o++

Last year, it was n++, so I thought I should move on to the next letter in the alphabet :).

To answer the biggest question : 28 done, many more to go.
And to answer the second biggest question : not yet. Let's see what this year holds ;-).


Thanks to all those who have called, SMSd, emailed, facebook'd or orkutted me. Also a special thanks to S for his hand-made card and letter, and to S and P who wished me in person at INRIA :).

This post will be short, in part because I need to get back to work, after a weekend spent in bed due to a nasty fever and a painful Wii-shoulder.

Firstly, this post is dedicated to the three other people I know with the same birthday as mine - Ilica, the daughter of Gyanam Bua, Avanti, the little brat of my ex-advisor, and Prof. S.K.Sharma, the inspirational go-getter at ITBHU. Happy birthday you [us] all!

A lot happened to me in the last 365 days, the three most important ones being my [eventual] graduation from the PhD, my relocation to France, and the most recent -- my foray into some _real action_ for the motherland. So far so good, thanks to all your good wishes. Let's see what the next year brings.

And finally, my gift to you today [esp. for the three co-birthdees].

1. A New Scientist report on how humans might be predisposed [pre-created ?] to believe in a "purpose" for everything, and therefore, a creator. Interesting experimental setups, I must say.

2. The oblig cheezy happy birthday song video :).



ciao!
-A

Holy Photosynthesizing Animals Batman!

In these tough days, food items are getting costly, as Fned also noticed recently.

Ever wonder what will be the most extreme ways to cut food costs? Well, worry no more, for a humble sea slug has shown us the way, by adding algal DNA to its own to convert itself to a mean-green slow-moving photon-processing machine!

The new scientist article is here, and the video is here [must watch!].

From the article (all emphasis mine):

[The researcher] has known for some time that E. chlorotica acquires chloroplasts - the green cellular objects that allow plant cells to convert sunlight into energy - from the algae it eats, and stores them in the cells that line its gut.

Young E. chlorotica fed with algae for two weeks, could survive for the rest of their year-long lives without eating, Rumpho found in earlier work.

But a mystery remained. Chloroplasts only contain enough DNA to encode about 10% of the proteins needed to keep themselves running. The other necessary genes are found in the algae's nuclear DNA.

...

In their latest experiments, Rumpho and colleagues sequenced the chloroplast genes of Vaucheria litorea, the alga that is the sea slug's favourite snack. They confirmed that if the sea slug used the algal chloroplasts alone, it would not have all the genes needed to photosynthesise.

They then turned their attention to the sea slug's own DNA and found one of the vital algal genes was present. Its sequence was identical to the algal version, indicating that the slug had probably stolen the gene from its food.

"We do not know how this is possible and can only postulate on it," says Rumpho, who says that the phenomenon of stealing is known as kleptoplasty.

One possibility is that, as the algae are processed in the sea slug's gut, the gene is taken into its cells as along with the chloroplasts. The genes are then incorporated into the sea slug's own DNA, allowing the animal to produce the necessary proteins for the stolen chloroplasts to continue working.

Another explanation is that a virus found in the sea slug carries the DNA from the algal cells to the sea slug's cells. However, Rumpho says her team does not have any evidence for this yet.

In another surprising development, the researchers found the algal gene in E. chlorotica's sex cells, meaning the ability to maintain functional chloroplasts could be passed to the next generation.

If you didn't click the previous link to see it, now is your time to watch the video.

Sadly, all Chloroplast and DNA is digested to mush in our stomachs, so don't go looking for algae yet :).

Links: Good, Hopeful, Pretty, and Crazy

Am busy with a proposal [to a funding agency, you-who-thought-otherwise!], so just posting some interesting links I came across today:

1. Good news: 64% of Kashmiris said, lets vote now to get better living conditions, worry about separation later.

2. Resilience news: Bihar flood victims finding ways to improve their lives using software, bamboos, and banana-trunks! [and yes, “Mobile inspectors” with GPRS-enabled phones have been deployed by the State Disaster Management Cell to travel incognito to these camps and take photographs of their conditions. -- right up my research alley!]

3. Science wackiness: particles that can mix and un-mix water and oil by remote UV-light control.

4. Nature cuteness: A gallery of rain-forest snaps, to remind you that a football-field-sized portion of them are disappearing every SECOND! [my fav. snap - this one]

5. and finally, Japanese gadget craziness: the face-bank!

F**K Me, I have a PhD!

A female friend of mine [who shall remain unnamed and uninitialed ;)] send me this article from New Scientist yesterday about the correlation between intelligence and sperm quality [emph mine]:

according to new research ... apparently a man's sperm quality turns out to be a decent indicator of his brain power.

Men who scored high on a battery of intelligence tests boasted high counts of healthy sperm, while low scorers tended to have fewer and more sickly little guys.

This suggests that intelligence might tip off a man's overall health to women looking for a mate with healthy genes, explained University of New Mexico evolutionary psychologist Geoffrey Miller at a recent Harvard University talk.

"It's not necessarily that the same genes are influencing sperm quality and intelligence," he said. Rather, the two traits could be linked through a tangled web of biological and environmental interactions that has evolved to help women pick a mate.

Miller and his colleagues uncovered the apparent sperm-intelligence connection after reanalysing data gathered in 1985 to assess the after-effects of the Vietnam War, particularly exposures to Agent Orange. Of the 4,402 veterans who participated in three days of physical and mental testing, 425 provided sperm samples.

After accounting for factors that could skew the results, such as age, drug use, and abstinence before providing a sample, Miller's team looked for a statistical link between men's sperm counts and motility and their scores on several tests of verbal and arithmetic intelligence.

Though the connections between brains and sperm were "not awesome, they're there and highly significant," Miller said. All things held equal, good sperm and good brains go together.

More interesting papers on this topic can be found on his official webpage. I think his lap-dancers-get-more-tips-when-ovulating paper got the IgNoble prize this year also.

My take on this? I agree that there might be no direct link between intelligence [lets call it I ] and sperm quality [ S ]. The way I see it, men can be divided in 4 types:

1. High I and High S


2. High I and Low S


3. Low I and High S


4. Low I and Low S

Of course, in a "natural" world, Individuals with low S will be weeded out by their competitors, therefore leaving individuals of types 1 and 3 in the population with high probability.

In a society of a species which is rapidly developing by replacing natural defenses [fur] with "intelligently made ones" [fur coats], it would have been obviously favorable for females to choose type 1 males over type 3. Heck, type 1 males may have even fooled type 3 males and slept with their wives!

Assuming all the above is true, it is easy to see how the two qualities become indirectly correlated.

And assuming that getting a PhD is correlated with "intelligence" ... well ... you get the title of this post :).

Holy Windmills Batman!

Proving that there are no free lunches in this world, scientists have shown how windmills are killing Bats! [ref: Digg]



Apparently, the low pressure regions created by the spinning blades causes the blood vessels in the bat's lungs to explode!

So, what to do -- I suggest somehow warning bats no to get close to windmills. Perhaps by installing ultrasonic bat-repellants?

More Reasons to Feel Humble

What is black and white, can fly without machines, and can recognize itself in a mirror?

No, not batman doused with some white paint, I am talking about a Magpie, as this new scientist post demonstrates.

What I liked a lot was the way the researchers prove it without a doubt. They placed a colored spot under the beak of a Magpie, so it could not see it directly. When the Magpie was shown a mirror, it began scratching at the dot, recognizing itself in the mirror. When a black spot was used, so that it was not visible in the mirror against its feathers, no scratching happened. Pretty convincing.



Next step in my opinion: Take two magpies in neighboring cages, put a dot under one's beak, and see if the other one begins scratching -- to make sure that it clearly understands that only the "other" magpie has the dot :).

The funny part is, in our arrogance, we humans had believed that self-awareness is possible only if the brain has a neocortex, but birds don't have one. Go figure.

In other related news, in addition to being able to be trained to paint, Elephants have shown how they can add numbers, and differentiate two quantities, even when they are close-by like 5 and 6, and not just like 2 and 6, as even Salamanders can!



Still think we humans are "God's special creatures"?

-A
P.S. Watched Ice Age 2 last night. Good movie :). Apparently mammoths speak like Raymond, and vultures speak like George Oscar Bluth ;)