Best Abstracts Ever

Michael Berry (of levitating frog fame) has recently been lauded as writing the best scientific abstract ever:

It's short, attention grabbing and conveys results, all of which are good things in an abstract. And I think it's better than many other claims for "best abstract". Avron and coworkers published in Communications in Mathematical Physics and decided "Abstract" was a good description of their paper (although some parts are concrete).

And Spiegelman's contribution to EOS-Transactions seems to indicate that anything can get published. I'm not sure if that was meant as a commentary on the deluge of fractal publications or just silliness.

My favorite abstract isn't ever mentioned in the corresponding paper. I'm not sure if the dry wit of the article and Dr. Strangelove reference in the title resonate with today's students. But examples the point out that a correlation doesn't mean a causation don't get better than:

Let me know if you know of any other candidates for "best abstract ever".

Gamers solve molecular biology problem

David Baker and coworkers at the University of Washington's Center for Game Science reported the structure of a molecule related to AIDS. in the latest Nature:Structural & Molecular Biology. This wasn't terribly exciting news. Yes, researchers have been actively trying to figure out this puzzle for over 10 years, but no one except a handful of professionals would have noticed if the Baker group had solved the elusive structure themselves. Instead, they used their online video game FoldIt to let people with no expertise tackle the problem.

FoldIt awards players points for getting parts of a protein in energetically favorable configurations (for example, hydrogen bonds are worth big points, while two atoms clashing together costs a penalty). Using tools provided in the game, "The Contenders" team shared ideas and structures and managed to come up with a good solution in only 10 days. This is the first published case where "the power of online games to channel human intuition" has solved a puzzle that baffled traditional scientists. But I'd be willing to bet that it's not the last.

Nanospiders!

Ayusman Sen and coworkers at Penn State have made the first synthetic nanoscale motor that is powered by a polymerization. First, they made "two-faced" nanoparticles that are silica on one side and gold on the other. Then they attached a Grubbs catalyst to the silica. These Ru catalysts love to grab on to double bonds and string them together. So when there is any double-bonded fuel (norbornene) around, the researchers could watch the particles being propelled towards it, and spinning out polymer chains as they go. The Royal Society of Chemistry has dubbed these nanomotors "spiders" because they spin out strands of product, and they move towards their "food".

Really inking skin

Skin grafts are a tedious, painful process for burn victims. Bioprinting is an exciting new field of research that is improving this procedure. Using a small sample of healthy skin, bioengineers can produce "inks" containing the patient's own stem cells. These inks are applied to the burned area to generate new, healthy tissue. Researchers at Wake Forest are beginning clinical trials using modified ink jet printers. A group at the University of Pittsburg has some impressive results using airbrush guns:

Diamond Planet

Matthew Bailes and his team in Australia announced the discovery of a planet made of diamonds in the latest issue of Science . Its name is technically PSR J1719 -1438, but some media reports have dubbed it Lucy. It's the most dense extrasolar plant to date, with a mass approximately equal to that of Jupiter, but 20 times more dense than the gas giant. It's  more than quadruple Earth's density, and almost twice as dense as lead. The diamond planet is very close to its star - an entire day takes only 2 hours, and the orbit would fit conveniently inside our sun. The planet is apparently what is left over when one part of a binary star pushes all the fusionable fuel away from it's partner. It's more than 4,000 light years away from Earth, so no one is likely to pick up continent-sized jewelry there anytime soon.

Periodic Comics

This website from two professor at the University of Kentucky collects references of elements in graphic novels. Some, like Metal Men, are chemistry specific comics but there are also appearances in mainstream comics from Batman and Scrooge McDuck. The nefarious elemental plots seem to outnumber those where chemistry saves the day. Most of the comics date from 1940 to 1970, with a few of more recent vintage. They don't seem to be updating anymore, but this is a fun collection to browse through.

Wolfram|Alpha

Wolfram|Alpha's goal is to make the world's knowledge computable. It's from the creator of the incredibly powerful Mathematica, and it provides straightforward answers to the questions it understands. Need to see a picture of myolglobin, determine which US president served the shortest time in office, or graph a 3-D wavy surface? Wolfram|Alpha can do it with ease.

It's a terrific curated resource, meaning experts deal with the content, so it doesn't suffer from the reliability problems that can afflict certain wikipedia articles and blogs. And it provides excellent citations, so you can find primary material or further information. It gives you one answer to each question, so there's no wading through 50 bazillion hits like Google sometimes provides.

The downside is that you are asking questions to an algorithm. As impressive as this algorithm is, it's not as good as a person at figuring out what you want. Ask what the chemical abbreviation DBA stands for, and you'll be told the definition of the word "abbreviation". Request information on dog allergies and you'll receive the lyrics to "How much is that doggie in the window". Everyday Wolfram|Alpha gets more knowledge and improves at answering questions. I'm not sure it will ever be able to compute everything, but it's definitely a handy tool to have in your research arsenal.