Friday, January 28, 2011
Do academics dream of electric sheep?
The problem
WHO KNOWS WHAT other people dream of? Unless you’re a character in Inception, your dreams are for you and you alone. That’s good for you if your dreams involve your best friend’s girlfriend, but bad for scientists who want to study dreams using the scientific method.
Since dreams are not directly observable, you have to collect thousands of dream reports and depend on the reliability of the subjects’ recollection in order to systematically study their content.
To make matters worse, each of the dream reports must be analyzed. To do this, an expert judge must evaluate the content and code the accounts into a set of rankings. Say you want to study emotional content, you have to go through each report and rank how positive or negative the emotions in a dream were.
Not only can the subjects distort the research by failing to perfectly recall the dream, but human bias during coding is virtually unavoidable.
The researcher
University of Ottawa’s Joseph De Koninck studies what our minds are busy doing while we sleep. He studies the (usually more negative than positive) emotions of dreaming, and is interested in how these emotions develop throughout the dreams. As a dream psychologist, De Koninck must continually work with human error introduced during the coding process.
The project
What if researchers could eliminate the need for a human judge altogether? Computers can be taught to identify the level of emotion in a written text. This sort of Artificial Intelligence uses algorithms that can be trained from databases of reports and their corresponding rankings by human judges. The computer model uses individual words and the reoccurrence of words throughout the text to shift rankings and take into account words like “not” that flip the meaning.
Most importantly for De Koninck’s research, the computer algorithm can follow the evolution of rankings as dreams progress. By quickly ranking many accounts, it can give statistical information on the evolution of dreamers’ emotions.
The key
The computer program has the possibility to agree with the human judge 65 per cent of the time, and was hardly ever worse than a ranking from the human judge. That’s quite good considering that human judges only agree 60–80 per cent of the time. With such good agreement, these electronic judges could be used to quickly mine the huge number of dream accounts available. De Koninck wouldn’t have to rank each one individually or worry about human bias—and that sounds like a dream come true for scientists.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Energy enthusiasts
The problem
THE TRANSPORT AND storage of energy is one of the main challenges of life. Creatures hunt and consume each other, stealing nutrients. Life constantly juggles energy: lifeforms evolve in order to change energy from one form to another, and store it away in their bodies. In particular, carbohydrates and fats are Mother Nature’s biological batteries.
Modern society has the same set of problems. We fight over resources; we mine fuels, like coal and petroleum; we extract energy from dams and wind farms. Then we store energy on power grids, in batteries or in the fuel tanks of our cars until we need it.
But humanity’s current sources of energy can’t sustain our needs. We need to access large amounts of energy that have been efficiently stored.
The researchers
André Tremblay and Marc Dubé are a pair of professors at the University of Ottawa whose research interests overlap when it comes to biofuels.
The project
Biodiesel is made from fatty acids produced from vegetable oils, animal fats, algae, or even waste grease. Amazingly, biodiesel can be used in current diesel engines without any modifications.
But the production of biodiesel is a remarkably difficult venture. What’s needed is a simple, single-step process that can continuously produce high-purity fuel without leaving residual gunk in the resultant.
Tremblay and Dubé have been working on a process to do just that.
The key
The reaction that turns waste grease into biodiesel is called transesterification. This reaction occurs at the surface of oil droplets mixed in alcohol. The transformation of oil into biodiesel is fast at first, when there’s very little fuel in the alcohol, but becomes less and less efficient as the alcohol becomes saturated with biodiesel.
To counter this, Tremblay and Dubé purify the results as the reaction occurs rather than after it. The oil flows through a reactor pipe. The pipe is formed by a ceramic membrane with tiny pores too small for the droplets to escape through. The biodiesel, on the other hand, can per- meate the reactor membrane easily.
What’s left? Lots of oil droplets in the reactor that are continually undergoing efficient transesterification on one side of the membrane and high purity biodiesel on the other.
THE TRANSPORT AND storage of energy is one of the main challenges of life. Creatures hunt and consume each other, stealing nutrients. Life constantly juggles energy: lifeforms evolve in order to change energy from one form to another, and store it away in their bodies. In particular, carbohydrates and fats are Mother Nature’s biological batteries.
Modern society has the same set of problems. We fight over resources; we mine fuels, like coal and petroleum; we extract energy from dams and wind farms. Then we store energy on power grids, in batteries or in the fuel tanks of our cars until we need it.
But humanity’s current sources of energy can’t sustain our needs. We need to access large amounts of energy that have been efficiently stored.
The researchers
André Tremblay and Marc Dubé are a pair of professors at the University of Ottawa whose research interests overlap when it comes to biofuels.
The project
Biodiesel is made from fatty acids produced from vegetable oils, animal fats, algae, or even waste grease. Amazingly, biodiesel can be used in current diesel engines without any modifications.
But the production of biodiesel is a remarkably difficult venture. What’s needed is a simple, single-step process that can continuously produce high-purity fuel without leaving residual gunk in the resultant.
Tremblay and Dubé have been working on a process to do just that.
The key
The reaction that turns waste grease into biodiesel is called transesterification. This reaction occurs at the surface of oil droplets mixed in alcohol. The transformation of oil into biodiesel is fast at first, when there’s very little fuel in the alcohol, but becomes less and less efficient as the alcohol becomes saturated with biodiesel.
To counter this, Tremblay and Dubé purify the results as the reaction occurs rather than after it. The oil flows through a reactor pipe. The pipe is formed by a ceramic membrane with tiny pores too small for the droplets to escape through. The biodiesel, on the other hand, can per- meate the reactor membrane easily.
What’s left? Lots of oil droplets in the reactor that are continually undergoing efficient transesterification on one side of the membrane and high purity biodiesel on the other.
Tanning turtles
The problem
NORTHERN MAP TURTLES (that’s Glyptemys geographica for those of you who like Latin) are found in northern states and southern Ontario and Quebec. They hibernate through the coldest parts of the year in communal groups on the floor of lakes and rivers. They don’t come up to breathe for the entire hibernation. Since they spend a lot of time in the sun during the summer, Map Turtles like areas that have fallen trees or other objects to bask on near large bodies of water. Basking sets their body temperature, but the more important question is just how energetically vital is sun-basking to these northern turtles?
The researcher
University of Ottawa professor Gabriel Blouin-Demers studies the physiological ecology of reptiles. He integrates laboratory experiments with field observations to better understand how phenotypes or biological traits—especially behavioural—are set by reptiles’ physiologies.
Blouin-Demers hopes that the research coming out of his laboratory can contribute to reptile conservation. Reptiles are in fact the most threatened vertebrates in Canada.
The project
The northern Map Turtles that Blouin-Demers studied were from Lake Opinicon (100 km south of Ottawa). He implanted thermometers into the abdomen of juvenile turtles to continuously monitor their body temperature for two years. Using their body temperature, Blouin-Demers can calculate the turtles’ metabolic rates to estimate how important thermoregulation is to the energy available for growth and reproduction.
The key
Blouin-Demers determined that basking has a huge impact on the energy budgets of northern Map Turtles. The turtles spend three-quarters of their day basking in the sun.
More importantly, he found that if northern Map Turtles don’t bask, their metabolic rate slows by as much as a third. This amounts to a huge loss in available energy for growth, reproduction, and everyday turtlely business. Despite the clear importance of basking, Blouin-Demers discovered that the turtles bask a little less than the theoretically expected optimal amount. Blouin-Demers speculates that this is because basking is a mutually exclusive behaviour: Turtles can’t multi-task while basking. They bask on land but do all their other important activities (like foraging and mating) in the water, so they must compromise.
Serious about solar
The problem
OIL IS EVIL. Humanity go green now. Solar panels suck. Apocalypse therefore inevitable.
The researcher
Karin Hinzer is the Canada Research Chair in Photonic Nanostructures and Integrated Devices. In 2007, Hinzer founded SunLab at the University of Ottawa, and since then has collaborated with many industrial partners. Just this year, a collaborative effort earned SunLab the 2010 Canadian Innovation Award.
The project
One such joint project is the Advancing Photovoltaics for Economical Concentrator Systems (APECS). APECS is a project that demonstrates the use of innovative technology in a practical setting. In January, Hinzer will install experimental solar panels on the roof of the Sports Complex parkade here at the University of Ottawa and at a sister site in northern California.
The key
Hinzer will use efficient gallium/arsenide(Ga/As) based multi-junction solar cells in the APECS project. Traditional silicon solar cells only absorb a small range of photons efficiently, while multi-junction cells absorb over a broader spectrum and so increase the efficiency. However, these solar cells are not cheap. APECS seeks to bring the cost down in a couple of ways.
First, Ga/As cells are usually grown on expensive germanium sheets, but Hinzer is testing Ga/As cells grown on much cheaper silicon sheets. Secondly, Hinzer is reducing the cost by getting more light to a smaller area. The way Hinzer does this is analogous to a kid using a magnifying glass to turn a normal sunbeam into a highly focused death ray for burning ants. But instead of using normal lenses, Hinzer uses waveguides that have been tested in SunLab under an artificial sun. Since the waveguides are much lighter than traditional lens systems, it won’t need the same kind of heavy-duty foundation that other big solar panels require. Therefore, it can be set on rooftops.
But having an efficient solar cell is only half the battle. If there’s only a little light shining on the solar panels, they won’t produce much electricity, no matter how efficient they are. To get around this, the modules will automatically track the motion of the sun to maximize their efficiency throughout the day. Solar panels work best when the sun’s rays are perpendicular to their surface. This is why APECS will have one station here in Ontario and a second one in California. Each panel will have an associated weather station, which Hinzer will use to compare any differences in efficiency to differences in latitude and weather.
OIL IS EVIL. Humanity go green now. Solar panels suck. Apocalypse therefore inevitable.
The researcher
Karin Hinzer is the Canada Research Chair in Photonic Nanostructures and Integrated Devices. In 2007, Hinzer founded SunLab at the University of Ottawa, and since then has collaborated with many industrial partners. Just this year, a collaborative effort earned SunLab the 2010 Canadian Innovation Award.
The project
One such joint project is the Advancing Photovoltaics for Economical Concentrator Systems (APECS). APECS is a project that demonstrates the use of innovative technology in a practical setting. In January, Hinzer will install experimental solar panels on the roof of the Sports Complex parkade here at the University of Ottawa and at a sister site in northern California.
The key
Hinzer will use efficient gallium/arsenide(Ga/As) based multi-junction solar cells in the APECS project. Traditional silicon solar cells only absorb a small range of photons efficiently, while multi-junction cells absorb over a broader spectrum and so increase the efficiency. However, these solar cells are not cheap. APECS seeks to bring the cost down in a couple of ways.
First, Ga/As cells are usually grown on expensive germanium sheets, but Hinzer is testing Ga/As cells grown on much cheaper silicon sheets. Secondly, Hinzer is reducing the cost by getting more light to a smaller area. The way Hinzer does this is analogous to a kid using a magnifying glass to turn a normal sunbeam into a highly focused death ray for burning ants. But instead of using normal lenses, Hinzer uses waveguides that have been tested in SunLab under an artificial sun. Since the waveguides are much lighter than traditional lens systems, it won’t need the same kind of heavy-duty foundation that other big solar panels require. Therefore, it can be set on rooftops.
But having an efficient solar cell is only half the battle. If there’s only a little light shining on the solar panels, they won’t produce much electricity, no matter how efficient they are. To get around this, the modules will automatically track the motion of the sun to maximize their efficiency throughout the day. Solar panels work best when the sun’s rays are perpendicular to their surface. This is why APECS will have one station here in Ontario and a second one in California. Each panel will have an associated weather station, which Hinzer will use to compare any differences in efficiency to differences in latitude and weather.
Setting the satellite cells
The problem
HAS IT EVER amazed you how quickly children seem to recover from injuries? Tumbles and falls are just part of everyday play. But that’s not what it’s like for adults—or grandparents, for that matter. Falling or breaking a bone can be a dangerous event, because injuries are not easily healed.
Why is that?
The foundation of the muscles’ repair system is a particular group of stem cells called satellite cells. Unlike most cells in the body, stem cells don’t have a unique type. Instead, they have the ability to transform into any specialized cell that is required by the body. This talent allows them to regenerate injured tissue by replenishing the old and damaged cells.
But satellite cells aren’t as industrious in adults as they are in children. In fact, their activity diminishes as we age. They’re still in the body, but if modern medicine wants to harness them for directed muscle repair, the stem cells will require stimulation.
The researcher
Dr. Michael Rudnicki is the director of the Regenerative Medicine Program and the Sprott Centre for Stem Cell Research at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute. His laboratory researches the molecular mechanisms that control stem cells during tissue regeneration.
The project
One of Rudnicki’s special interests is the function of stem cells in adult skeletal muscle—the muscle attached to bones by fibrous tendons.
Satellite cells may be the foundation of the muscles’ repair system, but they certainly don’t work alone. Ridnicki’s work stresses that myogenesis, the formation of muscle tissue, requires coordination between many different cells.
The key
A key player in myogenesis is a group of cells called fibro/adipogenic progenitors (FAPs). Rudnicki found that in healthy muscle, FAPs are dormant, but, in the event of acute muscle damage, they rapidly multiply.
That’s because FAPs are the distress beacon that signal the satellite cells. Rudnicki’s research shows that FAPs encourage the satellite cells to get active and to fuse with damaged muscle fibres or produce new fibres entirely. FAPs do this by establishing a specialized environment in the damaged muscle that facilitates the satellite cells. In myogenesis, FAPs stimulate satellite cells to regenerate muscle. In children, FAPs stimulate satellite cells and then are free to leave once myogenesis is complete; however, in elderly muscle, FAPs become firmly engrafted to the damaged site, and can no longer move on to the next injury.
Setting the centre of cells
The problem
IMAGINE YOU’RE AN anaerobic bacteria. You’ve swam around eating up nutrients, but you can hear that biological clock ticking. It’s time to have your very own bouncing baby bacteria. But how do you guarantee that you and your daughter turnout exactly the same? Of course, your DNA will be unchanged, but what about everything else? What molecular interactions ensure that your daughter is exactly the same size as you—that you divide symmetrically at the midpoint?
The researcher
Natalie Goto, an associate professor at the University of Ottawa’s Chemistry Department, sees protein as the machinery of life. Proteins bind molecules together in very specific ways and their interactions act as a clock, telling cells what phase of life they are in. Goto is interested in how the shapes of proteins mediate the interactions between them.
The project
In order to divide symmetrically, rod-shaped cells must construct a new wall at their exact midpoint. In bacteria, this process is controlled by the Min family of proteins.
The protein called MinC inhibits wall formation, but only when it is binded with its sister protein, MinD. MinD likes to moor on the cell wall. MinC and MinD have an affinity for each other.—whenever MinC floats by a MinD, it cuddles up and forms a complex that stops the cell from growing a dividing wall.
But there’s one last member of the Min family: MinE. MinE continually pushes its sister proteins around. MinE shoulders its way between MinC and MinD, displacing MinC. Afterward, MinE leaves MinD, forcing it to dissociate from the wall and driving it from the middle toward the pole of the cell. With no MinC and MinD left at the centre to stop the formation of a new wall, the cell divides.
The key
MinE has a special site in the cell that it uses to breakup MinC and MinD and push them from the centre. Goto found that MinE folds to keep this binding site wrapped inside itself. Only when MinE opens itself up can the site disunite the other pair of proteins. Goto suspects that by keeping the binding site inaccessible, MinE can specifically focus on chasing its sister proteins from the centre. By pushing MinC and MinD duos from the centre and into the poles, MinE frees the cell to form a new wall and divide symmetrically.
Caging carbon
The problem
INDUSTRIAL NATIONS EMIT countless millions of tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere every year. Coal combustion produces approximately a third of all that pollution and there is an immediate need to reduce emissions. One controversial idea is to bury the emissions deep in the ground before the CO2 can escape into the atmosphere and contribute to the greenhouse effect.
But you can’t just bury gas. You have to capture it first. Unfortunately, current methods of scrubbing CO2 out of a coal plant’s exhaust would require at least a quarter of all the energy produced by the power plant. It’s a prohibitively expensive procedure.
The researcher
Tom Woo is a researcher in the the Department of Chemistry and Centre for Catalysis Research and Innovation at the University of Ottawa. Woo specializes in molecular simulations and uses computer algorithms to model chemical systems at the molecular level. His simulations give fellow chemists insight into their experimental results and point them toward potential new designs for engineering materials.
The project
Compounds called metal-organic frameworks are special crystals of metal ions linked together by organic molecules. They are special because they can form very porous structures. In fact, these nanoporous materials can selectively capture CO2 molecules in their pores and hold the greenhouse gas trapped there. The rest of the combustion exhaust would float by and the CO2 would be left, filtered out of the gas.
But there’s one problem: the energy binding the CO2 to the pore is a little too weak. The material currently captures water vapour better than CO2. If the interaction trapping gas can be increased and the material made to not bind water, then nanoporous materials could be the short term solution to reducing carbon emissions.
The key
In order to design nanoporous material that better imprisons CO2, chemists must first understand the forces that hold the pollutant gas in the pore cavity. Woo’s simulations show that the forces responsible for keeping the CO2 captured are almost entirely made up of dispersion forces—a type of force that is weaker than most chemical bonds.
Woo believes that future materials can be designed to replace dispersion forces with stronger electrostatic forces. Using a stronger force ensures that the CO2 stays securely imprisoned while discouraging the seizure of water. Nanoporous materials engineered to use electrostatic interactions to selectively bind CO2 to their cavities would be an important step forward in carbon capture technology.
Mending a broken heart
The problem
HEART DISEASE IS a blanket term for any illness that causes the cardiac muscles to lack circulation (coronary heart disease) or to weaken (cardiomyopathy). Traditional medicine can only help patients cope with a weakened heart. However, techniques in cell therapy may one day allow doctors to direct special cells to regenerate tissue and repair heart damage through stem cell transplantation.
Unfortunately, stems cells are hard to come by and their use in clinics is strictly regulated. To make matters worse, cells taken from patients with cardiovascular disease are often dysfunctional. There is a desperate need for alternative cell therapies for tissue regeneration.
The researcher
Erik Suuronen is the director of the Cardiovascular Tissue Engineering Lab at the University of Ottawa Heart Institute. Suuronen wants to use stems cells and tissue engineering to treat heart disease. He hopes that one day these cell therapies will allow patients to regenerate new muscle and blood vessels rather than live their lives with chronic disease.
The project
Therapeutic cells already exist in the body, called progenitor cells. Rather than transplanting cells to the weakened muscle, Suuronen’s research aims to attract the body’s own progenitor cells to perform the repair and cause tissue regeneration. Normally, only a small number of these cells reach the damaged tissue, but if the target site could be encouraged to attract more of them then the progenitor cells would mobilize to repair and regenerate damaged tissue.
The key
Suuronen has developed a matrix of collagen (collagen is a common extracellular protein) and a complex sugar called sialyl LewisX. Sialyl LewisX instructs the progenitor cells to attract more therapeutic cells and regenerate the damaged tissue while the collagen acts as a “smart” scaffold that supports them during the repair.
Suuronen injected the enhanced matrix into the thigh muscles of rats with damaged blood vessels and dying muscles. The enhanced matrix recruited progenitor cells from the rats’ bone marrow into the bloodstream, leading them to the damaged site. The recruited cells then grew into new blood vessels and galvanized muscle regeneration. By successfully stimulating new muscle growth to replace lost tissue, this research suggests that heart damage could one day be repaired through cellular therapy.
The big game
The problem
MODERN SPORTING EVENTS have grown into megaprojects. Tournaments like the FIFA World Cup or Universiade are huge investment projects that host international teams, are watched worldwide, and require vast management administrations.
With such huge costs, and equally huge potential economic benefits, the organization of such games is taken very seriously. Planning is already well underway for the 2015 Pan American Games to be hosted by Toronto.
However, with so many people involved and with so much at stake, creating an efficient framework for communication amongst the network of coordinating bodies can be a daunting task.
The researcher
Milena Parent is an expert in sports administration at the University of Ottawa’s School of Human Kinetics. She specializes in strategic management and organization theory for large-scale sporting events.
The project
By chronicling and understanding the coordination network that existed for organizing the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Games, Parent can develop broad network theories for the management of large-scale sporting events that can then be used by future organizers.
The city of Vancouver began planning for the 2010 Olympic Games nine years before the opening ceremonies. A total of 97 separate federal, provincial, and municipal departments were involved in the planning and those were just the governmental bodies.
The coordination network of stakeholders included sponsors, organizational committees, community groups, governmental departments, the media, and delegations of athletes. Each stakeholder had his or her own interests and each was needed for the sporting event to be a success.
The key
Traditional theory presents the organizational network as a wheel with the organizing committee as the hub and the stakeholders as spokes, but Parent found a strikingly different picture. She discovered centralized control of the planning process lay with the local communities or “people on the ground,” and consequently, played a more pivotal role than that assumed by officials.
In practice, there wasn’t one centralized hub, but rather groups that formed multiple hubs of organization. None of the hubs were well connected to the entire coordination network. Instead, each had strong ties to a handful of stakeholders. Stakeholders formed strong local contacts with each other, but these local networks were relatively independent with only weak links between them. According to Parent, organizers who bridged two or more of these local networks had some of the strongest positions in the planning process since they acted as the main lines of communications between the fractured groups.
Tsunami simulations
The problem
IN THE YEAR 1700, a megathrust earthquake (that’s science talk for scary-big-earthquake) occurred along the Cascadia fault in the Pacific Ocean. The fault runs along the coast from Vancouver Island down to northern California. The earthquake triggered a tsunami off the Pacific Coast, which resulted in a flood that reached inland as far as the mouth of the Fraser River, travelling all the way across the Pacific Ocean and striking the coast of Japan.
The researcher
Engineering professor Ioan Nistor is fascinated by such tsunamis. After the 2004 Southeast Asia earthquake, he and his collaborators were the first research team in the tsunami-affected areas of Thailand and Indonesia. While in the field, they inspect damage to buildings and structures. Back in his University of Ottawa lab, Nistor measures the force of surge impacts on models. He then compares what he saw in the field to laboratory and numerical models in order to gain a better understanding of the effects of tsunami bores—the fast moving walls of water that occur once tsunamis break near shore.
The project
Nistor ruminates over the various scenarios that could result from a modern-day earthquake along the Cascadia fault. By simulating earthquakes at various points along the fault and the propagation of the waves towards shore, he is able to predict the resulting tsunami’s height and speed as it crashes inland. Nistor uses these values to estimate the strength of disastrous forces to which coastal buildings would be subject.
The key
Even though the major Canadian cities on the West Coast are located on inland waterways, simulations show that they would not be spared from devastation in the event of another Cascadia tsunami. Even though its approach is slowed in shallow waters, Nistor still expects 25-metre high surges.
Current building codes in Canada do not explicitly provide special design guidelines for structures located on tsunami-vulnerable shores. They do not account for the initial surge forces, the sweeping drag force, the increase in hydrostatic pressure, or the buoyancy force as the building floats away from its foundation. By properly quantifying these extreme loads on structures during inundation, new design guidelines for structures in tsunami-prone zones can be recommended and, in the event of a disaster, save countless lives.
Not your grandma’s network
The problem THE WORLD IS more interconnected than ever before. Social networks, the global economy, the Internet, and even delivery routes can all seem like a jumbled mess. Nowadays, it is common to see complex nets of relationships everywhere we look.
The simplest network we can imagine is life as an employee on a production line: Our neighbour to our left passes us some widget, we add our component and pass it on to the neighbour on the right. It isn’t a web at all; it’s just a chain.
Now imagine we work in a more complicated factory. Imagine we can get different widgets from multiple neighbours. In fact, even coworkers far from our workstation can toss us widgets. To make matters worse, the foreman lets us wander to and work at any part of the production line we want! What a disaster. We’d be doing a random walk on a random network while receiving random input to deal with.
The researcher
Vadim Kaimanovich, a professor in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, creates mathematical methods that can predict the nature of complex networks. His goal is to understand when the chaotic evolution of random systems can lead to stable and predictable output.
The project
Kaimanovich uses the analogy of a production line to ask: if we start the production line at a slightly different workstation—one that is close but not exactly the same—will we get a similar widget or something completely different? If the widget doesn’t change, the production is stable. If it’s different, the production diverges.
Scientists have noted many systems that seem as complicated as our crazy production line, but seem to have stable output. However, there were no mathematically rigorous proofs for the existence of stable solutions.
The key
Using a mathematically precise measure to decipher which widgets are similar and which are different, Kaimanovich demonstrated that certain sorts of abstract “random production lines” must have groups of workstations that give stable solutions for the same kind of random input. Not surprisingly, this is the first proof of it’s kind.
Fishy neurons
The problem
PARKINSON’S DISEASE (PD) deteriorates a patient’s central nervous system and debilitates motor skills. Doctors don’t know the cause of 90 per cent of PD cases, but better understand the source of the other 10 per cent. Heredity and genetics are the culprits in this type, called early-onset PD.
Surprisingly, the genes associated with PD are found in all kinds of life forms, including mice, yeast, and zebrafish. These genes play an important role in the special cells that control body motion and make dopamine, an indispensable chemical needed to transmit signals between neurons—these cells are called dopaminergic neurons.
The researcher
Marc Ekker, a biology professor at the U of O, works in the Center for Advanced Research in Environmental Genomics to better understand the genetics of PD. Ekker genetically alters zebrafish, whose genes are simpler than those of humans and can be associated with the disease, in order to further study the causes of PD.
The project
Since zebrafish are transparent, Ekker is able to genetically alter their neurons to fluorescent, enabling him to watch the destruction and regeneration of the dopaminergic neurons in the fishes’ brains while they are alive. He can therefore destroy individual neurons with a laser blast, poison, or alternatively, he can genetically block the gene altogether, making it inactive for the fishes’ entire life—essentially giving the zebrafish PD.
The key
Ekker looks at the genetically altered neurons in the brain and studies what they are doing to the fishes’ motion. Fish larva whose dopaminergic neurons are destroyed have very limited motor skills, and young fish without dopaminergic neurons will not respond with evasive motion when gently poked. Ekker’s zebrafish share the same symptoms as PD patients. Zebrafish, however, can regenerate the neurons. We can’t.
They can do this because of stem cells. Stem cells are different from common cells because they aren’t committed to becoming any one type such as a blood cell or a neuron. While humans have only a limited number of stem cells, zebrafish make stem cells throughout their entire life. The fish can draw on their bank of stem cells to replace the neurons.
Lucky fish.
PARKINSON’S DISEASE (PD) deteriorates a patient’s central nervous system and debilitates motor skills. Doctors don’t know the cause of 90 per cent of PD cases, but better understand the source of the other 10 per cent. Heredity and genetics are the culprits in this type, called early-onset PD.
Surprisingly, the genes associated with PD are found in all kinds of life forms, including mice, yeast, and zebrafish. These genes play an important role in the special cells that control body motion and make dopamine, an indispensable chemical needed to transmit signals between neurons—these cells are called dopaminergic neurons.
The researcher
Marc Ekker, a biology professor at the U of O, works in the Center for Advanced Research in Environmental Genomics to better understand the genetics of PD. Ekker genetically alters zebrafish, whose genes are simpler than those of humans and can be associated with the disease, in order to further study the causes of PD.
The project
Since zebrafish are transparent, Ekker is able to genetically alter their neurons to fluorescent, enabling him to watch the destruction and regeneration of the dopaminergic neurons in the fishes’ brains while they are alive. He can therefore destroy individual neurons with a laser blast, poison, or alternatively, he can genetically block the gene altogether, making it inactive for the fishes’ entire life—essentially giving the zebrafish PD.
The key
Ekker looks at the genetically altered neurons in the brain and studies what they are doing to the fishes’ motion. Fish larva whose dopaminergic neurons are destroyed have very limited motor skills, and young fish without dopaminergic neurons will not respond with evasive motion when gently poked. Ekker’s zebrafish share the same symptoms as PD patients. Zebrafish, however, can regenerate the neurons. We can’t.
They can do this because of stem cells. Stem cells are different from common cells because they aren’t committed to becoming any one type such as a blood cell or a neuron. While humans have only a limited number of stem cells, zebrafish make stem cells throughout their entire life. The fish can draw on their bank of stem cells to replace the neurons.
Lucky fish.
Mercury munching microbes (om nom nom)
The problem
THE MAJORITY OF MERCURY in the atmosphere is generated by human industries like coal combustion and gold mining. The rest comes from natural sources such as volcanoes and forest fires. Either way, when mercury is dispersed into the atmosphere, it is carried poleward where it is oxidized and becomes heavier, falling into sensitive Arctic regions as a toxic contaminant.
Mercury binds to proteins and then accumulates in organisms, causing mercury compounds from the environment to enter the Arctic’s atmosphere when they get soaked up by the tiny microbes that form the ecosystem’s foundation. Since there’s nowhere for it to go, mercury is passed from prey to predator. Eventually, high levels of mercury accumulate in the top of the food chain—that’s us, friend.
The researcher
Alexandre Poulain, a professor at the U of O, studies how microbes alter the mobility and the toxicity of metals and metalloids in the environment. He focuses on aquatic systems in polar regions and ventures out into the Arctic to bring samples home for analysis in his lab.
The project
Anaerobic microbes, bacteria that don’t use oxygen, alter the nature of the mercury. Some make metals more toxic by turning ordinary mercury into very harmful methylmercury. Dissimilarly, other bacteria break down methylmercury, making a gas and venting it out of the ecosystem. Poulain looks at the difference between the rates of these two processes by analyzing the production of proteins (ribonucleic acid or RNA) that control whether microbes create toxic mercury or whether they detoxify the Arctic atmosphere.
The key
Upon sensing mercury in their environment, certain northern microbes activate genes naturally encoded in their DNA. Poulain can determine which of these genes are active in biomass samples from polar regions and can even tell exactly which genes are needed to defend against the toxic nature of mercury.
Poulain’s goal is to bridge global-scale environmental science and microscopic biology The reduction of Arctic mercury by tiny microbes plays a major role in regulating the toxicity of the Far North and could possibly be used in integrated approaches to environmental management.
THE MAJORITY OF MERCURY in the atmosphere is generated by human industries like coal combustion and gold mining. The rest comes from natural sources such as volcanoes and forest fires. Either way, when mercury is dispersed into the atmosphere, it is carried poleward where it is oxidized and becomes heavier, falling into sensitive Arctic regions as a toxic contaminant.
Mercury binds to proteins and then accumulates in organisms, causing mercury compounds from the environment to enter the Arctic’s atmosphere when they get soaked up by the tiny microbes that form the ecosystem’s foundation. Since there’s nowhere for it to go, mercury is passed from prey to predator. Eventually, high levels of mercury accumulate in the top of the food chain—that’s us, friend.
The researcher
Alexandre Poulain, a professor at the U of O, studies how microbes alter the mobility and the toxicity of metals and metalloids in the environment. He focuses on aquatic systems in polar regions and ventures out into the Arctic to bring samples home for analysis in his lab.
The project
Anaerobic microbes, bacteria that don’t use oxygen, alter the nature of the mercury. Some make metals more toxic by turning ordinary mercury into very harmful methylmercury. Dissimilarly, other bacteria break down methylmercury, making a gas and venting it out of the ecosystem. Poulain looks at the difference between the rates of these two processes by analyzing the production of proteins (ribonucleic acid or RNA) that control whether microbes create toxic mercury or whether they detoxify the Arctic atmosphere.
The key
Upon sensing mercury in their environment, certain northern microbes activate genes naturally encoded in their DNA. Poulain can determine which of these genes are active in biomass samples from polar regions and can even tell exactly which genes are needed to defend against the toxic nature of mercury.
Poulain’s goal is to bridge global-scale environmental science and microscopic biology The reduction of Arctic mercury by tiny microbes plays a major role in regulating the toxicity of the Far North and could possibly be used in integrated approaches to environmental management.
Tomorrow’s butterflies
The problem
WORLDWIDE SHIFTS IN land use and global climate change are transforming the environment at a concerning pace. Only recently have scientists become aware of just how significant the impact of our actions has been. Average global temperatures have risen sharply over the past few decades, in addition to the loss of natural habitats by conversion into agriculturally cultivated land.
Intuitively, it is clear that such intense environmental changes will have repercussions that increase extinction rates, but the world’s ecosystems are complicated, and predicting how species diversity responds to climate change is no easy matter. Improving conservation and recovering endangered species requires accurate predictions of future shifts in biodiversity.
The researcher
Jeremy Kerr’s lab, the Canadian Facility for Ecoinformatics Research, is located in the Biosciences complex on campus. There he researches changes in biodiversity across entire continents rather than in any one, local ecosystem. This means that he deals with enormous amounts of information, requiring him to be on the forefront of ecoinformatics, the science of information in ecology.
The project
In order to test whether he can accurately predict future changes in biodiversity over larger areas, Kerr pretended to go back in time. He used a macroecological computer model to predict gradients in butterfly diversity over the entire 20th century. By comparing the predicted richness in butterfly species to actual historical records of 139 species, Kerr was able to judge the predictive power of his model.
The key
Starting from the year 1900 and inputting historical data sets on climate, elevation, land cover, and human population density, Kerr was able to accurately simulate how butterfly diversity changed across Canada throughout the 20th century. In northerly areas, butterfly diversity increased while at lower latitudes it decreased. This observation suggests that macroecological theory can indeed forecast where species will be found well into the future.
The ability to predict how species diversity will respond to climate change could improve conservation planning in the 21st century.
WORLDWIDE SHIFTS IN land use and global climate change are transforming the environment at a concerning pace. Only recently have scientists become aware of just how significant the impact of our actions has been. Average global temperatures have risen sharply over the past few decades, in addition to the loss of natural habitats by conversion into agriculturally cultivated land.
Intuitively, it is clear that such intense environmental changes will have repercussions that increase extinction rates, but the world’s ecosystems are complicated, and predicting how species diversity responds to climate change is no easy matter. Improving conservation and recovering endangered species requires accurate predictions of future shifts in biodiversity.
The researcher
Jeremy Kerr’s lab, the Canadian Facility for Ecoinformatics Research, is located in the Biosciences complex on campus. There he researches changes in biodiversity across entire continents rather than in any one, local ecosystem. This means that he deals with enormous amounts of information, requiring him to be on the forefront of ecoinformatics, the science of information in ecology.
The project
In order to test whether he can accurately predict future changes in biodiversity over larger areas, Kerr pretended to go back in time. He used a macroecological computer model to predict gradients in butterfly diversity over the entire 20th century. By comparing the predicted richness in butterfly species to actual historical records of 139 species, Kerr was able to judge the predictive power of his model.
The key
Starting from the year 1900 and inputting historical data sets on climate, elevation, land cover, and human population density, Kerr was able to accurately simulate how butterfly diversity changed across Canada throughout the 20th century. In northerly areas, butterfly diversity increased while at lower latitudes it decreased. This observation suggests that macroecological theory can indeed forecast where species will be found well into the future.
The ability to predict how species diversity will respond to climate change could improve conservation planning in the 21st century.
Goldfish on Prozac
The problem
WHEN YOU THINK of pollution, what jumps to mind? Heavy metals, BP oil spill, carbon tax? What about the words antibiotics, the pill, nicotine, or Prozac? These so-called pharmaceutical pollutants are seeping out of our medicine cabinets and into our rivers and lakes.
Drugs are only partially metabolized in your body; the rest of them are flushed down the toilet. To make matters worse, traditional sewage treatment plants fail to cleanse the water of these chemicals, allowing them to flow right into rivers and lakes.
Last year Canadians filled 483 million prescriptions (that’s 14 prescriptions per person and doesn’t count the large amounts of antibiotics given to livestock).
So what happens when all the fish in the pond are on Prozac?
The researcher
Vance Trudeau is a neuroendocrinologist at the U of O and the Centre for Advanced Research in Environmental Genomics. He studies how hormones control brain function and how, in turn, the brain regulates sexual development.
The project
Fluoxetine, the trade name for Prozac, can be found in the brain and liver tissues in wild fish, and, just like in people, increases fishes’ serotonin levels. To understand how the drug upsets sex hormone levels in wild fish populations, Trudeau studies normal goldfish whose food intake, seasonal growth rates, and reproduction have been previously well studied.
The key
When Trudeau’s research group studied female goldfish injected with flouxetine, they found that multiple genes in the brain were affected, causing a decrease in estrogen levels in the blood. Some of these genes are known to have an impact on the reproductive and social behavior of fish. To make matters worse, fluoxetine has an impact on the secretion of growth hormones, causing the fish to feed less and to become underweight.
To simulate the levels of Prozac detected in the environment, another test was done where fluoxetine was added directly to the tanks of male goldfish. Trudeau’s team then added potent female sex pheromones to the water. This should have stimulated the healthy, normal males to release their sperm and fertilize the eggs. However, male goldfish that had been exposed to the fluoxetine completely fail to release their sperm.
Poor goldfish.
WHEN YOU THINK of pollution, what jumps to mind? Heavy metals, BP oil spill, carbon tax? What about the words antibiotics, the pill, nicotine, or Prozac? These so-called pharmaceutical pollutants are seeping out of our medicine cabinets and into our rivers and lakes.
Drugs are only partially metabolized in your body; the rest of them are flushed down the toilet. To make matters worse, traditional sewage treatment plants fail to cleanse the water of these chemicals, allowing them to flow right into rivers and lakes.
Last year Canadians filled 483 million prescriptions (that’s 14 prescriptions per person and doesn’t count the large amounts of antibiotics given to livestock).
So what happens when all the fish in the pond are on Prozac?
The researcher
Vance Trudeau is a neuroendocrinologist at the U of O and the Centre for Advanced Research in Environmental Genomics. He studies how hormones control brain function and how, in turn, the brain regulates sexual development.
The project
Fluoxetine, the trade name for Prozac, can be found in the brain and liver tissues in wild fish, and, just like in people, increases fishes’ serotonin levels. To understand how the drug upsets sex hormone levels in wild fish populations, Trudeau studies normal goldfish whose food intake, seasonal growth rates, and reproduction have been previously well studied.
The key
When Trudeau’s research group studied female goldfish injected with flouxetine, they found that multiple genes in the brain were affected, causing a decrease in estrogen levels in the blood. Some of these genes are known to have an impact on the reproductive and social behavior of fish. To make matters worse, fluoxetine has an impact on the secretion of growth hormones, causing the fish to feed less and to become underweight.
To simulate the levels of Prozac detected in the environment, another test was done where fluoxetine was added directly to the tanks of male goldfish. Trudeau’s team then added potent female sex pheromones to the water. This should have stimulated the healthy, normal males to release their sperm and fertilize the eggs. However, male goldfish that had been exposed to the fluoxetine completely fail to release their sperm.
Poor goldfish.
Building biological barcodes
The problem
Medical tests required to diagnose diseases need to be performed at specialized centres, causing long wait times and expensive costs. In addition, current analytical tools are limited to looking at only handful of the biomolecules that signal the onset of diseases, such as cancer.
The researcher
Michel Godin, an assistant professor in the Department of Physics at the U of O, dreams of making disease testing as easy as scanning a barcode. Godin is part of the Interdisciplinary Nanophysics Centre labs where he mixes physics, chemistry, and biology to engineer hand-held microfluidic devices for the health sciences.
The project
Microfluidic devices are the computer chips of the chemistry world. Medical lab technicians search for biomolecules associated with disease—also called biomarkers—the way you would do math on an abacus: one by one. Godin wants to design a device that can take less than a drop of blood, purify it, and identify the presence of hundreds of biomarkers within seconds. That kind of speed would resolve the earlier inconveniences of wait time and would also allow better statistics for analysis. The device would be smaller than your cell phone and potentially cheap enough to be used in developing countries. Bigger isn’t always better—at least when you’re talking about microfluidic devices.
The key
But how would Godin’s device tell the hundreds of biomarkers apart? Some microfluidic devices integrate ultra-sensitive detectors that push biomarkers through tiny nanoscopic tunnels (or nanopores) capable of detecting single molecules as they pass. However, detecting molecules and telling them apart are two very different processes. While a nanopore might be able to detect biomarkers, it can’t distinguish between those that signal disease and perfectly normal biomolecules. To identify them, Godin wants to create a DNA scaffold—a long chain of single-stranded DNA that would attach specific biomarkers to unique spots along the DNA chain. By threading the DNA through the nanopore, Godin could read what biomarkers are present in the blood—exactly like scanning a barcode.
Medical tests required to diagnose diseases need to be performed at specialized centres, causing long wait times and expensive costs. In addition, current analytical tools are limited to looking at only handful of the biomolecules that signal the onset of diseases, such as cancer.
The researcher
Michel Godin, an assistant professor in the Department of Physics at the U of O, dreams of making disease testing as easy as scanning a barcode. Godin is part of the Interdisciplinary Nanophysics Centre labs where he mixes physics, chemistry, and biology to engineer hand-held microfluidic devices for the health sciences.
The project
Microfluidic devices are the computer chips of the chemistry world. Medical lab technicians search for biomolecules associated with disease—also called biomarkers—the way you would do math on an abacus: one by one. Godin wants to design a device that can take less than a drop of blood, purify it, and identify the presence of hundreds of biomarkers within seconds. That kind of speed would resolve the earlier inconveniences of wait time and would also allow better statistics for analysis. The device would be smaller than your cell phone and potentially cheap enough to be used in developing countries. Bigger isn’t always better—at least when you’re talking about microfluidic devices.
The key
But how would Godin’s device tell the hundreds of biomarkers apart? Some microfluidic devices integrate ultra-sensitive detectors that push biomarkers through tiny nanoscopic tunnels (or nanopores) capable of detecting single molecules as they pass. However, detecting molecules and telling them apart are two very different processes. While a nanopore might be able to detect biomarkers, it can’t distinguish between those that signal disease and perfectly normal biomolecules. To identify them, Godin wants to create a DNA scaffold—a long chain of single-stranded DNA that would attach specific biomarkers to unique spots along the DNA chain. By threading the DNA through the nanopore, Godin could read what biomarkers are present in the blood—exactly like scanning a barcode.
Truly unbelievable
Former on-campus researcher creates a media motion machine
THANE HEINS, SUPPOSED inventor of a perpetual motion machine, identifies with Thomas Edison, Nikola Tesla, Alexander Graham Bell, and the Wright brothers. Despite his lack of any university education, he compares himself to these heroes of science because, like each of them, he claims to have invented an unbelievable technology. But is there a difference?Controversial Claim
Heins, whose company Potential Difference was recently asked to leave the University of Ottawa’s SITE laboratory they were occupying, claims that using his discovery “generators can now accelerate themselves... It’s a cancelling of the work-energy principle.”The work-energy principle describes the conservation of energy for mechanical work: the work done is exactly equal to the change in energy. Any violation of this would call into question humanity’s entire understanding of the physical world—you can’t get something from nothing.
Heins claims “Our generator can create power from no power. What that means is [that] it’s not a perpetual motion machine, but it is more than 100 per cent efficient. There’s a huge difference.”
Severely Skeptical
Not everyone sees the difference. Brian Dunning, the host and producer of Skeptoid, a popular weekly pro-science, anti-pseudoscience podcast, says in an email to the Fulcrum that “Heins has built another in a very long line of variations on electric motors, claimed by the inventors to be ‘over unity’ or ‘free energy’ machines, where more energy is produced than is put in. Think of pouring a litre of water into a measuring cup, and expecting to get two litres out. That’s not the way the universe works. It would be nice, but it just isn’t so. The basic laws of thermodynamics state that over unity machines are impossible, and all known experimentation supports that.”Dunning, who has never seen Heins’ machine, sees problems even with his fundamental concept of full energy efficiency.
MIT-educated electrical engineer Seanna Watson also sees problems with the details of Heins’ experiments. Watson and a group of engineers from Ottawa Skeptics visited Heins’ lab in 2008.
“From what I could tell at the time, he was taking measurements and he was, for example, measuring volt-amps instead of watts, not taking into account phase differentials, and he was doing some rather odd math,” explains Watson about her doubts regarding Heins’ invention.
Watson made the results of the group’s investigation public through the Ottawa Skeptics website. She summarizes the skeptics’ disquietude saying “there seems to be people who do not have enough of a background to be able to look at what he is doing and see a problem with it ... It’s a concern that he’s trying to dupe people. And when I say ‘dupe’ I have to be a little bit careful because I don’t believe that he is deliberately trying to deceive anybody. I think he really does believe in what he is doing, but I think that he is very badly mistaken.”
Still Invested
Despite the validity of the skeptics’ claims, not everybody has always been so apprehensive. According to the Dean of Engineering, Claude Laguë, the University of Ottawa’s Faculty of Engineering opened its doors to Heins in order that he might get Potential Difference on its feet at the request of Ottawa Centre for Research and Innovation (OCRI). However, on March 1, after two years of facilitating Heins with lab space and access to the expertise of campus professors, the faculty asked Heins to vacate SITE due to his claims of external funding and a lack of return from his lengthy residency.“After two years, our assessment was that we had moved beyond what we consider the normal start-up period. The company had also indicated that they were expecting financing from external sources. Due to that change to the situation, we felt that it was no longer appropriate for the faculty to continue to provide resource to that company free of charge,” Laguë explains of the faculty’s decision.
Heins has claimed financial support from various individuals over the years. In a 2008 Ottawa Citizen article by Tim Shufelt, Heins claimed that a $15-million investment was offered by influential Oregon private investor Jacques Nichols. The Fulcrum contacted Nichols by email about his investment.
“I met Mr. Heins during the summer of 2008 and we discussed his company and its capital requirements. No offer to invest was made, and I heard nothing more,” says Nichols in response to Heins’ claim.
Currently, Heins is financed by a number of personal investors including Robert Clark, founder of VesCells, a company that treats heart disease by stem cell therapy, who optimistically expects to “be able to clearly see the returns,” and Kevin Thistle, president of Coppingwood Golf Club, who has already invested nearly $250,000 in capital.
Attaining Attention
Heins can attribute some of his investors’ attention to the notoriety given to him by the media. When energy and green technologies columnist Tyler Hamilton wrote about Heins, his article became the Toronto Star’s second most read online story of 2008.“I think Heins used it to his advantage to try to get in the door because it gave him a bit of [a] profile… He benefited from that and he rode that exposure,” asserts Hamilton. Although Hamilton says his intention was never to create debate, the Star’s article gave a level of credence to Heins—and started its own chain reaction of perpetual media attention. Canadian Business wrote an article. Heins garnered a mention on Gizmodo, Slashdot, BoingBoing, Wired.com, and innumerable private blogs. The Internet was abuzz, and both the Ottawa Citizen and the Toronto Star each devoted an article to all the attention he was getting.
Just this month, on the very heels of Heins’ exodus from campus, EV World published an article entitled “The Heins Effect,” in which tech editor Micheal Brace’s admitted purpose was to laud Heins with tenability. Brace writes that “[Heins] asked me to write this article because he’s hoping to change the public perception of his discovery.”
Dr. Riadh Habash, the U of O engineering professor who opened his lab to Heins, is not interested in discussing supposed controversy.
“We worked with him and we couldn’t prove his claims and, in science, to prove your claim you should be able to demonstrate that experimentally. In addition, you might write that in terms of a paper reviewed by others ... When you do research in science you shouldn’t contact journalists.”
The role of journalism in scientific debate is an important one in modern society, and the degradation of that debate is a main concern of each of the skeptics approached by the Fulcrum.
Mixed Media
Robert Park knows all about public debate regarding scientific issues. Park, who spent 25 years in Washington representing the American Physical Society to politicians and the press, sees a critical problem with the media.“Many people in the media who write science stories do not themselves have a real appreciation for the basic laws of science, so they are perfectly willing to violate the second law of thermodynamics. That doesn’t trouble them at all.”
Park says about five new perpetual motion machines are brought to his attention each year and he finds that astounding.
“Five perpetual motion machines a year? And you know, every one of those is a drag on the economy, but, worse than that, it encourages people to believe in this kind of mythology.” Dunning agrees with Park.
“The media is not engaged in the charitable act of educating people; they are engaged in the business of drawing attention ... The problem is that the media is the main source of science information for most people, and viewers are offered little reason to suspect the information that’s reported might not be complete or correct. Such reporting erodes the already low level of public understanding of science, technology, and medicine.”
Béla Joós is not only the head of the Physics Department at the University of Ottawa, but also the editor of Physics in Canada, a monthly periodical published by the Canadian Association of Physicists. Physics in Canada reports on research findings, but also keeps physicists informed about important issues relevant to the scientific community.
“A newspapers’ true purpose is just announcing things, but their purpose is not in that sense critical analysis,” Joós says.
Joós does not necessarily see this as a fault, but does note the need for caution.
“Journalists do have a responsibility to not take as fact what is being proclaimed by one solitary voice.”
Joós points to the benefits of the peer review system in which fellow researchers in the same field are asked to evaluate scientific work before it can be published in reputable journals.
“Nobody can be a specialist in everything, so peer review is essential to make sure that the proposed new results have followed the scientific method of reproducibility, quality of data or error calculation, and spurious effects which may explain the data which are not being accounted for ... Peer review manages also to identify questionable steps which have been taken or questionable assumptions that are not based on reality.”
Sayonara Science
Heins has had more success with the media than with scientific journals. According to Heins, “People were more critical than they should have been,” and so he has chosen to focus on the mass media rather than the scientific community.“My initial approach was the scientific approach. Have it evaluated, have it legitimized, go through the scientific route, but we hit a wall—we hit a wall that you couldn’t get over.”
And so with no discernible support from the academics on campus, Heins continues his “letter writing campaign” to Macleans, National Geographic, the CBC and whomever will listen—even the Fulcrum.
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