#thescicommunity

[ishasal]

The (disgusting) truth about (ugly) skin mites!!!

So dear too-curious-for-your-own-good-darlings, recently it’s been brought to my knowledge (note: by my very beautiful and lovely girlfriend, while having lunch none the less) that we have several hundreds of skin mites living in our faces, which come up at night, mate and go right back into their designated holes (which just happen to be our skin pores). I’m sure most of you have heard this as well. So, naturally as curiously disturbed I was I decided to investigate further about this, and just let me tell you already fellow academics, the truth was pretty disgusting. (This is what happens in a relationship between scientists)

IT’S TRUE

These skin mites, usually Demodex mites, have been living across the human skin for about 20,000 years and almost EVERYBODY has them. On that jolly historical note, wouldn’t you like to know what they look like......spiders, tiny microscopic spiders/slugs. Demodex mites have eight short and stubby legs near their heads. Their bodies are elongated, almost worm-like. Under a microscope, they look as though they're swimming through oil, neither very far, nor very fast. (UGH thanks, honey, I’m never gonna touch your ugly mug again.)

BUT

However, before you rush out to buy the recently-launched-strongest-bacteria-killing-facewash I’ll have you know that these mites are apparently harmless. And we don’t exactly know what they eat, maybe dead skin cells, maybe bacteria or maybe they’re sipping on the oily cocktail in our oil glands but they’re still pretty harmless.

What’s going on when the dermatologist says we’ve got a mite infestation, they were harmless right? Well, darling that happens when firstly, it mite (I’m hilarious) be a different parasite in itself and secondly it may be due to the excessive increase in the mite population living on your face, genitals and other creasy areas. These mites maintain a balance with the host in order to coexist when this balance is disturbed the cause skin ailments like rosacea and blepharitis in humans, which might have happened in the first place due to the low immune system.

On that satisfactory note, I’ll end this beautifully informant post.

Laters Darlings

SAL

(I’ll go and snog my girlfriend and our mutual 2000 mites now)

[paleochick]

If you aren't following @paleoparadox yet, TREAT YO SELF. Gabe is an amazing paleontologist & #scicomm superstar! Follow his adventures through his Insta stories NOW. #Repost @paleoparadox • • • • • So here’s the odontocete (toothed whale) skull that I helped to jacket today! . What does it mean to jacket a fossil? Well, we never fully excavate a fossil in the field. Fossils are usually super fragile when we find them. It would be risky to remove all the matrix (rock surrounding the fossil) and transport delicate fossils back to a museum. . So to protect fossils during transport, we leave a good amount of matrix around the fossil. Then we cover the fossil and matrix in a jacket usually made of layers of burlap and plaster. This provides an enclosed shell for greater protection. Once the jacket is hardened, it’s ready for transport back to the lab where it be carefully prepared using precise tools and techniques! . . . #fieldwork #paleontology #fossil #fossilsofinstagram #whales #dolphins #desert #peru #huacachina #thescicommunity #filipinoscientist #outdoorasian #myapalife #museumlife #whenyouworkatamuseum #wearescience

[paleochick]

Help us in our #scicomm efforts! #Repost @paleoparadox • • • • • Hello my fellow SVP SciCommers and educators! At this year’s SVP in New Mexico, Sara ElShafie, Ashley Hall (@lady_naturalist ), and myself will be organizing a fun workshop about telling science stories through multimedia! . We want to keep the registration for this workshop as low as possible, so we’ve started a small GoFundMe to help cover the costs of the workshop. Please help us out if you can! Check out the link in my profile! . More on the workshop: Storytelling is the most universal form of communication. In the digital age, storytelling through film and social media is crucial for reaching broad audiences. But these skills are typically overlooked or not sufficiently developed in science communication workshops. We have therefore put together an intensive workshop that will give participants fundamental skills for developing engaging science stories, and for sharing those stories on social media using DIY videography. . The morning session will offer an overview of story development, including visual storytelling. Participants will work in small groups throughout the morning to brainstorm and outline a story about a particular topic in paleontology. In the afternoon session, participants will learn essentials of videography, and work with their groups to produce short videos about the science stories they developed that morning. We will also discuss effective use of different social media platforms for science outreach. At the end of the workshop, we will publish the participants’ short videos online through the SVP Education & Outreach Facebook group. . . . #scicomm #science #paleontology #education #SvP2018 #2018svp #thescicommunity #wearescience

[paleochick]

Happy belated #LGBTQSTEMDay! The @thescicommunity is a wonderful group of humans that I am thankful to have found. I have made friendships I would have never thought possible! Are you a scientist or science communicator who would like to join? Message @thescicommunity! -------------- The SciCommunity family celebrates and supports the full spectrum of scientists on the first ever #LGBTStemDay from @prideinstem ! This collage (thanks for making it, @paleoparadox!) represents just a few of the LGBT+ or ally SciCommunity members who support equality and fair treatment for #lgbt+ scientists. When everyone is included in STEM, we all benefit! 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈 #communication #scicomm #science #pride #scienceforall #truediversity #scicomm #lgbtq #pride2018 #biinsci #rainbow #collage #scientists

[paleochick]

Why do I #scicomm? . Not because I'm a narcissist. Not just because I'm a woman. Because sharing science on social media is POWERFUL. . Yesterday, @science.sam, a fellow #scicomm'er was unfairly called out in @sciencemagazine by a fellow scientist because of her appearance and for taking "time away from research" because of Instagram. . This was an unnecessary attack on Sam. . The Instagram #scicomm community, composed of people from ALL genders, works HARD everyday to make everyone feel like they're joining scientists in their labs, classrooms, and in remote places "in the field". Science communicators take time during our day to communicate our science. Not for ourselves, but for those who are curious. For those who want to learn. All of this regardless of appearance. . Women in Science used to be INVISIBLE, but now WE ARE BEING SEEN. . I wear makeup. This is what I choose to look like everyday, regardless of if I'm taking selfies or not. . I don't #scicomm because I think I'm cute, I #scicomm to show people WHY museums are THE BEST places in the world. . I want to inspire you. . I want you to know why museums are important. . I want you to see 360 million year old fossils. . If a young girl is inspired by my posts because I look "girly", so be it! I grew up idolizing Jack Horner: a white male paleontologist. It would have been wonderful to have had a woman paleontologist to look up to, but I didn't know any different. . The Instagram @thescicommunity is STRONG. . We are here. . We want to share science with you using the best ways that we know how. . We will keep sharing our passions everyday because the world is a beautiful, wonderful place. . We take time from our day (a lot of time DURING research!) because we just HAVE to show you what FASCINATING thing we just saw before our own eyes. I grab my phone everytime I learn something in order to snap a photo because I want you to be fascinated, too. . Follow @scicommunity. Be inspired. . #scientistswhoselfie #selfie #scicommunity #wearescience #strongertogether #womeninscience #stem #womeninstem #science #wearestemsquad #palaeontology #womeninpaleontology (at Cleveland Museum of Natural History)

[paleochick]

Woohoo! Proud to be the newest member of @thescicommunity! ------------------ Hi everyone! I’m Ashley Hall (aka @lady_naturalist ), Adult Programs Coordinator at the ‪Cleveland Museum of Natural History‬. I design fun, educational, engaging programs for adults which often take place at the Museum, but also in conjunction with other local institutions like libraries, movie theatres, hiking stores, and more! Like a gem, my job is multi-faceted. Besides planning and conducting adult programs, I also teach classes for grades K-12 at the Museum in the galleries in the mornings (think old-school Museum tours, but more exciting!), video conferencing classes with schools in different states (and countries!), and I also take our programs on the road (Science-to-Go!) to schools within an hour radius of the Museum. Like my job, my background is also multi-faceted and extremely variable! While I am a paleontologist and informal educator by training, I hold a B.A in Anthropology and Animal Behavior from Indiana University Bloomington. I studied animal bones at archaeological sites in Kansas and Wyoming to determine diet in Protohistoric plains hunter-gatherer groups. After college, I decided to pursue my lifelong dream of working both in a ‪Natural History Museum‬ and as a paleontologist. I spent the last 7 years working in the Education Division at the ‪Natural History Museum of Los Angeles‬ (@NHMLA) and the world famous La Brea Tar Pits where I was able to design research-based programming (public tours, school programs) to a wide variety of audiences. I was then hired as Assistant Curator at the Raymond M. Alf Museum of Paleontology under ceratopsian expert Dr. Andrew A. Farke where I excavated, catalogued, identified, and curated fossils from Bureau of Land Management Land from the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. I’ve published research on Pleistocene birds from the La Brea Tar Pits and sauropod dinosaurs with my husband, Lee Hall (@paleeoguy). I love sharing my passion through social media, so feel free to follow my adventures on Instagram!