With over 2 million species on this planet, adaptation is a crucial part of species survival. Adapt or fail, if you will. With some species, this means becoming more generalist, while for others, this leads to niche specialization. These adaptations, or modifications even, have both inspired human technologies and led to advancements in human medicine.
Bits and Pieces: Microbial Perspective All of us know how “easy” it is to get a package delivered to our house. Access a website, click “buy”, and a few days later, it shows up at your door. As simple as it sounds, a delivery process cannot be summarized so straightforwardly due to the hidden complexity
You’ve got mail! How often do you send a text, phone a friend, or, if you’re into revivalism, send a pigeon? Our daily lives revolve so heavily around communication; it’s difficult to imagine a world in which we couldn’t express ourselves to others. Not only is this ability crucial in our interpersonal lives, but the
Imagine you’re about to step on stage to give a public presentation. Do you feel tightness in your chest or perhaps unease in your stomach? When you’re running late to an important event, does your heart begin to race? Have you ever wondered why stress impacts you physically, beyond your mental state? Physical symptoms like
Words hold a lot of power, especially when specific words mean different things to different people. Recently, there have been a lot of articles with headlines saying, “There are cancer-causing chemicals in food!” with little to no scientific explanation. How is the general public supposed to understand what the real data says or what that
Imagine yourself in this scenario: in a village, each person is given a stone to build a pathway for their community. The first stone was set by your ancestors, and their only instructions are to place the next stone, including yours, adjacent to another stone. Each stone has its own shape and size. Some are
The year is 2019 – before the pandemic, the good old times when climate change was the only existential threat we faced. A paper was published by a research group in Switzerland on the carbon mitigation potential of planting trees. The paper stated that there are enough non-forested, non-urban, and non-cropland areas on Earth to
When we think about scientific discoveries, we often imagine scientists in lab coats conducting experiments. While this has long been the norm, recent advances in robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) are rapidly shifting the landscape. A new and emerging field known as autonomous or “self-driving” laboratories is challenging the conventional idea of experimentation. Like self-driving
The guards are hunting down an invader. The guards have no idea what the invader looks like, but they pick up clues. They take these clues to the Captain of the Guard, who helps determine if the clues were left by an invader or are from residents in the palace. If the Captain determines the
Before it was mixed into your morning coffee, sugar had deep roots— literally. Unlike humans who rely on food for energy, plants can’t eat food to grow. Instead, plants have to make their own food in the form of sugar. If you’ve ever baked cookies or added sugar to your coffee, you’ve likely used table
Stretching over 438,000 acres, the Okefenokee Swamp is the largest blackwater wetland ecosystem on the North American continent. It is protected by the largest national wildlife refuge and the third largest wilderness area, respectively, east of the Mississippi River. The swamp is home to over 850 plant species and over 400 vertebrate species, many of
During our weekly lab meeting, my advisor told us he was concerned that the research funds our lab was awarded by the federal government would be pulled. If our lab was defunded, we wouldn’t be able to continue our projects, and he would not be able to pay us anymore. My heart sank, I did
