Not Mom's Day, Not Pop's Day, Not Cinco de Mayo, What Then?

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/14/science/humans-mastodons-florida.html?_r=0
Here is an article reported in NYT and Science Advances (journal) about the discovery made of a sinkhole in Northern Florida that contained mastodon bones and stone tools, which demonstrated that humans and mastodons coexisted in Northern Florida.


http://thescienceteacher.co.uk/working-memory/ From The Science Teacher, Working Memory and Why Teaching Science is Hard refers to a 1991 paper by A.H. Johnstone about science teaching. Suggestions are made to deal with misconceptions, put learning in context and ensure that practical work is focused.

http://hyperallergic.com/298405/blueprint-for-counter-education-republished-and-still-daring-after-all-these-years/  From the Hyperallergic blog by Edward Gomez, a report of the reprinting of a 1970 book by Stein and Miller the "Blueprint for Counter Education" about transforming higher education, an always current topic. (From the prehistoric era, (BNTT) before there were adjuncts.)


https://ww2.kqed.org/mindshift/2015/10/01/understanding-dyslexia-and-the-reading-brain-in-kids/ From KQED Mind/Shift, an article about dyslexia and the reading brain; Child Development Professor Wolf writes and lectures about phoneme awareness, knowing the sounds that correspond with words and letters.





http://zinnedproject.org/materials/eugene-debs-canton-ohio/  From the Howard Zinn peoples' history voices project, a youtube recording by actor Mark Ruffalo of Eugene V. Debs Canton, Ohio antiwar speech for which he was convicted of wartime espionage. He served ten years in prison and his voice fortunately lingers on as the voice of a true patriot and an eloquent spokesperson for the working class.


https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/nih-funded-study-reveals-how-differences-male-female-brains-emerge   An NIH-funded study  on nematode worms done at Columbia U is investigating how sexually dimorphic behavior emerges in the brain.



http://www.scidev.net/global/disease/news/software-diagnoses-lung-diseases-over-the-phone.html
From SciDev.Net SpiroCall software diagnoses lung function over the phone with rates of accuracy similar to actual spirometry. The future of medicine in underdeveloped areas.



https://cosmosmagazine.com/society/should-we-synthesise-human-genome This is an article from Cosmos magazine written by 2 Stanford U geneticists about a recent behind closed doors meeting about the synthesis of the human genome.

http://ww2.kqed.org/mindshift/2014/07/22/unpacking-the-science-how-playing-music-changes-the-learning-brain/  From KQED Mind/Shift, How Music Changes the Learning Brain. This is a report of research done at Tufts University.




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViwX9-Z7iPQ&feature=youtu.be From National Center for Science Education, a link to a recording of Sir David  Attenborough reading Charles Darwin.

https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/nih-funds-new-studies-ethical-legal-social-impact-genomic-information This is a report on several NIH-funded studies to study the ethical, legal and social questions resulting from the advances in genomics research. These studies are funded through the National Human Genome Research Institute’s (NHGRI) Centers of Excellence.

http://www.ragoninstitute.org/study-of-potent-hiv-antibodies-yields-hiv-vaccine-insight/ From a report by the Ragon Institute, a South African blood donor's blood produces natural neutralling antibodies which may become the basis for an anti-HIV vaccine. Some of this work was done in collaboration with the Ragon Institute.




http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/17/science/eske-willerslev-ancient-dna-scientist.html An article from NYT about a Danish scientist who is using ancient DNA to reconstruct 50,000 years of human history. He recently sequenced the DNA of a 4,000 year old Greenlander.



http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/17/science/emily-dickinson-lost-gardens.html?_r=0
Emily Dickinson's (Hope is the thing...) gardens in Amherst, Mass., are being restored.



http://gawker.com/the-horrifying-reality-of-the-academic-job-market-1776914525 The terrifying reality of the academic job market. From Hamilton Nolan, a writer at Gawker. Overeducated, maybe, underpaid, definitely.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ij1qBJwPOEk&feature=youtu.be Alan Alda received the 2016 National Academy of Sciences Public Welfare Medal for science communication.

http://phys.org/news/2016-05-scientists-evolutionary-link-protein-function.html
From phys.org,  a report of research published in the journal Scientific Reports  linking protein structures and functions across the geological record. This is ground breaking work, the linking of certain structures of protein which are conserved over time, certain loops that have been recruited to perform different functions. They called in "hierarchical modularity".



http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/how-the-giraffe-got-its-neck
From the NYer, the giraffe genome project, comparing the genes of the giraffe to its nearest living relative, the okapi finds 20% identity in the proteins encoded by genes. This work was done at the Nelson Mandela African Institute for Science and Technology.


https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/visual-impairment-blindness-cases-us-expected-double-2050  A press release from the NIH that as we baby boomers age, by 2050, blindness and visual impairment cases are supposed to double. Research done by SoCal's Roski eye institute and published in JAMA Opthalmology. (Here's looking at you, kid.)




http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyu-boss-told-professor-women-not-belong-science-suit-article-1.2641512 One day I'll blog about my sex discrimination lawsuit against the federal government and the USDA but in the meantime I am posting about this female malaria research who has a lawsuit against NYU School of Medicine after her boss told her that women do not belong in science.There is a federal lawsuit against Claudio Basilico as revealed in this New York Daily News article.



http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/46113/title/Antibiotics-From-Scratch/ This is an article from the New Scientist describing work done at Harvard U in which the scientists developed a way to synthesize macrolide antibiotics (like azithromycin) from eight chemical building blocks, which will allow synthesis of tens of thousand of compounds.

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2016/05/17/nearly-third-women-in-academic-medicine-experience-sexual-harassment.html From FOX news, a report that nearly one third of women in academic medicine experience sexual harrassment.




http://qz.com/686075/we-still-have-literally-no-way-to-quantify-exactly-how-much-work-women-do/
From Quartz, a query on how to quantify the amount of unpaid work women do. This is something Melinda Gates is thinking about at the Women Deliver conference in Copenhagen as posted by the American Women In Science on their FB page.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/05/18/fruits-and-vegetables-used-to-look-so-different-you-might-not-even-recognize-them/ This is an article from WashPost about artificial selection of fruits and vegetables. Did you know that you are eating the Cavendish banana, for example?



http://www.washington.edu/news/2016/05/19/appeal-of-genetic-puzzles-leads-to-national-medal-of-science-for-uws-mary-claire-king/ National Medal of Science to UW Mary-Claire King, geneticist.