Antarctica Part 2 - Getting to Mount Erebus

After arriving in Antarctica, many days were spent preparing for the 2 weeks we would spend out in the field on Mount Erebus. Basically, science gear all had to be listed, boxed, and weighed before departure. Additionally, gear had to be separated into two shipments: 1) for the gear going with us to Fang Camp, 2) the gear we would need once we got to Lower Erebus Hut.

I spent quite a bit of my downtime drinking tea and writing in my journal while looking out at the sea ice and pressure ridges from the lounge area. I also got out for a couple of walks along the pressure ridges, which was very scenic and refreshing.





What made the walks even more interesting were the Weddell seals that had chewed their way through the ice and were lounging on the sea ice near the marked trail.



After spending nearly a week at Scott Base preparing, we got confirmation that we would be heading to the field the next morning. After a few last minute changes, it was determined that we would it take 2 helicopter trips to get the 6 of us and our gear up the mountain to Fang camp. Fang camp is about two thirds of the way up the mountain and is used as a stop for a couple of days to get used to the altitude. Flying directly to Lower Erebus Hut isn't done much anymore since the altitude is 12000 ft, which feels more like 16000 ft since it is so far from the equator, and altitude sickness is a real concern. In fact, most of us took Diomox to help adapt to the altitude sickness along with drinking at least 4 liters of water per day.

It was my first helicopter ride and it was simply amazing.





Once we landed, everyone helped unload and start to get gear put into our tents. A few helicopter trips later and we were on our own on the side of Mount Erebus.

Heading to Antarctica!

On Nov. 8th I will depart from sunny California and with a quick one day stop in Christchurch, New Zealand I will be in Antarctica. Now this isn't just a trip to Antarctica, this is the trip to Antarctica. Please allow me to gloat a little bit. After arriving at Scott Base on Ross Island I will begin a 5 day field training course to make sure I survive the expedition I will be taking on. After training, 8 of us will be flown halfway up Mount Erebus where we will acclimatise to the altitude by living in unheated tents for a couple of days. Then we will travel to the top of Mount Erebus to reach the "Lower Erebus Hut" at an altitude of 12,000 ft. We will stay there for 2 weeks doing daily trips to "fields"/fumeroles where the snow has melted away due to hot volcanic gases (did I forget to mention that the Mount Erebus is a active volcano?). The main goal is to collect soil samples and environmental data to examine the microbes living in this extreme environment. At the research station there is a small heated hut for meal times and work, but sleep will still be in the same cold tents with 24 hour sunshine. Dehydrated food and -20 to -40 C temperatures will ensure I lose some weight, but that is an added bonus.

To say that I am excited is an under-statement. Sure it will be hard to be away from my family for a month and the altitude sickness will make me feel like crap, but the chance to go on such a crazy expedition ruled out any chance of me turning it down.
How many scientists, especially those that do bioinformatics, gets a chance to do field work like this!?

Science and Beer

As always, I am looking for ways to improve my publishing and would consider pretty much trying anything. As pointed out in a recent NYTimes article a study showed that drinking less beer correlates with improved publishing.

Personally, I would suggest that the amount of beer consumed is a measure of the scientist's social life and as I think most agree better science often requires less social life. Sadly, I guess I will have to try to be the exception to the rule, since I am not quite ready to part with my bottle of suds.

How do you find science papers to read?

I use a variety of methods to keep me updated on new papers that may be of interest to me, but I am always on the look out for a new tool or method that makes this job easier. Currently, I use the following methods (in order of relevance):

1. TOC email alert of certain journals (Nature, PLOS, EMBO, etc)
2. Pubcrawler
3. myNCBI updates
   
4. Papers mentioned in blogs
5. RSS feed of Connotea groups or similar users

Of course I still have to filter through tons of papers to find ones that I want to read and I often end up missing papers that are not caught by any of these methods. Ideally, it would be great if I had a tool that recorded what I read, and figured out what new articles I would probably be interested in (giving more weight to recently read papers). I think the information from the papers I have bookmarked and tagged in Connotea would be a great starting place for such a tool.

I wonder if anyone else has some tips or tricks that help them filter through the journal haystack?

Creation Museum

Today is the grand opening for the Creation Museum located just outside Cincinnati, Kentucky. I read about it in a Globe and Mail news article and couldn't help myself from blogging about it.

I am still shocked whenever I hear the statistic that ~45% of Americans believe in Creationism. However, I really wonder if it is fully explained to the people being polled that this means that our planet is ~6000 years old, humans co-existed with dinosaurs, and that millions of species have gone extinct in that amount of time. Have all of these people really took the time to think about what their beliefs are and what science implications are rejected by them by their choice? If so, I would feel much better about the situation.

However, I do worry about the gap between the public and science increasing over time. How do we keep the general public up to date with technology and science when the speed that they are increasing at is so rapid? Does anyone else see this as a potential problem?

Climate Change Myths

The recent surge of climate change in the media has not really interested me. Basically, I am a bit skeptical that the political interest will last long enough to really make the necessary changes, but deep down I do have some hope.

One of the big problems is getting the information to the public. I think there is a need for information between the high level one page news reports that don't provide any real science and the detailed scientific studies that most people can't and/or don't want to read.

Second, there is usually so much bias in reviews from both sides of the debate that the major facts get missed by the public. Instead, people are inundated with threats of massive storms and flooding or threats of economy collapse. Some people don't want the two major oppositions they just want some basic facts. I think this is similar to the Evolution vs Creationism debate and is one of the best points coming out of Francis Collins' book the Language of God.

A nice example of balancing the level of science and the point of views was published yesterday in the New Scientist. The article provides a "round-up of the 26 most common climate myths and misconceptions" and does so with a true effort in maintaining scientific clarity and an unbiased opinion.

Canadian Bioinformatics Workshop

Hello Blogosphere! I told myself about a month ago that I would stop lurking around everyone else's blog and start contributing once I had a free afternoon. Well I am finally here!

A couple of days ago I was asked to be a TA for the upcoming Canadian Bioinformatics Workshop and I graciously accepted. I am really excited to get a chance to do some teaching. I have been lucky enough to obtain funding for all of my graduate career thus far, so I haven't been required to TA any courses before. It looks as if I will be leading a lecture on global genome alignment tools, which is great since I have been using one such tool called Mauve in my personal research (soon to be submitted). Luckily, I don't have to start from scratch since I get to use material from last year's presenter Mike Brudno, who is the creator of the LAGAN alignment tools. Surprisingly, he didn't include any other tools besides his own in his lecture last year. I guess it is natural to talk about what you know best. :)