My guest post on Scientific American.

Cheerleader for science: A chat with Mireya Mayor, author of Pink Boots and the Machete

Today is the publication day of Pink Boots and the Machete, book by Mireya Mayor, physical anthropologist, National Geographic Explorer, and former NFL Cheerleader. For this occasion, Scientific American invited me to conduct a brief interview with the author.

Learn how she discovered the world’s smallest primate in existence in Madagascar, and what she thinks about including everyday citizens in science; and read her bold response to this question:

Darlene: Let’s talk about the objectification of women. Some folks have visceral objections to cheerleaders as science advocates, despite the cheerleaders’ credentials (science/engineering degrees), despite their very real connection to the estimated 3-4 million cheerleaders in the U.S. You’ve endured the ogling on-field and on-set. In your book, you recall the typical scene where you “shower beneath the waterfall.” The title of your new series “Wild Nights with Mireya Mayor” is indeed provocative. What do you say to critics who say this type of objectification does more harm than good?

Read the full interview here.

From Scientific American Magazine: The first doses of approved vaccines for the H1N1 “swine” flu will start trickling in across the U.S. on Tuesday. The first to arrive, 600,000 doses of MedImmune’s FluMist nasal spray, will be for healthy people ages two to 49, the Associated Press reported.  Full report here.

From Scientific American:

“With Major League Baseball’s All-Star game taking place tonight, a researcher explains why, when it comes to swinging a baseball bat, heavier isn’t necessarily better….Swinging light or normal weight lumber just before stepping up to the plate helps players become accustomed to swinging fast, repetition that is key to athletic training, the researchers say.”

Read the full story.

Read this, from the editors at Scientific American: “Millions of us dream of transforming our lives, but few of us are able to make major changes after our 20s. Here’s why.” Read the full article: Set in our ways. Why change is so hard. 

An easy way to enhance your life, apply your mind and do something good for mankind, is to participate in one of the thousands of citizen science projects out there. We’re developing a project finder where you’ll find a handy snapshot of each project and links to key information.

For those of you who desire to see the world this year in a big way, consider one of EarthWatch’s ”voluntourism” opportunities, where you can zip over to Easter Island for an archeological dig with scientists, for example.  W.O.W.

Cheers!

I met many fascinating people in Minneapolis at Innovation 2008.  One of them is Lynn Fellman, an artist who creates personalized portraits–and I do mean personalized. Her portraits are based on DNA sequences and mutation markers.

I’m ordering one–choosing to ignore that nagging inner voice cautioning me against this. “Do you REALLY want your DNA information to end up in the hands of scientists, insurance agents, future employers or worse–marketers!?”  Lynn assures me my DNA will be kept top secret and remain nameless.

Hey, a couple of weeks ago, ten super smart people volunteered to donate their DNA to science. More from Scientific American:

Ten people  allowed their genetic maps to be publicly displayed on the Web in the name of research. The effort is part of Harvard Medical School’s Personal Genome Project (PGP), which aims to create a large public database of human DNA to aid researchers in their quest to find the causes and cures for genetic maladies.   

One of the participants explains how relatively inexpensive DNA sequencing technology works and why he believes this project has the potential to change the face of medical research.

While another argues that privacy issues may be a concern but that it’s overshadowed by the fear that insurance companies will refuse to provide coverage or will charge sky-high rates if aware that someone has a pre-existing genetic condition or risk of developing a certain disease.

Interested in having your health history and genes published online for the benefit of science?  The project got approval this spring to expand the project to 100,000 people, and they’re looking for volunteers.

May I share something with you? Don’t tell anyone, ok?  When it comes to the gossip see-saw, I’ve been on top, crashed to the bottom and had to balance very carefully right in the middle at times. All three on any given day, come to think of it. So it was with great relief and a bit of amusement that I read this Scientific American article, by Frank McAndrew: The Science of Gossip: Why We Can’t Stop Ourselves.

The excuse: 
SciAM: Like it or not, our inability to forsake gossip and information about other individuals is as much a part of who we are as is our inability to resist doughnuts or sex—and for the same reasons.

SC: Not sure I’d label gossip, doughnuts and sex as being “equally resistant.”

Good point from an evolutionary standpoint:
SciAm: Individuals who violated expectations about sharing resources and meeting responsibilities became frequent targets of gossip and ostracism, which applied pressure on them to become better citizens. These social pressures discouraged free riders and cheaters and encouraged altruists. In such societies, the manipulation of public opinion through gossip, ridicule and ostracism became a key way of keeping potentially dominant group members in check.

SC:  Stay in line or sleep with one eye open, got it.

The benefit:
SciAm: People who were fascinated with the lives of others were simply more successful than those who were not, and it is the genes of those individuals that have come down to us through the ages.

SC:  Thanks, Grandma!

The obvious:
SciAm: Although males are usually more interested in news about other males, females are virtually obsessed with news about other females.

SC: Girls gossip about girls–a lot.

The bottom line:
SciAm: Gossip is part of who we are and an essential part of what makes groups function as well as they do. Perhaps it may become more productive to think of gossip as a social skill rather than as a character flaw, because it is only when we do not do it well that we get into trouble.

SciAm: Successful gossiping is about being a good team player and sharing key information with others in a way that will not be perceived as self-serving and about understanding when to keep your mouth shut.

Did we really need science to confirm this last point?

Cheers!

Two timely science facts from Scientific American:

Why Trees Lose Leaves: University of Missouri plant biologist John Walker says he and colleagues have identified a group of compounds [in Arabidopsis thaliana] that prompt production of the proteins that cause plants to shed their petals. By blocking these chemicals, they succeeded in keeping petals intact, according to their paper published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Well, assuming nature continues to take its course and old leaves are replaced with new ones in the spring, Project BudBurst will seek your help in observing the tree buds to detect long-term impacts of climate change. 

Each spring, thousands of citizen scientists participate in Project BudBurst by observing and recording buds and blooms across the nation. Scientists are using this data to learn about the responses of individual plant species to climatic variation locally, regionally, and nationally, and to detect longer-term impacts of climate change by comparing with historical data.  

—

Why hurricanes hit the East Coast of the U.S. (From Scientific American): Hurricanes almost always form over ocean water warmer than about 80 degrees F. in a belt of generally east-to-west flow called the trade winds. California’s cool coastal buffer appears to keep the West Coast hurricane free. If you want to learn a little more, here’s a nice primer on hurricanes from an Earth Science Teacher.

Cheers!

No one disputes that a lot of oil lies untapped under the rocky floors of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans off the U.S. coasts, in areas where Congress has banned drilling since 1982. But is it enough to free the U.S. from its dependence on foreign suppliers?

Based on this Scientific American article, the answer is no. However, read the reader feedback to gain a broader perspective. Regardless of whether you lean right or left, I think you’ll find the article and the comments enlightening (or infuriating).

We’re talking science, economics, statistics, values, and pure politics piled up like a giant parfait. If you can provide some clarity to this heavily layered conversation, please do. 

Surely you recall the infamous “hanging chads” of the Bush/Gore election….that’s what Congress was trying to avoid when it voted to switch over to electronic voting machines six years ago. If asked, you could have warned Congress that when it comes to electronics, one should never underestimate the malicious power of troubled teens, evil terrorists, representatives of the esteemed Nigerian Chamber of Commerce, and most dangerous of all perhaps, stealth 85-year-old poll watchers. 

Congress surely could have used some unbiased technical advice from the now defunct Office of Technology Assessment (once their most reliable source of science and technology advice on policy matters). Instead, they are facing this mess (from Scientific American):  ”with another presidential election less than three months away, many e-voting systems are fraught with security glitches, and the technology has yet to prove itself as the solution voters were looking for. Such systems could allow voters and poll workers to place multiple votes, crash the systems by loading viruses, and fake vote tallies”

If you were given the opportunity to hear the pros and cons of mandating electronic voting machines and presented a mechanism to share your thoughts with Congress, you probably would have told Congress to think more carefully about their decision to do so. And, at the very least, Congress should have been able to turn to their most trusted source of science and technology policy advice.  

I suspect, between the OTA and us, we would have simply suggested a ban on silly people from entering  voting booths rather than a complete overhaul of a system that appeared to work well for 99% of the country. But alas, the OTA was closed 14 years ago. Hence, the mess. The list of “reasons we need the OTA” continues to grow. As does the justification for including public input in major sci/tech policy discussions.

We weren’t asked about our opinions six years ago when Congress opted for the electronic machines but boy do folks need our help now. Help wanted: Election Day techies to monitor e-voting mess.

Transparency, democracy, basic civic rights and common sense….all reasons Congress should reopen the Office of Technology Assessment and mandate mechanisms for public participation.  Check out this  petition to reopen the OTA with citizen participation. 

Here’s hoping the electronic voting machines are both fool-proof and immune to those senior citizen hacker/poll watchers.  (I’m on to you, Agnes!)

Cheers!

No doubt about it: cancer is scary and it “sucks,” as the kids say.  As we age and start to peer ahead at our approaching demographics, the statistical odds aren’t quite as rosy as they were, say, 15 years ago.   And, the American Cancer Society projects that 1,437,180 new cases of cancer will be diagnosed here in the United States this year alone. 

But, far be it from the Science Cheerleader to put a downer on your day. I come to you with some promising news!

Scientific American reports that researchers are excited about the potential of so-called anti-cancer vaccines that work by pumping a patient full of the same protein or antigen that is on the surface of tumor cells. Researchers believe that if the body contains enough of the protein, the immune system will recognize it as a potential danger and send out armies of disease-killing cells to seek and destroy tumors harboring it.  (Some scientists are using tobacco plants as manufacturing facilities to make protein to combat cancer.)

SciAm also reports on findings published in  New England Journal of Medicine that scientists removed so-called CD4+ T cells (a type of infection-fighting white blood cell) from a 52-year-old man with stage IV (the most advanced)melanoma—the deadliest form of skin cancer; it had spread to a lung and a groin lymph node. The researchers grew T cells (that target a specific protein, or antigen, on the tumor cells) in the lab until they had a population they believed was large enough to destroy the cancer.

The news piece goes on to report that they infused five billion of the cloned cells into the patient. Two months later, PET (positron emission tomography) and CT (computed tomography) scans did not reveal any tumors—and the patient has remained disease-free for two years, Yee says. They infused five billion of the cloned cells into the patient. Two months later, PET (positron emission tomography) and CT (computed tomography) scans did not reveal any tumors—and the patient has remained disease-free for two years.

“This is the first example that I can think of where someone actually grew CD4+ T cells outside the body and gave [them] back and got results,” says Willem Overwijk, an immunologist at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, who was not involved in this study.

Score one for science!

To ensure this post ends on a high note, I leave you with this laugh from Science Jokes.

At a press conference, the Brunettes announce they are going to the Moon. The Redheads speak up “That’s been done before, we’re going to go to Mars”. The Blondes speak up “That’s nothing, we’re going to be the first people to go to the Sun”. One of the reporters says: “Don’t you know that you’ll burn up?” The Blondes say “No we won’t. We’re going to go at night!”