Category: public posts
The select public posts from syn·op·sis, written and reviewed by iSci students at McMaster University. Each post is interdisciplinary in nature, and a wide variety of subject matter is covered. So sit back, relax, and start learning.
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Thwaites Glacier: are we skating on thin ice?
The impacts of climate change are all around us and can be observed in our everyday lives. A direct and progressively concerning consequence of climate change is the rise of global sea levels. Conservative trajectories predict that the sea level will rise 49-56 cm by 2100 (Kopp, et al., 2017). Worst-case scenarios predict increases of…
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“According to all known laws of aviation, there is no way a bee should be able to fly,”- The Myth About Bees
“According to all known laws of aviation, there is no way a bee should be able to fly,” is a quote from Dreamworks’ 2007 animation Bee Movie. This fictitious claim originated from French entomologist, August Magnan, and mathematician Andre Sainte-Lague, who calculated that it should be impossible for bees to fly (Altshuler et al., 2005).…
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The Dunning-Kruger Effect
If I were to ask you how good of a driver you think you are, or what score you think you would receive when given a standardized test, what would you say? Now if you were to actually undergo said driving or standardized test, would your score align with what you inferred? Probably not. This…
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SPF 1000?
In 2020, the world’s largest reef, the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, experienced its third mass bleaching event in the last five years (Nelson, 2020). Exacerbated by climate change, extreme heat waves bleach coral as their thermal tolerance and photosynthetic symbionts are exceeded (Hoegh-Guldberg, 1999). While bleaching does not always lead to organism death, it…
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The physics of teaching physics
Education has certainly evolved into the 21st-century, and the way in which physics is taught is not shy to this phenomenon. How is physics taught? What are some problems associated with these teaching methods? How can we fix them? Students in physics classrooms are often sorted into two groups: those who believe that physics consists…
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Mathematics + Genetics = Molecular Computing
The interdisciplinary comprehension and use of mathematics and computing in science are essential for research and development. Mathematics aids in analyzing and visualizing patterns in data collected on computers, and allows for representation of scientific phenomena (Meredith et al., 2007). The use of math also allows for expanding existing ideas and discovering new ones. In…
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Learning How to Read Minds
Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), despite being one of the most pivotal innovations of contemporary medicine, is markedly limited due to its safety, cost, and inability to discern micro-insults within the brain (Glover, 2011). In 1992, scientists introduced functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI), a non-invasive technique intended to measure brain activity with unparalleled specificity (Soares, et…
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Is Carbon Capture Accelerating Global Warming?
It has been well established that climate change is driven by anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warns us in their 2021 report that even with massive reductions in current GHG emission levels, we will soon experience unprecedented rises in global temperature and natural disaster frequency (IPCC, 2021). The…
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A Blast of Clean Energy
Serviceable fusion power is a near-ideal source of effectively limitless clean energy—its high energy density, safety, and sustainability distinguish fusion from any other energy source today. Despite this, the funds required for fusion research and its highly specialized conditions of operation hinder its feasibility in the market (Cowley, 2016). However, as global energy use continues…
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Magical Muons and Magma Movement
Volcanoes can threaten public safety, water supplies, land, and contribute to temporary climate changes (U.S. Geological Survey, 2018). Canada primarily has volcanic areas in British Columbia and Yukon, but is also exposed to volcanoes along the United States border that may erupt again in the future (Government of Canada, 2020). Volcanoes, therefore, pose a threat…