emmadauster

Is Science for Women?

In the 21st century, a woman can do whatever she wants. If she wants to be an epidemiologist or a geologist, the world is at her fingertips. Some working environments still have not embraced this fact, but she will find a way if science is her passion. On the other hand, are the studies conductedContinue reading “Is Science for Women?”

Why Does Alcohol Make You Dizzy?

Your liver can only do so much at once. When you drink more alcohol than your liver can process at the time, it gets released into your bloodstream and into a fluid called the endolymph in your ears. This fluid sloshes around your ears to give you a sense of how your body is orientedContinue reading “Why Does Alcohol Make You Dizzy?”

Pipettes and Paintbrushes

What does science look like to you? The answer might be different if you’re a computational neuroscientist vs a plant biologist vs a potter vs a textiles specialist. In the second year of my PhD, I organized an art/science collaboration called “Pipettes and Paintbrushes” through my connections with That’s Life [Science]. I paired volunteers withContinue reading “Pipettes and Paintbrushes”

The Feelings that Linger

Have you noticed that all it takes is one bad event to completely ruin an otherwise wonderful day? Why do we devote so much brain power to fixating on the negative when we’d be so much happier by fixating on the positive? It all comes down to evolution. Because of the life-threatening nature of manyContinue reading “The Feelings that Linger”

Eureka!

Looking to get involved in science outreach? I’ve had some really great experiences partnering with the Eureka! program through my graduate institution, UMass Amherst. I have participated in this Summer program run by Girls Inc. every year since I moved to Western Massachusetts for my PhD. It’s all about empowering young women to explore STEMContinue reading “Eureka!”

Sleeping One Hemisphere at a Time

Unihemispheric sleep has got to be one of the coolest adaptations around. Animals like dolphins have evolved to breathe air but live under water. This makes sleep a risky endeavor, unless you develop a mechanism that allows you to always be a little bit awake. By keeping one hemisphere of their brain awake at allContinue reading “Sleeping One Hemisphere at a Time”

The Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting

Science conferences are amazing experiences! You get the inside information on all of the latest experiments in your field. Not to mention networking opportunities like no other. At these conferences, you can ask methodological and research design questions to the researchers who wrote those papers you’ve been reading for years. You also benefit from hearingContinue reading “The Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting”

5 Things You Didn’t Know About Rats

The first lab I worked in studied yeast cells. They also had worms (C. elegans) in the lab, but even those were a little too much for me to stomach. Today, I’ve been working with rodents for seven years. How do people conduct experiments on other animals? I’ve found that the more you appreciate theContinue reading “5 Things You Didn’t Know About Rats”

Human Eye Structure Makes No Sense…Or Does It?

When you take in visual information, it goes all the way to the back of the eye before you even start to process it. This seems counterintuitive. Wouldn’t it make more sense to start processing information at the outer edge of your eye and move inward toward the rest of the brain? Visual processing ifContinue reading “Human Eye Structure Makes No Sense…Or Does It?”

Breaks on Campus

What do researchers sacrifice for their experiments? Some projects require daily in-person progress. This can make vacations hard or impossible. But the payoff comes in the form of good data, and there’s nothing sweeter than that. Read more about my experiences spending university breaks keeping the research going. This post is in the format ofContinue reading “Breaks on Campus”