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Red Rover, Red Rover

Posted on by Promega

[wpvideo j5SvPhHA]On November 26, NASA launched the Mars Science Laboratory from Cape Canaveral. The science laboratory contains the newest Mars rover, Curiosity. NASA has already received the first signal from the laboratory, shortly after it separated from the rocket. The Mars Science Laboratory is flying free toward the red planet.

NASA has a wonderful video describing how the science laboratory landing is planned. The video illustrates just how complex a mission this is. To think that we can even imagine, must less carry out, such a feat of technology and engineering is amazing. Enjoy the video, and let’s hope that on August 6, 2012, Curiosity will land safely and begin teaching us more about our neighboring planet.

If you have difficulty with the embedded video, here’s a link to the video on the NASA website.

Networking for Scientists Part I: How I Learned to Talk to Strangers

Posted on by Karen Reece

When thinking about career opportunities in science (and in any field really), solid networking skills can be the key factor in determining where and how you’ll be spending your next holiday.  Networking breaks down into two parts: small talk/meeting people and establishing/maintaining job-relevant connections.  Neither of these things are rocket science, but can be particularly difficult depending on your personality. I realized early on that if I wanted to stay up on the latest, unpublished results, if I wanted to find out what other labs were working on, or if I wanted to know who was looking to fill a position before it was listed, I would need to master this skill.  It took lots of practice, but I now consider myself pretty darn good at this networking thing.  I even used the same strategies I used in the science world to build a network in the local music scene and it worked!  In this post, the first of two parts, I will address small talk. Continue reading “Networking for Scientists Part I: How I Learned to Talk to Strangers”

The Healing Power of Milk

Posted on by Traci Martinez

Part 2 of 2 – The Recipient

The Healing Power of Milk

In last month’s blog I shared my experience donating milk.  If you haven’t read Part 1 – click here to read the backstory.  I promised a happier ending to my story. As life would have it, there were some bumps in the road on my way to that happy ending.  It’s all about the journey, right?! 

After giving ourselves some time to heal – both emotionally and physically – we decided to try again. I was afraid, but for some reason, I had faith that things would work out better this time.  In September of last year we had our second child. This time it was a boy. My attempts at a VBAC failed, but our son was born healthy and we were overjoyed. Getting a baby to latch on and nurse after surgery was a little more challenging than just using a pump. With help and support from lactation experts we eventually figured it out. 

By the time I returned from maternity leave, breastfeeding was well established and I had a stash of milk in the freezer.  My pump and I were ready to return to work.   Since each of our buildings has a dedicated “Mother’s Room” there was always a place to pump while at work.  Other than the usual sleep deprivation that every parent faces, everything seemed to be falling into place. 

Then bam!  I was blindsided. Continue reading “The Healing Power of Milk”

Paying it Forward: Pour a Pint at Work With the American Red Cross

Posted on by Karen Reece

I don’t know about you, but I’ve had several people close to me- friends and family, that have fallen ill, had surgery or car accidents and needed blood transfusions to stay alive. The reason my friends and family were able to overcome those situations was plain and simple: other people took time out of their busy schedules to donate blood. Your body holds about 10 pints of blood, and the typical donation is one pint. Your body will replenish the lost blood in about two months. If you give only one hour of your time every 56 days, your donation can save up to three lives!

If you choose to donate, Red Cross staff will collect personal information like your name and social security number. You will be asked to answer a series of questions about your health and lifestyle to determine if you are eligible to donate. Collection of information is done in private and is kept highly confidential. Once your blood is collected, there is no personal information on the label. Your blood will be screened to ensure safety and will be labeled with a tracking number that can be used only if you need to be contacted regarding test results.

What if you don’t qualify to give blood? After all, only 38% of the population is eligible to give blood.  You may have travelled or gotten a tattoo and been deferred from donation for a year.  Maybe you have an illness or engaged in risky behavior that prevents you from donating.  Maybe you just hate needles. You can still help! The Red Cross always needs volunteers to help coordinate drives or to serve refreshments to donors after they have finished. If you’re not sure if you should give blood, you can find the information on the Red Cross website, call and speak to a Red Cross representative, or ask one of the nurses at a blood drive.

At Promega, we have quarterly drives organized faithfully by the women we call “The Marys.” Mary Doers, Mary Sobol, and Mary Upshaw have been coordinating these drives for years.  Mary S. and Mary U. share their thoughts. Continue reading “Paying it Forward: Pour a Pint at Work With the American Red Cross”

Rob Mies: Lessons From A Real Life ‘Bat Man’

Posted on by Robert Deyes

On a blustery, frigidly cold day in mid-April, a small gathering of cub scouts from one of several local packs congregated outside the Lussier Heritage Center on the southern end of Madison for the annual bat festival. They had braved the elements to see these furry creatures, perhaps for the first time in their lives, and to put aside the myth that they are little more than Transylvanian-born vampiric vermin. The cub scouts had come to hear the experts talk. And there could have been no better person for the job of getting the education process started than conservationist Rob Mies- indisputably the star of this year’s bat show.

Continue reading “Rob Mies: Lessons From A Real Life ‘Bat Man’”

The Ants Came Marching: Did Periods of Arctic Warming Help Giant Ants Migrate?

Posted on by Kelly Grooms

I guess you could say that I have been programmed to notice giant creepy crawly things. Starting when my son brought home a book about “Real Life Monsters”, my family has not been able to stop talking about one of the book’s featured monsters, the Goliath Bird Eater spider. While the book’s other stars, the giant squids and great white sharks, were pronounced by my son to be “cool”, a spider that is the size of a dinner plate and eats birds, is the thing of nightmares. Both my kids will fearfully bring up these giant arachnids anytime a hairy spider is spotted. [Note: Goliath Bird Eaters live in South America, not Wisconsin].

Photo by April Noble www.antweb.og

Given the number of family discussions I have had about gigantic arachnids, it was only natural that a headline about a hummingbird-sized ant that once roamed Wyoming caught my attention (1). Although there are living species of giant ants, the Wyoming ant is the first fossil from the extinct ant family Formiciinae to be found in the Western Hemisphere. The ant lived in the early Eocene (~49.5 Million years ago). And, unlike the cool climate insect taxa previously known to be shared between North America and Europe, this new ant, Titanomyrma lubei, was a thermophilic insect. Continue reading “The Ants Came Marching: Did Periods of Arctic Warming Help Giant Ants Migrate?”

Spring Cleaning Our Lives

Posted on by Becca McKnight

During spring cleaning we open up the windows, get rid of the junk we no longer need (or never needed in the first place) and give our carpets a much needed deep clean. When we are done we feel energized, organized, and focused—ready to take on the world again. What if we could apply this principle to our lives? Hear me out ….a big area of discussion these days is how to achieve a work-life balance. Sort of like spring cleaning for your life, getting better at organizing your time and taking more time for things that are important to you and rejuvenate your spirit instead of just your home. Something tells me we would all be happily surprised with the results. Guess what, The Executive Office of the President, Council of Economic Advisers, agrees.

Continue reading “Spring Cleaning Our Lives”

Yo-Ho, Yo-Ho, A Museum’s Life for Me

Posted on by Kelly Grooms

Ahoy all you pirate lovers out there! Have you ever wanted to visit a real pirate shipwreck? Well this could be your lucky day! Today, Indiana University, IU researcher and archeologist Charles Beeker and the government of the Dominican Republic are dedicating the wreck of the Quedagh Merchant as a “Living Museum of the Sea”. Now in case you missed all the hoopla three years ago when she was discovered, the Quedagh Merchant is the Armenian merchant ship that was captured in 1698 by the infamous 17th century pirate/privateer Captain William Kidd. It is, in fact, the ship that could be said to have been his undoing. Continue reading “Yo-Ho, Yo-Ho, A Museum’s Life for Me”

How “Happy” Wins

Posted on by Kari Kenefick

Volunteering sign “The science of happiness” is a catchy and promising title that was recently used for a series of articles on Newscientist.com.

So I took a look at some  research and found an intriguing report highlighted in a Wall Street Journal article “Is Happiness Overrated”. This article was about research done at the University of Wisconsin by Carol Ryff and Jennifer Morozink, et al. (1) .

It turns out that happiness is not only sometimes hard to find (personal communication), it can also be difficult to define. I learned that there is: 1) more than one kind of happiness and; 2) all happiness is not created equal.

Continue reading “How “Happy” Wins”