Archive for August, 2008
Jersey bird
Posted by in Habitats and Humanity on August 31, 2008
The Delaware River Joint Toll Bridge Commission (DRJTBC) recently announced the arrival of a peregrine falcon chick. The proud parents nested in the steelwork under the I-95 Scudders Falls Bridge. I traverse that bridge once a week when I’m attending my little class o’ regulatory dabbling at Temple U.
It’s a heavily trafficked span, but apparently that didn’t bother the peregrines. The article notes that the presence of the raptors is symbolic of the environmental rebirth of the “dirty Delaware.” The river valley north of the bridge is quite attractive with bike paths along the canals that bracket the river (better — ahem — on the Jersey side; our tax dollars at work) and scenic forest, cliffs and little old river towns hugging the high banks.
Although the span between New Hope PA and Lambertville NJ would have been a much more chic nesting location than Scudders Falls, that ancient bridge is a grid floored structure. Not much privacy there.
The presence of the peregrines adds just a little more (OK, just a little) validation to the informal state slogan: “New Jersey: Not as Bad as You Think!” Plus I love raptors. I know that peregrines adapt to the cosmopolitan life style (see Jack and Diane) so it’s kinda cool that they’ve become another roadside attraction along interstate.
Photo courtesy of the Pennsylvania Game Commission who supplied this and others to DRJTBC who in turn, supplied them to TOLLROADSnews
Did He Really Say That?
Posted by jim in Saturday Knock on the Head on August 30, 2008
Did Steve Doocy of Fox News really say what I thought he said about Sarah Palin?
Yep. She has “international experience” because Alaska is right up there, you know, next to Russia! Sure. And I must be fluent in French because I don’t live that far from Quebec.
Maybe Running Far and Fast IS Genetic
Posted by jim in The Running Ape on August 24, 2008
So Greg has made it clear that he doesn’t think that there’s any genetic basis for why some groups of people are able run very far, very fast. At the core of this are so-called “racial traits”. Any casual observer of the Olympics will note the dominance of people with dark skin in distance running races, and might lead them to the simplistic notion that “dark people can run really fast”. I agree that that is rather goofy, but the arguments are off the rails in a few places. A case has not been made that there is no genetic basis for this phenomenon.
Heat+Distance=Record?
Posted by jim in The Running Ape on August 24, 2008
It is well documented that as the temperature around an endurance athlete increases, performance decreases. And while one can train for and adapt to warm race conditions to mitigate that decrease, the effect remains. But at the highest levels of competition, control of the mind may make all the difference.
Given the conditions, conventional wisdom would dictate a cautious pace for the Olympic men’s marathon, but that’s not the way it played out. With temperatures in the 28-29C range by mid-race (mid 80s F), the pace was termed “suicidal”, with a 1:02:37 half split. I expected the lead pack to wither at 18-20 miles, but that’s not what happened at all. Ultimately, Sammy Wanjiru of Kenya prevailed in 2:06:32, smashing the Olympic record by nearly three minutes, and giving Kenya its first men’s marathon gold. Perhaps more amazing is that the run was only two minutes shy of Haile Gebrselassie’s world best run last year at the Berlin Marathon under far superior conditions. One can only imagine what Wanjiru might be capable of in the years to come.
A very good race recap may be found here.
A graph of men’s and women’s world and Olympic marathon records may be found here.
Sex and the Olympic Village
Posted by jim in Fun Is Where You Find It, Habitats and Humanity, The Running Ape on August 22, 2008
A very entertaining article in The Times today regarding Olympians and sex. The author, former Olympian Matthew Syed, discusses just what goes on behind closed doors (and sometimes on rooftops) at the Olympic village. He offers the usual bag of “reasons why” (testosterone, being away from home, etc.) but it’s presented in a light and humorous manner, a good read. Consider the opener:
I am often asked if the Olympic village – the vast restaurant and housing conglomeration that hosts the world’s top athletes for the duration of the Games – is the sex-fest it is cracked up to be. My answer is always the same: too right it is. I played my first Games in Barcelona in 1992 and got laid more often in those two and a half weeks than in the rest of my life up to that point. That is to say twice, which may not sound a lot, but for a 21-year-old undergraduate with crooked teeth, it was a minor miracle.
But my favorite is:
Which all begs a question, or possibly many questions. First, and most importantly, how can one get access to the village?
Hokey Haiku #1
Posted by jim in Catablogic Blathering on August 21, 2008
Time for a new category here at the Refuge, namely “Hokey Haiku“. It’s just a fun way to communicate a simple thought or observation of the day in a mere 17 syllables. Don’t expect Robert Frost or e.e.cummings though.
Summer’s vanishing
Where is my calculator?
The semester starts
Yep. I’m back on campus.
Amazing Women’s 10,000 Meters
Posted by jim in The Running Ape on August 15, 2008
Spoiler alert: If you don’t want to know anything about the Olympic Women’s 10,000 meter final just yet, stop now.
Amazing Women’s 10,000 Meters
Posted by jim in The Running Ape on August 15, 2008
Spoiler alert: If you don’t want to know anything about the Olympic Women’s 10,000 meter final just yet, stop now.
So. The new gig.
Posted by in The View from Pharma-dur on August 13, 2008
After coping with an immediate family member’s severe illness (thankfully resolved; better living through chemistry pays off) and discovering that my talents do not lie in management within a very large company, I stepped back from my almost 20 year career in discovery research several months ago. I gleefully wallowed around the home front, decompressing from an especially stressful time in my life and just generally vegetating. But I kept my foot in the door of the Dark Tower of Pharma-dur by taking a class in drug development in a regulatory affairs program at a (sort of) local university. As it turned out, I really liked it.
When I was ready to re-enter the workforce after about 6 months, jobs for principal investigators (veteran research biochemists at any rate) in discovery pharma were very scarce. Couple that with “reductions in force” from various companies, and the job market wasn’t (and isn’t) so hot.
So, in my less-than-introspective process of thinking about “what do I want to be when I grow up,” or more accurately, “how do I wish to reinvent myself so that I can be employable,” I continued to take classes in regulatory affairs and kept an eye out for entry level jobs in the area. Wikipedia has this boilerplate description of regulatory affairs. It’s not referenced, but I can attest to its succinct accuracy. Regulatory within the pharma industry provides documentation and guidance for the highly complex process of channeling clinical findings to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the European Medicines Agency (EMA).
Well, I found such a position as a medical writer in a full-service contract research organization. And I finished a not-horrible first draft of a Phase II clinical protocol today, second week into the job!
The clinical/regulatory side is a very different aspect of the Pharma-dur than discovery, but still engages my interest, even though I still get twinges for wanting to get back to the bench and design an assay or de-convolute a complex biochemical mechanism. It’s less abstract. It’s one thing to work on various defined targets for cancer: one kinase after another, maybe a methyltransferase as a novelty gag, or a metabolic enzyme that a tumor favors. It’s another to read and write a Phase I document in which patients with advanced stage carcinoma are described, knowing that they are husbands, wives, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers and friends who are likely dying and grasping for that last gold ring of life by letting sophisticated poisons course through their blood and organs.
Thankfully, Jim has been holding down the Refuge. Not that I’m essential to this joint (and I well know there’s the pie-eyed and ever hopeful “Bring back Beck” faction), but hopefully, I can pipe up a bit more now and then now that my brain is more scientifically engaged.
It Can’t Be Stopped?
Posted by jim in We're Doomed on August 11, 2008
“Once religion takes hold in a society it can’t be stopped.” So says President G W Bush in an interview with Bob Costas at the Beijing Olympics. Let’s all hope that such is not the case.
You can find the video here. The section in question is about 3:15 in. There are plenty of other moments to make you cringe as well.
Olympic Broadcast Acoustics
Posted by jim in Audio Island on August 10, 2008
There had been reports of the usual last-minute rush to complete facility construction at the Beijing Olympics. Now I wonder if they completed the main broadcast center. While watching the coverage yesterday, at one point NBC went to Bob Costas at the center and I noticed something strange. It was apparent that Mr. Costas was close-mic’ed, but it was also obvious that there was an inordinately large amount of room reverberation leaking in. The RT60 seemed long enough that it appeared Bob was speaking from inside of an airplane hangar. I wonder if they had time to install any acoustic treatments in the broadcast center. The effect wasn’t enough to reduce intelligibility, but it was odd nonetheless, sort of an “excessively live” quality. I am curious to see (hear) if the situation continues.
Obama Guilty of Attempting Reasonable Compromise
Posted by jim in We're Doomed on August 5, 2008
Enough already with the “Obama flips-flops on offshore drilling”! You can really tell when the news networks need a lead story: They simply leave out some salient details and allow their talking heads to spin. If you haven’t seen the original interview that appeared in The Palm Beach Post, here’s the most important bit:
“My interest is in making sure we’ve got the kind of comprehensive energy policy that can bring down gas prices,” Obama said in an interview with The Palm Beach Post.
“If, in order to get that passed, we have to compromise in terms of a careful, well thought-out drilling strategy that was carefully circumscribed to avoid significant environmental damage – I don’t want to be so rigid that we can’t get something done,” Obama said.
If there’s any question on his position, consider this:
After speaking to a capacity crowd at Gibbs High School auditorium in St. Petersburg, he told the Post he would be open to expanding the current drilling boundaries if it meant winning approval for more fuel-efficient cars, developing alternative energy sources and making the country more “energy independent.”
“I think it’s important for the American people to understand we’re not going to drill our way out of this problem,” he said.
Obama isn’t guilty of flip-flopping, he’s guilty of being a reasonable human being who is aware of certain political realities. And you can be damn sure that if he dug in his heels over this they’d be painting him as some kind of eco-extremist who hates America and who can’t relate to the average citizen (not that they aren’t going down that path anyway).
TechnOlympics
Posted by jim in Techies & Technology, The Running Ape on August 1, 2008
It has been said that the Olympics is rather like a genetic freak-show: All of the extreme outliers from the population show up and do their thing. While specific “genetic gifts” are pretty much required to reach the top of most any sport these days, a little technology can certainly assist in the process. This week’s Electronic Design cover story is The 2008 TechnOlympics and discussed some of the technology that will be used in Beijing.
One item that caught my eye was the increased use of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software. Although wind tunnel testing has been used on cyclists for some time, CFD software is being used for other areas, including the design and analysis of low-drag swimsuits. Speedo claims that their new LZR suits offer a 10% reduction in passive drag over it’s earlier racing suits. Of course, the passive drag of a suit is only a very small element in the overall performance so it’s not like they’re saying that the race times will drop by 10%, but world-class races are sometimes decided by hundredths of a second, so every little edge counts at that level.
Some might argue that access to wind tunnels and advanced modeling software offers an “unfair advantage”, but a counter argument can be made that it is just another resource in the mix (like whether or not you live and train at altitude). My attitude on this is somewhat mixed, but I will say that once you start throwing advanced technologies at these sorts of problems, the concept of world records kind of falls apart. That is, while it would be perfectly accurate to say “No person has ever run this fast, thrown this far, etc.”, it is also true to say that that does not mean that a former record holder couldn’t have done so given the same technology.
Granted, the IOC could simply decide to “freeze” technology at a certain level, but spectators and fans do like to see world records. A second problem comes in as to where you freeze the technology. For example, we might disallow certain types of running shoes, but then why allow shoes at all? And before you know it, I can’t stop thinking about this:
Yes, well, I mean, (clears throat) you know, four years ago, everyone knew the Italians were coating the insides of their legs with bolinaise, the Russians have been marinating themselves, One of the Germans, Biolek, was caught actually putting, uh, remolarde down his shorts. And the Finns were using tomato flavoured running shoes. Uh, I think there should either be unrestricted garnishing, or a single, Olympic standard mayonnaise.
But let’s not get into the chemical “enhancements” just yet…
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- Doc Bushwell is a biochemist and a medical writer who serves as a slavering minion of the dark lords of Big and Little Pharma; Jim is an engineering professor with a fondness for running shoes and drumsticks; and Kevin Beck is a self-exiled member of the clan who refuses to stay gone.
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