Category: Hi-SEAS

Words to Keep Handy

Six strangers.

It’s always a bit intimidating to head towards a new experience. In a new place. With new people.

Maybe you’re starting a job, heading off to college, or traveling to a different country, either way you’re going to run into ‘strange’ people. While that may seem daunting and scary, it is a wonderful opportunity to open yourself to a unique experience or connection.

Growing up in suburbia outside of Louisville, Kentucky, I wasn’t exposed to much cultural diversity. Even Louisville’s famous Kentucky Derby Festival opening ceremonies, Thunder Over Louisville, turns the Waterfront lawn into a live People of Walmart, but with more fireworks and beer.

I was very fortunate to have the opportunity to travel to Italy, Greece, and Spain during a few weeks of my last two summers of high school. However, being shuffled around by teachers and parents did not provide many chances to really interact with the people able to offer real insight into the magnificent locations we visited. More recent trips abroad have allowed me to truly interact with the people and culture of my destinations.

College was a hub of strangers, eager and waiting to find and make new connections. It was here, in the small city of Bowling Green, KY, that I really learned about the importance of enjoying the ‘new’ parts of life. I transformed from an unknown freshman to being unable to walk across campus without running into someone to chat with. During my years at WKU, I was lucky enough to have a stable job working in the Ecology Lab, but to also have a boss/advisor/mentor that encouraged me to explore my options each summer.

So I did:

Summer 2006 – Chicago Botanic Garden
Summer 2007 – Kellogg Biological Station
Summer 2008 – South African Study Abroad
Summer 2009 – H. J. Andrews Experimental Forest
Summer 2010 – NMSU Algae Research
Summer 2011 – Kellogg Biological Station

And they were some of my best experiences to date.

I promise to share stories from my summer adventures and tales of some of the fine people I’ve met in later posts, but what I really wanted to share today is a poem that has stuck with me and inspired me (posted after the jump – click ‘Explore the Beyond’). It brings up some other aspects of talking to strangers that may not apply to the circumstances I focus on above, but I still enjoy the overall message.

Hopefully, I will be able to put these experiences to work helping me adapt to the unique group dynamics of an isolated Analog Habitat.

Question of the Day:
How would you deal with meeting and living with 5 others for 120 days?
Do you have any ‘ice breaking’ tips/tricks?

Also, you can find my answer to yesterday’s QOTD here.

Also, also, check out my new flag counter at the bottom of the blog. What an appropriate addition on Talk to Strangers day! Welcome all! Thanks to Timothy for the idea and help.


Talk to Strangers

By: Bonny Bonfiyah
Oh no little bitty Joe’s momma told
him not         to talk         to strangers.
Don’t talk to strangers, no don’t Joe, no, so
Little Joe didn’t talk to strangers, no,
Didn’t talk to the blind girl       at school
Didn’t talk to the janitors          eeyyoo
Didn’t talk to the mailman        mmm mmm.
Then he grew and he grew and he grew,
          didn’t talk to strangers.
Talked to aunts and cousins and friends of the family,
goin back n forth between big       houses, then frat       houses,
theeeeeeeen whaddya know Joe Schmo became CEO
          keeping strangers—
way up in the tippity top, glass office, what not.
Hey, he’s in the business of keeping strangers!
         Cuz he knows:
I might be mad at Mr. Joe,
(you know, for selling frankenfood for a huge profit whilst layin off half the staff to buy a convertible and a summer home in France with a Jacuzzi bath?)
Yes, indeedy, I might be mad,
but as long as I don’t know you or you or you,
what am I gonna do?
So for as many times as it has been told to you
I mean to undo I mean to undo it
Talk          to            strangers!
As long as Ms. Thousand Dollar Rent keeps Ms. Scrounging 50 Cents a stranger,
Ms. Extravagant won’t get Ms. Disadvantaged
is working hard for just barely enough
and has a true love too and reads good books too and here’s what’s true:
They know if we start talking we might start sharing
and sharing is scandalous; sharing is a solution
that starts with (you know)
talking to strangers.
Talk to strangers;
share your books, your food, your complaints,
your magazines, your movies, your worries, your stories,
your solutions.
Talk to strangers so we can share our STUFF!
FIVE, TEN, TWENTY-FIVE people livin in a building–
Do we ALL need a blender? 
Do we ALL need a subscription to Netflix? 
Do we ALL need a car? 
We HAVE BEEN TAUGHT TO GO IT ALONE
SO MR. JOE CAN SELL US ALL
WHAT HE STOLE
FROM THE LABOR OF STRANGERS STAYIN STRANGE.
Divide and conquer, friends, look at it, there it is:
they keep us strange from each other so they can sell us shit separately. 
That’s it.  No mystery.
Sister starts making some money, they HOPE
she enters that big ole ongoing stuff contest with her
neighbor-strangers.
Instead of sharing it, she wears it. 
People: 0, Aeropostale: 2.
The only way to protest is to not participate. 
Share your stuff so you can shop less.
Shop less to protest and
Talk
To
Strangers
‘bout the revolution
growing in your bones
the dis-chord among the formerly alone.
The unknown? Unh-unh!
Talk to strangers
let them know:
We don’t wanna be strangers       any mo
We don’t wanna be allowing        Joe schmo
to feed the rich by stealing from the poor.
Talk to strangers, y’all, talk,
tell ‘em it’s time.
Walk the streets, talk to strangers,
haunt the bookstores, the coffee shops,
bring your literature and your reserves,
talk to strangers, peace warriors, spread the word,
talk y’all, talk, yeah,
let those former strangers know:
To must emerge from the strangeness placed upon us,
we must be louder, to be louder, we must come together,
to come together, we must SPEAK together,
we must go, get out there, go, let each other know, go, now, please, go!

Working to Save the Planet

One of the many requirements for participants in this food study is a Bachelor’s degree from an accredited institution, preferably in engineering, biological or physical sciences, mathematics, or computer science. All applicants were required to propose research to be conducted during their time in the Mars Analog Habitat. For the results of the food study to be applicable, the working conditions of the participants must closely resemble those of astronauts who conduct research in space. 

I received my Bachelor’s of Science from Western Kentucky University, where I majored in Biological Sciences and minored in Mathematics.

Currently, I am a second year Masters student at New Mexico State University in the Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Ecology department. I plan on defending my thesis and graduating this May (remember Zing Phrase #13? Graduation or Death!) Since the research I proposed to the Hi-SEAS review committee is a continuation of my present research, I feel it would be helpful to introduce you to the world of algae cultivation for biodiesel production. 

Nannochloropsis salina and other organisms

Perhaps you’ve heard of ethanol, or another source of renewable biofuel? The energy stored in algae lipids may be refined in a similar process to create biodiesel. Microalgae are ideal sources of energy because they are capable of year-round production, require less water than terrestrial crops, and produce valuable co-products.

The main goal of my project is to address limitations of algae cultivation methods through an aquatic ecology approach. Increasing lipid production in these systems while minimizing the invasion of non-target algae will improve the cost of algal biofuel. The simplest approach would be to manipulate environmental factors to simultaneously promote algal growth and limit competitor or predator growth.

‘Invading organisms’ are usually dispersed by the wind (and right now New Mexico has plenty of that to go around) and can include diatoms, rotifers, ciliates, and cyanobacteria. They are pests to the algae industry when they munch all the nutrients meant for the target algae or munch the target algae themselves!

Our species, Nannochloropsis salina, was selected due to exhibit high growth rates, lipid productivity, and a wide tolerance range for different environmental parameters. Meaning, these guys might be small, but there is strength in numbers and they’ll be tough against competitors and predators. Salinity, pH, and temperature are valuable environmental parameters to utilize for our purposes. Each parameter is the focus of a pair of experiments:

2012 Temperature Experiment

  1. Nannochloropsis Growth and Invading Organism Occurrence at Different Levels of [Salinity, pH, Temperature] 
  2.   Nannochloropsis Lipid Accumulation 

Samples from these experiments are later quantified by some very diligent and helpful undergraduate students. Imagine spending a few hours with your eyes glued to a microscope counting little green circles! (Note: I do not actually glue my undergrads to their microscope…yet.) Other samples are taken to a special lab on campus where I work with some very knowledgeable and helpful researchers to determine lipid accumulation. They even go a step further and investigate what different kinds of lipids are present!

2010 Salinity Experiment

Once experiments are completed and data is collected and analysed, there still remains the process of writing everything up into a concise and informative manuscript. When I am ready to defend I will have a thesis with three separate chapters that cover everything I have worked on during my time at NMSU. Before I may graduate my committee must read it all and I will present my findings in a 40 minutes presentation. Eventually, each of my three thesis chapter will be reformatted into journal articles that may be submitted for publication, along with other papers I may write with data from other research endeavors. 

I hope you now feel confident with your new algae cultivation knowledge. More important than being able to conduct research is being able to communicate the concepts and results to the public successfully. I hope I’ve been able to do that today. Please ask questions if you are interested in learning more!

I will try to speak more in depth about different aspects of the life of a graduate student. But for now, thanks for reading along with me. Please also check out my new ‘Experiences‘ tab for a taste of the fun life as a scientist can entail!

Question of the Day:
Was this post helpful and informative or do I need to work on my science communication skills?

Challenge Accepted

Starting a blog is a big undertaking. But, then again, so is living in an isolated research station designed to simulate the living and working experience of six astronauts on a real Mars mission. So, why does this blog feel like the more challenging pursuit?

Last week, with a mere 7 minutes to spare, I submitted my 19 page application to the Cornell/University of Hawaii Hi-SEAS mission. I allowed myself a brief moment to savor my achievement and enjoy that pleasant calmness that follows the anxiety of anticipating a deadline. Graduate School does not allow you much time to rejoice before it throws a new obstacle your way, so I grabbed my thinking helmet and was off to tackle more challenges.

But, instead of studying for my statistics exam, I wanted to be searching the Hi-SEAS facebook page for news of other successful applicants. Instead of finishing my SAS homework, I wanted to be reading and commenting on blogs that have already started to chronicle the application process. It was becoming increasingly clear that waiting quietly and patiently for semi-finalists to be announced in late-March was not an option.

When I first discovered the call for applicants in early February, something took hold of me and inspired my decision to spend the limited spare time I had available on compiling a competitive application. Once inspiration, motivation, and excitement take hold, it’s quite difficult to tell everything bubbling up inside of you to hush up! With good reason, that is my voice aching to be heard!  I have more to say and I shouldn’t think I have to wait to do so. I spoke often about passion and optimism in my application. It seems only fitting to demonstrate them now.

I hope to spend the next year sharing my opinions, insight, and knowledge with the followers of the blog. I encourage everyone to add their own voice to the mix through comments, questions, suggestions, jokes, etc. I will attempt to maintain a wide assortment of discussions, while remaining ever-mindful of the big picture objective: instilling an interest in all for space exploration (and other scientific endeavors). The challenge of maintaining a blog pales when compared to the potential impacts of inspiring others.

I will leave you with a few words from friends that have inspired me.

“Your words are your best weapons, adversity is your toughest battlefield, but your armor of determination will shield your way.” C. L.

“just tiny people
in the middle of space
in a tiny amount of time
completely irrelevant
except to each other” D. C.