Chain Reaction

1 May 2017

Chain Reaction

This comic was dreamt up because our artist Jess had to have her wisdom tooth removed a few days ago. Fortunately the dentist was a bit more skilled than Dr Mad.

Rube Goldberg was, among other things, a cartoonist. In his cartoons he invented crazy convoluted machines to do simple tasks. There have been many different Rube Goldberg machines since, a famous example being Honda’s Cog advert.

↓ Transcript
Panel 1.
Dr Mad: Don't worry, dentistry is just applied physics!

Moustache

24 Apr 2017

Moustache

There are some surprising animals with moustaches. Some, like famous cats on the internet, just have a distinctive pattern on their fur. But others have hair that is much more similar to humans. Emperor Tamarins are the most obvious, with their very long moustaches. But what about horses?

Facial hair growth in humans could have an evolutionary advantage, in making the grower appear more dominant than his peers. In pandas, facial fur patterns appear to be used for social communication. Who knows how a moustache could help the social status of a panda?

↓ Transcript
Panel 2.
Prof Panda: And that's how I got my moustache

Eggs

16 Apr 2017

Eggs

The first study we can find that examines how light affects chicken egg production is from 1934. E.L. Dakan found that red artificial lights gave a greater egg yield than other colours, and blue light produced the least number of eggs. Since then, there have been many papers (often with conflicting results, probably because of the type of lighting used) examining specific wavelengths, durations and intensities of light on egg laying.

While red light gives you more eggs, these eggs tend to be smaller than for other colours. Er et al (2007) found that blue light gave shorter eggs than other colours. Green light seems to increase egg quality and many new chicken farms are using green LEDs in their lighting.

Hassan et al (2016) also included shifts from red to green LED light in their study, and showed that this gave a similar yield to pure red light. Considering the effect of green light on egg quality, this could be the best idea.

The causes for these effects are diverse. Green light appears to be activating retinal photoreceptors, possibly increasing serotonin levels. Red light stimulates hypothalamic extra-retinal photoreceptors through deep tissue penetration, which regulate reproduction.

Knowing all of this, it does make you wonder how urban lighting could affect humans

↓ Transcript
Panel 1.
Dr Mad: It's clear from your review paper on bird spectral sensitivity that light controls hormone release. I know how we can test this!

Panel 2.
Sign: Exclusive Disco! (Chickens go free)

Panel 5.
Chicken: BRAK

Panel 10.
Chicken: BRAK

IT Support

9 Apr 2017

IT Support

I’m grateful to have worked on both sides of this, first as a part-time IT guy while doing my PhD, then as a more research-oriented tech support, and finally as a researcher. There’s always going to be that one researcher who calls up IT without checking if their computer is plugged in, and there’s also the IT guy who doesn’t listen to the user and treats them like an idiot.

In universities there’s the problem that a lot of the users calling IT support are very clever people, who know their specialist field’s software inside and out, but can’t do some of the simplest computer tasks. And being in the IT team of a highly technical research department is challenging when there is so much specialist software. It’s one thing to work out why someone can’t print from pdf, but another when the PC is running with custom-made IO devices which are only compatible with an unpatched version of windows 95.

↓ Transcript
Panel 1.
IT Support Panda on phone: As I've told you before Dr Mad, we can't send a university technician to your office until you've run through these steps. Now, have you tried switching it off and on again?
Annoyed IT Support Panda (whispering): Ugh, is it him again?
SFX: nod nod nod

Panel 2.
Dr Mad: And as I keep saying, I want YOU to switch it off!

Timesheets

3 Apr 2017

The plots for this comic were created in R using ggplot2‘s geom_rect and coord_polar commands. This may have been accompanied by a little bit of swearing. When the swearing increased, it was handed over to Jess to redo the text, fix the colours, and improve the formatting.

There is a tendency for academics to have terrible diagrams and graphs. But as use of programs like R increases, we’re slowly seeing fewer “screenshots of excel” or “unformatted SPSS output” graphs. It also helps that libraries are stocking The Visual Display of Quantitative Information and websites like Information is Beautiful and /r/dataisbeautiful are popularising infographics and more interesting diagrams.

It’s been fun to work together to design these graphs, although searching for tips on creating ring plots reveals several warnings telling you that you’re probably an idiot for not choosing a different graph format.

 

↓ Transcript
Panel 1.
Mid-Term Project Report
Name: Prof Panda
Designation: Professor of Pandology
Role in Project: Principal Investigator. Responsible for coordinating research plan and "managing" a certain Co-PI.
Time allocated to project: 10%

Prof Panda's Timesheet Analysis Inner Ring:
Meetings = 90%
Administration = 5%
Teaching = 2%
Keynote Speeches = 2%
Research = 1%

Prof Panda's Timesheet Analysis Outer Ring:
Research Meetings, = 10%
Departmental Meetings = 10%
Faculty Meetings = 10%
University Meetings = 10%
Funding Meetings, = 5%
Meetings about Meetings = 5%
Ethics Committee Meetings = 5%
Ethics Meetings about Dr Mad = 15%
Administration Meetings = 20%

Panel 2.
Name: Dr Mad
Designation: Assistant Professor (Research)
Role in Project: Co-Investigator. Responsible for groundbreaking research that will change the world!
Time allocated to project: 25%

Dr Mad's Timesheet Analysis Inner Ring:
AMAZING RESEARCH OF DOOM = 50%
Tedious Interactions = 40%
Avoiding Teaching = 5%
Making PhD Students Panic = 5%

Dr Mad's Timesheet Analysis Outer Ring:
Creating Monsters to do my bidding = 10%
Fighting Monsters that do not do my bidding = 12%
Disciplinary Hearings = 20%
Networking = 5%
Pointless Meetings = 15%

NOTE: That monster was not my fault - Dr Mad

Panel 3.
Name: Kit
Designation: PhD Student
Role in Project: Project Student. Responsible for researching whatever the professors decide is important.
Time allocated to project: 100%

Kit's Timesheet Analysis Inner Ring
Existential Dread = 5%
Crying = 5%
Worrying = 5%
Battling Imposter Syndrome = 5%
Thesis Writing = 60%
Experiments = 20%

Kit's Timesheet Analysis Outer Ring
Staring at PC = 5%
Panic Writing = 5%
Failed Experiments = 18%
Successful Experiments = 2%

NOTE: NORMAL

Catnip

26 Mar 2017

Catnip

There has been a long history of scientist experimenting on themselves. In 1964, Jack Barnes stung himself to prove that the jellyfish Carukia barnesi could cause the incredibly painful Irukandji syndrome. Barry Marshall drank a culture of H. pylori to convince his peers that it was the cause of stomach ulcers. Though please don’t try this at home, there are reasons there are tight ethical controls in place for testing and research.

Cats usually seem to know when too much catnip is enough. If they eat too much it tends to cause vomiting & diarrhea. So it’s best not to give them too much. Although with the high sugar content, it’s probably worse to feed them marshmallows.

↓ Transcript
Panel 1.
Dr Mad: It took many years, but I hold in my hand a refined form of pure catnip!
Prof Panda: You're not going to eat that before you test it are you?

Panel 2.
Dr Mad: Hee Hee

Panel 3.
Dr Mad: NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM

Panel 4.
SFX: SHRUG

Panel 6.
SFX: PAW PAW

Panel 7.
Marshmallow Prof Panda: Are you ok? You don't look so good.

Dinner

19 Mar 2017

Dinner

The lament of scientists’ other halves. We’ve been to a fair few academic dinners over the years. They’re not all like this but I have to admit that there have been a few occasions where the following happens: While the evening generally starts off well, after some time the conversation tends towards discussing current work, academia in general, or research-related anecdotes.

It could be that the way students are taught to write for academic publications? Or could it be that an academic dinner party is one of the few social occasions where a researcher can really let loose and talk about their work, in comparison to usual social situations where they worry about seeming boring?

There could also be a cross-cultural element to this. Since research groups can be made up of people from many different countries, maybe talking about work ensures that no one accidentally makes a cultural faux pax such as asking too many personal questions.

I’m sure academics aren’t the only ones who can’t switch off outside of the office. For many who get dragged along to a work event, the pain can be even worse. As the work-life separation gets more and more blurred, with people taking work home with them, they’ve probably had a full run down of all recent work activities at home the night before. Or maybe if you talk about work at home enough, your wife will be able to make a science webcomic…

↓ Transcript
Panel 1.
Prof Panda: I know you find these academic dinners boring, but I promise we won't talk about work!

Panel 2.
Dr Mad: RESEARCH RESEARCH RESEARCH!!...
Scientist: Research research
Dr Mad: ... Research research research research research research!
Scientist: Did you read that new article research research research?
Scientist: And then reviewer two said research research research!
Other scientist: Research!!!!
Prof Panda: Research research research research...
Kit: Research!

Ears

12 Mar 2017

Ears

EEG is my specialist area, so it’s funny it’s taken this long for us to do an EEG comic.

Electroencephalography (EEG) is a way of detecting electrical activity in the brain using electrodes attached to the surface of the scalp. It’s been used in neuroscience research for over 100 years, adapting and improving with technology to increase sampling rate, reduce electrical interference and become smaller and more mobile.

Unfortunately, research grade EEG equipment is still incredibly expensive, setting you back tens of thousands of dollars. But as neuroscience research has become more well known, cut-price commercial versions are being marketed as the latest technology for gaming, sleep, relaxation and communication. They’re designed to look a bit cooler than the research ones, so the popular designs use minimal electrodes fitted to a solid band.

Since most of these use one or two electrodes primarily on the forehead, they’re much more likely detecting blinks, eye movements and facial muscles than anything in your brain. To be fair to these companies though, they say they pick up concentration, relaxation and stress, and I know my eyebrows probably move to different places for each of those.

I’d love to think that in the future we could all be walking around with brain-reading devices. But if that happens I don’t think it’ll look anything like EEG.

 

↓ Transcript
Panel 1.
Dr Mad: What are you wearing?
Prof Panda: Do you like them? They're EEG powered robotic cat ears! They translate my brain waves into physical movements! Watch!
SFX: WHIRRR

Panels 2 - 7.
SFX: Boop Boop
Waaavee
Flap Flap Flap Flap Flap Flap Flap Flap
Swooosh
TWIST
TWITCH TWITCH

Panel 8.
Dr Mad: Frankly sir, I find that highly offensive to cats AND neuroscience!
SFX: FLOP

Robot Slave

5 Mar 2017

Robot Slave

Brain-computer interfaces are developing rapidly. A common, non-invasive form is to measure EEG activity on the surface of the scalp and get the participants to direct their attention to different visual stimuli that correspond to different commands (e.g. up, down, left, right). A much more invasive method is to implant microelectrode arrays directly into the cortex. This allows a more direct measure of motor cortex activity, which is much more accurate.

It’s possible that encasing the entire brain in a set of microelectrode arrays would allow control over this robot’s motor functions as well as allowing sensory integration, but I don’t think getting the robot to work is the primary cause of Prof Panda’s concern.

↓ Transcript
Panel 1.
Dr Mad: Wait till you see this! The ultimate robot slave!

Panel 2.
Dr Mad: All it needs is a brain, then it'll be fully operational.
SIGN: Insert brain

Panel 3.
Prof Panda: Why does it look like me??
Dr Mad: Oh... No reason...

Legion of Doomy

26 Feb 2017

Legion of Doomy

Cats have many folkloric associations with ghosts. In the UK, white cats were linked with ghosts, and black cats linked to death. While cats in Japan can be linked to good luck, the bakeneko were cats thought to be possessed by ghosts or demons, who could walk like humans, talk, and shapeshift.

While dogs seem like the better choice to train to follow commands, cats can also be trained. The important thing to know is that they have different motivation levels to dogs and will often consider the cost/benefit trade-off in learning to be much lower. Dr Mad needs to get himself a clicker and some treats!

↓ Transcript
Panel 1.
SFX: Rub Rub
Prof Panda: Why are we at a cat cemetery? I'm tired.
Dr Mad: I have created a way to bring the dead back to life!
Prof Panda: That doesn't sound like a great idea.

Panel 2.
Dr Mad: Once risen, my legion of the doomy will answer only to me and will take over the world!

Panel 3.
Prof Panda: Legion of "doomy"?

Panel 4.
Dr Mad: BEHOLD!
SFX: Click Click Click

Panel 5.
Dr Mad: Who DARES to leave ectoplasm in my litterbox??!!