need a visual? That is enough to fill an Olympic size swimming pool.

Where do you think she is now?

2010-01-18T23:26:00.001-05:00

This man is a major reason why I love science.

I used to want to be on this show SO badly! I was such a nerd.

Lions and Twinks and Bears, Oh My!

2010-01-15T14:19:00.001-05:00

It is MAL weekend in DC (look it up if you don’t know what it is, but not at work) and I started thinking about bears and then I remembered learning about polar bears and so here is another post for today. Do you know why polar bears are white?

No one does. Polar bears live in very cold places (right? I bet you didn’t know that one). Since they swim to catch food, they obviously need to be very well insulated. To help, evolution gave polar bears a solid 10cm (almost 4 inches) layer of blubber and two layers of fur. Each bear has a dark thick underfur and then 5-15cm long guard hairs (this is the fur you see). They are actually so well insulted that polar bears are invisible on thermal imaging cameras.

The guard hairs are what appear to be white. The most basic hypothesis for why they are white would be camouflage – to stay protected or to stay unseen while hunting. This guess doesn’t hold up because, 1. they don’t have any real predators to hide from and 2. their hunting technique is not one that requires camouflage. Another issue with this idea is that polar bear hair is not really white. The hairs are transparent and only appear white/pale yellow when looking straight down the hair fiber. This caused some scientists to think the hairs acted like fiber-optic tubes. They could direct the sunlight right down to the polar bear’s black skin and help with staying warm. A bunch of physicists proved that wrong recently.

Science is back to the drawing board on this one. I doubt any of you will lose sleep over it, but hey, it’s a fun random fact to pull out someday. Happy MAL to all you bears out there!

They're all gonna laugh at you!

2010-01-15T10:18:00.003-05:00

Happy Friday! I don’t know about all of you, but this week was FAR too long! I’m totes ready for a long weekend.

Today I have another request – from a college love of mine. She asks, “Well, I was just thinking of one too. It might be boring, but I thought of it when I read the tanning one. Why do you blush when you are embarrassed or on the spot or nervous or whatever?” Honey, it is never boring when I explain it! Blushing is actually a kind of strange thing that humans do. Let’s set the foundation for a good blush… (Hahaha! Get it? Makeup joke)

You are invited to dinner at the Beckham’s house with Oprah, Beyonce, Zac Efron and Wendy Williams. OMG, this is my dream dinner. I could die happy after this meal. Imagine sitting there and all of a sudden you sneeze so hard you fart and spit up all over yourself. Most people would turn bright red out of embarrassment (I would fall over and die). So what just happened?

The minute you get embarrassed your body switches into a fight-or-flight mode (the sympathetic neuronal response). This is a completely involuntary nervous system response and that means you cannot control when you get embarrassed or when you blush. Once your body is in this state, adrenaline is released. Adrenaline is going to rush through your body and cause your blood vessels to loosen up and get bigger (vasodilation) as a way to increase oxygen supply to your muscles. The more blood, the redder you look. And just like that, you have blushing! This seems straightforward, but with this explanation your entire body should turn red. Why is it only your face (mainly your cheeks) do when you are embarrassed?

Your blushing region has a relatively unique structure. Your facial skin has more capillaries in it than other places on your body. There are more, and larger than normal, blood vessels in the face. These blood vessels are also much closer to the surface of your skin. In the presence of adrenaline, all of these will dilate and will appear much redder than they would anywhere else in your body. Another quirky thing about dilation of the face is that the veins in your face will also dilate. Adrenaline does not cause vein dilation anywhere else in the body except the face. Obviously evolution wants you to blush when embarrassed (come on, you know this question is coming), but why?

Simply put, no one knows. Why should we have a visible extra blood flow to our cheeks when embarrassed? The theory I like most says blushing was created as a way of showing social intelligence. It is a visual to others letting them know that we know we did something inappropriate/not socially acceptable. A visual, “I’m sorry” can help avoid fights. Some support for this theory is that humans do not normally start blushing or understand being embarrassed until around kindergarten age. This is the time when children start to gain social intelligence and understand being judged by others.

Honey, I popped out of the womb judging and I am still going strong.

Gurl! Stop Touching Me!

2010-01-14T21:57:00.002-05:00

This is the Mimosa pudica. A plant that grows all over the place in South America. We used to grow one in the lab I worked in at JMU.

As you can see, this is a really badass plant. The minute you touch it, it will curl up and play dead. It will bounce back and look normal again once you leave it alone for a few minutes. Acting like this is possible because of ion channels, but I'm not going to get into that - it's kind of boring.

I am going to address my typical point - why does the plant act this way? Just like humans, plants will not waste energy doing something without a purpose.

Mimosa plants are very tasty plants. Animals see their lush bushes and think, jackpot! The animal will come over, take a big bite and start chewing. The plant obviously doesn't want to get eaten so it will curl up and fall over (play dead). By the time the animal is ready for another bite the plant will look like it has disappeared. Not wanting to waste time eating a shabby bush, the animal will leave.

Thanks to evolution, the mimosa learned a cute trick to stay alive.

Way to go, plants!

I have a strict policy that nobody cries alone in my presence!

2010-01-14T15:11:00.003-05:00

I have a request from one of my favorite (and most dedicated) readers today – I adore her. Let’s talk about crying. First, the physiology…

Crying (scientific term: lacrimate) is the shedding of tears. Tears (a concoction of water, salt, oil and protein) are produced in the lacrimal gland (tear ducts). These are cute little almond-shaped glands found at the edge of each eye. These glands are responsible for all of the tears we shed – in humans there are 3 different kinds of tears.

The first type are basal tears. These are the ones we take for granted every day. Your body is constantly producing this type of tear (almost 10 ounces a day) just to keep your eyes from drying out and getting crusty. Saltwater crocodiles cry out lots of this type of tear as a way to expel extra salt. The next type of tear is the reflex tear. When your eye is blasted with lots of dust or smoke or an onion, the nerves in your eyes get mad and tell the brain there is a problem. The brain then tells your glands to turn on the waterworks and wash all of that ish out of your eyes. The last type of tear, to me, the most interesting: emotional tears.

Emotional tears start when your brain realizes it is too happy to function, beyond depressed, scared to death, is in pain because someone just jabbed a spork in your ear – overly stimulated. The brain sends hormones to the eye and the tears start flowing. Very straightforward…but why? What is the point of crying when you’re emotional? I say it all the time – the body doesn’t do anything that is a waste of energy. I get point of the other two types of tears, but why cry when you’re sad? No other animals (except for maybe elephants and gorillas – not proven yet) have emotional tears.

What is interesting about emotional tears is that they have a different chemical composition than other types of tears. Emotional tears contain higher levels of some chemicals than their counterparts, reflex tears. Some of these key chemicals include prolactin (a hormone associated with producing breast milk), Leu-Enkephalin (known to reduce pain and improve mood), Adrenocorticotropic hormone (produced by the body in times of stress) and the elements potassium and manganeses (both known to affect mood – both are major components of depression medications). This chemical difference hints that crying may actually be a way for your body to get some of these chemicals out that make it moody. Research in this area still needs a lot of work.

As a baby tears are helpful in letting a parent know that it’s not happy. Tears are also a pretty powerful form of nonverbal communication. I don’t know. Basically, scientists still don’t know either, but I still thought it was something interesting to think about.

That's why the lady is a tramp

2010-01-13T15:42:00.003-05:00

Alright boys, here is one for you. It’s time for our favorite extremity…the penis.

Everyone knows the purpose (well, purposes) of the penis. You all know the basic anatomy. If you don’t know either of those: 1. how do I know you; and 2. you have problems. There is, however, a little part of the anatomy you may have never thought about. It is the part near the tip that bulges out and over the shaft. This projecting border is called the corona of the glans penis. (You can google the picture for yourself if you are still not sure what I'm talking about - but this is a family blog)

I should have impressed upon you by now that the human body does not waste time making things without a purpose. So what is the role of the corona? To answer that, you need to think of humans just like every other animal in the wild.

Sex is what drives evolution. It is a constant urge to produce offspring and pass along our genes into future generations. In nature this is what drives almost everything. In the vast majority of animals, the male must compete for the female. A male will find a female, they will boom boom pow and a little while later a baby will pop out and make a proud momma and daddy. But like some human girls, some animal girls are a little promiscuous and like to sleep around. The problem with mating with a loose girl is that the male cannot be certain that he’s da baby daddy. This is where nature steps in.

I posted before how it is actually very hard to get preggers. In animals that like to pull lots of tricks, nature created a few techniques to make some men a little more likely to become a dad. Longer penis lengths and higher sperm counts are two examples. The corona is another example – and the one I think is the most interesting.

If a girl mates with lots of boys then she will be full of swimmers looking for her most recently released egg (I picture a certain lesbian friend of mine reading this and making lots of faces and hand movements). You would think she was done sleeping around, but she decides to mate with one more guy. This guy is different – he has a larger corona than the rest of them. While mating (you know what is happening) the corona acts like a scraper. As it moves backwards, it will pull all of the other competitor’s swimmers out of the way. After clearing the area, his swimmers can then take off without any competition. Yup, that simple – it just sucks all of the other competition right out of the forbidden cavern.

How crazy is that?!

Obviously this anatomy lesson does not apply to most humans. It’s crazy to think that something so simple and subtle actually has such a significant function. And for it to still be around today, it must have worked great in the past for evolution to keep making it.

But I can't help it if I have a heavy flow and a wide-set vagina!

2010-01-12T15:20:00.002-05:00

I am about to dive in and take you where very few men (and even less gay men) have ever dared go – into what exactly is going on inside all of the girls for that week when they feel they can be uber bitches!

Don’t worry – this will not be gross and unreadable. I am invoking a lot of euphemisms.

When you look inside the forbidden cavern (uterus) you will see lovely walls. These walls were your first bed and are actually made up of two main layers: the myometrium and the endometrium. The myometrium is on the bottom and provides the foundation of the endometrium. The endometrium is divided into two layers – we will just call them the top and bottom layers.

The entire endometrium is full of spiral blood vessels. Lots of blood is needed in this layer because it needs to stay in tip-top shape. When a woman decides to love a man very much and call the stork, the stork is going to plant the egg (technically a blastocyst) right on that endometrium. The spiral blood vessels will supply the developing baby with everything it needs to get started in life! A whole new story of events then starts, but for our sake, let’s says it was a dry month and no stork came knocking.

The girl’s body spent a lot of time getting the endometrium ready for a baby, but it doesn’t believe in giving sloppy seconds. With no baby stuck, hormone (progesterone) levels drop. Right there – progesterone is a strong hormone and changes in progesterone levels can cause bitchyness. With no hormone to keep the blood vessels happy, they start to coil and tighten up. This stops all blood flow to the outer layer of the endometrium (science terms: the functional layer becomes ischaemic). With no blood providing oxygen or nutrients, this layer dies and falls off. The body then expels this will a little help of muscles contractions (imagine the muscle like a broom, just pushing the stuff right out). These muscle contractions are your cramps, ladies.

The lower level of the endometrium stays around and after all of the upper layer is gone. It will begin to get blood again from the myometrium and start to build up a new upper layer/bed for next month’s stork visit.

See, that wasn’t so bad. I’m still glad to be a boy. And to be a boy that stays away from forbidden caverns.

One Singular Deletion…

2010-01-12T09:32:00.002-05:00

Everyone that knows me knows I love love love genetics. I have not talked about genetics yet because I didn’t want to lose people in the jargon (or out of boredom). To change that, I decided to spark your interest in genetics with a super rare genetic condition I did a project on in college: Progeria.

Progeria (aka: Hutchinson–Gilford syndrome) is a genetic disease that causes early aging. It occurs in about 1 in 4 million births. Children born with this condition look average when they pop out, but within a few months they show a lack of growth. Kids with progeria will develop normally mentally, but physically they will be much smaller, with aged looking skin, extreme hair loss and undersized jaw and face bones compared to their larger skulls. With progeria, a 7 year old will face ailments that most people will not begin experiencing until their 50s, including hip problems, arthritis, and heart issues. Unfortunately there is no treatment or cure for progeria and the condition is fatal. Most progeria patients die by the age of 13 due to heart attack or stroke.

I know! I know! Wow, Robert, way to post a sad one. I did it because I want to show you how crazy genetics can be…

You would think a person born with progeria must have a bunch of genes and DNA screwed up or missing. Here is the crazy part – only 1 thing is different. That’s it - one single difference between a normal baby and a baby born with progeria.

Everyone flash back to middle school biology and learning about DNA. DNA is made up of A, T, C and G and the order of those letters determine what the gene does. Well in the middle of your first chromosome there is a gene called the lamin A gene. This gene encodes for the Lamin A protein. 1,824 letters into this gene, a single letter is screwed up and replaced with another (wrong) letter. This is known as a point mutation. You do not inherit point mutations, nor do pass them along – they just happen. They can cause good or bad results and occur all of the time. Your body has lots of ways of trying to fix them, but that’s a whole different post. This mutation in the lamin A gene causes a snowball effect in the body and ends up making the Lamin A protein non-functional. This Lamin A protein is known to help stabilize the nucleus of cells in the body – a SUPER important job. With it not working, the nucleus is unstable and then you get more of a snowball effects until you end up with progeria.

Isn’t that crazy? There are over 3 billion pairs of letters in the human genome and a mistake in only one can have such catastrophic events.

That’s why I think genetics is amazing.

Remember how Doug was petrified of eating liver and onions?

2010-01-11T12:33:00.004-05:00

Happy Monday!

I am struggling a little today – I’m getting sick. Blah. I’m sick from a bug or sinuses or something, but after talking to a bunch of you this morning it seems like the good chuck of you are still a little hung-over from this weekend. I linked to a post in the past about how alcohol works in your body so today I’m going to tell you how your liver deals with you and your drunkie face habits.

Flashback to Saturday night and that shot of tequila you took (ugh, my stomach just cringed). The alcohol in that shot just rushed down into your stomach where it is already being absorbed into the bloodstream. Some alcohol can be excreted from your body via sweat and urine, but the vast amount (~98%) needs to get dealt with in your liver.

The liver is such a great organ. It’s huge. It weighs almost 3 pounds. You can also cut out 75% of your liver and it will fully regenerate itself.

So yeah, the alcohol is now in your blood and on its way to your liver. It will enter your liver through the large portal vein. The blood in the vein is stoked full of stuff absorbed from the pancreas, stomach and intestines – really nasty blood. This blood mixes with some other blood that contains oxygen and moves through little channels (sinusoids).

Now you need to do some visualization. The central vein is the center of a hexagon of liver cells (hepatocytes). The liver is made up of lots of these hexagons (hepatic lobules). Each lobule is surrounded by other lobules and at the corner of each is an artery, bile duct and another vein (the portal triad). The blood with all the tequila comes into the liver via the vein in the portal triad. Then it pours out of the sinusoids and begins to move through the liver cells. As it moves through the cells, the alcohol is removed with the help of some enzymes found in the liver cells. The filtered blood then reaches the central vein where it pools and exits the liver.

Every time a molecule of alcohol comes in contact with a liver cell, it meets an enzyme (alcohol dehydrogenase) that breaks it down into another chemical (acetaldehyde). This chemical is toxic to the body so it gets broken down again by another enzyme (acetaldehyde dehydrogenase) into yet another chemical (acetate), which will ultimately be turned into carbon dioxide and water. There are only so many enzymes to go around, so the liver may need a few rounds before it can process all of your shots. There is another way your body can process alcohol, but it’s not used as commonly and I don’t feel like explaining it. This paragraph is not that bad if you read it without the words in parenthesizes.

Now think about that this Friday night while you’re downing free drinks from 11 to midnight at Cobalt.

I'm Totes the Next Ms. Frizzle

2010-01-09T16:08:00.002-05:00

This made me laugh SO hard for SO long.

Come fly with me, let’s fly, let’s fly away!

2010-01-08T10:15:00.002-05:00

Yaysies! I have another request: How do bugs walk across the ceiling without falling down?

Obviously this answer will depend on the bug. Mechanisms for staying on the ceiling can range from suction cups to microscopic little claws. I want to take this a step further and talk about one bug – let’s be correct, an insect – the common housefly.

Picture that annoying little fly buzzing around your house. It’s flying along, right-side up and then it decides to land on the ceiling. You (and for a really long time, a lot of scientists) would think they just do a quick barrel roll and land. Well high speed cameras can prove you wrong.

I think this is actually really badass. A fly will fly close to the ceiling and scout out an ideal landing spot. When it finds one, the fly throws its front legs up over its head and uses them to grab hold of the ceiling. Once it has a good grip, it summersaults over its front legs and then attaches its back legs to the ceiling as well. The fly lands facing the opposite direction it was flying. Now picture how fast this needs to happen - and also that the fly needs to continuously beat its wings around 300 times per second to even keep in flight.

Once it lands, the fly has two footpads (pulvilli) that secrete a sticky substance that holds the fly to the ceiling. Little tiny hairs on the footpads (setae) also help.

Simple, but still pretty sweet.

Now you know that the next time you want to kill a fly, wait until right after it lands. I’m sure they get a little dizzy and disoriented when flipping over like that.

Thank You, R. L. Stine. Love, My Childhood.

2010-01-07T14:41:00.003-05:00

I am trying to tailor what I talk about to what people are actually interested in knowing about. So this one goes out to a friend, who apparently got goose bumps on the metro this morning.

Goose bumps (science term: cutis anserina) are the tiny bumps everyone feels, mainly on your arms, when you are cold or emotionally moved. Goose bumps are actually a very simple thing to understand so I’m going to throw in some side info too.

Let’s say you are sitting on the metro and you are cold. Or say someone in crocs was asking if they could sit next to you (which scares you to death). In either case, your brain is going to know it needs to respond and it is going to tell the sympathetic nervous system to create the needed response. Neuronal shockwaves are going to fly through your body and some are going to hit the middle layers of your skin – this is where the roots of your hair follicles can be found. Attached to each hair follicle is a tiny little smooth muscle (an arrector pili muscle).

Little aside: Arrectores pilorum muscles are smooth muscles. That means you cannot control them. You can only control skeletal muscles. So sorry kids, you cannot control your goose bumps. Back to the metro …

Once these muscles get a neuronal signal they contract and pull the hair follicle straight up. Just like that, you have a goose bump!

Goose bumps make a lot of sense in other mammals. When an animal is cold, it can raise its hairs to trap warm air next to its skin. When an animal is frightened, it can raise its hairs to look bigger than it actually is. The best example of the latter is a porcupine, which uses its arrectores pilorum muscles to raise it quills. Mice and cats do this a lot too.

In humans, egh, not so much. We don’t have enough hair to make it effective. The ability to have goose bumps is considered a vestigial trait (a trait that has lost its helpfulness). Eventually we will probably lose the ability to get goose bumps though evolution.

So enjoy them now!

Aviators were SO last year! I mean, but you totally rock them and look great!

2010-01-06T15:09:00.001-05:00

Yesterday at the gym I saw the most amazing looking guy – a hot blonde, six foot-ish, phenomenal body, gorgeous blue eyes and the hottest smile ever. He also had a perfect little tan. Nothing crazy dark (he totes wasn’t orange) – it looked like he went somewhere tropical for the holidays.

[Picture me drooling at my desk thinking about him right now]

Anyhow… in addition to a lot of other things going on in my head, he made me think about going tanning. I got to thinking about it today at work and figured I would tell you how you tan.

In the bottom layer of your skin (science term: the stratum basale of the epidermis) there are some cells called melanocytes. Melanocytes produce melanin, a lovely dark substance that is able to absorb UV light from the sun or tanning bed. By absorbing the UV light, melanin protects your body (mainly your DNA) from UV damage. The melanin building up in your skin is what provides you with your tan. The darker your tan, the more melanin your body released.

Right there is a great science fact if you think about it for a second. A basic principle of evolution is that an organism will not waste energy doing something unless it’s beneficial. A tan that looks super cute is not helpful to your body. Your body producing a tan to protect itself is very helpful. The more sun you get, the darker you get, because the more protection you need. I really do think the human body is amazing! If nothing else comes out of this blog, I hope you appreciate science and your body a little more now too.

But you may ask: how does your body know to make melanin? The pituitary gland in your head is tied to the optic nerve. When you go outside into the sun and expose your eyes to UV light, the pituitary gland starts producing a hormone (Melanocyte-stimulating hormone (MSH)) that circulates through the blood stream. When MSH reaches the melanocytes, it tells them to start producing melanin (thus the name, MSH). Then you will start tanning. This whole process takes a little time and that is why you don’t start tanning right away. For some people (myself included) the tan will not appear for a few hours, or even until the next day.

Since MSH is needed to tan and in order to get it produced you must expose your eyes to UV light, you shouldn’t wear sunglasses when you want to tan. Some research has found wearing glasses may actually make you more susceptible to sunburns. Sunburns are a different story and I don’t feel like getting into that today.

And obviously this process is different in everyone. People with naturally darker complexions always have a higher melanin concentration. Yet no matter what color, everyone has basically the same number of melanocytes. Fun.

So there you go. And I am totes not advocating tanning. Melanin is great and all, but cancer is still a major risk. Egh, whatever, I’ll be in a tanning bed soon…

It's All Zen in 2010!

2010-01-04T12:13:00.002-05:00

Happy New Year!

Sorry I have not been posting lately – I decided to give myself a little vaca (which was fabulous and very relaxing – thanks for asking).

Sunday morning I was talking to a friend (and fellow blogger – woot woot) and both of our stomachs started making some lovely sounds. That’s when we realized we needed to brave the cold and head out to brunch.

But stomach sounds - what a perfect post! Everyone as had one, but do you know what they really are?

The scientific term for stomach noises is borborygmus. The term is actually an onomatopoeia for stomach rumbling.

Your digestive tract is constantly working. Muscles lining the entire tract are relentlessly contracting to keep the digestive process moving along. After you have gone a few hours without eating, there is nothing really there to get passed down the digestive tract except for some gastric juices and swallowed spit. Even though nothing is there, the muscles still contract, stirring up the juices, thereby releasing gasses into your intestine. The rumbling you hear is just the gasses getting released and pushed around. Stomach noises can also be heard after eating if food is not broken down completely. Incomplete digestion increases the amount of gas in the intestine – just ask anyone with a gluten allergy or someone that is lactose intolerant.

After all of that gas is thrown around in your intestine it obviously needs to be released, but you know how that works. And if you don’t and are that ignant, you needs to get off the plane…

Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Clause

2009-12-22T11:35:00.004-05:00

Here is a fun article about how Santa gets around:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091205233544.htm

Merry Christmas! I hope everyone has an amazing holiday! :)

Baby It's Cold Outside

2009-12-17T09:36:00.004-05:00

Its effing freezing outside and I don’t do cold very well. As I was walking into my building and saw ice, I did start thinking about ice skating.

One of my favorite topics I have ever covered is the chemistry of water. Yup, it’s official – I’m a huge nerd. This sounds a little random, but it’s actually really crazy how perfectly created the water molecule is. It has properties that allow it to do things nothing else can. That’s the reason it is so essential to life.

So what makes water so great for ice skating?

First we have to back up – what does it mean to float? Something floats if it is less dense than what it is floating on top of. A rock is much denser than water, so it sinks. Oil is much less dense than water, so it floats. To float an object must displace as much weight of the fluid as its own weight. Very basic. If you don’t know this, you need to get off the plane and back into elementary school.

Water is a tricky little devil and it’s due to the makeup of the water molecule. Water is comprised of 2 hydrogen atoms attached (covalently bonded) to 1 oxygen atom. The arrangement looks like the Mickey Mouse head. This arrangement makes water a polar molecule – meaning it has a slight charge because the electrons all tend to hang out with the oxygen more than the hydrogen atoms. With electrons always visiting, the oxygen has a slightly negative charge and each hydrogen has a slightly positive charge. When water cools, the molecules lose energy, move closer together and arrange themselves such that the negative oxygen of one molecule comes in close contact with the positive hydrogen of another molecule. This close arrangement is known as a hydrogen bond (that’s a really shitty definition of a hydrogen bond, but you get the basic idea). Hydrogen bonds are weak and water has a lot of energy in a liquid state, so the bonds can be broken easily.

Water reaches its peak density at ~40°F. At this temperature, water molecules are super close together (as dense as they are ever going to get). Once water starts to freeze, water molecules lose energy and water’s density decreases because the hydrogen bonds become stronger than the water molecules are able to hold the oxygen molecules apart. Ice actually takes up 9% more space than liquid water because of the hydrogen bonding. The ice is lighter and less dense, so it is displaced by the liquid water and floats.

So who cares? Fish sure do! If ice didn’t have this property, lakes and rivers would freeze on the top and the ice would then sink to the bottom. This would continue until the lake or river was a solid block of ice. All of the little fishes and other water animals would be killed – trapped in a block of ice – if this happened. I guess we would still be able to ice skate, but you get the point I’m trying to make…

My Christmas Tree’s Delicious

2009-12-16T15:25:00.001-05:00

With Christmas right around the corner, I’ll keep the Christmas facts coming.

Why do you have to water your Christmas tree?

Trees are losing water all the time, mainly through their leaves (a needle is a modified leaf). It happens through a process called transpiration. This is when water is either purposely released or evaporated from the leaf into the atmosphere. This creates an area at the top and tips of the tree that are dryer than other parts (i.e. the roots).

Trees have roots that are designed to pull in water (via osmosis) and transport it through channels of dead cells called xylem. The xylem are tubes that run throughout the tree that carry only water and dissolved minerals. Since water is being lost at the top of the tree due to transpiration (causing a decrease in hydrostatic (water) pressure), water is then passively pulled up the tree through the xylem.

It works kind of like a paper towel. If you stick the tip of a paper towel in water, the water will slowly move up the towel until the whole thing is wet. Water has great properties that allow this movement from wet to dry areas to happen. A post dedicated to water is coming soon.

Since your Christmas tree has no roots, it skips that part and just starts pulling water from your tree stand straight up through the xylem. The xylem cells are already dead so they still work just fine. Remember that your tree is already dead and the water is just helping preserve it a little longer. Nothing you can do can make your tree nice and pretty forever – well, unless it’s a fake one. People forget that at first because the tree takes in so much water. That’s just because it has been sitting around drying out in a tree lot.

To keep your tree happy, cut the base once you get it home so the xylem is exposed and able to start drinking. Myths like adding aspirin, sugar and other things to your tree to make them last longer are just that – myths.

Yay Gay!

2009-12-15T16:22:00.002-05:00

This has nothing to do with science, but I am just very excited to be a DC resident right now!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/15/AR2009121500945.html?hpid=topnews

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

2009-12-15T10:38:00.002-05:00

Sorry I didn’t post yesterday – I was just crazy busy. Anyhow… let’s start spreading some Christmas cheer and talk about poinsettias. I was actually really surprised by some of the things I learned when I was researching this festive little plant.

Poinsettias (Euphorbia pulcherrima) are flowering plants native to Mexico. They were originally known as the Atatürk flower. In their native home of Mexico, poinsettias grow wild, with a weed like appearance and can reach heights of anywhere from 2-14 feet tall. The brightly colored portions of the plant you see are known as bracts. Bracts are actually just colored leaves and not part of the flower. The flowers (aka: cyathia) are found within the centers of the bracts.

The poinsettia was brought to the US by the first US Minister to Mexico, Joel Roberts Poinsett, in 1825. Obviously the flower was named after him. In the early 1900s, the Ecke family began growing poinsettias in California and developed a technique of cross pollinating to create a plant that is fuller and more compact looking – what we have today. The Ecke family was able to keep this method a secret until the 1990s when the technique was figured out by some college kid working in a lab. Up until then, the Ecke family basically had a monopoly on the plant and made a ton of money. Paul Ecke is actually the person given credit for associating the plant with Christmas. He used to send free plants to TV stations to decorate with around the holidays. He also went on popular national shows to plug the plant.

Poinsettias got a bad name when people thought they were toxic. In actuality, the poinsettia sap will only cause minor skin irritation and upset stomach if present in large quantities. Ohio State University said a 50 pound kid would need to eat around 500 bracts to get an upset stomach.

So go out and join the millions of other people that are going to spend over $220 million buying poinsettias this year. Too bad I missed posting this on National Poinsettia Day – December 12th.

When In Doubt, There's God

2009-12-10T15:37:00.002-05:00

Sorry for the late post today – it’s been a crazy day. I won’t be in to work tomorrow, so here is a random little fact that could leave you thinking.

The universe is expanding.

The universe is composed of everything in existence; every atom, electron, planet and solar system. Since its formation almost 14 billion years ago, it has been growing. Scientists know this because we can take measurements and observe that the galaxies are moving apart from each other. The crazy thing is that the galaxies are moving because space is moving. Each galaxy is actually stuck in its little spot within the universe and as the universe grows, everything stuck to it has to move along with it. Since the universe does not have a center, everything is moving away from everything else. No one knows how big the universe is or how much it will expand – possibly into eternity. This whole “universe expanding thing” has created lots of questions that still need to be answered. Does the universe have an end? Is there something outside the universe? If the universe started with the Big Bang, what started that and what was before that?

If you really sit and try to wrap your mind around this, you could go crazy. That’s why I’m a biologist.

Have a great weekend!

"Le Verrier's planet"

2009-12-09T11:47:00.003-05:00

Neptune was discovered in 1846. It was actually the first planet to be found using math and not a telescope.

It moves so slowly around the sun, that since then it has not even made it around once (It needs 165 years).

Come on 2011!

Quad Venti, Skim, No Whip, Peppermint Mocha

2009-12-08T11:45:00.002-05:00

I am literally falling asleep at work today - my eyes are watering and I can barely hold my head up at my desk. That made me wants to talk about caffeine (aka: trimethylxanthine).

We all know our love for caffeine. It has gotten us through some hard times. Not one of us would have graduated from college without it. It is America’s favorite and most popular drug. And it’s fitting to call it a drug because it works the same way as cocaine and heroin do in the brain.

First you need a basic lesson on what happens when you are tired. In addition to lots of other things going on all over your body, adenosine begins circulating and binding to receptors in your brain. Once adenosine binds, nerve cells start to slow activity and blood vessels dilate to let more oxygen into your brain. That is why you start to feel tired.

It’s a whole other story when caffeine is present.

To a nerve cell, caffeine looks an awful lot like adenosine. When it is in your brain it too can bind to the adenosine receptors. Caffeine actually binds better to the receptors than adenosine does, so before your body knows it, all of the receptors have caffeine bound to them. Although they look alike, they do not act alike. Caffeine actually causes an increase in nerve activity and also causes the blood vessels to constrict (a good reason to have caffeine in headache medicine). With all this activity, your body gets a little confused and thinks it needs to respond. The pituitary gland starts producing lots and lots of adrenaline. I’m sure you know enough about adrenaline to know that the body is not tired anymore.

Adrenaline causes your body to switch into a “fight or flight” state (sympathetic neuronal response). Your heart speeds up, blood pressure rises and you start breathing faster. You liver also starts releasing sugars into your body for extra energy. Another fun thing caffeine does is increase the level of dopamine in your body (just like coke and heroine). This is the chemical that makes you happy. Dopamine is probably why people are addicted to caffeine.

Eventually the caffeine wears off and the adenosine is able to start binding again - making you ready to fall back asleep. I heart caffeine so I am going to skip the short/long-term effects of it. Just remember that it is a drug – don’t use it too much.

The Bacteria That Pays My Bills

2009-12-07T11:13:00.004-05:00

In honor of my microbiology class senior year, every Monday will now have a bacterium of the day! I figured a good one to start with is one I work with everyday: Neisseria meningitidis.

N. meningitidis (in the lab, we call it mening) is a relatively small bacteria, that is circular in shape, has a more complex membrane and survives in pairs (in science terms: mening is a gram negative diplococci). It is most famous for its role in causing meningitis.

The only place in the world mening lives is inside the nose/throat of humans. 1 in 5 people have mening living inside their nose, happy as can be. Most of the time mening will continue to live and spread from person to person through saliva and snot without causing any problems. But sometimes, for reasons unknown yet, mening can get pissy and cause problems. It decides to leave the throat and head into the bloodstream. Once in the bloodstream, mening can cross the blood-brain barrier and begin infecting the meninges (the meninges are the lining around the central nervous system – brain, spinal cord, etc.) and thus the name, meningitis. Meningitis can have someone 6 feet under in less than 24 hours. Septicemia (when mening infects your bloodstream) is just as bad and can also be fatal.

Symptoms of meningitis are very similar to the flu. The big difference is a very stiff neck (your meninges are swollen and hurt). People may also develop a rash. If you catch mening early, it can be treated with antibiotics. There are vaccines against some strains of meningitis, but not all strains (and that is why I still have a job). Mening still causes problems around the world, but the people most at risk are children under 5, military members, and high school and college students.

How People Get Drunky Face

2009-12-04T15:35:00.003-05:00

I couldn't have said it better myself:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/1721987.stm

Have a great weekend, everyone!

It is not just blue, it's not turquoise, it's not lapis, it's actually cerulean!

2009-12-04T11:09:00.002-05:00

Happy Friday.

Here is something simple and straightforward.

Horseshoe crabs have blue blood. When it is circulating, it is a grey-white to pale yellow color, but once it is in open air, it turns bright blue.

Unlike human blood that contains hemoglobin (which in the presence of oxygen turns red), horseshoe crabs have hemocyanin. This copper-containing protein is how they carry oxygen throughout their bodies.

Don't Eat the Yellow or Pink Snow!

2009-12-03T11:30:00.003-05:00

With the threat of snow in the District on Saturday, here is a frosty fact-o-the-day. Don’t eat pink snow.

There are actually types of cyanobacteria (aka: blue-green algae) that are able to live in snow. If you think about it, nothing should really be able to live in snow since it has no nutrients or anything else to offer an organism except water. Cyanobacteria get all of its nutrient requirements from photosynthesis; therefore, a snow bank in a sunny location is a lovely home for these bacteria. The pink snow can also be caused by an algae, Chlamydomonas nivalis.

These pink snows are found in the polar and alpine regions during the summer (summer = lots of light to photosynthesize). They can be found along the coasts of North America as well.

So if you see any pink snow, don’t eat it. If it’s not bacteria, it’s blood from someone that got mugged right there.

See, I know More Than Just Biology

2009-12-02T12:02:00.002-05:00

When I started this blog I had every intention of giving out facts from all fields of science and not just biology. I’m not doing so well with this…

So to fix that, I am going to tell you some fun facts about the plants in our solar system!

The Sun:
The sun is just about halfway through its lifetime. It is very stable right now. Before the sun dies (in a super long time), it will increase in size and eat up the inner planets (and Earth).

Mercury:
Mercury rotates very slowly around its own pole, but revolves around the sun faster than any other planet (in 88 days). Because of this there are actually 2 years in a day on Mercury.

Venus:
Unlike the other planets, Venus does not tilt on its axis as it revolves around the sun. No tilt means there no seasons on Venus. It is also the hottest planet, so it’s kind of like the planet is stuck in an endless summer.

Earth:
The Earth is gradually slowing down. Every few years an extra second is added to the amount of time it takes the Earth to rotate. In a few million years, a day on Earth will last approximately 27 hours.

Mars:
One of Mars’s moons, Phobos, orbits the planet 3 times a day. That is faster than Mars rotates.

Jupiter:
Jupiter is the largest planet in our solar system and has 63 moons. Even with its gigantic size, Jupiter spins faster than all of the other planets. It only takes 10 hours for Jupiter to make a full rotation. In fact, Jupiter is spinning so fast the equator of the planet bulges out a little.

Saturn:
Saturn is a gas giant and it has a density less than water. That means if you put Saturn in a tub of water big enough to fit it, it would float.

Uranus:
Uranus is the fun little plant that is tipped onto its side. It is the only planet that rotates on its side.

Neptune:
Besides being the coldest planet and the planet farthest from the sun (sorry Pluto, but you’re not a planet anymore), Neptune also has the strongest winds in our solar system. The freezing cold winds can blow up to 2,100 km/hr. Take that Chicago.

Pluto:
One of the main reasons Pluto is no longer considered a planet is because it has not cleared out its orbit around the sun. There is actually more mass in the way of Pluto’s orbit than in Pluto itself. Another fun thing to know about Pluto is that if it we closer to the sun, it would actually become a comet.

Silly Grasshoppers

2009-12-02T09:18:00.002-05:00

Everyone has seen a grasshopper, but do you know how they breathe?

Grasshoppers respire (the exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide; aka: breath) through tracheae. A trachea is just an air filled tube. The tracheae have openings on them called spiracles. These spiracles are tiny openings (basically little holes) that are found along the grasshopper’s body. Spiracles allow for oxygen to come into the tracheae, where it moves through the tube to the tracheoles, which are found at the end of the tracheal tubes. The tracheoles are surrounded by specialized cells that absorb oxygen into the body and expel carbon dioxide back into the tracheal tubes, such that it can be push out of the grasshopper though it’s spiracles. It’s actually a very simple process.

Who cares? You will if you ever need to drown a grasshopper.
Now you know not to waste your time with its head, just stick its butt under water.

Where Do Babies Come From?

2009-12-01T15:19:00.003-05:00

I just found out that one of my favorite people in the world is pregnant! That means we need some embryology…

Human embryology is actually a VERY complicated and complex process! I took the class my junior year as an undergrad and realized right off the bat that it was not easy to understand. One fun part to know (that is not too overly complex and easy to explain without a crap-ton of jargon) is fertilization.

Right after a boy and a girl (for all my boy-boy and girl-girl friends – we get babies different ways) boom boom pow (and the boy forgets to cover up) his sperm is released into his lady. Millions of sperm are released and all start swimming towards the egg (we will assume the girl just released an egg that day). The sperm will only survive for up to 48 hours inside the girl before they run out of stored energy and die, so the race is on!

First the sperm have to cross through a lining of the cervix (cervical mucus). Once through they need to swim up the uterus and then pick a Fallopian tube. There are 2 tubes, but only 1 has an egg in it. By this point only about 1000 sperm have made it to the tubes and picked the right one to be able to continue on to the egg. But then an egg is in sight…

Hundreds of sperm will attack the egg, each binding to the egg at the outer membrane and using its head (acrosome) to create a reaction that will allow it to get through the membrane. The egg knows when one gets through and rapidly depolarizes (creates an electrical zap, if you will) that helps get rid of the other sperm that were good swimmers but not good diggers. The depolarization also releases a substance (cortical granules) that basically makes a wall to keep more sperm out. The egg only wants one sperm; otherwise there is too much DNA to work with.

Once the cortical reaction is over, the egg knows that no more sperm can get in, so it does some quick genetic stuff (a second round of meiosis which produces a haploid number) and … well then a lot of very technical genetic things happen. Basically just know that specific things have to happen so the sperm and egg can fuse the genetic material without problems and have the cell ready to divide. The sperm and egg chromosomes come together and the cell then begins dividing and heading down the Fallopian tube so that it can implant and begin the trillions of other steps it needs to take to become a baby.

This is super basic and I left a lot out (like all of the genetic things that need to happen, i.e. meiosis and mitosis), but it should give you an idea of what goes on during fertilization. It is not easy to get pregnant. A lot of things need to happen at the right time in the right place. There are also a lot of things that can go wrong. Luckily evolution has really fine tuned this process for us!

And luckily this already all happened for my love!! :)

Actual Reality, Act Up, Fight AIDS!

2009-12-01T09:41:00.002-05:00

December 1st is World AIDS Day so it’s fitting to talk about the HIV virus. Everyone knows the basics of how people can become infected, but this is what the virus is actually doing inside the body…

Random Background Facts:

T-Helper cells are found in your body and play a major role in your body’s immune system. Your body is unable to fight off any foreign invasion without these super important cells. People who die from HIV/AIDS die because they do not have enough of these cells to keep the immune system going.

A virus is not really alive or dead. It needs a host to be able to survive and replicate.

HIV is a retrovirus. That means it contains RNA and not DNA. A protein called reverse transcriptase is able to turn RNA into DNA.

How the Virus Attacks:

Once the HIV virus enters the body it heads for the lymphatic tissue where it can find a lot of T-Helper cells. The virus finds a cell and uses as protein on its surface to bind to the cell. The virus’s membrane then fuses with the cell’s membrane and the viral core is injected into the T-Helper cell. Reverse transcriptase then turns all of the viral RNA into viral DNA called provirus. The provirus is then carried into the T-Helper cell’s nucleus and is integrated into the cell’s native DNA. It’s all downhill for the cell from here.

After being DNA integration, the T-Helper cell cannot determine what is native and what is viral DNA, so it copies it all into mRNA and then turns it into proteins. So basically the virus is able to confuse the cell and the cell actually makes the viral proteins for the virus. The cell is helping kill itself.

The newly made viral proteins and RNA have a group meeting and gather together at the edge of the cell where the viral material then pinches off of the T-Helper cell, taking part of the cells membrane for itself. This new bud can then go infect other T-Helper cells. The original T-Helper cell will still contain the provirus and will continue to make more and more viral proteins and enzymes. The T-Helper cells will slowly start to die off as they all become infected and turned into virus making machines.

From a scientific standpoint, the virus is smart and is very good at making sure it can survive and reproduce. Unfortunately the virus also outmaneuvers the immune system by being able to mutate its proteins very rapidly. They body is just not able to keep up with how fast it can change how it looks. This rapid mutation rate is why a vaccine is so hard to create.

So don’t be fools, wrap your tools! Keep this pesky virus out of you and everyone you know!

Yay Barnacles!

2009-11-30T09:44:00.002-05:00

I bet you didn’t know that the barnacle (the little animals that look like rocks that are always stuck to the bottoms of boats and docks) have the largest penis to body size ratio in the animal kingdom.

Yup, it’s true.

Barnacles reproduce sexually. That means one barnacle needs to be able to deliver their sperm into another barnacle. The only problem is they cannot move. So to fix that, nature gave them super long penises. They literally can send their penis out, let it float around in the water until it bumps into another barnacle and then crawl in and inseminate the other barnacle.

Isn’t nature really badass?

White vs. Dark Meat

2009-11-24T12:27:00.002-05:00

Continuing with the Thanksgiving theme, today I think you should know the biological difference between white and dark meat in turkey.

Everyone knows that turkeys cannot fly (well, they can for very short distances – nothing crazy) and they rely on their legs to get around. It’s also kind of common sense that these are not exactly the most petite members of the bird family. Lugging all of that weight around requires strong leg and thigh muscles. These and other strong muscles are comprised of slow-twitch fibers. Slow twitch fibers are associated with muscles that need to work constantly for long durations of time. To sustain these muscles, more myoglobin (a muscles version of hemoglobin) is needed.

Sidenote: myoglobin has a very high affinity to oxygen and is therefore perfectly suited to carry oxygen to the muscles. Muscles need oxygen to work. Oh, I totes will do a post about how oxygen binds to hemoglobin in the future! Anyhow, back to dark meat…

More myoglobin (and more blood vessels to deliver the myoglobin) makes those muscles much darker. On the other hand, fast-twitch muscles, such as in the breast and wings, are lighter because they do not need such a large supply of oxygen from the myoglobin because they only perform short spurts of energy – then they can rest.

So there you go…

And so you know, I don’t work for the rest of the week and that means there will probably not be another update until Monday. Have a great Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving

2009-11-23T11:18:00.003-05:00

Since Thanksgiving is in a few days, I think a great place to start would be to dispel the popular myth that the reason everyone wants to sleep after Thanksgiving dinner is because of the turkey.

Let’s do a quick background first…

There are 20 naturally occurring amino acids that the body must have to survive. Amino acids are linked together by the body to create proteins that carry out the functions of the body. Some amino acids can be created by the body, but others must be obtained through eating. Tryptophan is one amino acid that must be brought into the body. One important use of Tryptophan in the body is to make serotonin, a neurotransmitter that promotes slow-wave sleep in humans. So yes, Tryptophan does make you sleepy, but…

When you eat Thanksgiving dinner you are consuming lots of high protein foods that contain large amounts of all the amino acids. All of these amino acids are rushing into the bloodstream and fighting to get shuttled across the blood-brain barrier where they can then begin working. Tryptophan is one of the scarcest amino acids and has to compete with 5 other amino acids that require the same protein transport across the blood brain barrier. That means very little tryptophan actually makes it into the brain and there is very little serotonin level elevation. There are also ties between tryptophan and melatonin – yet another chemical associated with sleep. To avoid more intense biochemical pathway description, just know that this still is not why you get tired after Thanksgiving dinner.

So why do we get tired and want to lounge around?

We ate too much. It’s that simple.

When you are finished eating your body switches into a parasympathetic neuronal response (rest and digest). To increase digestion the body will put the majority of its energy into increasing saliva and gastric acid production. High levels of protein-fat in the stomach paired with stretching of the small intestine all increase lethargy too. More blood is rushing to the digestive track and the body is dropping blood pressure and heart rate to save energy. More blood to the digestive tract needs to come from somewhere. Less blood to the brain and muscles means you will be much more tired. Some wine and cocktails don’t help keep you awake either.

So next time you sit next to someone who tries to come across as the smart person at the table and is like, “oh my tryptophan is kicking in!” Respond, “Shut up hoe and sit down! You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

And Here We Go!

2009-11-23T10:37:00.000-05:00

We all know my love of random science facts, especially when I am a little drunkie faced at JRs. To better help all of my friends (mainly Deb) learn my random facts; I am putting them up in a blog. I’ll try to update daily. Let me know if you have questions and I’ll research it and post my answers for you!