Does Anyone Know the Funny Handshake? |
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Nick Oswald |
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Greg Petsko, President of the American Society for Biochemistry wrote a very interesting article recently in which he drew attention to the parallels between the PhD/Postdoc system and the medieval trade guilds, and the problems our profession faces because it is drifting away from that system.
In the trade guild system the right of an individual to work as a tradesman had to be approved by the guild members, and approval was earned in two stages. The first stage required years of work as an apprentice under a master craftsman until the master decided that the apprentice had reached a sufficient level of competency to transition to a journeyman.
Attaining journeyman status meant being accepted into the guild as a tradesman in your own right, and was often accompanied by great ceremony, lots of beer and the passing down of funny handshakes. A journeyman was allowed to travel to different towns and work under different masters to gain a wide berth of experience in his trade. After many years of work, and generally after the production of a “masterpiece”, a journeyman would then be accepted into the guild as a master craftsman.
Substitute “apprentice” for “PhD/grad student”, “journeyman” for “postdoc”, “mastercraftsman” for “PI/Professor” and “masterpiece” for “a paper in Nature” and it is easy to see how the two systems parallel, although, like Petsko, I have never been shown the funny handshake for the Guild of Bioscientists.
So what’s wrong with the system?
The problem with the system, as Petsko points out, is that unlike 50 years ago when a fully fledged, master craftsman scientist would work in the lab along with his apprentices and journeyman, today’s PI’s rarely get to work in the lab and instead work on managing their scientists, writing papers, applying for grants and wading through politics. So the hands-on technical skills that were honed during their apprentice and journeyman stages are worth little to a PI and instead, they need a whole new set of skills – writing, communicating, people management, schmoozing etc etc. Few of these skills are widely taught, leaving PIs to stumble along and learn it themselves, which kind of defeats the purpose of the training system.
The solution?
Petsko’s absolutely logical and sensible solution is to make training in these skills mandatory throughout the undergrad and PhD stages and, indeed, this is starting to be offered by some institutions. I also hope that Bitesize Bio can help in this regard as one of our main focuses is on giving advice on non-technical skills and in the future we hope to expand out to provide more robust and detailed teaching on these topics.
But perhaps the most interesting point came in a comment left by an ASBMB member. He/she suggested that the solution is to change the system so that PIs can, and in fact are required, to do the job that they have been trained to do – practical lab in the work, alongside their PhDs and Postdocs. This would surely make a far more efficient system, but I won’t hold my breath waiting for it.
Worth bearing in mind
These points made by Petsko should be borne in mind by anyone who has the career goal of becoming a PI. Whether or not it is offered by your institution, you should take, and seek out, every opportunity available to train in the actual skills required to be a PI and equip yourself for the job that you are aiming for. Failure to do so means you are only storing up difficulties for yourself in the future.
How do you think our Guild should be fixed? And does anyone know our funny handshake?
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When Your Partner is NOT a scientist |
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Suzanne Kennedy |
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A recent article published by The Scientist called Power Couples gave advice and examples for scientist couples who have successfully balanced their life at home and in the lab. It was interesting from the perspective of how two very busy and career motivated people work together to have it all: raise a family, run a lab, and stay in love with each other over the years.
My previous relationship was with a scientist and in fact we worked together in the same lab for a while. We had no problems working together- we enjoyed it. Working in the same field as your spouse means you have much more in common. There is more to talk about and you can actually help each other with your work. How rare is that to have in a boyfriend or girlfriend?
The bigger challenge is trying to maintain a relationship when your spouse is not a scientist. As someone in this position, I can tell you, it’s not easy. Let me tell you why.
I’ll be leaving in 5 minutes honey…
The non-scientist spouse doesn’t understand that when you bring home a stack of papers to read, it means that while he (or she) is sitting on the couch watching “Man Tracker” on The Science Channel, you will be right by his side with your head buried in work. And when his feet make their way up to rest on the paragraph you were in the middle of, it’s not going to get him a foot rub.
The non-scientist spouse doesn’t understand that your job doesn’t end at 5 pm or 6 pm or 8 pm. They don’t realize that long after you are home, the wheels are still turning ferociously in your mind, churning over possibilities. The magnetic draw of the computer to look something up is overwhelming and before I know it, I’ve been at it another two hours until I am snapped out of the reverie with a romantic call from the bedroom of ”GET OFF THE COMPUTER AND COME TO BED. NOW!”
The non-scientist spouse doesn’t understand that when you say you are leaving in 5 minutes, you actually mean 5 minutes after the gel is done, you wrote up the result in your notebook, and you sent an email to your boss. (You can’t say “in 30 minutes” or you will be met with a slew of complaints from the non-scientist spouse. The words “the gel needs to finish” has become a meaningless phrase used to avoid going home.)
But it’s not all bad
Living with a person who does not understand the life of a scientist has its benefits too. You spend much less time complaining about work because it would take too much explanation of the issue to gain the sympathy you seek. I don’t discuss the latest new product I saw that competes with mine or the poorly written paper I read that used our product wrong and then said it didn’t work. I go running instead and let the steam out via sweat. In the end, I think this makes for much greater relationship harmony. Who wants to hear their spouse complain about their job all night?
What I love about my non-scientist partner is that it doesn’t matter what I do, he is impressed and he thinks I am a genius. I try to tell him the truth but he won’t accept it. So I let him keep his grandiose vision of me, a master at work unfairly spurned by the Nobel Prize committee for my thesis work that is gathering dust in a library in Virginia, which, incidentally, holds the cure to all known cancers if anyone cared to read it (so he has convinced himself). Why fight it?
There are many professions that demand the dedication and focus that science also does. However, I don’t know if any other profession becomes so infused with one’s “being” as being a scientist does. One’s approach to figuring out problems in the lab is applied in all areas of life.
At least….it is for me. How about for the rest of you?
Tips and tricks
A Bitesize Bio article is not complete if it doesn’t have some kind of tips and tricks list, so here are my tips for making a relationship work with a non-scientist. Every relationship is different, of course, so feel free to share the secrets to your success.
1. It is best to be consistently late so they understand that you will always be late and then they can plan for it instead of complaining about it. If you are always late and then decide one day to be on time, it can be stressful for the non-scientist spouse. Whatever you do, be consistent.
2. Try to devote at least 1 hr a night to watching TV with the non-scientist spouse, even if you can’t stand the show they want to watch. Even if it’s the UFC, or worse, Dog the Bounty Hunter. Leave the research articles on the floor, engage yourself in the action, and pretend that you don’t even know you had something else to do.
3. It is normal that the non-scientist spouse does the majority of the upkeep at home because of your schedule so try to remember to comment on things and say thank you. The non-scientist spouse will be upset if you do not acknowledge their effort. You’ll earn bonus point for noticing before being told that the bathroom is sparkling or that they did all the food shopping and bought all your favorite food.
4. This is a difficult one but sometimes you have to leave the computer at home when you go on vacation. I’ve only done this a couple of times but the response from the non-scientist spouse makes it worthwhile. Of course these were only one day get-a-way vacations. For longer than a day, bring the computer, but it is best that you only check emails when the non-scientist spouse is in the bathroom, napping or going to get ice.
5. There are always work related events, such as happy hour or dinners where everyone gets together. Let’s face it. When scientists get together, we almost always talk about work. Do not bring your non-scientist spouse to these functions. They will feel left out and bored and the next time there is a function, they will complain. Only bring your spouse to functions where everyone else is bringing their non-scientist spouse. This way they have someone to talk to who has some idea of what is going on outside the world of science. Or in the UFC.
That’s my advice for all of you dating or considering dating a person who has a completely different occupation than you do. While it can be tough on your relationship to not share a passion for something that is such a huge part of your life, at least you can count on the fact that your future in-laws will instantly love you.
Personality plays a big role in relationships and so your advice might be totally different from mine. I’d like to hear from all of you out there who are making it work with a non-scientist. What are your tips?
15 Reasons to Be A Scientist
10 Reasons NOT to be a Scientist
Scientist, GSOH. Seeks Similar.
How Plasmids Became Embroiled in The Cold War |
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Nick Oswald |
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The humble plasmid. We now know it so well, but as little as 60 years ago the field of extra-chromosomal heredity was decidedly murky. Not only was it the subject of great debate, conflict and friction within the scientific community, it was even used as a politico-religious tool during the Cold War!
The origin of the term “plasmid”
The term “plasmid” was coined in 1952 by Joshua Lederburg. It is a hybrid of the terms “cytoplasm” (or “plasmagene”; a term put forward by Darlington in 1944 to define “self-reproducing cytoplasmic particles”) and the “id”, the latin for “it”, as in plastid or chromatid.
For Lederburg, the plasmid was a generic term for any extra-chromosomal genetic particle. Of course, that wide definition could describe viruses, mitochondria or many other things, but over the years this was honed down to reserve the term for double-stranded, extra-chromosomal, self-replicating DNA.
The debate on extrachromosomal inheritance
Early experiments seemed to show that certain genes could be infectively transmitted from cell to cell but the idea of “cytoplasmic inheritance” was dismissed by much of the community, who argued that the chromosome was the sole heritable unit and that the observed inheritance was due to infection of the cells by parasites. In fact, the split in opinion went straight (and simply) down the lines of who studied what: Microbiologists embraced the idea of extra-chromosomal inheritance, while those who worked on Drosophila dismissed it. From a distance, it seems quite obvious why this would be the case, but at the time it was a very hot debate.
Plasmids in the Cold War
In those politically charged times, this scientific argument even became embroiled in clash between the communist and capitalist ideologies. This was because followers of the Soviet Lysenkist doctrine, which criminalised the teaching of Mendelian genetics in the USSR, held up cytoplasmic inheritance as evidence that Mendelian genetic theory was wrong.
This in turn led to proponents of cytoplasmic inheritance being viewed suspiciously as anticommunist hysteria swept the USA, and the Genetics Society of America came close to dismissing the theory based purely on political grounds. Now that would have been something to talk about!
This is all impressive work for a small piece of circular DNA, but given the revolution plasmids sparked in bioscience in recent decades, perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised.
If you have anything to add, or any comments to make on this article please feel free to join in.
For further reading on the early days of plasmid research, check out this reflective article by Lederburg himself.
Sending Plasmids: How to Avoid Jail Time and Shredded Envelopes
Reductionism and Biology
Tech Clinic #4: Can a single E.coli take up 2 plasmids?
Love Is In The Air |
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Nick Oswald |
To enable tagging you will need to register on Bitesize Bio. We're sorry for the inconvenience, but it's free, only takes a few seconds, and it will enable you to view our seminars for free, ask questions from the professional community, and take part in the lively community of Bitesize Bio
It’s Valentine’s day this weekend so, even though it is possibly the cheesiest event on the calendar, we are almost obliged by law to carry an article today about love and relationships. But let’s just keep it fun and brief. Here are some of the best love-related posts from the last couple of years of Bitesize Bio. Enjoy.
We love science:
Reasons to be a scientist part I
Reasons to be a scientist part II
We love science (maybe) not:
Breaking up is hard to do:
Alternative careers for scientists
If music be the food of love, play on:
Music for scientists, by scientists
If you can’t be with the one you love, use a dating service:
15 Reasons to Be A Scientist
BioPop: 10 Songs That Should Be On Every Biologist's iPod
Love in Mendel's Garden
The Best of Bitesize Bio 2009 |
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Nick Oswald |
To enable tagging you will need to register on Bitesize Bio. We're sorry for the inconvenience, but it's free, only takes a few seconds, and it will enable you to view our seminars for free, ask questions from the professional community, and take part in the lively community of Bitesize Bio
Before we get our brains fully back into gear after the festive season and embark on what we hope will be a momentous year for Bitesize Bio (watch this space, we’ve got some cool stuff in store), we thought this would be a good time to look back at the best articles we published in 2009.
Below are the 10 most popular articles that were published in the last year. Enjoy.
1. Free Online Bioinformatics Tools – Carrie topped the chart with a great article describing 4 must-use, free bioinformatics resources.
2. How to Create a Heatmap in Excel – A neat Excel hack from Paul, showing how to bring your numerical results to life in glorious technicolor.
3. Quantitative RT-PCR: One-step or Two-step RT? – Shoba weighed in with some excellent practical advice for quantitative PCR
4. An Intro to Cell-free Protein synthesis – And Shoba wasn’t finished there — she also produced this excellent beginners guide to cell free protein synthesis.
5. Reasons to be a Scientist Part II – If you want to reassure yourself that science is a great career choice, have a look at this one.
6. Delivering Effective Criticism – This is a message for anyone who is or will be a supervisor in any capacity. Think about how you treat your charges!
7. Plasmid v Genomic DNA Extraction:The Difference – Another molecular biology mystery demystified by Suzanne
8. 5 Types of Bad Boss and How to Handle Them – And some great practical advice from Suzanne on how to deal with your bad boss.
9. How To Get Great DNA Sequencing Results – Because bad sequencing results are such a waste of time.
10. 10 Tips for Consistent Real-Time PCR - And not content with only two entries in the top 10, Shoba sneaks in a 3rd with this excellent tip sheet.
I hope that these will help your brain wake up for the new year. If you have any personal favorites, please share them in the comments.
As I said, look out for some more great stuff from us in the coming year. And if you want to be a part of it and join our writing team, the door (or, rather, the contact form) is always open.
Best of luck with your research in 2010.
Get Involved With Bitesize Bio
Assessing the Bitesize Bio Experience
The essential conferences of 2009
I’m Not That Kind of Doctor: A Guide for Enjoying the Holidays |
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Alex Tan |
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As a graduate student or a card-carrying PhD, you may have discovered that you unwittingly (and probably inappropriately) have become the authority in your family on all things scientific and health related. For this reason, the upcoming holiday season might harbor some additional family-related stress for you.
Before you shout “I’m not that kind of doctor” for the hundredth time, here is another option. With a little deep breathing and a lot of hot toddies, these helpful hints might just steer you through the holiday perils of life among the lay, if only for a week.
Limit Your Scientific Vocabulary: While words like “mutation” seem benign enough to us, to the lay public it brings to mind nasty, oozing monsters and green vats of glowing hazardous waste. X-men may have made mutations cooler, but metal skin and mind reading are not likely what you’re working on.
Leave the Soapboxes at Home: You know your family, you know your science. The two may not agree. Although GMO crops and stem cells are important political topics, they can be a little too much for dinner conversation. If it isn’t actually going to be friendly, save the “friendly debating” for another time, even if you’re right.
Show Them the Glory of Wiki: When they ask you to explain something, think of them as rotation students and say “look it up”. With clear definitions, history, illustrations, etc., Wikipedia covers most of the scientific topics they are likely to ask about, and it is user friendly enough even for Grandma. (But you might have to explain what the internet is first.)
Give Up On “I’m Not That Kind of Doctor”: They’re proud of your accomplishments, even if they don’t know what they are. Say thank you and smile. You probably understand the chemical reaction of their blood pressure medication or the current research of breast cancer genes better than their doctor does anyway.
What are your sanity-saving strategies for the holidays?
And Merry Christmas from all of us at Bitesize Bio
Gift Ideas For The Scientist In Your Life This Christmas |
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Suzanne Kennedy |
To enable tagging you will need to register on Bitesize Bio. We're sorry for the inconvenience, but it's free, only takes a few seconds, and it will enable you to view our seminars for free, ask questions from the professional community, and take part in the lively community of Bitesize Bio
It’s that time of year again. The time when you have to fit in buying holiday gifts among the hundred other things you need to do at work and at home. Coming up with cool ideas or the “perfect gift” is a challenge for busy people with too much on their plate already.
To help our readers with their holiday shopping, here is a list of unique gift ideas for science geeks like us. Whether you are looking for a gift for a co-worker, a friends or you are looking for things you might like so you can drop hints to your signigicant others these ideas will help you hit the spot. If you come up with some other great gift ideas, please share them by dropping us a comment!
So here are our gift ideas for science geeks:
Things to read
1. Cold Spring Harbor Labs Press’ library of novels, technical guides and text books can’t be beaten. A gift certificate to purchase from CSHLP would be a treat for any scientist.
2. A magazine subscription is a great gift that keeps on giving throughout the year! Amazon has a great selection of science-related magazine subscriptions
3. Kindle Wireless Reading Device
Things to wear
4. You can never go wrong with a t-shirt as a gift. Check out some of these fun and interesting t-shirts at everydayheroshirts.com.
5. If you are looking for a gift for a scientist who likes to stand out from the crowd, these specially commissioned cow- and snow leopard-print lab coats from The Lab Rat could be just the thing.
Things to make the lab look nice
6. While searching on Amazon.com I came across this cool selection of inspirational Einstein posters
7. One of my favorite gifts from a co-worker was a plant. Nothing brightens your office or lab space or desk like a potted plant and they last forever (or at least as long as you take care of them).
Cool geeky things
8. For the collectors on your list, fossils are a one of a kind gift. Check out a large selection of fossils at Fossil Mall. These range in price but are mostly expensive but are sure to be appreciated by anyone interested in archeology and prehistoric life.
9. Another unusual gift along the same lines is the Meteorite jewellery pendant from Science Mall USA.
10. And for your international friends or people who travel, take a look at some of these cool passport holders and laptop cases from Levenger.com.
Experiences
11. If you’ve got $5000 to spend, the ultimate gift could be a zero gravity flight. It might be expensive, but you can sooth your conscience with the fact that a ZERO-G keychain is included in the price.
12. Always wanted to be a writer but never feel like you have been given a chance? Bitesize Bio offers a free science writer experience to anyone with experience in the lab and the ability to string a few sentences together. Get the satisfaction of crafting your article, the fun of interacting with the Bitesize Bio staff as your article is polished and beautified and the thrill of knowing that your creation will be read by tens of thousands of scientists for years to come. This could be a gift to yourself or to someone you know. Drop us a line to get started! You won’t regret it. (ok, I’m kidding – you can do this at any time of course!)
Food and drink
13. Food is always a good gift for any hard-up graduate student so how about a gift card to Trader Joes (if you have one in the area) or gift certificates to your local favorite pub?
14. Or if your giftee is a caffeine addict, how about giving them a home-made gift voucher, offering to pay for the coffees each coffee break for a month?
Time – not every gift has to cost money
15. For friends who have a hectic family life, you can offer to take the weight off them for a while by doing dishes for the next month or free baby-sitting so they can have an evening out with their spouse. Who wouldn’t love that gift?
16. Or for people without families you could offer to make their life easier in the lab by looking after their cells or doing all of their minipreps for a month.
Gifts for others
17. Another option for the person who has everything is to buy a charitable gift in their name. Whether you (or they) would prefer to donate to Oxfam, the WWF or something completely different, a quick Google search will help you find a place to buy in their name.
18. And on a similar note, a worthy mention goes to the Toys for Tots campaign. Make a donation to them and they will use it to buy a gift for a kid who wouldn’t otherwise receive one this year. You could do this in lieu of a gift for someone else (or you could just do it anyway! 
).
So those are my ideas, but whatever you buy, remember, it really is the thought that counts! Don’t forget to leave your gift ideas for scientists under this tree article before you leave.
10 Reasons NOT to be a Scientist
Evolution: 24 Myths and Misconceptions At New Scientist
What is your Life Changing Book?
The Microbiology of Food |
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Suzanne Kennedy |
To enable tagging you will need to register on Bitesize Bio. We're sorry for the inconvenience, but it's free, only takes a few seconds, and it will enable you to view our seminars for free, ask questions from the professional community, and take part in the lively community of Bitesize Bio
The fourth Thursday of November marks the annual tradition in the U.S. called Thanksgiving. Originally, Thanksgiving was a religious holiday that has sinced turned secular and became a national holiday in 1941. Now, for families celebrating Thanskgiving, it is a time to cook a whole lot of food and eat way too much pumpkin pie.
But if you undercook, cross-contaminate, or improperly store your food you can get some pretty interesting microbiology going on. After all, pumpkin pie is full of sugars, protein, and fats- everything that a lovely swarm of bacteria also enjoys as a midnight snack.
So let’s take a seasonal look at what you could be growing in your Thanksgiving dinner, and how you can prevent growing it to ensure the celebrations pass with no ill-effects.
So what are the sources of bacterial contamination in food?
1. The Animal
Microbes are everywhere in our environment and on our bodies so there are many opportunities for bacteria to infect sources of food. In the case of beef and poultry, the microorganisms are often found in the intestines of healthy animals and are spread during slaughter. Fruits and vegetables may become infected when they are washed or irrigated with water contaminated with animal manure. Salmonella can infect the hen egg before it is formed so the egg can be contaminated (which is why you shouldn’t eat raw cookie dough!)
2. Food Handlers
Some types of microbial pathogens can be passed on to your food via the staff working in the kitchen (sorry, Mom. This includes you). Shigella and some viruses (Norwalk and Hepatits A) come from human contact with food. Another source is using cutlery on raw foods and not cleaning them before re-using. Similarly, cutting boards and utensils used for handling raw food need to be cleaned before use. Even if the food was cooked, the contamination can be reintroduced with contact with surfaces or drippings from raw or contaminated food.
Improper Storage
Most likely, mom and her helpers in the kitchen all washed their hands and the utensils after handling the raw turkey and moving on to the mashed potatoes or cranberry sauce. So another source of food poisoning is by simply not storing the cooked food properly once it has cooled down. That’s right- the leftovers! Make sure to store your leftover food correctly so bacteria that may be present from the environment and the little kids hands isn’t allowed to flourish.
What are the best storage temperatures? According to the Arizona Dept. of Health, food should be stored at 34 to 40°F (1 to 3°C). Above 3°C foods will spoil rapidly. Frozen food should be kept at 0°F (-17°C). The temperature should not reach higher than 5°F (-15°C). Check the temperature with a thermometer, or use this rule of thumb: If the freezer can’t keep ice cream brick-solid, the temperature is above the recommended level. Some additional food storage tips can be found on the Santa Barbara Dept. of public health website also.
What critters should you watch out for?
Now let’s discuss the bacteria that can cause the post-celebration blues. What are the most typical pathogens that infect foods, both pre and post cooking? Based on statistics collected by the CDC between the years of 1983 and 1997, Campylobacter spp. contamination resulted in the majority of bacterially caused food borne illnesses (2.4 million cases, almost 50%) followed by non-typhoidal Salmonella (1.4 million cases). However, there can be a high degree of under-reporting in bacterial infections because not everyone will go to a hospital when they are sick. The level of under-reporting for Salmonella is estimated at ~38 fold and for E.coli (0157:H7), ~20 fold. However, Norwalk viruses caused far more food-borne illness, approximately 23 million cases out of a total of 30 million.
Name that Food Pathogen
The following information comes from the Iowa State Food Safety website. The symptoms of all of these are very similar. You can pretty much count on having abdominal cramps and diarrhea if you become infected with any of these microorganisms and for some, add in vomiting:
Bacillus cereus
Campylobacter jejuni
Clostridium botulinum
Clostridium perfringens
Escherichia coli 0157:H7
Hepatitis A
Listeria monocytogenes
Norwalk, Norwalk-like, or norovirus
Salmonellosis
Staphylococcus
Shigella
Vibrio
Yersiniosis
Make sure the critters don’t get you this year…
As you can see, proper food handling and storage is serious business. But prevention is simple; don’t eat raw chicken, clean cutlery and counters between handling raw meats, wash your hands after using the bathroom, wash your hands after changing a diaper, don’t sneeze on food and then leave it out on the counter all night, and make sure you have a half-gallon block of ice cream in your freezer that is frozen solid (as a measure of how well your freezer is working).
Joking aside, getting sick on your vacation is not fun or a safe way of losing the extra holiday pounds. So use common sense and enjoy a hot and tasty meal with all the trimmings and the leftovers too.
Thanks for reading and please leave us a comment if you have more food safety advice or a personal experience involving food-borne pathogens you’d like to share.
~Suzanne (twitter.com/SuzyScientist)
More information on foodborne illness can be found at the CDC’s website.
Quick reference: Determining DNA Concentration & Purity
The Price of PBS These Days!
A Not So Good GM Crop - Pharma Corn
Does (Should) Your Lab Rock? |
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Nick Oswald |
To enable tagging you will need to register on Bitesize Bio. We're sorry for the inconvenience, but it's free, only takes a few seconds, and it will enable you to view our seminars for free, ask questions from the professional community, and take part in the lively community of Bitesize Bio
My PhD was a soul-less affair. It was also rock-less, jazz-less and pop-less. And all because my supervisor was of the opinion that music in the lab was a distraction that reduced concentration and our ability to do the job. “Rubbish!”, I thought, “Nothing helps you through a mindless task like splitting cells, pipetting or labelling like a bit of music”.
A 2005 study in the “Psychology of Music” Journal backs up my opinion, reporting that music increased the performance of software developers in both creative and routine tasks. But over the years I have found that while music in the lab does help alleviate the boredom in some situations, and even inspire you in others, it can also cause serious headaches.
Hell is other people’s music
Passive soundwaves can seriously damage mental health. What if your lab mates’ idea of wonderful music is the Titanic theme, Enya or Alanis Morissette (you know, the one who has no idea what ironic means)?
While they are working and warbling away to their favorite tunes, you could be trapped day in day out in a Music Hell that certainly won’t improve your productivity or your mood. And sometimes you just need silence in which to do your work – should you be forced to auditorily inhale if others want to partake? Probably not.
So it’s vital that your lab agrees on an audio policy that includes whether to allow music in the lab. when it is allowed and what type, or how to agree on it. At the top of the policy should be a cast-iron rule that if any one person in the lab doesn’t want the music to be on, then the sounds should be firmly switched off.
What to play
When the music is on, there is the small but thorny matter of what to play. The common but, to me, extremely depressing, solution is to go for a generic radio station. This is favored because these types of radio station cater for the lowest common denominator; they play music that not too many really people hate. But the huge downside this is the sort of music that no-one really likes either. It’s difficult to be inspired by bland pop, over-played oldies and a playlist that numbers in 10′s rather than 100′s. In my opinion, you’d be better off with no music at all.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. Ideas like theme days, where everyone brings in a CD from their collection to match a given theme, or nominated DJs, where each person gets to plug their iPod into the speakers and take control of the music for a certain time, can be a lot of fun and create a sense of community in the lab. Or using services like LastFM or Spotify you can create customised, and even trained, playlists to suit the collective tastes of your lab. It doesn’t matter how you choose your lab music. It just has to be democratic and fair.
What about headphones?
Another possible solution is to use headphones to personalise and control your in-lab musical experience. This gets rid of many of the irritations with playing music in the lab, but creates its own problems because it isolates lab members from one and other, and the tinny sound of “Ironic” being played at full volume in a pair of headphones can be almost as annoying as the speaker-borne experience. So your lab’s audio policy should also deal with headphones.
So while music has its benefits in the lab, making sure that it doesn’t annoy, alienate or isolate other members of your lab takes a bit of consideration. Perhaps my PhD supervisor was right after all.
What do you think?
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Don’t Miss This Free Online Bioconference |
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Nick Oswald |
To enable tagging you will need to register on Bitesize Bio. We're sorry for the inconvenience, but it's free, only takes a few seconds, and it will enable you to view our seminars for free, ask questions from the professional community, and take part in the lively community of Bitesize Bio
How would you like to participate in a free, online Bioconference? Watch and participate in live presentations from the biggest names in the life science industry and the thought leaders of the research community? And do it all from the comfort of your own computer?
Well Bioconference Live allows you to do just that on 17-19 November (2009). And I think this is a not-to-be missed event. As well as lining up some great speakers, the Bioconference Live team have worked hard to capture the conference experience, offering the opportunity to field questions to speakers, view posters, mingle in the networking lounge, and even visit virtual vendor booths (we’ll have a booth there so be sure to come and chat to us!).
Topic tracks include Bioinformatics, Microbiology, Nucleic Acid Analysis and Amplification, Drug Discovery and Delivery, Lab Automation, Cell & Tissue Analysis, Biotechnology, Autism Research, Cancer Research, Immunology, Clinical & Diagnostic Applications, Chemistry, Neuroscience, Protein Expression, Genetics and Genomics. With all of these choices, you’re bound to find alot of interesting stuff, no matter what your research interests are.
Enter the lobby
Your conference experience begins when you log in and enter the lobby of the virtual convention center. This is a 3D envirornment from where you can feel the conference vibe and access all of the available options, just like in a traditional conference, although you’ll have to supply your own coffee and cookies.
Speeches, talks and posters
The lobby houses aisles containing hundreds virtual booths, each of which houses live keynote speeches or talks/posters that are going on continuously for the three day event. Enter any of the booths at the advertised time to watch a live talk, then hang around afterwards for moderated text chat with the speaker. Immediately after all talks and presentations are given live, they’re then available on-demand (for free) to come back and see later, so no need to worry if you miss something.
Network
Networking is a vital aspect of any conference, so Bioconference Live has a Networking Lounge where users can congregate to meet with their peers or network with other professionals in their field, then use the Live Chat feature to discuss industry issues and news, or just have a conversation.
Visit the exhibit hall
You can then visit the Exhibit Hall and explore new technologies. Companies are divided by specialty or floors, so you are able to see all the vendors within your area(s) of interest in one central location. Each vendor has their own “virtual booth”, where you can view their commercials or video uploads, peruse their pdf’s (adding them to your “briefcase” if it is something that you would like to refer back to later or download to your PC), and even Live Chat with a representative from their company if you have any questions or would like to request additional information. Suzanne and myself will be at the Bitesize Bio booth and we’d love to see you there.
Register now, win a prize
You can register for Bioconference Live by clicking here. Once registered, you can enter a prize draw (with prizes including a Macbook) by telling three friends about the conference. I’m really looking forward to this event, and hope to meet you there.
Inspirational Talks at TED
Free Online Bioinformatics Tools
Don't Forget to Visit the Exhibits!
