via It Takes 30, from the Department of Systems Biology @ Harvard Medical School As so often with mathematical treatments of complex problems, one of the key benefits of creating the model is that it…

This story appeared on Science Daily, based on a press release from CNRS in France: Segmentation Is the Secret Behind the Extraordinary Diversification of Animals ScienceDaily (July 27, 2010) —…

Early last month, Michael White’s Adaptive Complexity on Science 2.0 had a useful critique of the citizen scientist. It is very important to consider these things, and the future of citizen…

Here's how I roll: my wife loves three-dollar bagels from the Sunday farmers' market. And so she says, "let's get a loaf of bread, some flowers, and a flat of strawberries!" When we roll home with…

Dynamic quantum logic Abstract Quantum logic has the structure of an orthomodular lattice. This defines a static skeleton. There is nothing in QL that restricts dynamics. There is also nothing that…

New Scientist reports on experiments that give search engines metadata about the person searching, with the hope of increasing the relevance of search results. It seems that some of it’s promising,…

Arctic Ice July - Update #5 The sharp decline in ice extent slowed somewhat during July.  Some people are claiming this as a sign of recovery. If you are going downhill at full throttle and you…

Part of the enjoyment in birding includes directly experiencing nature, taking your time, breathing, listening, watching each rustle in the trees, and listening some more. Part of the limitations,…

Plastiki  is made out of – you guessed it – plastic. Plastiki, the plastic bottle version of Thor Heyerdahl's Kon-Tiki  , was carried from San Francisco to Sydney on a conveyor belt....and…

The concept of "primitive" is one that is very often misunderstood. Properly defined, "primitive" means "more like a particular ancestor", refers only to individual characteristics (not whole species…

As I have explained in various blog posts and in this paper, it is a fallacy to assume that any one character found in a so-called "primitive" species alive today was also found in the ancestral…

John Mattick, University of Queensland, is one of the leading proponents of the idea that much -- perhaps most -- of the human genome is functional. He has been making claims along these lines for at…

For the past year, I have been working with several colleagues to completely redesign our first year biology program at the University of Guelph. One of the aspects of the new "Discovering…

In Symbol Stacks And Science Communication In The Scienceblogs Pepsigate Scandal I mentioned something that was unpopular with the bloggerati in science but obvious to those of us outside the…

Recently Elizabeth Cunningham Perkins brought us a Weedy Rumination on the Creeping Bellflower, Campanula rapunculoides. I will now tell you about a wildflower growing in my own garden, which is full…

There have been a lot of good articles lately in the dealing with the Underground Railroad. Recently, Timbuctoo was recovered in New Jersey by Temple U. and is currently under extensive survey. It’s…

I gave you my media secrets on how to get interviewed by NPR.  Now that I've heard the final cut of the Project Calliope segment, I can look at 'was it worth it'?  Short answer: absolutely…

The parallel sessions at the international conference on High-Energy Physics in Paris are over, and it is time for a summary of results. Of course if you are following the conference you will get it…

How To Win Any Argument (Part 1) and (Part 2) Here's how I roll: my wife loves three-dollar bagels from the Sunday farmers' market. And so she says, "let's get a loaf of bread, some flowers, and a…

I thought that I knew what a unitary transform is, until I started thinking about it.(2^n-ons are hypercomplex numbers that are related via the 2^n-on construction. Including n=3 the 2^n-on…