Tales from the Microbial Laboratory

~insulation, because you care~

It was an interesting day.

Exhausting, but interesting.  It was a day where words were tossed around, words with deep meaning, words that lead one down a road where there is no turning back.

Academic tomfoolery.  Ballyhoo.  Cries of mutiny!

Fortunately, I was able to leave work early - at 3 pm I needed to meet with the prospective HVAC consultant on the house.  Yes, I find it hard to believe too, but my silly little house-on-paper has an HVAC consultant.

~~~~~

This was the first time this guy had come out to 'the site'.  He is pushing - and I mean pushing - geothermal, so a ground source for heating and cooling.  He is also beyond fond of a certain type of insulation, Icynene, which I've got to admit seems too good to be true.  (Can one fall in love, deeply, with insulation?). Here is a bit about the product from the Icynene website:

Icynene^®, the leading soft foam insulation and air barrier system, is becoming the industry standard for providing maximum building envelope performance. Icynene's pour and spray formulations represent a breakthrough in the science of moisture and thermal management.

Icynene^® is the leading 100% water-blown foam insulation that minimizes air leakage for increased energy efficiency, creates a healthier indoor environment, reduces airborne sounds and offers greater design freedom. Icynene^® maintains its performance with no loss of R-value over time. It does not shrink, sag or settle. Icynene^® adheres to most construction materials and is the perfect insulation for walls, attics, ceilings and floors.

Spray Formula
Applied as a liquid, Icynene^® expands to 100 times its volume in seconds to fill every crack and crevice while remaining flexible so that the integrity of the building envelope seal remains intact over time. Icynene's spray formula has an R-value of 3.6 per inch. It acts as a complete insulation and air barrier to minimize air leakage and seal the building envelope for optimal airtightness.

And to help you visualize this whole insulation thing (because by now I'm sure that you are riveted to this fascinating post), here's a video I found over at YouTube showing Icynene being installed (yeah, I know, the guy is wearing a moonsuit):

Now, I'm not advertising for this stuff - but everything that I have read really does suggest it is the way to go.  My HVAC guy says that if you are considering energy efficiency - that this product is probably the #1 thing you can do to help yourself out.  Plus, in our humid climate, it handles moisture better than other products of it's kind.  As is generally the case, it's expensive - quite a bit more than the average insulation.  So - as is the case with everything now - it's weighing the advantages with the cost and the house's overall budget and aesthetic.

~~~~~

I swear - one day there will be a house.  And it's likely that I will know way more about it than I ever dreamed I would.

~~~~~

What does all of this really mean?

It means that I was home early, with plenty of light, and had time to wander the garden with the new wild dog and Stan - time to inspect the beds for signs of life, tiny movements, growth - and I found myself spending quite a bit of time staring at the buds of the star magnolia - Magnolia stellata - somehow thinking that if I stared hard enough, and long enough, that perhaps the buds would start to swell, and that perhaps the white petals of the flowers would start to emerge.  Well, as you might have guessed, they didn't.  So I came inside, and baked a cake for my favorite 87 year-old camellia gardener, who I hope to sneak away and visit tomorrow.  But tonight, as cool winds that are blowing across the midwest finally reach us here along the coast -  a gale builds - and behind these winds are warm days.

~~~~~ 

There is no mutiny in the garden.  There is never a need there for such foolishness.  I'm glad that the garden is not real life.

~a camellia, a day, and another camellia~

Glistening flower petals of Camellia japonica 'Margaret Radcliffe'. 

The start of a day, beginning with a walk around the garden - Stanley wanders, the New Wild Dog attacks - attacks the morning with the enthusiasm of a New Wild Dog that finds each and every little thing fascinating - the start of a day later filled with meetings - hours spent around a conference room table - discussing this, that, avoiding this, that - meetings, the curse of modern day societies (or perhaps not, but definitely the curse of my working life). 

~~~~~

In the middle of the day, in the middle of a Wednesday, the lab once again met:  featuring homemade sourdough bread prepared and shared by Katherine, then a discussion by the lab's senior graduate student - a presentation of what he has been doing, what his thoughts are, as he titled the presentation 'As Ben's World Turns'.  A new theory, new data, new questions - we didn't come close to getting through what we needed to do because, yes, I had another meeting to attend.  But I need to think, and hopefully I can get back to Ben's world on Friday - to reconsider his thoughts on Fe and metal toxicity, Fe and membrane vesicles.  Fe...and Ben's world.  (Anyway, let's face it:  I just need to think).

And there was a poem.  By Rainer Maria Rilke.  One that Katherine said that all introduction-to-poetry classes cover - and one that appears on-line with several different translations.  (Translated, of course, from german:  'Reform!' vs 'You must change your life.'  The last line of the poem seems controversial). 

[From this site:  Male torso, marble (perhaps Parian), from the island of Miletos, "Severe" early classical style. c 480-470 BC. The Louvre, Paris. Photo © R.M.N./H. Lewandowski - according to this post, it is thought this is the torso that inspired Rilke - although, just in general, one could get lost in this discussion thread and since it is something that I know little - to nothing - about, then I should probably stop rambling before I say something so - wrong - that I'll regret it.  But go there, and read.  Scholars roam there.  There's text that one could get lost in, easily.] 

Archaic Torso of Apollo by Rainer Maria Rilke (Translated by Stephen Mitchell, from Ahead of All Parting:  Selected Poetry and Prose of Rainer Marie Wilke, 1995)

We cannot know his legendary head
with eyes like ripening fruit. And yet his torso
is still suffused with brilliance from inside,
like a lamp, in which his gaze, now turned to low,

gleams in all its power. Otherwise
the curved breast could not dazzle you so, nor could
a smile run through the placid hips and thighs
to that dark center where procreation flared.

Otherwise this stone would seem defaced
beneath the translucent cascade of the shoulders
and would not glisten like a wild beast's fur:

would not, from all the borders of itself,
burst like a star: for here there is no place
that does not see you. You must change your life.

~~~~~

So as always, I wander - and wandering through the poetry of Rilke tonight I came across this one, and let me just say....WOW. 

'I want to unfold'.

God yes.

I love that line.

It seems like everything.

~~~~~ 

And have you noticed, have you been fortunate enough to notice - that the days are longer?  Noticeably longer?  Perhaps, that, the days are unfolding?   I managed to end my day of meetings with another camellia, a different one, one that I have called by the wrong name for two years now (and one that I will print an image of out, and take to my friend Skip on a hopefully-to-be-soon visit to his camellia garden.  I need to visit him.  I need to visit his camellias.  I need to call this camellia by it's proper name.)

And really, a day that begins and ends with camellias (even if it is filled with meetings) is a truly good day, isn't it?

~the mysterious~

Look closely.

Streaks of coral mucus (in folds), the small green dots (prokaryotes), the larger orange spheres (most likely eukaryotic cells of some kind) - an image obtained today by the eclair-making postdoc (who hasn't brought in eclairs in a long, long time). 

It's own universe.

The surface mucopolysaccharide layer of the Caribbean reef-building coral, Montastrea faveolata.

The universe in this image is what we are trying to understand.  It's funny how we're studying the microscopic members of this mysterious universe, but here I am tonight, looking at this image - sensing the vastness of it all.

It's like wandering into a strange and new world.

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. - Albert Einstein

~electricity~

Holly fern.  Cyrtomium falcatum.  A broken branch, early on a cool morning in late January.

~~~~~

I realized recently that when I think of science, rather the history of science - that I generally either daydream about scientists of years and years ago - or am enthralled with the science of the present.

Old discoveries, the first observations, surprisingly sophisticated cave drawings - the origin of writing in Mesopotamia - old things, old things that were beyond bold.  To stand up one day and draw on a wall (which, now that I think about it, I have the freedom to do in my soon-to-be-demolished home).  Then, today's science, science of the minute - what scientists can see today amazes me.

~~~~~

Last week Katherine sent me a pdf of a book review published in Science (2007, Vol. 315:768), a review of Joyce E. Chaplin's The First Scientific American:  Benjamin Franklin and the Pursuit of Genius.

I haven't read the book, but I think that I will.

From the review:

"Experiments and demonstrations were public events," Chaplin comments.  The term scientist was not coined until the 19th century, and many citizens from all professions had a hand in advancing and appreciating scientific knowledge.  For his famous electrical experiments, Franklin collaborated with a lawyer (Thomas Hopkinson), a silversmith (Philip Syng), and a Baptist Minister (Ebenezer Kinnersley).  In contrast to the polarization too often seen nowadays, how refreshing to think of "[m]embers of the clergy preach[ing] the new philosophy of nature."

Wow.  Now that is something.

I've ignored that transition.  The transition from doing science (and having that activity be a part of the popular culture) to being a scientist.  Perhaps I'd rather do it as a normal part of society (which, yes, it probably is - and I'm being sensitive here) - an activity which others can contribute to - than to do it isolated in a laboratory with other scientists.

It's just something to think about.

I submitted a manuscript today for review.  I hope it's a decent contribution.  I hope the submission process will go smoothly. 

I hope that a lawyer will be ask to review it, or perhaps a silversmith.

But I doubt it.

~~~~~

Words of wisdom:

Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing. Benjamin Franklin

Words of even greater wisdom:

Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.  Benjamin Franklin

      

~simple observations, of no particular importance~

Galls on a tree, just across the fence, a tree that I think - perhaps - I noticed for the first time today.  (How is that?).  I noticed today that it was covered in dangling, small balls - it was beautiful. 

About 10 feet away - the lowquat, and it's trunk - with an interesting pattern - made by a woodpecker perhaps? 

A daffodil - in a small cluster of daffodils - sitting there with a bud, a few inches high, a bud sitting there thinking about flowering in the not-so-distant future. 

Seeds turning more and more yellow-gold each day, tangled up in the plumes of the striped Eulalia grass (Miscanthus sinensis 'Variegatus').

Looking up at the southern magnolia - a tree composed of five different trunks, slowly growing together and up (I'm guessing the main trunk was taken down during Hurricane Hugo).  It's now a presence, a large one, in the front corner of the garden. 

A new camellia blossom opening - one that I've wrongly called 'Brigadoon' for a few years (note to self:  find out which one it really is).

The texture of a banana tree leaf (after it's frozen, dried out, and quite paper-ish - and no longer banana-leaf green) - still beyond perfect.

Blueberry 'Sunshine Blue' preparing for warm days with tiny leaves starting to sprout, and flower buds beginning to form.

Pieces of paper, pieces of the trunk of the river birch - littered all over the front perennial border.

A beautiful flower, Camellia japonica 'Magnoliaeflora', a flower keeping a sweet beagle company.

      

~a state of flux~

Today, after a late afternoon meeting with two colleagues about an extremely delicate issue, I walked down the hallway to the lab and thought:

My entire life right now is in a state of flux.

Yep.  That pretty much sums it up.

I could present all of the reasons why I feel this way, but let me just cite one specific example of immense significance:

My hair guy, the guy who has been cutting my hair for a few years, who makes me laugh hysterically every time he cuts my hair, who is the one person in my life who tells me what to do where I actually do it, well, he is moving out of state.

Now, this might seem minor, but on top of everything else, where every other aspect of my life is in a state of flux, let me just say that it really sucks.

Not my hair guy.

(Image:  This is what the leaves of a copper plant look like after the first December frost - when one is attempting to take a macro image of the leaves, with a camera in one hand and in the other hand - a leash attached to the New Wild Dog).

~crankiness, dog-scratching branches, fig trees, a visit to a bookstore, and a poem~

I've been cranky.  Pretty much for the past two days, yep, cranky.  Ahh, there's reasons, reasons (work stuff) that I'll not go into here - but trust me when I say you'd be cranky too.

~~~~~

Besides being cranky, I've also been cold.  Which sounds terribly whiny (whiney?  or either?) - so, there's also the possibility that I've been whiny AND cranky.  Yikes.  Not good.  I'm sure that it hasn't been pretty.

(And let me just add, at the risk of humiliating myself:  it's 54 degrees outside as I write this).

~~~~~

So, what does one do?

~~~~~ 

Pay attention to the little things, the funny things.  Like tonight, while I was walking the New Wild Dog, the Stannish was running in circles under the three Leyland Cypresses - going back and forth, then in circles - and finally I realized that the branches were at a height that they scratched his back when he moved under them.  The Stan was happy!  Then I noticed that the passion vine had sprouted some leaves at it's base, that one hyacinth was up (and you could see the beginning of a flower) - and that there were several clumps of daffodils that were already four or so inches high.  There were also all sorts of birds hanging out in the branches of the fig tree, waiting patiently even, daydreaming of mid-July and a tree filled with sweet, sweet brown figs.

~~~~~

Before that, I thought about something interesting I had listened to on NPR - this piece about building a bacterium's genetic code in the laboratory (something recently published in Science, Online).  Their organism of choice was Mycoplasma genitalium - the smallest known free-living bacteria - and this truly has remarkably possibilities (for both good and bad - but possibilities nonetheless).  It's a step in a new direction.

~~~~~

Which is what we all try to do, right?

~~~~~

Then I did what I've shown great personal restraint in regards to for months now:  I went to the bookstore.  I needed the distraction of books.  I hadn't looked around for awhile, and I need to get some hot tea and walk around, just wandering, discovering that I might need to read Brooks' 'March' , that Mary Oliver's latest book, 'Our World', is her text along with the photographs of her deceased partner, Molly Malone Cook.  There was not a 'newest-greatest' collection of Neruda (and I had hoped there would be one) and I read a bit of Stanley Kunitz but wasn't moved to get the book (I can't remember now which one it was).  I did weaken though, and walked away with Jonah Lehrer's 'Proust Was a Neuroscientist' and Michael Dirr's 'Viburnums:  Flowering Shrubs for Every Season'.  I've been wanting to learn more about viburnums (especially those with the gorgeous blue berries that linger during the winter) - and as for Proust, here's a bit of Lehrer's Prelude:

I used to work in a neuroscience lab.  We were trying to figure out how the mind remembers, how a collection of cells can encapsulate our past.  I was just a lab technician, and most of my day was spent performing the strange verbs of bench science:  amplifying, vortexing, pipetting, sequencing, digesting, and so on.  It was simple manual labor, but the work felt profound.  Mysteries were distilled into minor questions, and if my experiments didn't fail, I ended up with an answer.  The truth seemed to slowly accumulate, like dust.

At the same time, I began reading Proust.  I would often bring my copy of Swann's Way into the lab and read a few pages while waiting for an experiment to finish.  All I expected from Proust was a little entertainment, or perhaps an education in the art of constructing sentences.  For me, his story about one man's memory was simply that:  a story.  It was a work of fiction, the opposite of scientific fact.

But once I got past the jarring contrast of forms -- my science spoke in acronyms, while Proust preferred meandering prose -- I began to see a surprising convergence.  The novelist had predicted my experiments.  Proust and neuroscience shared a vision of how our memory works.  If you listen closely, they were actually saying the same thing.

~~~~~

So I'm feeling less cranky tonight.  I hope this new feeling holds.

~~~~~

So during yesterday's lab meeting, we listened to one student tell us about new observations (that even made sense - how nice!) while a second student continued her on-going preparations for her proposal defense seminar.  Another student interjected a cry - 'it's Fe!!' - because he's had Fe (iron) on the brain of late.  As usual, Katherine presented us a poem - from a collection of poems titled 'Verse and Universe' (edited by Kurt Brown) - a poem by Charles Harper Webb that, I'm guessing, Proust might have been fond of...(and forgive the scan of page 197 in the book - but the form of this poem is important and I haven't the patience to re-create it here). (Much better!  Now I can add:  And with belated permission from the author, via Katherine).

    

   

~a South Carolina Citrus Farm~

Tonight, while wandering the garden with the New Wild Dog and The Stanimal, I couldn't help but notice that I had horrifically failed my eucalyptus tree. 

(I think it's Eucalyptus cinerea, the Silver Dollar Gum tree.  Charlestonians love their eucalyptus - I suppose anyone would, right?)

~~~~~

So, can one truly fail a tree?  I suppose.  I think I did.  I should have pruned mine when it was feet (and feet and feet) shorter - but now mine sits just off the end of my side deck, towering a good 10 or 15 feet above a deck that is already 12 or so feet off the ground.  This thing is tall now.  When I got it, from Pete's, it was about a foot high - a baby of a tree - unintimidating, quiet, sweet - and now it is striking, upright and tall, Suessian.  Dare I try to chop off the top 10 feet so that it bushes out a bit more, gains some width, becoming less of a hurricane-waiting-to-happen disaster?

I like it though.  I like it the way it is now, but I know that I have failed it.  Yes, I can start all over, get a new and smaller one, a quiet one, and start pruning it at an early age. 

But isn't this one beautiful?  I would never think of abandoning it.  That just won't happen.

Perhaps I can start pruning it back, slowly, somehow.

~~~~~

In a day where I it hit me hard that pretty much every aspect of my life is stressful challenging right now, I had a little 'find' that made me happy.  There is a citrus farm in South Carolina!

Take a look at Mckenzie Farms in Scranton, South Carolina.  (And Scranton is about two hours NORTH of me).

They don't just grow citrus - they grow INTERESTING citrus.  Cold hardy citrus.  Like citrus junos (or YUZU) - a cold hardy citrus from the highlands of Japan that has been reported (according to their site) to have survived temperatures as low as 5 F.  And then there is Ten Degree Tangerine and the Ichang Lemon.  Wow.  The cold hardiness reported on their website is impressive - and I might just have to email the guy (the guy being Citrus Man - perhaps a new super hero?).

Anyway, this was a find.  This was optimistic (considering that I have a satsuma and two Meyer's Lemons in the ground, and am craving an enlargement of my non-existent citrus grove).  I want a grove.  Of citrus.  I want to walk in the grove in the springtime, and smell the wonderfully sweet fragrance of the flowers.  I want to invite friends to come and sit in my citrus grove in springtime.   

~~~~~

Back to the stressful challenging stuff.  (But with a hint of fragrance lingering).         

~seeds~

A number of years ago, I planted a Texas Mountain Laurel (Sophora secundiflora) in my garden - one that I held on my lap during a flight from College Station, Texas to Charleston, South Carolina. 

I think that then - and even now - it might be the only one in Charleston, except, perhaps, for the seedlings started by Pete and his Dad over a year ago from seed pods that I took them.

A few days ago, I was reading something, and read that the seeds of this tree were red.  I felt silly, here I've had this tree in my garden for awhile, and I had not once peeled open a seed pod, to look at what was inside.

So - they are red.  Now I know.  For sure.

~~~~~

So here is my wishlist (just the flowers, and, to be honest, just the flowers from a few of the catalogs that I've looked at thus far...) - I've narrowed it down and this is where I am.  I need to narrow it down even more.  (I'm not good at that, as you might guess - I somehow thought that writing the list down and seeing how long it was might help me see that this is not manageable - but so far, nothing.  Not a thing.  I still want all of them.  Damn.  But...but...look at that Kaimon Dake Leopard Plant!  And the Giraffe Foxglove!  Oh, and the Tassel Flower!  See what I mean???)

~~~~~ 

Select Seeds

Seeds

• Night Jessamine (Cestrum nocturnium)
• Tobacco ‘Bella’ (Nicotiana alata x mutabilis)
• African Foxglove (Ceratotheca triloba)
• Cleome ‘Violet Queen’ (Cleome hassleriana ‘Violet Queen’)
• Kiss-Me-Over-the-Garden-Gate (Polygonium orientale)
• Fluttering Poppies Collection:  Corn Poppy (Papaver rhoeas), Black Peony Poppy (Papaver paeoniflorum), Danish Flag Poppy (Papaver somniferum), Pink Peony Poppy (Papaver somniferum)
• Genetian Sage ‘Cambridge Blue’ (Salvia patens)
• Tassel Flower (Emilia javanica)
• Creeping Gloxinia ‘Joan Lorraine’ (Asarina scandens)
• Foxglove ‘Spanish Peaks’ (Digitalis thapsii)
• Rose Campion (Lychis coronaria)

Plants

• Phlox ‘David’s Lavender’ (Phlox paniculata ‘David’s Lavendar)
• Phlox ‘Delta Snow’ (Phlox paniculata ‘Delta Snow’)
• Clematis ‘Rubromarginata’ (Clematis x triternata)

Bulbs

• Abyssinian Gladiolus (Gladiolus callianthus)
• Iris ‘Faustine’ (Iris germanica)
• Iris ‘Quaker Lady’ (Iris germanica)

Plant Delights Nursery, Inc

• xAmarcrinum ‘Fred Howard’
• Cobra Lily (Arisaema candidissimum)
• Black Jack-in-the-Pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum ‘Black Jack’)
• Wayne’s World Redneck Lupine (Baptisia alba var. alba ‘Wayne’s World’)Purple Smoke Redneck Lupine (Baptisia ‘Purple Smoke’
• ‘Heron’s Pirouette’ (Begonia grandis ‘Heron’s Pirouette’)
• Hardy Calanthe Orchid (Calanthe kawakamiense)
• Serrate-leaf Cloranthus (Cloranthus serratus)
• Crinum ‘Sangria’
• Mexican Giant Cigar Plant (Cuphea micropetala)
• Kaimon Dake Leopard Plant (Farfugium japonicum ‘Kaimon Dake’)
• Hardy Ginger Lily (Hedychium ‘Daniel Weeks’)
• Oxblood Lily (Rhodophiala bifida)
• Eveline Sage (Salvia ‘Eveline’ PP 14,905
• Rhapsody in Blue Sage (Salvia ‘Rhapsody in Blue’)
• Nodding Ladies’ Tresses (Spiranthes cernua var. odorata)
• Underwood’s Trillium (Trillium underwoodii)

Swallowtail Garden Seeds (foxgloves can be seen here, these I've already ordered)

• Giraffe Foxglove (Digitalis laevigata)
• Café Crème Foxglove (Digitalis lanata)
• Apricot Foxglove (Digitalis purpurea)
• Milk Chocolate Foxglove (Digitalis parviflora)

~packing~

Two dogs at the dining room window, wondering why I'm taking so many boxes outside and putting them into my car, only to leave for a short while and return - with no boxes in hand.  (This has been going on for too long, their faces say).

You know the saying about packing:  the first 90% is easy and the last 10% is hell.  I'm in that 10% now, if you don't consider the large pieces of furniture that I can't move myself (and will hire a mover to do so), or the group of things that will go into the Airstream.  I'm down to 27 books.  That's the best I can do.  My desk is piled with...debris, as is the dining room table and kitchen counters.  I'm slowly sorting through it - trying not to throw out important documents, but become less sentimental each day (even though I did pack a bird's nest today that has been on my dining room table for awhile, as well as two sunflower heads from when I did my master's degree research).

But I need to take a break from sorting and packing for awhile - and go over the most recent set of houseplans that my architherapist sent me.  I looked at them briefly two days ago, but need to sit down and look over them carefully - pretty soon the plans will be THE plans, and the first stage of this will be over.  After looking at the plans, I need to start sketching out my landscape plan (a requirement for LEED).  Now the landscape plan I'm excited about - having known for sometime that I plan to build, I haven't done some things in my garden that I wanted to - but now that I know (for the most part) where the new house will be on the lot, I can now start thinking about how this southern exposure will change my garden, and what I might do to help the changes along.