CharonY

There could be advantages independent on the topic, depending on what the thesis entails. Especially practical work could be beneficial, but also learning different methodologies. Especially as an undergrad one is less exposed to doing actual science. If the thesis would be mostly busywork, it is probably less ideal of a time investment.

Well, if you cannot get sufficient selectivity FISH may be the way to go, unless you are exclusively interested in live titer.

A different question: what is your ultimate goal. I.e. why do you want to enter an ivy league institute rather than one of the other research unis?

DNA profiling can refer to a number of analyses. The most common one is based on the presence or (in case of repeats) length of a particular region that can (or cannot) be amplified via PCR. Usually at this point the DNA sequence is not really used anymore, it is generally just required to design primers for the PCR. Comparisons are then often made by e.g. comparing the presence and number of similar PCR products from different individuals. Other assays can also be termed DNA profiling, though. In the end it is a rather generic term and what is meant is determined by context.

In that case one should carefully define what one means with academic excellence. It is not terribly hard to excel in a system that is geared towards memorization, for example. One of the points OP argues (in my interpretation) is that the metrics we use to define academic excellence is woefully lacking. That being said, regardless whether such a system really accurately gauges academic excellence (and I believe most would argue it does not), I do not see how extroverts benefit from the system. The ability to memorize things is probably not necessarily controlled by either outlook. Extroverts may get gratification from good grades (and the positive feedback it may cause), introverts may be motivated by a given mental challenge all by itself. While it may be true that the US society may frown upon introversion, the academic setting often caters towards them. I would be surprised if in academia the ratio of introverts would not be higher than the population average. If we talk about post-graduation excellence, obviously either extreme may be detrimental. Though chances are that the extreme extroverts have a higher chance of landing a job as they are more likely to expose themselves to others and have a better network.

Eh, this is heavily in speculations. As a general rule, you can just stick things to metabolites such as neurotransmitters, because they a) are likely not able to perform their activities anymore and b) tagging these molecules is usually not possible in vivio in whole organisms. Even assuming that there are a lot of neurotransmitters attached to magnetic nanobeads and even if we assume that they still perform, what would a magnetic field do? The molecules are deposited within cells and are released by specific mechanisms after stimulation. What would a magnetic pulse actually do? In the best case you induce movement within the magnetic field, so the metabolites move a bit around in the cell. Chances are, however that you may need a field strong enough that has more effects on the rest of your body. In other words, you cannot specifically "activate" specific synapses with this scheme.

I am not absolutely certain about the specificity, so you should research it a bit more but IIRC inhibitors that are mostly selective for serine proteases include AEBSF, and PMSF (though both also inhibit papain, and potentially some other cysteine proteases). Then there is aprotinin, TLCK and TPCK which tend to be a bit more narrow in use. Obviously, if your protease is somewhat more exotic some testing is likely to be needed. And as I said, this is just stuff that I vaguely remember so it may be somewhat inaccurate.

Not all biotechnological applications are of equal use. Letting microbes produce metabolites has been done for some time (insulin being a textbook example), yet the utility for it for food is at best disputed. What is even more important is that the economic aspects of GMO food cannot be overlooked. I am not convinced that having patented strains under the control of biotech companies is a terribly good idea. These biotech products are rarely made available for free. The thing is that food as it is is already pretty good. We evolved to use it. We have more than enough food to provide basically everyone on earth with a healthy diet. The issue is that many cannot afford it. The very same that cannot afford resistant GMO strains (which usually have to be rebought). Craig Venter, according to him (or rather press releases) he created artificial life already twice. Third time is the charm? Finally, increasing biofuel harvest from algae sounds impressive, until one realizes that the yield is still incredibly low. Not that these may not be important progresses, but in this field there is a lot of fluff to wade through. Extrapolating that to everyday life is usually not that easy.

Yep, that is what generally is meant.

I would be careful in these disciplines, too.

Do I understand it correctly that you infected mice with fusobacteria and want to isolate them back from the colon? If so it is quite tricky. The simplest would probably use even more ABs (e.g. as being used in FSA agar). But it may also depend on what you want to do. If e.g. enumeration is the goal flow cytometry (somewhat tricky) or FISH may help you.

I would be surprised if the MIT undergrad curriculum would allow you the freedom that you describe. At that level you are supposed to learn some fundamentals which requires practice, and a certain amount of rigor.

Language itself is not unique to humans. Alex certainly did not use it in a stimulus response way, but he was able to associate properties such as color and shape with words. Note that not all communication has to be verbal. The main difference is the apparent depth and level of abstraction human language has. compared to what other animals are capable of (though more research would be needed). Same goes for tradition, the development of traditions have been extensively researched in macaques (see e.g. Leca et al 2010 Animal Behavior) and other animals. Again, it is not an all-or-nothing matter, but rather one of degree. As such there is not likely to be a singular turning point during our evolution.

I think one should also acknowledge that many differences, be it on the tribal, city or fiefdom level were often enhanced in order to create a type of unique identity. So in a way I would argue that the borders and differences were not necessarily natural lines determined by cultured and tradition, but it also worked the other way round. Tradition and culture were used as tools to create separate identities. To me cultural identity is at the same time incredibly stubborn yet sometimes changes in surprising ways (though, without doubt this is heavily influenced by me living in an academic environment and being a immigrant).. While most like to emphasize differences, I always felt that at least in the important matters we tend to be fairly similar. We agree on what we want, but we want to achieve the results in very different way (and often have issues with compromising).

I realized that my reply could have sounded a bit more harsh than I intended to. It is less a matter of bothering, but the fact that this is a discussion forum. Advertising your own blog is not a good way to start a discussion. I would have welcomed if you e.g. provided a succinct summary or highlighted some salient points that would be conducive for further discussions.

And how friggen smart they can become in such a short time. It is probably for the better. If they had many more years to live and learn, they would probably be our tentaculated overlords by now. Somewhat unrelated but quite interesting: Winkelmann et al. Proc. R. Soc. B 22 May 2013 vol. 280 no. 1759.

Oranges win, hands down.

Why don't you try to start a conversation here instead of just linking to your blog?

Ants are frickin amazing. They are farmers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leafcutter_ant, raise aphids as cattle, , engage in slavery (and rebellions) http://scienceblogs.com/notrocketscience/2009/04/01/the-rebellion-of-the-ant-slaves/, developed boating (sort of) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A042J0IDQK4, engage in warfare , can take on spiders , or really, about anything http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LE2DSXBOgg, are amazing builders http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLHAdwxLD-I, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O05javlMW6k. Just to name a few things.

a) this is odd b) stop hurting your penis c) see a medical doctor d) websites are not good for medical advice e) cancer f) see d

Yupp. Kids are big picture people. That is why we let 6 year olds write all the grants. The problem is that for some reasons we only apply for chocolate.

Well, on the analytical side the error is very low (any half-way decent lab can perform it accurately). The only real issue is that samples could have been mixed up during sampling or processing (should also not happen).It wold be even more conclusive if the mother was also tested but it is more likely to (falsely) include a parent rather than exclude them. Four mismatches would require mutations in the respective sites and that amount is highly unlikely, as you already mentioned. If the result is wrong it would really require mishandling of the samples. The lab is reputable (and is also offering services in the UK) so I doubt there would be a high likelihood of errors on their part. Obviously, a repetition should erase any remaining doubts (using the same set of test alleles).

Nope, during sequencing you can take either strand. In most cases you will actually sequence both. The question regarding coding strand and mRNA is thus not related to Sanger sequencing. If you had the finalized sequence and were to derive the mRNA you would obviously need which is the coding strand.

Awwww. It is patently unfair that they have so low life expectancy.

I am sorry, but as already mentioned, the assumption that the first organisms had three base pairs is pretty much flawed and any argument starting from this assumption is not going to go anywhere.