Author: Shannen Cravens

February 10, 2015

The Biophysical Society Logo: Random or Profound?

Today was my last day at the Biophysical Society Meeting and I have to say that I truly enjoyed my first experience at this conference! I’m used to the American Chemical Society National Meetings, which are significantly larger, so this was a nice change of pace. Blogging was definitely a new facet to a scientific conference for me, so I hope you’ve enjoyed reading these posts as much as I’ve enjoyed writing them!

I wanted to bring up an amusing question that someone mentioned to me earlier this week and see if it boggles your minds as much as it did mine! I attended the New Member Coffee break on Monday since I just recently joined the Biophysical Society and a relatively new PI at my table brought up a question he hadn’t managed to find an answer to…

What does the Biophysical Society logo represent?

We’ve all seen it – horizontal lines sandwiching the name of the society – and it’s even in the banner for this blog at the top of the page. Does anyone actual know the origin of the logo, though? Is there a significance behind the design or an interesting history that explains its look? I tried Google-ing it and came up with nothing!

Since I had absolutely no idea what the logo meant, I decided to take up the task of unofficial investigator and I promised the initial question poser that I would blog about it so his question could reach a larger audience. For the last two days, I have been asking people at random what they think the logo represents and I got an interesting array of responses! The most amusing thing I noted was that everyone had their own unique interpretation – I kid you not, I did not have a single idea given to me more than once! Below is a list of some of the answers I got from new and old members alike:

1. An hourglass energy landscape
2. Artistically enhanced error bars
3. Noise
4. A poorly drawn Jablonski Diagram
5. A rotational-vibrational spectrum
6. Representation of the number of subgroups you can join
7. Loop and beta-sheet structure representations
8. A free induction decay
9. Single molecule FRET data
10. Random scribbles the society founder drew when drunk
11. “Old school DNA sequencing thingy”
12. Absolutely nothing

I hate to disappoint, but I never found someone who actually knew the answer! That’s kind of wonderful if you think about it. Just take a look at those responses… you can see the expertise of some people poking through. We have some physical chemists, NMR spectroscopists, structural biophysicists, single-molecule experts, and a class of folks with a great sense of humor. The interpretations I received seemed to be biased, in a sense, by the way each person viewed science. Whatever “lens” we use to see the world of biophysics trains us to approach problems in a particular way and view the results with unique perspective. Maybe that’s the point of an ambiguous logo. It’s nothing and everything all at once depending on who happens to be looking at it. Isn’t that a lot like this particular field we all love so much? You might view a certain biological phenomena one way and I might disagree, but that’s the point. That’s how discoveries continue and our knowledge evolves. We come up with answers, but there has to be someone out there who remains skeptical. It keeps us honest and makes it possible for us to rewrite textbooks when old ideas turn out to be wrong or incomplete.

…or maybe the logo really is just a set of horizontal lines that looked neat. That’s a bit anti-climactic, though, so I think I’ll stick with my idealized view of it representing the beautiful, multi-faceted nature of biophysics. I think that meshes quite nicely with the enormous diversity of research that culminated at this conference and the vast array of viewpoints I’m sure many of you heard with regards to your own research at your poster session or talk.

Feel free to prove me wrong in the comments if you have an idea about the logo’s meaning or actually know the answer!

February 10, 2015

Free Resources for Improved Science Education

I attended a session today that is near and dear to my heart. The session was titled US Science Education in a Global Context and it was a nice presentation on the shortcomings and clear consequences of how we educate future scientists and the general public about science in this country.

Now this might be just my personal opinion, but I feel like there tends to be a stigma associated with spending time on the instructional aspect of an academic position. Our primary objective is typically portrayed as being innovative in the lab and spending as little time as possible in the classroom unless we work at a community college or primarily undergraduate institution. I find that to be a gross misconception of our purpose, and essentially our duty, as scientists. Our objective should not just be to make new discoveries, but to also prepare the next generation to continue where we leave off. We cannot possibly hope to accomplish those goals if we stay the course and propagate the use of ineffective teaching techniques. A common argument against altering our typical teaching styles is the notion that we all survived the current educational system, so there’s no excuse for the next generation. That’s fine if we consider STEM education to be reserved for the select few that become the movers and shakers of their field. Think about this for a second, though: how many of those elite critical thinkers leave the lab and enter politics? How many of those highly educated scientists become involved in making decisions about budget distributions to federal organizations that provide grant money for science research? If you answered “basically none” to either of those questions, then you already know there is a desperate need for improved science education in the United States for everyone.

This session on education showcased the perspective of three panelists with varied backgrounds: a former President of the National Academy of Sciences, a representative of a non-profit organization focused on improving national K-12 science education standards (Achieve), and someone heavily involved in how the NSF strives to improve undergraduate education. All three were in agreement that the way we go about educating students in the STEM disciplines at all  levels fails on multiple fronts, two of which are that 1) students do not recognize that science is an interdisciplinary craft that cannot be comprehended through memorization and 2) students are not trained to navigate how science is presented in their textbook or the literature, which leads to disinterest and misguided understandings. Those two follies arise from an ineffective communication of science, which falls on us (the educators) to strive to correct.

There are a number of free educational resources that the panelists promoted, which I would like to provide for you here. Despite my interest in science education, I was actually unaware of these and am very excited to dive in! I hope you find some of these resources useful in your own educational endeavors.

http://scienceintheclassroom.org/
Science in the Classroom is provided by AAAS and is a resource for educators interested in effective ways of teaching science literacy. On this website, you will find a collection of annotated publications that are geared to either the high school or college level. This provides instructors with a framework for guiding their students through dissecting the scientific literature.

http://portal.scienceintheclassroom.org/
This is another resource provided by AAAS and it’s a collection of all the freely available educational resources they have to offer. This includes a blog about education research, a collection of Science articles on education, and special editions of Science focused entirely on STEM education.

Reaching Students
This is a free PDF provided by The National Academies Press, which attempts to address the following questions: how do students best learn STEM? Are there ways of thinking that help or hurt their learning process? Which teaching strategies are most effective? And how can educators apply these strategies or suggest new approaches to their institutions? You will need to register with the site to get your free copy, but registration is free!

http://www.globaleducationproject.org/
This website provides a digital copy of a book written by Janet English, which details her experience as a Fullbright Scholar in Finland, exploring their extremely successful educational system. She provides insightful vignettes of Finnish policy and practice that provide an excellent framework for how you might want to improve your own classroom.

I could go on and on about why I find researching effective teaching techniques to be so important to our overall success as a scientific community, but I don’t want to trip over the line and turn this blog into a sermon. I do hope that the questions I posed earlier and these free resources get you thinking, though, and steer you in the direction of the educational workshops, sessions, and posters you can find all over the Biophysical Society meeting. Consider this, my fellow biophysicists, if we do not invest in the next generation, our legacy is short-lived and our brand of innovation becomes a dying breed either by a shortage of educated scientists or an overabundance of science illiterates in public office. We are in positions to make the changes we wish to see in our educational system and it is entirely up to us if those changes ever happen.

February 8, 2015

A local pub named after paradise: Tir Na Nog

After a long day of talks and soaking up all of the great science being presented, it’s always fun to enjoy one of the local treats the city has to offer. For all of you new to Baltimore, you’ll be happy to know that the convention center is located in a hopping part of town, so there are plenty of places to choose from.

One of my favorites happens to be an Irish gem located along the water at the intersection of Pratt St. and Calvert St. called Tir Na Nog. If any of you have seen the Irish movie Into The West, you’ll recognize this as the name of the magical horse that plays a prominent role in the film. Tir Na Nog actually hails from Irish mythology and is a land of youthful paradise where its residents never age. The story tells that a mortal man names Oisín falls in love with a mythical woman Niamh who takes him to Tir Na Nog atop a magical horse that can walk on water. Oisín eventually becomes homesick and Niamh sends him back with the warning to never touch the ground. Once home, Oisín realizes that 300 years have passed in Ireland and, as you can probably expect, he falls off his horse. Well, then he rapidly ages as time catches up with him and he dies. Not a really nice ending, but I promise this restaurant is far more pleasant than that old folk tale! That’s just a bit of trivia you can use to impress your fellow biophysicists should you choose to take them here!

This little restaurant is decked out in Celtic decorations with a menu littered with an assortment of Irish delights, like Shepard’s Pie and Guinness, as well as local fare. Yes, this is one of the nearby places where you can enjoy a famous Maryland crab cake! Not a fan of trying crab that’s been pressed into a ball? Well, you can try their crab soup or my personal favorite: the crab and artichoke dip! There really is no wrong choice with their menu. Their plentiful beer list sure doesn’t hurt, but just make sure you save room for dessert! They offer a number of finger-licking treats, including creme brulee that comes in a different flavor every day.

A group of us Hopkins grad students decided to celebrate the end of our first day at the Biophysical Society Meeting here and I would encourage you to give it a try. If you stop by for lunch, you’ll even get a nice view of the Inner Harbor!