Filed Under #other
Apr 28, 2020
Our new paper about using the Tea Bag Index in the tropics, headed by Aloysius Teo, has just come out in Pedobiologia. The Tea Bag Index (TBI) was designed by Keuskamp et al. (2013) as a standardised and cheap method to quantify microbial-driven decomposition by measuring the mass loss of tea within tea bags. It can be used by scientists and citizen-scientists alike. School students from cpt. Nálepka elementary school, Slovakia, participate in Teatime4science. (Photo credit) However, we found that when the TBI was deployed in tropical forests, termites damaged up to 80% of the tea bags. Termites also consumed...
Extended Tea Bag Index to measure microbial- and termite-driven decomposition in the tropics
Our new paper about using the Tea Bag Index in the tropics, headed by Aloysius Teo, has just come out in Pedobiologia. The Tea Bag Index (TBI) was designed by Keuskamp et al. (2013) as a standardised and cheap method to quantify microbial-driven decomposition by measuring the mass loss of tea within tea bags. It can be used by scientists and citizen-scientists alike. School students from cpt. Nálepka elementary school, Slovakia, participate in Teatime4science. (Photo credit) However, we found that when the TBI was deployed in tropical forests, termites damaged up to 80% of the tea bags. Termites also consumed...
Oct 23, 2019
Parker et al. (2013) created a general model for sperm allocation under a trade-off between male investment of resources \(R\) into pre-copulatory effort (e.g. search time) \(T\) versus post-copulatory effort (e.g. ejaculate) \(U\). Their model is interesting because it encompasses a range of different scenarios of female remating and the type of competition between males. For female remating scenarios, the risk model has females mating a second time with probability \(q\), with the possibility that being first or second leads to higher fertilisation rate (`loaded raffles’); whereas the intensity model has females mating with \(N > 2\) males on average....
New solutions for Parker sperm competition model
Parker et al. (2013) created a general model for sperm allocation under a trade-off between male investment of resources \(R\) into pre-copulatory effort (e.g. search time) \(T\) versus post-copulatory effort (e.g. ejaculate) \(U\). Their model is interesting because it encompasses a range of different scenarios of female remating and the type of competition between males. For female remating scenarios, the risk model has females mating a second time with probability \(q\), with the possibility that being first or second leads to higher fertilisation rate (`loaded raffles’); whereas the intensity model has females mating with \(N > 2\) males on average....
Dec 19, 2018
Link to annotated cycling map: NUS to Serangoon
Off-road cycling route from Serangoon to National University of Singapore
Link to annotated cycling map: NUS to Serangoon
Feb 1, 2015
Biodiversity versus ecosystem services
This is a brief summary of a debate about the proper role of conservation, and the relationship between biodiversity conservation (BD) and managing for ecosystem services (ES). The debate centres around an article by Kareiva and Marvier (2012). Some threads of the discussion can be found in: A reply by Soule (2013), followed by Marvier (2014), and those below. A reply by Miller et al. (2014), followed by Kareiva (2014), Soule (2014). A reply by Doak et al. (2014b), followed by Marvier and Kareiva (2014a), Doak et al. (2014a). A reply by Cafaro and Primack (2014), followed by Marvier and...May 7, 2014
Proceedings of the Hivemind B
My partner just sent me a link to a post by Marcio von Muhlen called We Need a Github of Science. I started using Github just recently. For those new to Github (like me), it is a web-based hosting service for software development projects that use the Git revision control system. Basically you can upload your code there, and anyone else can see it and its entire revision history, comment on it, and download it. Most of interesting of all, anyone can make a copy of it to correct mistakes or to create their own extensions (forking), and you can...
Jul 5, 2006
Monica from Merici College painted a portrait of me for the 2006 Portrait of a Scientist project. It was lovely meeting Monica and it is flattering to have such a nice picture painted for me, especially one also featuring Cthulhu.
The commentary accompanying the portrait was amusing:
Monica was surprised when she met Nadiah, ‘She didn’t seem like a scientist, she was completely normal and had a nice fashion sense. She was wearing red and black - her description noted that these were her two favourite colours.
Portrait of a scientist
Monica from Merici College painted a portrait of me for the 2006 Portrait of a Scientist project. It was lovely meeting Monica and it is flattering to have such a nice picture painted for me, especially one also featuring Cthulhu.
The commentary accompanying the portrait was amusing:
Monica was surprised when she met Nadiah, ‘She didn’t seem like a scientist, she was completely normal and had a nice fashion sense. She was wearing red and black - her description noted that these were her two favourite colours.