Posted by Frenya
Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:52:00 GMT
I listened yesterday night to some podcasts from the “Naked Scientist” - probably my favorite science podcast - and heard a really cool news.
Researchers from MIT created the smallest scale able to measure the weight of a bacterium. According to what Pr Scott Manalis said, they are able to segregate bacteria in a small U tube allowing to have only one at the time. He gave the example of E.coli that weighs about 100 fg (femtograms) or 1e-13 grams.
One of their goal is eventually to be able to distinguish cells like cancer cells from regular, happy cells - of course using other methods in addition to the scale-.
Even if this project does not go where the researchers want it to go, I think it is still a pretty cool idea and piece of technology that they were able to develop.
J’ai écouté quelques podcasts du Scientifique Nu (“Naked Scientist”) hier soir - ce podcast est probablement mon favori pour avoir des nouvelles scientifiques- et ils ont présenté une nouvelle technologie. Des chercheurs du MIT on créé la plus petite balance capable de peser une bactérie. D’après ce que Pr Scott Manalis a dit, ils sont capables de ségréger des bactéries dans un petit tube en U qui permet de n’avoir qu’une bactérie à la fois. Il a donné l’exemple de la bactérie E.coli qui pèse apparemment 100 fg (femtograms) ou 1e-13 grams.
Une de leur buts est d’éventuellement être capable de distinguer les cellules cancéreuses des cellules saines - bien sûr en utilisant d’autres méthodes en complément de la balance -.
Même si ce projet n’aboutit pas là où les chercheurs veulent, je pense que c’est quand même une bonne idée et une technologie des plus intéressantes.
Tags Science | 10 comments
Posted by Frenya
Tue, 13 Nov 2007 14:18:00 GMT
Vendredi dernier, j’étais à la reunion du groupe de microbiologie et immunologie occulaire (OMIG) à la Nouvelle-Orléans et quelque chose d’un peu surréaliste s’est produit.
En fin de matinée, qui était aussi la fin de la réunion (c’est petit, environ 50 personnes attendent chaque année), tout le monde était prêt à partir et discutait avec son voisin quand un vieil ophtalmologue britannique décida qu’il avait quelque chose d’intéressant à dire à l’assemblée et alla tout simplement au micro et pris la parole. Comme on peut s’en douter, très peu de personnes présentes l’entendirent et firent attention à ce qu’il disait.
C’était bizarre de voir tout le monde discuter et être complètement inconscient de ce que le vieil homme essayait de dire… bon d’accord, je suspecte que ce présentateur non prévu n’avait pas toute sa tête (si son élocution est une preuve), mais bon, malgré tout, j’ai eu la soudaine impression d’être dans la cinquième dimension! Cette expérience de moins de cinq minutes m’a rappelée la série Twilight Zone… une pièce pleine de gens en pleine discussion et un vieil homme expliquant un cas medical comme s’il avait l’attention complète de tout le monde.
Cela montre simplement que si vous voulez présenter quelque chose, essayez toujours de planifier et de le dire aux organisateurs… sinon, vous pourrez vous retrouver à parler aux murs…
Tags Français | no comments
Posted by Frenya
Tue, 13 Nov 2007 14:15:00 GMT
Last Friday, I was at the Ocular Microbiology and Immunology Group (OMIG) meeting in New Orleans, LA and something a little surrealist happened.
At the end of the morning, which also was the end of the meeting (it is small with about 50 people attending each year), everybody was getting ready to leave and was chatting with their neighbor when an old British ophthalmologist decided that he had something interesting to say to all and just went to the microphone and started speaking. As it can be imagined, very few heard him and actually tried to concentrate on what he was saying.
It was bizarre to see all these people talking to each other while being completely oblivious to what the old man had to say… granted, I suspect that the unscheduled speaker did not have all his head (if his speech is of any indication), but still I felt that I suddenly was in the fifth dimension! This less than five minutes experience reminded me of the Twilight Zone… a room full of people chatting and an old man explaining a medical case as if he had the audience complete attention.
That just shows that if you want to present something to your peers, try to plan it and let others know that you want to do that…otherwise, you night end up talking to the walls…
Tags English | no comments
Posted by Frenya
Tue, 18 Sep 2007 11:44:00 GMT
Il y a une dizaine de jours, Eric et moi avons dit Oui, voici une photo pour le prouver!
Tags Personal | 8 comments
Posted by Frenya
Mon, 22 Jan 2007 10:13:00 GMT
Aujourd’hui, l’Abbé Pierre est décédé à l’hôpital du Val de Grâce près de Paris. Ce prêtre catholique mais avant tout un immense être humain avait lancé le mouvement Emmaus à la fin de la seconde guerre mondiale.
L’Abbé Pierre fut une immense figure de l’après-guerre en France. Il a aidé les français à réaliser que la pauvreté n’était pas plus loin que leur pas de porte et que tous pouvaient faire quelque chose juste à côté de chez eux.
Malgré son grand age, ses pensées étaient très modernes et pas toujours en accord avec l’Eglise Catholique. Il était par exemple d’accord avec l’adoption d’enfants par des couples homosexuels.
Pour plus d’informations, vous pouvez trouver une biographie sur ce site .
Regardez aussi le site de la Fondation Abbé Pierre .
Today is a sad day for French people. L’Abbé Pierre passed away this morning at the Val de Grâce hospital near Paris. This Catholique priest but before all a tremendous human being started the Emmaus movement after World War II. I remained a very important figure in France throughout his entire life. He helped the French realize after World War II that poverty was not far from them, was in fact just outside of their door and that anybody could do something to help.
Despite his age, his ideas remained very modern and sometimes not in agreement with the Church. He was for instance for children adoption by gay couples.
Wikepedia has a good biography of him.
Also, you can look at the site of his foundation: Fondation Abbé Pierre , the site is in french but it is really informative.
Finally, there is the site of Emmaus International , international branch of the movement he started in 1954.
Tags Français | 2 comments
Posted by Frenya
Fri, 28 Jul 2006 00:00:00 GMT
July 21st
Last day in India… and what a day! It started at 6:30 am to say good bye to our main host, Dr Srinivasan, who had to go to Tirunelveli. The rest of the morning was dedicated to work at the hospital.
After lunch, I went to explore the other side of the street from the guest house. It is a lot different from the hospital site. First there is the cows area, of course in India, cows are sacred and they freely live in the street. I saw a couple of cows walking nonchalantly on the road despite all the traffic.
The traffic in southern India:
I just realized that I have not spoken of the traffic yet. It is simply a mix between amazement and fear! Bicycles, scooters, motorbikes, autorickshaws , cars and trucks share the road in the same time and in a very noisy way. It seems and sounds (for that matter!) that the street language is the horn. Everybody uses it and it is the custom way to tell a vehicle in front of you that you intend on passing it. Moreover, on the lot of trucks, the quote “Sounds Horn” is written! People pass everywhere and at anytime either in the country or downtown. It really looks like the only rule to pass is to use the horn right before. This technique lead to a lot of scary moments, especially in autorickshaws where we saw the moment we would meet a car, bicycle or other rickshaw in a very unfriendly manner.
Tags Voyages | 13 comments
Posted by Frenya
Thu, 27 Jul 2006 23:56:00 GMT
July 20th
One more day of work but today the decision is taken, we do our work for the day and go downtown! Shopping and visit of the Meenakshi (goddess, wife or consort of Shiva, if I remember well) temple are on the program.
We have been in the country for 4 days and the only view of downtown and the temple that I have had so far was from the rooftop restaurant on Monday.
The Meenakshi temple is extremely important to Hindus of south india. I used to be a major pilgrimage site. In this part of the country, pre-aryan beliefs are still really strong. That translates into a more matriarchal society, the woman and especially the mother is essential to the familial structure. This phenomenon is also quite striking when we do some shopping (and I say some, since I had about 1,5 hrs to look at everything that I was supposed to look at), it is more than easy to find gifts and items for women but extremely hard to find anything for men.
The Meenakshi temple:
To come back to the temple - like for every house, you have to remove your shoes at the entrance. Few feet away, we found the first surprise of the visit: an adult elephant ready to bless people on the head with its trunk in exchange of a coin. By lack of coin, I could not do it but a couple of people from the team did and that was fun.
We then proceeded on visiting the temple per se, first the side of Shiva and then of Meenakshi. There are statues (usually painted) everywhere, small altars where the faithfuls can make their devotions as well as pools for the ritual baths.
Hinduism is really complicated and I am sorry I could not fully appreciate the meaning of all the statues. Nevertheless, the style was different compare to any other religious style I have seen so far. We went there at night and some of the corridors and altars were not illuminated which gave a somewhat scary vision of the statues. But maybe the most impressive aspect of the temple is the number of 20 to 30 meters high towers completely covered with painted statues. This temple was mostly built during the 16th century but there is a portion that dates back 3000 years. Of course, this part is the most sacred and can only be seen by true hindus, with their hinduism certificate in hand!… quite serious!
Tags Voyages | 5 comments
Posted by Frenya
Thu, 27 Jul 2006 23:53:00 GMT
July 19th
My colleague, Salena, from San Francisco and I went on a little adventure yesterday evening. We traveled to the Aravind Eye hospital in Tirunelveli. Tirunelveli is about 150 kms south of Madurai, very close to the south point of the indian subcontinent.
The clinic there will also enroll patients for the study, so we had to see the site and talk more to the different people involved (they actually worked with us on Monday and Tuesday in Madurai). We worked all day long with all our Indian colleagues and I have to say that I had a blast. I interacted a lot with the chief of the cornea section, Dr Meenakshi, and she is great! She is not only on top of things despite her “ginormous” load of work but she is also funny and relax. Salena and I had the warmest welcome I have seen in ages. I believe this welcome reflected the “famous” indian tradition of friendship and sharing.
Hospitality and coffee tradition:
People at both Tirunelveli and Madurai hospitals are just wonderful. They treated us as if we were family, extremely friendly. The funny thing, and my French friends would love that, is that every morning around 10 am, as much as possible, we would get a cup of coffee or tea as well as a samosa. Everything is prepared by the canteen of the hospital and the samosas are amazingly good! Their teas and coffees are very sweet and contain a lot of milk… not so good for a “loose weight” diet. Of course, most indians do not use silverware and eat with their right hand. In case you are not already aware, there is a golden rule in India: never use your left hand to touch food… this hand is reserved for “non-pure” activities. When you see their traditional restrooms, you understand why!
I have tried to eat their way for several meals and I have to acknowledge that I am not that gifted. Also, I try to say Thank you and Good morning/Welcome in Tamil (“Nanri” and “Vanakam” respectively) as much as possible. People usually kindly smile but I think they appreciate that I try.
Tags Voyages | 18 comments
Posted by Frenya
Thu, 27 Jul 2006 23:51:00 GMT
July 17th, 1st day at work.
The night was not so peaceful but I nevertheless ended up sleeping a bit. Breakfast was yummy… typical south indian food.
The day went on. A long meeting in the morning with everybody involved in the study, then I went on delivering the study medicines and discovered that this task apparently completely brainless was not because a lot of details were not thought through… Happy me since I had not idea a week ago that I would be responsible for that! Anyhow, eventually things went fine.
We had lunch at the guest house and dinner downtown, at the Supreme hotel’s rooftop restaurant with view of the towers of the Meenakshi temple.
The clash of societies:
The clash of the different levels of society is amazing around the guest house in Madurai. The house is comfortable, the rooms are simple but air-conditioned and we each have our own “occidental” bathroom. On the other side of the street though, there is a slum, animals hang out on the sidewalk, around the trash (which is everywhere!), kids follow you and offer you to take their pictures - apparently simply because they like to see themselves on pictures! People have roofs over their heads but I do not think these roofs would resist strong winds.
In Chennai, the clash is even stronger… logical since it is a larger city… there are very rich people and there are people with nothing else than just a little rug used as mattress to sleep on the sidewalk every night.
Nevertheless, from what I could see in Madurai, people are happy. They play music and organize expensive festivals regularly.
Tags Voyages | 4 comments
Posted by Frenya
Thu, 27 Jul 2006 23:49:00 GMT
July 16th, 10pm.
Well I made it safely to Madurai after one more flight delay but my suitcase did not. It got blocked in Chennai and it actually is partially my fault. I was supposed to pick up the suitcase when i arrived in Chennai and go through customs with it. The hick is that the suitcase was checked until Madurai so I did not think I had to do something with it before that. It is not a nice surprise to discover that you can not have fresh clothes after a 24 hrs + long trip. At least I know now (and you too!) and I am supposed to get it tomorrow Monday (we will see).
I am staying at the guest house of the hospital. A very nice, simple but comfortable place.
Tonight, I went to a remembrance service for Dr V., founder of Aravind Eye Hospital who passed away few days ago. It was an evening for the family (quite extensive!) and guests staying at the guest house.
I was a great way to first experience indian hospitality, everybody was so nice, they did most of the speeches in english to allow us (foreigners) to understand and then they served food, a little spicy but not so much that we could not enjoy the food.
Tags Voyages | 12 comments
