Deceiving with doubt: How industry denies scientific evidence on the dangers of pesticides

Posted on March 19, 2019 by Chris ChoGlueck

The bias of industry-funded research is pervasive and well-documented. When industry funds a study, it is more likely to produce pro-industry conclusions than is a non-industry funded study. Companies regularly use this pro-industry science to cast doubt on research that hurts their bottom line. Classic cases come from the tobacco and fossil-fuel industries, challenging evidence about the harms of smoking and the human causes of climate change. Businesses have marshaled pro-industry science to defend everything from asbestos, lead, and plastics, to pharmaceutical drugs and even sugary drinks. But how exactly does industry use science to defend their products? What’s the methodology behind their political strategy?

A picture of a man driving a tractor through a field with rows of soy beans, spraying pesticide on the crops. — Chlorpyrifos is a pesticide commonly used for agriculture. While there is strong scientific evidence that it is toxic for children’s development, the pesticide industry disputes it. (Image credit: Creative Commons CC0)

Let’s look at a recent case involving organophosphates like chlorpyrifos, formerly used in the household pesticide Raid, and now one of the most common pesticides for agricultural use. The EPA proposed to ban chlorpyrifos in 2015, based on a series of observational studies published in 2011 documenting the neurotoxic effects of low dose exposure in children from independent teams at the University of California Berkeley, Columbia University, and Mt. Sinai Medical School. These original studies documenting neurotoxic effects were conducted by epidemiologists (scientists who study disease outbreaks among populations) who linked exposure with deficits in IQ, working memory, and perceptual reasoning. All three studies used a prospective birth-cohort design, meaning that they recruited pregnant women and their children before birth. They measured in-utero exposure and cognitive development across early childhood up to age 7. (more…)

Telling Science Stories: Lessons from Last Year’s SciComm Symposium

Posted on March 12, 2019 by Jennifer Sieben

Many of us here at ScIU have recognized that there is a shortage of classes to teach science communication at IU and in science programs in general. While not every scientist does outreach everyday, we sometimes forget that the simple act of explaining your science to a grant committee or your neighbor who likes to chat is science communication, too.

This is one of the main reasons we organized a science communication symposium last year. Everyone will have to talk about their science to people who are not working on that same project and being able to effectively communicate complex ideas is hard. By inviting people who have more experience communicating science than us, we are making sure that the scientists of the future are more prepared to go out in the world. (more…)

Winter makes me SAD: The biological story behind seasonal affective disorder and its potential treatments

Posted on March 5, 2019 by Kat Munley

As fall transitions into winter, all animals, including humans, must acclimate to colder weather, shorter days, and less sunlight. In many northern latitudinal regions across the globe, winter is often characterized by overcast skies and snowy days, in which little to no sunlight reaches life on the ground. Colloquially, some people report having the “winter blues” each year once winter briskly enters the picture. However, what many people don’t know is that winter depression actually has a biological basis and is classified as a medical condition, called seasonal affective disorder (ironically, abbreviated SAD). Better yet, scientists are diligently working to tease apart the biological mechanisms underlying SAD, which will ultimately allow for the development of novel treatments.

A barren hillside with a few large boulders and trees scattered in the background. The trees pictured have no leaves, and there are a few small patches of grass growing on the side of the hill. The sky above is overcast, and no visible sunlight is shining through the clouds. — In the northern latitudes, winter is commonly characterized by overcast skies, in which little to no sunlight is visible from the ground. This lack of light exposure during the day is thought to be the major cause of seasonal affective disorder. *Image credit: Petr Horák*.

A young adult woman is hunched forward and covering her face with both of her hands. The photograph is in black and white. — People that have seasonal affective disorder (SAD) often experience depressive episodes during the fall and/or winter months. In addition, patients often report symptoms such as fatigue, increased sleep, loss of libido, overeating, carbohydrate craving, and weight gain. *Image credit: Peter vd Ham.*

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which describes the standard criteria for classifying mental disorders, defines SAD as “depression that begins and ends during a specific season every year, in which no episodes of depression occur during the season in which you experience a normal mood.” Specifically, winter SAD is a subtype of depression that is characterized by the recurrence of major depressive episodes in the fall and/or winter months and remission of these episodes during the following spring or summer. In addition to depression, SAD is often accompanied by atypical depressive symptoms, including lethargy; increased sleep, or hypersomnia; overeating, or hyperphagia; craving for carbohydrates; weight gain; and loss of libido. Interestingly, although SAD is a relatively common condition, which affects about 5% of adults in the United States; SAD is four times more common in women than in men. Overall, SAD prevalence and severity tend to be inversely related to photoperiod, or day length, such that SAD is more common at higher (i.e., northern) latitudes. (more…)

Science as a bridge to barriers in diversity and inclusion

Posted on February 26, 2019 by Alexandra Moussa-Tooks

A look inside the work of Dr. Mary Murphy in celebration of Black History Month

Pie chart reflecting the racial distribution of students at IU Bloomington in 2018. The pie chart reflects 76% of students identify as White, 7% as Asian, 7% as Hispanic or Latinx, 5% as African American, 5% as 2 or more races, and 0% as American Indian or Pacific Islander. — IU Bloomington undergraduate racial diversity in degree-seeking students, as reported in 2018. Specifically, 22,791 (76%) students identified as White, 1,918 (7%) as Asian, 2,137 (7%) as Hispanic or Latinx, 1,504 (5%) as African American, 1,473 (5%) as 2 or more races, 33 (0%) as American Indian, and 8 (0%) Pacific Islander.

Picture this: you’re a Black student on a large college campus. This is your first year. One day, you are accosted by a White male slinging racial slurs and threats, as your peers (~70% of whom are White) stare, yet stand idle. This was the experience of several IU students just 1 month ago, and just days before MLK Day 2019.

Considering how this student must have felt, how it impacts the student’s engagement in the IU community, and how to improve IU’s response to and prevention of these types of incidents is a primary role served by Dr. Mary Murphy, an associate professor in IU’s Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences and, since October of 2017, associate vice provost for diversity and inclusion.

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Brewers without borders: Crossing racial divisions in the world of craft beer

Posted on February 19, 2019 by Lana Ruck

A banner that reads: ScIU Commemorating Black History Month

A profile of Aaron Ellis in celebration of Black History Month

A portrait of IU Ph.D. candidate Aaron Ellis

Craft brewing: chances are if you’re over 21, you’ve heard about it, drank it, or even tried to brew it yourself. For anthropologist Aaron Ellis — a brewer, a Ph.D. candidate in IU’s Department of Anthropology, and an IU academic advisor in the departments of Human Biology, Religious Studies, and History and Philosophy of Science — craft brewing has become more than a hobby. It’s the focus of his academic research, in which he traces the rise of craft beer in America from 1980 (when craft brewing started becoming more popular) to today. He also explores the barriers to diversity that exist within craft brewing and suggests that such barriers might relate to the role of science within craft brewing culture.

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Kissing, hand holding, and somatotopic organization in the brain

Posted on February 12, 2019 by Taylor Woodward

Have you ever wondered why humans express affection by kissing and hand holding? As with most things in life, the more you think about it, the weirder that it seems. Here’s an interesting insight from neuroscience that is fun to think about next time you decide that you want to over-analyze your love life even more than already happens.

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Interwoven Threads

Posted on February 5, 2019 by ScIU Editorial Team

This post is from ScIU’s archives. It was originally published by Liz Rosdeitcher in February 2018 and has been lightly edited to reflect current events.

A profile of IU professor Sharlene Newman in celebration of Black History Month

IU Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences Sharlene Newman

Any glance at the demographics tells us that African American women are among the least represented of any group in STEM disciplines. Such is true in the field of psychological and brain sciences, where Sharlene Newman is the only African American professor in her department. It is even rarer to find black female professors in the sub-field of cognitive neuroscience.

Yet, the path to science was in many ways etched onto Sharlene’s future. From kindergarten on, it was clear to all her teachers that Sharlene was just plain good at math and science. “You should be an engineer,” she was told, so often that it became an undisputed fact, something she “didn’t even have to think about.” Add to that the mesmerizing talents of a young uncle, who “once built a radio for class and could fix anything.” To which her response was simply, “I want to do that.”

At the same time, the issues of African American life and history, as they extend back in time and into the future, remain ever-present around her. Like a set of interwoven threads, her own history intersects with some of the most iconic people, places and events of African American history, as it unfolded in the tiny southeastern Alabama town of Abbeville, where she grew up. (more…)

Stellar psychology part II: what does signaling theory tell us about communicating with other life in the universe?

Posted on January 29, 2019 by Lana Ruck

This is the second part of a series on extraterrestrial psychology. Read part 1 here!

In Part 1 of this series, I discussed how the interdisciplinary field of evolutionary psychology can help us explore similarities between the human mind and possible extraterrestrial ones. One common potential feature is how we search for resources, which often involves a trade-off between exploring wide swaths of the environment and exploiting a patch of resources once you find that patch. Although humans have greatly improved our exploration skills in terms of searching for life beyond our planet, we have yet to reach an exploitation phase, and – more concerning – we have not thoroughly considered how to prevent others from exploiting our patch of resources, the Earth. Can evolutionary psychology inform us about this aspect of alien intelligence as well?

A person shines a flashlight into the night sky, which is filled with stars — CC0 by FelixMittermeier on Pixabay

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The early bird gets the worm, part I: What can behavioral ecology tell us about female aggression and its underlying mechanisms?

Posted on January 22, 2019 by Kat Munley

This post is the first of a two-part series on a day in the life of a behavioral ecologist, which features the stories and research of members of Dr. Kim Rosvall’s laboratory in the Department of Biology.

When most people imagine a scientist, they picture a person wearing a stark white lab coat and thick-rimmed goggles, hunching over a lab bench and watching a solution bubble and steam as a chemical reaction takes place. However, many scientists — including biologists, anthropologists, geologists, and sociologists — conduct part or all of their research in the field. While some scientists travel abroad to conduct fieldwork, members of Dr. Kim Rosvall’s laboratory in the Department of Biology have the advantage of conducting their research locally at field sites in and around Bloomington.

A timeline of different breeding stages is shown in black, which contains tick marks with text that describes each stage. In chronological order (from left to right on the timeline), the stages are territory establishment, mating/egg laying, incubation, and chick provisioning. A solid blue box is shown over the tick marks for the territory establishment, mating/egg laying, and incubation stages; and a red box with hatch marks is shown over the tick marks for the incubation and chick provisioning stages. Black text that reads “Nest Box Manipulations” is located over top of the blue box, between the territory establishment and mating/egg laying breeding stages. Black text that reads “Simulated Territorial Intrusions” is located over top of the blue box, between the mating/egg laying and incubation breeding stages. Blue text that reads “Part I: Seasonal Plasticity in Hormonal Signaling and Territorial Aggression” is located above the black text, and red text that reads “Part II: Effects of Early-Life Stress on Telomere Dynamics” is located over top of the red box. — Timeline of the breeding stages observed in a typical field season in Dr. Kim Rosvall’s laboratory overlaid with descriptions of the topics that will be discussed in this two-part series of posts on a day in the life of a behavioral ecologist. The current post (Part I, in blue) addresses the field manipulations and behavioral assays that are conducted during the early and middle stages of the field season, including nest box manipulations and simulated territorial intrusions. The second post in this series (Part II, in red) will discuss the experimental testing that occurs during the late stages of the field season, including the effects of early-life stress on chick development, growth, and physiology.

The Rosvall lab studies the genomic and physiological mechanisms of behavior in songbirds. One of the lab’s primary areas of interest is how physiological changes modulate same-sex aggression in females, a topic that has historically been understudied in birds and mammals, despite observations that females can be quite aggressive in nature. To explore these mechanisms, the Rosvall lab uses a charismatic songbird species, the tree swallow (Tachycineta bicolor). These birds, which are notable for the vibrant, blue-green iridescent feathers on their backs, migrate each spring from the Gulf coast to Indiana to breed and raise their young. Once they arrive in Indiana, tree swallows build their nests in cavities, including holes in trees and bird boxes. Importantly, tree swallows are obligate secondary cavity nesters, which means that their entire reproductive success depends on successfully acquiring and defending a nesting site; but, unlike a woodpecker, they are unable to excavate a cavity for themselves. Interestingly, this pressure to find a cavity means that females are actively involved in territorial defense against other females, making this species ideal for studying female-female aggression. (more…)

Seeds, Cyanide, And Medicinal properties (SCAM)

Posted on January 15, 2019 by Guest Contributor

This post was written by IU undergraduate student Yiling Dong. It is the third in a series of featured stories written for a ScIU in the Classroom collaboration with Dr. Cathrine Reck in the Department of Chemistry.

“Good source of B17” sounds legit, right? A quick internet search will lead you to thousands of results touting the anti-cancer benefits of vitamin B17 that are found in the pits of apricots, the seeds of apples, and in bitter almonds. B17 is being sold to consumers as a health food supplement, but dig a little deeper (perhaps try the second page of Google) and you’ll find a completely different story. B17 is not actually a vitamin and is instead a compound called “amygdalin.“ And the thing about amygdalin? It can be broken down into cyanide in the body after consumption [1].

Image of two orange apricots with one apricot split in half to expose the pit in the foreground. — Figure 1. Apricot with pit shown. Image credit. “Abricot” by Frédérique Voisin-Demery is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

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