When nature provides creatures such as the anglerfish with an amazing, interesting, confusing, confounding, awe-inspiring, manner of procreation, how can anyone help but fall in love with the study of biology!

http://deepseanews.com/2013/01/true-facts-and-a-haiku-about-the-angler-fish/

Time to finish up my REU applications

I've had a wonderful holiday! Missed the big snow storm in Little Rock because I was in North Carolina visiting family. When I got back I worked on projects around the house and then, when I realized I still have a few days before school starts, began to work on my internship applications.

I revisited my summer internship applications for two colleges. With the help of my professors I applied to the REU (research experience for undergraduates) at VIMS (Virginia Institute of Marine Science at William and Mary). This one is now finished and in the mail so to speak. Let me just say that the professors at my school are fantastic and I have found that they volunteer to help me whenever I encounter the next step  in my goals to get into grad school.

Once the VIMS application was complete I began working on my application to the  Maryland SeaGrant REU at the University of Maryland. I have to write a personal statement, which I am working on. And I've already lined up the people who will proof read it and edit it before submission.They also require a resumé which I have previously completed as an assignment in my Environmental Practicum class. I will have a couple of people check it and then everything will be ready on my part. Now the big question. I contacted two professors to write recommendation for the VIMS REU. I need two more for the Maryland REU. Do I contact two different professors? Is it okay to ask the first two professors to write another recommendation? I really don't know. I'm going to ask some grad students what they think I should do. After all, they have already been through this process.

I am really excited about both opportunities. They are located in the same area of the country and the research opportunities are a collaboration through the Sea Grant funding program run by NOAA. Getting accepted by one of these internships will be a learning experience that I don't think that I would be able to get anywhere else given my interest in protecting the oceans during the coming years of climate change. I find myself reading all the different webpages of both programs getting excited about what professor they may assign me to and what type of research I will have available to me. Both programs have large RV's (research vessels) and the prospect of going out onto the ocean and participating in this type of research is daunting. These vessels work round the clock and every researcher has shifts that they are required to take samples, do lab work, and sleep. It's a crazy schedule but it sounds great to me. After doing police work for 23 years I have no problem adapting to strange work schedules, altering sleep times, and eating when ever I get the opportunity.

Cheese!

This post doesn’t have much to do with any of my research or my classes. Instead I offer up a counter-argument to the idea that we should follow the diet of our ancestors.(full disclosure: I have tried the vegan diet in my quest for a healthy diet and maintaining healthy weight)

Our modern american society seems to grab onto any fad (read new research into….) that explains the why and how of obesity. Similarly with what constitutes a healthy diet. I was reading an article from the National Geographic web site http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/01/restless-genes/dobbs-text in which one paragraph discusses the lactose gene. This article is about our genetic predisposition to explore strange new worlds. This paragraph about lactose is to support the premise that culture influences genetic makeup.

The lactose gene is held up as an example of a culture-gene influences. Few individuals carried the lactose gene up until approximately 15,000 years ago. The advent of agriculture, with the supporting dairy farming, allowed individuals possessing the lactose gene a powerful advantage. These individuals were able to utilize a nutritional food source, thereby increasing their chances of survival during times of poor agricultural output and in turn increasing the likelihood of successful reproduction.  A greater percentage of survivors with the lactose gene leads to an even greater percentage of offspring carrying the gene. In other words, the cultural change of farming influenced the expression of the lactose gene.

So the fact that our ancestors did not eat dairy does not support the argument that dairy is unhealthy. Our modern genetic makeup has evolved into something different than our ancestors. Not better. Not worse. Simply different. If dairy were an unhealthy food source, the percentage of individuals carrying the lactose gene should be lower and if dairy were truly dangerous then eventually the lactose gene would disappear due to those individuals being unlikely to successfully reproduce.

This explains why I love cheese!

Another semester down

I have finished the semester.

Not as successfully as I hoped. 

What I learned:     

1. Oral exams are difficult.
2. Open book tests require a great deal of preparation.
3. Even if I think I’m too tired to edit a paper, I should still try.  

And now, back to studying for the GRE.

Update for Plant Ecophysiology project.

       What an interesting, confusing, exciting, frustratingly, long strange trip it's been. Okay, couldn't resist that one. If you read my October 25th post you know that I am working on my Plant Ecophysiology experimental design and it is not going well. I think I have a handle on it and then I discuss with the professor my new idea and realize so many things that I did not consider. I think I might be on draft number 379. Okay. Maybe draft number 4 but it seems like 379. I have begun the lab work with the new hypothesis. "The new growth leaves of plants that are producing fruit or flowers will have a greater stomatal density when compared to new growth leaves of plants that are not producing fruit or flowers." Plants in the reproductive phase of development require higher levels of energy which means the leaves must be able to bring in increased levels of carbon dioxide to facilitate increased sugar production.There is way more going on with the plant than just carbon dioxide intake and sugar production but this is a good starting point. If you want to know more check out plant respiration,potassium pump,stoma or photosynthesis for basic info. I will be comparing stomatal density of new growth leaves on the Tilia americana (Linden Tree) sampled from a tree with fruits to new growth leaves sampled from a tree without fruit. The tree with fruit was found growing in the valley along White Oak Bayou at the base of the Emerald Park Trail, whereas the tree without fruit is growing at the top of the Emerald Park trail. This is the first project that is that I have had to complete on my own. Every project up to now has been with a lab group.

        Earlier in the semester my lab group fumbled through a study design for Environmental Practicum. We are assessing current plants species and populations in a piece of farmland that is being placed into a wetland mitigation bank. Some of the many issues we ran into: How do you divide up the work? New lab partners, with different strengths and abilities. (sometimes the work spreads out perfectly as it did in my Environmental Practicum and other times all three of you are complete noobs, as in my Plant Ecophysiology)

•  What kind of sample design are we going to use?
•  Plot or transect? Why? 
• What can we expect to find? 
• How are we going to identify the plants? Down to species or stop at genus? 
• How are we going to section off the land? 
• How does that GPS work? (none of us were well versed with the Garmin) 
• Will it ever cool off? (the first three excursions to the farm the temps were above 90F)

     Some answers:

• Transects. Because they were recommended by literature we found at the EPA website. 
• Morningglory and Cocklebur! 
• Dichotomous keys from three different books, the internet, pictures and the Plant Taxonomy professor. Both species and genus. 
• Farm plot, Cadron Creek riparian area with levee, Hwy 65 border and the unique habitat in the southwest corner. 
• Give up on the GPS after we laid the baseline transect diagonally across the field. 
• And yes, it finally cooled off!

So many questions

Driving into school today, listening to NPR update the Sandy destruction I drove around a long curve and there it was. A full moon. My first thought upon seeing this particular full moon was how powerful that tiny moon is. After all, some of the destruction from Hurricane Sandy can be attributed to the high tide coinciding with the storm. My daughter lives in Brooklyn and I've been pretty anxious these past couple  of days. She is fine. She evacuated to the lake house in Pennsylvania. The storm was bad there too but they survived intact, no trees down, no power outages.

How different would this storm have been if the moon was in a different phase? I haven't had any course work into tides and tidal forces beyond the basics in freshman level sciences classes. I'm sure someone out there has done modeling to show the answer to my question but would I even understand the papers that explain computer and mathematical models on that level? Probably not. Fascinating to say the least. I envy people who get math on that level.

How are the ecosystems going to be affected by this storm? So many studies to be done up and down the eastern seaboard. Maybe some of the internships I am applying to this summer will be studying this storm's effects upon the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem. I do hope that I'll get to participate in the research.

Salt water moving into areas where it hasn't been before. The tidal force pulling up sea grass beds, oyster beds, and just plain scouring the dunes and coastal areas of all vegetation. How long will it take for the areas to recover? One season, two seasons, never? Are the wild pony populations of the outer banks islands suffering? Does commercial fishing improve or suffer immediately after a storm of this magnitude? Are there species of plants that can hang on in such a storm? What attributes lead to a plant surviving this storm? In areas that are swept bare what will the re-population look like? What are the pioneer plants for the sea shore? So many questions and soon I will be one of the scientists looking for answers.

The application process

          I'm beginning the application process to summer internships. REU (research experience for undergraduates) and never realized how hard it is to present the best side of myself in less than 250 words. But I'm getting there and have a great mentor at my university helping me with it all.

What is a proper gift to give your mentor to show them how much they have helped you?

What is a good resource for how to write up a resume?

A little bit everyday. An hour a few days a week. And soon the project is finished. Whether it is a research project or the application to a internship these small increments make it seem smaller.

Now I need to go put in my 30 minutes of time on my water resources paper.