By Julia Simpson Imagine for a moment you’re in a bar with a group of friends; it’s science-themed trivia night – which you’re attending, because you’re awesome – and the announcer says, “okay folks, final question: the modern medical research industry and healthcare system depend on harvesting a critical chemical from what blue-blooded ocean-dwelling creature?” … Continue reading rFC: The Solution to Ending Industrialized Vampirism of Horseshoe Crab Blood
Author: lionstalkscience
Fantastic Bacteria and What to Feed Them: A Glimpse into Rad Environmental Bacteria
By Victoria Silvis Bacteria are an incredibly diverse domain of microorganisms which were among the first organisms living on earth. In order to survive through hundreds of millions of years’ worth of change, these bacteria have learned how to consume and survive on some fascinating and unbelievable substances! Not only have bacteria evolved to eat … Continue reading Fantastic Bacteria and What to Feed Them: A Glimpse into Rad Environmental Bacteria
Feed Me Seymour! The Real-life Plants that Eat Meat
By Ian Hayman Charles Linnaeus, the father of modern taxonomy, famously said “A carnivorous plant is against the order of nature as willed by god” when he was presented with specimens and engravings of Dionaea muscipula 1. D. muscipula, the scientific name of the Venus Flytrap, was first exported to Europe in 1768 and became … Continue reading Feed Me Seymour! The Real-life Plants that Eat Meat
The Developmental Origins of Health and Disease: The Role of Maternal Nutrition
By Kaitlin Carson Are alterations in diet during pregnancy enough to change the course of offspring development? Insights from the Dutch Hunger Winter, a famine that occurred near the end of World War II in which food supplies were severely restricted for a period of 5 months, have helped us address the effects of diet … Continue reading The Developmental Origins of Health and Disease: The Role of Maternal Nutrition
Treating obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD): Is surgery an option?
By Rachel Kallus, PsyD Over the last few years, organizing has evolved from your least favorite chore to a trendy topic on social media, Netflix reality shows, and loads of advertisements. Organizing icons and brands like Marie Kondo and The Container Store have become household names we refer to constantly. With people spending more time … Continue reading Treating obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD): Is surgery an option?
What’s Diss? Explaining my (diss)ertation titled “Investigating the Wnt/MYC axis in the pathogenesis of Crohn’s disease”
By Stephen Matthews, Ph.D. This article is based on the dissertation of Dr. Stephen Matthews who defended his thesis at PSCOM on June 2, 2021. TL;DR: Genetic variants can be linked to diseases through genome-wide association studies. While some variants are found in protein coding genes, many are found in non-coding regions of the genome, … Continue reading What’s Diss? Explaining my (diss)ertation titled “Investigating the Wnt/MYC axis in the pathogenesis of Crohn’s disease”
Why should children get the HPV vaccine?
By Gail D'Souza Human Papillomavirus (HPV). Yes, we have all heard of it. HPV is a common sexually transmitted disease that people can be exposed to as early as adolescence.1 Currently, there are 79 million HPV-infected Americans, and an estimated 14 million new HPV infections recorded annually.2 Most cases are detected in young adults in … Continue reading Why should children get the HPV vaccine?
We’re All Just Boltzmann Brains, Living in a Boltzmann Universe: A Crash Course in Statistical Mechanics
By Mike Sha Let’s take a quick trip through the groundbreaking theory of statistical mechanics and use it to smash our current understanding of the universe to pieces. Around the late 1800s, Ludwig Boltzmann (Figure 2) started thinking about order, disorder, and atoms, a line of thought that led him to become the father of … Continue reading We’re All Just Boltzmann Brains, Living in a Boltzmann Universe: A Crash Course in Statistical Mechanics
Controlling Outbreaks Before They Happen – Targeting Emerging Diseases at the Source
By Ian Hayman Bird Flu. Ebola. Hantavirus. Dengue. Zika. SARS-CoV2. Bubonic Plague. West Nile. Malaria. These pathogens are often cast as the central antagonist, the great evil in many books, movies, and in real life. Even hearing their names can produce a visceral response, a sense of dread in the back of the head about … Continue reading Controlling Outbreaks Before They Happen – Targeting Emerging Diseases at the Source
Recycling Pseudoscience for the Coronavirus Pandemic
By Carson Purnell Early in 2020, the tone around the Covid-19 pandemic quickly changed from a ‘bad flu’ to a worldwide catastrophe, to be compared to the 1918 flu pandemic’s 50-100 million deaths1. Nobody in the world had specific immunity to this pathogen, and it was clear the novel coronavirus was highly contagious and had … Continue reading Recycling Pseudoscience for the Coronavirus Pandemic
Lions Talk Science 