Biology

Hi! I just joined this forum because I needed to ask a question about a scientific term that I couldn't seem to find on Google. A little backstory: I'm not much of a scientist myself, really more of a fantasy writer/artist. But I do value science, and whenever I create fanciful alien worlds/realities, I can't help but take a very... "logical" approach to everything. Everything has to "make sense". For instance, when designing a system for how magic works in my world, I created an unidentifiable pseudo-plant that consumes physical matter and generates magical energy, to compensate for the fact that mages consume magical energy to conjure rocks and chemicals and such ou…

Hi! I'm considering growing bacteria in agar in petri dishes. However, I have heard that once bacteria have grown in the agar, you should not open the dish for safety reasons. I would like to ask: What are the risks? What should I and shouldn’t I do to avoid growing harmful bacteria? And if it is best not to reopen the dish, then what is the point of using them, if you cannot apply the microbes to a slide to be analyzed under a microscope?

Hi, I'm quite interested in plant biology and I do some gardening in my spare time. I have been reading online about electroculture and magnetoculture - the application of electricity and magnetism respectively, to stimulate growth in plants. Has there ever been any official research done on this? Have electricity and magnetism been scientifically proven to have a positive effect on plant growth? Does electromagnetic radiation also have any affect of plant growth? Thanks, pyroglycerine

From the Huffingtonpost: ''Frank Baker faced death while earning two Purple Hearts in Vietnam, but the scariest moment of his life came in June 1995. Baker was in his home in Vermont, when he suddenly burst into flames, an experience he discusses for the first time on "The Unexplained Files," airing Oct. 2 on the Science Channel. "We were getting ready for fishing and sitting on the couch," Baker said on the episode. "Everything was great. [Friend] Pete [Willey] was sitting next to me [and] we were having a helluva time." That is, until things started heating up -- literally -- when flames appeared on Baker's body. "It was the damndest thing I've ever seen," Willey r…

Which hormones are being made by the endocrine system, and how do those hormones work in the brain? Thanks

Hello i'd growing spirulina (Arthrospira) but my culture is impurity i have to purify my Spirulina culture i'd tried change pH 5-13 but pollutant bacteria won't die if u guys have any idea help me Sorry for my bad English Email removed

Hello everyone This is probably my last question concerning genetics. It's a question about recombination frequence, and thus also the centimorgan (cM). Given out of my book for preparation on the acceptance exam most of you probably already know the existance of: "With tomatos, a red colour is dominant over a yellow colour. The allele for a big plant is dominant over that for a small plant. A farmer wants to optimalize his harvest. In the future, he'd like to get only plants that are both big and produce red tomatos. He asks you to do a test-experiment on his land. He gives you a seed that is the result of the crossing of a small plant of pure race for red t…

So I've recently received my new Bresser Biolux Microscope and have been having a plethora of fun with it. I've looked at blood, pond water, salt crystals, a dead fly, pollen and rose petals under the microscope. It's been very interesting but as unimaginative as it seems I think I've run out of ideas of things to look at under the microscope. If anyones got some cool, fun suggestions of things to look at under the microscope I'm all ears! Thanks in advance

Hello In preparation for the acceptance exam for Med school, inheritance is very important. I just discovered how I can see whether a disease is dominant or recessive. There's only one problem: I don't know how to tell if the disease is so-called 'gender-related' (or X-chromosome linked). Take the following example: Healthy brother has an affected sister. They have an affected father and a healthy mother. The affected father has a healthy sister. They are the result of healthy parents. The mother has a healthy brother. They are the result of a healthy father and an affected mother. I can tell this disease is recessive. I do this by reasoning as following: (p…

Hi, Can someone please provide me with a schematic diagram/patent/link of information for an Algae Bioreactor modified to produce hydrogen gas? (As described here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biological_hydrogen_production_(Algae) ) I would like to learn more about it and possible produce a small scale one to experiment with. Thanks, pyroglycerine

In my plant science class I have designed an experiment to test the success of Partridge Pea germination depending on the amount of water it receives and whether or not it is put through a short chill. The seeds were split into two groups, each group having two treatments and a control. All seeds were received from a seed-bank-like facility at my school. The first group was put through a chill; I placed the seeds in a refrigerator for a week. The second group was not put through a chilling process. The controls for the group were sanitized and then put in separate papers that retain water well and then put into dark chamber containers. The first treatment for each group w…

In my plant science class, my group and I created an experiment that simulated fire to test success rates of germination in prairie seeds. The prairie seeds we tested were common milkweed, purple prairie clover, compass plant, and lead plant. To start we placed the seeds in separated the four seed types as experimental seeds and control seeds. Then placed them in individual pots. The experimental seeds were placed into a plastic box and was saturated with smoke using a bee smoker. We continued added more smoke every minute for 20 minutes. In addition to the smoke saturation, we added ashes of switch grass into the soil. We watered the experimental and control pots th…

i am looking for an open science journal in-order for us to publish our research paper. If you know some of the open science journal i hope you will post it here.. thanks in advance

Hell SF, I have a question that google searching has not been able to help me with. Are there organisms that can survive in the abscence of organic matter. For instance, could any organisms survive and reporduce purely off of sunlight, water, and some mix of the elements?

Hi, I'm a budding synthetic biologist (Currently studying Biochemistry at the university of Bath, UK) and I just wanted to strike up a conversation about the subject. I'm personally interested in the metabolic engineering of micro-organisms to produce biofuels or pharmaceuticals! For those of you who are new to the subject or for those of you who want to know more or just read- Please check out my essay to below- It's only Part 1, as more shall follow! Please check it out and reply/comment as much as you want! I'm happy to discuss any aspect! http://synbiorobbath.blogspot.co.uk/

Personally, I'm tired of defending gmo's but that seems to be what I'm constantly having to do. I kind of see the gmo-free craze as something like the "natural" craze, where most of the people who obsess about it don't know what it even means. Normally, I just let most people just poison themselves with ignorance, assuming they figure it out eventually in an effort not to sound too nerdy. However, I guess the cat is out of the bag now and I've been ranting and raving to everyone who will listen (everyone, because everyone I've raved around is ignorant about it). Does anyone have similar problems? I'm relatively for all the health labels, even if I don't always belie…

I found this inside a bottle of lemon juice.

Is the optimal temperature for catalase activity the same regardless of what the enzyme is sourced from? ie. potato vs a person. What is the optimal temperature for catalase activity sourced from a potato, or if it is the same regardless of where it is sourced from what is the optimal temperature?

The Gram Stain Kit is intended for the demonstration and differentiation of Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Gram Positive Bacteria: Blue Gram Negative Bacteria: Red Other Tissue: Yellow Nuclei: Red The Giemsa Stain Kit (May-Grunwald) is intended for use in the visualization of cells present in hematopoietic tissues and certain microorganisms. This kit may be used on formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded or frozen sections. Nuclei: Blue/Violet Cytoplasm: Light Blue Collagen: Pale Pink Muscle Fibers: Pale Pink Erythrocytes: Gray, Yellow or Pink Rickettsia: Reddish-Purple Helicobacter Pylori: Blue Mast Cells: Dark Blue with Red Granules Source : Scytek Laboratories

One of the recurrent arguments posts that are made touch upon intelligence in humans and its heritability. Almost in every case there are serious misconceptions that result in the same type of often fruitless discussions conducted over and over again. In this thread I would like to clear up some issues to the best of my abilities. While I will stick to present literature, I am not an expert in the area of intelligence research. Hopefully, I will provide enough information to start a proper discussion or at least to clear up some low-level confusion. I will preface by stating that many studies utilize measures such as IQ, which is generally accepted not to be a precise me…

I have always wondered this. I will try my best to explain what I mean. Why is life viewed through this body that I have? Why do I not view life through the body of someone else? Actually, why was I not someone else? My consciousness, why is it in this body? If I were to use religious terms, why is my "soul" in this body? Someone told me once that it is because of the genes that go into making me, but that doesn't answer why. If my mother had had sex with another man instead of my father, would my consciousness still be a part of that new individual? Would I be that person? Or would my consciousness cease to ever exist? Nothing has ever made any sense to m…

is it possible to make paper using only grass.if it will we can save millions of tress.

Personal Interest I engaged in a conversation recently that began with a fleeting mention about how, for the sake of my own emotional stability, I wish that monogamy was the natural course of action for human mating strategy. This is a lot like the well-beaten "why do men cheat?" question, but less one-sided, less political/societal, and more biological. Personally, I am a very all-in, committed type. Once I'm in, I don't think about or look at anyone other than my significant other, because I don't want to or feel the need to. It's like everyone else becomes less attractive. I have always been this way. Being a generally heterosexual woman, I'm sure anyone coul…

Is S.J. Gould's punctuated equilibrium really at odds with adaptationism / gradualism? Environmental changes (climate, geology) can lead to ecological changes like (mass) extinction, and or adaptive advantages for mutations that had been not advantageous before. These ecological changes in population-numbers and new succesful mutations influence / disturb the balaces in the eco-system, giving other mutations in other species a chance, leading to a snowball effect. In other words: if a mutation becomes an adaptive succes (for whatever reason), this can give rise to a chain reaction throughout the eco-system, resulting in a changing environment giving opportunities for yet …

Hi. I have a question about agar used for growing bacteria. The package on my agar powder says to use the entire pack for 1 liter of solution, which will fill about 50 petri dishes. But I however only wish to use a couple of petri dishes at a time. Should I use the entire pack and simply store what's leftover, or measure out what I need?