Category Archives: Research

Too Much Choice

When Choice is Demotivating: Can One Desire Too Much of a Good Thing? by Sheena S. Iyengar and Mark R. Lepper:

In 1830, Alexis de Tocqueville commented that, “In America I have seen the freest and best educated of men in circumstances the happiest to be found in the world; yet it seemed to me that a cloud habitually hung on their brow, and they seemed serious and almost sad even in their pleasures.” (p.536) More than one hundred years later, we are confronted with empirical findings which may support the paradox that de Tocqueville observed.

The three studies described in this report demonstrate for the first time the possibility, that while having more choices might appear desirable, it may sometimes have detrimental consequences for human motivation.

See more on this from our management blog: The Psychology of Too Much Choice.

Related: Choices = Headaches – The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less (videocast)

Boiling Water in Space

Bizarre Boiling, NASA:

The next time you’re watching a pot of water boil, perhaps for coffee or a cup of soup, pause for a moment and consider: what would this look like in space? Would the turbulent bubbles rise or fall? And how big would they be? Would the liquid stay in the pan at all?

Until a few years ago, nobody knew. Indeed, physicists have trouble understanding the complex behavior of boiling fluids here on Earth. Perhaps boiling in space would prove even more baffling…. It’s an important question because boiling happens not only in coffee pots, but also in power plants and spacecraft cooling systems. Engineers need to know how boiling works.

I had trouble seeing what was happening in the first video. Try this video first.

Because a smaller volume of water is being heated, it comes to a boil much more quickly. As bubbles of vapor form, though, they don’t shoot to the surface — they coalesce into a giant bubble that wobbles around within the liquid.

Brain Research on Sea Slugs

How many genes does it take to learn? Lessons from sea slugs

“In the human brain there are a hundred billion neurons, each expressing at least 18,000 genes, and the level of expression of each gene is different,” said Moroz, who is affiliated with UF’s Evelyn F. and William L. McKnight Brain Institute and the UF Genetics Institute. “Understanding individual genes or proteins is important, but this is a sort of molecular alphabet. This helps us learn the molecular grammar, or a set of rules that can control orchestrated activity of multiple genes. If we are going to understand memory or neurological disease at the cellular level, we need to understand the rules.”

Scientists also analyzed 146 human genes implicated in 168 neurological disorders, including Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases, and genes controlling aging and stem-cell differentiation. They found 104 counterpart genes in Aplysia, suggesting it will be a valuable tool for developing treatments for neurodegenerative diseases.

Delaying the Flow of Light on a Silicon Chip

IBM Milestone Demonstrates Optical Device to Advance Computer Performance

IBM today announced its researchers have built a device capable of delaying the flow of light on a silicon chip, a requirement to one day allow computers to use optical communications to achieve better performance.
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“Today’s more powerful microprocessors are capable of performing much more work if we can only find a way to increase the flow of information within a computer,” said Dr. T.C. Chen, vice president of Science and Technology for IBM Research. “As more and more data is capable of being processed on a chip, we believe optical communications is the way to eliminate these bottlenecks. As a result, the focus in high-performance computing is shifting from improvements in computation to those in communication within the system.”

Additional information on silicon nanophotonics

Smallest Known Living Organisms Found – 200 nanometers

Shotgun sequencing finds nanoorganisms by Robert Sanders:

Once Baker had found gene segments (ribosomal RNA) from three Archaea, he was able to fish the microbes out of the slime soup and found that they were extremely small, around 200 nanometers in diameter, the size of large viruses. Bacteria average about five times this diameter. These therefore could be the smallest organisms ever found, though Baker needs to culture them before confirming this. Because they’re so small, however, they may not be free-living.

“We’re not sure they can live independently, whether they have enough genes to fend for themselves, but instead are symbiotic with another organism or are feeding off another organism,” Baker said. Baker now is trying to find the right conditions for these Archaea to thrive in a culture dish. For now, he has dubbed them ARMAN-1, -2 and -3, for Archaeal Richmond Mine Acidophilic Nanoorganisms.

Jetson Jetplane

photo of person flying a jet-pack with wings

Finally the Jetpacks we were promised by the Jetson’s 🙂 Well not really but still pretty cool. Many very cool videos (they broke link so I removed it 🙁 ) on the Jet-man website show the jetpack in action. The flight is controlled by body movements (not controls, other than the gas). To fly, currently, Yves Rossy jumps from a plane and then extends the wings turns on the jets. Some additional improvements are needed to allow Yves to achieve ground take-offs, aerobatic operations and vertical climbs.

Batfish Key to Keeping Reefs Clean

Batfish may come to Great Barrier Reef’s rescue by Catherine Brahic:

Neither species was able to make a dent in the damaging algae. Nor did any of the remaining 41 herbivorous fish found in the area make much of a difference. Instead, the researchers found that a rare batfish, Platax pinnatus, moved in. The team was surprised to see the batfish act this way, as they usually feed on plankton and invertebrates on the sea bed. “In five days the batfish had halved the amount of weed. In eight weeks it was completely gone and the coral was free to grow unhindered,”
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Batfish are vulnerable because of their large size, which makes them attractive to spear fishers, and because their young depend on coastal mangroves which are in decline in many areas. For now, they are one of the last populations apparently capable of reversing the fate of coral reefs that have been damaged by overfishing. Already, the reef has all but lost two major weed-mowers: dugongs and green turtles.

Which relates to a story this morning on NPR (I can’t find the link on the site?). It had to do with village officials paying fisherman… to maintain the mangrove swamps since the swamps were shown to greatly decrease the impact of tidal waves (and large storms) on land. Previously government officials had supported (and I would imagine many still do…) large developers raising the mangrove swamps and building big beachfront hotels.

UK Science and Research Funding

UK Science and Innovation Awards from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council:

University of Oxford – over Â£3.3 million has been awarded to establish a forward looking world class research centre in the Analysis of Non-linear Partial Differential Equations (PDEs).
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Universities of Cambridge and Oxford and Imperial College London – almost Â£6 million to create a new collaboration of complementary expertise between the Physics Departments at Cambridge, Imperial & Oxford in the area of quantum coherence…

Universities get Â£31m research awards:

The money is going to leading research-intensive universities. Four out of the seven awards are for joint projects, indicating how even players like Cambridge and Imperial are having to collaborate to keep up with the international competition.

Diabetes Breakthrough

Diabetes breakthrough by Tom Blackwell:

In a discovery that has stunned even those behind it, scientists at a Toronto hospital say they have proof the body’s nervous system helps trigger diabetes, opening the door to a potential near-cure of the disease
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The researchers caution they have yet to confirm their findings in people, but say they expect results from human studies within a year or so. Any treatment that may emerge to help at least some patients would likely be years away from hitting the market.

More: Canadian scientists reverse diabetes in mice – Type 1 Diabetes May Be Caused By Disruption of Link Between Nerve Cells and Beta Cells

The A to Z Guide to Political Interference in Science

The United States government bears great responsibility for keeping our environment clean and Americans healthy and safe. And while science is rarely the only factor in public policy decisions, this input should be objective and impartial.

In recent years, however, scientists who work for and advise the federal government have seen their work manipulated, suppressed, distorted, while agencies have systematically limited public and policy maker access to critical scientific information. To document this abuse, the Union of Concerned Scientists has created the A to Z Guide to Political Interference in Science.
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In 2004, 62 renowned scientists and science advisors signed a scientist statement on scientific integrity, denouncing political interference in science and calling for reform. On December 9, 2006, UCS released the names of more than 10,000 scientists of all backgrounds from all 50 states—including 52 Nobel Laureates—who have since joined their colleagues on this statement.

It is important for the public to have access to type of information. There will always be areas of intersection between science and politics. And there is a role for politicians in science policy. However, covering up data and attempts to promote unscientific conclusions from data, in order to serve political ends, is something that should be condemned. Certainly many will seek to turn political disagreements into condemnation of the opposition, so the mere accusation is not the important factor – the important factor is the evidence of wrongdoing. Then the facts should be debated.
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