Let us do Science!

Nobel in Physics 2010: a carbon flake, one atom thick.

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2010/press.html

"Why don't you write books people can read?"-Nora Joyce, to her husband James

That's fuckin' impressive.

Fight smart, not fair.

Huh! About time. ^.^ Nobels take a while to process. I still hope to see more things we can do with graphene — it's cool stuff.

Sakamoto demands an explanation for this shit.

An interesting thing I learned in chemistry class: When they say "regular adhesive," they mean Scotch tape. They used Scotch tape to help make a Nobel Prize-winning, groundbreaking scientific discovery.

Which makes it the #2 most awesome Nobel prize. #1 goes to Brainbow mice, because they look awesome and sound like the long-lost care-bear. Sadly, they are probably a lot less useful than graphene.

Now I've got this image of Robin's secret childhood love affair with Mr. T. - Idler 20

I'm a writer who admires scientific thinking and interested in science, primarily so I can put them in my work. I originally wanted to be a scientist, probably physics related, but mathematics is my biggest enemy so that was not an option.

I find the physical implication of time and space very interesting, but have too short attention span to actually read into stuff. Oh, and quantum physics. Is there any book or thesis (doubtful) for introduction to time/space or quantum physics for layman?

Stupid and irrelevant post, I know, but had to post this somewhere....

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

So, my most recent assignment is on a type of nerve cell that might be able to be used to repair spinal cord injuries and brain lesions! It comes from the olfactory mucosa, so they can get them from a sample of the skin in your nasal cavity.

Be not afraid...

Is it for your college? It sounds too complex to be for high school. I pretty much followed you until orfactora nervousa thing.

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Yeah, this is a university assignment. Olfactory mucosa is just the skin deep inside your nose, that contains the nerves used to detect smells.

Be not afraid...

@Loni Jay: Yay plasticity! I don't know much about stem cell therapies but they always seem kind of optimistic to me - I mean, you've got to get the right electronic and neurotransmitter properties, and they have to wire-up into the right circuits to do what they're supposed to. I don't know how much we already know about how that happens (because embryology is hard), but getting the cells seems like only step one on a really, really long road.

@d Roy: Richard Feynman! Genius, brilliant explainer and by all accounts an excellent bongo player. Six Easy Pieces and Six Not-So Easy Pieces were specifically written to introduce laypeople/new undergrads to these concepts.

I'm not a Physicist, but I found these to be good reads. :) If you want to go into things in a bit more detail, you could follow it up with some more specialist popsci books or even some textbooks. Most general undergrad textbooks assume you don't know much until you get into it, so they might not actually be too bad.

Or, even better: Online courses for free from MIT. It's really helping me to suck less at Maths.

edited 24th May '11 4:15:23 AM by robintherose

Now I've got this image of Robin's secret childhood love affair with Mr. T. - Idler 20

Ah, that's the thing - these don't seem to be stem cells or progenitor cells. The literature is a little confusing, but I think they're a fully differentiated cell that just happens to be able to wrap around nerve axons and help them grow through scar tissue.

Be not afraid...

Oh, OK. My bad, I read cells as neurons. >_>

Are they a type of Schwann cell? Because from what I remember, one reason you can get regeneration outside of the CNS is that Schwann cells allow it, but Oligodendrocytes might actually actively prevent neuronal regrowth. And the nose seems like as good a boundary as any between CNS/PNS...

Now I've got this image of Robin's secret childhood love affair with Mr. T. - Idler 20

They're closely related to schwann cells, yeah. In fact I'm just reading about how it's difficult to isolate them away from the schwann cells as they express many of the same proteins.

Be not afraid...

Awesome :). Can you recommend any good reviews?

Now I've got this image of Robin's secret childhood love affair with Mr. T. - Idler 20

I would, but I'm not sure you can get to a lot of the articles I'm reading - I'm using a uni subsription to view them. But if you put 'olfactory ensheathing cells' into google scholar or pubmed or a similar literature database you should come up with something.

Be not afraid...

Will do, but I have a uni library account too . First authors name and year of publication is usually enough to find something on Pub Med (although some people are horrendously prolific).

Anyone have views on Open Source Science? I hate the fact that non-academics (or non-uni students) are basically blocked from learning more about current research unless they're willing to pay like £30 for an article. It feels super-elitist and at least partly responsible for poor science literacy.

But it's really hard to justify submitting to an open journal if you could get it into a higher-impact non-open one. Not to mention all the very important but very un-sexy stuff that has a hard time getting published anywhere and gets read by a fraction of the people who should read it. Grrr.

Edit: Ooh, a new glial subtype! Shiny. Also: There's an entire issue of Experimental Neurology dedicated to them?

edited 24th May '11 5:36:29 AM by robintherose

Now I've got this image of Robin's secret childhood love affair with Mr. T. - Idler 20

Ah, in that case, try "Olfactory ensheathing cells from the nose: Clinical application in human spinal cord injuries", Mackay-Sim. Or perhaps "Olfactory ensheathing cells: Biology in neural development and regeneration", Su.

Admittedly, some of this stuff is really difficult to understand without an understanding of the area to start with. So your average joe might not even understand the jargon.

edited 24th May '11 5:37:45 AM by LoniJay

Be not afraid...

Thanks. :) I found "Encouraging regeneration in the central nervous system: Is there a role for olfactory ensheathing cells?" (King-Robson 2010) and "Remyelination after olfactory ensheathing cell transplantation into diverse demyelinating environments" (Sasaki et al 2011, which is apparently part of the Experimental Neurology special issue).

>_> Stuff like this makes me realise that I will never know all the things. Both awesome and sad.

I have a pretty good Neuro background (I'll have a degree focussing on it by June if I haven't failed the exams). I only have medic-level everything else, though. And my embryology is laughable.

edited 24th May '11 5:42:27 AM by robintherose

Now I've got this image of Robin's secret childhood love affair with Mr. T. - Idler 20

All of the things? Your head would explode ;)

Be not afraid...

I know. It's so sad. :(

I admit that not everyone is going to want to read really in-depth jargon filled stuff, but they should have access. And a lot of more general reviews would be really accessible.

Plus, a lot of stuff that is thought of as "jargon" now probably shouldn't be. Like most kids are expected to leave school being able to understand at least on some level quite high-level discussion about literature. I think the bar is set a lot lower for science education at the moment (definitely in the UK. You can read really advanced art and literature reviews in the Sunday broadsheets, but most of the science still boils down to "Does X cause or cure cancer?")

edited 24th May '11 5:53:50 AM by robintherose

Now I've got this image of Robin's secret childhood love affair with Mr. T. - Idler 20

Ah, I have only one subject's worth of Neuro. And they cut embryology from my degree almost entirely *shrug* I guess they felt it wasn't too useful.

Be not afraid...

Embryology is way more interesting than I first thought. They just tried to teach us the entire subject in about ten lectures. It was...pretty awful.

It's just a really neglected topic at the undergrad level.

Now I've got this image of Robin's secret childhood love affair with Mr. T. - Idler 20

The little embryology they did teach each us - that of the lungs and heart - was pretty difficult to get your head around.

I disagree with you on the jargon, though - some of these papers went into rather more depth than I understood about a method of using magnetics to purify cells, and (to take an example from a different branch of biology) if someone doesn't even know what a ribozyme is how are they going to understand an article about synthesising new ones to order?

Be not afraid...

What I'm saying is that your average joe should probably have a vague idea about what that jargon means. At the moment I have a (very intelligent) friend who didn't know what a neuron was and an (equally intelligent) mother who had no idea what a "synapse" is.

Understanding all methods in detail isn't necessary, what's important is having the skills to be able to read new things and find out what they mean and why they were used. And to do that you have to have a more solid understanding of the basics than schools give most people at the moment.

I'd like people who are able to leave school knowing what cells look like in EM, how they make proteins and how different organ systems work, and ideally with some understanding of how science is done and how to read papers. (With similar requirements for Chemistry and Physics).

So: can read a paper, and can watch Cosmos without getting confused or being presented with something completely new (which is what Cosmos was trying to do). I think that's totally doable.

Now I've got this image of Robin's secret childhood love affair with Mr. T. - Idler 20

Hmm, I suppose; as long as you have a decent understanding of the basics and the ability to learn you shouldn't need a university lecturer to help you figure stuff out, you just need resources. it isn't the information that's the issue, it's just learning terminology.

Be not afraid...