Informed by Nature: support for science outreach, education

I've been dying to mention Informed by Nature on my blog, but couldn't really. Until now. For the last couple years, I've assisted in the development of their website dedicated to helping science outreach projects around the world GET FUNDED. It's set to launch in about 6 months.

Basically, public science literacy is not where it should be. You know it. I know it. Science outreach helps, as NSF knows: they give millions each year to ensure outreach is included in every science research project they fund (among other things.) But alas, more could be done.

So, the founders of Informed by Nature reasoned--instead of building their own infrastructure to carry out additional science outreach programs, why not take a more cooperative approach and lift up the projects that are already going. Why reinvent the wheel? Some of you are doing a great job already.

But, you could probably use some more money, right? For your ongoing science conference, web project, public events series, educational group outing...On the Informed by Nature site, you'll be able to submit your project: we'll help promote it online and in pop media, help you get funding from your friend circle, AND we'll often match that money with our own. If we like your project well enough from the start, we'll just fund it outright. We give based on whether the project is well-run, professional, sustainable, and fits with the goals of make citizens aware of science as: a tool to sharpen decision-making, a vehicle to drive human progress, and generally a pleasant subject that should be a big part of culture just like art and music.We love to hear about proposed new project, too, as long as your team has a good plan and great track record!

Why are we doing this? Because we have money. And we wanna give it to science. And this seems like the best way to do it. How? Because one of the founders is a former money manager in the finance world who feels extremely indebted to scientific discovery and knowledge for what he's been able to accomplish in his life. "If I have seen further, it's by standing on the shoulders of giants," he'd say (quoting Newton.) This guy is motivated, and has the skills (almost overly so) to keep this thing funded and running.

I'm getting excited about the website launch. Oh yeah, and by the way--we've just secured a partnership with NSF. So, visit and bookmark the temporary website, put yourself on the mailing list to get monthly updates about our progress, and, get excited to see this thing launch.

Also, we have new Facebook and Twitter pages, so follow/like us and spread the word!

Revival of the cell phone vs. the brain debate?

I don't want to hear it again--cell phone waves are harmful to your brain...stick your face close enough for long enough and you'll turn to mush. But, there's a new paper out there that I'm afraid might catch on as fodder for the pseudoscience susceptible.

[Just cool animation. Not part of the study.]

Scientists at Caltech recently found that weak electrical fields in the brain might cause neurons to fire in sync. It's really kinda neat. Researchers dropped a cluster of minuscule electrodes into a tiny mass of brain tissue and measured the local electric fields that were hanging around while neurons were firing. The thing is--they'd always known that electric fields resulted from neurons firing--neuroscientists have been measuring alpha and delta brain waves for decades, that's how we know someone's asleep or awake. But with this study, they found that electric fields also cause neuron firing.

The theory is that the brain might need to synchronize it's neurons during complex cognitive functions like memory formation and electric fields help this to happen. There's no telling where or how all this is organized.

So why wouldn't an external electric field like a cell phone or microwave affect our brain synchronization and therefore interfere with some complex brain processes like remembering? As explained well by others, cell phone's ionizing radiation energy is too small to cause cancer. But, a cell phone's electric field strength is 51 volts/m and the brain's electric fields run from about 2-3 volts/m in strength to 100 volts/m (during seizure.) Physics says it's possible that these outside fields affect our brain's internal fields--but wait. 

Anyone who knows how science works knows that even though this paper was published in Nature Neuroscience, we should wait until others chime in with their theories of what's going on. I'm gonna say it--this is a very preliminary study. When you hear that, you should not think--well, By George! this is the first person to prove what others will prove for decades to come--you should instead think--ok, i wonder who else has a theory of what's going on here.

And, I do wonder. I wonder how the vicious cycle between firing neuron and electric field begins and how it's directed to the part of the brain that needs to be used. I wonder whether brain electric fields are reinforced by some internal brain process that might not allow for much interference from the outside. And, I wonder how you can exclude outside electric fields during the experiment itself.

And now that I've told you what to think, you hate me. But, at least we've learned a little something about new research together. Or maybe you stopped reading right before the bolded 'but wait' in which case I question whether I should have written this post in the first place.

Anastassiou CA, Perin R, Markram H, & Koch C (2011). Ephaptic coupling of cortical neurons. Nature neuroscience, 14 (2), 217-23 PMID: 21240273

PIC: A. afarensis had arched feet

A. afarensis foot bone found in Ethiopia. Read about it at BBC News.

VIDEO: How do we educate when we don't know what our world will look like tomorrow?

Great lecture series produced and animated by RSA. This one, narrated by Sir Ken Robinson.

0:25 How do we educate our children so that they can participate in the economy given that we can't predict what it will be like next week?

2:20 Our current idea of public education dates back to the enlightenment.

4:40 Today's children are besieged with info and tech, but get penalized for being bored with traditional teaching methods.

5:50 We are taught to deaden our senses. The arts/sciences suffer.

8:05 Creativity is key to trying to meet the future.

10:05 We all have the capacity to be creative. It mostly deteriorates, under our current educational system.

SCI CAL, LOS ANGELES (February)

FEBRUARY
4TH    NHM: First Fridays event (5PM) Call ahead for tix, res req.
4TH    Caltech: Inside Planet Earth, film (10AM) Free
4TH    Griffith Park Obs: All Space Considered, lecture various cosmology topics  (7:30PM) Free 
8TH    UCLA: Global revolutions in science and medicine, lecture (12-1PM) Free
9TH    UCLA: Biology Past and Biology Future, lecture (12-1PM) Free
9TH    USC: Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser, Food Inc. conversation (7PM) Free
9TH    Caltech: Hottest little moon in the solar system, lecture (8PM) Free
12TH    Griffith Park Obs: Public Star Party (5-10PM) Free
13TH    Caltech: How old is the universe? Skeptics society lecture (2PM) $10
17TH    JPL: The Moon: from crust to core, lecture (7PM) Free
18TH     Pasadena City College: The Moon: from crust to core, lecture (7PM) Free

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Science news ROUNDUP: around the world

Ancient medicines found in shipwreck, Italy. From Washington Post:

..Samples from two tablets analyzed at the Smithsonian's Center for Conservation and Evolutionary Genetics reveal a dried concoction of about a dozen medicinal herbs, including celery, alfalfa and wild onion, bound together with clay and zinc. The tablets may have been used externally to treat skin conditions or dissolved in water or wine and taken for intestinal ailments such as dysentery....more

What if the US shut down the internet like Egypt? From Christian Science Monitor:

While the economy probably could reverse the damage from being offline a few days, every day without the Internet would be a step closer to calamity for manufacturing, finance and other sectors of the economy. Such would be the consequence if the United States ever followed the example of Egypt, which shut off its Internet Jan. 27 in an attempt to silence widespread protests. A bill introduced in the Senate last summer proposed giving the U.S. president an Internet kill-switch for use in times of emergency.…more

Dino tracks in Tibet: from a deity? From Dinosaur Tracking blog:

..Some believed that the tracks had been left by the “Deity of the Mountains,” scared away by the noise of the construction, while others asserted that the tracks were left by King Gesar, the legendary star of one of the world’s longest epic poems. This was not the first time that fossils have been mistaken for the signs of gods, monsters, and heroes....more

Unknown, uncontacted tribe in Amazon. From Wired Science:

A previously uncontacted tribe has been found in Amazon jungle, with aerial photographs giving a glimpse of people who've had no known contact with anyone except their tribal neighbors. About 100 uncontacted tribes are believed to exist worldwide. They live in remote, resource-rich areas...more

A perfect place to stargaze: a dark sky island.  From Universe Today:

The Channel Island of Sark has been officially recognized for the quality of its night sky by the International Dark-sky Association (IDA), who have designated it as the world’s first dark sky island, the latest in a select group of dark sky places around the world. What makes the Sark skies so dark? The island has no public street lighting, there are no paved roads and cars, so effectively, there is no light pollution in the skies. Those who have been there say the night sky is very dark, with the Milky Way stretching from horizon to horizon, meteors streaking overhead, and countless stars on display. The people who live there have made dark skies one of their priorities....more

Genetic Engineering in French schools--debate. From Discoblog:

..This is the first year that French students as young as 15 years old have been taught to change DNA using plasmids–but 17- and 18-year-old students have been doing it for years. Séralini’s group isn’t totally opposed to genetic engineering: it just wants more restrictions in place before younger students start fiddling with bacteria....more