Over 15 years of ocean science and conservation online
For almost all of our five year run, Southern Fried Science has had the same three column, blue-background scheme. It’s finally time for the old blog to get a new coat of paint. Welcome to the new, improved Southern Fried Science! We’ve stripped away the bells and whistles that began multiplying on the sidebars in … Read More “Welcome to a shiny new Southern Fried Science” »
Happy Fun Science Friday everyone! After a busy semester I hope to get into the regular groove of Fun Science Friday posts.
This week I bring you the first and only known venomous crustacean, the remipede Speleonectes tulumensis.
These crustaceans were first discovered in the 1980s and suspected to be venomous after documentation that behind their jaws, they had a pair of sharp, hollow-tipped fangs that were connected to glands. This was a strong indication that the fangs were being used to inject a chemical into prey, though it was never proven…. Until now! Step forward Bjorn von Reumont, from the Natural History Museum in London, whose team thoroughly described the fangs and characterized the cocktail of toxins in the venom of S. tulumensis.
Read More “Happy Fun Science Friday – First Venomous Crustacean” »
On Thursday, October 24th at 9:00 P.M. eastern time, CNN will be airing Blackfish, the critically-acclaimed documentary about orca whale captivity and SeaWorld. Be sure to check out Southern Fried Science’s review (and fact-check) of the film. Blackfish will be followed by a live debate at 11:00 hosted by Anderson Cooper. The debate will feature … Read More “CNN is airing “Blackfish” Thursday at 9. Watch with us and join the live twitter chat!” »
We’ve reached the point in the program where requests for #DrownYourTown are coming in faster than I can process. That’s great! It means people are really connecting with the #DrownYourTown hashtag as a way to bring the concept (if not the specific details) of sea level rise home. The response has been greater than I ever imagined!
So, rather than leave people high and dry (we wouldn’t want that, would we), here is a step by step guide to simulating sea level rise anywhere in the world using Google Earth and a little geographic wizardry. The best part? It can all be done with completely free software.
1. Download Google Earth — you can find it here. Take some time to play around with it. Google packed this free package with some awesome features.
Read More “How to #DrownYourTown: a step by step guide to modeling sea level rise in Google Earth” »
On October 17th, after a 16 day shutdown, the U.S. government re-opened. Here are what the twitter accounts from U.S. science and environment agencies had to say on their first day back. I’ll continue to update this throughout the day as more twitter accounts come back online
Read More “Welcome back, U.S. government science and environment agencies!” »
UPDATE: These posts, and the hashtag are getting a lot of attention, so I’d like to reiterate, Caveat Tweetor (twitter beware) — these models are being generated on the fly as request come in. They are not validated and there are many variables that influence sea level rise which are not taken into account. This is a fun way to visualize potential sea level rise but it would be inadvisable to use it for real estate speculation.
This afternoon, I took to twitter to try out a novel outreach initiative — getting people to think about sea level rise by asking them to drown their home towns. With Google Earth and a “Sea Level” image layer booted up, I was poised for 2 hours of intense map manipulation. The requests came in fast, and ranged from the expected coastal cities with a couple meters of sea level rise all the way to the radical (yes, we flooded Reno, Nevada). After 120 minutes, I had produced models at 52 locations and interacted with more than 400 people. I was also completely exhausted. Here, for your enjoyment, is the complete collection of #DrownYourTown models from the initial 2-hour marathon.
Read More “#DrownYourTown: Exploring Sea Level Rise through real-time, interactive, GIS modeling” »
UPDATE: These posts, and the hashtag are getting a lot of attention, so I’d like to reiterate, Caveat Tweetor (twitter beware) — these models are being generated on the fly as request come in. They are not validated and there are many variables that influence sea level rise which are not taken into account. This is a fun way to visualize potential sea level rise but it would be inadvisable to use it for real estate speculation.
The central conceit in the world of Fleet–my dystopian maritime science fiction serial adventure–is that sea level has risen 80 meters, an extreme maximum projection under global climate change prediction (INSERT LINK TO USGS DATA HERE AFTER SHUTDOWN ENDS – UPDATE: Oh, neat, we have a federal government again. Here’s the source). Since 80 meters is pretty hard to visualize, I turned to Google Earth to help me simulate what our world would look like under those conditions, starting with my new residence in San Francisco:
Oh, but we’re not done yet.
Read More “Science in the Fleet: What would your hometown look like with 80 meters Sea Level Rise” »
Earlier this semester, Dr. Craig McClain, of NESCENT and Deep Sea News fame, launched the Sizing Ocean Giants project. His crack team of exceptional undergraduates will be conducting “outresearch” — a research adventure in which outreach is an integrated component of their research, rather than a secondary tag-along. They are 10 articles deep into the … Read More “If you aren’t following Sizing Ocean Giants, I don’t even want to know you” »
So you’re heading out to Miami this weekend for Science Online Oceans and you’re thinking “hey, I really need some fresh jams to get me pumped up for the conference”. Or perhaps you’re thinking “you know, I need some good thoughtful rhymes that make me think about ocean issues from a different angle”? Well, we here at Southern Fried Science Aim to please. Enjoy.
Alela Diane – The Pirate’s Gospel
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpwSxHiiNSw
And that includes teen drama parody series. Especially when it promises some nerdy marine science in-jokes. httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3kpKNXLdCQ “You know what I love about members of the Chordata phylum? Nothing!” You and me both, Aquaman, you and me both.
