The Mystery of the Ill-Timed Tides

By: | December 16, 2013

RasalkThis weekend the moon pulled back the curtains on the beach, revealing plenty of sand in the evening hours. I love the beach in the winter, particularly near dusk. The sand seems to go on for miles; when there’s a full moon, it rises from behind the mountains, which are still rosy from alpenglow.

I think I understand how tidal extremes work, enough so that I can explain using a stick drawing in the sand. The moon and the Sun and the Earth fall into line (or close enough), giving a little extra tug on the tides. These higher highs and lower lows are called spring tides, ones that “spring forth” around the time of the new and full moons.

But I haven’t yet figured out why the beach seems to appear mostly in the evening in the wintertime, while it’s drowning in seawater near dawn. Continue reading →

The Last Word

By: | December 15, 2013

beebee-500x332December 9 – 13

Guest Michael Balter would like scientists to understand that by talking to science writing grad students, they’re talking to the people who will one day be representing their work to the public.  Please and thank you.

I wouldn’t consider reading my horoscope but in any case, it’s always wrong.  Abstruse Goose reads his and it’s uncannily accurate.  How does he do it?

Cameron’s son loves infectious diseases, wants her to read him about them, asks her to tell him everything she knows.  What’s a mother to do?

A national — nay, an international– crisis, says Christie:  English has no second person plural pronoun.  When a woman’s right, she’s right, y’all.

Babies’ lives all over the world could be saved, Jessa says, if we could just keep the little guys warm.

Simple ways to save a life

By: | December 13, 2013

beebeeOut of 20 million premature and underweight babies born each year, four million die. Most are in developing countries. Solving this problem is not just a short-term humanitarian effort, it also constitutes low-hanging fruit in the international development field. When infant mortality goes down, we tend to see population sizes decrease as well.

Poverty can be confoundingly complex, but for these infants the proximal threat is clear: Hypothermia. Without the body fat reserves to regulate their own temperature, babies need external heating. Kangaroo care (skin-to-skin contact with a mother) promotes breast feeding and warms babies to the right temperature but can only ever be part of the solution when mothers have competing survival demands of work and other children.

The incubators we see in well-supported hospitals are expensive, but the real barrier to access is infrastructure. Incubators require a continuous power supply. Continue reading →

Y’all Need this Word

By: | December 12, 2013

YallComeBack

 

Most people don’t adopt a new manner of speech in their 40’s, so when my husband recently started using the phrase “y’all” I wondered what was up. It wasn’t like his Swiss parents taught him to use this slang, and he’d grown up in Colorado, where y’all is uttered only by Texas transplants.

After hearing him say y’all for something like the tenth time in a week, I asked him why he’d suddenly adopted this word, which seemed out of place spoken by someone without a southern accent. He explained that he’d started using y’all with the college ski team that he coaches. Most of the skiers are women, and he thought it would be lame to refer to them as “you guys” — the phrase more widely used here in Colorado. “English really needs a plural you,” he says.

He has a point. All of the languages I’ve studied — German, Italian and Spanish — have a plural you, and while that extra pronoun was frustrating to me as a language student, I’ve encountered plenty of times when I’ve wished for a plural you in English that wasn’t gendered or regional.

According to Mental Floss, “y’all” is just one of eight ways to construct the plural “you” in English. Others include “you-uns,” “you guys,” “you lot,” and “yous.” None of the terms on this list roll off my tongue any easier than the others. Continue reading →

Once Upon a Bacterium

By: | December 11, 2013

leaf blotchesI need a new disease. Not for me, not exactly, but for my son. Instead of stories about two mystery solvers named Sam and Lydia, he wants me to regale him with chronicles of ailments, with tales of viruses and bacteria.

This started yesterday, because we were going to the doctor to get Hepatitis A shots. (We bought an enormous bag of frozen fruit this summer that was recalled as possibly contaminated.) And I have already run out of diseases. Continue reading →

Abstruse Goose: Astronomology

By: | December 10, 2013

astronomology

AG’s mouseover says that astronomers began charting the motions of the planets, continued through the law of gravitation, and ended up with us on the moon; so sure, the planets affect our lives.

I have nothing to add.  If I did, I’d probably end up telling you I read my horoscope every day.  And that, I’ll never admit.

Except to say, it’s always wrong.

_______

http://abstrusegoose.com/519

Guest Post: Talk to Them, Just Talk to Them

By: | December 9, 2013

8054870424_5a53f107b8Scientists, policymakers, FDA officials, industry spokespersons–talk to my science journalism students! Yes, they haven’t received their masters degrees yet from New York University’s Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program (SHERP); and yes, most of them are newbies to the profession. But you shouldn’t ignore their emails or make them send reminder messages two or three times before you respond–and then tell them to just read your latest paper or report because you don’t have time to talk to them on the telephone. You won’t be doing them a favor, because after much effort and frustration they will eventually find someone else to talk to; you will be doing yourself a favor, because they are the future of science journalism. By helping them you will be helping yourselves get the word out about what you are doing. Continue reading →

The Last Word

By: | December 7, 2013

Schistosoma_20041-300December 2 – 6
This week, Cassie explored the freakonomic chain of events that leads from repurposed bednets to the rise of a perilous parasite.

Roberta wondered why she can never quite remember what that e-book was about.

Richard revealed the dirty secrets of astronomers: “the library is my telescope now.”

Michelle introduced us to the unassuming man who chronicled more than 150,000 botanical specimens.

And Helen rediscovered the books of Oz — and found that their writing stands the test of time. The science? Not so much.