Last night, I headed down to the beautiful Bell House, in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn, for this month's Secret Science Club lecture. Last night's lecture marked the triumphant return of Dr Evon Hekkala, evolutionary biologist at the American Museum of Natural History and biology professor at Fordham University. Dr Hekkala lectured back in 2013, so this wasn't her first time at the Secret Science rodeo.
Dr Hekkala began her lecture with a simple declaration: Surprises should be part of science. She noted that sometimes things will be what you don't expect, citing the unexpected discoveries of Rosalind Franklin, Luis and Walter Alvarez, Raymond Dart, scientists whose discoveries upended prevailing conventional wisdom. She noted that life is full of good accidents, citing her own PhD woes, when she was unable to study lemurs, and settling on crocodilians as a field of study instead. She noted that ideas come from everyone and everywhere because people start out with curiosity... she joked that a child who overturns a container of milk is performing an experiment. In her case, she started out studying art history and anthropology.
She characterized art as depicting hypotheses, specifically citing the dioramas at AMNH, each of which depicts a particular moment in space and time. Museum collections are archives of the natural world. Museums started off as curiosity cabinets, collections of wonders from around the world. Most museum specimens are not on display- there are vast collections of preserved specimens behind the scenes. Archives are specimens, Dr Hekkala cited a 1930s-era letter in the AMNH archives concerning the danger of extinction faced by the indri, a letter she described as 'a smoking gun for a changing planet'. Dr Hekkala also noted that museums besides natural history museums have important scientific evidence- for example, the Metropolitan Museum of Art has a crocodile mummy.
Dr Hekkala's particular specialty is the study of crocodiles. Two decades ago, it was thought that Nile crocodiles (Crocodylus niloticus) were well known, but people were wrong about a lot of things, especially by thinking that crocodiles were 'living fossils'. One mystery about the crocodiles of Madagascar is whether there are separate species on the island. Back in the 1970s, African crocodiles were in danger of extinction, but were brought back by the introduction of sustainable crocodile leather production- economic value was an important factor in conservation. Alligators are approximately as closely related to crocodiles as humans are to bats, having split from each other approximately sixty-five million years ago- they have a similar form because this particular submarine predator physique works well. The extant crocodile populations of African can be divided into two species, with Crocodylus suchus inhabiting West Africa and Crocodylus niloticus inhabiting East Africa. The crocodiles of the New World are more closely related to the East African crocodiles than to the West African ones, with the lineages splitting between three and six million years ago. C. suchus and C. niloticus were long considered the same species, until Dr Hekkala ran DNA tests on samples of Egyptian crocodile mummies, finding them to be a distinct species, C. suchus. She joked that she was 'scooped' by a couple of centuries by French naturalist Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire who noted differences between the two species. Saint-Hilaire was inspired by the works of Herodotus, which described two separate, distinct populations of African crocodiles. Dr Hekkala is at the forefront of a new era, extracting ancient DNA from old specimens... she has been responsible for mummy genomic projects, extracting DNA from temples and museums full of crocodile mummies. She noted that the Egyptians could distinguish between niloticus and suchus, even without the benefit of DNA sequencing. Crocodile mummies are also being scanned, with one mummy actually containing almost fifty crocodile hatchlings and two larger specimens.
Dr Hekkala noted that crocodilians were considered important by many cultures that were in contact with them throughout their range- Egypt, Australia, Mexico, Madagascar. People observe the animals they live with, and crocodiles were considered to have various powers. The apothecary alligator crops up in art throughout the ages, and crocodilians were considered to have healing powers. Crocodilians' blood has antibiotic properties.
Dr Hekkala then narrowed her focus to the crocodiles of Madagascar. Once considered a separate species, Crocodylus madagascariensis, the Malagasy crocodile is now considered a subspecies of Crocodylys niloticus. Prior to the arrival of C. niloticus to the island, there was an endemic crocodilian species, Crocodylus robustus or Voay robustus (also known as the horned crocodile), which is now extinct, along with other Malagasy megafauna such as gorilla sized lemurs, dwarf hippopotomuses, and elephant birds. The extinction of Madagascar's megafauna is a big whodunit- was it people or pathogens or environmental change? What happened to the endemic horned crocodile of Madagascar? The Nile crocodile only arrived on the island about two thousand years ago. Humans started sporadically colonizing the island about twelve thousand years ago, with a sustained human habitation being achieved about two thousand years ago. Did the two crocodile species coexist? Up until the 1860s, explorers described two types of crocodiles. Did the horned crocodile succumb to human overexploitation? The horned crocodile is allied with the dwarf crocodiles, but only seven complete specimens are known. Did the Nile crocodile outcompete the horned crocodile? Did it 'swamp out' the horned crocodile through hybridization (if they were closely related enough). This being a whodunit, she went to the archives for clues, perusing the account of shipwrecked sailor Robert Drury for descriptions of wildlife.
In a stroke of luck, while watching a video of cave divers collecting lemur bones in a flooded Madagascar cave, Dr Hekkala noted a crocodile skull:
It turned out that PBS wanted to produce a program on the crocodiles of Madagascar, which led to what Dr Hekkala comically referred to as 'In Search of Lost Crocodile Lineages of Madagascar, or What I Did on my Summer Vacation'. I have to note that it just wouldn't be a Dr Evon Hekkala lecture without a generous dose of globetrotting adventure. She had twelve days to head to Madagascar with a film crew which would visit four locations on the island. She joked that it seemed impossible for this expedition to be pulled off in such short time, but a local 'fixer' was able to sort things out for them. They started off at the Croc Farm, then visited some sacred crocodile lakes (in local legend, crocodiles are ancestors of the populace- they were inhospitable people transformed into crocodiles because of their nastiness). While she and the crew weren't able to touch the crocodiles in the sacred lakes, where zebu are sacrificed to the crocs, they were able to collect DNA from traces in the water. They then traveled via boat and zebu cart (Dr Hekkala quipped 'planes, trains, and automobiles') to the spiky karst landscape of Ankarana Special Reserve. All the while, she was obtaining evidence- DNA from footprints, signs of 'robustus' among the crocodiles at Croc Farm. She kept the audience enthralled with pictures of lemurs, of giant baobabs, of rugged landscapes. The cave which the team visited was accessible by a forty foot ladder- originally, spelunkers would have to climb down a banyan root into the cave. There are numerous birds in the cave- raptors, kingfishers. The water in the cave is about 80F. The expedition was headed by Dr Laurie Godfrey, who Dr Hekkala photographed holding a lemur femur.
The cave was a trove of bones- four extinct lemur species could be found in one meter of sediment, and the bone collectors hit their specimen limit in four hours. The Madagascar Cave Diving Association provided the divers for the expedition. Dr Hekkala related a funny anecdote about falling in the mud in the cave, whereupon it took twenty minutes to extract her. To make matters more unpleasant, in order to maintain 'continuity' for the filming, she had to wear the muddy clothes the following day.
The cave dive was productive, a small 'robustus' skull was quickly found. The divers eventually found thirty crocodile skulls 'grinning' from the cave walls, though only two skulls were removed from the cave. Unfortunately, the team only had permits to collect lemur bones, not crocodile skulls, so Dr Hekkala took a tooth from one skull in order to obtain DNA samples. DNA testing will resolve the question of whether these crocodiles were a relic population with low genetic diversity or if they hybridized with the newly arrived Nile crocodiles. The two skulls examined by Dr Hekkala increased the diversity of known 'robustus' specimens by almost thirty percent. The twelve day trip was an accident, a happy one, and left Dr Hekkala resolved to obtain cave diving certification (as if she's not 'Indiana Jones' enough as it is!).
Dr Hekkala wrapped up her lecture by noting that, in order to understand the future, sometimes we have to visit the past. The study of biodiversity is crucial to our human survival. Also, outreach to children is crucial to the future success of humanity. so she is dedicated to teaching little kids as well as graduate students and, on occasion, barflies.
The lecture was followed with a Q&A session. Regarding the relationship between New World crocodiles and East African crocodiles, the divergence took place between the two lineages took place three to six million years ago. In a somewhat macabre aside, Dr Hekkala ruefully noted that the crocodiles probably drifted along the same currents that slave traders ended up using. The Nile crocodiles of Madagascar probably originated from the Zambezi River. Saltwater crocodiles have been encountered seven hundred miles from shore, so crocodiles are capable of long sea voyages. Since the construction of the Aswan Dam, crocodiles have gone extinct in Egypt, so no DNA is available for comparison.
Another question involved the cave ecology- pollen trapped in speleothems can provide clues about conditions in the cave, whether it was wetter or drier at various times. The crocodile remains are intact and articulated, so the crocs died in situ. Banyan trees near the cave entrance tend to attract animals, but perhaps the crocs came in through another entrance.
Another question involved the diversity of crocodilians- along with the birds, crocodilians are one of the great surviving archosaur lineages. There are two alligator species, several true crocodile species, dwarf crocodiles, caimans, and slender snouted gharials. These lineages diverged about sixty-five million years ago.
Another question regarded the suchus/niloticus divide in Africa- the suchus crocodiles are smaller and less aggressive than their eastern counterparts. It's possible that some hybridization occurs, but the extent is unknown.
Another question involved the antibiotic properties of crocodilian blood. Croc blood plasma was effective in killing staphlococcus, E. coli, and streptococcus bacteria. Additional testing is needed to gauge the extent of croc plasma antibiotic properties.
Some bastard in the audience asked Dr Hekkala to speculate why New World crocodiles haven't penetrated into the territory of the American alligator while the Chinese alligator has a tiny geographic distribution... could alligators have better cold tolerance? Dr Hekkala noted that there are crocodile populations at high elevations in Madagascar where the crocodiles are exposed to cool temperatures.
One again, Dr Hekkala knocked it out of the park... she hit what I call the 'Secret Science sweet spot'- a heavy dose of hard science with revelation of new discoveries, combined with adventure narrative and science/conservation advocacy, the whole shebang leavened with humor. Kudos to Dr Hekkala, Dorian and Margaret, and the staff of the beautiful Bell House. Now, here's a video of Dr Hekkala giving an overview of the 'Crocs' exhibit at AMNH:
Pour yourself a nice beverage and soak in that SCIENCE!!!
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query hekkala. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query hekkala. Sort by date Show all posts
Friday, January 18, 2019
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
Post- Lecture Recap: No Crocodile Tears in Brooklyn!
Last night, I headed down to the beautiful Bell House in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn for the latest Secret Science Club lecture, featuring evolutionary biologist Dr Evon Hekkala of Fordham University.
Dr Hekkala started her lecture with a brief autobiography. She had a personal statement, "doing" is better than "believing"- the process of scientific inquiry is what is important, not reliance on authorities. She then chronicled her rambling career, as she became disenchanted with the graphic design she studied as an undergrad, then progressed to a study of evolutionary theory, with a desire to study lemurs. Her study of lemurs was derailed when she discovered that the residents of the villages she visited had eaten the lemurs in the vicinity, but she came to the realization that one can't tell someone whose child's belly is distended with malnutrition to refrain from eating bushmeat. She was determined to return to Madagascar, and changed the focus of her studies to the native crocodiles. When she returned to Madagascar, she had to act as a courier for a team of researchers who had run low on funds. In a plot worthy of a "James Bond" movie, she detailed getting a transfer to her bank account, purchasing bundles of travelers' checks, then cashing them in Madagascar, where the exchange rate was so lopsided that she had to hire porters to help her carry the cash.
Dr Hekkala then gave a quick overview of the crocodiles. There are 12 recognized species of extant true crocodiles, genus Crocodylus (compared to two species of extant alligators). Crocodiles have been hunted for their skins, which can be made into a fine leather. They also face danger from wetlands development , chemicals which interfere with the development of their endocrine systems, and, perhaps most alarmingly, from global climate change, which can determine which gender hatchlings will develop in the nest.
Most of Dr Hekkala's work with crocodiles involved the East African "Nile" crocodile Crocodylus niloticus, which inhabits various ecological niches in Madagascar, including karst caverns and "sacred" lakes, such as Lake Ravelobe. Again, her work comes across as an action film (and was immortalized in a "National Geographic" documentary, Man-Eaters of Madagascar- in the space of a year, nine humans were killed by the crocodiles of Lake Ravelobe. Traditionally, the humans in the area coexisted peacefully with the crocodiles- women could wade into the waters of the lake with cans of worms on their heads while they fished. Unraveling the mystery of the crocodile attacks, Dr Hekkala determined that the lake was being fished by persons unfamiliar with the area, and runoff from slaughterhouse located upstream from the lake caused the crocodiles to become more aggressive (I am reminded of a case in Brazil where sewage runoff attracted aggressive sharks) while water management efforts by the government caused the level of the lake to rise and destroy crocodile nests and the lack of younger crocodiles (crocodiles are cannibals) removed an important food source from the lake. As an aside, I have been looking for Man-Eaters of Madagascar on the web, but have not been able to find the video, much to my chagrin. It really sounds like it has the makings of a great action/mystery flick.
Dr Hekkala then proceeded to discuss her efforts to collect DNA from crocodiles, both living and dead, and to sequence their genomes. Again, she was confronted by a mystery- ever since Herodotus wrote his histories, the crocodiles of the Nile were divided into aggressive, dangerous monsters and more docile crocodiles sacred to the ancient Egyptians, who often mummified them. The mummies were often wrapped in documents, and the possibility that such mummies were used as fuel would represent a tragic loss.
In 1807, the French naturalist Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire noticed differences in the skulls of the "sacred" crocodiles and the larger Nile crocodiles. Sadly, the two types of crocodiles were lumped together as C. niloticus and Saint-Hilaire's proposed species name Crocodylys suchus went largely forgotten. In her study of the DNA of various crocodile mummies and preserved specimens from museums around the globe, Dr Hekkala was able to determine that the crocodiles of the Nile belong to two distinct, distantly related species. Crocodilus niloticus is actually more closely related to the New World crocodiles than it is to the "rediscovered" C. suchus. Yet another instance of "sleuthing" on Dr Hekkala's part- is her career better than a movie, or what?
Dr Hekkala, no stranger to preserved crocodiles, then went into a brief digression into the tradition of scholars and apothecaries hanging crocodiles in their shops. In a case of truth being stranger than fiction, it turns out that crocodile blood has antibiotic properties... maybe those old quacks were onto something after all!
In the Q&A, some bastard in the audience asked Dr Hekkala about the contrast between the diversity and cosmopolitan (in the tropics and subtropics) distribution of the true crocodiles vs the relatively limited ranges of the two extant alligator species. Why are the crocs so much more successful? While Dr Hekkala didn't have a direct answer for this question, she noted that the alligators and crocodiles diverged about 65 million years ago, in the Cretaceous period, so alligators and crocodiles, despite superficial similarities, are about as closely related as bats and humans. The Nile crocodile, far from being "primitive", is about as old as humanity.
All told, this was another incredible Secret Science Club lecture... it hit the sweet spot between adventure narrative and hard science, and Dr Hekkala came across as a supergenius action star. She totally knocked it out of the park.
On an unrelated note, I met an old friend, handsome Johnny C., native of Ireland, but long-time Brooklyn resident, at the Bell House for the lecture. He coaches soccer for the same program I coach judo for- I had a big blond 'fro when I first met Johnny C. It was good to be able to hoist a few pints with an old friend and, more importantly, to win another convert over to the ways of the Secret Science Club.
Dr Hekkala started her lecture with a brief autobiography. She had a personal statement, "doing" is better than "believing"- the process of scientific inquiry is what is important, not reliance on authorities. She then chronicled her rambling career, as she became disenchanted with the graphic design she studied as an undergrad, then progressed to a study of evolutionary theory, with a desire to study lemurs. Her study of lemurs was derailed when she discovered that the residents of the villages she visited had eaten the lemurs in the vicinity, but she came to the realization that one can't tell someone whose child's belly is distended with malnutrition to refrain from eating bushmeat. She was determined to return to Madagascar, and changed the focus of her studies to the native crocodiles. When she returned to Madagascar, she had to act as a courier for a team of researchers who had run low on funds. In a plot worthy of a "James Bond" movie, she detailed getting a transfer to her bank account, purchasing bundles of travelers' checks, then cashing them in Madagascar, where the exchange rate was so lopsided that she had to hire porters to help her carry the cash.
Dr Hekkala then gave a quick overview of the crocodiles. There are 12 recognized species of extant true crocodiles, genus Crocodylus (compared to two species of extant alligators). Crocodiles have been hunted for their skins, which can be made into a fine leather. They also face danger from wetlands development , chemicals which interfere with the development of their endocrine systems, and, perhaps most alarmingly, from global climate change, which can determine which gender hatchlings will develop in the nest.
Most of Dr Hekkala's work with crocodiles involved the East African "Nile" crocodile Crocodylus niloticus, which inhabits various ecological niches in Madagascar, including karst caverns and "sacred" lakes, such as Lake Ravelobe. Again, her work comes across as an action film (and was immortalized in a "National Geographic" documentary, Man-Eaters of Madagascar- in the space of a year, nine humans were killed by the crocodiles of Lake Ravelobe. Traditionally, the humans in the area coexisted peacefully with the crocodiles- women could wade into the waters of the lake with cans of worms on their heads while they fished. Unraveling the mystery of the crocodile attacks, Dr Hekkala determined that the lake was being fished by persons unfamiliar with the area, and runoff from slaughterhouse located upstream from the lake caused the crocodiles to become more aggressive (I am reminded of a case in Brazil where sewage runoff attracted aggressive sharks) while water management efforts by the government caused the level of the lake to rise and destroy crocodile nests and the lack of younger crocodiles (crocodiles are cannibals) removed an important food source from the lake. As an aside, I have been looking for Man-Eaters of Madagascar on the web, but have not been able to find the video, much to my chagrin. It really sounds like it has the makings of a great action/mystery flick.
Dr Hekkala then proceeded to discuss her efforts to collect DNA from crocodiles, both living and dead, and to sequence their genomes. Again, she was confronted by a mystery- ever since Herodotus wrote his histories, the crocodiles of the Nile were divided into aggressive, dangerous monsters and more docile crocodiles sacred to the ancient Egyptians, who often mummified them. The mummies were often wrapped in documents, and the possibility that such mummies were used as fuel would represent a tragic loss.
In 1807, the French naturalist Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire noticed differences in the skulls of the "sacred" crocodiles and the larger Nile crocodiles. Sadly, the two types of crocodiles were lumped together as C. niloticus and Saint-Hilaire's proposed species name Crocodylys suchus went largely forgotten. In her study of the DNA of various crocodile mummies and preserved specimens from museums around the globe, Dr Hekkala was able to determine that the crocodiles of the Nile belong to two distinct, distantly related species. Crocodilus niloticus is actually more closely related to the New World crocodiles than it is to the "rediscovered" C. suchus. Yet another instance of "sleuthing" on Dr Hekkala's part- is her career better than a movie, or what?
Dr Hekkala, no stranger to preserved crocodiles, then went into a brief digression into the tradition of scholars and apothecaries hanging crocodiles in their shops. In a case of truth being stranger than fiction, it turns out that crocodile blood has antibiotic properties... maybe those old quacks were onto something after all!
In the Q&A, some bastard in the audience asked Dr Hekkala about the contrast between the diversity and cosmopolitan (in the tropics and subtropics) distribution of the true crocodiles vs the relatively limited ranges of the two extant alligator species. Why are the crocs so much more successful? While Dr Hekkala didn't have a direct answer for this question, she noted that the alligators and crocodiles diverged about 65 million years ago, in the Cretaceous period, so alligators and crocodiles, despite superficial similarities, are about as closely related as bats and humans. The Nile crocodile, far from being "primitive", is about as old as humanity.
All told, this was another incredible Secret Science Club lecture... it hit the sweet spot between adventure narrative and hard science, and Dr Hekkala came across as a supergenius action star. She totally knocked it out of the park.
On an unrelated note, I met an old friend, handsome Johnny C., native of Ireland, but long-time Brooklyn resident, at the Bell House for the lecture. He coaches soccer for the same program I coach judo for- I had a big blond 'fro when I first met Johnny C. It was good to be able to hoist a few pints with an old friend and, more importantly, to win another convert over to the ways of the Secret Science Club.
Thursday, March 26, 2015
Thanks Are in Order
Wow, I have to take a moment to express my gratitude to several people in the aftermath of last night's post. First of all, I have to thank Dr Christoper Mason, who sent me a text message to correct an inaccuracy in my post, regarding the pace at which genome sequencing halved in cost. Thank you, Dr Mason! Next, I want to thank the awesome Dr Evon Hekkala, who delivered an amazing Secret Science Club lecture back in April 2013. Dr Hekkala suggested that Dr Mason and I exchange contact information and "talked up" my blog... thanks, Dr Hekkala, you have been unfailingly supportive and 100% fantastic. I also want to thank Elisabeth Bik of Microbiome Digest, who sent a link to my blog post via Twitter. I knew something funny was going on when my post counter started "upticking" at 1AM. I have never met Ms. Bik, but count me as a member of her fan club... thank you!
It goes without saying that I am grateful to Margaret and Dorian, who make the whole Secret Science Club experience possible. Thank you one and all!
It goes without saying that I am grateful to Margaret and Dorian, who make the whole Secret Science Club experience possible. Thank you one and all!
Thursday, January 17, 2019
Jesu Christo, un Cocodrilo!
This post is going to be a quick one before I head down to Brooklyn for this month's Secret Science Club lecture featuring my great and good friend Dr Evon Hekkala. For the record, Dr Hekkala's 2013 lecture was one of my favorite Secret Science Club lectures- it really hit that 'secret science sweet spot', being a heady blend of hard science lecture, adventure narrative, and science/conservation advocacy. In the subsequent years, I have come to know and love Dr Hekkala and her husband- they reliably show up at pro-science events such as lectures and the March for Science. I can't say enough about how awesome they are.
Anyway, the post title comes from my favorite episode of my beloved Italian Spiderman. Seeing a still of Peter Parker in Venice from the upcoming Spider-Man movie inspired me to rewatch Italian Spiderman in all of its glory. Perhaps my favorite episode is the third one, when Italian Spiderman interacts with members of the two extant archosaur lineages:
That scene with the chicken never fails to crack me up.
Anyway, the post title comes from my favorite episode of my beloved Italian Spiderman. Seeing a still of Peter Parker in Venice from the upcoming Spider-Man movie inspired me to rewatch Italian Spiderman in all of its glory. Perhaps my favorite episode is the third one, when Italian Spiderman interacts with members of the two extant archosaur lineages:
That scene with the chicken never fails to crack me up.
Thursday, September 19, 2013
DNA from Dioramas
In yesterday's blog post, I indicated that I had an interesting conversation with a previous Secret Science Club lecturer, and that I would write a future post about this conversation. As regular readers may recall, April's Secret Science Club lecture featured Dr Evon Hekkala of Fordham University. Her lecture was an outstanding combination of hard science, adventure narrative, mystery novel, and autobiography, and she came across as a combination of Indiana Jones and Sherlock Holmes, only cooler, and a real person.
Dr Hekkala is currently seeking funding for her DNA from Dioramas project, an undertaking which involves obtaining DNA from organisms collected by an expedition to the Congo which lasted from 1909 to 1915. The DNA from Dioramas project involves comparing the gene sequences of the 20th Century Congo specimens to modern specimens in order to determine how modern biodiversity stacks up against that of a century ago.
Currently, the project is 6% funded, $860 has been pledged towards a $13,000 goal. There are eighteen days left in the campaign. One of the classic protest slogans of the Cold War era read "It will be a great day when our schools get all the money they need and the air force has to hold a bake sale to buy a bomber." A current slogan could read "It will be a great day when our scientists get all the money they need and the Televangelists have to hold a bake sale to push Creationism."
I don't "bleg" often, but this is a special case. I took an oath "to uphold the scientific method and to advance the public understanding of science throughout the Universe" and publicizing this project is the least I can do to fulfill my responsibilities as a card-carrying member of the Secret Science Club. Seriously, if you can make a pledge, no matter how small, it would be fantastic. Dr Hekkala deserves your support, she's so awesome that she saved a village in Madagascar using SCIENCE!
Dr Hekkala is currently seeking funding for her DNA from Dioramas project, an undertaking which involves obtaining DNA from organisms collected by an expedition to the Congo which lasted from 1909 to 1915. The DNA from Dioramas project involves comparing the gene sequences of the 20th Century Congo specimens to modern specimens in order to determine how modern biodiversity stacks up against that of a century ago.
Currently, the project is 6% funded, $860 has been pledged towards a $13,000 goal. There are eighteen days left in the campaign. One of the classic protest slogans of the Cold War era read "It will be a great day when our schools get all the money they need and the air force has to hold a bake sale to buy a bomber." A current slogan could read "It will be a great day when our scientists get all the money they need and the Televangelists have to hold a bake sale to push Creationism."
I don't "bleg" often, but this is a special case. I took an oath "to uphold the scientific method and to advance the public understanding of science throughout the Universe" and publicizing this project is the least I can do to fulfill my responsibilities as a card-carrying member of the Secret Science Club. Seriously, if you can make a pledge, no matter how small, it would be fantastic. Dr Hekkala deserves your support, she's so awesome that she saved a village in Madagascar using SCIENCE!
Wednesday, September 23, 2015
Secret Science Club Lecture Recap: Love Those Lemurs
Last night, I headed down to the beautiful Bell House, in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn, for this month's Secret Science Club lecture, featuring primatologist Dr Patricia Chapple Wright of Stony Brook University, who founded Madagascar's Centre ValBio Research Station. Dr Wright has won numerous awards, including a MacArthur “Genius Grant” and the 2014 Indianapolis Prize. She was one of the subjects of the recently released IMAX film Island of Lemurs, along with the eponymous island and its endemic primates.
Dr Wright began her lecture with a quick account of her pathway to a career in the sciences. After a childhood in Buffalo, New York, she determined to make her way to a warmer clime, joking, "In my dreams, I thought I'd go south of Buffalo, I'd go to New Jersey." She and her husband made it all the way to Brooklyn, in the days when she could see Dzimi Hendriks at the Filmore East for five dollars. In a pet shop near the Filmore, she was enchanted by an Aotus monkey, which she purchased. The purchase of the monkey inspired her to learn all about furry animals and the monkey's dissatisfaction with being alone when she and her husband went out at night drove her to take a leave of absence from work so she could travel to Latin America to find her monkey a mate, a project in which she succeeded. While in Costa Rica attempting to ascertain whether Aotus was present in that country, she was stuck in San Isidro by a cyclone. While there, she fell ill and, after a battery of tests to determine if she'd picked up an illness, she learned that she was pregnant. She gave birth to a daughter right around the time that her pet monkeys had a baby (at this point, she displayed an incredibly cute picture of her adorable young daughter with an adorable baby monkey perched on top of her head).
After the birth of the baby monkey, she noticed that the father took care of the baby about 90% of the time. The mother would nurse the baby, but the father would take care of it when she had finished. She wanted to learn how the division of parental care between males and females evolved, but first she had to learn how a non-academic would begin such a study. Her initial impulse was to write a letter to Jane Goodall. After receiving no reply, she wrote to the National Geographic Society and was informed that she would not be eligible for funding without a PhD. She called her mother for advice, and her mother was able to have upstate philanthropist George Eastman advise her- without a university affiliation, she wouldn't be able to get grant money, if she were to obtain affiliation, she would be able to get funding. She was able to contact a staffer at The New School who told her that, for a 25% fee to cover overhead, she could receive affiliation. At around the same time, her mother, a habitual clipper of newspaper articles, sent her an item about a City College professor studying monkeys in the Amazon. She then called CCNY, where she informed Dr Warren Kinzey that she wished to study Aotus. His immediate response was, "You know they're nocturnal?" She was able to secure funding and eventually wrote her doctoral dissertation on Aotus.
After obtaining her dissertation, Dr Elwyn Simons of the Duke University Primate Center (now the Duke Lemur Center) contacted her- he had received a grant from the NSF to study tarsiers, and had sent five researchers to obtain the nocturnal primates, with no success. Hearing that she was the nocturnal primate expert, he wanted to send her to Borneo to bring back tarsiers. She was able to obtain twelve tarsiers in Borneo and twelve tarsiers in the Philippines.
After this successful foray, she was presented with a big problem- since a 1972 revolution had occurred, there were no primatologists working in Madagascar. Nothing was known about the current state of the island's lemurs. In particular, it wasn't known if the greater bamboo lemur (Haplalemur simus) had gone extinct. In 1986, Dr Wright was sent to ascertain whether or not the animal were extinct. When she traveled to Madagascar, it was one of the poorest countries on the planet- there were no roads, no cars, the medium of exchange was barter, and the country's only ally was North Korea. After a month of searching, she looked for lemurs in the forest behind the old hotel in which she was staying. Her first clue that there were lemurs about was a shredded bamboo trunk surrounded by green pellets- lemur turds! While she didn't find H. simus at this time, she discovered a species new to science, the golden bamboo lemur (Hapalemur aureus). Happily, she found greater bamboo lemurs in 1987.
At around this time, timber exploiters were coming to Madagascar to cut trees in the forest in which a new species had been discovered and a lost species rediscovered. A national park was needed, but money was needed to form a park. If she were able to get money, the government of Madagascar could create a park. Put starkly, if she did nothing, these animals would go extinct. She was able to raise $3.8 million dollars from Liz Claiborne and the MacArthur Foundation, and then contacted the timberers and all of the villagers in the vicinity in which she'd located the bamboo lemurs, explaining the need for a park. In turn, the villagers spoke of their needs- they needed schools, they needed healthcare, they needed economic aid, and they needed a soccer ball. Dr Wright noted that the Malagasy people are extraordinarily organized, so once their needs were met, they acted quickly- in 1991, Ranomafana National Park was created. USAID provided a new bridge to replace the terrifying old bridge that gave access to the area, and soccer balls were obtained for the villagers.
After her account of her career, and her triumph in creating a refuge for lemurs, Dr Wright proceeded to discuss the primates themselves. The ancestors of lemurs arrived at Madagascar about sixty million years ago, not long after the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs. When these early primates colonized Madagascar, there wasn't much animal life there, so they were able to adapt to a multitude of environmental niches, eventually radiating to over 100 species. Members of the order Carnivora didn't reach the island until about twenty million years after the lemur ancestors did, and there weren't a lot of birds or bats on the island, though some of the birds were spectacular. She introduced us to a bunch of representative lemurs- the bamboo lemurs, which have adapted to a cyanide-rich diet,being able to excrete cyanide in their urine rather than having it blow up their red blood cells. The dwarf lemurs hibernate for about six months- Dr Wright quipped that they are the world's laziest mammals. The frugivorous black-and-white ruffed lemurs swap babies from nest-to-nest among related groups in a form of animal 'daycare'- the males care for the babies while the females feed, thus increasing the chance of survival for all offspring. The nocturnal woolly lemurs are noted for their night calls. The sportive lemurs have a high tolerance for alkaloids in their diet. Red-bellied lemurs form female-dominant groups- males are colorblind while females have color vision... it is thought that high-status females use their color vision in order to better forage for fruits.
There was a wonderful aside concerning the otherworldly Aye-Aye. Aye-Ayes were needed at the Duke University Primate Center, so Dr Wright was charged with bringing them to the U.S. Regarding the task, "It's easy, climb tree and pull the Aye-Aye out of its nest." After poking around one-hundred and thirty-five nests, no Aye-Ayes were obtained... thousands of dollars, and no Aye-Ayes? Finally, two Aye-Ayes were found... both male, no breeding pair- what kind of biologist brings back two males? The males were brought to the primate center, and another expedition was sent to obtain females. Finally, a pair of female Aye-Ayes were found, a mother and her daughter, were found on the first day in the field. They were supposed to be transported in dog carriers, but one of them was able to gnaw its way out of the carrier- it had to be pushed down into the carrier, which was hastily repaired with duct tape. Facing a six month quarantine for the animals (a critical delay), Dr Wright was referred to KLM being told "They like animals." She was reluctant to show the animals to the KLM agent, thinking "look at that face!" She relented and showed one of the animals to the agent, who promptly exclaimed "That's an Aye-Aye!" and produced a picture clipped from National Geographic magazine. The only seats available were in the first class section, but the agent exclaimed, "This animal deserves first class." While Dr Wright had beetle larvae in her pocket to feed to the Aye-Ayes, the KLM stewardess decided to feed them a banana, which they ate- until that stewardess in the first class section of that KLM flight fed them that banana, it was never known that they ate fruit. At some point in the flight, the animals were let out of their carriers with the permission of the other passengers. When the female Aye-Ayes arrived at the primate center, the formerly silent males began calling out and now there are thirty-two Aye-Ayes in the center. A female Aye-Aye enters estrus every three years, when it calls out and mates with a single male, which she grabs with her hind feet, whereupon they copulate for one to two hours.
The Aye-Aye has big ears and long fingers- it taps on dead logs in order to listen for insect larvae (a technique known as percussive foraging). It then gnaws holes in the wood with its beaver-like teeth and spears the grubs with an alarmingly skinny finger- its feeding style is best compared to that of a woodpecker.
Another fascinating aside concerned grey mouse lemurs. In the 1950's a bunch of mouse lemurs were brought to Paris by French researchers. In captivity, the lemurs are subject to dementia and type two diabetes. In 1991, it was discovered that the mouse lemurs of Paris got plaques and tangles in their brain neurons (for some Secret Science synergy, see the recap of last month's lecture). A NSF grant was earmarked to study if lemurs in the wild were subject to dementia, so a number of animals were caught, chipped, and tracked. Old lemurs, twelve to eighteen years of age, were found in the wild, but out of a sample of 650 individuals, none exhibited symptoms of Alzheimer's. The wild lemurs eat a lot of insects and berries toxic to humans, but only captive lemurs exhibit symptoms of diabetes and dementia.
The heart of the talk was the history of Ranomafana National Park and the Centre ValBio facility. From 1986-2003, researchers had to camp in tents or cabin. In 2003, a grant came in to build a grander facility, and provisions were made to train Malagasy students. In 2012, the facility was expanded- the expansion involved a great deal of labor, with bricks being handmade and the stones being chiseled by hand. The expanded facility includes a molecular biology lab and an infectious disease lab. Currently a reforestation project is underway- in twenty-two sites, ten thousand endemic trees are being planted in order to restore degraded habitats. Thirty-thousand tourists are expected to visit the park per year, and 50% of the park entrance fees goes to support nearby villagers. With improved horticultural techniques, the fruit-to-flower timespan for most of the native trees is about eighteen years. The reforestation efforts are first being put in place along riverbanks.
There are conservation education outreach programs- the future of lemurs depends on educating the next generation. To benefit the local Malagasy population, cyclone relief is provided as needed and there is an economic development component to the center's work- local people are employed full-time and there is a mobile wellness team to provide care for locals. A certain amount of parkland is earmarked for vanilla and cacao production- cash crops among the endemic trees. The center also is expanding university connections and sponsors four "study abroad" sessions per year. There's also a Music and Arts "embassy" program. Madagascar's Minister of the Environment is working to create a constellation of connected sites for lemur conservation and research. There's hope for Madagascar, and there's hope for lemurs.
After the lecture, as a special treat, Dr Wright had Ben Mirin, a musician who combines his "human beatbox" schtick with lemur calls, give a brief performance:
Ben, seems like a really likeable, idealistic guy, but I'd be lying if I said most of us weren't hoping for a live lemur.
In the Q&A, some bastard in the audience asked about discoveries of extinct lemur species, and Dr Wright went on a glorious digression about an amazing discovery of subfossil remains, including the bones of lemurs the size of gorillas. When presented with sacks of large bones, Dr Wright hired fifteen laborers to dig for fifteen days in an area of fifteen meters, uncovering hippo bones, Aepyornis bones, crocodile bones, and tortoise bones dating to approximately ten thousand years ago- humans did not reach Madagascar until about two-to-three thousand years ago. More recently, a treasure trove of remains was found in an underwater cave, and among the giant lemur remains, the remains of a giant fossa were found.
Dr Wright delivered a fantastic lecture- part superhero origin tale, part introduction to a fascinating branch of our primate family tree, part conservation procedural, part earnest argument for development and conservation spending, and part well-deserved victory lap with cautious acknowledgement that the important work goes on. Her love for science, her love for lemurs, her love for the Malagasy people, and her love for Madagascar were palpable. She informed the audience that she'd be flying to Madagascar in a couple of days, and I wish her a heartfelt bon voyage.
As an added bonus, Secret Science superstar and Madagascar adventurer Evon Hekkala was in attendance, along with her awesome husband. Over a post lecture beer, Dr Hekkala mentioned that she had asked Dr Wright for some of the prefossil crocodile remains. It's always good to know that Secret Science synergy is actually a thing.
Thanks to Dr Wright, Dr Hekkala, Dorian and Margaret, and the staff of the beautiful Bell House. Once again, a standing room only crowd was treated to a fantastic, informative lecture. High fives all around.
Here's the trailer for Madagascar: Island of Lemurs:
Crack open a beer and soak in the gorgeous visuals and the mellifluous tones of Morgan Freeman's narration, and you'll have some sense of the Secret Science Club ambiance.
Dr Wright began her lecture with a quick account of her pathway to a career in the sciences. After a childhood in Buffalo, New York, she determined to make her way to a warmer clime, joking, "In my dreams, I thought I'd go south of Buffalo, I'd go to New Jersey." She and her husband made it all the way to Brooklyn, in the days when she could see Dzimi Hendriks at the Filmore East for five dollars. In a pet shop near the Filmore, she was enchanted by an Aotus monkey, which she purchased. The purchase of the monkey inspired her to learn all about furry animals and the monkey's dissatisfaction with being alone when she and her husband went out at night drove her to take a leave of absence from work so she could travel to Latin America to find her monkey a mate, a project in which she succeeded. While in Costa Rica attempting to ascertain whether Aotus was present in that country, she was stuck in San Isidro by a cyclone. While there, she fell ill and, after a battery of tests to determine if she'd picked up an illness, she learned that she was pregnant. She gave birth to a daughter right around the time that her pet monkeys had a baby (at this point, she displayed an incredibly cute picture of her adorable young daughter with an adorable baby monkey perched on top of her head).
After the birth of the baby monkey, she noticed that the father took care of the baby about 90% of the time. The mother would nurse the baby, but the father would take care of it when she had finished. She wanted to learn how the division of parental care between males and females evolved, but first she had to learn how a non-academic would begin such a study. Her initial impulse was to write a letter to Jane Goodall. After receiving no reply, she wrote to the National Geographic Society and was informed that she would not be eligible for funding without a PhD. She called her mother for advice, and her mother was able to have upstate philanthropist George Eastman advise her- without a university affiliation, she wouldn't be able to get grant money, if she were to obtain affiliation, she would be able to get funding. She was able to contact a staffer at The New School who told her that, for a 25% fee to cover overhead, she could receive affiliation. At around the same time, her mother, a habitual clipper of newspaper articles, sent her an item about a City College professor studying monkeys in the Amazon. She then called CCNY, where she informed Dr Warren Kinzey that she wished to study Aotus. His immediate response was, "You know they're nocturnal?" She was able to secure funding and eventually wrote her doctoral dissertation on Aotus.
After obtaining her dissertation, Dr Elwyn Simons of the Duke University Primate Center (now the Duke Lemur Center) contacted her- he had received a grant from the NSF to study tarsiers, and had sent five researchers to obtain the nocturnal primates, with no success. Hearing that she was the nocturnal primate expert, he wanted to send her to Borneo to bring back tarsiers. She was able to obtain twelve tarsiers in Borneo and twelve tarsiers in the Philippines.
After this successful foray, she was presented with a big problem- since a 1972 revolution had occurred, there were no primatologists working in Madagascar. Nothing was known about the current state of the island's lemurs. In particular, it wasn't known if the greater bamboo lemur (Haplalemur simus) had gone extinct. In 1986, Dr Wright was sent to ascertain whether or not the animal were extinct. When she traveled to Madagascar, it was one of the poorest countries on the planet- there were no roads, no cars, the medium of exchange was barter, and the country's only ally was North Korea. After a month of searching, she looked for lemurs in the forest behind the old hotel in which she was staying. Her first clue that there were lemurs about was a shredded bamboo trunk surrounded by green pellets- lemur turds! While she didn't find H. simus at this time, she discovered a species new to science, the golden bamboo lemur (Hapalemur aureus). Happily, she found greater bamboo lemurs in 1987.
At around this time, timber exploiters were coming to Madagascar to cut trees in the forest in which a new species had been discovered and a lost species rediscovered. A national park was needed, but money was needed to form a park. If she were able to get money, the government of Madagascar could create a park. Put starkly, if she did nothing, these animals would go extinct. She was able to raise $3.8 million dollars from Liz Claiborne and the MacArthur Foundation, and then contacted the timberers and all of the villagers in the vicinity in which she'd located the bamboo lemurs, explaining the need for a park. In turn, the villagers spoke of their needs- they needed schools, they needed healthcare, they needed economic aid, and they needed a soccer ball. Dr Wright noted that the Malagasy people are extraordinarily organized, so once their needs were met, they acted quickly- in 1991, Ranomafana National Park was created. USAID provided a new bridge to replace the terrifying old bridge that gave access to the area, and soccer balls were obtained for the villagers.
After her account of her career, and her triumph in creating a refuge for lemurs, Dr Wright proceeded to discuss the primates themselves. The ancestors of lemurs arrived at Madagascar about sixty million years ago, not long after the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs. When these early primates colonized Madagascar, there wasn't much animal life there, so they were able to adapt to a multitude of environmental niches, eventually radiating to over 100 species. Members of the order Carnivora didn't reach the island until about twenty million years after the lemur ancestors did, and there weren't a lot of birds or bats on the island, though some of the birds were spectacular. She introduced us to a bunch of representative lemurs- the bamboo lemurs, which have adapted to a cyanide-rich diet,being able to excrete cyanide in their urine rather than having it blow up their red blood cells. The dwarf lemurs hibernate for about six months- Dr Wright quipped that they are the world's laziest mammals. The frugivorous black-and-white ruffed lemurs swap babies from nest-to-nest among related groups in a form of animal 'daycare'- the males care for the babies while the females feed, thus increasing the chance of survival for all offspring. The nocturnal woolly lemurs are noted for their night calls. The sportive lemurs have a high tolerance for alkaloids in their diet. Red-bellied lemurs form female-dominant groups- males are colorblind while females have color vision... it is thought that high-status females use their color vision in order to better forage for fruits.
There was a wonderful aside concerning the otherworldly Aye-Aye. Aye-Ayes were needed at the Duke University Primate Center, so Dr Wright was charged with bringing them to the U.S. Regarding the task, "It's easy, climb tree and pull the Aye-Aye out of its nest." After poking around one-hundred and thirty-five nests, no Aye-Ayes were obtained... thousands of dollars, and no Aye-Ayes? Finally, two Aye-Ayes were found... both male, no breeding pair- what kind of biologist brings back two males? The males were brought to the primate center, and another expedition was sent to obtain females. Finally, a pair of female Aye-Ayes were found, a mother and her daughter, were found on the first day in the field. They were supposed to be transported in dog carriers, but one of them was able to gnaw its way out of the carrier- it had to be pushed down into the carrier, which was hastily repaired with duct tape. Facing a six month quarantine for the animals (a critical delay), Dr Wright was referred to KLM being told "They like animals." She was reluctant to show the animals to the KLM agent, thinking "look at that face!" She relented and showed one of the animals to the agent, who promptly exclaimed "That's an Aye-Aye!" and produced a picture clipped from National Geographic magazine. The only seats available were in the first class section, but the agent exclaimed, "This animal deserves first class." While Dr Wright had beetle larvae in her pocket to feed to the Aye-Ayes, the KLM stewardess decided to feed them a banana, which they ate- until that stewardess in the first class section of that KLM flight fed them that banana, it was never known that they ate fruit. At some point in the flight, the animals were let out of their carriers with the permission of the other passengers. When the female Aye-Ayes arrived at the primate center, the formerly silent males began calling out and now there are thirty-two Aye-Ayes in the center. A female Aye-Aye enters estrus every three years, when it calls out and mates with a single male, which she grabs with her hind feet, whereupon they copulate for one to two hours.
The Aye-Aye has big ears and long fingers- it taps on dead logs in order to listen for insect larvae (a technique known as percussive foraging). It then gnaws holes in the wood with its beaver-like teeth and spears the grubs with an alarmingly skinny finger- its feeding style is best compared to that of a woodpecker.
Another fascinating aside concerned grey mouse lemurs. In the 1950's a bunch of mouse lemurs were brought to Paris by French researchers. In captivity, the lemurs are subject to dementia and type two diabetes. In 1991, it was discovered that the mouse lemurs of Paris got plaques and tangles in their brain neurons (for some Secret Science synergy, see the recap of last month's lecture). A NSF grant was earmarked to study if lemurs in the wild were subject to dementia, so a number of animals were caught, chipped, and tracked. Old lemurs, twelve to eighteen years of age, were found in the wild, but out of a sample of 650 individuals, none exhibited symptoms of Alzheimer's. The wild lemurs eat a lot of insects and berries toxic to humans, but only captive lemurs exhibit symptoms of diabetes and dementia.
The heart of the talk was the history of Ranomafana National Park and the Centre ValBio facility. From 1986-2003, researchers had to camp in tents or cabin. In 2003, a grant came in to build a grander facility, and provisions were made to train Malagasy students. In 2012, the facility was expanded- the expansion involved a great deal of labor, with bricks being handmade and the stones being chiseled by hand. The expanded facility includes a molecular biology lab and an infectious disease lab. Currently a reforestation project is underway- in twenty-two sites, ten thousand endemic trees are being planted in order to restore degraded habitats. Thirty-thousand tourists are expected to visit the park per year, and 50% of the park entrance fees goes to support nearby villagers. With improved horticultural techniques, the fruit-to-flower timespan for most of the native trees is about eighteen years. The reforestation efforts are first being put in place along riverbanks.
There are conservation education outreach programs- the future of lemurs depends on educating the next generation. To benefit the local Malagasy population, cyclone relief is provided as needed and there is an economic development component to the center's work- local people are employed full-time and there is a mobile wellness team to provide care for locals. A certain amount of parkland is earmarked for vanilla and cacao production- cash crops among the endemic trees. The center also is expanding university connections and sponsors four "study abroad" sessions per year. There's also a Music and Arts "embassy" program. Madagascar's Minister of the Environment is working to create a constellation of connected sites for lemur conservation and research. There's hope for Madagascar, and there's hope for lemurs.
After the lecture, as a special treat, Dr Wright had Ben Mirin, a musician who combines his "human beatbox" schtick with lemur calls, give a brief performance:
Ben, seems like a really likeable, idealistic guy, but I'd be lying if I said most of us weren't hoping for a live lemur.
In the Q&A, some bastard in the audience asked about discoveries of extinct lemur species, and Dr Wright went on a glorious digression about an amazing discovery of subfossil remains, including the bones of lemurs the size of gorillas. When presented with sacks of large bones, Dr Wright hired fifteen laborers to dig for fifteen days in an area of fifteen meters, uncovering hippo bones, Aepyornis bones, crocodile bones, and tortoise bones dating to approximately ten thousand years ago- humans did not reach Madagascar until about two-to-three thousand years ago. More recently, a treasure trove of remains was found in an underwater cave, and among the giant lemur remains, the remains of a giant fossa were found.
Dr Wright delivered a fantastic lecture- part superhero origin tale, part introduction to a fascinating branch of our primate family tree, part conservation procedural, part earnest argument for development and conservation spending, and part well-deserved victory lap with cautious acknowledgement that the important work goes on. Her love for science, her love for lemurs, her love for the Malagasy people, and her love for Madagascar were palpable. She informed the audience that she'd be flying to Madagascar in a couple of days, and I wish her a heartfelt bon voyage.
As an added bonus, Secret Science superstar and Madagascar adventurer Evon Hekkala was in attendance, along with her awesome husband. Over a post lecture beer, Dr Hekkala mentioned that she had asked Dr Wright for some of the prefossil crocodile remains. It's always good to know that Secret Science synergy is actually a thing.
Thanks to Dr Wright, Dr Hekkala, Dorian and Margaret, and the staff of the beautiful Bell House. Once again, a standing room only crowd was treated to a fantastic, informative lecture. High fives all around.
Here's the trailer for Madagascar: Island of Lemurs:
Crack open a beer and soak in the gorgeous visuals and the mellifluous tones of Morgan Freeman's narration, and you'll have some sense of the Secret Science Club ambiance.
Saturday, February 11, 2017
A Woman's Place is in the Laboratory, or the Field, or the Classroom
Via Shakezula, we have a reminder that today is the International Day of Woman and Girls in Science, and a link to a herpetologist's snarky takedown of a stupid piece about capping women's admission to science programs by Breitbart 'technology editor' Milo Youcangofuckyourself, who probably can't use any technology more complicated than a hair-gel applicator.
The role of women in the sciences has gotten a great deal of attention lately, with special attention being paid to the formerly neglected African-American women who crunched the numbers that put NASA's astronauts into space and onto the moon. In the previous century, women played a crucial role in crunching the numbers used by astronomers mapping the heavens. Ever since the dawn of the 'Scientific Age', women have been working in the 'STEM' fields, largely ignored by misogynistic assholes like the Breitbrats.
I decided that my particular contribution to the celebration of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science would be to link the various Secret Science Club lectures by women (it's worth noting here that the SSC is run by two talented, dedicated women of great intelligence and strong civic values).
Ichthyologist Dr Melanie Stiassny lectured on the incredible biodiversity among fish in the Congo River.
Primatologist Dr Patricia Chapple Wright lectured on lemurs and the conservation efforts being undertaken to protect them.
Astrophysicist Dr Priyamvada Natarajan lectured on dark matter and gravitational lensing on two nights.
Neurologist Dr Leslie Voshall lectured on the human olfacory system.
Cognitive scientist Dr Alexandra Horowitz lectured on the cognitive capabilities of dogs.
Neuroscientist Dr Diana Reiss lectured on animal cognitive capabilities, with a focus on dolphins.
Anthropologist Dr Helen Fisher lectured on attraction and amor.
Neurologist Dr Dr Susana Martinez-Conde lectured on human perception, specifically illustions.
Paleoanthropologist Dr Shara Bailey lectured on the study of hominin teeth.
Biologist Mandë Holford lectured on snail venoms and their possible pharmaceutical use.
Primatologist Dr Mary Blair lectured on primate conservation.
Neurologist Dr Anne Churchland lectured on the decision making process.
Dr Heather Berlin lectured on consciousness.
Friend of the Bastard and all around great person Dr Evon Hekkala lectured about crocodile behavior and genetics in one of my personal favorite SSC lectures.
Comparative anatomist Dr Joy Reidenberg lectured on whale anatomy and the process of performing a necroscopy on a dead whale.
Molecular geneticist Dr Alea Mills lectured on the role of specific genes in tumor suppression.
Neurologist Dr Daniela Schiller lectured on the role of the amygdala in human emotional responses.
Sadly, I began my lecture recaps in December of 2009, so I missed writing recaps for two years and three months of SSC lectures. Suffice it to say, there are plenty of women doing amazing work in the various scientific fields. As someone who believes in a meritocracy, the very idea of caps on the admission of women and minorities in ANY field is abhorrent to me.
I would much prefer a cap on the number of paid internet trolls spouting stupid, misogynistic garbage.
The role of women in the sciences has gotten a great deal of attention lately, with special attention being paid to the formerly neglected African-American women who crunched the numbers that put NASA's astronauts into space and onto the moon. In the previous century, women played a crucial role in crunching the numbers used by astronomers mapping the heavens. Ever since the dawn of the 'Scientific Age', women have been working in the 'STEM' fields, largely ignored by misogynistic assholes like the Breitbrats.
I decided that my particular contribution to the celebration of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science would be to link the various Secret Science Club lectures by women (it's worth noting here that the SSC is run by two talented, dedicated women of great intelligence and strong civic values).
Ichthyologist Dr Melanie Stiassny lectured on the incredible biodiversity among fish in the Congo River.
Primatologist Dr Patricia Chapple Wright lectured on lemurs and the conservation efforts being undertaken to protect them.
Astrophysicist Dr Priyamvada Natarajan lectured on dark matter and gravitational lensing on two nights.
Neurologist Dr Leslie Voshall lectured on the human olfacory system.
Cognitive scientist Dr Alexandra Horowitz lectured on the cognitive capabilities of dogs.
Neuroscientist Dr Diana Reiss lectured on animal cognitive capabilities, with a focus on dolphins.
Anthropologist Dr Helen Fisher lectured on attraction and amor.
Neurologist Dr Dr Susana Martinez-Conde lectured on human perception, specifically illustions.
Paleoanthropologist Dr Shara Bailey lectured on the study of hominin teeth.
Biologist Mandë Holford lectured on snail venoms and their possible pharmaceutical use.
Primatologist Dr Mary Blair lectured on primate conservation.
Neurologist Dr Anne Churchland lectured on the decision making process.
Dr Heather Berlin lectured on consciousness.
Friend of the Bastard and all around great person Dr Evon Hekkala lectured about crocodile behavior and genetics in one of my personal favorite SSC lectures.
Comparative anatomist Dr Joy Reidenberg lectured on whale anatomy and the process of performing a necroscopy on a dead whale.
Molecular geneticist Dr Alea Mills lectured on the role of specific genes in tumor suppression.
Neurologist Dr Daniela Schiller lectured on the role of the amygdala in human emotional responses.
Sadly, I began my lecture recaps in December of 2009, so I missed writing recaps for two years and three months of SSC lectures. Suffice it to say, there are plenty of women doing amazing work in the various scientific fields. As someone who believes in a meritocracy, the very idea of caps on the admission of women and minorities in ANY field is abhorrent to me.
I would much prefer a cap on the number of paid internet trolls spouting stupid, misogynistic garbage.
Sunday, November 20, 2016
Reptilian Respite
On Friday afternoon, I was sick and tired of seeing cold, glittering reptilian eyes, so I decided to stop reading about the Trump transition and headed down to the American Museum of Natural History with one of my old college roommates and his son to see the crocodilians exhibit. The awesome Dr Evon Hekkala receives some much deserved accolades in the exhibit, which features several live crocodilians, including African dwarf crocodiles (Osteolaemus tetraspis) and some cute baby American alligators (Alligator mississippiensis). Another major centerpiece of the exhibit was a huge mounted taxidermy specimen of a saltwater crocodile (Crocodylus porosus). There were fossil crocodilians on exhibit as well, and some interactive displays, such as an alligator vibration simulator:
This was a social visit, with an old friend and a grammar-school aged boy, so I didn't take copious notes. I tend to go to the exhibits multiple times (museum membership has its advantages), so I will write it up in a more thorough future blog post. I just wanted to get away from slimy, soulless reptiles for a while and see some Archosaurs.
Yesterday morning, at my volunteer coaching gig, we had an eleven-and-up girls group, a really fun group of students, some of whom have been with us long enough so we can teach them some of the throws with more 'oomph'... we were teaching them the major hip throw, O goshi, yesterday. Two of the girls in the group are identical twins, very athletic, pretty, nice, and smart girls who are instantly likeable. One of them told me at the end of the class that she would prefer to stay in the dojo rather than going to the pool for swimming:
"I wish we could stay here, I don't want to go swimming today."
"You really need to go to swimming, it's the most important thing you learn here, because it's one activity you might not have a choice to do or not to do."
"I'm a really strong swimmer, I've gone swimming in the ocean with riptides."
Thinking of crocodiles... "You've gone swimming in the ocean with reptiles? Saltwater crocodiles? Sea turtles?"
"Riptides. Riptides."
"Oh, sorry, I was at the museum of natural history yesterday and have crocodiles on the mind."
She's too nice of a girl to have called me a lunatic.
This was a social visit, with an old friend and a grammar-school aged boy, so I didn't take copious notes. I tend to go to the exhibits multiple times (museum membership has its advantages), so I will write it up in a more thorough future blog post. I just wanted to get away from slimy, soulless reptiles for a while and see some Archosaurs.
Yesterday morning, at my volunteer coaching gig, we had an eleven-and-up girls group, a really fun group of students, some of whom have been with us long enough so we can teach them some of the throws with more 'oomph'... we were teaching them the major hip throw, O goshi, yesterday. Two of the girls in the group are identical twins, very athletic, pretty, nice, and smart girls who are instantly likeable. One of them told me at the end of the class that she would prefer to stay in the dojo rather than going to the pool for swimming:
"I wish we could stay here, I don't want to go swimming today."
"You really need to go to swimming, it's the most important thing you learn here, because it's one activity you might not have a choice to do or not to do."
"I'm a really strong swimmer, I've gone swimming in the ocean with riptides."
Thinking of crocodiles... "You've gone swimming in the ocean with reptiles? Saltwater crocodiles? Sea turtles?"
"Riptides. Riptides."
"Oh, sorry, I was at the museum of natural history yesterday and have crocodiles on the mind."
She's too nice of a girl to have called me a lunatic.
Sunday, April 23, 2017
What Do We Want? SCIENCE!
Yesterday was a great day- I took a vacation day and headed down to the NYC March for Science. I met up with
Yastreblyansky (nice to put a face to the name) at 65th and Broadway and we had to walk up to 68th St to queue up for the march due to the number of attendees. The crowd was amazing- there were a lot of really smart people, a lot of kids were in attendance with their parents and teachers. The signs were awesome, a lot of them played on Pi and the square root of negative one. Many signs, including my own, played on the whole 'Alternative Facts' dope-trope. Another popular theme was 'small hands can't grasp big facts'. One woman had a heart-wrenching sign... eight years of primary school, four years of high school, four years undergraduate college, seven years of graduate school, four years post-doc, under one year to take it away.
It was a coldish, rainy day- my sign started soaking up water before we hit Times Square- but spirits were high. It was fun meeting physicists and psychologists, and school kids, all of whom were advocating for funding science and for basing public policy on evidence-based science. There were a couple of places where the crowd started booing- passing a 9/11 'Truther' and passing the The Trump International Hotel and Tower in Columbus Circle. The march ended in Times Square, where, by happy coincidence, a samba group was drumming. The overall vibe in the Broadway pedestrian plaza was festive. I ran into Secret Science diva Dorian Devins, along with her fantastic husband and a couple of other SSC regulars. I also ran into the awesome scientist/adventurer Dr Evon Hekkala, her fantastic husband, and their lovely children. I had a great conversation with some folks from Jersey who had met at the NYC Women's March and were continuing their resistance activities (nevertheless, they persisted). I also ran into an alumnus from my Prestigious Bastion of Prestige who had graduated a few years ahead of my enrollment, but we had several biology professors in common. We must have spent an hour shooting the breeze about the teachers we had in common, about current mutual acquaintances. He hinted to me that Morbid Anatomy might be rising, Phoenix-like, from the ashes.
Finally, around 3PM, I decided that, in desperate need of a piss-break, I would retreat to the shelter of a tavern. After a warming shot of Tullamore Dew, I was fortified for the subway ride back to the Bronx- I passed small groups from the march and we greeted each other warmly. I walked all the back to Columbus Circle, and there were a bunch of Fordham University students hanging out outside the subway station. We shouted one of the slogans from the march:
WHAT DO WE WANT?
SCIENCE!
WHEN DO WE WANT IT?
AFTER PEER REVIEW!
Yastreblyansky (nice to put a face to the name) at 65th and Broadway and we had to walk up to 68th St to queue up for the march due to the number of attendees. The crowd was amazing- there were a lot of really smart people, a lot of kids were in attendance with their parents and teachers. The signs were awesome, a lot of them played on Pi and the square root of negative one. Many signs, including my own, played on the whole 'Alternative Facts' dope-trope. Another popular theme was 'small hands can't grasp big facts'. One woman had a heart-wrenching sign... eight years of primary school, four years of high school, four years undergraduate college, seven years of graduate school, four years post-doc, under one year to take it away.
It was a coldish, rainy day- my sign started soaking up water before we hit Times Square- but spirits were high. It was fun meeting physicists and psychologists, and school kids, all of whom were advocating for funding science and for basing public policy on evidence-based science. There were a couple of places where the crowd started booing- passing a 9/11 'Truther' and passing the The Trump International Hotel and Tower in Columbus Circle. The march ended in Times Square, where, by happy coincidence, a samba group was drumming. The overall vibe in the Broadway pedestrian plaza was festive. I ran into Secret Science diva Dorian Devins, along with her fantastic husband and a couple of other SSC regulars. I also ran into the awesome scientist/adventurer Dr Evon Hekkala, her fantastic husband, and their lovely children. I had a great conversation with some folks from Jersey who had met at the NYC Women's March and were continuing their resistance activities (nevertheless, they persisted). I also ran into an alumnus from my Prestigious Bastion of Prestige who had graduated a few years ahead of my enrollment, but we had several biology professors in common. We must have spent an hour shooting the breeze about the teachers we had in common, about current mutual acquaintances. He hinted to me that Morbid Anatomy might be rising, Phoenix-like, from the ashes.
Finally, around 3PM, I decided that, in desperate need of a piss-break, I would retreat to the shelter of a tavern. After a warming shot of Tullamore Dew, I was fortified for the subway ride back to the Bronx- I passed small groups from the march and we greeted each other warmly. I walked all the back to Columbus Circle, and there were a bunch of Fordham University students hanging out outside the subway station. We shouted one of the slogans from the march:
WHAT DO WE WANT?
SCIENCE!
WHEN DO WE WANT IT?
AFTER PEER REVIEW!
Wednesday, October 15, 2014
Secret Science Club North: Entomophagy Expectations Exceeded
Last night, I headed down to the scintillating Symphony Space to attend the second-ever Secret Science Club North lecture, featuring the American Museum of Natural History's parasitologist and curator of invertebrates Dr Mark Siddall. Dr Siddall's topic was the consumption of various invertebrates for the good of the consumer and the good of the planet. Dr Siddall had delivered a previous Secret Science Club lecture about leeches back in December 2012. Before the lecture, Secret Science Goddesses Margaret Mittelbach and Dorian Devins were giving out samples of gummy worms and, more importantly, delicious mealworms and crickets:
The cocktail of the evening was the deliciously "swampy" Spineless Wonder, a blend of Bailey's, vodka, and Coca-Cola- the acidity of the cola partially curdled the Bailey's, making for a slightly chunky drink.
Dr Siddall's lecture last night was largely a travelogue/epicurean exploration. Think of a night spent listening to a very funny, very intelligent friend talking about their travels to interesting locations in the developing world and you'll get an idea about last night's lecture. Dr Siddall began by asking the audience if any members were vegans or vegetarians, moving to to asking attendees where they drew the line regarding consuming animals... would any of us eat gorilla? How about dolphins? They're relatively closely related to cows, which many of us eat. He displayed a mammalian cladogram and asked us to pick out which animals we'd eat- would any of us eat an opossum but not a wallaby? He then showed a cladogram of all known animal taxa and asked us which of these animals we would eat. He reminisced about taking university students on a tour of tidal zones and exhorting them to add taste to the other sense they used to explore the environment, serving them mussels and (at the tides ebb) sea urchin gonads. He noted that barnacles were tasty, being basically stationary shrimp encased in a stony shell, but eating the typical Atlantic barnacles was too difficult to be practical- likening barnacles to the "celery of the sea", one would burn more calories rendering them edible than one would obtain by eating. He then told of his "barnacle epiphany", trying the giant picoroco barnacle in Chile and finding it delicious. This was the first of many times in the course of the lecture in which he averred that, if in doubt about the palatability of any foodstuff, you should eat it served in a spicy broth. In an aside, he quipped that you should eat with a parasitologist if you want to know what bugs you.
To determine how squeamish the audience members were, Dr Siddall showed us a slide of huitlacoche, then he passed around a bag of tortilla chips and a container of delicious corn smut for the audience to sample. Que sabor rico!
The bulk of the lecture was occupied by a slide show of Dr Siddall in various markets in various nations, eating various invertebrates. Interspersed with pictures of Dr Siddall munching on grubs and grasshoppers, there were pictures of vultures scavenging the leavings at an outdoor market, of a jolly African matron laughing because the Americans wanted to eat mopane "worms" (in a spicy broth, of course), giant Hercules beetle grubs roasted on a stick (tastes like buttered popcorn! he quipped). He told us a funny story about the run-up to a trip to Oaxaca, when he enthusiastically told his young daughter that they would be eating chapulines, so that she was eager to be eating them in a taco with a spicy sauce and guacamole. In a picture of a bucket in a market in Korea, he remarked, "There are five phyla in that bucket!"
He advised us, if you want to know what's safe to eat, you ask the locals and you eat what the locals eat. In Madagascar, he joked about how the staple was rice- rice for dinner every day, occasionally a meal of beans, and if you were lucky, rice and beans. He then quizzed us about water safety, showing pictures of two glasses of water and asking whether one should drink the cloudy water or the clear water- answer: the cloudy water was boiled in the pot in which the rice was cooked to loosen the rice from the pot, and was safe to drink. He then showed a picture of Secret Science Club lecturer and all-around great person Evon Hekkala laid up with a bad illness she got from the water in Madagascar. He also talked about cultural savvy in the field- you should eat whatever is placed in front of you because it represents an act of hospitality from someone who can little afford it. If you are a vegan and your host or guide offers you their last chicken, eat the chicken. It's less of a sacrifice than the one made by your host.
Being the leech guy, Dr Siddall digressed on the topic of edible leeches, pronouncing the blood-suckers kinda flaccid and tasteless. The leeches to eat are the muscular carnivorous ones, like the giant earthworm eating red leeches. He showed us a portrait of himself eating a leech while a grad student working in the field- the booze bottles photoshopped out because he had shown the lecture to a bunch of grammar school students.
Another aside dealt with the "medicinal" uses of certain foods- snake is sold in the markets of Taiwan to improve virility, scorpions are sold in the winter because they are considered "hot". He then mentioned English naturalist Thomas Muffet, whose writings on the medicinal virtues of eating spiders may have inspired the nursery rhyme Little Miss Muffet.
Dr Liddall then went into a lengthy digression about the blister beetle Lytta vesicatoria, the infamous Spanish fly, the source of the blistering agent Cantharone- he related an anecdote about a pediatrician wishing to topically apply Cantharone to his daughter's arm, but he wouldn't allow the treatment until he swabbed himself with it. After much resistance, he liberally applied it to his arm, resulting in three-inch blisters- the pediatrician told him that the merest touch would be applied to his daughter's arm. He then related a tale about the Marquis De Sade giving Spanish fly laced sweets to women because the irritating agent is concentrated in the urogenital system and the "stimulation" was thought to be an aphrodesiac. He also told of a unit of the French Foreign Legion that had been laid up with painful priapism from eating the legs of frogs that had consumed Lytta vesicatoria. Frogs have a knack for accumulating insect toxins- the wickedly poisonous golden poison frog accumulates beetle toxins in its flesh. This led to a bit of advice about avoiding bright bugs- they are aposematic, they advertise their toxic status by standing out.
Another funny topic was drunken elephants- Dr Siddall noted that it would take three trailer loads of fermented marula fruits to get an elephant drunk, and that the intoxicated elephants of legend are probably tripping on poisonous insects consumed with tree bark. Another slide showed a slug happily munching on an Amanita muscaria.
Regarding locust "plagues", Dr Siddall advised us to eat the locusts, noting that it was sad that Laura Ingalls Wilder's dad didn't know that. He showed a newsreel of an African locust plague and noted that the gentleman walking through the cloud of grasshoppers ate one.
The home stretch of the lecture dealt with the nutritive value of insects. Dr Siddall noted that the worst features of malnutrition resulted from an underconsumption of protein and a lack of protein and fat diversity. Starches are easier to come by. After an strong exhortation not to eat bats, which carry ebola, Dr Siddall started to show us "nutritional labels" for various insects. To produce a pound of beef, it requires 12 pounds of feed, 5,000 gallons of water, and 31 kilowatt-hours. For a pound of chicken, it requires 2 pounds of feed, 815 gallons of water, and 4 kilowatt hours. By comparison, a pound of crickets requires 2 pounds of feed, one gallon of water, and 2 kilowatt hours.
2.5 acres can produce enough beef to feed one person, while the same land can produce a plethora of crickets. Dr Siddall exhorted us to eat more insects. Currently, three pounds of cricket "flour" typically costs around sixty dollars. Demand for edible insect products will drive costs down.
The whole lecture involved a lot of audience participation. In one exchange, a lucky bastard was able to say he ate a bug because he took advantage of the periodic influx of brown marmorated stink bugs at his workplace... and to think that earlier that day he'd only eaten cicadas among the real "bugs". Besides huitlacoche, Dr Siddall passed around figs so we could eat the tiny wasps that inhabit the inflorescenses. It was a very fun lecture with a serious takeaway- eat insects, preferably in a spicy broth.
In the Q&A, some bastard asked Dr Siddall a question in his capacity as the leech guy. Given the number of (relatively) unrelated taxa that consume blood, were the anticoagulants used by, or example, leeches and mosquitos, similar? Dr Siddall indicated that there are many factors in the coagulation cascade that can be targeted. Hirudin, the anticoagulant in the saliva of the medicinal leech, is an anti-thrombin. Different sanquivorous taxa target different parts of the coagulation cascade, some anti-coagulants attack thromin, some attack pre-thrombin, some attack platelets. There are also anticoagulants that are A-pyrases, they destroy free ATP (after the lecture, I asked Dr Siddall if any of these pyrases were proposed as anti-cancer drugs, but they are large proteins that cannot penetrate the cell walls, making them unlikely to be used against tumors).
Another audience member, who suffers from ulcerative colitis, asked Dr Siddall about nematode therapy. After briefly discussing the hygiene hypothesis, Dr Siddall emphatically stated, "People in wormy areas would rather have your allergies than their parasitic worms." He then noted that pig whipworms, which cannot reproduce in a human host, can be used with some success. He then commented on the near eradication of the hideous Guinea worm, a meter-long worm that burrows beneath the skin- last year, there were only 83 recorded cases of Guinea worm, all in South Sudan.
A funny question by an audience member regarded squeamishness- what does it take to make the bug-eating Leech Guy puke? His answer was that vomit makes him want to vomit, and that this has a really good evolutionary basis. We are descended from individuals who ate together, so if one of them ate something that made them sick, the others would be safer if they threw up as well. Those individuals who were non-pukers died off, leaving no descendents.
Asked about parasites, Dr Siddall noted that, while we are co-evolved with them, we don't need them. He then brought up toxoplasmosis, which is caused by a protozoan related to the malaria pathogen. The definitive hosts of toxoplasmosis are cats, though all mammals can act as vectors. Mice infected with toxoplasmosis tend to engage in risky behaviors- they don't fear cat urine and they are more active in the daytime... perfect behaviors to make it more likely that they will be eaten by cats. All mammals can act as hosts for toxoplasmosis- the organism tends to go through different stages in different hosts. In the bloodstream, the parasites reproduce quickly- they are "tachyzoids". In pregnant females, the tachyzoids can cross the fetal barrier in the placenta and cause birth defects (the process is known as teratogenesis). Never change kitty litter when you're pregnant- make someone else do it. Dr Siddall then joked that mosquitoes are the primary hosts of malaria, and that humans are vectoring the parasite for those poor mosquitoes.
After the lecture, Dr Siddall hung out with the crowd, fielding any and all questions. I asked him if he'd ever eaten trepang, which led to a digression on contact between Indonesia and Australia before Europeans "discovered" the continent. A young woman was asking about the feasibility of raising crickets in a community garden, and Dr Siddall noted that the insect market was unregulated but that insect producers, leery of onerous USDA crackdowns, tend to autoclave their product to forestall any scares. Some bastard joked that we should all pool our resources and start an "artisanal" cricket market and sell crickets to hipsters. That led to digressions about Brooklyn crickets (brickets- rub them with the same spices you rub on briskets) and pickled crickets- pricklets. Yeah, there was beer involved.
All told, it was a very fun night with a very engaging lecturer and some unusual snacks. Kudos to Dr Siddall, Dorian, Margaret, and the staff of the Symphony Space.
The cocktail of the evening was the deliciously "swampy" Spineless Wonder, a blend of Bailey's, vodka, and Coca-Cola- the acidity of the cola partially curdled the Bailey's, making for a slightly chunky drink.
Dr Siddall's lecture last night was largely a travelogue/epicurean exploration. Think of a night spent listening to a very funny, very intelligent friend talking about their travels to interesting locations in the developing world and you'll get an idea about last night's lecture. Dr Siddall began by asking the audience if any members were vegans or vegetarians, moving to to asking attendees where they drew the line regarding consuming animals... would any of us eat gorilla? How about dolphins? They're relatively closely related to cows, which many of us eat. He displayed a mammalian cladogram and asked us to pick out which animals we'd eat- would any of us eat an opossum but not a wallaby? He then showed a cladogram of all known animal taxa and asked us which of these animals we would eat. He reminisced about taking university students on a tour of tidal zones and exhorting them to add taste to the other sense they used to explore the environment, serving them mussels and (at the tides ebb) sea urchin gonads. He noted that barnacles were tasty, being basically stationary shrimp encased in a stony shell, but eating the typical Atlantic barnacles was too difficult to be practical- likening barnacles to the "celery of the sea", one would burn more calories rendering them edible than one would obtain by eating. He then told of his "barnacle epiphany", trying the giant picoroco barnacle in Chile and finding it delicious. This was the first of many times in the course of the lecture in which he averred that, if in doubt about the palatability of any foodstuff, you should eat it served in a spicy broth. In an aside, he quipped that you should eat with a parasitologist if you want to know what bugs you.
To determine how squeamish the audience members were, Dr Siddall showed us a slide of huitlacoche, then he passed around a bag of tortilla chips and a container of delicious corn smut for the audience to sample. Que sabor rico!
The bulk of the lecture was occupied by a slide show of Dr Siddall in various markets in various nations, eating various invertebrates. Interspersed with pictures of Dr Siddall munching on grubs and grasshoppers, there were pictures of vultures scavenging the leavings at an outdoor market, of a jolly African matron laughing because the Americans wanted to eat mopane "worms" (in a spicy broth, of course), giant Hercules beetle grubs roasted on a stick (tastes like buttered popcorn! he quipped). He told us a funny story about the run-up to a trip to Oaxaca, when he enthusiastically told his young daughter that they would be eating chapulines, so that she was eager to be eating them in a taco with a spicy sauce and guacamole. In a picture of a bucket in a market in Korea, he remarked, "There are five phyla in that bucket!"
He advised us, if you want to know what's safe to eat, you ask the locals and you eat what the locals eat. In Madagascar, he joked about how the staple was rice- rice for dinner every day, occasionally a meal of beans, and if you were lucky, rice and beans. He then quizzed us about water safety, showing pictures of two glasses of water and asking whether one should drink the cloudy water or the clear water- answer: the cloudy water was boiled in the pot in which the rice was cooked to loosen the rice from the pot, and was safe to drink. He then showed a picture of Secret Science Club lecturer and all-around great person Evon Hekkala laid up with a bad illness she got from the water in Madagascar. He also talked about cultural savvy in the field- you should eat whatever is placed in front of you because it represents an act of hospitality from someone who can little afford it. If you are a vegan and your host or guide offers you their last chicken, eat the chicken. It's less of a sacrifice than the one made by your host.
Being the leech guy, Dr Siddall digressed on the topic of edible leeches, pronouncing the blood-suckers kinda flaccid and tasteless. The leeches to eat are the muscular carnivorous ones, like the giant earthworm eating red leeches. He showed us a portrait of himself eating a leech while a grad student working in the field- the booze bottles photoshopped out because he had shown the lecture to a bunch of grammar school students.
Another aside dealt with the "medicinal" uses of certain foods- snake is sold in the markets of Taiwan to improve virility, scorpions are sold in the winter because they are considered "hot". He then mentioned English naturalist Thomas Muffet, whose writings on the medicinal virtues of eating spiders may have inspired the nursery rhyme Little Miss Muffet.
Dr Liddall then went into a lengthy digression about the blister beetle Lytta vesicatoria, the infamous Spanish fly, the source of the blistering agent Cantharone- he related an anecdote about a pediatrician wishing to topically apply Cantharone to his daughter's arm, but he wouldn't allow the treatment until he swabbed himself with it. After much resistance, he liberally applied it to his arm, resulting in three-inch blisters- the pediatrician told him that the merest touch would be applied to his daughter's arm. He then related a tale about the Marquis De Sade giving Spanish fly laced sweets to women because the irritating agent is concentrated in the urogenital system and the "stimulation" was thought to be an aphrodesiac. He also told of a unit of the French Foreign Legion that had been laid up with painful priapism from eating the legs of frogs that had consumed Lytta vesicatoria. Frogs have a knack for accumulating insect toxins- the wickedly poisonous golden poison frog accumulates beetle toxins in its flesh. This led to a bit of advice about avoiding bright bugs- they are aposematic, they advertise their toxic status by standing out.
Another funny topic was drunken elephants- Dr Siddall noted that it would take three trailer loads of fermented marula fruits to get an elephant drunk, and that the intoxicated elephants of legend are probably tripping on poisonous insects consumed with tree bark. Another slide showed a slug happily munching on an Amanita muscaria.
Regarding locust "plagues", Dr Siddall advised us to eat the locusts, noting that it was sad that Laura Ingalls Wilder's dad didn't know that. He showed a newsreel of an African locust plague and noted that the gentleman walking through the cloud of grasshoppers ate one.
The home stretch of the lecture dealt with the nutritive value of insects. Dr Siddall noted that the worst features of malnutrition resulted from an underconsumption of protein and a lack of protein and fat diversity. Starches are easier to come by. After an strong exhortation not to eat bats, which carry ebola, Dr Siddall started to show us "nutritional labels" for various insects. To produce a pound of beef, it requires 12 pounds of feed, 5,000 gallons of water, and 31 kilowatt-hours. For a pound of chicken, it requires 2 pounds of feed, 815 gallons of water, and 4 kilowatt hours. By comparison, a pound of crickets requires 2 pounds of feed, one gallon of water, and 2 kilowatt hours.
2.5 acres can produce enough beef to feed one person, while the same land can produce a plethora of crickets. Dr Siddall exhorted us to eat more insects. Currently, three pounds of cricket "flour" typically costs around sixty dollars. Demand for edible insect products will drive costs down.
The whole lecture involved a lot of audience participation. In one exchange, a lucky bastard was able to say he ate a bug because he took advantage of the periodic influx of brown marmorated stink bugs at his workplace... and to think that earlier that day he'd only eaten cicadas among the real "bugs". Besides huitlacoche, Dr Siddall passed around figs so we could eat the tiny wasps that inhabit the inflorescenses. It was a very fun lecture with a serious takeaway- eat insects, preferably in a spicy broth.
In the Q&A, some bastard asked Dr Siddall a question in his capacity as the leech guy. Given the number of (relatively) unrelated taxa that consume blood, were the anticoagulants used by, or example, leeches and mosquitos, similar? Dr Siddall indicated that there are many factors in the coagulation cascade that can be targeted. Hirudin, the anticoagulant in the saliva of the medicinal leech, is an anti-thrombin. Different sanquivorous taxa target different parts of the coagulation cascade, some anti-coagulants attack thromin, some attack pre-thrombin, some attack platelets. There are also anticoagulants that are A-pyrases, they destroy free ATP (after the lecture, I asked Dr Siddall if any of these pyrases were proposed as anti-cancer drugs, but they are large proteins that cannot penetrate the cell walls, making them unlikely to be used against tumors).
Another audience member, who suffers from ulcerative colitis, asked Dr Siddall about nematode therapy. After briefly discussing the hygiene hypothesis, Dr Siddall emphatically stated, "People in wormy areas would rather have your allergies than their parasitic worms." He then noted that pig whipworms, which cannot reproduce in a human host, can be used with some success. He then commented on the near eradication of the hideous Guinea worm, a meter-long worm that burrows beneath the skin- last year, there were only 83 recorded cases of Guinea worm, all in South Sudan.
A funny question by an audience member regarded squeamishness- what does it take to make the bug-eating Leech Guy puke? His answer was that vomit makes him want to vomit, and that this has a really good evolutionary basis. We are descended from individuals who ate together, so if one of them ate something that made them sick, the others would be safer if they threw up as well. Those individuals who were non-pukers died off, leaving no descendents.
Asked about parasites, Dr Siddall noted that, while we are co-evolved with them, we don't need them. He then brought up toxoplasmosis, which is caused by a protozoan related to the malaria pathogen. The definitive hosts of toxoplasmosis are cats, though all mammals can act as vectors. Mice infected with toxoplasmosis tend to engage in risky behaviors- they don't fear cat urine and they are more active in the daytime... perfect behaviors to make it more likely that they will be eaten by cats. All mammals can act as hosts for toxoplasmosis- the organism tends to go through different stages in different hosts. In the bloodstream, the parasites reproduce quickly- they are "tachyzoids". In pregnant females, the tachyzoids can cross the fetal barrier in the placenta and cause birth defects (the process is known as teratogenesis). Never change kitty litter when you're pregnant- make someone else do it. Dr Siddall then joked that mosquitoes are the primary hosts of malaria, and that humans are vectoring the parasite for those poor mosquitoes.
After the lecture, Dr Siddall hung out with the crowd, fielding any and all questions. I asked him if he'd ever eaten trepang, which led to a digression on contact between Indonesia and Australia before Europeans "discovered" the continent. A young woman was asking about the feasibility of raising crickets in a community garden, and Dr Siddall noted that the insect market was unregulated but that insect producers, leery of onerous USDA crackdowns, tend to autoclave their product to forestall any scares. Some bastard joked that we should all pool our resources and start an "artisanal" cricket market and sell crickets to hipsters. That led to digressions about Brooklyn crickets (brickets- rub them with the same spices you rub on briskets) and pickled crickets- pricklets. Yeah, there was beer involved.
All told, it was a very fun night with a very engaging lecturer and some unusual snacks. Kudos to Dr Siddall, Dorian, Margaret, and the staff of the Symphony Space.
Wednesday, August 29, 2018
Secret Science Club Post-Lecture Recap: Vampire Hell Ants of the Cretaceous
Last night, I headed down to the beautiful Bell House, in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn, for this month's Secret Science Club lecture featuring paleontologist and entomologist Dr Phillip Barden of the New Jersey Institute of Technology and the American Museum of Natural History. Dr Barden specializes in the study of fossils of social insects such as termites and ants.
Dr Barden began his lecture with a short definition of paleontology. Paleontologists ask two main questions: What is the history of life on Earth? How does evolution work? Paleontologists study finite events, such as the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs. Life on Earth is 3.7 billion years old, with humans occupying a miniscule span of time. Most life is extinct, almost everything that has ever lived is now dead. Dr Barden asked the audience to picture a fossil, immediately following this up with the admonition that not every fossil is dinosaur remains. Some of the most famous non-dinosaur fossils are trilobite and ammonite fossils. There are also environmental remains of organisms, such as footprints. His concentration is the study of fossil insects.
Eighty percent of animal species are insects, While dinosaurs, being charismatic megafauna, attract most of the public's attention, there are spectacular insect fossils, such as that of Meganeura, a dragonfly-esque creature with a wingspan attaining over two feet which hunted in the Carboniferous skies, which had a higher oxygen content than our modern atmosphere- insects breath through treachea, so the surface area of these tubes limit body size. Dr Barden also displayed a fossil of a Jurassic Era lacewing which resembled a butterfly.
The best-preserved insect fossils are encased in amber, fossilized tree resin (NOT SAP!). Resin is secreted when a tree is injured, forming 'scabs' in which organisms can be trapped. When subjected to heat and pressure through geological processes, it becomes polymerized- Dr Barden joked that amber is 'OG Plastic'. Amber, known to the ancient Greeks as 'elektros', produces electric sparks when rubbed. Insects trapped in amber are preserved in three dimensions. Dr Barden accompanied this portion of the lecture with gorgeous photographs of amber-trapped insects, such as two ants trapped in amber while fighting (evidence of a social structure).
Amber is distributed worldwide, with particularly nice Cretaceous amber being found in New Jersey. Dr Barden showed us photos of various amber sources, such as an amber deposit in a Gujarati lignite mine (the remains of a forest compacted and rendered into coal), excavated amber mines in the Dominican Republic, and Baltic amber which is typically found on beaches or 'fished' from the sea. Amber is often fashioned into jewelry, sometimes including fossilized animal remains.
Dr Barden then showed us the 'Mr DNA' clip (though not the Mr DNA you were thinking of) from Jurassic Park, noting that the stand-in for the giant prehistoric mosquito in the amber walkingstick ornament is actually a crane fly and chiding anyone who killed a harmless crane fly as a 'giant mosquito'):
Dr Barden noted that the book Jurassic Park was released in 1990, and that in 1992, it was reported that DNA was extracted from an Oligo-Miocene termite, but that this study posed a problem of reproducibility. DNA from bones has a half-life of 521 years and that new techniques for DNA extraction are constantly sought.
Dr Barden continued to display images of amber encased animal remains, such as a thumb-sized, feathered dinosaur tail found in Myanmar, a tick attached to a dinosaur feather, and an ant queen (the wings identify it as such) transporting a symbiotic mealybug in her mandibles- mealybugs excrete honeydew, which ants consume. Another fossil was that of a lacewing larva with spines for collecting camouflaging detritus. Dr Barden noted that there are about as many ant fossils as there are dinosaur fossils, but that only he and a French paleontologists are studying them- he joked that his job prospects are good. Among these fossil ants was one the size of a hummingbird.
Dr Barden stated that the oldest ants were not like was expected- early ants were thought to be wasplike, having similar body plans. The oldest ants discovered were more like basal Hymenoptera than wasps, with the similarities in body resulting from adaptive radiation.
Dr Barden conducted 3D imaging of ant fossils at the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory, fluorescing specimens while rotating them to provide the three-dimensional images. He joked that he was the guy putting bugs in the machine. As a comedic aside, he displayed a stupid tweet by a Kardashian: Do ants have dicks? He then displayed a photo of a drone ant fossilized in amber, then zoomed in, showing us a dick pic of a 20 million year old ant.
The topic of the lecture then shifted to the vampire hell ants of the post title. Haidomyrmex scimitarus was a Cretaceous Era ant found in an amber deposit in Myanmar. A detailed reconstruction using animations based off CT scans of this ant suggested that it used its mandibles to impale other insects, and grooves in the mouthparts hint that these ants consumed the hemolymph of the impaled. Dibs on "Hemolymph of the Impaled" for the name of my Doom Metal band. The queen ant was found outside of the nest, and lacked fat storage, indicating that the queen had to forage like a common worker. The generic name Haidomyrmex is a combination of 'Hades' and the Greek term for 'ant', so Dr Barden decided to make 'Hell Ant' the popular term for these insects- he asked the audience members to 'hashtag' #hellant. Another similar 'hell ant', Ceratomyrmex had a horn as well as the impaling jaws. Then, a scan of an ant dubbed Linguamyrmex vladi revealed that the horn was so dense as to suggest that the horn contained sequestered metal, leading to such lurid headlines as: 'Meet the vampire ant from hell with huge jaws and a metal horn.' Dr Braden then displayed a succession of increasingly lurid and 'clickbaity' headlines about this ant. The good doctor then displayed an articulated model of this ant's head, about the size of an American football.
The hell ants thrived for about twenty-million years, during the Cretaceous Era. It is not known what happened to this diverse clade of ants. The earliest ants were social, there is evidence of different specialized castes among early ants. About fifty million years ago, ants became more abundant, ants now currently compose 50-80% of insects in tropical tree communities. The hell ants don't seem to have been all that ecologically impactful. There are many Cretaceous ant fossils. There is a gap in the fossil record until the Eocene, a sort of 'black box' from which only modern ants emerge, while having diverse behaviors, extant ants have similar body forms. Divergent forms, such as the hell ants, disappeared. Dr Braden likened this emergence from a 'black box' to the K-T extinction event, from which one lineage of dinosaurs, the birds, emerged.
Dr Barden posed a question: Does extinction mean failure? He displayed a picture of the thylacine, a wolf-shaped marsupial that was killed off by humans (as an aside, I am obliged to plug SSC goddess Margaret Mittelbach's Carnivorous Nights: On the Trail of the Tasmanian Tiger, co-written with SSC alum Michael Crewdson- it's a great book by good friends, a funny, sad, and informative read). Dr Barden offered his three measures of evolutionary success: Diversity of species (beetles, with over 350,000 species, are very successful), Ecological Impact (South African harvester ant foraging territories can be seen in satellite images, such is their ability to reshape their environment), and Longevity (Neandertals were around for 430,000 years while modern Homo sapiens has been around for about 300,000 years). Certain taxons were extremely successful- about twenty thousand trilobite species are known, which indicates that there were probably many more. The impact of the dinosaurs on other evolutionary lineages is difficult to understate. The hell ants were around for about twenty-one million years, great apes a mere eight million. We only see about .01, much of the evolutionary legacy is hidden.
The lecture was followed by a Q&A session, as always. The first question regarded the phenotype of the hell ants- the 'archtecture' of the hell ant lineage has been lost, no traces last into modern ant lineages. The next question was, why did the hell ants go extinct? While this is unknown, it could be that their social structure was outcompeted by the social structure of modern ants which supplanted them. Perhaps the hell ants were 'painted into a corner' evolutionarily. Another question regarded evidence of the large structures which ants and termites build- fossil remains of these structures have been found, and Dr Barden likened this evidence to an 'extended phenotype' which provides clues to the behavior of the insects themselves. Regarding the gaps in the fossil record, new amber deposits have been found in Alaska and compression fossils have been found in Alberta- gradually, the 'black box' is being filled in. Regarding the half life of DNA, while DNA sequences degrade, partial genomes provide information valuable to researchers. Some Bastard in the audience asked about molecular evidence from insects trapped in amber- can inferences be made about pigmentation or the composition of venoms? Dr Barden noted that coloration is often preserved in amber, and stingers are often present in fossil insects, but no molecular structures for pigments or poisons have been found. Regarding prey items of hell ants, they have been found in association with a larva of an insect and a cockroach like insect. The musculature of an insect, useful in computer modelling, can be inferred from bulges in the interior of the exoskeleton, to which muscles, inside the skeleton, are attached. Regarding the caste system of social insects, insects from the same species have the same genome but different gene expression- while a worker has a lifespan of 1-3 years, a queen may live as long as twenty years- transcriptomes play a role in this sort of development. The earliest known modern style ant dates back to the Cretaceous, about ninety-two million years ago, and was found in New Jersey- the lineage probably split off from other ant lineages about 120 million years ago. Finally, asked about his application of the species concept, Dr Barden indicated that, due to the nature of his work, he applied the paleontological species concept, largely working off whether specimens look similar or different.
Once again, the Secret Science Club delivered a fantastic lecture. I make no bones about loving the life sciences the most, so this lecture was right up my alley, or allele... Dr Barden hit what I call the 'Secret Science Sweet Spot'- the lecture was specific, extremely informative about recent discoveries, accompanied by gorgeous images of fossils, and leavened with humor. I call it a grand slam. Kudos to Dr Barden, the staff of the Beautiful Bell House, and Margaret and Dorian for another great monthly event. It was also great to see both the NJIT 'swarm lab' crowd with Dr Garnier and the AMNH crowd, represented by Dr Hekkala and her husband, in attendance. High fives to everyone!
Poking around the t00bz, I found a fun video of Dr Barden giving a tour of the AMNH insect collections to a budding young entomologist:
I only have one quibble, and that's because bugs suck. The video, however, is great. Pour yourself a nice beverage, and watch two cool young dudes talk about SCIENCE!
Dr Barden began his lecture with a short definition of paleontology. Paleontologists ask two main questions: What is the history of life on Earth? How does evolution work? Paleontologists study finite events, such as the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs. Life on Earth is 3.7 billion years old, with humans occupying a miniscule span of time. Most life is extinct, almost everything that has ever lived is now dead. Dr Barden asked the audience to picture a fossil, immediately following this up with the admonition that not every fossil is dinosaur remains. Some of the most famous non-dinosaur fossils are trilobite and ammonite fossils. There are also environmental remains of organisms, such as footprints. His concentration is the study of fossil insects.
Eighty percent of animal species are insects, While dinosaurs, being charismatic megafauna, attract most of the public's attention, there are spectacular insect fossils, such as that of Meganeura, a dragonfly-esque creature with a wingspan attaining over two feet which hunted in the Carboniferous skies, which had a higher oxygen content than our modern atmosphere- insects breath through treachea, so the surface area of these tubes limit body size. Dr Barden also displayed a fossil of a Jurassic Era lacewing which resembled a butterfly.
The best-preserved insect fossils are encased in amber, fossilized tree resin (NOT SAP!). Resin is secreted when a tree is injured, forming 'scabs' in which organisms can be trapped. When subjected to heat and pressure through geological processes, it becomes polymerized- Dr Barden joked that amber is 'OG Plastic'. Amber, known to the ancient Greeks as 'elektros', produces electric sparks when rubbed. Insects trapped in amber are preserved in three dimensions. Dr Barden accompanied this portion of the lecture with gorgeous photographs of amber-trapped insects, such as two ants trapped in amber while fighting (evidence of a social structure).
Amber is distributed worldwide, with particularly nice Cretaceous amber being found in New Jersey. Dr Barden showed us photos of various amber sources, such as an amber deposit in a Gujarati lignite mine (the remains of a forest compacted and rendered into coal), excavated amber mines in the Dominican Republic, and Baltic amber which is typically found on beaches or 'fished' from the sea. Amber is often fashioned into jewelry, sometimes including fossilized animal remains.
Dr Barden then showed us the 'Mr DNA' clip (though not the Mr DNA you were thinking of) from Jurassic Park, noting that the stand-in for the giant prehistoric mosquito in the amber walkingstick ornament is actually a crane fly and chiding anyone who killed a harmless crane fly as a 'giant mosquito'):
Dr Barden noted that the book Jurassic Park was released in 1990, and that in 1992, it was reported that DNA was extracted from an Oligo-Miocene termite, but that this study posed a problem of reproducibility. DNA from bones has a half-life of 521 years and that new techniques for DNA extraction are constantly sought.
Dr Barden continued to display images of amber encased animal remains, such as a thumb-sized, feathered dinosaur tail found in Myanmar, a tick attached to a dinosaur feather, and an ant queen (the wings identify it as such) transporting a symbiotic mealybug in her mandibles- mealybugs excrete honeydew, which ants consume. Another fossil was that of a lacewing larva with spines for collecting camouflaging detritus. Dr Barden noted that there are about as many ant fossils as there are dinosaur fossils, but that only he and a French paleontologists are studying them- he joked that his job prospects are good. Among these fossil ants was one the size of a hummingbird.
Dr Barden stated that the oldest ants were not like was expected- early ants were thought to be wasplike, having similar body plans. The oldest ants discovered were more like basal Hymenoptera than wasps, with the similarities in body resulting from adaptive radiation.
Dr Barden conducted 3D imaging of ant fossils at the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory, fluorescing specimens while rotating them to provide the three-dimensional images. He joked that he was the guy putting bugs in the machine. As a comedic aside, he displayed a stupid tweet by a Kardashian: Do ants have dicks? He then displayed a photo of a drone ant fossilized in amber, then zoomed in, showing us a dick pic of a 20 million year old ant.
The topic of the lecture then shifted to the vampire hell ants of the post title. Haidomyrmex scimitarus was a Cretaceous Era ant found in an amber deposit in Myanmar. A detailed reconstruction using animations based off CT scans of this ant suggested that it used its mandibles to impale other insects, and grooves in the mouthparts hint that these ants consumed the hemolymph of the impaled. Dibs on "Hemolymph of the Impaled" for the name of my Doom Metal band. The queen ant was found outside of the nest, and lacked fat storage, indicating that the queen had to forage like a common worker. The generic name Haidomyrmex is a combination of 'Hades' and the Greek term for 'ant', so Dr Barden decided to make 'Hell Ant' the popular term for these insects- he asked the audience members to 'hashtag' #hellant. Another similar 'hell ant', Ceratomyrmex had a horn as well as the impaling jaws. Then, a scan of an ant dubbed Linguamyrmex vladi revealed that the horn was so dense as to suggest that the horn contained sequestered metal, leading to such lurid headlines as: 'Meet the vampire ant from hell with huge jaws and a metal horn.' Dr Braden then displayed a succession of increasingly lurid and 'clickbaity' headlines about this ant. The good doctor then displayed an articulated model of this ant's head, about the size of an American football.
The hell ants thrived for about twenty-million years, during the Cretaceous Era. It is not known what happened to this diverse clade of ants. The earliest ants were social, there is evidence of different specialized castes among early ants. About fifty million years ago, ants became more abundant, ants now currently compose 50-80% of insects in tropical tree communities. The hell ants don't seem to have been all that ecologically impactful. There are many Cretaceous ant fossils. There is a gap in the fossil record until the Eocene, a sort of 'black box' from which only modern ants emerge, while having diverse behaviors, extant ants have similar body forms. Divergent forms, such as the hell ants, disappeared. Dr Braden likened this emergence from a 'black box' to the K-T extinction event, from which one lineage of dinosaurs, the birds, emerged.
Dr Barden posed a question: Does extinction mean failure? He displayed a picture of the thylacine, a wolf-shaped marsupial that was killed off by humans (as an aside, I am obliged to plug SSC goddess Margaret Mittelbach's Carnivorous Nights: On the Trail of the Tasmanian Tiger, co-written with SSC alum Michael Crewdson- it's a great book by good friends, a funny, sad, and informative read). Dr Barden offered his three measures of evolutionary success: Diversity of species (beetles, with over 350,000 species, are very successful), Ecological Impact (South African harvester ant foraging territories can be seen in satellite images, such is their ability to reshape their environment), and Longevity (Neandertals were around for 430,000 years while modern Homo sapiens has been around for about 300,000 years). Certain taxons were extremely successful- about twenty thousand trilobite species are known, which indicates that there were probably many more. The impact of the dinosaurs on other evolutionary lineages is difficult to understate. The hell ants were around for about twenty-one million years, great apes a mere eight million. We only see about .01, much of the evolutionary legacy is hidden.
The lecture was followed by a Q&A session, as always. The first question regarded the phenotype of the hell ants- the 'archtecture' of the hell ant lineage has been lost, no traces last into modern ant lineages. The next question was, why did the hell ants go extinct? While this is unknown, it could be that their social structure was outcompeted by the social structure of modern ants which supplanted them. Perhaps the hell ants were 'painted into a corner' evolutionarily. Another question regarded evidence of the large structures which ants and termites build- fossil remains of these structures have been found, and Dr Barden likened this evidence to an 'extended phenotype' which provides clues to the behavior of the insects themselves. Regarding the gaps in the fossil record, new amber deposits have been found in Alaska and compression fossils have been found in Alberta- gradually, the 'black box' is being filled in. Regarding the half life of DNA, while DNA sequences degrade, partial genomes provide information valuable to researchers. Some Bastard in the audience asked about molecular evidence from insects trapped in amber- can inferences be made about pigmentation or the composition of venoms? Dr Barden noted that coloration is often preserved in amber, and stingers are often present in fossil insects, but no molecular structures for pigments or poisons have been found. Regarding prey items of hell ants, they have been found in association with a larva of an insect and a cockroach like insect. The musculature of an insect, useful in computer modelling, can be inferred from bulges in the interior of the exoskeleton, to which muscles, inside the skeleton, are attached. Regarding the caste system of social insects, insects from the same species have the same genome but different gene expression- while a worker has a lifespan of 1-3 years, a queen may live as long as twenty years- transcriptomes play a role in this sort of development. The earliest known modern style ant dates back to the Cretaceous, about ninety-two million years ago, and was found in New Jersey- the lineage probably split off from other ant lineages about 120 million years ago. Finally, asked about his application of the species concept, Dr Barden indicated that, due to the nature of his work, he applied the paleontological species concept, largely working off whether specimens look similar or different.
Once again, the Secret Science Club delivered a fantastic lecture. I make no bones about loving the life sciences the most, so this lecture was right up my alley, or allele... Dr Barden hit what I call the 'Secret Science Sweet Spot'- the lecture was specific, extremely informative about recent discoveries, accompanied by gorgeous images of fossils, and leavened with humor. I call it a grand slam. Kudos to Dr Barden, the staff of the Beautiful Bell House, and Margaret and Dorian for another great monthly event. It was also great to see both the NJIT 'swarm lab' crowd with Dr Garnier and the AMNH crowd, represented by Dr Hekkala and her husband, in attendance. High fives to everyone!
Poking around the t00bz, I found a fun video of Dr Barden giving a tour of the AMNH insect collections to a budding young entomologist:
I only have one quibble, and that's because bugs suck. The video, however, is great. Pour yourself a nice beverage, and watch two cool young dudes talk about SCIENCE!
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