Science Buzz Lunch in Building 2, 6- 26-2012

Science Buzz Lunch in Building 2, 6- 26-2012

Topics discussed included:

1) Foods (including strawberries) that may be effective against pollen allergies

2) Non-harmful methods used to collect genetic material from Green Sea Turtles (a protected species) for population genetic analyses, and to tag individual turtles for tracking

3) The periodic shift of the magnetic poles of the sun, including a possible shift this year from the existence of 2 poles to the existence of 4 poles, and possible effects on the sun's activity level, and consequently on the earth's climate

4) The recent achievement of self-organizing optic-cup morphogenesis in three-dimensional cultures of human embryonic stem cells, and how this resolves a long debate over whether intrinsic cues drive optic cup morphogenesis (they do).

5)  The competition for scholarships awarded by the Tomizawa Jun-ichi & Keiko Fund of Molecular Biology Society of Japan for Young Scientists

Science Buzz Lunch in Mixer Room, Building 1, 6-22-2012

Science Buzz Lunch in Mixer Room, Building 1, 6-22-2012

Topics discussed included:

1) Genes involved in controlling axial patterning during regeneration in planarians

2)  RNA and protein quality control mechanisms in various organisms

3) Attempts and roadblocks to determine the whole genome sequence of planarian

4) The recent paper:

Structure of yeast Argonaute with guide RNA

by Kotaro Nakanishi et al.

Nature Vol 486, pg 368ff 21 June 2012

Science Buzz Lunch in Building 1, Mixer Room, 6-15-2012

Science Buzz Lunch in Building 1, Mixer Room, 6-15-2012

Topics discussed included:

1)  How important is it to adhere to the time schedule of the program for scientific meetings by strictly adhering to the time allotted for each speaker's talk?

Do meeting organizers, session chairmen, speakers, and audiences in different countries tend to have different values about the importance of adhering to the time schedule of such programs?

2) What was the most interesting thing you learned at this week's RNA Sciences in Cell and Developmental Biology II meeting  at the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology in Kobe this week? For some, it was the talk presented by Aki Hayashi entitled:

HP1/Swi6 Acts in Concert with Ers1 to Regulate RNAi-directed Heterochromatin Assembly


Dr. Hayashi and her colleagues have a recent paper on the same topic in PNAS titled:

Heterochromatin protein 1 homologue Swi6 acts in concert with Ers1 to regulate RNAi-directed heterochromatin assembly

3)  Why are "Ivy League" universities in the USA called "Ivy League"? Hints: the name is historically related to both sports and the New England climate.


4) Evolutionary importance and mechanisms of quality control mechanisms for protein and RNA  

Science Buzz Lunch in Building 1, Mixer Room, 6-8-2012

Science Buzz Lunch in Building 1, Mixer Room, 6-8-2012

Topics discussed included:

1) Surgical technique for partial amputation of newt midbrain

2) Role of Oct4 gene homolog in controlling stem cell proliferation in Hydra

3) The great progress in recent years in elucidating the RNA-directed mechanism by which the Tetrahymena germline micronucleus (generally transcriptionall silent; containing 10 chromosomes) gives rise to the macronucleus (transcriptionally active; containing over 20,000 chromosomes produced by fragmentation and amplification of the gene regions from the micronucleus), reviewed in:

 Developmentally programmed, RNA-directed genome rearrangement in Tetrahymena


by Kazufumi Mochizuki

in Develop. Growth Differ. (2012) 54, 108 - 119

Science Buzz Lunch in Building 2, Room 107

Topics discussed included:


1)  Super computer K (named for the Japanese word "kei", meaning 10 quadrillion) (with LINPACK performance of over 10 petaflops; produced jointly by RIKEN and Fujitsu), and its proposed applications:

Field 1 Predictable life science, healthcare and drug discovery foundation
Field 2 New Materials and Energy Creation
Field 3 Projection of Planet Earth Variations for Mitigating Natural Disasters
Field 4 Next-generation manufacturing technology
Field 5 The origin of matter and the universe 

and artificial intelligence computer system Watson (produced by IBM), and its myriad applications as a "question-answering machine".

2)  The specialized mechanism of motility of the sperm of the green tree frog, Rhacophorus arboreus, that enables these sperm to move in the highly viscous environment of the egg-containing "foam nest" that females of this species construct on vegetation.

This mechanism was elucidated in the publication:

A novel mechanism of sperm motility in a viscous environment: corkscrew-shaped spermatozoa cruise by spinning.

Muto K, Kubota HY.

Cell Motil Cytoskeleton. 2009 May;66(5):281-91.


3) The recent sighting of fireflies along the nearby Philosopher's Path


4) News about a study showing that the blue light from LED displays and fluorescent lights interferes harmfully with people's circadian rhythm


5) The insights into the evolution of birds gained from the study published recently in the journal Nature online in the paper:


Birds have paedomorphic dinosaur skulls


by Bhart-Anjan S. Bhullar et al.

Science Buzz Lunch Schedule for June, 2012

Science Buzz Lunch:

What:  Free discussion in English about what’s new (“the buzz”) in your science  -- everyone interested in science is welcome

Topics discussed will be blogged at:  sciencebuzzlunch.blogspot.com

Where & When:

Monday, June 4, 25:  Building 2, Room 107; 12:00 – 13:00

Friday, June 1, 8, 15, 22, 29:  Bldg 1, Room 214 (Mixer Room); 12:00 – 13:00

Thursday, June  ?, Institute for Chemical Research (Uji Campus);  12:00 – 13:00

                                           Contact: Elizabeth Nakajima, PhD, Leader      

                                     Building 1, Room 216