Extending horizons with in Mexico

Lorena Palacio Molina (second on left hand side of Dr. Oropeza in photo) left yesterday (25th Feb., 2012) evening to Instituto de Biotecnologia, Cuernavaca, Morelos to carry out part of her thesis work with Dr. Ricardo Oropeza (in blue t-shirt at Centre of the photo), a distinguished alumini and a good friend of our Facultad, hopefully soon officially :-). She will be working on "mcrA gene of methanogens and its relevance in monitoring anaerobic biodigestors" until August, 2012 with Dr. Oropeza. We thank Dr. Oropeza for this collaboration and for accepting Lorena at his lab. We hope that this stay helps her to learn and look for more such learnings in her future.
Our best wishes to Lorena for a happy and productive stay at IBT.

Community Lab

What do you think about this BBC news?

A group of researchers has created the first community-run biology laboratory in New York City.

The lab is an effort to provide a home for amateur scientists, as well as professionals looking for a space away from academia and business.

The co-founder of Genspace says it is "crucial that this lab exists" in order to foster creativity in the sciences.

The BBC's Matt Danzico visited the Brooklyn facility, which originally opened in late 2010, at a building home to a range of professionals ranging from designers to pastry chefs.

Check the video:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-17033379

uppercut to the arsenic-life paper - Rosie's preprint

YEAH... in the middle of a controversial media fight against SOPA, PIPA, ACTA & others acts "against" piracy and copyright info's sharing. Rosie Redfield show us that PEER-REVIEW CAN BE PUBLIC, just two days ago the arsenic-life manuscript of Rosie's team was submitted to Science, reporting the lack of arsenate in the DNA of arsenate-grown GFAJ-1 cells, now this pre-print is available on the arXiv server at http://arxiv.org/abs/1201.6643.

Critical commentaries alredy started, so I'd like to see a good discussion about this in our lab, starting from here.

<-- i made this pic, with all my respect to Rosie Redfield & their team.

Milenio articles about BioremLab

This week our Lab has an interview with Milenio (Milenio Group) journalists, where we explain the latest projects which are being developed on Biorem Lab:


Estudiantes trabajan energía renovable

UA de C investiga energías alternativas


These are the first two articles of our group in the year, even this do not reflect the Lab productivity, this kind of articles help us to publicize the work that we are doing. 


I let u a list of previous articles about our group, about the work done by our friends Cheve, Natalia, Arge, Sarahí, Ale, Aldo, just for quote some of them:


University of Georgia and Mexican Universities focus on production of Biofuels in the agricultural sector.  (June, 2008)


Estudian las propiedades energéticas del Metano. (November 2008)


Buscan nuevos métodos para producir biogas. (November 2008)


Intercambio académico estudiantil en la UA de C. (January 2009)


Estudios sobre metano avanzan en Biológicas. (June 2009)

Talk with Diego Alberto Dévora Canales

Last Friday, we were lucky to have the chance of talk with Diego Alejandro, a former student of Biological Sciences (Class of 2008). His talk was very interesting. He explained us how he entered in the post-graduate program of CINVESTAV, Monterrey and explained his thesis project. It is an interesting multidisciplinary work.

  

His talk was really interesting. He explained how he study the motility of Trypanosoma cruzi and identify its relation to other known movements such as Brownian Motion and the Levy's Flight. His thesis work is related to one of your topics we discussed in March edition of BioSciences. For those who have forgotten, can consult the article about Chagas disease, entitled: Un mal que parece olvidado, la enfermedad de Chagas.

I do not even imagine that birds use mathematics to find food!!!

Diego's emails:
adevora@cinvestav.mx
die_go1984@hotmail.com








And... if you get lost in the woods... now you know how to survive:







Levy Flight (you will survive)                



 

        Brownian Motion (sorry for you)

Visita y Prácticas con estudiantes del Excelsior

La semana pasada, tuvimos la visita de estudiantes del Colegio Excelsior a Biorem Lab, los estudiantes pudieron estar en contacto con los integrantes de nuestro equipo de trabajo, realizaron 4 sencillas prácticas con el Microscopio de Fluorescencia, el Cromatógrafo de Gases, el Humedal Artificial Híbrido de Melisa y el Reactor UASB de Sol.


Esperamos que algunos de estos estudiantes se interesen en Ciencia, y que comiencen pronto su carrera como investigadores, recordemos que México está muy atrasado en el desarrollo de Ciencia Básica y Tecnología, así que para todos aquellos que quieran aprovechar las oportunidades que las instituciones mexicanas e internacionales ofrecen para el desarrollo de nuestra profesión, éstas ahí están disponibles, sin embargo, son sólo para los que están convencidos que la Ciencia e Investigación es lo que les gusta hacer, y es su prioridad; y están dispuestos a asumir las responsabilidades que con esto conlleva.


Les anexo unos links para que esten al pendientes de becas:


CONACYT:
http://www.conacyt.com.mx/


Hoy me mandó la Alianza Francesa esta convocatoria para distintas Universidades en París:
http://www.rbuce-up.eu/content/who-can-apply-and-how


Erasmus Mundus también abrió sus convocatorias para Europa:
http://becas.estudia.com.mx/becas+erasmus+mundus+mexicanos.htm#cuatro

Research Stay

IBQ. Argelia Cervantes Ovalle, Master's student of our lab left today to Charleston, WV, USA to carry out part of her thesis work for six months at the laboratory of Dr. David  Huber, Professor, Department of Biology, West Virginia State University, Institute, USA. 

Our thanks to Dr. David Huber for accepting Argelia at his lab and for all his help in making her research stay possible.

Our best wishes to Argelia for a fruitful and productive stay in terms of learning and research with Dr. David Huber and hope her efforts will strengthen collaboration between our labs.

LAB interpretation

"Here, we describe a bacterium, strain GFAJ-1 of the Halomonadaceae, isolated from Mono Lake, California, that is able to substitute arsenic for phosphorus to sustain its growth." for me, this means GFAJ-1 can live with Arsenic instead of Phosphorus, or not?

Natalia's Visit: Thank you!!!

Our laboratory was privileged again to see Natalia Montenegro, our colleague and friend. Currently she is in her second year of a master degree in biotechnology at West Virginia State University, along with our dearest friends Cheve and Aldo (Hi! guys), Natalia is part of Dr. David Huber's Lab, and is currently working whit Anaerobic Digestion.
Through a series of photographs, recalling her stay in our school and in our lab, explaining the lasts results of her projects and admiring some landscapes of the city where she lives now, she shared with us her experiences about getting a grand, and also her insight about the opportunities and challenges for Mexican students.
Among other things she told us that when there are something you really want, you should not stop trying, and that a consistent and timely preparation is the key to success in the entrance test. Finally, she concluded that despite the hard work you always have to keep smiling and because at the very end, the attitude is everything. Besides, we enjoy a very tasteful cake cause Ale's B-Day, congratulations to her!!
We're really grateful to Natalia, and waiting for her to come back soon. Cheve and Aldo are welcome to talk to us about their own experiences too, or even so, you can send us a video guys!!!

Atte. Ale & Emilio

Ya caigo (creo)

Luego de haber escuchado diversas explicaciones de los mismo, siempre me parecía confuso el verdadero significado. Explicado desde diferentes trincheras, el término me parecía ocioso. Yo no le veía sentido y mucho menos pensar en explicarle a alguien más el porque. ¡Y es que creo que tengo la respuesta!

Me refiero a ¿por qué el título PhD? Sí, sí unas palabras raras que en español vendrían siendo Doctor en Filosofía, pero porque filosofía? ¿Qué tiene de filosófico estudiar aún cuando puedes conseguir trabajo con el conocimiento que tienes? ¿Qué tan filosófico es crear conocimiento? Me parece que todo depende del individuo y precisamente ahí la tácita respuesta. Sin embargo me gustaría compartir un video explicativo, pues son pensamientos ilustrativos que me parecen simplemente complicados de explicar en un blog.

Sería como dudar del conocimiento existente o inexistente, tirar al diablo la facilidad del conformismo y aventurarse a la libertad del descubrimiento  de más conocimiento.