Science behind the Scenes

Pregnancy? If you ask me, we’re doing it wrong

Posted on April 16, 2013 by steffi suhr

Pregnancy is beautiful – or so they say.

Well, I beg to differ. Interesting or even fascinating? Yes, definitely. But also inconvenient, weird and just plain impractical.

I have to disclose that, even as a young girl, I’ve always found that pregnant women look very strange, and often rather uncomfortable (I even felt a bit sorry for them). This hasn’t changed over the years, and neither did my feelings about pregnancy in general – not when I was pregnant with my first child almost ten years ago, or now with my current pregnancy…

Think about it: there is a small human being inside another human being!!! Moving around, kicking from the inside, squeezing their feet under your ribcage (causing that weird tingly sensation, which was new for me), pushing on the same spot over and over until you feel bruised inside and all the midwife can do is tell you it’s normal and to put a cold pack on it (also new for me), hiccupping, growing bigger and bigger… in fact, so big that at the end it’s quite a struggle to push him/her out through a passage that is barely adequate for this! In fact it’s such a tight fit that all kinds of additional adaptations had to happen, such as the skull bones of the baby not being fused until after the birth – to make the head more squishable – and the joints of the mother loosening up so the pelvis can open wider.

Speaking of which: the entire female body undergoes such profound changes that medical doctors treated (and often still treat) pregnancy as a medical condition, rather than a natural process. Which is of course silly, because – as strange as it is – it’s not a disease. (By the way, this is a comparatively recent phenomenon, see e.g. this brief overview).

But let’s just list a few of these changes here for fun – physiological:

blood plasma volume increases by 50% while the number of red blood cells only increases by 20-30%, completely changing the haematology
heart rate and cardiac output increase
the blood sugar level increases
breathing increases
the immune system is slightly suppressed
…and don’t even mention the hormones..

..and anatomical changes (besides the joints mentioned above):

the uterus increases its weight about 20 and its initial capacity about 1,000 times (not to mention all that muscle it packs on and starts exercising not too far into the pregnancy, getting ready for that olympic-class event of giving birth)
the placenta and umbilical cord grow
the breasts significantly increase in size (…and then even more, after the baby is born, for nursing)
and that absolutely massive belly people insist on affectionately calling “the bump” in a ridiculous understatement, which is due to the uterus growing into the abdomen, causing the abdominal wall to expand to accommodate it.

Anyway. The reason I am writing this post? I have a proposal to make.

Can we please lay eggs instead?

An egg, yesterday. (Isn’t it cute?)

Think about it. First of all, such an egg is smooth and round and would – frankly – come out a bit easier, with far less potential for drama including breech birth and other complications. But, more importantly: once the egg is out, it doesn’t have to be just the mother who looks after it. Look at Emperor penguins, for example! The fathers sit patiently on the eggs, keeping them warm, while the ladies take off to the seashore to replenish their used-up energy stores after producing that egg. Then they come back and take over again so the lads can have a break. How beautiful would that be? Truly equal sharing of responsibilities, right from the start!

And of course, humans being the ingenious species we are, looking after the egg doesn’t have to mean staying at home/stationary and sitting on it. I can imagine entire ranges of padded designer egg-carrier bags that can be set at just the right temperature and that even the most fashion conscious mum or dad wouldn’t be embarrassed to take to work with them, or any social event for that matter. It might even be admired and be quite the conversation starter. And it doesn’t have to stop there! With eggs in a carrier bag the entire family can share in the experience: grandmother and grandfather, older siblings… even friends could have a go!

—

P.S. Where did this post come from? Due to my employer’s special status, although based in the UK, my maternity leave had to start this week, four weeks before the due date, with no choice involved. Oh, the time to overthink this…… I guess I really should do some more relaxing now…

Posted in Silliness, society | Tagged eggs, pregnancy, proposals | 30 Comments

Maxine Clarke

Posted on January 2, 2013 by steffi suhr

I learned only now, via Twitter, that Maxine Clarke has died.

Maxine was kind of the reason I started blogging.

Back in 2008 I rather suddenly – and unexpectedly – found myself having been made the editor-in-chief of a small journal that was not doing well at all. In my naiveté, to try and kick things up a bit, I decided to put together a special issue on science communication. As you might when finding yourself in such a situation, I googled around for possible contributors and found a piece by Maxine on Nature Network (ironically, I cannot find it now – I will add the link later when I do). I liked what she said and was bold enough to ask whether she would contribute to the special issue. She accepted, which I have to say I was as pleased as pleasantly surprised about.

So I ended up editing her article – and afterwards she complimented me on a great job. As absolutely nice as that was I only later realised the scale of that compliment, considering Maxine’s role at Nature! Once I did, I was almost mortified (and had I known before I would probably not have dared to touch the text at all..!). But I have to admit that I later extremely proudly used the argument “I’ve been commented on my editing by a Nature editor” once or twice.

After this I started reading the blogs on Nature Network more regularly, and I liked much of what I saw, most of all the community spirit that clearly came across. After some soul-searching, I decided to start blogging myself. (After NN was discontinued, the posts – with comments – were moved here, but I also copied them to Occam’s, if you’re interested. I have not fixed the formatting on most of them yet, apologies.)

There’s something else – big – that Maxine helped me with: because of a coincidence, I learned that one of the editors of that same journal I was put in charge of was a very prominent figure in the HIV-AIDS denialism world. Which I had never come across before. So while I was “familiarising myself” with that parallel universe and as my belief in the general sanity of humankind started wavering, I asked her – as a senior, very experienced editor – for advice on how to deal with this situation. I learned that Maxine had a lot of experience with that particular kind of madness, and she was an absolutely tremendous help for me. She even put me in touch with a prominent HIV researcher who spent time on a long phone conversation with me, basically educating me on the issue. I would like to stress that she never even remotely told me what to do – she just gave me the information to make up my own mind.

The first time I met Maxine in person was at the first Science Online London event in 2008. The day before, there was a guided tour of London’s sciency-sites (led by Matt Brown, now from The Londonist). Throughout the tour and afterwards I was very impressed by her friendliness towards and interest in seemingly absolutely everyone! She made a real effort to talk to lots of people, and it was not just small talk. This is a skill I wished then (and still wish) I had.

It was the same on Nature Network: Maxine constantly seemed to be everywhere, and I remember wondering regularly how she found the time to follow all these blogs and make comments that were far more than “this is a great post” cheers.

Towards the end of the time of the now “Occam’s crew” at Nature Network, my contact with Maxine broke off. But I kept thinking about her, what she had done for me and what I learned from her, at very regular intervals.

I guess several of “me and my blogging buddies” may have similar stories. Eva wrote a wonderful post about Maxine already on 18 December.

Maxine was an absolutely beautiful person, and my thoughts are with her family and the friends and colleagues she leaves behind.

(Maxine’s obituary by Nature is here.)

Posted in on a personal note, Women in science | 11 Comments

Last night at the gingerbread house..

Posted on December 29, 2012 by steffi suhr

My brother and his family visited us over Christmas. As we did the presents-bit in the evening on Christmas Eve we had some time to kill earlier in the day.. which we did effectively with a massive gingerbreadhousesweetdecorationorama.

The thing is that we have to eat it now.

Caption contest, anyone?

Posted in Silliness | 5 Comments

Career impediments

Posted on August 2, 2012 by steffi suhr

A bit over a year ago now, sitting at Berlin central station after a three-day training seminar, sipping a latte while waiting for the train, I was chatting with a medical doctor/researcher at a big cancer research institute in Germany about “career impediments”.

Me: “My problem is that I say what I think. I mean, when something isn’t working, and it’s in the way of making progress with the project or whatever I’m involved in, I point this out, and I make suggestions for how I think this could be fixed. I just can’t help myself. It’s a bit of a problem because so many people tend to take it personally while I’m really just talking about the issues. But I don’t seem to be able to learn any lessons from that, either”.

Him: “My problem is that I believe what people tell me. Even when they’re joking.”

He wasn’t joking, I checked. I told him he’d won.

Which is the bigger impediment?

Posted in science management, Silliness | 2 Comments

Inside my genome

Posted on July 26, 2012 by steffi suhr

Or: Craig Venter and I¹

I spat into a tube this morning:

This is to participate in a study called “Inside your genome” that is run by the good folks at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute. The study offers 1000 people working here on the Genome Campus to be voluntarily genotyped at a set of ~100-150 known variants, showing results for around 30 traits. Among some other things, this study is set up to explore people’s attitudes, views, opinions and awareness of personal genomics (using genetic technology) to learn about how their own genome sequence relates to their traits.

I like this simple description of what’s going on:

Every cell in your body has a complete set of instructions, known as the genetic code, that tell the body how to make your cells and their components, and to direct how these interact. This set of instructions is encoded in your genome. You could think of the genome as a recipe book that carries all of the instructions necessary to make a human being. Sometimes, variation in the genome between individuals can result in the presence of certain traits, some of which may be related to your health.

The traits included in this study – as voted for by study participants – are entirely “benign”:

Ancestry (Worldwide, Neanderthal and population markers)
Cholesterol
Eye colour
Smell perception
Taste perception
Blood glucose
Muscle performance
Blood pressure
Body mass index (BMI)
Blood type
Nicotine addiction susceptibility
Caffeine consumption
Fat distribution
Lactose intolerance
Norovirus resistance
Male pattern baldness

Most of this doesn’t sound very exciting. After all, I already know the colour of my eyes (green), my hair colour (dark blonde… well, increasingly grey), I know (from experience!) in which areas my body fat is most likely to be stored, and I am pretty sure I am not at risk of developing male-pattern baldness. I am, however, a tiny bit excited about the prospect of finding out exactly how “Neanderthal” I am – I do have all four of my wisdom teeth and they are fully functional… I’ve always wondered whether that may be any indication?

Even judging only by the number of times this was mentioned in the information paperwork, among the biggest concerns of the researchers seems to be:

Study participants asking researchers about specifics concerning their genome/results (which will NOT be possible)
Feedback of any “incidental” findings (i.e. things not included on the list above) to study participants (which will NOT take place)

The reasons for this (I am guessing) might be:

Practical issues involved in storing and (re-)analysing the data
Keeping data identifiable (i.e. possible to link with the individual study participant, which in this study is explicitly NOT the case)
and, probably the reason for the previous point, ethics involved in feeding back findings to the participants (probably along the lines of the issues described recently in an article in Nature).

But to be honest, and as much as I understand that this is not feasible, I was/am almost a bit disappointed that the study will not look at factors that may indicate detrimental health effects. For example, I would have liked to know exactly how likely I will be to get arthritis, as one of my close family members has it. Then again: arthritis is not life-threatening, and it’s probably sufficient if I just mentally prepare myself for the eventuality (plus try and keep my joints healthy by eating the “right” foods and exercising). It might be quite different if I was confronted with a finding that indicates I might die rather a bit sooner than I had hoped.

One of the aims of the study is to “give [participants] the opportunity to personally think through the technical and ethical considerations that surround personal genomics”. But I wonder whether looking at “harmless” traits contributes in any way towards finding out the real attitudes, since the big issues seem to me to only arise once the findings are not “harmless”. One colleague joked, predictably, that if traits relating to a detrimental effect on health had been included in the study, “the next thing would be that you’d find yourself being struck off the health insurance” – and I bet this or a similar thought is the first that pops into the head of anyone who thinks about genotyping, especially in the context of personalised medicine.. and despite its huge potential to help patients by targeting treatments. If not, let me know in the comments.

Just this morning it seemed like the participation in the study would be modest, judging by the number of sampling kits that were left over. However, with just 1.5 hours to spare before the deadline, there was an update that the kits have all gone now. A mad, last-minute rush – have people just made up their minds (or were they just too lazy to do it earlier, like me)?

How do you feel about genotyping – if you really think about it?

1. The study is completely voluntary, confidential, etc., and only looks at a veryvery limited set of traits, so it really is not quite like having your entire genome sequenced and published openly like Craig Venter’s… but since the consistency of his earwax was mentioned in the introduction to the keynote talk I heard him give a bit over a week ago at ESOF 2012 in Dublin, the subtitle seemed somehow appropriate.

Posted in personalised medicine, science and society | Tagged ethics, genomics, personalised medicine | 25 Comments

Something more glamorous

Posted on June 15, 2012 by steffi suhr

I just had a bit of an experience while uploading an old photo to Facebook – this one:

A dirty girl, ca. August 1998

Ok, maybe it was the caption I put with the photo – but still!

Anyway, if you’re interested in the story behind that photo, we have to go back to sometime in 1998 – I believe it was August. A lovely summer. I was at the Southampton Oceanography Centre (as it was called then). I had just finished my biology degree in Germany. Those were the days before bachelor’s and master’s degrees were introduced there, so it took about 5 years (or 10 semesters) on average to get a biology degree, and the last year consisted of a project and thesis in the area one had decided to specialize in towards the end. I had decided to do my project in Southampton for various reasons.. and then, for other reasons, I got stuck there. Not a bad place at all to be stuck at the time! The summer of 1998, I was working as a research assistant/technician in the resident deep sea research group. To my immense joy, I was given the opportunity to lead a small team of volunteers on a cruise to the Porcupine Abyssal Plain to take samples from a unique, deep sea long-term study site, the PAP site.

So off I went with my little team, all efficient. Taking sediment samples for macrofauna, diligently slicing up box core samples. Doing science. I didn’t even let the person who snuck up to me to leave those paw prints distract me – I was on a mission.

The sediment samples had to be rinsed through fine mesh sieves – these types of sieves were originally meant for geologists to analyse the grain size of sediments, but benthic biologists have been using them for a long time to wash the critters out of the sediment and pre-sort them by size (or rather, aptitude to pass through certain mesh size sieves – but let’s not get into that). Now, deep sea mud can be quite sticky – finely sorted, very small grained sediment. It takes a long time to wash any reasonably-sized sample through even a very big sieve.

One day (or was it night? I don’t remember – it started to all blend together), after standing on deck for endless hours with a big sieve, lots of mud, and a hose with running seawater, gently going back and forth with the sway of the ship and washing and bottling sample after sample, one of the engineers walked up to me. He was really trying the small talk, but I was really very tired. One thing he said has stuck with me until this day, however:

“I would have thought that someone like you would have chosen to do something more…. glamorous.”

Well. I ended up in science management, didn’t I?

Posted in Silliness | Tagged careers, deep-sea fauna, dirty girls, mud, Porcupine Abyssal Plain | 2 Comments

Somewhere in Essex

Posted on May 18, 2012 by steffi suhr

Or: Leaving Germany – again? For good? Whatever

Yes, I’ve gone and done it again – moved my family to a different country. Or should I say back to an old country? I’ve moved from Germany to the UK again, a country which I left in 2002, almost exactly ten years ago, to move to the US. I arrived as an undergraduate student then and ended up doing my PhD here. In some ways, during this period before I have my family here (we are still in the process of moving), I’ve almost been feeling thrown back to those days: shared accommodation, a desk in an office that was built as a lab, the new-ness and uncertainty and excitement that comes with such a big move and a new job.. and I feel that I am back in a more academic environment again, here at the European Bioinformatics Institute in Hinxton (near Cambridge).

Plus I have only public transportation and my feet to get me around. Take that, my determination to explore my new surroundings, and consider how much I miss my family, and it might explain (somewhat) why I went on a twenty mile hike through the Essex countryside last weekend. It was excellent, and I’m glad I did, because this was just one of the things I saw:

So it’s England – again for me, the first time for my family. We’ll have it good here. And no, I’m not planning on repeating the sequence again.. (Germany -> UK -> US -> Germany -> UK…).

However… even though I should be used to it, this still somehow makes me nervous:

Posted in career, Keep on fighting | 19 Comments

Christmas pickles

Posted on December 24, 2011 by steffi suhr

It’s the time of year during which everyone follows some kind of tradition or rituals, whether it be conscious or not. Depending on which country you’re in, seasonal activities may include several (or all) of the following activities:

the ritual Christmas shopping rush
the Christmas party at work
putting up an advent calendar
lighting candles on an Adventskranz
decorating the tree and maybe the entire house
baking biscuits/cookies
putting up lights

… etc.

So far so ~~hectic~~ ~~stressful~~ good.

Having a somewhat difficult relationship with these types of activities myself, however (I am always to late with things and frequently only get stuff ready at the very last minute – I was going to post this earlier but had to wrap the presents, the last of which I got this morning…), I’ve often wondered about them: where do such traditions come from, anyway? Who thought them up? And – most importantly – why do we seem to completely forget the origin of many (or most?) of our traditions?

Two Christmas carols traditionally sung in Germany use melodies that go with very different lyrics (and are sung for very different occasions!) in other countries:

O Tannenbaum
Morgen kommt der Weihnachtsmann

Ok, maybe melodies are not the best example. So then maybe look at these two photos and tell me which one is the Hefezopf, which is traditionally made in Germany, Austria and some areas of Switzerland for (get this) the central feast in the Christian liturgical year, and which one is the Challah:

And it’s said that the traditional German Adventskranz goes back to the 19th century, when it was “invented” by a guy called Johann Hinrich Wichern, the founder of an orphanage and (still existing – I know because I went there!) school in Hamburg. I don’t know whether this is true – but in any case, I’m pretty sure Wichern may have put together some existing traditions. Hanukkah lights anyone?

It’s fun to see how one tradition inspires another. But the innocent joy of observing such influences is lost when seeing how unaware many (or even most?) Germans are of many of “their” customs going back to Jewish traditions. It’s important that we stop and ask ourselves why we do certain things. It helps to remember, and it makes us aware that pretty much all we do is part of something bigger.

And then there’s the Christmas Pickle.

Translated from Wikipedia (as you’ve noticed, I’m relying heavily on Wikipedia for this post):

A Christmas Pickle is a glass Christmas tree ornament shaped like a pickle. Hiding a Christmas Pickle in the tree is a tradition in the United States. The pickle is somewhat hard to find due to its green colour. Whoever finds the Christmas Pickle in the tree receives an additional present.[...]

The origin of this custom is unclear. In the US it is said that it is an old German custom. However, the custom is unknown in most German-speaking regions. It is unclear whether the Christmas Pickles that can be found in some German-speaking places can be traced back to a local tradition or whether they are based on taking over this custom from the US.

Until this morning, when they talked about this on the radio, I had never heard of a „Christmas Pickle”. I checked with my mother: she hadn’t either, and she emphatically added that she had never seen a glass ornament shaped like a pickle on any of the many Christmas markets she had visited on her annual trip with friends either (among which were the markets in Munich, Salzburg, Oldendorf, Cologne, to name a few).

But who knows, maybe give it a few years and we’ll have a pickle in our tree. I’ll be watching this pickle thing in any case.

Until then: Merry Christmas or whatever you’re into!

Posted in society | 9 Comments

Happy birthday OT!

Posted on December 9, 2011 by steffi suhr

Dear OT,

I wish you all the best for your first birthday. I apologise that this is coming a bit later than the congratulations from my fellow OT-ters (otters?), but it’s been that kind of day. And that kind of week. And, kind of, that kind of year. And in a way, it may be appropriate that I am a bit late – after all, I was also late in joining when you first got going.

Anyway.

You’re turning one today, which is – it seems to me – a good age for a site set up by a group of bloggers as dissimilar as us here on OT. My husband also had a birthday this week (it was a round one – he’s in denial). Here’s a picture of him around age 18, which was a very long time ago indeed and which kind of shows how much can change in a lifetime:

We’ll see what the next year brings for you, OT. In any case, here’s to you.

Posted in Silliness | 8 Comments

Where photons will fly

Posted on September 2, 2011 by steffi suhr

Today was one of those work days that makes working at the European XFEL fun, despite all challenges and frustrations. Around lunchtime, I found myself standing in one of the photon tunnels of the facility.

We were giving a tour of our biggest construction site to external visitors. I was thoroughly distracted from my growling stomach.

As the name says: when the facility starts operating in a few years, this is the tunnel one of the photon beams will run through. When you look closely, you can see that every piece of concrete wall material is connected via a little metal bit to every other piece of wall. This is to turn the entire tunnel wall into a Faraday cage, to prevent any electromagnetic contamination of the outside that could be caused by the extremely high energy beam. I should mention that all tunnels are at a depth of 6 bis 38 meters below the surface.

The tunnel boring progress is updated frequently on our website. If you’re seriously interested in the tunneling itself (it really is cool stuff), there’s an interesting short film at the bottom of the German part of the site – this is because the information is primarily aimed at the neighbours surrounding (and living above) the construction area.

Turning around and heading back into the future Experimental Hall of the facility, we almost got squished by a flying backhoe.

Well, not quite.

Posted in exciting science, Photos | 9 Comments