ANGER

Yesterday, I experienced a human feeling often associated with something negative, the worst sensations in human behavior: ANGER, well in fact it was almost king of RAGE. The reasons, of course are personal, however, this event has make me reflect on the nature of anger, according to Jezova et al., (1995) rage occurs when oxytocin, vasopressin, and corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) are rapidly released from the hypothalamus. This results in the pituitary gland producing and releasing large amounts of the adrenocorticotropic hormone, which causes the adrenal cortex to release corticosteroids. The most amazing thing that I found was that oxytocin and vasopressin were related to anger, if oxytocin is mostly of the times called the "love hormone" and vasopressin, which is related to increase the blood pressure (now I realize, why I felt that my blood was boilling meanwhile I was playing my "rage-scene" (not-proud)), but related too, like CRH, to human behavior... so... Is this anger or rage, natural or common in human beings? Or is another i-dont-like inheritance of our pre-humans ancesters which we try to avoid?

I don't know, maybe is a non-desirable feeling, but... In fact is a feeling, that make us humans, am I right? Is like happiness and sadness... no?

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.
Mark Twain

Anger is one of the sinews of the soul.
Thomas Fuller

Finalmente... ¿indignados mexicanos???

Hoy en la mañana me sorprendió ver por primera vez una protesta física en el Congreso del Estado contra el endeudamiento de Coahuila, y en cierta manera en contra de la clase política mexicana... y a parte con máscaras de Guy Fawkes.

De acuerdo a las noticias, estos indignados son artístas locales, antitaurinos y estudiantes, los cuales protestaron en contra del endeudamiento del estado, el incremento de los impuestos y las corridas de toros.

Me pregunto si algún día llegaremos a ver un "Occupy Bolsa Mexicana de Valores"

Por cierto, a la gente que está en favor de las corridas de toros: eso NO ES ARTE, NO ES CULTURA.

A todos los demás... disminuyamos o eliminemos nuestros consumos de carne (esas tambien son vidas).

Madame Curie

Joyeux 144eme Anniversaire, Madame Curie¡¡¡

Como estudiante, la vida de Marie Curie siempre me ha parecido fascinante, si no hubiera existido Marie Lavoissiere, consideraría llamarle la Madre de la Química a esta polaco-francesa, doble ganadora del Nobel, primera profesora de la Soborna en París, con motivo de su cumpleaños, quiero postear estos dos artículos que ví en el NYT ayer, el primero, muy interesante (algo que ya hemos comentado en el Lab) sobre el desinterés del estudio de las Ciencias Exactas; y los otros dos, sobre el rol de la mujer en la ciencia (que mejor manera de honrar a Madame Curie) y el status de ésta (donde éstan las mujeres en la Ciencia), por increible que parezca, jejeje están enfocadas en la Biología, haber que piensan mis compañeras sobre ésto:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/06/education/edlife/why-science-majorschange-their-mind-its-just-so-darn-hard.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=general

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/06/education/edlife/closing-the-girl-gap-in-science.html?_r=1&ref=edlife

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/06/education/edlife/where-the-women-are-biology.html?ref=edlife

The real 5th of November

Remember, remember the fifth of November,
The gunpowder treason and plot,
I know of no reason
Why the gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot...

Really, this is one of my top 5 movies... V of Vendetta. Why? 'Cause I love dystopias, besides, there's Natalie Portman on it.

But, what many of us didn't know is the true behind the identity of this popular mask ... Guy Fakes... is this guy for real? does he try to blow up the british parliament? The answer for both questions is... YES.

On 5th November 1605 a York man, Guy Fawkes, was discovered about to ignite 36 barrels of gunpowder underneath the Houses of Parliament. His aim was to spark a Catholic revolution.

Fawkes was born in York in 1570, probably at a house in Stonegate. He was baptised in St Michael le Belfrychurch on April 13. His father Edward, a church lawyer and a prominent Protestant in the city, died when Guy was only eight years old.

His mother remarried, to a Catholic, and they moved to the village of Scotton, near Knaresborough. Fawkes’ schooling continued in York, at St Peter’s. His schoolmates included brothers John and Christopher Wright, who were later destined to join the gunpowder plot. Christopher, or ‘Kit’, was the same age as Guy Fawkes.

In the 1570’s and 80’s York was a centre of the Catholic resistance. About the time that Fawkes himself converted he would have been aware of a particularly brutal example of the religion’s suppression. In 1586 Margaret Clitherow was publicly executed for protecting Priests in her home.

As an adult Fawkes inherited property in York, at Gillygate and Clifton. But on his 21st birthday he sold his estate and enlisted in the Catholic Spanish army. He spent his next ten years fighting for Spain, becoming commander of a unit of soldiers and an expert in explosives. In Madrid Fawkes met up again with Kit Wright and they joined a group of conspirators, who together plotted to murder King James and replace him with a Catholic monarch.

The plan was audacious and brutal. The plotters hired a cellar under Parliament and smuggled in the barrels of gunpowder. Fawkes stood guard. It was his role to light the fuse, then head to Flanders to raise forces who would join in the Catholic uprising in England.

After his arrest Guy was tortured. His school-fellows, John and Kit Wright, died in November 1605 when they were caught with other conspirators at Holbeche House in Staffordshire.

Then, in January 1606, Guy Fawkes himself was put to death in Westminster by hanging, drawing and quartering. His remains were sent to the four corners of the Kingdom as a warning to other plotters.

Will there be a real modern Guy Fakes out in our complicated time?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBadSmt2CIY

Occupy Wall Street - Environment & Science

How many times we haven't complained about the "injustices of the world"? how many times we haven't done anything to improve "these" things we do not like about society, life, & the world itself? All these questions came to my mind to see the latest PhD Comics, which is added to this post; removing the background of humor to the academia and students which characterizes this comic, for the second or third time... I began to think seriously about the phenomenon of the INDIGNANTS in Spain, NY, and now all over the world (Rome, Greece, Paris, to name the most "outrageous"). Definitely something is very wrong with the economic system that prevails in the world (finally I accept it), and is not that the other "ism's" (socialism, communism, communism in the XXI century, etc) have the reason.

Is this the beginning of the end of capitalism? What's next? In my very limited understanding of the global economy, it seems that a group of protesters in Battery Park or the Plaza del Sol would not shake the global economic system, but... hey!!!! Revolutions start with small & blinking sparks of ideologies that join towns and even the entire world to their philosophy, just ask Marie Antoinette, if she ever realize how the revolution that behead her, change the destiny of the World, if French Revolution had not detonated when it did, America would be very different from what it's today.

Let me hear what you think about all these changes in the World: Occupy Movements, World "Peace" (Gadaffi's dead, ETA's surrender, Iraq end of war, Mexico's drug war, etc)... this is the World that we are living, so like our Environment this will affect us (we are Microbiologist we know about this), in a personal & professional way... if we think that we work in a hard environment... pls read the Monod's Nobel Lecture... I was shocked when I realize that .. HE WAS WORKING ON BACTERIAL GROWTH DURING THE NAZI OCCUPATION OF FRANCE ... ¬¬ and we complain 'cause we work on Sunday¡¡¡ <--- speechless

So, please, let us (Biorem Lab) know what u think about our "today" environment and how this could or could not affect our relation with Science & Research.

Have a nice Sunday¡¡¡

Aldo, I miss our discussions a lot, I hope we can keep it hereby. & Happy BDay again¡¡¡

Bon Voyage

Best wishes to Marina Montserrat Atilano Camino & Emilio Nafarrate Rivera for a happy journey and purposeful participation at IV International Conference on Environmental, Industrial and Applied Microbiology (BioMicroWorld2011) to be held at Malaga, Spain from 14-16, 2011. We hope that they will make use of this opportunity to better their professional career.

Bacterial interactions could save millions

This life is filled with amazing things.

Probably what amazes me the most is the interactions between organism or between molecules.

Our ancestors (including the LUCA) have found ways to channel the chemical interactions in our system towards certain goals for billions of years, and now we are just contemplating them and taking advantage of new ones. I leave this news note that i found fascinating.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-14761417

Bon Voyage

Hoy nos deja Andre Paola Arias Muñoz, deja Biorem, deja México. Después de una estancia de cuatro meses y 19 días regresa a Colombia. Te felicitamos enormemente por haber concluido tu pasantía. El laboratorio (o sea todos nosotros) sabemos que no te vas con las manos vacías, aunque nos hubiera gustado que te llevaras más. Y sinceramente esperamos que tus metas sean alcanzadas tal y como lo deseas. Aunque no lo dudamos, ya que si por ellas trabajarás de la misma forma en la que trabajaste durante tu estancia en Torreón, seguro lo lograrás.
¡¡Mucha suerte Andrea!! Keep moving forward!

Esperamos verte muy pronto. Bon Voyage!

Congrats Ale

Well done Ale. Our best wishes for lot more honors and laurels in your future, both in professional and personal. Your performance in TOEFL is another feather in your cap. Our best wishes are with you always to realize all your future dreams. But your constant efforts coupled with self-confidence is the only way by which you can realize all your dreams.

Felicidades otra vez, pero creo es el primero de muchos mas que vamos a felicitar usted en el futuro.

Software libre?

Antes que nada quiero pedir disculpas pues no usare acentos para esta publicacion y siento mucho los posibles dobles sentidos que de igual forma tratare de evitar.

En fin, recien he regresado a utilizar un sistema operativo de codigo abierto (Ubuntu 11.04) el cual funciona de maravilla a pesar de que es necesario batallar con algunos aspectos de incompatibilidades de hardware y con microsoft office (resalto office porque es ampliamente utilizado en usuarios de procesadores de texto), a lo que iba es que mi regreso a Ubuntu coincide con el uso de un programa estadistico que estamos utilizando en clase de bioestadistica. El dichoso programa no es gratis (no conozco el precio) y ante mi joven e inexperto impulso por aprender le cuestione a mi profesor sobre la opcion de utilizar algun programa estadistico de codigo libre, que podria dar la misma utilidad pero sin gastar algunos dolares (que a nadie le sobran). Mi pregunta hacia el Dr. surgio pues hace ya algunas semanas un recien PhD de no recuerdo que universidad, vino (arrivo, llego... changos todos llevan acento) a dar una conferencia sobre su trabajo en nanoparticulas metalicas en donde uso solamente programas de codigo abierto para crear complejas graficas de resistencias de materiales, metodos estadisticos y demas datos que hubo que procesar en su investigacion.

En fin, mi pregunta es: Es valido utilizar software codigo abierto para sustentar una investigacion?

No seria utilizar datos y/o procedimientos informaticos que cualquiera (cualquiera entre comillas pues los programas son bastante robustos) puede modificar? Se podria parecer esto a usar Wikipedia como referencia en cualquier manuscrito que se precie de ser confiable?

En fin dejo la siguiente pagina donde pueden revisar toooodos los programas que existen de ingenieria y ciencia http://sourceforge.net/.