Weekend Culture Corner: Water Bear, Somatic Revenge, And A Little Math

Some science and math goodness for your eyes and ears:

Coma Niddy has a new rap extolling the perspective of the ‘water bear’ – scientifically known as the Tardigrade.

Baba Brinkman just completed a short repertory run of three of his works: Rap Guide To Evolution, Ingenious Nature (based on Rap Guide to Human Nature) and The Canterbury Tales Remixed.  He continues to produce new work, and has released a single from a forthcoming Rap Guide to Medicine.  The track is called “Revenge of the Somatic” and is performed from the perspective of a cancer cell.  Brinkman hasn’t announced a date for this latest Rap Guide, which follows his previous guides on Evolution, Human Nature, and Business.

They Still Might Go To Jail, But Researchers Are Working On Earthquake Prediction

While researchers are split on whether or not earthquakes can be effectively predicted, some are working on improving what tools are available to try.  The Global Earthquake Model Foundation recently announced the public coming-out of a large earthquake dataset (H/T ScienceInsider) that, when couple with other tools, should make it a bit easier to calculate the hazard of earthquakes (the chance of one happening over a set time period) as well as the associated risks (what could happen in the event of a quake).  Besides this database, which is a collection of earthquake data for nearly a thousand quakes, the model will also take advantage of a map of strain accumulation at plate boundaries.  The information on quakes will be complemented by information on building stocks and other items connected to earthquake impact.

A serious challenge in this area is understanding the limitations of the data and of what that data might be able to indicate.  In the case of the Italian researchers who ended up in jail based on their assessments, the seriousness of the task was augmented by the state of the infrastructure in L’Aquila, which was far from earthquake-ready.  Having a better model is a good thing, but it doesn’t guarantee certainty.

How To Archive That Government Social Media?

While the arrangement between the National Archives and Twitter for access to public Tweets attracted my attention, there’s another job the Archives has with respect to Twitter and social media.  It has to figure out how to archive this material.

It’s not as simple as making backups (though that’s not necessarily simple) of the web video, posts, messages and other stuff that gets produced from social media sites.  Archives require planning, resources, and thought about what to keep to best reflect what happened.  To that end, the Archives has updated its guidance to agencies on collecting and keeping social media material (H/T NextGov).  It’s taking comments on the draft update until July 12.

While social media can be exquisitely ephemeral, government agencies are under legal obligation to keep records of their activities.  And if massively witnessed events can’t get their online trails archived fast enough, the Archives likely has an uphill climb.  It’s not like it can simply store the records as if they were paper and deal with it later. The government needs effective policies for current social media platforms and whatever hot new thing(s) are coming next.  And it needs to train and persuade agency staff to start capturing this material.

Play Your Way Through The PRISM?

Perhaps this is just an opportunity to make bad news work for a project, but there are some enterprising game designers in Austria developing a game around dealing personal data.  Called Data Dealer, there’s a Kickstarter campaign to further develop the current English language demo, which you can play online (no download needed).  You play the CEO of a data-intensive concern – someone running a company that depends on personal data to make money.  As the developers describe it:

“Players run all kinds of companies and online ventures – from dating sites, mobile apps to search engines and their own social web. On the way to becoming the world’s most powerful data tycoon, they obtain data from a variety of sources – whether legal or illegal – and ruthlessly sell it to insurance companies or human resources departments. Their growing data empires have to be defended against hackers, complaining citizens, critical media and pesky privacy activists.”

While the game is organized around commercial data-intensive companies (at least in the early levels), the recent disclosures around government data collection and data mining matter (you can sell data to the government in the demo).  By using these commercial concerns as data sources, as well as their own methods, government data collection has its own value – something under a slightly different kind of debate than its commercial counterpart.

Now, I’ve only spent a few minutes with the demo, so I haven’t discovered all the little intricacies.  This is a far cry from games designed to educate the public on a news story, but succeeding at this game probably involves learning more about data collection practices.  You’ll probably still have fun.

NCATS-Led Program Announces First Translational Research Awards

Last week the National Institutes of Health announced $12.7 million in grants to help explore new treatments in eight disease areas (H/T ScienceInsider).  The program is called Discovering New Therapeutic Uses for Existing Molecules, and was announced last May.

The program partners research groups with pharmaceutical companies, and has new kinds of agreements established that make establishing the proper licensing and other arrangements for intellectual property much faster.  The nine research groups will take their compounds and test them out against one of eight disease areas (Alzheimer’s, schizophrenia, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, alcohol dependence, nicotine dependence, peripheral artery disease, lymphangioleiomyomatosis (a progressive lung disease), and calcific aortic valve stenosis.  Additional details can be found on each project online.

The idea behind this project is to try and gain additional benefit(s) from drug development.  Given how some highly profitable drugs were not designed to respond to the purpose for which they found a market, it makes sense to spend some effort to find out where drugs may be useful.  Even if it isn’t used for what it was intended.

Microryza Seeks To Give Researchers A Boost They Can’t Get Elsewhere

Microryza is a research-oriented crowdfunding platform.  Created in 2012, the founders were motivated to do something when one of them was dismissed out of hand (H/T STEM Daily) as an undergraduate when she sought a small grant for research on hospital infections.  The site has 100 projects, of which 30 have been funded to date.  It forgoes the incentives many crowdfunding sites have for their projects, and encourages project researchers to share as much information as they can with their donors.

I don’t necessarily agree that the Microryza projects are as ‘fringe’ as Fast Company implies.  There are a fair amount of applied research projects, which don’t necessarily fit well with the traditional research agencies.  Citizen science projects have a home on Microryza, and they certainly don’t fit the mold of traditional funding agencies.  That doesn’t make these projects fringe.

One project funded via Microryza that could be considered fringe may be familiar to some readers.  Dr. Bishaka Sen at the University of Alabama at Birmingham has used Microryza to fund research on gun control policy.  Such research could not receive federal funding (though the President has relaxed such restrictions) by law, so alternative sources are necessary.

While the company does check to make sure the proposed project is a research project, and confirms the capability and identity of the project proposers, the projects are not peer reviewed, even in an unconventional sense.  Donors should always (regardless of the project) take care to check out those to whom they may fund.

 

Science and Technology Guests on Late Night, Week of June 24

Traditionally the ‘dog days’ come in August, but this week’s dearth of guests makes me think they came early.  The repeat fairy takes firm hold next week, so I’ll take what I can get right now.  The only notable repeat this week is on Friday, when Jim Parsons from The Big Bang Theory visits with David Letterman.  He plays a scientists on television.

Tonight author Andrew Solomon will visit with Stephen Colbert to discuss his book on differences between parents and their children.  Given that Colbert’s mother recently passed, this could be a particularly interesting interview.  On Wednesday the director of Gasland, a documentary film about hydraulic fracturing (often called fracking) will sit down with John Oliver on The Daily Show (Mr. Stewart is off in the Middle East directing a movie).

This week in content I missed in advance, I offer the June 5th edition of The Colbert Report.  Stephen dug into the recent revelations that herbicide-resistant wheat engineering by Monsanto somehow got into the ‘wild’ years after the company destroyed it.  He explains the situation before interviewing Laurie Garrett of the Council on Foreign Relations.  She discussed the international implications of the apparent tainting of the American wheat crop.

The Founding Fathers Are Being Digitized

One of the under-reported aspects of increasing digital content is its application to the past.  That’s why it has been rewarding to watch the National Archives do what it can to bring the ‘Nation’s Attic’ into the digital age.

The latest effort is Founders Online, a means to search across the papers of Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, Madison, Hamilton and John Adams (along with many of his family).  There are over 119,000 searchable documents available through this portal, covering roughly 1748-1836.

While the papers have been available courtesy of the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, putting them online dramatically increases their availability.  Not only can more people take a look at these documents, but a computerized database should make it easier to ‘wander the stacks’ so to speak and raise the chance of making new and unexpected connections between some of our Founders and the other important people of the era.

In Lieu Of Fruit Or Flowers…

Today marks the end of the fourth year for Pasco Phronesis.  Amidst the daily grind of the…daily grind, sometimes this simply feels like a different stone upon which I place my nose.  But in many respects having a place to articulate, and on occasion refine, my science and technology policy interests that don’t intersect with my job is a welcome thing.  And I do appreciate all of you who stop by.

To mark the anniversary, here are the top four posts, all time, by views:

• Newton’s Third Law of Funny
  
• Is Marriage By Skype Legal? Should It Be?
• Seriously, Don’t Put Words in the Mouths of Engineers. Don’t Even Imply It.
• Can Thermodynamics Be Funny?

While the second and fourth top viewed posts are new to the top four, the posts were not written in the last year.  Given the top-viewed post has been about comic strips and science, that another post on a similar theme cracked the top four is not surprising.  I should look into the incidence of marriages by Skype (where each party is on the other end of the transmission, rather than as an option for guests who couldn’t be there in person).  Perhaps it’s on the upswing?

While the blog is a great outlet to complement my day job, I suspect the time commitments of same have made it harder for me to commit the time needed to raise my profile.  A more active commenting presence on other blogs, and more Twitter conversations with others engaged in science and technology policy should be next steps on that path.  Let’s see how far I manage to travel it over the next 12 months.

Science Envoys Seem To Work With Stealth, At Least Domestically

Earlier this year several members of Congress offered a bill in each house to establish a Science Laureate.  Those bills are parked in each chamber’s science committee, but comparable positions – Science Envoys – are currently filled and active in the State Department.

It’s been nearly a year since I last posted on the Science Envoys, trios of noted scientists and/or engineers who traveled to other countries on behalf of the United States.  Typically in these trips the envoys would work to support scientific exchanges (of personnel and knowledge) in countries that aren’t necessarily on the best terms with the United States.  While the Science Laureate would focus on non-scientific audiences (presumably in the United States), the men and women who are Science Envoys work with other scientists, engineers, and public officials in support of scientific cooperation and projects of mutual interest to the respective countries.

Much has happened since I last posted on this matter.  In November 2012, then Secretary of State Clinton announced the following people had been appointed as Science Envoys:

• Dr. Bernard Amadei, a Professor of Civil Engineering at the University of Colorado, Boulder.  Amadei is also the founding president of Engineers Without Borders.
• Dr. Susan Hockfield, former President of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and is part of the Neuroscience faculty at MIT.
• Dr. Barbara Schaal, Professor of Biology at Washington University.  Dr. Schaal is also a member of the President’s Council of Advisers on Science and Technology.

Dr. Hockfield took her first trip as Envoy last month, going to Turkey.  Dr. Amadei visited Pakistan in March.  To date Science Envoys have visited 20 countries.

While I understand the focus of the Department of State is outward, I think the activities of the Science Envoys could be better publicized inside the U.S.  I think it would be go to help science and engineering students in the United States get more information on how their work can help support the country’s diplomatic interests.  The Envoys are already helping us internationally, and it wouldn’t take much more to help us domestically.  We should hear more about them.