Tag Archives: quote

Compounding is the Most Powerful Force in the Universe

A talking head with some valuable info. I remember my father (a statistics professor) getting me to understand this as a small child (about 6 years old). The concept of growth and mathematical compounding is an important idea to understand as you think and learn about the world. It also is helpful so you understand that statistics don’t lie but ignorant people can draw false conclusions from limited data.

It is unclear if Einstein really said this but he is often quoted as saying “compounding is the most powerful force in the universe.” Whether he did or not, understanding this simple concept is a critical component of numeracy (literacy with numbers). Also quoted at times as: “Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world.” My guess is that people just find the concept of compounding amazing and then attribute quotes about it to Einstein.

I strongly encourage you to watch at least the first 2 segments (a total of 15 minutes). And then take some time and think. Take some time to think about compounding in ways to help you internalize the concepts. You can also read his book: The Essential Exponential For the Future of Our Planet by Albert Bartlett.

Bacteria and Efficient Food Digestion

Gut Bacteria May Cause And Fight Disease, Obesity

“We’re all sterile until we’re born,” says Glenn Gibson, a microbiologist at the University of Reading in Britain. “We haven’t got anything in us right up until the time we come into this big, bad, dirty world.”

But as soon as we pass out of the birth canal, when we are fetched by a doctor’s hands, placed in a hospital crib, put on our mother’s breast, when we drag a thumb across a blanket and stick that thumb in our mouths, when we swallow our first soft food, we are invaded by all sorts of bacteria. Once inside, they multiply – until the bacteria inside us outnumber our human cells.
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University of Chicago immunologist Alexander Chervonsky, with collaborators from Yale University, recently reported that doses of the right stomach bacteria can stop the development of type 1 diabetes in lab mice. “By changing who is living in our guts, we can prevent type 1 diabetes,” he told The Wall Street Journal.

The bottom line: We now have two sets of genes to think about – the ones we got from our parents and the ones of organisms living inside us. Our parents’ genes we can’t change, but the other set? Now that is one of the newest and most exciting fields in cell biology.

Follow link with related podcast: Gut bacteria may cause and fight, disease, obesity. This whole area of the ecosystem within us and our health I find fascinating. And I fall for confirmation bias on things like becoming inefficient at converting food to energy as a way reduce obesity.

You could have two people sitting down to a bowl of cheerios, they could each eat the same number of cheerios but because of a difference in their gut bacteria one will get more calories than the other.

They then gave an example of the difference being 95 calories versus 99 calories. Hardly seems huge but it would add up. Still that is a less amazing difference than I was expecting.

Science, Engineering and Math Fellowships

I work at the American Society for Engineering Education as an Information Technology Program Manager (this blog is not affiliated with ASEE). A large portion of the computer applications I work on are related to the science and engineering fellowships we administer. The fellowship applications are all open now (for certain fields the NSF application deadline is next week). Those fellowships include:

National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship has the earliest deadline, starting November 3rd for some while some fields are as late as November 12th. The fellowship provides support for 3 years (a yearly stipend of $30,000 plus educational expense) to approximately 1,000 students and is open to most science, engineering and math fields.
National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship applications are accepted until January 5th, 2009. 200 students receive $31,000 for 3 years plus educational expenses.
Science, Mathematics And Research for Transformation Scholarship for Service Program is another Department of Defense fellowship with a deadline of December 15th, 2008. This program offers awards to 200 science and engineering undergraduate and graduate students with awards between $25,000 and $41,000 a year as well as education expenses, health insurance, internships and employment placement after graduation.
NASA Aeronautics Scholarship offers 20 two-year undergraduate scholarships and 5 two-year graduate scholarships to students in Aeronautics and related fields. The deadline is January 16th, 2009.

Other scholarships and fellowships (these are not managed by ASEE): Gates Millennium Scholars Program (January 12th deadline) – NASA Graduate Student Researchers (February 1st) – Goldwater Science Scholarships (January 30th)

Foreign Cells Outnumber Human Cells in Our Bodies

This is one of those area I find very interesting: People Have More Bacterial Cells than Human Cells. Colin Nickerson has written an interesting article on the topic: Of microbes and men

Scientists estimate that 90 percent of the cells contained in the human body belong to nonhuman organisms – mostly bacteria, but also a smattering of fungi and other eensy entities. Some 100 trillion microbes nestle in niches from our teeth to our toes.

But what’s setting science on its heels these days is not the boggling numbers of bugs so much as the budding recognition that they are much more than casual hitchhikers capable of causing disease. They may be so essential to well-being that humans couldn’t live without them.

In this emerging view, humans and their microbes – or, as some biologists playfully put it, microbes and their attached humans – have evolved together to form an extraordinarily complex ecosystem.

The understanding of the complex interaction is something I came to through reading on the overuse of antibiotics. And the more I read the more interesting it gets.

“We can’t take nutrition properly without bacteria. We can’t fight bad germs without good germs,” he said. “It may turn out that secretions from bacteria affect not only long-term health, but hour-by-hour moods – could a person’s happiness depend on his or her bugs? It’s possible. Our existences are so incredibly intertwined.”

However, in the opinion of some researchers, this strange union may be headed for trouble because of profligate use of antibiotics and antiseptic lifestyles that deter the transfer of vital strains of bacteria that have swarmed in our systems at least since early humans ventured out of Africa.

Best Research University Rankings – 2008

The annual ranking of research Universities are available from Shanghai’s Jiao Tong University. The methodology values publications and faculty awards which provides a better ranking of research (rather than teaching). Results from the 2008 rankings of Top 500 Universities worldwide, country representation of the top schools:

location	Top 100	% of World Population	% of World GDP	% of top 500
USA	54	4.6%	27.2%	31.6%
United Kingdom	11	0.9	4.9	8.3
Germany	6	1.3	6.0	8.0
Japan	4	2.0	9.0	6.2
Canada	4	0.5	2.6	4.2
Sweden	4	0.1	0.8	2.2
France	3	0.8	4.6	4.6
Switzerland	3	0.1	0.8	1.6
Australia	3	0.3	1.6	3.0
Netherlands	2	0.2	1.4	2.4
Denmark	2	0.1	0.6	0.8
Finland	1	0.1	0.4	1.2
Norway	1	0.1	0.7	0.8
Israel	1	0.1	0.3	1.2
Russia	1	2.2	2.0	0.4
China		20.5	6.6	6.0
India		17.0	1.9	0.4

There is little change in most of the data from last year, which I think is a good sign, it wouldn’t make much sense to have radical shifts over a year in these rankings. Japan lost 2 schools in the top 100, France lost 1. Denmark (Aarhus University) and Australia (University of Sydney) gained 1. Last year there was a tie so there were 101 schools in the top 100.

The most dramatic data I noticed is China’s number of top 500 schools went from 14 to 30, which made me a bit skeptical of what caused that quick change. Looking more closely last year they reported the China top 500 totals as (China 14, China-Taiwan 6 and China-Hong Kong 5). That still gives them an impressive gain of 5 schools.

Singapore has 1 in the 102-151 range. Taiwan has 1 ranked in the 152-200 range, as do Mexico, Korea and Brazil. China has 9 in the 201-302 range (including 3 in Hong Kong). India has 2 in the 303-401 range.

University of Wisconsin – Madison is 17th again 🙂 My father taught there while I grew up.
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Science Policy Research Virtual Intern

externs.com is another curiouscat.com web site that lists internship opportunities. I am surprised that virtual internships and externships have not grown much more popular in the last 5 years. Scientists and Engineers for America do have such a virtual internship:

Members of the first Scientists and Engineers for America (SEA) virtual intern class can be located anywhere in the world and will work remotely on specific SEA projects. Intern will research the positions elected officials and candidates for office take on science policy issues.

The internship is for between 10 to 20 hours per week and can be done anywhere, as long as you have a computer, internet connection, and telephone. The dates of the internship are flexible accepted on a rolling basis.

Also see the externs.com science internships and engineering internships. If you have an internship you would like included, please add it (there is not cost for the site, listing or using).

Bacteria Evolutionary Shift Seen in the Lab

Bacteria make major evolutionary shift in the lab

A major evolutionary innovation has unfurled right in front of researchers’ eyes. It’s the first time evolution has been caught in the act of making such a rare and complex new trait. And because the species in question is a bacterium, scientists have been able to replay history to show how this evolutionary novelty grew from the accumulation of unpredictable, chance events.
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sometime around the 31,500th generation, something dramatic happened in just one of the populations – the bacteria suddenly acquired the ability to metabolise citrate, a second nutrient in their culture medium that E. coli normally cannot use. Indeed, the inability to use citrate is one of the traits by which bacteriologists distinguish E. coli from other species.
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The replays showed that even when he looked at trillions of cells, only the original population re-evolved Cit+ – and only when he started the replay from generation 20,000 or greater. Something, he concluded, must have happened around generation 20,000 that laid the groundwork for Cit+ to later evolve.

Lenski and his colleagues are now working to identify just what that earlier change was, and how it made the Cit+ mutation possible more than 10,000 generations later.

Women Choosing Other Fields Over Engineering and Math

graph of science and engineering degrees by gender in the USA 1966-2005

The graph shows college degrees granted in the USA. This topic sets up one for criticism, but I believe it is more important to examine the data and explore the possible ideas than to avoid anything that might be questioned by the politically correct police. An import factor, to me anyway, is that women are now graduating from college in far higher numbers than men. And in many science fields female baccalaureate graduates outnumber male graduates (psychology [67,000 to 19,000], biology[42,000 to 26,000], anthropology, sociology [20,000 to 8,000]) while men outnumber women in others (math [7,000 to 6,000], engineering [53,000 to 13,000], computer science [39,000 to 11,000], physics [3,000 to 900]).

Data on degrees awarded men and women in the USA in 2005, from NSF*:

Field	Bachelors		Master’s		Doctorate
	Women	Men	Women	Men	Women	Men
Biology	42,283	25,699	4,870	3,229	3,105	3,257
Computer Science	11,235	39,329	5,078	12,742	225	909
Economics	8,141	17,023	1,391	2,113	355	827
Engineering	13,197	52,936	7,607	26,492	1,174	5,215
Geosciences	1,660	2,299	712	973	243	470
Physics	903	3,307	427	1,419	200	1,132
Psychology	66,833	19,103	12,632	3,444	2,264	211
Sociology	20,138	8,438	920	485	343	211
All S&E	235,197	230,806	53,051	66,974	10,533	17,405

What does this all mean? It is debatable, but I think it is very good news for the efforts many have made over the last few decades to open up opportunities for women. I still support efforts to provide opportunities for girls to get started in science and engineering but I think we have reached the day when the biggest concern is giving all kids better math and science primary education (and related extracurricular activities). Also continued focus and effort on the doctorate and professional opportunities for women is warranted.
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Bigger Impact: 15 to 18 mpg or 50 to 100 mpg?

This is a pretty counter-intuitive statement, I believe:

You save more fuel switching from a 15 to 18 mpg car than switching from a 50 to 100 mpg car.

But some simple math shows it is true. If you drive 10,000 miles you would use: 667 gallons, 556 gallons, 200 gallons and 100 gallons. Amazing. I must admit, when I first read the quote I thought that it must be an wrong. But there is the math. You save 111 gallons improving from 15 mpg to 18 mpg and just 100 improving from 50 to 100 mpg. Other than those of you who automatically guess that whatever seems wrong must be the answer when you see a title like this I can’t believe anyone thinks 15 to 18 mpg is the change that has the bigger impact. It is great how a little understanding of math can help you see the errors in your initial beliefs. Via: 18 Is Enough.

It also illustrates that the way the data is presented makes a difference. You can also view 100 mpg as 1/100 gallon per mile, 2/100 gallons per mile, 5.6/100 gpm and 6.7 gpm. That way most everyone sees that the 6.7 to 5.6 gpm saves more fuel than 2 to 1 gpm does. Mathematics and scientific thinking are great – if you are willing to think you can learn to better understand the world we live in every day.

Awesome Cat Cam

CatCam - photo of the famous cat photographer CatCam - cat photographer on the run CatCam - cat photographer get picture of another cat

CatCam by Juergen Perthold – this great project involved taking a digital camera and some additional equipment to create a camera that his cat wore around his neck which took pictures every 3 minutes. The pictures are great. The cat got photos of several other cats and seemed to like cars.

See more cool gadgets, See our other popular posts and our cat related posts.

Sometimes I have some challenging ideas, or crazy like some other people would say. This time I thought about our cat who is the whole day out, returning sometimes hungry sometimes not, sometimes with traces of fights, sometimes he stay also the night out. When he finally returns, I wonder where he was and what he did during his day. This brought me to the idea to equip the cat with a camera. The plan was to put a little camera around his neck which takes every few minutes a picture. After he is returning, the camera would show his day.
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The VistaQuest made it very easy for me, because it is able to supply my circuit also if switched off. This is because of an internal DC/DC converter which boosts the voltage from the 1.5V battery to 3.3V. The DC/DC converter is always working because of the internal SRAM which holds the pictures. I just had to hook the microcontroller to the internal camera supply.
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Well, I thought the hardest part is done by developing the software and soldering the controller board. But it is more the housing to protect the camera. You can not imagine what kind of requirements have to be fulfilled if you want to equip your cat with a camera. I built a small housing out of plastic plates and put it on the collar of the cat for evaluation purpose. This housing was last seen as the cat walked out of the door… Probably the wires I used for attaching were not strong enough. Or someone released the cat from the interesting looking piece.

For the second try I used the plastic package of a child toy (Kinderueberraschung), put a stone in it for loading it with some weight and attached it again to the cat collar. This time the part returned – dirty and scratched outside, water inside. What the hell is the cat doing !? This raised the requirements for the camera protective housing a lot
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Big moment no. 1: attach the collar with the camera to the cat. The reaction was not very happy but finally accepted. Reality check passed 🙂

This is my favorite home engineering project. The concept is great. The explanation of the technology is great. The adjustment to real life situations is great. The end result (the photos) is great. This wins the non-existent Curious Cat Cool Contraption award. If someone doesn’t start selling prefabricated cat cameras I will be very surprised (if I was more enterprising I would do it myself). Maybe J. Perthold will, in any event he should inspire many to try making their own.