Author Archives: curiouscat

Adventures in Synthetic Biology

Nature offers its first ever comic: Adventures in Synthetic Biology (via easternblot). Learn more about the creation of the comic. The graphics are nice, though honestly the interface to view the comic could be better. The pdf version is larger and easier to read.

I think it is great to experiment with using different ways to present scientific ideas. This comic is a good example of one of those ways. Also see several books that use cartoons to present ideas: Cartoon Guide to Genetics, Cartoon Guide to Physics and Cartoon Guide to Chemistry (all by Larry Gonick).

Center for Engineering Educational Outreach

Center for Engineering Educational Outreach at Tufts University.

The core purpose of the CEEO is to Improve Engineering Education for all Ages from the K – 12 student, to her parents, to the university engineering and liberal arts student. Four “towers of work” make up the Center: (1) engineering education research, (2) educational tool development, (3) teacher/volunteer support, and (4) a “bakesale” tower that funds a lot of these efforts.

The center provides a number of excellent resources including:

Robotics: Fundamentals of IT and Engineering – “to design a curriculum for an after school program that will integrate robotics into science, technology, engineering and mathematics courses in the Boston Public Schools.”
Student Teacher Outreach Mentor Program (STOMP) – “places engineering students into classrooms and after school programs to support engineering education. The students aid educators in designing and implementing hands-on activities that teach engineering concepts ranging from the design process to gear ratios to digital logic.”
Pre-College Engineering for Teachers (PCET) – “professional development program for K-12 teachers sponsored by the National Science Foundation. Teacher participation starts during a ten day summer workshop, and continues during the school year. The workshop introduces teachers to different strategies for incorporating engineering design into their classrooms, and each participating teacher is required to include a unit about engineering design in their classroom during the following school year.”
Robotics Academy

A great resouce.

2005 intercollegiate Genetically Engineered Machine competition

Davidson College: Kristen DeCelle 2006 and Andrew Drysdale 2007

2005 Intercollegiate Genetically Engineered Machine Competition. Thirteen schools participated in the 2005 Intercollegiate Genetically Engineered Machine competition (iGEM 2005): Berkeley, Caltech, Cambridge, Davidson, ETH Zurich, Harvard, MIT, Oklahoma, Penn State, Princeton, Toronto, UCSF, and UT Austin. Learn about and sign up for the 2006 competition.

Photo of Davidson College students: Kristen DeCelle ’06 and Andrew Drysdale ’07. Davidson Students “Ace” Presentation at MIT Synthetic Biology Competition.

The Davidson team-“The Synth-Aces,” a word play on enzymes called synthases-presented their design of a genetically-engineered, E. coli-based “digital decoder.” The device detects which combination of three common chemicals (with eight combinations possible) is present, and then displays a human-readable number that glows in the dark. The number is produced by genetically customized bacteria that grow in a familiar pattern of a digital numeric display. The resulting readouts of “0” through “7” correspond to the specific chemical combination detected in solution. One real world application of a decoder device might be to monitor water for contaminants or toxins.

The Innovation Agenda

Democrat’s are proposing an Innovation Agenda, including:

Educate 100,000 new scientists, engineers, and mathematicians in the next four years by proposing a new initiative, working with states, businesses, and universities, to provide scholarships to qualified students who commit to working in the fields of innovation.

Place a highly qualified teacher in every math and science K-12 classroom by offering upfront tuition assistance to talented undergraduates and by paying competitive salaries to established teachers working in the fields of math and science; institute a “call to action” to professional engineers and scientists, including those who have retired, to join the ranks of our nation’s teachers.

Create a special visa for the best and brightest international doctoral and postdoctoral scholars in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Make college tuition tax-deductible for students studying math, science, technology, and engineering.

They also propose doubling the funding for the National Science Foundation. Making promises about what you will do is much different than actually doing something: lets see what actually happens.

Currently the United States has over $8,000,000,000,000 (that is over $8 trillion – see current count) in debt (increasing by over $400 Billion a year). That brings every person’s share to over $27,000. Given that, it seems reckless to just add spending without either cutting something else or increasing taxes and I don’t see those details in the innovation agenda. Of course, my opinion on that being reckless may not be shared by a majority choosing to spend more money – after all they have been adding to that debt at a record pace the last few years.

To me, the most realistic federal action, given the role of the federal government (k-12 education is primarily a state and local responsibility) is the scholarship proposal but lets see what actually happens. In July we posted about proposed Science and Engineering Fellowships Legislation (which also seems like a good idea). We have not been able to find out about any progress on that legislation. From the November AAAS S&T newsletter:

Meanwhile, across the Capitol, Senators Joe Lieberman (D-CT) and John Ensign (R-NV) are currently drafting bipartisan legislation to implement a series of policies based on the “National Innovation Initiative” report from the Council on Competitiveness. The legislation, which the senators originally planned to introduce in September, has reportedly been delayed by lack of agreement on its immigration provisions.

I am not certain whether the legislation being worked on includes the fellowships or not (though I would guess that it does).

A Decade of Progress for Women in Science …

A Decade of Progress for Women in Science … by Nancy Hopkins

In 1995 it was unimaginable that within 10 years the presidents of Princeton University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Michigan, and University of California at San Diego would all be women, and remarkably, women scientists.
…
The percentage of women faculty at MIT is climbing, slowly. In 2004, 13% of faculty in the School of Science and 14% of the School of Engineering were female, up from 8% and 6%, respectively, in 1993. Women who make it to the top in science have long known what holds many women in science back: family demands and bias. But until recently both topics were taboo. A critical step to making progress for women in science has been to put these problems on the agenda.

Progress is being made and continued progress is needed. The percentage of women studying engineering is still very low. And the recent talk in the blogosphere about how many potential engineers are turned away shows that not just women choose to turn away.

We should work to make the option of pursuing a science and engineering path more desirable for those who are interested. Still, it seems progress is being made in including more women on the path to careers in science and though engineering is lagging, progress is being made there also.
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Science Toys You Can Make With Your Kids

Science Toys You Can Make With Your Kids

Photo: the simplest steam engine you will ever see. It has no valves, no moving parts (in the traditional sense of the phrase), and yet it can propel it’s little boat easily across the largest swimming pool or quiet duck pond.

The site includes many simple projects to create toys and teach scientific principles in a fun way with simple materials. Gonzo Gizmos, is the book the site is based on.

Projects include: the impossible kaleidoscope, a simple rocket engine, building a radio in 10 minutes and building your own solar battery.

This cool site is definitely worth a visit.

What Ails India’s Software Engineers?

India does not produce enough good computer engineers and those it does are good at theory but not very well equipped to handle the practical aspects.’
— Microsoft Chief Technical Officer Craig Mundie

What Ails India’s Software Engineers? is an interesting series of 3 articles by Rediff exploring the state of India’s software engineering industry.

From its 113 universities and 2,088 colleges — many of which teach various engineering disciplines — India produces nearly 350,000 engineering graduates every year. All of Europe produces 100,000 engineering graduates a year, and America produces only 70,000.

But, the quality of Indian engineers is questionable, says Madhavan, who has had a career spanning four decades and is now advisor to several engineering colleges in Karnataka and Kerala.
“That is because of the lack of trained faculty and the dismal State spending on research and development in higher education in the country,” he says.

Part of what makes this article interesting is it challenges the accepted wisdom. The article offers an interesting perspective and some details that are not well understood.

In the 1980s, India had just 158 engineering colleges. That number has jumped to 1,208 in the last two decades, mainly because of the information technology boom and the ever-burgeoning capitation fee that self-financing colleges charge.

Every year, these engineering colleges admit about 350,000 students. Apart from this, nearly 3,500 students are absorbed into the seven premier Indian Institutes of Technology.

GAO Report: Federal Science, Technology and Engineering Trends

GAO Report: Federal Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Programs and Related Trends

13 federal civilian agencies reported spending about $2.8 billion in fiscal year 2004 for 207 education programs designed to increase the numbers of students and graduates or improve educational programs in
STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) fields. NSF and NIH each account for a bit over 1/3 of the spending.

University officials frequently cited teacher quality as a key factor that affected domestic students’ interest in and decisions about pursuing STEM degrees and occupations. Officials at all eight universities we visited expressed the view that a student’s experience from kindergarten through the 12th grades played a large role in influencing whether the student pursued a STEM degree.
…
officials at many of the universities we visited told us that some teachers were unqualified and unable to impart the subject matter, causing students to lose interest in mathematics and science.

Estimated Changes in Numbers of International Students in STEM fields by Education Levels from the 1995-1996 Academic Year to the 2003-2004 Academic Year

Education level	Number of international students, 1995-1996	Number of international students, 2003-2004	Percentage change
Bachelor’s	31,858	139,875	+339
Master’s	40,025	22,384	-44
Doctoral	36,461	7,582	-79
Total	108,344	169,841	+57

Bannanas Going Going Gone

Can This Fruit Be Saved? by Dan Koeppel, Popular Science:

The banana as we know it is on a crash course toward extinction. For scientists, the battle to resuscitate the world’s favorite fruit has begun…

. It also turns out that the 100 billion Cavendish bananas consumed annually worldwide are perfect from a genetic standpoint, every single one a duplicate of every other. It doesn’t matter if it comes from Honduras or Thailand, Jamaica or the Canary Islands—each Cavendish is an identical twin to one first found in Southeast Asia, brought to a Caribbean botanic garden in the early part of the 20th century, and put into commercial production about 50 years ago.

That sameness is the banana’s paradox. After 15,000 years of human cultivation, the banana is too perfect, lacking the genetic diversity that is key to species health. What can ail one banana can ail all. A fungus or bacterial disease that infects one plantation could march around the globe and destroy millions of bunches, leaving supermarket shelves empty.
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What can ail one banana can ail all. A fungus or bacterial disease that infects one plantation could march around the globe and destroy millions of bunches, leaving supermarket shelves empty.

A wild scenario? Not when you consider that there’s already been one banana apocalypse. Until the early 1960s, American cereal bowls and ice cream dishes were filled with the Gros Michel, a banana that was larger and, by all accounts, tastier than the fruit we now eat.

Gates Millennium Scholars

Gates Millennium Scholars, funded by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, was established in 1999 to provide outstanding low income African American, American Indian/Alaska Natives, Asian Pacific Islander American, and Hispanic American students with an opportunity to complete an undergraduate college education in any discipline area of interest.

Continuing GMS Scholars may request funding for a graduate degree program in one of the following discipline areas: education, engineering, library science, mathematics, public health or science.