- Calm in the Storm: Finding Your Zen at Work
Have you ever had a panicked colleague breathlessly share how hard they are working on grants, papers and mentoring only to find that you feel completely stressed out just having talked to them?
It turns out there's a biological basis for it. A subset of your brains neuron...
- A Fussy, Stubborn and Unreasonable Woman: The Contributions of Frances Kelsey to Safety and Science
Frances Oldham Kelsey. This name may not ring a bell, but it should. She died on August 7 at the age of 101. But how does Dr. Kelsey affect you?
Dr. Kelsey began working at the FDA in August, 1960, one of 7 full time medical officers hired to review human drug applications....
- Introduction to Medical and Other Ignorance
It turns out that asking a foundation to support your medical school prep class entitled "Introduction to Medical and Other Ignorance" is a tough sell.
But an Op/Ed in the New York Times by Jaime Holmes offers a humbling reminder as many of head back into the classroom that mu...
- I Don’t Think Team Means What You Think It Means
Team work. Team building. Team meetings.
There's a whole lot of team-themed language that's used in how we think about the folks we work with and the projects we develop. And teams are great. Darn great. But last night I started to think maybe the team analogy had spread j...
- Academic Social Media Tangles: The Evolving Tale of Jennifer Berdahl
An interesting thing is happening to our northern neighbors. Several prominent academics have been asked by their universities to “ix-nay on the talky-say about work-hey”.
Academics are built to gather information, learn, test and improve. Indeed, conversations about our bosse...
- Making Lemonade: A Retraction Watch Interview
Retraction. Its a word that for many scientists is synonymous with phrases like 'failure', 'dishonesty', and 'career ending'. A recent Retraction Watch features an interview with Pamela Roland, a Professor from UC Davis, who retracted two high profile papers on plant immunity...
- The Land of Monsters
For academics, being courageous is part of the deal. You fight for your ideas and observations in clear, concise language. You lay out a problem, share your data and propose a model or a solution. The next person comes along, kicks at the base of your idea with their data, ad...
- I’m Not Saying I’m the Best Mentor Ever, But…
I'm traveling with two female grad students in my lab and we have 8 pairs of shoes and 1 pair of boots between us and no checked bags. I'm all like..
- A Monday Morning Giggle from The Onion
In grad school, a new investigator was pressuring me to come to his lab to study the molecular basis of learning in sea slugs. Sea slugs are dreadful little creatures and I pointed out to the PI that 'all the smart sea slugs are back in the ocean where they belong'.
This morni...
- Heart to Heart: Anna Hemnes
Every day, Anna Hemnes, MD, treats patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension. Every day, she works to find a cure.
Pulmonary arterial hypertension is a rare disease that narrows and stiffens the arteries connected to and within the lungs. The increased work of pumpin...
