Hooked on Biology

When I was reviewing the post on photosynthesizing sea slugs, I realized it was my first post on animals. This is mostly because I generally find microbes, plants, and fungi more interesting, but here's another exception to that trend. And yes, you're getting more sea slugs. I like sea slugs. I've been excited about this one for a while because I don't do a lot of animal posts, but you have to love sea slugs. I would love to share more (maybe I will at some point) because there are so many kinds of sea slugs and they are pretty amazing creatures, but let's start with these guys for now. Have you seen any of them? A few have been popular online. Overview - Glaucus atlanticus - Jorunna parva - Dirona albolineata - Thecacera pacifica - Cyerce nigricans - Cyerce elegans The picture at the top is of a Glaucus atlanticus , also known as a blue glaucus or blue dragon sea slug. Despite the name atlanticus , they can be found in the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian oceans in m...

Hello hello! You might have seen some of these fun fellows around the interwebs, and though they might not look real, they do exist. The slug on the left is a Costasiella kuroshimae , affectionately nicknamed "leaf sheep," and the one on the right is an Elysia chlorotica , which is also known as an emerald elysia. I call them sea leaves or leaf slugs. So, why slugs, why today, and why these two? Slugs, because sea slugs are beautiful and amazing creatures, today because why not, and these two because they have a few things in common. They're sea slugs, they're green, they're cute, they're tiny...oh, and did I mention they can photosynthesize? Yep. Photosynthesizing animals. Did your jaw drop? Mine did when I stopped to really think about it. Overview: Costasiella kuroshimae - About the slug - Habitat n' feeding Elysia chlorortica - About the slu...

  I have a small confession. This is an image of an unspecified Salmonella species, because when I searched for Salmonella enterica or typhoid in the free use image database I use, there were no results and I do not have a terrible amount of trust in Wikimedia. However, as promised, this is a long one. Buckle up.   Today, I would like to begin by writing about Queen Mary I, the first queen of England to rule suo jure (in her own right and not because she married into the royal family, aka queen regnant) better known as Bloody Mary, daughter of Henry VIII and his first wife, Catherine of Aragon. Henry and Catherine were married for 24 years, initially happily, and Catherine could match Henry's intellectual interests and she was a competent regent - a paragon of royalty. However, her Spanish descent did nothing to save Henry's first surviving daughter, Mary, from scrutiny when she married the Spanish King Philip II. Mary has often been painted as a murderess, similar to the Ch...

Hi everyone! I know I abruptly disappeared for a little while because Things™ are happening, but I'm officially on summer holidays as of today and I will be on vacation next week, so I wanted to get a post or two (or maybe three if we're really really lucky) before I head off! I don't know why you clicked on this post. Maybe you thought "Wow, Rowan actually posted? It's been almost two weeks!" If that's the case, I really am sorry for not writing sooner...but yeah Life Things are still happening and it's kind of chaotic for me at the moment. Anyway that is a tangent. Perhaps you thought "Haha funni name" which is also valid. Maybe the picture looked cool, or maybe you thought "No way it's actually called that." It actually is called that. When I first saw this funky guy (funkgus, if you will), it reminded me of a morel. I would not recommend eating it though. Why? Well, let's get into it.   Overview - Taxonomy + Naming - Th...

When was the last time you ate a tomato or potato? And did you think about where the tasty plants come from? Many of us associate tomatoes with Italy - after all, they're used in lots of pasta sauces and pizza! The Italian word for tomato is pomodoro , adapted from the older pomo d'oro , or golden apple. That really goes to show how much they love tomatoes, but French might top even that. In French, the word for a (specific kind but that's because the word tomate exists now) tomato is pomme d'amour , literally apple of love. The name for potato is much less romantic - pomme de terre , or apple of the earth. The Italian is patata , stolen from Spanish (and it's not alone - see History) according to Wiktionary. This makes sense - more on that later. Clearly, those European countries enjoy tomatoes, but it hasn't always been this way. Tomatoes and potatoes are two staples around the world, so today is mostly a history day. Let's get right to it! History If you...

"What is the difference, Potter, between monkshood and wolfsbane?" - Severus Snape, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone . If you've read the Harry Potter books, you might know the answer to the question posed in this scene. There is absolutely no difference between monkshood and wolfsbane - they are two names for the same genus of plants, Aconitum. Overview - General Aconitum - The Toxin(s) - History, legends General Aconitum There are over 250 species in the Aconitum genus, which really begs the question as to why they're collectively referred to with the same common names. They are perennials mostly native to the mountainous regions of the northern hemisphere in cool, moist, but well-draining soil. They belong to the Ranunculaceae  (buttercup) family, which is known for its toxicity. The flowers have a very distinctive appearance reminiscent of a monk's hood, according to some old English guy, giving them the very creative name of monkshood. Any of the na...

Today, we shall scratch the surface on HeLa cells. Overview: - What are HeLa cells? - Where did they come from? - Why are they so important? - Ethics Things What are HeLa cells? HeLa cells, also known as Hela or hela cells, are a strain of human cell that can be cultured without dying. When they were first cultured in Ye Olden Days (late 1940s, early 1950s) it was a really big deal because previously, human cells would die after a few days. The guy who figured this out, George Otto Gey, freely distributed this cell line, which, slay of him ig. We will talk more about this later. HeLa cells aren't actually anything super fancy, except they are good because they do not die (they are immortal cells, meaning they do not have the normal self-destruct that other cells do after replicating a certain number of times called senescence ) and they are human tissue which means human research. Nice. Where did they come from? Being human tissue, it would be reasonable to assume they came from a ...