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9 July 2020
Danse Macabre, Not as Fun as it Sounds
Wildlife diseases not only impact the health of humans and animals, but they also play a large role in generating artistic trends. One such trend in, or genre of, art was the Danse Macabre, also known as the Dance of Death. This French term comes from the artistic genre that was seen in 1250 to 1500 CE Europe, during the Late Middle Ages. It symbolizes the fact that the journey of life and death is expired by all, and is a uniting theme despite its morbid tone.
6 July 2020
Viruses as Medicine for Antibiotic-Resistant Bacterial Infections
One of the most groundbreaking medical discoveries has been the development of phage therapy. Phage therapy refers to the use of bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria, as a mechanism to defeat antibiotic resistant infections. Phage therapy was first researched due to the fact that, globally, 1.5 million people die from tuberculosis each year.
3 July 2020
15 feet Tall and Threatened!
Wild giraffes across Africa are suffering from multiple skin disorders. The Rothschild’s giraffes (Giraffa camelopardalis rothschild) population is shrinking at an alarming rate in Kenya and Uganda. Located in Uganda, Murchison Falls National Park (MFNP) did a survey in 2016 that discovered that one third of their giraffes had rash-like lesions of unknown origin.
2 July 2020
Rabies: What Do You Really Know?
When people think of rabies, they are most likely visualizing an aggressive animal foaming at the mouth and ready to viciously attack any living thing in sight, but is this image always the case?
1 July 2020
Myth Busting: Lyme Disease
There have been many claims that Lyme disease has correlations to the presence of autism within people…However, there is an experiment done by Armin Alaedini that has proved against this myth.
22 June 2020
Writing about wildlife diseases
It’s that time of year again when I head to rural Pennsylvania to teach a field course in disease ecology for undergraduates at my alma mater, the University of Pittsburgh.
No it’s not. But it should be.
14 August 2019
Wakelet – the new (& in my opinion better) Storify
I spend a lot of time on social media, specifically Twitter. It’s my job. Our @AGU_SciComm account is one of the primary ways to disseminate Sharing Science information, AGU happenings, new science in the field of scicomm, popular science pieces around policy and communication, and more. Twitter is also where I turn to for hashtag campaigns, especially those centered around AGU.
12 July 2019
Tuberculosis: One of the Biggest Killers of All Time
Throughout human history, it is estimated that over 1 billion people have succumbed to Tuberculosis. The deadly bacterial infection targets the immunocompromised population as well as those who have weakened their lungs through smoking. It is believed that the first cases of tuberculosis appeared over 17,000 years ago in the wild by infecting bison. There is also a theory that puts the disease in humans around the same time. But, it is unclear whether humans or bison were the first carriers of Tuberculosis.
11 July 2019
Transmission of Leprosy in the US via Armadillos
Repeatedly referenced throughout the Bible, leprosy, also known as Hansen’s Disease, may often be perceived by the general public to be an ancient disease that has ceased to endanger the modern world. Much to the misfortune of people living in Africa, Brazil, India, and the Philippines, where the majority of outbreaks occur, nearly 700,000 people throughout the globe annually contract leprosy.
10 July 2019
Hey, farmer, farmer, put away the DDT now
Music has often been used as an outlet for activists to reach a broader audience on issues concerning politics, social issues, and environmental crises. Joni Mitchell was a prominent and very influential recording artist in the 1970’s that embodied this idea of using music to educate the public. One of her most popular songs “Big Yellow Taxi,” called out various environmental issues like deforestation and, what stood out the most to me, the use of DDT.k
The Plainspoken Scientist is the science communication blog of AGU’s Sharing Science program. With this blog, we wish to showcase creative and effective science communication via multiple mediums and modes.
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