100 Years of Color

Taken in 1909 this scene along the Ostrechina river in Russia is one of many color photographs on display at the Newsweek website this week. These are some of the earliest color photographs in existence. Among the images is one of the only known color photographs of Leo Tolstoy! As we move through history the importance of outstanding recording is highlighted by these rare crisp glimpses into the past.

Science is Real. By They Might be Giants

Biking made easier in NYC

Caught my ear today. As a former resident of Greenwich Village I' like to think Paine would be proud.

Limeriks of Learning

Two biochemically inspired limericks by Kristopher Hite

1.)
The proteosome proceeds to forage
transforming proteins to porridge
if ubiquitin tagged
Then subsequently bagged
catabolized and placed into storage

2.)
Hec1 and Nuf2 unite
together coiled-up tight
microtubule bound
never coming unwound
to align all the chromosomes right

inspired by the following research...

Yao, T. (2000). Cyclization of Polyubiquitin by the E2-25K Ubiquitin Conjugating Enzyme Journal of Biological Chemistry, 275 (47), 36862-36868 DOI: 10.1074/jbc.M006050200

GUIMARAES, G., DONG, Y., MCEWEN, B., & DELUCA, J. (2008). Kinetochore-Microtubule Attachment Relies on the Disordered N-Terminal Tail Domain of Hec1 Current Biology, 18 (22), 1778-1784 DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2008.08.012

beauty in the everyday

I turned on the radio this morning to change-up my usual internet and coffee regime. After fuzzing through the noise and stopping at all the clear channels I realized all of the old media outlets (TV, radio, and newspapers) are finally and completely filled with junk. Avarice in advertising has marginalized the main-stream to the point of irrelevance. I came back to the internet by typing in scienceblogs to the "google machine" and the first thing I saw was this wonderfully zen video about the ephemeral moments that we all let go by without a second reflection. After watching I realized there is no turning back. Web 2.0 will only continue to get better and bring us people-powered content that is tailored to our unique interest-profiles. Simply beautiful.

Thanks to Bioephemera for passively passing this along.

More Tour de Fat

Photos by Kristopher Hite

Tour de Fat 2009

Photos by Kristopher Hite.
The annual Tour de fat bike parade put on by New Belgium Brewery. Creativity galour on display at City Park in the Fort Collins, Colorado version of this carnival on wheels. Ride on!

Heat Moon

Took this picture from my back yard in Fort Colins, CO on Monday night. Posting it to honor the work of William Least Heat Moon, author of the book I'm currently reading Blue Highways - Journey into America.

A Lesson

Great Conversation

This past May as I sat in the audience at the Unity Church in Boulder, Colorado listening to Michael Pollan speak about food and the negative global impacts of cheap food for Americans I could not help but think him a bit pretentious. I do have incredible respect for his cause and his scholarly work in clearly explaining the whole story when it comes to the American food web, but asking cash-strapped regular folks to spend more on food pangs of self-righteousness.

The conversation that follows (below) provides a contrasting opinion to Pollan's but I do have to say Charlotte Allen sounds a bit too far out on the opposite slant. Her argument that the environmental problems associated with products made in China are China's problem is isolationist, selfish, and flat out juvenile. Geographical separation does not mean that our global resources/responsibilities are not shared.

Still, this conversation is one I find myself having with my own organic-food-loving friends. Right here in Fort Collins this very evening our local food co-op is having a community meeting to decide whether or not to buy into a national food co-op in order to get better prices on bulk organic products. Are we selling out to save a buck when we should be thinking about the farmers next door just scraping by as it is? In a population whose percentage of church-goers is dwindling (which I have no problem with) we have to ask ourselves as humanists where should we put our tiny bit of extra income if we have any at all that is. A convincing argument could be made to keep it as local as possible. How do we do that most effectively?