Darwin and Lincoln: men of vision and reason

Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln were both born 200 years ago today. Consider the remarkable impact each man made on humanity, and celebrate science and reason by reading some of their own words.

Peruse the Darwin Correspondence Project online, or browse through the 16 printed volumes in our collection: Correspondence of Charles Darwin. The Darwin Day Celebration web site offers a wide range of resources, including audio files.

Robert Krulwich (Class of '69) presented a fascinating look at Darwin's life on NPR's Morning Edition this morning, considering the possibility that love for his wife and the tragedy of the death of a beloved daughter, directly influenced the timing of publication of On the Origin of Species. Listen to the story.

The library owns many editions and reproductions of Darwin's work [search OBIS by title], or you can read a reproduction online.

Lincoln's Bicentennial is being celebrated across the country. The Kentucky Abraham Bicentennial Commission web site is a good place to explore some of the events, documents, photos and links to other sites.

Don't let the day slip away without giving some thought to the enduring legacy of Lincoln and Darwin!

Stimulus Package Compromise Announced -- Scientists Hope for Jolt to Research

National Public Radio posted this breaking news this afternoon: Congressional Leaders Announce Stimulus Deal and Scientists Hope Stimulus Will Give Jolt to Research. Richard Harris, in his report on science research funding, noted that the stimulus package includes billions in funding for the National Institutes of Health. Raynard Kington, the NIH's acting director, says that NIH currently has 14,000 peer-reviewed applicants, worthy of funding, waiting for support. "Give the NIH the money, he says, and in just a few weeks the money can flow out the door and into a thousand labs or more." Read more or listen online.

Help for Off-Campus Access to the EJC

Getting access through the OhioLINK Electronic Journal Center to publishers' web sites is a little more complicated if you are off-campus. Follow these steps:

1. login to the proxy server or the VPN client on your computer [download it here]
2. find the journal you need in the OhioLINK EJC
3. link to the publisher's web site from the EJC
4. if you do not have immediate access, look for this option: "Oberlin College - OhioLINK Trial, Oerlin College", rather than "Oberlin College, Oberlin College_IP," which is for our local subscriptions.

You will have access only to those journals purchased by OhioLINK, which does not include the pre-1995 archives of all publishers.

These procedures will be necessary only until the OhioLINK Electronic Journal Center is completely restored.

Update on OhioLINK EJC

OhioLINK staff are working diligently to restore access to the Electronic Journal Center, as explained in this message from Director Tom Sanville. Updates will be posted in OhioLINK's What's New.
-------
Important Message to the OhioLINK community of students, faculty, and staff:

Beginning Wednesday afternoon, February 4, the OhioLINK computer disk storage system suffered a widespread, and supposedly not possible, multiple component failure affecting all major services with the exception of the OhioLINK Library Catalog. We have restored all services except the Electronic Journal Center (EJC). Restoration of the EJC remains under vigorous analysis, but unfortunately we know that any solution will not be immediate. In light of this, we are taking immediate steps to provide alternative access to the resources of the EJC through the various Web sites of the EJC journal publishers.

As noted on [EJC welcome page], we have immediate access to many EJC publisher sites and are working to expand access to the rest as quickly as possible. While the EJC is down, we will continue to improve this site to direct you to the proper publishers. We will also work to adjust our systems that link article citations to full text in the EJC by redirecting links to the publisher sites. We are examining every possibility to keep you connected to resources you need and to improve that connectivity as quickly as possible, while the EJC is not available.

The OhioLINK staff is sincerely sorry for this significant disruption in services. We remain committed, as we have since 1992, to providing high quality information resources on a consistent and reliable basis to the Ohio higher education community.

Sincerely,

Tom Sanville, Executive Director, tom@ohiolink.edu tom@ohiolink.edu>

Drastic Reductions Proposed for Science Funding in Senate bill

From Science Debate 2008, 9 am this morning:

"I am writing to alert you to efforts underway this morning to zero out a large portion of the science funding from the Senate American Reinvestment and Recovery Act as a part of a $77.9B reduction effort led by Senators Ben Nelson (D-NE) and Susan Collins (R-ME).

"As you know better than most, science and technology are responsible for half of the economic development of the United States since WWII and yet, if current trends hold, some, such as the Business Roundtable, have predicted that 90% of all scientists and engineers will live in Asia within 5 years.

"The United States simply MUST renew our investment in the single greatest economic engine this country has ever known. Small federal investments in scientific research have helped produce things like the internet and the transistor that have consistently delivered multi-trillion dollar economies.

"The United States is at a critical juncture, and if this concerns you we suggest now would be a time to contact your Senators and urge them to support science funding. Here is what is being proposed to be cut from the bill, according to TPM:

NASA exploration $750,000,000 = 50%
NSF $1,402,000,000 = 100%
NOAA $427,000,000 = 34.94%
NIST $218,000,000 = 37.91%
DOE energy efficiency & renewable energy $1,000,000,000 = 38%
DOE office of science $100,000,000 = 100%"

Larry Squire '63 on NPR: Memory, the Hippocampus and Alzheimer's

Oberlin alumnus Larry R. Squire, class of 1963, and Principal Investigator of the Memory Research Laboratory (University of California, San Diego and the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in San Diego) explained recent findings on NPR's Morning Edition today. Dr. Squire's study, co-published with Christine N. Smith, is published in the newest issue of Journal of Neuroscience:

• Medial Temporal Lobe Activity during Retrieval of Semantic Memory Is Related to the Age of the Memory. Christine N. Smith and Larry R. Squire. The Journal of Neuroscience, January 28, 2009, 29(4):930-938; doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.4545-08.2009
  

From the Morning Edition story:

"What we found was that the hippocampus was most active when subjects were recalling memories about new events that occurred just a year or two earlier," Squire says. "The hippocampus became less active as subjects recalled memories that were five years or 10 years old."

As people tried to remember older events, the scientists saw more and more activity on the surface of the brain.

The results suggest that the hippocampus is necessary to form new memories and to retrieve recent memories, says Russell Poldrack, a brain scientist at UCLA. But it plays little or no role once memories are a few years old.

"This is the clearest demonstration yet of what happens as memories get older," Poldrack says. "It's pretty compelling evidence." [more]

Related reading in the library:
The library is grateful to Dr. Squire for his many contributions to the collection, including his most recent monograph co-authored with Eric R. Kandel, Memory: from mind to molecules.

See other books in OBIS authored by Larry Squire.

Eat Right, Save the Planet: Bittman on NPR

Hear NPR's interview with Mark Bittman, author of Food matters: a guide to conscious eating. Mark Bittman is a food columnist for The New York Times and an advocate for '"conscious eating." Bittman's book is an obvious choice after reading Michael Pollan's The omnivore's dilemma and In defense of food.

All copies of Mark Bittman's book in OhioLINK are currently checked out, and Oberlin's copy already has two holds. Read an excerpt at NPR, and place a hold on Oberlin's copy if desired.

From the synopsis @ Barnes & Noble: "The simple truth, as he points out, is that as long as you eat more vegetables and whole grains, the result will be better health for you and for the world in which we live."

What You Need to Know About Energy, from Natl Acad Press

The National Academies Press invites you to download and read, for free, more than 4,000 books! One of their newest offerings is What You Need to Know About Energy.

Listen also to the podcast America's Energy Future and link to related resources from the NAP web site. Browse books by topic or search specific keywords. Free PDF books will have a "sign in" link in the "purchase options" box. Click on the link, complete a short survey, and you will be able to download the book.

2009 is the Year of Science! Celebrating How We Know What We Know

Year of Science 2009 Kicks Off this Week Across the Nation [COPUS Press Release]

The Coalition on the Public Understanding of Science (COPUS) kicked off Year of Science 2009 (YoS2009) -- a national, yearlong, grassroots celebration--this week in Boston at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology. COPUS, which represents more than 500 organizations, is celebrating how science works, who scientists are, and why science matters. Ira Flatow, host of Science Friday, broadcast every week on National Public Radio, launched the week’s events.

One of the themes for January 2009 is Communicating Science. The library is over-flowing with wonderful books that do just that - engaging and enlightening, books by scientists and science writers for the general public are regularly featured on our new books shelf.

Start with the annual series "Best American Science and Nature Writing" for a sample of excellent articles. The 2008 volume is now on the new book shelf.

Think you're smart? Plenty of other animals are also adept at complex thinking.

Scientific American Mind features the intelligence of animals in a Dec. 2008 article by Paul Patton:

One World, Many Minds: Intelligence in the Animal Kingdom

From the introduction: "complex brains and sophisticated cognition have arisen multiple times in independent lineages of animals during the earth’s evolutionary history. So-called lower animals, such as fish, reptiles and birds, display a startling array of cognitive capabilities. Goldfish, for instance, have shown they can negotiate watery mazes similar to the way rats do in intelligence tests in the lab."

Read the whole story at Scientific American Mind. While you're there, check out some of the latest stories, including "Did a Comet Hit Earth 12,000 Years Ago?", posted Jan. 2.

Looking Ahead: Pres-Elect Obama's Science Advisory Team

As we prepare to leave campus for winter break, pause a moment to consider the new year and new possibilities after President-Elect Obama is inaugurated. The recently announced appointments for the science advisory team indicate that peer-reviewed scientific consensus will guide the administration's actions in science, health, technology and environmental issues.

This is expressed most clearly in Mr. Obama's own words:
"...the truth is that promoting science isn’t just about providing resources—it’s about protecting free and open inquiry. It’s about ensuring that facts and evidence are never twisted or obscured by politics or ideology. It’s about listening to what our scientists have to say, even when it’s inconvenient—especially when it’s inconvenient. Because the highest purpose of science is the search for knowledge, truth and a greater understanding of the world around us."

From the Science Team Rollout Radio Address
Listen to the NPR Story.

And to that I say, Amen.

Wind-Powered Radio in War Weary Southern Sudan

Living on Earth [Dec. 5] brings a remarkable story of community radio from the Sudan: energy technology innovation, human resilience, moving materials with people power, and community effort to bring journalism with integrity to hundreds of people in remote areas.

LOE's Bruce Gellerman interviews John Mussa, a reporter with Internews in southern Sudan. Read the transcript or download the MP3 version, and you'll no longer take your local radio station for granted!

After War, Wind-Powered Radio

"Twenty-two years of civil war destroyed Sudan’s electrical infrastructure, so locals have turned to wind and solar energy to power their new radio station."

'Tis the Gift Giving Season - Go Green & Support Social Justice

My inbox is overflowing with messages encouraging me to reduce waste, carbon emissions, and unnecessary spending on products that contribute to over-consumption and our non-sustainable culture. The holiday season is a wonderful opportunity to give gifts that Do Good, and these messages show the seemingly countless ways to do so! Here are just a few of the Green Gift and Alternative Gift guides that have come my way. In addition to shopping locally and supporting Oberlin merchants (and artisans, whose works are sold in The Ginko Gallery and at Uncommon Objects of the FAVA Gallery) you might consider spending your gift dollars in support of environmental sustainability and social/economic justice, while honoring the people you love at the same time.

• GreenGiftGuide.com.
• Heifer International.
• NRDC Great Green Gift Guide.
• Oxfam America Unwrapped.
• Ten Thousand Villages. (some products are carried locally at Ben Franklin!)
• TreeHugger Holiday Gift Guide.
• World of Good from eBay.
• Yahoo Green Gift Guide.

Shop also at the Alternative Gift Fair, to be held Monday-Friday, Dec. 8-12, from 11:30-1:30 each day, in the Bent Corridor of the Science Center. If you'd like a catalog of items offered at that gift fair, please contact me.

If you know of other great sources for sustainable, fair trade, and/or locally produced gifts, don't hesitate to add your comments. Thanks!

Faculty Publication: Dan Styer on Entropy and Evolution

Daniel F. Styer, John and Marianne Schiffer Professor of Physics and Astronomy, has published an article that brings together biology, thermodynamics and physics teaching.

Entropy and evolution. American Journal of Physics, Volume 76, issue 11 (November 2008), p. 1031-1033

Author's abstract: Quantitative estimates of the entropy involved in biological evolution demonstrate that there is no conflict between evolution and the second law of thermodynamics. The calculations are elementary and could be used to enliven the thermodynamics portion of a high school or introductory college physics course.

The article is accessible to all OhioLINK affiliates at the OhioLINK Electronic Journal Center.

Interested in seeing current articles from other Oberlin science faculty? ISI Web of Science (also known as Science Citation Index) provides a quick way to search across all science disiciplines. Search "Oberlin Coll" as an address phrase, limit to 2008, and you'll find 40 papers in seconds.

Happy Founders Day! 175 Years of Classes at OC

Oberlin College opened its doors for classes on December 3, 1833. 175 years today! Frederick Scovill, the College’s first teacher, wrote in a letter to a friend dated December 13, 1833, “The grand object of this Institution is to educate those who shall be prepared physically, as well as intellectually and morally, to illuminate the world with the light of science and civilization.”

Learn more about science education at Oberlin at the College Archives, beginning with the very worthy Dr. James Dascomb, village and college physician, chemistry, botany and physiology professor, and, briefly, college librarian. Dr. Dascomb also taught sacred music, rhetoric, mathematics and civil law, among other courses, according to the 1836 Catalogue. This photo, courtesy of the Oberlin College Archives, was taken in the 1850s. The Archives department is a wonderful place to research our past.

The Oberlin Alumni Magazine for December 1961 includes a nice history of science education at Oberlin. It's available in the Archives or in the periodical stacks on the 2nd floor of the Main Library.

Dance Your Ph.D.! Contest Winners Announced

If you start learning basic dance moves now, you may be ready to choreograph your own interpretive dance sequence, should the AAAS sponsor another "Dance Your Ph.D." contest. The 2009 contest winners depicted positron emission tomography, the role of vitamin D in beta cell function, and isoelectric focusing of asymmetric mutant hybrids (Indeed. A bit different from inspiration of the Fall Forward dancers, I assume). They will be honored guests at the 2009 AAAS Annual Meeting in Chicago. The dances are enormously creative -- take a look!

Take the BioScience Challenge

Action Bioscience, a Web-based educational resource of the American Institute of Biological Sciences, offers dozens of peer-reviewed articles on timely, critical issues, written for the non-specialist. Biodiversity, environment, genomics, biotechnology, and evolution are five of the major categories of bioscience "challenges" that impact our lives on a daily basis. Each category on the Web site includes excellent review articles by experts, with references for more reading. Sign up for ActionBioscience e-updates, and you'll be alerted when new articles are posted.

One of the highlighted articles considers polar bears and climate change, a very timely topic given the Defenders of Wildlife new report on the urgent need to act now to protect wildlife from global warming.

Read your way through the Web site and you'll be wonderfully informed on the most pressing issues in bioscience today - and better prepared to appreciate the Year of Science, to be celebrated in 2009.

What's that Stuff? C&EN Online makes it easier to find out.

Have you seen the new look for the American Chemical Society publications, including the member's news weekly Chemical & Engineering News? C&EN features regular elucidating columns with entertaining information about the chemicals we encounter in everyday life - perfect for the non-chemist and chemical savvy alike.

What's That Stuff? considers contact lens solutions this week. Have you stopped to wonder what's pooling around that contact lens as you tease it out of its lens case? Or given any thought to be benefits of the moisturizing agent polyvinyl pyrrolidone as opposed to, say, your own spit? No? You might want to find out!

Yeah! New Books for your Thanksgiving break

Want to read something that isn't required yet still engaging and educational? Todays' new books shipment offers some wonderful choices! Here are just a few to tempt you:

• Mean and lowly things by Kate Jackson, is a naturalist's glaringly truthful account of snakes, science, and survival in the Congo.
• A Supremely bad idea by Luke Dempsey follows three mad birders and their quest to see it all through 8 states, 1 foreign country, 129 towns, 34 national parks and "too many alarming motel rooms" to chase the most beautiful and rarest birds the country offers. [Listen to Bruce Gellerman's interview with the author on Living on Earth, Sept. 12]
  
• David and Richard Garfinkle's Three steps to the universe offers a guided tour from the sun to black holes to the mystery of dark matter throughout the entire universe.
• What the nose knows (Avery Gilbert) explores the science of scent in everyday life. One could only wish for scratch and sniff cards to make it complete.
• Peter Pringle brings us the story of Stalin's persecution of one of the great scientists of the twentieth century, in The Murder of Nikolai Vavilov.

There are plenty more, so come on in and browse the new books area! Or browse the new list online.

ACS Publications Unavailable this Weekend

On the weekend of November 15–16, 2008, the American Chemical Society Publications website will be unavailable as they deploy a dynamic new web delivery platform, hosting all 34 ACS Journals on a platform rich with new features and functionality. A flash-based demo showcasing many of the features and benefits of the new site is available at: http://pubs.acs.org/flashdemo

Download what you need before 8:30 a.m. Saturday!

Former CIA Director Woolsey on National Security and Oil

From Scientific American special editions, October 2008:
For National Security, Get Off Oil
Former CIA director R. James Woolsey says America's oil dependence is a grave threat
By Stephen D. Solomon

"At R. James Woolsey’s farm in southern Maryland, solar panels on the roof of his house send electricity back to the utility grid when his family is not using much power. And he drives a Toyota Prius hybrid with a conversion kit that enables him to recharge the car’s battery pack using an extension cord and household current."
Read more at Scientific American online
SciAm.com > Special Editions > Energy > Automotive Technology

Interested in learning more about hybrid cars and other energy technologies, from a physics perspective? Here's a fascinating new book that has just been cataloged on OBIS: Physics of societal issues : calculations on national security, environment, and energy / David Hafemeister. New York : Springer, c2007
Available online to OhioLINK libraries at springerlink.com. Link there from OBIS.

"Forward linking" in JSTOR

JSTOR continues to expand in the number of journal titles archived and in the wonderful flexibility of its search features. It also provides an easy way to jump from the archive to more recent issues of any journal title, through links to publishers' web sites and the OhioLINK Electronic Journal Center when appropriate.

BROWSE BY DISCIPLINE is a quick way to see all of the content in a broadly defined subject area. The biological sciences are well-represented in JSTOR, but physical and chemical studies are plentiful in the General Science category. See, for example:

Philosophical Transactions: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences Vol. 358, No. 1766, Jan., 2000

Science into the Next Millenium: Young Scientists Give Their Visions of the Future: II: Chemistry and Biological Physics.

Science titles added to the JSTOR archives in the past few months include:
Ambio
American Biology Teacher
Botanical Review
Economic Botany
Flora Neotropica
Folia Geobotanica
Oecologia

Create a MyJSTOR account, and you can take advantage of some great new features, such as exporting saved citations directly to RefWorks.

Have you tried RefWorks yet?

RefWorks is the newest bit of bibliographic nirvana the library offers. Okay, that's a wildly inaccurate overstatement and misuse of the true meaning of nirvana - but RefWorks is pretty darn nifty all the same. Get your references in order, all in the same electronic folder for a specific project or paper, have them formatted for you in just about any style you desire, share your references with research team members, and get in-text citations inserted in your manuscript as you write... all from a web-accessible server that you can access from any networked computer anywhere. Export citations directly from dozens of databases into your RefWorks account, and it even saves those handy FIND IT links to the full-text. You can also import all of those references you've stored on your computer with some other bibliographic management utility, and have the benefit of accessing those citations from anywhere! Want more information? Contact me and I'll walk you through the process - or get started on your own at refworks.com. Create your individual account and you'll be on your way.

Intriguing Reference Titles on the New Book Shelf.

Two of the new titles we received in our latest shipment of new books are:

• Encyclopedia of Scientific Principles, Laws, and Theories / Robert E. Krebs. 2 vols.
• The Senses: a Comprehensive Reference / Stuart Firestein, et al., editors. 6 vols.
  

Both are excellent sources for succinct and clear explanations of complex phenomena. Reading through the first title is far more entertaining than one might suspect, covering ancient to very recent principles, laws and theories in one alphabetical sequence. From Ptolemy's Theory of a Geocentric Universe to Schneider's Theory of Biological Systems and Climate Change, the 2-volume set covers a lot of ground. Just scanning the table of contents is enlightening, given the wide range of subjects offered. Take a look!

The Senses is far more in-depth in its presentation, providing longer articles on very specific topics (Neurotransmitters in the taste pathway; Aquatic animal models in the study of chemoreception; and Genomics of invertebrate olfaction are just three articles out of 220 or so). Each article is supported by numerous references to primary literature, so this is a very good starting point for research. Good illustrations and photographs add to its usefulness.

There are many other enticing books on the new book shelf - stop by and enjoy looking at the book covers and reading blurbs, at least, in between class and lab.

Intro to Permaculture: Ecological Edible Landscapes

Invitation to a Workshop on September 20, sponsored by OEFFA and Cleveland Museum of Natural History.

Explore the basics of permaculture, a system of design that uses principles and processes found in nature to create food, fuel, and fiber for people, while caring for the earth and its inhabitants.

Focus on edible forest gardens; gardens which look and function like forests and provide food for people in urban and rural homes alike. From the design through planting and care, expert designers Josh Beniston of Habitats Landscaping and Brett Joseph of Conneaut Creek Farm will tell how to create such a garden anywhere.

$45 OEFFA members/ $60 non-members. Class size is limited so sign up early! Please bring your own brown bag lunch.

To register, send your check, along with your name, address, phone number and email to: OEFFA Workshops, 41 Croswell Road, Columbus OH 43214. Questions can be directed to laura@oeffa.org or 614-421-2022.

Cleveland Museum of Natural History, Classroom A
1 Wade Oval Drive, University Circle, Cleveland OH 44106-1767
Saturday, Sept 20 - 9am-5pm

Get Oriented! New Student Tours of the Library on Friday

All of the campus libraries offer orientation tours for new students on Friday [complete orientation schedule, pdf]. You could make a day of wandering through all of our spaces! We suggest that you choose just one branch library to visit in addition to the VERY important introduction to the Main Library in Mudd. Plus, you get cookies and punch (maybe lemonade) when you take the Main Library tour... nice.

Science library tours are Friday afternoon @ 1:00, 1:30, 2:00 and 2:30. Only 20 minutes in length! You'll get to practice using the movable, compact shelving, find the current issue of Nature, check out a good study carrel to claim for the semester, and take a post-tour nap in a window seat, if you're so inclined. Nappers always welcome. See you Friday!

From Waltzing Planets and Nanostructures to Volcanoes and Flamingos

New books arrived last week, by the dozens. Quick, while there are just a few lovely weeks of summer left, grab a new book and head for the shade of the nearest tree on your lunch break. So many fascinating titles to explore! In addition to the tantalizing keywords in our blogpost title, we have new books on wildlife conservation in China, genomic approaches to stem cell biology, mycorrizhal symbiosis, scientific exploration of the dreaming brain, bacterial communication, and biogas generation from waste. You're sure to learn something new by even a cursory review of the new book shelf!

The Science Library, circa Summer 2002

I came across this photo while sorting through a drawer recently, and felt nostalgic at the sight of so many print journal issues! Just look at all those lovely things. The biology section of the current journals area is practically overflowing. This was taken early in the summer of 2002, after our first academic year in the new Science Center, and we were apparently gathering journals for binding (note the stacks of issues lying on top of the low shelving). Within just a few months more than 70 of these print titles were cancelled, in favor of online-only access at the OhioLINK Electronic Journal Center, and we have continued to reduce the print collection since then. How quickly things can change!

New Faculty and Student Publication: FitzGerald, et al., Phys Rev B

Stephen FitzGerald and Affiliate Scholar Jesse Rowsell have collaborated with a number of OC students to publish new research findings in Physical Review B. Student collaborators and their anticipated (or actual) dates of graduation are listed at the end of this posting.

S. A. FitzGerald, K. Allen, P. Landerman, J. Hopkins, J. Matters, R. Myers, and J. L. C. Rowsell, "Quantum Dynamics of Adsorbed H2 in the Microporous Framework MOF-5 Analyzed using Diffuse Reflectance Infrared Spectroscopy"

Physical Review B 77, 224301 (2008).

Thanks to Jesse Rowsell for providing this information: "Employing hydrogen as an energy carrier continues to be a lofty goal, with significant technological challenges remaining unmet. Storing the supercritical gas, both safely and efficiently, is a particularly difficult endeavour for vehicular power generation, i.e. using fuel cells. To improve hydrogen storage densities, several classes of sorbent materials have been identified. Only a handful of analytical tools are currently available to assist scientists in understanding the interaction between H2 and these materials, some requiring very expensive instrumentation and limited resources, such as nuclear reactors.

"Our work involves the use of a compact infrared spectrometer equipped with a sample chamber that can be pressurized with hydrogen gas and cooled to temperatures approaching 10 K (-263°C). Under these conditions, hydrogen molecules stick to the surface of the sorbent material and their rotational and vibrational motion--which is quantum mechanical--can be analyzed. Ultimately, the spectral data provide information on the strength of the H2 binding at discrete sites on the material's surface, allowing an assessment of its performance. As we analyze a wider array of sorbents, correlations between their structures and properties should emerge, providing some direction for enhancing their hydrogen storage efficiencies."

Student collaborators:
Jesse Hopkis 2009
Patrick Landreman 2008
John Matters 2008
Kelty Allen 2007
Ross Myers 2007

The mighty Mustard seed: an alternative to methyl bromide and a green fuel source

Methyl bromide is an effective and highly toxic biocide used widely in strawberry fields of California. It is also one of the last major contributors to the hole in the ozone layer. The EPA has established more stringent guidelines for pesticide use, to protect agriculture workers, and alternatives to methyl bromide are actively being researched. Living On Earth considers one promising alternative in this week's show: ground-up mustard seed being developed by Farm Fuel Incorporated. Listen to the radio show [download mp3 file] or read the transcript.

[image from G.S. Dunn, Dry Mustard Millers]

Farm Fuel Inc. is also involved in developing biodiesel for transit buses. Scott Doggett, a contributor to Green Car Advisor, tells more in his post "This Biodiesel Plan's a Spicy One!"

Geological Context for the Wenchuan Earthquake

The July issue of GSA Today, published for members of the Geological Society of America (GSA), includes an indepth study of the geological and geophysical factors of the recent deadly earthquake in China.

Given the world-wide interest in this devastating event, the GSA has made the article available for open access.

The books just keep on coming!

Another large shipment of new books brings many more possibilities for your summer reading list. Continuing the garden theme, we offer Gods and goddesses in the garden : Greco-Roman mythology and the scientific names of plants, by Peter Bernhardt. There is something for everyone on the new book shelf, whether you're looking for an explanation of the placebo effect or want to explore the color of butterfly wings or are anxious to identify a spotted tail quoll (see color plate 1 of Trees, truffles, and beasts for a close up of that carnivorous marsupial). The universe and solar system are featured in several new titles, as is sedimentary geology. Not to be missed is Bonk: the curious coupling of science and sex, by Mary Roach, best-selling author of Stiff. Alternative reproductive tactics provides a rather drier but no less fascinating approach to studying sexual behavior. Do stop by and find a book for yourself. Gracious, it is nearly the end of June! So many options, so little time ...before required reading takes over students' lives.

Summer Reading is Here!

Our newest shipment of books includes great titles to see you through the summer. Chemistry in the garden by James Hanson, published by the Royal Society of Chemistry, is a fine introduction to natural products chemistry in common plants possibly growing in your own backyard.

The Mystery of the Missing Antimatter "is at once a history of ideas and an exploration of modern science and the frontiers of human knowledge" [from the publisher, Princeton Univ. Press].

There are dozens more on the new book list! Selected keywords from the list will whet your appetite for good reading: Archimedes, Hiroshima, stem cell ethics, feminist science, DNA & evolution, nanosilicon, death in the Cretaceous, seashells, parasitoids, sexual behavior, synergy, biomass combustion, hydrogen future, neuroeconomics, Amazon, stream ecology...

stop in and check out a few. Heard of a good book we should order? Tell us! email aricker at oberlin.edu. Thanks.

New Report from NSTC: Effects of Global Change on U.S.

The National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) has released its report, Scientific Assessment of the Effects of Global Change on the U.S., dated May 2008.

As reported by Andrew C. Revkin in the New York Times (May 28, 2008, p. A14), "The rise in concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from human activities is influencing climate patterns and vegetation across the United States and will significantly disrupt water supplies, agriculture, forestry and ecosystems for decades." Among the more sobering conclusions of the report are the predictions of wide-spread water shortages in the western U.S., with dire consequences for populations and agriculture, and the migration of invasive species adversely impacting ecosystems throughout North America.

Healthy biodiversity, essential for ecosystem maintenance, is predicted to suffer as species struggle to adapt to rising temperatures, and conditions that encourage parasitic-induced disease as well as competition for resources and suitable reproductive habitats. From the Executive Summary: "The resilience of many ecosystems is likely to be exceeded this century by an unprecedented combination of climate change, associated disturbances (e.g., flooding, drought, wildfire, insects, ocean acidification), and other global change drivers (e.g., land use change, pollution)." Read the Summary and Findings.

Faculty publication: A. J. Roles in Evolution, May 2008

Angela J. Roles, Visiting Assistant Professor of Biology, has published a portion of her doctoral dissertation in this month's issue of Evolution:

"Fitness effects of mutation accumulation in a natural outbred population of wild radish (Raphanus raphanistrum): comparison of field and greenhouse environments."
vol. 62 (May): 1066-1075.

This issue was not yet accessible on either the BioOne or OhioLINK EJC servers at the time of this posting, but it will be very soon. In the meantime, you can read the print issue in the library.

US Lists Polar Bear as Threatened Species

From the Natural Resources Defense Council, taken from Associated Press and NRDC Press Release, May 14:

"Faced with Scientific Evidence on Global Warming, Court Order, and Public Pressure, Government Grants Polar Bear Endangered Species Act Listing Due to Global Warming."

Despite listing polar bear as a species requiring protection under the Endangered Species Act, the first such listing attributed to loss of habitat due to global warming, Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said it would be "inappropriate" to use the listing as an impetus to address global warming generally or reduction of greenhouse gases specifically. Learn more at Defenders of Wildlife.

Darwin Online

On this date… May 14, 1856

Charles Darwin, then 47, sits down in the study of his country home in Down, England, and starts to write On the Origin of the Species.*

You can now read Darwin’s publications and correspondence online!

The Complete Works of Charles Darwin Online

The Darwin Correspondence Project

*from: The Illustrated Almanac of Science, Technology, and Invention.

Amphibians Slipping Away: one third of all species threatened

From Defenders of Wildlife eNews:
"Frogs, salamanders and other amphibians are on a slippery path to extinction. Habitat loss, disease, global warming and other factors are taking their toll. Worldwide, a third of these key players in the web of life are considered threatened -- making amphibians the most vulnerable group of animals in the world.

"This month, Defenders Magazine profiles the plight of these slick critters -- and takes a look at what people are doing to save them."

Learn more about amphibians in this recent book in our reference collection:
The ecology & behavior of amphibians / Kentwood D. Wells

Laptop policy updated - 2 iBooks available for overnight use.

Please read our revised lending policy for the laptop loaners, available to students, faculty and staff with current and valid OCID.

Highlights: iBook G4s may go out overnight - but must be back by 10am the next day (Mon-Fri) or by 1pm the next day if borrowed on Friday or Saturday afternoon. There is now a penalty fee of $20 (ouch!) for unauthorized overnight use, so PLEASE pay attention to the due time and our closing times!

Robert Krulwich honored by Webby Award selection

Fans of Radio Lab will heartily support the selection of Robert Krulwich, OC '69, as an Official Honoree of the 12th Annual Webby Awards. Robert Krulwich — and his team of Odd Todd and BPP Video Producer Win Rosenfeld — were honored in the Online Film and Video - Best Use of Animation/Motion Graphics category, for their cartoon feature It's All About Carbon, part of NPR's Climate Connections series.

Visit the site:
Global Warming: It’s All About Carbon, Cartoon Series Main Page

'Fearless' Campaign Covered by NPR

Tune into NPR.org for yesterday's story on Oberlin's Fearless campaign. It's interesting listening, and Dan Bobkoff of member station WCPN in Cleveland does a good job of presenting different points of view.

All Things Considered, May 1, 2008 · A top-notch Ohio college's two-year-old marketing campaign — "We Are Oberlin: Fearless" — is the subject of internal mockery from Oberlin students.

Thanks to Kolleen for sharing this.

An April Shower of New Books!

The last week of April has showered us with new books, thanks to those fine folks working in the main library who order, process and catalog new materials. Look at all of these great new titles! No fewer than eight books are devoted to climate change and global warming; some are focused on the politics of implementing solutions, others present scientists' findings, two are devoted to predictions of how global warming will change Earth and human society, and one considers governmental censoring of Dr. James Hansen. Hansen was one of the first to bring the climate crisis to the public's attention, with testimony to Congress in the 1980s.

The Guardian (April 7, 2008) reported on Hansen's latest paper, co-published with eight others in arXiv, on appropriate targets for levels of atmospheric carbon.

Books on animal societies and behavior are also well-represented in this latest shipment: rhesus monkeys, gorillas, turtles, rodents, hornbills, eagles, ants and lizards - oh my! There are plenty of titles to entice those of you reading chemistry, geology, physics and other aspects of biology as well.

National DNA Day

I hope you are already aware that today is National DNA Day. And the day is half gone at the time of this posting... tsk! Now, if there is one thing we can all celebrate - and I do mean ALL - it is Deoxyribonucleic Acid! Gracious, we would be nothing without it, and Earth would be quite a different place. So give thanks for your genetic code, much of which you share in common with the rest of living organisms (evolution is a MARVELOUS thing). Squirmy worms, flying fowl, leaping lemurs... and us! Not so different on a molecular level, really.* There's still time to chat online about all things DNA-ish. Talk with the scientists at Genome.gov.

*How similar are we to those other species? I'm glad you asked! Here's the answer I received to that question on genome.gov:
Mary Schueler, Ph.D.

This expert's focus:
Comparing the DNA sequence of essential chromosomal regions from multiple primates to define functional changes that have occurred during evolution.

: Generally, human DNA is most similar to more closely related species like the great apes - chimp, gorilla, and orangutan. These are more closely related to us in evolutionary time. Species that have been separated from us for longer periods of time share less similarity. As you compare with species farther away from us on the evolutionary tree, we observe that DNA sequences that code for proteins are conserved while other sequence is not. This is thought to be due to the necessary function of the proteins in the life of the cell. If the sequence changes, the cell can't survive. We are less than 90% similar to most other species. Even within the primate lineage, as compared to old world monkeys, protein coding sequences can vary by as much as 15% (be 85% similar). As you move further away to mice and flies and yeast, the percentage similarity falls off quite a bit.

Earth Day! Get out there... read a book in the shade.

And what a glorious day it is.
Lie on the grass.
Breathe in the scent of magnolias.
Love the earth.
Take a book out with you!

A few suggestions:

• Beyond Earth Day. Main Library GE195.N45 2002
• Earth: the sequel. Science Library TJ163.4.U6 K78 2008
• Humanity's Footprint. Main Library GF75.D65 2008
  

Or Listen to the audio recordings of speakers at the Climate Change Solutions symposium... an excellent way to remind us that every day is Earth Day.

Climate Change Solutions for Ohio - Symposium highlights

Reporting from the Climate Change Solutions Symposium in the Science Center's West Lecture Hall : here are a few of the solutions highlighted so far this morning -

• The technology that will save humanity "The solar energy you haven't heard of is the one best suited to generate clean electricity for generations to come." By Joseph Romm. Salon.com April 13, 2008
  

• A Renewed Push for Ethanol, Without the Coal. New York Times, April 17, 2007
• Cellulosic Ethanol - Renewable Fuels Association
  
• Wind Industry and Projects for Ohio Richard Stuebi, BP Fellow for Energy and Environmental Advancement
• Midwest Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership (on DOE Web site) and MRCSP.org
• The Wedge Stabilization model - supported by Dow Chemical, as outlined by Princeton Professors Socolow and Pacala in their article, "A Plan to Keep Carbon in Check", which appeared in the September 2006 issue of Scientific American.
• Solar Design Associates
  

How Science Will Heal the Earth

On the current periodical display shelf this week is Discover's special issue: How Science Will Heal the Earth. Read how to go carbon neutral, learn what food has no carbon footprint, and the daring plan to reclaim water.

Also check out A Science Fair for a Better Planet: "A contest to show Discover—and the rest of the humans—how to help Mother Earth". You can enter your own ideas in what is being billed as the World's biggest Show and Tell.

ScienceDebate 2008 - an appeal to the candidates

Sciencedebate 2008 is a citizen-led initiative to focus the presidential debate on matters of scientific inquiry and the urgent need for accurate scientific information in policy decisions. The call for presidential candidates to engage in a science-focused debate is rapidly becoming more wide-spread and publicized, with thousands of individuals joining the effort. Read the policy forum piece in the April 11 Science magazine, and see the many other news highlights at the Sciencedebate2008 web site.

Celebrate Science Poetry During National Poetry Month

April is National Poetry Month! A fine time to read science in verse - or communicate science in verse.

Consider:
"Shall not geology, which is the first science in affording scope for the imagination, be brought into favor with the Muses, and afford themes for the Poet?"
—Edward Hitchcock, Jr., 1849

You would surely enjoy the The Biochemist's Songbook (take to your next fireside sing-along and amaze your friends with references to complex biochemical pathways).

FirstScience.com offers an entire section on poetry.

The poetry collection in the main library is brimming with science-themed compositions - go explore books with call numbers that begin PS3551, for starters. You can spend a life-time there.

Submit your own science poetry here! Just leave a comment with your creative lines. We'll post your submissions in the science library at the end of April. An award (very modest, possibly edible) might be in the offing!

Go Green with GreenFILE from EBSCO

EBSCO has released a new, free, database for environmental literature. Give it a try!

From the EBSCO press release:
GreenFILE offers a unique perspective on the positive and negative ways humans affect the ecology. The initial release will include abstracting and indexing for more than 600 titles, including comprehensive coverage – from to volume 1, issue 1 to present – for Bioscience (back to 1964), Conservation Biology (back to 1987), Journal of Ecology (back to 1913) and Journal of Environmental Planning & Management (back to 1948). The total number of records is approximately 295,000, and full text is provided for more than 4,600 records from open access titles.

Check out our DVD collection

We've recently pulled the DVDs out of the closed cupboard behind the circulation desk and put them in the browsing rack along with the CD-ROM collection. It's right on your way to the iMac lab - so pause there for a moment, and see what's available. It's a very small collection, but offers excellent viewing (and educational!) opportunities.

See the list of DVDs owned by the Science Library [pdf].

Cognitive Neuroscience of Music

Robert Zatorre, co-editor of The Cognitive Neuroscience of Music, will be on campus for a lecture on April 2.

Stop by the library for a look at some related reading now on display in the front window. Although this book and other closely related titles are currently checked out from Oberlin's library, you can find other copies available through OhioLINK.

Downtown bookstores offer copies of Zatorre's work, along with two other fascinating books for the general reader : Daniel Levitin's This is Your Brain on Music and Musicophilia: tales of music and the brain, by Oliver Sacks.

Read a chapter or two, even if you think you don't have time - it's good for the brain! Possibly even better if you take a break and sing or play an instrument in between chapters...

Spring Break is coming! Need access from off-campus?

The sun is shining and Spring Break is just one day away - surely a better outlook than yesterday's drizzle which became falling slush before the snow set in once again. I hope everyone who plans to leave campus for a well-deserved week of relaxation and recreation does that just - but if you must also squeeze in a bit of research and need access to our subscription resources (how could you go a week without reading Nature and Science online?), remember to visit this page for login instructions. Easier still, download the VPN client from the CIT web page and launch that for seamless access to everything the library offers online.

Birds of the World - on our shelves

We have now received 11 volumes of the acclaimed Handbook of the Birds of the World, published by the Spanish publishing house Lynx Edicions. This is a monumental work, gorgeously illustrated with color plates, and certain to be a valued source of important information for decades. We will continue to receive volumes as they are published, as a wonderful complement to the Birds of North America (available online and in print).

Read reviews of published volumes from various journals archived in the OhioLINK Electronic Journal Center. Wikipedia provides a very nice overview of the set, complete with all contents of volumes published to date. The most recently received volumes are on display with the new books, others are in the reference section.

Image taken from the jacket cover of vol. 8: Broadbills to Tapaculos, illustrated by Frances Jutglar. Black-and-red Broadbill (Cymbirhynchus macrorhynchos).

African plants photographed and desribed in Aluka

Aluka.org is a new resource for the library, offering many digital collections at one site. Its mission is to build a "digital library of scholarly sources from and about Africa." Aluka is an international collaboration, bringing together in one digital resource materials that are archived around the world. Read more about Aluka and explore the plant database. Enjoy the picture of the day, which frequently highlights a plant from the archive, including the Pretoria African Plant Slide Collection, just one of many collections contributed to Aluka.

Dragons and Damsels! Flies, that is... in OdonataCentral

OdonataCentral, sponsored by the Texas Natural Science Center of UT Austin, is just about the coolest thing since a new insect order was discovered in 2002. If you are an Odonata enthusiast (and why wouldn't you be?) this will become a favorite way to view dragonflies and damselflies without leaving your keyboard. The distribution maps are searchable and interactive, so you can locate, within seconds, all reported occurrences of a given species within a certain locale. Give it a try! In addition to the maps, OdonataCentral offers hundreds of amazing photographs (Red Saddlebags is just one example of exquisite detail), detailed identification records, an extensive bibliography of journal articles with its own search interface, back issues of the journals Bulletin of American Odonatology and Argia, and a well-organized list of related Web sites.

Thanks to Dr. John C. Abbot, Curator of Entomology, Texas Natural Science Center of University of Texas, Austin, for making such a fine and reliable source of information openly accessible, and to all contributors of OdonataCentral for building the database. John Abbott is author of Dragonflies and Damselflies of Texas and South-Central United States, which you can borrow through OhioLINK.