Well, I’ve been away on vacation for a bit, enjoying weddings and camping and catching up on sleep.It was seriously lovely and needed.So, I’m back to the city and back to the jobby job.I decided to spend last weekend doing some serious cleaning and organizing of the apartment.It’s often seemed to me that the state of my apartments usually are a pretty good match for the state of my brain, meaning that if the kitchen counters are so full of dirty dishes and groceries not put away, there is just not space to try to cook anything new.And life has probably been too hectic (or I’ve gotten too careless) to do much about it.If the home office floor is cluttered with items I haven’t taken the care to put away yet, and I have a desk full of neat to-do piles that haven’t been touched in 4 months, it’s probably time to do something.It’s hard to move on to bigger and better things when the things you should have done months ago are still staring you in the face and getting heavier with dust.So, I went to work, and I did a fine job.I took two whole days to straighten up, whittle down those to-do piles and projects, write in my journal and dust, vacuum and scrub.Was feeling pretty good.However, there was a smell.A nagging smell.Every time I sat down to my computer.Like old garbage.Like forgotten food.And it was getting worse each day.Seeing as how I was working so hard to clean things out, this was getting more and more frustrating just as the smell was getting stronger and stronger.Finally, it got strong enough that I could locate a general area of odor, and I sniffed it out.I found the bookshelf of notes that it was coming from.The shelf contains 3-ring binders full of my old class notes from medical neuroscience and anatomy. I loved those classes, and I love those notes.(Nerd.)I realize I have to go through those books.And I don’t want to, but I must.Sure enough, after shaking out about 4 notebooks, out falls something furry and black.And so stinky…
a dead BAT!
What the!So, I dealt with it, and it’s out of the house now.I still don’t know how that bat got in there and died while I was away on vacation.And, I don’t want to read too much into the symbolism here, but if the state of my apartment is really representing the state of my brain…I need to get back to work!
A perfect vacation sunset over the St. Lawrence River.
The sun, dragging light ever so slowly away.Leaves and flower blossoms unwilling to let go of today.
The warm light takes hours to finally wane, and all of nature’s treats bask in color, their edges soaked in orange light.
Above, gently roving blue clouds, clinging to their own edges of pink, steadily giving way to shades of grey, becoming blue mirrors to the sky.
Bobbing flowers reflect their spectrum of the sun to the last, but there is no sadness in the coming dark.It seems as if all living things are breathing slowly, deeply, getting in all of what there is to offer in these,
the longest days of the year. Even in dusk, with the sunlight faded, there is a glow and those bright flowers, those deeply green trees still show.
There is so much life in a summer night.And June is the best of it.The air full of flowers and cookouts, the breeze that never chills, the concerts in the park, Frisbees flying.The gardens that were planted in May become confident now, the plants growing faster, their blossoms showing full.They have optimism and they must.It’s now or never.Enjoy.
Well, our fantastic summer weather brought on a completely unintentional blog hiatus!Oops!That, and my incredible need for a summer vacation seems to be sapping all the creative life right out of me.But, it will happen soon enough!
Scientists out there, do you ever tire of talking science?At the moment, I’m so burned out from molecular markers, protein expression, and various physiological parameters that I can barely begin to think about writing more science in my blog.And this was supposed to be a science blog.And I was supposed to be a scientist.Oh, dear.
So, until I get freshened up, I hope you’ll roll with me.Maybe after my vacation I’ll feel fresh enough to delve back into science and what’s special about being a part of it.But in the meantime, in this heady June air, I have been rather busy delving back into life itself.
One thing I know for sure:definitely one should always begin the summer with a camping trip.I learned this the first weekend in June.Do it right off the bat.Black flies, be damned!Although I came back looking like I had a bad case of the chicken pox, I’d still take black flies over those whiny, awful mosquitoes any day of the year.Camping was a fantastic way to start things off and let that summer greenness ooze right into your pores, as well as copious quantities of SPF 45 and DEET.And we went canoe camping, at that!One of my new favorite things in life is canoe camping.Lakes are not as fun as rivers, and headwinds are never fun at all, but there’s something special about being out on the water, powered by your own newly mastered J-stroke.We visited Lac Mauricie National Park and while, generally, there was a lot of that lovely peace and quiet that is only found in the woods, including that wild and crazy call of the loon, we also had the pleasure of listening to a bachelor party about a kilometer off, over the water.Turns out, they had brought a Chewbacca suit for someone to wear in the night and scare the pants off of the lucky groom-to-be.This explains a lot of the ridiculous noises we heard, and makes me glad my friends never pulled such a trick on me. J
Well, for part of this blog, I wanted to write about things I see and do in town. Stuff I like. Well, I wouldn’t have expected this little bit, but it’s entertaining at least, and I have to share. A few mornings ago, we were awakened by a huge crash on the glass skylight. Quickly shot out of bed to assess the damage. The skylight was not broken, but there was a new beam of metal dangling above, attached to some sort of rope that ran up to the slightly higher roof next door. OK then. Awake now. Getting ready for work and there is some strange, high squeaky sound. Look up into the skylight and the beam is gone, as well as the rope. Neat. A while later, we look outside at the front of the place, for any clue as to what the crap just happened. And we see this guy next door. Doing whatever this is. Three stories up.
Noticed the other day that I wasn’t rushing down the hill towards the subway on the way home after work.My head wasn’t down, defending against pelting rain, snow, or that god-awful Montreal wind.I was looking up, walking slowly, breathing in the air, planning this year’s balcony garden in my head.I was even smiling.I didn’t even realize how rare this is until it actually happened.Spring.
Then, a week of rain.A whole week.Not exaggerating here.I think, to live in northern climates, people need to build up a whole lot of inner reinforcements against the bad things that can come from enduring months of cold winter.Outdoor exercise like skiing and skating help, and an appreciation for those days of doing “indoor” activities: watching movies, reading books, taking all Sunday to make a delicious stew.
See, this is what happened this week:we finally made it through a rainy/snowy April that only contained a few hints of spring to come.A little warmth here, a little sun there.And the month of May, it came in bright and shiny.I planted my garden.And then it rained for the next 7 days.And not warm humid rain, mind you.Cold rain, with a hurricane breeze to match.It felt like winter.And I had already cast off all my winter inner reinforcements when I tilled the soil for this year’s balcony garden.Oh, the misery!
And now, the sun has unexpectedly forced its way through those clouds.I have frantically grabbed up the laptop, the phone, the journal, a glass of water, the cat, and made myself comfortable for a whole afternoon of working on the front balcony.Surrounded by the new porch garden I hadn’t even had the chance of enjoying yet, and it’s been planted a week.It’s warm enough for bare feet, and my happy little toes are basking in the breeze running through them.And now, the possibilities of the future are bright again.Now, I’ve rediscovered optimism.
And I wonder, why are moods so dependent on the weather?
It might sound absurd to anyone in a career outside of academia.But, I’ll just be brave right now and put it out there.My feelings about a science career change absolutely every day.Going through PhD school, this might have been the case, but I was so concerned with every last detail of bladder anatomy, spinal cord pathways, and however the habenula connects to the stria medullaris thalamicus, that I didn’t notice.In learning all of those details, I was (overall) enjoying myself and following a path, feeling like I was getting somewhere.But it seems to me that, at least in myself and my own science friends, there comes a point (or two or twenty) where you are lost.No sense of a path.You are left to discover, and discover you must, in order to feel successful.You have a fuzzy sense of betrayal, although you are not sure who betrayed you, when it happened, or how.
Personally, I made myself very tired getting that PhD.And soon after, I embarked on a post-doc that I thought I should sure be well qualified for, having that fancy PhD and all.But of course, it’s science.It’s academia.It has its perks, but is also completely unpredictable.Dependent upon luck.
And in my case, the post-doc research is not nearly as lucky as the PhD work.Try as I might, none of my own ideas have really panned out.The angst was really taking over for a while.I can see now that I had way-too-high expectations for the post-doc.I confounded the angst with a sense of entitlement.This is the thing:in order to get through the PhD, I told myself I was getting such a specialized degree in order to get a career that really suited me.Putting in the work then, it was certain that I would be happy later.I assumed it would be the next step that would be so great.I probably expected my post-doc to be sunny, productive, friendly, easier.This was very silly, but maybe forgivable.
Now, pessimism was never my style.It’s been creeping in for a long time now.Holding off on “life”, never really letting go on the weekends, forgetting to enjoy hikes with your friends because you’re writing a thesis and are anxious to get back to it...You might know the drill.
So, PhD students and post-docs, and anyone struggling in their “pathway” to their dream career, here’s what I’m thinking: there is no pathway.It might look that way on paper, but I’ll bet very few professors, or professionals in any field, really ever knew what they wanted to be at nine years old (I wanted 5 PhD’s, remember?), then followed every exact step to that point without a moment of doubt.Or a few years of being broke.Or some heartbreak.It’s supposed to be imperfect.Life is not easy.And having fantastic plans and a solid head on your shoulders doesn’t change that.Of course, you should have goals.But so many of us make the mistake of thinking that hard work will get you everything you ever wanted just exactly when you decide it’s time.What I might be trying to say is: don’t sweat it.
Don’t be surprised if you wake up one day, thinking that suddenly all of those things you were reaching for are out of reach.This might not be the worst thing.Did you think a great paycheck was the goal?Maybe you’ll come home from work one day and get mail that informs you your money’s gone.All of it.This is not the worst thing.Maybe you thought you needed a bunch of publications in order to know that you were successful.And maybe, try as you might, those publications were not accepted, were never written, or the data was never positive.This is not the worst thing.The worst thing?Forgetting who you are. Forgetting what you have to offer outside of that chosen path.A path is important, but really, your path might be leading along a gorgeous shoreline, or through a close forest, and you might be too busy looking down in the dirt for your paper, or the money you lost!You’d miss the sound of the waves, you’d miss seeing the passing ship, you’d miss the hazy summer blue sky, the songstress birds up in the trees.
Stop and think.Could it be that at one point you already were successful?Perhaps, there were a few months back in school where you were on top of the world, full of dreams, not a tiny bit of doubt that you would make it to the exalted heights, the place you always wanted to be.You were happy.Your friends were around.You knew you had it all.Remember.You didn’t realize it then, but you had success.You were giving it your all.It might be that success is just that simple.
You know what skills you have.You know what you want to do.It’s true that you have talent.Don’t let experiments and setbacks make you feel like you don’t.Do not waste your time.You are attempting one of the most difficult things that there is to do.You are trying to make a completely new discovery, with unperfected techniques, on your very own.You have learned as much as you can in your field, and now you’re on the frontier, moving the field forward.Silly scientist, this is no easy task!Don’t forget to be proud of how far you’ve gotten.
If happiness is not your ultimate goal, then we won’t be understanding each other. JBut if it is, here’s what I think: don’t convince yourself that outward signs of success are actual success.Listen, deep.Look at what you’ve done, who you’re close to, who you’ve met, think of the places you’ve loved.Success will find you, and it might not look a damn thing like what you thought it would.It doesn’t come quickly, no matter what silly degrees you might have earned.But, keep listening.No matter what, keep going in some direction, and just enjoy what there is to enjoy there, no matter what.
If you’re feeling lost, you just might find yourself again in a simple moment.
I’m still believing that hard work works, after all.Just at a slower pace than I had anticipated.And it might take me in a completely different direction than I had anticipated or been prepared for.And that’s OK.
One of my favorite things about Montreal:the harbinger of spring here for me is a yard made of gorgeous blue flowers.I have no idea what they are, but they seem to be a perennial ground cover for some of the lawns on campus.The temperatures only barely became spring-like a week or two ago, and those brave little flowers have popped up on little hillsides, bright and bold as can be.While tree leaves are still slowly, slowly forming their buds, shyly waiting for that first truly warm weekend to burst forth with some tiny yellow-green baby leaves, these fabulous little flowers are showing us all they’ve got, just as soon as they can.And it’s only April!In Montreal!I love these flowers.
Does anyone know what these are?I need some in my future yard.They are gorgeous in April, and then just just blend in with the grass for the rest of the growing season.
Being fairly frazzled from a few years’ living in the city, and inspired by my own experience of writing about the mountain for my blog, I did a somewhat spontaneous, but totally satisfying thing: I went there. Other wooded places are helpful, but I knew that only this one place would get me what I needed. Only on the mountain would I hear the wind in the trees like I needed to hear, to see the open views of the neighboring hills from that spot in the field. The day was sunny, above freezing, and the air was promising of spring. It was time.
Now, I knew there were new owners. I had never met them. I had heard there was a new, year-round house in the place of the old farmhouse. I knew no other family would love our “Little Camp” as much as we had. I knew I never would have been ready to go there until now. But, there I was. I rang the doorbell and met the new owner. A friendly guy, who happens to obviously appreciate the land and its history as much as I do. He walked with me from his new house, up the hill, to the Little Camp, where my family and I had always stayed. My favorite apple trees are still there. He told me they are still producing apples every year. The Little Camp is standing although, as I had been prepared for, disheveled. But proud. Some of our old stuff was still in its cupboards, and I gathered up my brother’s and my old berry-picking pails. If no one loves it now, I had to take what I could, including pictures. How many gorgeous hours did I spend sitting in those fields, humming songs, thinking, plucking and (mostly) gobbling up those wild strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries. The berry season ended always gloriously with the ripening of the apples in the fall. After June began, there was never a weekend without some sweet treat to hunt for. We would pick berries for mom’s breakfast on Mother’s Day, and give her breakfast in bed with fresh berries on her cereal. We were very thoughtful children. J
I captured pictures of all the old things that were still the same, things I remembered so clearly. I gathered it all up again, seen by my eyes for the first time in my adult life. Most importantly, almost none of my favorite things had changed. The landscape was the same, the fields the same, the older familiar pines surrounding the yards were still there, although twice as tall as I remember them. One big thing: the Little Camp was SO much smaller than I remembered. I suppose I’ve grown a few inches since I was 14.
There was surprisingly comfortable conversation between the new owner and I, considering that I had shown up unannounced on a Monday afternoon, hoping to tromp all over his land and take photos.
There is so much more to tell and a thousand different ways to say it, but it will take me a while to absorb it all. My overall feeling from the visit: satisfaction. Like revisiting my own subconscious, if you can imagine. It was as if the place remembered me. And how wonderful to know that it had been here all along, changing too, but with the heart still in it. A lot like me. My favorite place in the world is doing OK, and I have the photos to prove it! He invited me to visit again in the summer, when things are green, and I’m thinking it’s pretty likely I could find the time to go back…
Estrogen’s a funny thing.It has purpose throughout the female body, and is even produced in men’s bodies.It also serves as a suspect in many researcher’s minds as a key source of pain in women.It’s a fact that women experience more chronic pain conditions than men, including painful bladder syndrome, endometriosis, fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome, chronic pelvic pain, temporomandibular joint disorder, and migraines.Women naturally produce more estrogen than men, and thus estrogen is being vigorously studied by pain scientists as a potential target to alleviate many of the chronic pain conditions experienced largely by women.
The thing is, each lab comes up with something of a different conclusion.Some experiments show that the presence of estrogen alleviates both chronic and short-term pain, others show that it makes it worse.Sometimes the relief is temporary, and sometimes permanent.All of the experiments are carefully thought out, well-done peer-reviewed studies, good enough to be trusted and believed.So, what could be going on here?One idea out there is that fluctuating levels of estrogen somehow trigger certain pain conditions.This is a popular emerging idea, especially in migraine research.Still, this idea doesn’t experimentally fit for all pain conditions.
Of course, part of the frustration of research is that the best of intentions and hard work don’t necessarily lead to an answer right away, if ever.And, the less success we have with our basic research, the less informed physicians are.And this leads to a lot of unresolved pain.The average time for diagnosis of endometriosis after onset of symptoms ranges from about 5-10 years.Endometriosis is a painful condition in which tissue like the inner lining of the uterus appears in other parts of the body.The average time for diagnosis of painful bladder syndrome (also called interstitial cystitis) is about 4 years.All of the pain conditions I’ve named are conditions that affect daily life, pain that sometimes gets better or worse throughout a month, pain that can come suddenly in spells over many years, or more constant, daily, chronic suffering.
So, a considerable amount of research is currently being carried out on all of these topics.And, for each chronic pain condition I’ve named, there is at least one laboratory exploring the role of estrogen in that pain condition.The fact that some laboratories report that estrogen improves painful conditions, and that others are just as certain that that the opposite is true makes for some interesting (and heated) discussions at scientific conferences.(I know, I’ve been privy to several).I’m hoping someone can brilliantly gather up all the information that is out there so far on the topic, and be able to put all the pieces together.Once we know what estrogen might be doing in all of this, we might have a new way to alleviate some of this pain!Until then, there are some useful coping mechanisms out there:
One of the common side effects of pursuing the PhD-postdoc path is that you tend to become super-focused on a very small piece of your field.Lately, I am so focused that I have almost completely lost track of why I study what I study.I’ve had a lot of bad research luck lately, and this leaves me with a thoroughly isolated vision of a thoroughly frustrating task.My guess is that I am not the only scientist in this position.This situation is good for no one.So, I stepped back, took a look at the work, and realized, well this is really interesting.And people I talk to about it think so, too.At the clinical level, this is a question that affects many, many people.This is what I forget until my work happens to come up in a social conversation.
The funniest thing about working on medically-related research is that strangers will often talk to you like you’re a physician.I’ve heard a lot of weird details about the health of strangers, completely unbidden.It happened when I did my PhD research on bladder function (awkward) and it happens now when I mention that I study the potential role of estrogen in pain.It starts casually, “Oh, what brings you to Montreal?What are you doing at the University?...”If they keep pressing for details, I tell them, “I’m looking at the effectof estrogen on pain, specifically abdominal pain.”Once this happens, I know I’ll either get a funny look, plus complete silence thereafter, or way too much information that I’m not even remotely prepared to comment on.I’ve heard about the veterinarian’s monthly pain experiences, and the estrogen treatments that were given to a new acquaintance I met at a friend’s wedding.Yep, people share these things with me just as soon as I meet them.
I’ve got more coming, just wait!To be continued soon. J
There’s a few great things about my Montreal life.One of them is simply the view I have from my front room.I know lots of people in this city and in the whole world have way better views than me.But, I have been enjoying the heck out of mine for a few years now.From here, I can see the shiny buildings of downtown, have a clear view of Mont Royal and the St. Joseph’s Observatory.There is the added bonus of the highway just outside, providing hours of vehicle-watching, seeing accidents nearly happen on the highway just outside.Haha.I sit out on my front balcony for 3 seasons, watch my plants grow, listen to my pot-head neighbors as they party a few balconies over, pull up my head from my book to the sound of cars honking.In summer, I can see the fireworks from the International Fireworks Competition (but only the ones that go really high).I can see Mont Royal turn from brown/grey to that baby-bright green in spring, to full dark green in summer, over to yellow and red in the fall.And then when winter hits, I sit inside and watch the snow fall, looking out at the highway, glad to not be driving one of those cars I see out on the road.I snuggle under a blanket with the purring cat, and feel grateful.(Yes, you might have noticed, I am easily pleased.)
However, now, it is March.The only month of the year that I regularly wonder: “WHY didn’t I move further south?Why oh why oh why?”I’m ready to head out to the balcony again.Cabin fever is setting in, and the wacky weather has begun.Single-digit (Fahrenheit) cold one day, things are melting the next day for a few hours, then whatever melted turns back into ice.Then they predict a snowstorm, and it’s back to winter with 20 cm of snow.Two days later, it’s a sunny day.The sunlight lasts until after you leave work (miraculous!) and you begin to notice that the days, in fact, are actually getting longer.And now that the U.S. government decided in 2007 to extend Daylight Savings time, this modern miracle of screwing with time happens even sooner.(In fact, we’re almost there!)By the way:thank you to the Canadian government for also adapting the new Daylight Savings time.
However, this is still March.To me, the month of eternal torture.The temperatures hover around the freezing point, above and below, above and below, rarely shooting high enough to give actual hope.March.It’s supposed to ‘come in like a lion and go out like a lamb,’ but I’ve noticed that ever since I moved to various northern locations near or north of the Canadian border ten years ago, that this isn’t really true.Where is the lamb?Somewhere in April, the lamb shows up.Until then, it’s simply daydreams of sitting out on the front porch, quietly plotting my new container garden, literally dreaming of soil and basil plants.At least we have St. Patrick’s Day to look forward to.Green beer, anyone?
I am thinking of the mountain again, and this time, I'm thinking about ants! JSo, how about heading back there with me?!Here goes: early summer day, not too hot, everything including the grass, so green, trees decked out in their fullest leaves, heavy swish of the wind through their branches, a plethora of chirping birds.The screen door bangs as a little, young version of you leaves the house to head to the backyard by yourself and visit your ant trail and check on the doings of your ants (yeah, I really was always so nerdy).There is occasional kitchen clatter and chatter from the cabin, but you don’t notice.The mountain was plentiful in carpenter ants, the big black ones, about the size of a grown-up thumbnail.Here’s what you’re wondering, if you’re me:how and why are they wearing a trail in the grass so well that the grass is worn down to dirt, so clear that you can see it from standing.You’d spend some time watching them walk along, enjoying the day, observing the way the ants meet and greet each other with their little antennae as they pass in different directions.
And then the questions would begin.What sort of information they are passing to each other, if anything, and how might they be doing it?How awesome is it that they walk along the same path enough to wear the grass down?And how do they find the path?Do they find it by smell?They don’t have eyes do they?How big is an ant brain?Does an ant have a brain?So, I’m all grown up now, and I still want to look into what was going on here.I realize that even after all this neurobiology training, I still don’t know much about ant brains, after all!
So, I have now done my research and I’ve learned a few neat things.A lot of neat things, actually, but here are some of my favorite bits.
Ants are actually incredibly interesting and the study of ant behavior has applications to neuroscience, engineering, ecosystems, and stock markets (whoah!).As for foraging and trail-making, ants make trails using pheromones.The pheromones, depending on the species of ant, are secreted from a variety of gland locations, including glands on the feet, thorax, anus and abdomen.They even release different pheromones for ‘to’ a food source as opposed to ‘away from’ a food source.Ants will leave a pheromone trail behind them as they are leaving a food source, indicating to other ants that the trail had been successful.As the food source is used up, the ants cease leaving this ‘success’ pheromone behind, and the trail scent slowly dissipates.Carpenter ants can make well-worn trails that they use for years, probably guiding them to an area commonly good for food (perhaps towards our camp, for example).
Argentine ant trails - Latty et al., 2011
While doing my present-day ant exploration (reading, no ant progressions to follow here in the apartment in Montreal that I’ve found, very grateful for THAT), I also found that ant path-making is an area of current active research.In particular, researchers are interested in the way individual ants find the shortest route to a food source or other location with no central influence. Latty et al. arranged a colony of Argentine ants in separate nests and then recorded and studied how they form paths between the nests.They also wanted to know if the number of individual ants made a difference in the way the ants organized network pathways.Here’s what happened:the ants made networks of paths with lengths that increased to a maximum, and then were trimmed down to a final length.At first, individual ants made redundant paths, but overall, through trial and error, the colony of ants produced more efficient pathways.With more ants in the colony, the networks formed were less precise in the end, and the extra total length traveled per ant increased.With too few ants, no paths were created at all.
This fits in interestingly with something else I found.An ant brain has about 250,000 neurons.A human brain has about 100 billion neurons (of course, this is a bit debatable).Some ant researchers liken an ant colony to a single human brain, where each ant could represent a neuron, all of them signaling to each other in various ways.Together they are accomplishing great feats where one neuron in a brain or one ant in a colony could accomplish so very little.
This is also interesting because the authors compare the ant networking situation with, for one, mammalian vasculature development.It’s funny, because little ant paths and networks really do resemble vascular networks in a visual sense.Just like ants don’t always follow the straightest path from A to B, so endothelial cells (the cells that form the inner lining of blood vessels) do not form blood vessels that make straight lines through the human body.And I remember this from anatomy class:not everyone’s vasculature is the same.And most do not look exactly like those diagrams in the textbooks.It’s all just a bit haphazard, organic.And worthy of a lot more study.Perhaps the same principles that guide an individual ant on its journey to find food, is in some global way related to the workings of neurons in a human brain or the relation of individuals to a stock market.This is cool.
Now, I am only scratching the surface of ant science and am certainly not giving it due justice, but that was fun!!Check out the references if you’d like to know more.There are plenty of ant books out there also.
References:
Delgado J, Sole, R (2000) Self-synchronization and task fulfillment in ant colonies.Journal of Theoretical Biology.205: 433-441.
Jackson DE, Ratnieks FLW (2006)Communication in ants.Current Biology.16:570-574.
Latty T, Ramsch K, Ito K, Nakagaki T, Sumpter D, Middendorf M, Beekman M (2011)Structure and formation of ant transportation networks.Journal of the Royal Society Interface. Published online 2 February 2011.
Robinson EJH, Ratnieks FLW, Holcombe M (2008)An agent-based model to investigate the roles of attractive and repellent pheromones in ant decision making during foraging.Journal of Theoretical Biology. 255:250-258.
By the way, I am a big fan of old-school Dave Matthews Band.I hope you will enjoy this video as much as I did!!
I was so excited about the positive feedback on my first few posts, I sort of forgot to get going on the next post.And then I became unsure of what I wanted to write about.And then I got so nervous that I felt like I couldn’t write anything at all.Oh, the madness!
For now, I wanted to share this lovely tidbit with you.I have been reading Ray Bradbury’s Zen in the Art of Writing.It is wonderful, inspiring and motivating.I’d recommend it for anyone, including non-writers.This is one of my favorite quotes from it:
“Self-consciousness is the enemy of all art, be it acting, writing, painting, or living itself, which is the greatest art of all.”
So, there you have it. Don't think about it, just go ahead and do it! Hopefully this might inspire a few of you out there, suffering from some sort of temporary or long-term block, be it writer’s or whatever.I’m busy working on my temporary writer’s block, and I’ll get back to you soon, I hope!! J
I had the good fortune to be asked to judge a high school science fair on a recent afternoon. I just thought I’d sit here and jot down a couple of things that really struck me, having to do with teenagers and the strange experience of viewing science through their eyes. And of course, when you get to see something important to you through another set of eyes, interesting thoughts usually come up!
First: wow, do these kids have energy! I haven’t been in a high school setting, or among a mass of teenagers in a very long time, probably not since I was one of them myself. Some of these students clearly had energy for their project and in making clear to me what thought and effort they had put into it. Those kids were a lot of fun. Others had energy, but it just as obviously was focused on other aspects of their lives. Certainly not on putting effort into a silly science fair. (I wonder if these students realize how easy it is for us to tell that they only put one afternoon’s effort into their project?) Anyway, the gymnasium was buzzing with their energy. As the judges arrived, all were nervous, all attention on last-minute practices mumbled to project partners. As the judges visited our assigned projects, asked our questions, and steadily worked our ways through the students, the atmosphere correspondingly changed, super-energy high school students steadily regressed from focused, obliging mini-scientists into kids again, all grouping up together, the sounds of giggles taking over the gymnasium air. Students were running around, God knows where or why, earning stern words from their teachers. And suddenly, the high school students began making me very nervous, giving strange flashbacks to days not so long ago when I was JUST like that. What’s scary is that I didn’t realize how old and low-energy and DULL I’ve become in comparison. Holy crap!!
On a more scientific note, the other thing that stood out for me at the fair was the scientific method. The whole thing was up on their gymnasium wall, on a giant banner, just like this:
Define the question
Gather information
Form a hypothesis
Perform experiment and collect data
Analyze data
Interpret data and draw conclusions that serve as a starting point for new hypothesis
I do remember learning about this process in school. I do remember being a bit baffled by it at the time (maybe I shouldn’t admit this?). Now, the students at the science fair didn’t really seem to get the idea of a hypothesis, either. And I didn’t truly understand it until grad school. Back in high school and earlier, I just didn’t get what they were saying with it. Something didn’t connect. At least for me, early science education did not have anything to do with the discovery of new ideas. It was simply the memorization of super fascinating discoveries that other people had already made. And now I am wondering: why is there so little discovery involved in elementary and high school education? Why didn’t I learn how to really think critically until I was being battered with questions by professors in grad school in front of the whole Neurobiology department? Did I miss something along the way?
And this brings me to something that’s been running around in my brain for a few years now. I’m just wondering if there might be a better way to teach young students the scientific method. Once I learned and practiced the process of analyzing data, and to design an experiment that best rules out all variables and alternate conclusions (not an easy trick, mind you), I found that these skills apply fascinatingly well to everyday life. I suppose they used to call it critical thinking back in school, but that too was a boring phrase that went in one of my ears and right out the other. Being able to look at a set of information and truly get the most out of it, to be certain that you are not being tricked into a conclusion based on an incomplete data set, is a skill that is useful everywhere. Just try and read the news, searching for the same sort of bias or incomplete data that you’d search for in a journal article. I now try to never let these hard-earned skills go to waste. It’s amazing the way the world looks once you can see through the crapola, analytically listening to a political speech or reading a news article. I only got here after many years of science training. Yes, I was a total sucker and believed most things that I read and heard before that. But, isn’t there a way to make the importance of this skill more obvious to everyone, at a young age? Otherwise, we’re all just suckers, aren’t we?
I know a number of my readers teach high school. Any ideas? Or am I just being a lunatic? That’s cool if I am, you can say so. J
Well, wow! Thanks everyone so much for visiting my first blog! The number of visits to the page was so big, I think I’m suffering a little stage fright in writing this next piece. :-) But, I’ll do my best. The good news is that in starting the blog and writing that first piece, I’m already feeling a lot less angst overall. Mostly. Writing therapy is wonderful.
In my current quest for sanity (simplicity), and wondering how in the world I got to this particular spot in life, a certain place keeps popping up in my mind. I’ve been dying to revisit this place, and maybe you’d be up for joining along. I’m quite sure this is where the whole science path began. Until I was 14 years old, my family and I stayed in a cabin on land in Pennsylvania owned by my dad’s parents and aunt. We stayed there almost all weekends through the spring, summer and fall. The cabin itself was built by hand by my great-grandfather and his friend. A plaque on the chimney has the year 1940 scratched into it. It was a rustic and small two-story cabin with stone walls, a one-room downstairs and an open loft upstairs. There was a screened-in porch that we used in the summer days and evenings. Of course, it was cozy and beautiful to us, the feeling of family ever-present in the place, every corner hand-made. We called it the Little Camp.
But, it’s more than just the Little Camp I wanted to visit. We called the whole place, land, cabin and all, The Mountain. To me, it was: the big mowed yard, surrounded by a modest stone wall, and past that, acres and acres of trees. Quiet. The occasional deer and bear wandering through the yard. Red eft salamanders making their brilliant appearances near the creek after a rainstorm. Meadows of tall grass, huge old maple trees standing tall as the years passed, a small pond that was only filled with water until mid-summer. We had a view from the big field on our hillside, below the Little Camp, onto the next hill, the whole thing covered with trees. There were no buildings in sight but ours, not a cottage or a power line. As a small kiddo, I’d get up early to gather (mostly just eat) wild strawberries in the field, munch from apple trees that gave delicious Spy and Golden Delicious in the fall. Most important: the quiet. All weekend, to only hear the breathing of the earth: the wind through the trees, rushing through branches choked with leaves in the summer, and a brittle sound as the leaves would change color and fall. A bright whistle once the leaves were gone. The call of a crow. The screen door slamming periodically. These sounds, always a gentle backdrop: understated peace.
Everything was so quiet and close that the super-occasional car passing by on the dirt road was an attention-grabbing event. For me as a kid, events on the mountain were defined in much smaller spaces than they are in life these days. The discovery of a path made by ants in the grass, the magic of witnessing my first ice storm, each branch and blade of grass covered in its own glass sheath. All of the changing seasons, apple blossoms slowly turning into apples. Tadpoles hatching from their eggs, slowing becoming frogs. I’d keep track of all these things, week to week, making my visits to be sure and witness all that was going on. There’s a lot of magic in watching and listening to the earth just do her thing. And that’s the beginning, for me. In all of these events is another whole set of fun blog posts, I’m sure. :-)
Oh, and happy Valentine's Day! Eat some chocolate!!
Well, here we are.Welcome!I’ve decided to embark on a little blogging adventure, and see where it takes me.I initially wanted to write a science blog.However, while I was putting together some things in order to begin, I decided I should just dive in; I have a lot that I feel like saying.So, here goes.On this blog, I’m just going to write, and work on finding my voice again.Hopefully you find it enjoyable, and then we’ll both be happy!We’ll see where this leads, but hopefully it will be enjoyable and useful for us both.
For starters, I’m working as a post-doctoral fellow in Montreal, Quebec.I moved here from the U.S.A. two and a half years ago and have had my perspective turned around in a thousand different ways since then.It’s a blessing and a curse.(In the end, maybe after a few beers, I’d probably admit to you it’s been a blessing and I wouldn’t change a thing).
If you’re unfamiliar with what a post-doctoral fellow is, well then you’re in good company.As I understand it, once upon a time, folks who were ambitious (or nuts) enough to be a university professor could attain that inviting-sounding position after obtaining a Ph.D. degree.They could then teach undergraduates, run a small lab, and basically enjoy a life of educating others and educating themselves all the time.It sounded fabulous to me.However, nowadays, there is enough Ph.D. competition out there, that a post-doc is necessary in order to achieve some research experience, hence hire-ability.So, I survived the Neuroscience Ph.D. program and enjoyed that so much that I moved on to the post-doc.The post-doc, as far as I know, is the lowest-paying (and accordingly modest) job option out there for a newly graduated Ph.D. student.Mind you, this is someone who has gone to school for at least 25 years.Anyway, the idea is to fill yourself in on any skills you missed during Ph.D. school, become an independent researcher and develop your own research program.This means that if you were handed a lab tomorrow, you’d be ready to fill it up with students, churn out some data, and apply for and obtain some serious funding.The funding comes from many sources, private and public, but as far as I know, the climate in the last few years has been that big government grants, National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR) are the top goal (lots of money).However, as the world economy (and especially the U.S. economy) is starting to show cracks, so has the government-funding of research.Science is a difficult field to get a degree in, and an even harder one to get a job in these days (oh, what have I done?).
Still, I always wanted to be a scientist (as well as an astronaut, an inventor, a writer, a pilot, an engineer…).There was even a moment where I specifically remember yearning for 5 Ph.D.s; this was just after I learned what a Ph.D. was.I believe I was around 9 years old.(Dear God, what is wrong with me?)
Such ambition and determination in a risky and sorely difficult type of career must eventually lead to burnout or breakdown, right?Anyway, here I am now.Approaching or involved in a transition period, a burnout period, a moment of asking myself, “what in the WORLD am I doing here?”How did I get here?Why did I leave comfort for adventure?What is most important?Before any science ambition, before I knew why the leaves changed color in the fall, and long before I’d ever heard of the Dave Matthews Band (J), I wanted to write.I could write.It was the one thing I could always just do.Through the angst of teenage years, through long northern winters, through breakups and big moves, I wrote.And I’ve written in quiet, in journals that are never read, poems that are never published.It’s been a long time since I’ve used this voice, loud and clear.I’d like to share it again, to see where this might take me.
It’s time to sort the last few years of my life out.It’s time to make some observations, to analyze my experiences, to evaluate the situation.And I’m inviting you along for the ride.Please, please comment and share.Would love for this to be as beneficial for my readers as I hope it will be for me.
And, a note about the blog title, in case you were wondering.“Both Sides Now” is a Joni Mitchell tune, and I happened to be listening to Joni Mitchell, a classic Canadian singer-songwriter, during the lovely cold winter afternoon in the coffee shop where I wrote this first blog!I think it really suits.Enjoy!
