No longer in charge

Well, the two months of my temporary promotion are over and I am back in my office, trying to do my own work again and I'm feeling really disoriented. I mean, I can't even remember where shit is in my own desk. I'm trying to figure out what work I have to catch up on, what came in while I was gone that now I'm in the middle of, and where the hell my F-ing paperclips are.

I'm all sorts of grumpy today. After being gone for the last 2 months, I am truly afraid that I'm going to be really bored doing my own job. I was already starting to need more before I left (which is one of the reasons why I left), and now that I've seen all of the stuff that's out there, I look at my own work and think, "Huh, well... that's quaint."

There's some reorganization that's going to happen soon, which will most definitely shake things up. But as it stands, it doesn't look like I will be very affected by the reorganization, so I'm somewhat disappointed. *sigh*

Things I have learned over the past couple of months:

1. I like being an engineer more than a chemist
2. Lasers are really cool
3. Working on cosmetic devices makes me feel cheap somehow
4. I really like my work at home days
5. I like having a window office
6. The air is thinner on the third floor
7. Maybe stability isn't all it's cracked up to be

We'll see how things go. Maybe I need to take some reviewer details to see what else is out there. But I'm quickly learning that I'm not likely to get very far where I am, since there are so many other people who have been here so much longer than I have, and they are already the "go-to" people. It would take a lot for me to get to that point around here. There are more decisions ahead of me... much sooner than I had originally thought.

Nerdiness of the day

For anyone who doesn't know, I love quantum and particle physics. I don't pretend to completely understand what everyone is talking about, but I find the subject absolutely facinating. I was more than a little excited when Ang's Dad took me on a tour of the Rhic particle accelerator at Brookhaven National Labs a few years back.

The thing about these particle accelerators is that there is always some fear that a black hole will be formed from one of the experiments. So, the new particle accelerator/collider at Cern is about to go online, and these fears have again resurfaced. Will scientists, in their quest for knowledge, destroy the earch because they will form a black hole or release some dangerous relativistic particles? You gotta love the New York Times Science Times. Every once in a while, there is just a quote than pretty much encompasses it all:

"Besides, the random nature of quantum physics means that there is always a minuscule, but nonzero, chance of anything occurring, including that the new collider could spit out man-eating dragons."


I know. It's nerdy. But I find this absolutely hysterical.

Ask Dr. Tina

I went over to TC's parent's house on Christmas Eve Eve for the traditional dessert mooching. During this evening, BC (TC's sister) tells me that her 5-year old son, Nicky, wants to be a scientist. He asks all sorts of very insightful questions and "invents" things (apparently, the favorite among the family is the pogo-stick plunger - just think about that for a moment). However, as much as BC has answers for many of his questions, there are some things that she can't or simply doesn't know how to answer. When Nicky asks a question, when you respond, it is usually followed by an equally insightful counter-question, and this goes on until he is (somewhat) satisfied. Or unless he wants to take time time to think on your response.

TC and BC informed Nicky that I was, in fact, a scientist. He was facinated. He tells me that HE wants to be a scientist, too. An EVERYTHING scientist. And proceeds to ask me a ton of questions like why dirt doesn't burn, and what would happen if your buried an oxygen making machine underground to help the dirt to burn, and why the dinosaurs are extinct, and what would happen if you send an animal, like a dog, to Mars with a closed house with it's own supply of oxygen and how long it would survive.

After the flood of questions, I told BC that if there was ever a question that she couldn't answer for Nicky, then she should just email me. Actually, why not set up an email address that she and Nicky can email science questions to - Nicky could have his own personal scientist. Which is exactly what I have done.

There is now an email address and accompanying blog for Ask Dr. Tina, where I will post the question and response. There's nothing there yet, since Nicky is currently away on vacation. I'm sure there will be when he gets back later this month.

I think this will be fun and funny. I can't wait to see the kinds of questions I'll get.

Vagina vagina vagina

Okay, now that I have your attention.

This is going to be a post about the word VAGINA:
Function: noun
Inflected Form: plural va·gi·nae /-(")nE/ or va·gi·nas
a canal in a female mammal that leads from the uterus to the external orifice opening into the vestibule between the labia minora

We are going to be talking about the word vagina and not about the vagina itself. Why? I started thinking about it when I read this article about the term "va-jay-jay" of Grey's Anatomy lore (in the New York Times, no less). Long ago, in a land far away, I used to be a grad student. I was a grad student who did animal experiments on mouse vaginas. I think most of you know this. At some point, I was talking about my work at lab, and someone (a female, FYI) asked that I not use the word 'vagina' before noon. "It was too early in the morning to hear that," apparently. Too jarring for sensitive ears. This request was seconded (and thirded) by a couple of more people in the lab.

I had always thought of that reaction to be very interesting. It's a part of the female anatomy. Perfectly natural. The general population doesn't react to the word penis in the same way. Why is the name of female genitalia more jarring?

I never got my answer to that question while I was in grad school. However, me being who I am, got childish glee from watching people squirm. Rooms full of scientists, listening to my talk at meetings and symposia, wriggling in their seats everytime I said the word 'vagina.' I even had one woman come up to me after seeing my talk and ask me how I could stand up there and not be embarrassed. Again, not something I would even think of, since it was my research, and since I wasn't saying anything dirty. Vagina.

But it does bring up a salient point. Why is it that the word penis (and every euphamism for that word) is more accepted in popular vernacular, not even blinked at, while the word vagina isn't? I guess that's what the Vagina Monologues was trying to point out.

I like the word va-jay-jay. Vagina is an anatomical term which, as pointed out in the Times article, "is inadequate because it is not inclusive enough. It does not, they have pointed out, include the labia and clitoris, the nerve-rich locus of a woman’s sexual pleasure." While "Vajayjay...is like your good buddy."

It's the best buddy a woman can have.

Pressure... pushing down on me, pushing down on me...

I have an unusual skill that I wish I didn't have. It's not a skill actually, more than just a physical perception. I am, or rather, my sinuses act as a barometer. A guage of air pressure. Specifically, that rise in air pressure that usually preceeds a thunderstorm.

What happens? Generally this dull pain begins right between my eyes which then increases as time passes until such point that it either rains or the weather front passes, thereby releaving the air pressure.

It's summer in the Mid-Atlantic, which means thunderstorms all the time. It also means that I am absolutely miserable nearly every afternoon. And I've searched for other reasons over the years, like lack of caffiene and such, but none of these explanations correlate to the headaches other than the weather.

At this very moment... my head feels like it's going to explode. Make. It. Stop.

Pain in my butt

For years now, I have been dealing with a pain in my butt. I am not speaking of a person, but a literal pain in my butt. I have had butt and back pain for years which began in grad school during my tae kwon do training. It began as something minor, and progressed into something chronic. Pain in my lower back, butt and tingling in my foot, far worse in the right leg than the left, but there in both. I now have a name for this condition: piriformis syndrome.


It sucks. And it had been getting better for a while over the years - I stopped doing tae kwon do, stretched more, strengthened my back and core, did everything I was supposed to. Then I started working at a desk job, which apparently aggravates this condition. Great. The long drives to NYC don't help either, apparently.

I've recently started going to physical therapy for this... and I thought I was making progress. Things were feeling looser and freer. That was until Friday. I have no idea what I did between Wednesday morning (my previous PT session) and Friday morning. All I know is that when I sat down in the car, I felt pins and needles along my leg and bottom of my right foot. GAH! My right lower back has also been slowly tightening over the weekend. It's never a good sign when the first thing I say to my physical therapist is, "I have no idea what I did, but..." Yeah.

According to my physical therapist, I have "classic" piriformis syndrome. Pretty much textbook case. Which, I suppose, is good. No one wants to have an undiagnosable condition that takes years to figure out. No one wants to have a condition named after them. But after years of having it, I just wish it would go away.

Drink more coffee

It's good for you. I happen to love coffee. Not for the caffeine, really, as I don't drink it everyday. I just love the taste of coffee. I will occassionally patronize a Starbucks, as there are really no independent coffee shops near work. I will not drink their drip coffee, however, as it just tastes like bitters. So I usually cough up a few bucks for a mocha or something to that effect (Frappuccinos, I have to admit, are really tasty, but that could be because of all the sugar). There is a bit of ridiculousness as to the preponderance of Starbucks in this country. Anyway, this is not a Starbucks rant - there are plenty of websites out there for that.

Back to the point - I really like coffee. For the taste. So I generally search out good coffee, if at all possible. In the northeast, the mecca for good and relatively cheap coffee is Dunkin Donuts. Love Dunkin. And they have been known more for their coffee than their doughnuts for a very long time. In their expansion across the US, rather than compete with the ubiquitously good Krispy Kreme for king of the doughnut kingdom, Dunkin is marketing their coffee - a good move, I think.

I spent much of my last year in grad school, typing my thesis at Evergreen Cafe, fueled by excellent coffee and free WiFi. Why would I go anywhere else when there's internet and free refills all day long (for $1.50 - try to find that anywhere else). The thing is, I really miss is that kind of place. The cafe where you can sit for hours on end, nursing a coffee and cookie, reading and just relaxing. I haven't really found a place that even comes close since moving down here. And as a result, my coffee consumption has dropped.

I need to find a place like that around here. There are coffee shops here and there, but they are usually a part of the strip-mall culture that reigns in these parts. It takes away the allure a bit. *Sigh* I need a place with good coffee, comfy couches, cool music and interesting people to watch. The search goes on.

Killer kangaroos and the demon duck of doom

Seriously. Sometimes, it's not even necessary to make up headlines.

More science

This time from the world of physics. Yeah, I'm totally science geeky these days...

Muscle soreness

Okay, I'm on a science kick these days... but there are a lot of interesting things coming up recently, so please bear with me.

I read this interesting article about lactic acid. We all learned over the years that lactic acid buildup in the muscle was bad - caused cramping, soreness, etc. Turns out, that theory was completely wrong. Lactic acid is, in fact, fuel for the muscle. And that endurance trained athletes are more efficient in the use of lactic acid during exercise and competition. It all has to do with the mitochondria in the muscle cells. The more endurance trained you are, the more transport molecules are produced to transport the lactic acid into the muscle for fuel.

Well, there goes another thing that we can blame for crappy workouts.

Scientific ethics

This morning, it was reported that the South Korean scientist, hailed for successfully cloning human stem cells only to be disgraced as a fraud, was indicted "on charges of fraud, embezzlement and bioethics violations in a scandal over faked stem cell research." Five members of his lab were indicted on lesser charges. This is very important. I don't know what the precedent is, but I don't recall a case where a scientist has been legally charged with fraud, at least not in the US - I'm not sure about other countries, as this case is (if someone can come up with one, please let me know). But this case was huge. The claims made in the article were huge, thus being proved fraudulent was enormous.

The thing that disturbed me initially when the fraud was exposed was how Dr. Hwang tried to blame his researchers. How he said that he did not realize they had made up the data. Which may be true. I have known many PI's who have absolutely no idea what the hell is going on in the lab - they are too busy grant writing, or on travel, etc. But the work that comes from a lab is the work of the PI. The PI, who generally does not touch an experiment, is the one who gets the acclaim, elevating the status of the lab in general. So the lack of responsibility taken really bothered me.

The other thing that bothered me was how this example called into question, once again, the peer review process in scientific publishing. Scientists are self-criticized, self-edited. But there in an inherent trust that the data being presented is truthful. The data is scrutinized, but rarely, if ever, are lab notebooks of the raw data requested and cracked open to check if what is reported was what was actually observed. When scrutiny is increased, the dissemination of scientific information is slowed. When it is lax, false information is published to the detriment of the rest of the scientific community. When seemingly large breakthroughs occur, however, it's easy to get overexcited and miss what can sometimes be obvious.

Scientists reputations are based on their integrety. When something is proven fraudulent, careers can be ruined, not only for the PI but also for the people in the lab, past and present. Having been a lab for the majority of the last decade, reports like this are still very close to my heart.

Update: Blood and sweat

Unfortunately, there are no updates... it's been a week since this whole thing began, and I haven't heard a thing.

In the meantime... an image, courtesy of PhD Comics:

Blood and sweat

I have discussed multiple times the elation I felt when I completed my PhD. It was a lot of work, but in the end I joke about what it got me: three letters after my name, a piece of paper in a frame which basically says that I was in school for a really long time, and a book (my dissertation). My Dad asked me when I presented him with a copy of my thesis whether anyone would read it or buy it. I told him, honestly, that we write and bind these things and they generally sit on a shelf in a library collecting dust. No one will read it. And certainly no one would buy it - I didn't think they could even be sold. That is, until I got this email from LJR:

"This is really creepy - I was googling my name to see if my new website was showing up yet, and found this.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000EOUOFI/104-2407611-6118346?v=glance&n=551440

and

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000EQIW9Q/qid=1143229077/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-2407611-6118346?s=books&v=glance&n=551440

What do you think? Any idea how our dissertations wound up online for sale at Amazon?"

WHAT?!?! My dissertation is on sale on AMAZON!?!?!

Needless to say, I was a little disturbed. Here is my work, of which I always joke that no one cares, on which I spent a quarter of my life thus far working, on sale, without my knowledge. I called my department and reported this finding, and there are many people looking into it. JS called thedistributorr and they told him that I had signed a release when I gave my dissertation to Hopkins. And apparently, after $100 in sales, I get a 10% royalty. The dissertation is copyrighted to me. I remember signing a whole bunch of papers when I gave in my dissertation, one of which was about creating an electronic copy for the library, but I don't remember signing anything about selling it. It's also possible that I did, I haven't a clue. It was over a year ago, and I was so happy to be done, that I'm not sure I would remember anyway.

A lot of emails have been sent. No one in my department knew about any of this. They wrote to the library. The person they contacted didn't seem to know anything. She's going to contact her boss. And up the chain it goes. The fact that no one seems to know anything yet disturbs me - it all seems kind of shady. Particularly since LJR said that she didn't find the dissertations of any of our other classmates on Amazon. Whether or not I signed over the publication rights, which is still in debate, I would have like to have been informed that my work is publicly for sale. I feel disturbed and violated.

Sleep eating...

I am so glad that I am no longer an insomniac. For the entire span of my graduate studies, all 7 years, I did not get a full, uninterrupted night of sleep. Not one. I would just wake up in the middle of the night, sometimes several times, for sometimes no reason at all. However, through all of it, I never invested in any kind of sleep aid. Why? 1) I hate taking drugs. I avoid it as much as possible. 2) For reasons like this.

I've heard of some strange/scary side effects from drugs before - but sleep eating? Not only just sleep eating, but gorging, ravenously. And then not remembering the next morning.

No cause has been found for sleep-related eating disorder, but Dr. Schenck says he believed that it happened when the brain confuses two basic instincts: sleeping and eating. "Those two become linked," he said. "In the sleep stage you eat. I think two instinctual behaviors become intertwined."

So strange. I would love to see what the brain scans of these people while they are in this state. It must be very strange to wake up in the morning with a Snickers bar in your hand, not knowing where it came from. I guess the cupboards and fridge should be locked up before bedtime.

Do you hear what I hear?

I am always interested and amused by strange research. Having been a lowly PhD student for a *ahem* few years, I have run across all sorts of interesting (to put it mildly) research - things I have read in journals, seen at conferences, read in newsclippings, etc. And in seeing all the different things being researched, I have become convinced that ANYTHING will be funded as long as there is one person interested.

Genetics has always produced a great deal of interesting work, especially recently with the "completion" of the Human Genome Project. Completion is a relative term, because even though the genome is mapped, people are still trying to figure out what these genes do. (I personally don't believe the project is truly complete until they figure that portion of it out... but I digress.) Anyway, with a map of genes available, geneticists have been able to determine such important things such as the genes which, when mutated, could cause cancer.

So when I saw a news article entitled, "Scientists Find Gene That Controls Type of Earwax in People," my interest was a little more than peaked. Who researches this kind of thing? Why earwax? There are apparently two types of earwax - wet and dry (who knew?) - which are controlled by a specific gene. According to researchers, a single DNA change causes the inactivation of an export mechanism in cells, therefore resulting in dry earwax. Wet earwax is prevalent in the African and European populations, while dry earwax is dominant in East Asians. There is also apparently a correlation between the type of earwax, sweat and armpit odor, where those who have dry earwax tend to have sweat less and have little to no body odor. Eeeen-ter-est-ink

What does this mean for the rest of us? What can we do with this information? Who the heck knows. Maybe at some point there will be gene therapy for people with really bad BO. I think that would be a great step forward for humanity. It will at least make riding in a packed subway a little less gross.