I knew those plants were slacking.

Have you ever wondered if you could get more bang from those lazy plants. Are they really using the least amount of energy to grow? Could they be bigger and use less water or fertilizer? A team of researchers at the University of Illinois asking the same questions used computer modelingto figure out how to make plants more efficient. This is sort of my line of work, except I don't fit models to plant processes. These guys fit a model to the plant data and then simulated photosynthesis. Pretty cool if you ask me. It must have been a little complicated since they needed a supercomputer to do it. Then, by tweaking some parameters here or there, they made the computer plant model produce better plants and use less energy. Quite a feat with all the different processes going on during photosynthesis.

I wonder if they could tweak the model to see if plants could suck up more carbon dioxide (CO2), then we wouldn't have to worry about a global warming problem, just breed plants for those specific traits and voila, no more polar bears swimming for days without finding ice.

They think that the plants weren't being as efficient as possible because they have something in them saying that they need to reserve energy for survival. Silly plants, don't you know that we'll just eat you.

Links if you want to get into the details.

http://www.plantphysiol.org/cgi/content/full/145/2/513?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&author1=Long+S&andorexactfulltext=and&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&sortspec=relevance&volume=145&resourcetype=HWCIT

http://access.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Stories/geochem/ClearingAir4.html

http://access.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Stories/SME/Ecology2.html

http://www.ornl.gov/info/ornlreview/v40_3_07/article05.shtml

http://access.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Stories/MolPhotodynamics/light1.html

http://www.ks.uiuc.edu/Research/psu/psu.html

Today's Savior?

Is there anyone who can unify us all? Anyone who can find a common understanding and lead us into an advanced age of science and reason where people just get it? Thirty years ago everyone thought we would be flying around in cars living in cities in the sky like the Jetsons. But here we are oogling over the iphone and wondering when the next hybrid is coming out. Instead of making great leaps and bounds for humanity we are stuck in a spin cycle of keeping the massess uneducated and puttylike while those with degrees and some insight about things benefit only themselves and their kin.

Are we too fragmented in our beliefs, customs, languages, etc to agree on anything? One thing I think we all can agree on, is that humanity should persevere. We should advance. Reverting back to the stone ages is not where we should be. You don't have to be college educated to understand this.

When you look at the fossil records and compare how long we have been on earth to other species like the crocodile, we're just babies. Some variants of species have been around more than hundreds of millions of years. In fact, we are only now understanding how birds evolved. What gets me is that we're so arrogant that we think the earth was created for us. To ensure that we aren't just renting this place and that we are going to live here a while, we need to start doing something. We constantly fight with eachother and destroy everything without thinking how humanity as a whole will change millenia from now. Global warming may just be a tiny pen mark on earth's timeline of events, but not for our timeline. We haven't been here long enough to withstand major climate change. Yes, we might have made it through a few ice ages, but how can we even begin to understand such things when our leadership doesn't embrace science.

I read about a hypothesis where the human race will evolve into two races...the beautiful tall people who live till they are 120 and the short fat troll people who die in their 30s. With how our society is going now, I kind of agree. Races will go away and we will all blend into eachother, but we will start to better selectively breed and the middle class will probably go away leaving even more of the haves and have-nots. If you have ever seen the movie GATACA or The Island, then you probably have a clue why these thoughts come to mind. I'm actually all for giving our future generations better genes. We all are I'm sure. Who wouldn't want their children to live long happy lives free from disease.

Another thing that I think will happen is that those who don't embrace science will end up living lives like sheep, not thinking about what they are doing and just living. Many religions promote this. We are the flock are we not? I don't want to say that science should be a religion, but we have advanced enough to not depend on creation tales and fancy stories to explain how we got here. Stop using religions as a crutch to understand why you are here. Instead, recognize that we are here to better humanity and that all religions agree on this. Stop fighting about silly things. Religions helped us get to where we are today. They provided common foundations for today's society. Why can't we recognize this and move on?

Those who get it, will try to do what they can to advance the human race. Going back to evolution for a minute...everyone is so upset about these multi drug resistant staph aureous (MRSA) infections that have been popping up here and there. I'd hate to say it, but the science community has been expecting this for over a decade now. The news is scaring people saying that there is no treatment for it and you can die from it, so schoools are deep cleaning and disinfecting everything. The problem is, that we have been disinfecting things for so long, taking antibiotics for colds caused by viruses (not bacteria for which an antibiotic would work for) and washing hands with antibacterial soap, that we're hurting ourselves. How are we hurting ourselves by killing bacteria you ask? The bacteria we are trying to destroy by taking all of these measures has a natural ability to mutate so that every once in a while it's little progeny will be able to live in a new environment. What we are doing is providing that sterile evironment for the bacteria to adapt too. Once some of the bacteria "evolve", and it already has started as we saw with some cases of MRSA, there will be other bacteria that follow suit. Humans don't evolve as fast as bacteria. I don't know if it is too late, but please stop taking antibiotics for colds and just use regular soap and warm water.

This concept of media manipulation, scaring the public about MSRA and dumming down the science for the people, reminds me of something. I would love to get on a jury, but as soon as they ask me questions and find out what I do, they immediately dismiss me. It seems that your "peers" are people who have no idea about anything. Lawyers seem to want the dumbest people or perhaps the most easily influenced. The media treats us like the lawyers do, they want to influence us, but they have no interest in benefiting the public, they only want something from you...watch these commercials. They tease you and play with you and even scare you so that you will keep watching and in between watch the commercials that pay the network. I love Tivo by the way.

So, where am I going with all of this? Well, I wish there was someone who was educated in the sciences and able to influence people in the right direction to care about humanity for the sake of humanity and not for "their people" (family, race, religion, language, culture, sports team, city, country). Bacteria don't care who you are. To them you are their host and they'll just throw you away after they have used up all the resources (you) and moved on. Anyone read history books anymore? Plague people.

Whoever this savior is, I hope that they can convince people to not be scared of science. Don't be an idiot. Be enlightened. Care about humanity. Make the world a better place for everyone. Don't just say "Fuck it, I don't care. I'm going to enjoy my ride here and not care about anyone but myself." The world is the smallest it's ever been. We all affect eachother and it seems like the people who don't get it will continue having more and more children who will believe in the same things that their parents did and will continue living lives of sheep. Don't be a sheep.

California Wildfires

I'm many miles from the fires, pretty safe. Just heavy smoke and ash here.

Here are some useful links.





NASA has taken some pretty nifty photos of the fires.

Fillmore Gazette's Page.

Google Earth's Fire blog.

Ventura County Fire Department Fireline

Ventura County Sheriff Department Fire Updates

Inciweb, a site for national incidents has a pretty good page updated frequently.

This is all too reminiscent of the 2003 fires.
2003 photo
2007 photo

Here is a cool site: Geomac wildland fire support. Geospatial Multi-Agency Coordination. Click on QuickView active perimeters to see the perimieters of the active fires.

My Name is Brian, not Brain.

Okay,
Here is an issue that is worth typing about,... my name - Brian.

For many years the misspelling of my name has been a rare occurrence, but lately it has been happening more often since I've been interacting more frequently via email with others. More than likely, the chances are that either you are a Brian and you know what I'm talking about or you know a Brian and you've misspelled their name too. After all, according to babynamewizard.com, Brian was the 8th most popular name in the 1970's. The Brians are coming of age now, joining the workforce, contributing to society. We're here, learn to spell our name.

Now, to my question. What should I do when someone addresses me as "Brain" in an email? Doing a Google search for Brian+Brain+misspelling gave me a whole bunch of people including other Brians out there saying how easy it is to switch those two little letters a and i. There are also a lot of Brians who have websites with the word brain in them, obviously capitalizing on the problem.

Other Brians are having the same problem. I've found a website asking "People misspell the name Brian as Brain....why?"

One Brian even made it part of his fight against brain tumors - Brain's Flight.

Some people even wish their names were Brian so they can get a compliment from the misspelling.

I estimate that it happens to me about 30% of the time. I'd like to take it as a compliment, but really, I'm not that smart. Not even smart enough to have "Brain" as a nickname. Yesterday I pondered replying to an email from someone who called me Brain by misspelling their name just for S&Gs, but that might be seen as cruel especially if they don't know that I'm trying to have a little fun. A lot of people get hurt when you misspell their names. I'm sure they don't have such an easily misspelled name as mine. I've gotten over that issue a long time ago. I wonder what the stats are for misspelled Brians? On a serious note, someone could have a problem with their own brain when they misspell Brian as brain. Dyslexia comes to mnid frist.

It's so common, I think a lot of Brians accept it, not taking it as a compliment but knowing that most people are rushed and misspell sometimes. The word brain is probably typed more often than Brian and it is just sort of automatic. However, I'm sure there are some Brians that don't accept it and try to immediately correct it or perhaps they secretly despise people who make the error and plot for their ultimate misspelling revenge. Watch out people.

For fun, I wanted to see how many times the phrase "The Human Brain" came up as "The Human Brian" in Google. I found about 1,160 instances. Some of them were obviously meant to be misspelled, like this great 6-sentence story about a boy named Brian. Others/most were obvious mistakes. Some are quite funny, like this piece from myanswerbag.com.

"Yes, the human brian can and does permanently lose information. Memory is stored in the patterns of neural connections; when those connections are lost through traumatic disruption or because of the death of too many of the neurons involved, the memories which had been stored are gone."

Have I lost some information permanently? Probably. There are some memories that I believe I have permanently lost as a result of traumatic disruption or death to my neurons. Ethanol can do that do you can't it? So can concussions during football games - Brian damage. (I couldn't resist). I promise, no more puns.

Like I said, I could be one of those Brians who is pissed, but I'm just going to chalk this up to one of my pet peeves. You misspell my name once, I forgive you. You do it again, then it gets irritating. You do it more than twice, I'm going to let you have it. Bryans don't have this problem. The best I could come up with is Brayn or Brany for them, losers. I'm going to give you my opinion about Bryans on a later post.

I think that if you're a Brian, you agree with me. It does get annoying. It has happened and will happen more frequently unless we get the word out. What are your misspelling stats? 20%, 30% or more? Will it only get worse? Have any Brians had misspelled legal documents? I can imagine many Brains owning the deeds to land or making payments on cars. I'd like to think that these are Freudian misspellings, but I know better. What do you think?