And so we come to the best Nature Network blog posts from 2009. All the usual clichés about the shortlist being ‘really difficult to choose’ apply here. Any given blogger could have featured multiple times. But once again we’ve narrowed it down to five. Please leave your own picks in the comments, and be sure to vote for your favourite down at the foot of the post.
The best of 2009 picks:
Eva Amsen – Expression Patterns
Introducing Squishy Cow, a spongy bovine toy acquired by Eva at a lab equipment expo. Squishy is a well travelled beast – Eva pictures her in London and Lausanne among other places. But the itinerant cow also has a ‘creepy side’, promoting the sale of fetal bovine serum for biomedical science. This prompts Eva to ponder the less tangible involvement of animals in research:
I feel guilty about things like FBS or antibodies – lab reagents for which animals have been killed. Even though we tell ourselves that our molecular biology research is done without animals, it’s not really – there just aren’t any animals in the lab . But there is no other available source for antibodies than animals, and even if there was a way to use synthetic serum in cell culture, it would probably be unaffordable.
What I Think About When I Think About Manuscripts
Henry Gee – I, Editor
When he’s not ‘being fed grapes by flying babies’ or tending to his extensive home menagerie, Nature Editor Henry Gee buries his head in manuscripts. He gets through a staggering 700 a year. In this post, Henry sets out the thoughts and feelings that typical items from this Sisyphean inbox elicit.
When I sit down to read a manuscript, the question in my head – what I think about, when I think about manuscripts – is how the sheaf of paper in my hands, or the dots on my screen, will change the way I see the world, in some fundamental way. So much the better if I can see how the world was changed for the researchers in the course of making their own discoveries.
My Nobel prize acceptance speech, 2010
Stephen Curry – Reciprocal Space
Stephen’s writing often touch on the moral and legal issues surrounding pseudoscience and alternative medicine. This post sets out his acceptance speech for the trio of Nobel Prizes he expects to scoop next year, and serves as an hilarious Swiftian broadside against the claims of homeopathy.
There must be a “Tangential Universe”, I hypothesised, to which the homeopaths — uniquely until now — have had access. I gave it this name both to distinguish it from parallel universe theory (whose proponents might one day find themselves here in Stockholm) but also to highlight the very different laws of physics that obtain there. By unshackling myself from thought I found a way to gain access to this tangential universe and began to codify the wondrous phenomena that occur there, not the least of which is homeopathy.
Mind The Gap – Jennifer Rohn
Jenny has a problem. Despite sticking rigorously to normal working hours, refusing to stay late or sacrifice weekends, she’s becoming addicted to her science. The lure of uncovering new knowledge has led her to break her own rules about avoiding workaholic tendencies. Fortunately, she still finds time to craft such posts as this:
When I first returned to the bench I found it hard to do more than one experiment at a time; now…I am piling them one atop another to see how high the tower can get before it topples. The inevitable failures, which before were just part of the hoovering (like having to pause to empty the filters), in this environment become more frustrating because they keep away the truth for one day longer. Yes, the essence of it is that now, I am starting to care.
The Nobel Prize in Medicine 2009
Stripped Science – Viktor Poor
And finally… Viktor wins the prize for ‘most unique blog’ (if we can get away with using that phrase among such a grammatically precise crowd). His fortnightly science-themed cartoons have consistently brought a collective chuckle to the network. It’s difficult to quote a cartoon, so you’ll just have to click through to this subtle telomeric joke.
DON’T FORGET TO VOTE FOR YOUR FAVOURITE:
My Nobel Prize acceptance speech
And now go vote for the 2008 and 2007 posts you liked the best.