chrisdellavedova.com

My friend and fellow scientist Jason has been hassling me to write a post about the recent stem cell breakthroughs that have been all over the news for the last week. Two research groups, one led by Shinya Yamanaka at Kyoto University and the other by James Thomson at the University of Wisconsin, have published […]

[Read more →]

This week in Science Tuesday we’ll focus on research with implications on the beginnings and the ends of human life. First, a study from Yale looking at the morality of infants and second, a paper from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Seattle suggesting that a certain class of anti-depressant can increase the lifespan of […]

[Read more →]

When things get nasty in a particular environment, organisms that call it home have got to come up with ways to cope. Animals are mobile and tend to migrate to an environment where the proverbial grass is greener. However, if you are a sedentary organism - a plant for example - you must find other […]

 

 The Beatles - "Mother Nature's Son" [2:48m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

[Read more →]

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) now causes more deaths per year in the U.S. than AIDS. MRSA’s tendency to resist treatment by common antibiotics has predictably earned it the nickname “Superbug” in the lay press. But beyond the press hype is the foundation of a true epidemic. Staphylococcus species of bacteria are fairly benign and are […]

[Read more →]

There was an article that came out yesterday in BBC News citing a study that claims that breast fed children with a certain allele (variant) of a gene involved in fatty acid metabolism scored seven points higher in IQ tests than formula fed babies. This is one of those studies that I’ve suddenly become interested […]

[Read more →]

“I love you more than I did the week before
I discovered alcohol
O Alcohol, would you please forgive me?
For while I cannot love myself
I’ll use something else…”
-Barenaked Ladies - “Alcohol”
Alcoholism is a disease with major world health implications. There are over 15 million people in the U.S. suffering from alcoholism resulting in over 100,000 deaths a […]

 

 Barenaked Ladies - "Alcohol" [3:43m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

[Read more →]

Neanderthals are our hominid relatives with whom we shared the Mediterranean region for several thousand years before began to be supplanted by modern man around 45,000 years ago and became extinct shortly thereafter. There are a number of questions regarding their fate, the biggest being why modern humans were ultimately more successful than neanderthals. Some […]

[Read more →]

“There’s no map
To human behaviour
They’re terribly moody
Then all of a sudden turn happy…”
Bjork - “Human Behavior”
Evolution of species is driven by selective forces, usually changes in the environment that require a species to adapt or to die out. For example, a plant may be living happily in a marshy environment, perfectly adapted to a wet […]

 

 Bjork - "Human Behavior" [4:14m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

[Read more →]

Breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer death among women world wide. Like all types of cancer it is notoriously difficult to cure because it is not a simple disease - like a bacterial infection - rather it is a complex failure in cell regulation. This failure results in a single rogue cell that […]

[Read more →]

My training as a scientist is in plant genetics, but my Science Tuesday posts to date have all been medical in nature. This is because science that has a direct impact on people is “sexier”. This week, however, I’ve started feeling some guilt about spurning my botanical roots (pun intended) in favor of the glamour […]

 

 Townes van Zandt - "Dead Flowers" [4:47m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

[Read more →]