Displaying posts categorized under

physiology

Sequencing the frog that can save lives

TL; DR:  The genome sequence of the North American Wood Frog will tell us a lot about the genetic control of freezing and reanimating whole organisms. My friend and colleague, Dr. Andor Kiss is crowdfunding this project. If you would like to help, please go to experiment.com. You will get acknowledged by name in the paper. To […]

Quit smoking, more bacteria will like you

As an ex-smoker I can attest to this: quitting is  hard.  It can also make you fat. I gained quite a few kilos when I quit, and those took a long time to lose. Happily, these days I am spending money on running marathons rather than on cigarettes. Weight gain after smoking cessation is fairly […]

The power of single-cell genomics: the mysterious SR1 bacteria have a unique genetic code

Thanks to Mitch Balish for calling my attention to this one. SR1 bacteria are not exactly a household name, even among microbiologists. They were first discovered in contaminated aquifers,  and since then they were found to be also in animal and insect guts, as well as in human mouths. They are even suspected of being […]

Funny Science Friday: The IgNobels, Wall Street Journal

The IgNobel prizes were awarded this week. Yes, the Nobel prizes too, but the IgNobels are the really interesting ones. (For an thoughtful piece about why the Nobel Prizes in the sciences do not enhance or may even hurt scientific recognition, read Carl Zimmer’s piece at The Loom) . The IgNobel prizes are awarded annually for […]

Warm blooded turtles?

If you entered this post to comment the error in the title, then I have one word for you. Gotcha! Yes, “warm blooded” animals are not, really, warm blooded. After all, a lizard in the baking sun has a core temperature higher than most mammals, but it is still called “cold blooded”.  So-called cold blooded […]