Truism via graphical representation

I’m starting to be persuaded that any idiom may be represented in graphical form. Another graph from Indexed:

 Source: Indexed by Jessica Hagy

The important assumption here is that cook#1 is not me.

Ig Nobels Awarded

Forget those other awards coming out next week, the Ig Nobel awards were awarded last night.

For the uninitiated, the Ig Nobels are awards that celebrate research that “makes you laugh, then makes you think”. They’re doing a great job of promoting interesting science, I always enjoy seeing who wins.

Winners this year:

• VETERINARY MEDICINE PRIZE: Catherine Douglas and Peter Rowlinson of Newcastle University, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, UK, for showing that cows who have names give more milk than cows that are nameless.
  
• PEACE PRIZE: Stephan Bolliger, Steffen Ross, Lars Oesterhelweg, Michael Thali and Beat Kneubuehl of the University of Bern, Switzerland, for determining — by experiment — whether it is better to be smashed over the head with a full bottle of beer or with an empty bottle.
  
• ECONOMICS PRIZE: The directors, executives, and auditors of four Icelandic banks — Kaupthing Bank, Landsbanki, Glitnir Bank, and Central Bank of Iceland — for demonstrating that tiny banks can be rapidly transformed into huge banks, and vice versa — and for demonstrating that similar things can be done to an entire national economy.
  
• CHEMISTRY PRIZE: Javier Morales, Miguel Apátiga, and Victor M. Castaño of Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, for creating diamonds from liquid — specifically from tequila.
  
• MEDICINE PRIZE: Donald L. Unger, of Thousand Oaks, California, USA, for investigating a possible cause of arthritis of the fingers, by diligently cracking the knuckles of his left hand — but never cracking the knuckles of his right hand — every day for more than sixty (60) years.
  
• PHYSICS PRIZE: Katherine K. Whitcome of the University of Cincinnati, USA, Daniel E. Lieberman of Harvard University, USA, and Liza J. Shapiro of the University of Texas, USA, for analytically determining why pregnant women don't tip over.
  
• LITERATURE PRIZE: Ireland's police service (An Garda Siochana), for writing and presenting more than fifty traffic tickets to the most frequent driving offender in the country — Prawo Jazdy — whose name in Polish means "Driving License".
  
• PUBLIC HEALTH PRIZE: Elena N. Bodnar, Raphael C. Lee, and Sandra Marijan of Chicago, Illinois, USA, for inventing a brassiere that, in an emergency, can be quickly converted into a pair of gas masks, one for the brassiere wearer and one to be given to some needy bystander.
  
• MATHEMATICS PRIZE: Gideon Gono, governor of Zimbabwe’s Reserve Bank, for giving people a simple, everyday way to cope with a wide range of numbers — from very small to very big — by having his bank print bank notes with denominations ranging from one cent ($.01) to one hundred trillion dollars ($100,000,000,000,000).
  
• BIOLOGY PRIZE: Fumiaki Taguchi, Song Guofu, and Zhang Guanglei of Kitasato University Graduate School of Medical Sciences in Sagamihara, Japan, for demonstrating that kitchen refuse can be reduced more than 90% in mass by using bacteria extracted from the feces of giant pandas.

Fear the Biologists

xkcd on biologists:

 
Source: xkcd.com

One reason to pay attention in physics class

You never know when a megalomaniacal criminal mastermind will use physics against you. From xkcd:

Source: xkcd.com

Nappium

I reported earlier on the newest element to be added to the periodic table, Copernicium. Here we look at the process of element discovery those researchers most likely went through in their search for the new compound. From Married to the Sea:

Source: Married to the Sea

Scientists Model Zombie Outbreak

I recently reported on a few troubling signs that the robocalypse may be closer than we think. However, there are other equally serious apocalypse scenarios that we should also be concerned about. I’m talking, of course, about zombies.

 
Especially zombie strippers

Never you worry though, teh scientizts are at work. A chapter in Infectious Disease Modelling Research Progress published by researchers at Carleton University and the University of Ottawa, is titled

When Zombies Attack!: Mathematical Modelling of an Outbreak of Zombie Infection

The abstract of the paper pretty much says it all:

Zombies are a popular figure in pop culture/entertainment and they are usually portrayed as being brought about through an outbreak or epidemic.  Consequently, we model a zombie attack, using biological assumptions based on popular zombie movies.  We introduce a basic model for zombie infection, determine equilibria and their stability, and illustrate the outcome with numerical solutions. We then refine the model to introduce a latent period of zombification, whereby humans are infected, but not infectious, before becoming undead.  We then modify the model to include the effects of possible quarantine or a cure.  Finally, we examine the impact of regular, impulsive reductions in the number of zombies and derive conditions under which eradication can occur. We show that only quick, aggressive attacks can stave off the doomsday scenario: the collapse of society as zombies overtake us all.

And a snippet of the reference list, for where they draw their assumptions:

[6]  Capcom, Shinji Mikami (creator), 1996-2007 Resident Evil.
[7]  Capcom, Keiji Inafune (creator), 2006 Dead Rising.
[8]  Pegg, Simon (writer, creator, actor), 2002 Shaun of the Dead.
[9]  Boyle, Danny (director), 2003 28 Days Later.
[10]  Snyder, Zack (director), 2004 Dawn of the Dead.

Very likely the first time Simon Pegg has been cited in a scientific publication. Hopefully not the last.

We need more publications like this is we’re to combat the stereotype of scientists as boring, stuffy people who don’t have any sense of humour. Hats off to Nova Publishers and the authors for doing the scientific community a service here.

Wired Science: Mathematical Model for surviving a Zombie Attack
Publication in Question: Infectious Disease Modelling Research Progress
Corresponding Author: Robert Smith? (read his bio – it’s worth it)

Awesome comic find from xkcd

New cartoon to go up on my lab bench:

Source: xkcd.com

The Evil Pixie of Reaction Mixtures

Anyone who has worked in organic chemistry or structural biology can appreciate this cartoon:

Cartoon by Nick D Kim, lab-initio.com

We knew it was only a matter of time before they turned on their masters

The robot apocalypse may soon be upon us.

The robots, they have rendered their opinion on humans, and they say that we’re delicious.

Robot Identifies Human Flesh as Bacon

A prototype robot, used to analyze foods  and drink using light-based (spectrographic) methods, said that the hand of a subject tasted just like bacon. It doesn’t take a brain surgeon to recognize that this is grim news for the entire human race. Once the masters, we soon shall be prey.

So keep your head up, or this may be the last thing you see.

Image credit: Paul Burnett - www.paulburnettphotography.com

Important Medical Breakthrough via The Onion

From the Onion:

Scientists Discover Gene Responsible for Eating Whole Goddamn Bag of Chips

This makes me feel a little bit better. I need not be ashamed anymore. Thank you, genetic determinism, for making me feel better about my low self-control.

As a biochemist, I’m interested in the mechanism by which this gene might exert it’s effect:

"People with this gene have up to four times the amount of fritoceptors normally found in a human," Alvaro said. "This increases their pleasure response to snaxamine-2, the human body's principal chip-eating hormone, which is released in response to giant handfuls of chips being shoveled into the mouth. This tends to promote entire-goddamn-bag-eating behavior in those individuals who possess the series."

Makes sense.

The Science Scouts: Awesome

If you do, or ever have, worked in a lab, you need to check out the Science Scouts. Do it now.

Badges are presented in recognition of scientific accomplishments like setting things on fire, successfully dodging monkey feces, and making fruit flies get it on. Particularly memorable badges include:

The emergency evacuation due to science badge

The I’m a marine biologist and, to be honest, I kind of f**ing hate dolphins badge

The have violated the posterior of an animal in the name of science badge

and the science deprives me of my bed badge (three levels, corresponding to the degree of red-eye suffered as a result of experiments)

I’m waiting on a sustained frost burns while “working” with dry ice badge, or inadvertent acid and base spills keep my hands soft and smooth badge.

Meow!

I enjoyed today’s Toothpaste for Dinner comic, and thought I’d share: