gradstudentx

President Obama Delivers Morehouse College Commencement Address...

Mon, 20 May 2013 21:44:47 -0400

President Obama Delivers Morehouse College Commencement Address (by whitehouse)

"As Morehouse Men, many of you know what it’s like to be an outsider; know what it’s like to be..."

Mon, 20 May 2013 21:42:28 -0400

“As Morehouse Men, many of you know what it’s like to be an outsider; know what it’s like to be marginalized; know what it’s like to feel the sting of discrimination. And that’s an experience that a lot of Americans share. Hispanic Americans know that feeling when somebody asks them where they come from or tell them to go back. Gay and lesbian Americans feel it when a stranger passes judgment on their parenting skills or the love that they share. Muslim Americans feel it when they’re stared at with suspicion because of their faith. Any woman who knows the injustice of earning less pay for doing the same work — she knows what it’s like to be on the outside looking in.”

- Remarks by the President at Morehouse College Commencement Ceremony | The White House

(via Brilliant Speech by Obama, Ugly Reaction by Drudge - The...

Mon, 20 May 2013 21:29:56 -0400

(via Brilliant Speech by Obama, Ugly Reaction by Drudge - The Daily Beast)

amazing men of distinction

(via Itch A Skitch // HTML5 Canvas Powered Etch A Sketch)

Mon, 20 May 2013 12:45:01 -0400

(via Itch A Skitch // HTML5 Canvas Powered Etch A Sketch)

atlasobscura: Displayed for the first time to the public in...

Sat, 11 May 2013 01:56:59 -0400

atlasobscura:

Displayed for the first time to the public in 1917, the mummified heart was once the property of Edward Lovett, an eccentric British erudite and wealthy chief cashier in the bank of the City of London who, in his spare time, was the most relentless archivist of his era. A member of the Folklore Society since 1900, Lovett had one very unusual obsession: once off work, he would spend his free time strolling through the slums of Edwardian London to collect evidence of magic and medicinal practices, vernacular beliefs that the century of industrialization and rational sciences hadn’t eliminated. From his urban explorations, conversation with street sellers, sailors, and working classes witches, Lovett accumulated an astonishing array of charms, an incredible collection of odds and ends that proved superstitions were an invisible, yet persistent, practice, even in modern England.
Read more about the magic relics of modern England here !

"Julia Bascom writes, “When you’re disabled, you see death everywhere, and it isn’t because..."

Thu, 09 May 2013 17:41:36 -0400

“Julia Bascom writes, “When you’re disabled, you see death everywhere, and it isn’t because your body stands out or doesn’t stand at all, it’s because everyone talks about you like you’re in a refrigerator, like you’re not real, like you’re dead.””

- Autism in the Media: Stop with the Awful Stories! | BlogHer

"To Be Continued Brass Band (Armstrong Park, 3pm-8pm) This Thursday’s Jazz in the Park series kicks..."

Thu, 09 May 2013 11:43:19 -0400

“To Be Continued Brass Band (Armstrong Park, 3pm-8pm) This Thursday’s Jazz in the Park series kicks off again after JazzFest, so come hear some brass, plus Meschiya Lake and the Little Big Horns. Sponsors Old New Orleans Rum and NOLA Brewing are provided the drinks at the free concert, and sales help support People United for Armstrong Park and their various programs for the Treme”

- Today in New Orleans 5.9.13 | NOLA DEFENDER

Jazz in the Park 2013 Lineup | NOLA DEFENDER

Thu, 09 May 2013 11:43:11 -0400

Jazz in the Park 2013 Lineup | NOLA DEFENDER

Thao’s Grandma Makes A Statement | Snap Judgment

Sun, 05 May 2013 17:11:34 -0400

Thao’s Grandma Makes A Statement | Snap Judgment:

When indie rockstar Thao Nguyen isn’t rocking the stage around the globe, she’s listening to public radio. So of course we had to bring her in to tell a tale about her sweet, lovely grandma—who you definitely don’t want to mess with.

Thao composed all the instrumentals in this segment specifically for this story. The other two songs are from her album, We Brave Bee Stings and All. She is currently performing at Radiolab’s live show and is working on a new album.

infinitebody: Healed daith with titanium heart, by...

Sat, 27 Apr 2013 22:22:11 -0400

infinitebody:

Healed daith with titanium heart, by Kellan.

WANT

AUSTIN KLEON: Need a better word? Skip the thesaurus, and go to the dictionary

Sat, 27 Apr 2013 22:21:49 -0400

AUSTIN KLEON: Need a better word? Skip the thesaurus, and go to the dictionary:

austinkleon:

There’s another (paywalled) John McPhee piece in this week’s New Yorker on his writing process. After he reads his second draft aloud and makes some adjustments, he starts drawing boxes around words that he thinks can be improved:

You draw a box not only around any word that does…

The neuroscientific wonder of the mind at rest

Sat, 27 Apr 2013 22:20:56 -0400

The neuroscientific wonder of the mind at rest:

Neuroscientists are trying to work out why the brain does so much when it seems to be doing nothing at all.

insteadofwatchingtv: Childbirth vs. Getting Kicked in the...

Fri, 26 Apr 2013 16:42:36 -0400

insteadofwatchingtv:

Childbirth vs. Getting Kicked in the Balls

(via PHD Comics: Budget Sequestration Explained)

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 13:14:27 -0400

(via PHD Comics: Budget Sequestration Explained)

mad-as-a-marine-biologist: This megamouth shark was fished in...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 01:38:05 -0400

mad-as-a-marine-biologist:

This megamouth shark was fished in the Philippines on April 21, 2013. The megamouth shark (Megachasma pelagios) is an extremely rare species of deepwater shark, so rare that only over 50 sightings have been recorded since its discovery in 1976.

Of the now 56 megamouth sharks recorded worldwide, 11 specimens (20%, most numerous next to Japan) come from the Philippines.

The megamouth is the smallest of only three filter-feeding sharks (the others being whale sharks and basking sharks).

Photo from CJ Fives for Butuan Bay Divers.

neurosciencestuff: Scientists Find Antibody that Transforms...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 01:37:16 -0400

neurosciencestuff:

Scientists Find Antibody that Transforms Bone Marrow Stem Cells Directly into Brain Cells

In a serendipitous discovery, scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have found a way to turn bone marrow stem cells directly into brain cells.

Current techniques for turning patients’ marrow cells into cells of some other desired type are relatively cumbersome, risky and effectively confined to the lab dish. The new finding points to the possibility of simpler and safer techniques. Cell therapies derived from patients’ own cells are widely expected to be useful in treating spinal cord injuries, strokes and other conditions throughout the body, with little or no risk of immune rejection.

“These results highlight the potential of antibodies as versatile manipulators of cellular functions,” said Richard A. Lerner, the Lita Annenberg Hazen Professor of Immunochemistry and institute professor in the Department of Cell and Molecular Biology at TSRI, and principal investigator for the new study. “This is a far cry from the way antibodies used to be thought of—as molecules that were selected simply for binding and not function.”

The researchers discovered the method, reported in the online Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the week of April 22, 2013, while looking for lab-grown antibodies that can activate a growth-stimulating receptor on marrow cells. One antibody turned out to activate the receptor in a way that induces marrow stem cells—which normally develop into white blood cells—to become neural progenitor cells, a type of almost-mature brain cell.

Nature’s Toolkit

Natural antibodies are large, Y-shaped proteins produced by immune cells. Collectively, they are diverse enough to recognize about 100 billion distinct shapes on viruses, bacteria and other targets. Since the 1980s, molecular biologists have known how to produce antibodies in cell cultures in the laboratory. That has allowed them to start using this vast, target-gripping toolkit to make scientific probes, as well as diagnostics and therapies for cancer, arthritis, transplant rejection, viral infections and other diseases.

In the late 1980s, Lerner and his TSRI colleagues helped invent the first techniques for generating large “libraries” of distinct antibodies and swiftly determining which of these could bind to a desired target. The anti-inflammatory antibody Humira®, now one of the world’s top-selling drugs, was discovered with the benefit of this technology.

Last year, in a study spearheaded by TSRI Research Associate Hongkai Zhang, Lerner’s laboratory devised a new antibody-discovery technique—in which antibodies are produced in mammalian cells along with receptors or other target molecules of interest. The technique enables researchers to determine rapidly not just which antibodies in a library bind to a given receptor, for example, but also which ones activate the receptor and thereby alter cell function.

Lab Dish in a Cell

For the new study, Lerner laboratory Research Associate Jia Xie and colleagues modified the new technique so that antibody proteins produced in a given cell are physically anchored to the cell’s outer membrane, near its target receptors. “Confining an antibody’s activity to the cell in which it is produced effectively allows us to use larger antibody libraries and to screen these antibodies more quickly for a specific activity,” said Xie. With the improved technique, scientists can sift through a library of tens of millions of antibodies in a few days.

In an early test, Xie used the new method to screen for antibodies that could activate the GCSF receptor, a growth-factor receptor found on bone marrow cells and other cell types. GCSF-mimicking drugs were among the first biotech bestsellers because of their ability to stimulate white blood cell growth—which counteracts the marrow-suppressing side effect of cancer chemotherapy.

The team soon isolated one antibody type or “clone” that could activate the GCSF receptor and stimulate growth in test cells. The researchers then tested an unanchored, soluble version of this antibody on cultures of bone marrow stem cells from human volunteers. Whereas the GCSF protein, as expected, stimulated such stem cells to proliferate and start maturing towards adult white blood cells, the GCSF-mimicking antibody had a markedly different effect.

“The cells proliferated, but also started becoming long and thin and attaching to the bottom of the dish,” remembered Xie.

To Lerner, the cells were reminiscent of neural progenitor cells—which further tests for neural cell markers confirmed they were.

A New Direction

Changing cells of marrow lineage into cells of neural lineage—a direct identity switch termed “transdifferentiation”—just by activating a single receptor is a noteworthy achievement. Scientists do have methods for turning marrow stem cells into other adult cell types, but these methods typically require a radical and risky deprogramming of marrow cells to an embryonic-like stem-cell state, followed by a complex series of molecular nudges toward a given adult cell fate. Relatively few laboratories have reported direct transdifferentiation techniques.

“As far as I know, no one has ever achieved transdifferentiation by using a single protein—a protein that potentially could be used as a therapeutic,” said Lerner.

Current cell-therapy methods typically assume that a patient’s cells will be harvested, then reprogrammed and multiplied in a lab dish before being re-introduced into the patient. In principle, according to Lerner, an antibody such as the one they have discovered could be injected directly into the bloodstream of a sick patient. From the bloodstream it would find its way to the marrow, and, for example, convert some marrow stem cells into neural progenitor cells. “Those neural progenitors would infiltrate the brain, find areas of damage and help repair them,” he said.

While the researchers still aren’t sure why the new antibody has such an odd effect on the GCSF receptor, they suspect it binds the receptor for longer than the natural GCSF protein can achieve, and this lengthier interaction alters the receptor’s signaling pattern. Drug-development researchers are increasingly recognizing that subtle differences in the way a cell-surface receptor is bound and activated can result in very different biological effects. That adds complexity to their task, but in principle expands the scope of what they can achieve. “If you can use the same receptor in different ways, then the potential of the genome is bigger,” said Lerner.

kqedscience: New ‘Fairy’ Insect Is Mind-Blowingly Small “A new...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 01:35:50 -0400

kqedscience:

New ‘Fairy’ Insect Is Mind-Blowingly Small

“A new species of tiny fly named after the fairy in “Peter Pan” is mind-blowingly miniscule, with delicate wings trimmed in fringe.

Tinkerbella nana is a newly discovered species of fairyfly from Costa Rica. Fairyflies are a type of chalcid wasp, and almost all are parasites, living on the eggs and larvae of other insects. It’s a gruesome way to live, but it makes fairyflies useful for farmers, who sometimes import them to control nasty pests.”

thatscienceguy: Simple House Hold Science Trick: Submerge the...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 01:33:55 -0400

thatscienceguy:

Simple House Hold Science Trick:

Submerge the egg fully in Vinegar, leave for 24 hours.

Renew the vinegar; pour out the old vinegar carefully and resubmerge the egg in a new sample of vinegar. leave for another 24 hours

pour away the vinegar and rinse in cold water: The eggs shell is now completely gone, giving it a Translucent look to it!

Done!

smells like citizen science…

autoentropy: Deb

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 00:10:33 -0400

autoentropy:

Deb

Photo

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 01:59:25 -0400