Matilda's Lab Newsletter #52
This week we settle in and get assessed. We also look for a new planet, have interstellar repairs, microscopic DNA repairs and acknowledge the sounds of nature.
What we’ve been up to
I’ve been not writing newsletters! Yes, I missed an edition last week. With a full time job, 2 children and 2 dogs, my main opportunity to write these is in my lunch breaks; so if I have a busy week at work then I simply don’t get time to write anything out. And busy it has been. Before I talk about work, let’s focus on a highlight from last week.
Edison has been with us for a week now and is settling in beautifully. I thought that Matilda would be the most enthusiastic about her arrival, but it actually appears to be Nathaniel who has found a new BFF. It’s really cute watching them play together.
The vet’s have given us the all clear to start some pavement walks with her, following her first vaccinations. So we’re now able to start taking her out into the big wide world. She seems much more adventurous than Cassini was at her age. Cassini didn’t want to leave the house, but then we did get her in January, so the conditions were significantly less appealing.
I don’t often talk about work in these newsletters, but I’m making an exception here because it is science related. I work in a laboratory and this week we had our annual audit. My laboratory tests flocks of turkeys for signs of disease. We are approved by government to perform legally required tests that allow us to export our birds around the world. This week’s audit is what we have to pass if we want to continue to do this. It’s not just a case of checking if our tests work. It covers everything; like checking that our measurements are accurate, that our records are present and correct, that staff are trained, that procedures are up to date and documented. We need to keep enough information about our testing that if anything were ever to go wrong that you could track down exactly where that happened and why. It is my job to put these system together to make sure that they work, therefore in this audit of the laboratory, I am more under the spotlight than anybody else. I therefore need to make sure that I am ready for this. Since all of the above is just one half of my job, this should help explain why last week was quite so busy for me.
New Blog content
The only thing that I have for now is to remind you of is the new record: Burning Fossils.
From the Archive
We revisited an old genetics cartoon:
And a few sharks and relatives, so I’ll pick just one from the offering.
Science News
Even when things get busy, I can always rely on good only science news for some content:
Tech support from 24 billion kilometres away. Voyager 1 is the first spacecraft to travel out of the solar system and into interstellar space. Then is stopped working. It takes light, and therefore any messages sent to the craft, nearly a day to reach it. Despite this, NASA have managed to diagnose the communication with Voyager 1 and fix it!
One the biggest problems with demoting Pluto to dwarf planet status is that it also ended the search for the fabled, and cool sounding, planet X. Lame as it now sounds, the search for planet 9 is still very much alive and getting is gaining momentum. Yes, we’ve sent spacecraft out of the solar system and we’re still not sure if we’ve found all the planets yet. How small is this new planet? Huge. Massive. Giant. Those are the guesses. Why can’t we see it then? Because it’s believed to orbit like a comet. The sun is not at the centre of it’s orbit, and the planet is currently at it’s far end of orbit. But something as big as planet 9 leaves a trail when it passes close to everything that we can see, and even more evidence of that has just been discovered.
Nature is now on Spotify. If an artist is using any of the myriad sounds of nature on their record, then they can now credit nature as a contributing artist. This means that they will share some of the royalties of the song with conservations projects. I may well do this myself before the year is out.
Tardigrades (or water bears) are a favourite here at Matilda’s Lab. These microscopic, nearly indestructible critters have a lot to teach us about resilience. One of the many things that they are resistant to is radiation. It was thought that they somehow protected their DNA from getting damaged by it. In reality, tardigrade DNA is damaged by DNA but they are capable of repairing the damage.
Kicking back
Schools out, let’s have fun.
As I’m currently living with a collie pup, I feel this
It’s just like walking on clouds
Never been to the Sistine Chapel? No problem, got you covered.
That’s it for this week.
Please feel free to get in contact with any questions, suggestions or comments either via Substack or at matildaslab@gmail.com.
Please share this with anyone who you think will appreciate it. And remember to share with me any cool sciencey stuff that you find to make sure that I can pack this newsletter with best new science content each week.
Until next time, remember that one person’s old news is another’s revelation; so explore. Sometimes it’s not about being the first up the hill. The view’s still going to be breath-taking, no matter how many people have seen it before you.
It was interesting to hear about your work!
Thanks for the Sistine Chapel link. As a high school student, I went on a trip to Italy. I went looking for it, but took a wrong turn and never found it.