Posters at the International C. elegans Meeting

UCLA and Los Angeles. COURTESY: UCLA Department of Physiology.

I just returned from the International C. elegans Meeting in Los Angeles (being hosted on the UCLA campus). There are posters, talks, workshops, and much fun to be had. I will give a more detailed discussion of some of the sessions in a future post.

Some people (not me) took turns wearing the "worm suit".

COURTESY: #worm15 Twitter feed.

There were several days of talks and posters, plus the famous C. elegans art and variety shows. Talks ranged from Physiology to Evolution and Development. The worm art show is somewhat unique to the conference, The OpenWorm group was able to meet up and discuss research strategies. 

There was also a worm art show. Here are some of the entries. 

Aside form partaking in the intellectual and social festivities, I also presented two posters on Saturday night. One was in the area of experimental evolution, and the other on the DevoWorm project.

Sample of the Experimental Evolution poster. Full poster can be viewed/downloaded here.

Sample of the DevoWorm poster. Full poster can be viewed/downloaded here.

My week was not all worm biology. I also sampled some botany, courtesy of the Mildred Mathias Botanical Garden, UCLA.

Freely-associated Earth Day and Outdoor Adventure-related Content

This is being cross-posted to my micro-blog, Tumbld Thoughts.

Here is a recent story on how 70,000 ladybugs have been released in the Mall of America to combat aphid infestations of the interior foliage. At 4.2 million square feet, the Mall of America has developed an incipient ecosystem [1]. The dynamics of this ecosystem will interesting to observe, particularly in light of the work that has been done in the field of biospherics (e.g. Biosphere 2, which is sponsored by the University of Arizona) [2]. Speaking of self-sustaining ecosystems.......

Nice ecosystem animation for Earth Day, courtesy of Google Doodle. Surf the web to find the true meaning of Earth Day, I guess. Speaking of surfing.....

Why it pays to Surf Michigan. No, really! There is a thriving (albeit obscure) surf culture in the US state of Michigan [3]. Lake Michigan surfing (inset on the left, picture from the St. Joseph Pier on Lake Michigan) has been going on for years, usually in the Fall and Spring when gales present waves large enough for surfing on.

When there is significant rainfall (such as during the past few weeks) or Spring snowmelt, the inland rivers (inset on the right, picture from the Red Cedar River in front of the Administration Building at Michigan State University) allow for interesting surf conditions.

Rincon Beach Park, Santa Barbara County, CA. There is also beachfront right across the street from the UCSB campus.

Surfing at Michigan State is a bit like a cold UC Santa Barbara with ducks on a river (odd mental image, I'm sure). Speaking of academically-oriented surfing [4], here is a profile on the "Physics of Surfing" class offered at UC San Diego [5]. Happy outdoor adventuring!

Scenes from the "Physics of Surfing" class, which combines lessons in instrumentation, oceanography, and of course surfing.

NOTES:

[1] this has parallels to ecosystems that emerge due to climatic changes such as the retreat of glaciers.

[2] Allen, J.   People Challenges in Biospheric Systems for Long-Term Habitation in Remote Areas, Space Stations, Moon, and Mars Expeditions. Life Support and Biosphere Science, 8, 67-70 (2002).

[3] Pictures of wetsuit adventurers in interesting conditions courtesy of Matuli Surf Company (Matulis brothers, Midland, MI).

[4] Here is a list of the top 10 surf colleges from Surfer magazine. Michigan State (nor any other Michigan University) is on it. The only odd duck here is NYU, which offers you the opportunity to surf Long Island (and perhaps the sewers). I might add Florida Atlantic University (FAU) to the list, at least during hurricane season.

[5] A few more links about those skeptical of the academic value of studying surfing: 1) a video on the physics of surfing by Kevin Stahl and friends, 2) a white paper called "The Physics of Ocean Waves" by Michael Twardos (courtesy of Snake Gabrielson's Surflibrary.org), 3) a story by John Jeka at the University of Maryland in the "Neuromorphic Engineer" called "Light touch-contact: not just for surfers". The article profiles the role of touch (e.g. somatosensory information) in helping people and other animals keep their balance when moving across a surface.

Media Neuroscience Lab Profile

Here is a new research lab [1] recently founded by my colleague Rene Weber [2] at UC-Santa Barbara. The Media Neuroscience Lab does research at the intersection of Virtual Worlds and Neuroscience. Their emphasis is on using physiological data [3] to understand the substrates of communication and cognition during use of entertainment media and other virtual worlds. Check it out.

Figure 1. This figure features an example from the lab's most recent paper [4] featured in a summary post on the Neuroskeptic blog [5]. Images courtesy [4] (middle, bottom) and [5] (top).

NOTES:

[1] the Media Neuroscience Lab is affiliated with the SAGE Center for the Study of the Mind and the Institute for Collaborative Biotechnologies (both at UCSB). The lab also maintains a Twitter feed.

[2] a pioneer in the area of applying innovative neuroimaging techniques to the study of video gameplay and television watching. He and I have worked together on the role of dynamic attentional processing during immersion in virtual environments (so far unpublished).

Picture of Dr. Weber in front of his primary scientific instrument.

[3] the lab also maintains an archive of neuroimaging (fMRI) and psychophysiological (Biopac) datasets if you are interested.

[4] Klasen, M., Weber, R., Kircher, T.T., Mathiak, K.A., and Mathiak, K. (2012). Neural contributions to flow experience during video game playing. Social, Cognitive, and Affective Neuroscience, 7(4), 485-495.

The free-viewing condition (fMRI experimental design) was used to understand what the brain is doing while the subjects played "Tactical Ops" (Figure 1, middle). The results were interpreted in the context of Csíkszentmihályi's flow theory of experiential cognitive (in this case, neural) processing.

[5] Post from Neuroskeptic blog on their recent paper "Neural contributions to flow experience during video game playing": How Your Brain Gets In The Game. Neuroskeptic, May 23, 2011.