5,220 Matching Annotations
  1. Feb 2020
    1. ACTIVITY 2: ASYNCHRONOUS COMMUNICATION TOOLS

      a·syn·chro·nous /āˈsiNGkrənəs/ Learn to pronounce adjective 1.(of two or more objects or events) not existing or happening at the same time. 2.COMPUTING•TELECOMMUNICATIONS of or requiring a form of computer control timing protocol in which a specific operation begins upon receipt of an indication (signal) that the preceding operation has been completed.

      In telecommunications, asynchronous communication is transmission of data, generally without the use of an external clock signal, where data can be transmitted intermittently rather than in a steady stream. Any timing required to recover data from the communication symbols is encoded within the symbols.

      wikipedia

    1. ectothermic

      Commonly called "cold-blooded", this term describes an animal that regulates its body temperature using external energy sources. For example, this is the reason why many reptiles sunbathe.

    2. gestation time

      The period of time that viviparous animals (those that give live birth and do not lay eggs) will carry a developing embryo. The length of this period will vary depending on species; for example humans have a gestation period of 40 weeks, whereas rabbits only take about a month.

    3. scaling coefficient

      Ecologists often use equations to try to describe animal behavior. A "scaling coefficient" is a number by which a variable is multiplied, which is used here to say that temperature (the variable in this case) will cause a larger change in the behavior of prey (large scaling coefficient) than predators (small scaling coefficient).

    4. trevally

      Caranx ignobilis, the "Giant trevally" is called out as an animal that has some key similarities and differences in behavior from the blacktip reef sharks at the center of this study.

      While both are apex predators from the Phylum Chordata, the trevally is a bony fish (Class Actinopterygii) while the shark is a cartilaginous fish (Class Chondrichthyes)

    5. serial correlation

      Also known as autocorrelation, this is a phenomenon that occurs within datasets such as a time series in which the data points are not independent of each other. For example, the temperature recorded one minute is very likely to be similar to the temperature that was recorded for the previous time point because these time points have a relationship to each other, as the temperature will only change as quickly between them as the underlying physics allow. This phenomenon has consequences for some statistical analyses that researchers must correct for to avoid generating spurious results.

    6. teleosts

      An infraclass of the class Actinopterygii, this classification includes most ray-finned fishes found in the world today, with only a few exceptions of ancient fish which branched off earlier in evolutionary history.

    7. tonic immobility

      Many animals "play dead" in response to a stress or threat, but this trance-like state in sharks is thought to be connected to mating since they typically have few predators to feel threatened by. It typically takes 15 minutes for this effect to wear off and has little or no lasting health consequences for the shark.

    8. temporal resolution

      How many measurements are made over a period of time. A measurement is said to be continuous if it is being constantly tracked, whereas discrete measurements are taken periodically at a time interval that the scientists have determined is frequent enough to answer their research question.

    9. backreefs (2–3 m depth, high vertical relief coral, good visibility) which transition to forereefs

      This illustration of the anatomy of a barrier reef shows the relative position and depth of the backreef and forereef to the lagoon found at the center of an atoll:

    10. Palmyra

      Located in the Pacific, south of Hawaii: With no permanent residents, this is a United States Minor Outlying Island that is part of the largest marine protected area in the world: the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument.

    11. behaviourally thermoregulate

      Behaviors performed to control the temperature of an organism such as basking in the sun or seeking shelter.

      An example of turtles basking in the sun to increase their body temperature:

    12. thermal niche

      The temperature conditions within which an organism has the best chance of thriving. This is one of several factors that determine the ecological niche of an organism, which describes how its behavior and habitat choice play a specific role in the context of the larger ecosystem that it is a part of.

    13. enzyme kinematics

      Enzymes perform many important functions in our bodies (such as digestion) and have a temperature at which they can perform optimally. Temperatures that are higher or lower will require more energy to perform the same task. Keeping your body, and the enzymes that it contains, at an optimal temperatures is a way to maximize the efficient use of energy.

    14. crepuscular

      Refers to things that happen during the twilight hours (dawn and dusk). This is in contract to "nocturnal" things that happen at night or "diurnal" things that happen during the day. Crepuscular animals such as deer, bears, and housecats tend to be the most active during these time periods.

    15. body condition

      A measurement that can be used to infer the health status of an organism. This is typically calculated by comparing a measurement like length to another like weight, for which a healthy ratio is known.

      The human body-mass-index (BMI) can be considered a measurement of body condition, as this is derived from a person's height and the range of weights that are considered to be healthy for that height.

      A fish with a high body condition is likely to be on the plump side with excess energy stored as a buffer for times of low food intake or high energy use, while a fish with low body condition would be skinny for its length and have low energy reserves.

    16. metabolic cost

      The energy required for an organism to perform an action. This includes constant needs such as the maintenance of cells or voluntary actions like the use of muscles for swimming. Organisms must balance all of these metabolic costs with the intake of energy from food, or they will run an unsustainable deficit in their energy budget.

    17. thermal inertia

      Describes the resistance of an object (or, in this case, an animal) to changes in temperature, and the speed at which it approaches the temperature of its surroundings. A warm fish with high thermal inertia would maintain its heat relatively well in cold waters, whereas a fish with low thermal inertia would lose its heat quickly in cold water and is more likely to have a body temperature that is similar to its surroundings.

    18. diurnal prey

      "Diurnal" refers to things that happen during the daytime. This is the opposite of its antonym "nocturnal", which appears much more often in common speech to refer to animals that are active at night. In this case, "diurnal prey" is used to refer to the daytime activity of fish that the sharks may be feeding on.

    19. tropical atoll

      An island formed when an extinct mid-ocean volcano surrounded by coral reefs is eroded and subsided beneath sea level, leaving only a coral reef ring visible above the ocean surface. These are found only in tropical and subtropical regions where corals can thrive and continue to build up a reef at a rate that keeps pace with the erosion and subsidence of the underlying volcano.

    1. three-point bending test

      The three-point bend test provides values for the modulus of elasticity, and flexural stress and strain.

      Modulus of elasticity is the ratio of the stress in a body to the corresponding strain.

      Flexural stress is the maximum bending stress that can be applied to that material before it breaks.

      Flexural Strain is the ratio of stress to strain in flexural deformation, or the tendency for a material to resist bending.

    2. poly(anhydride)-based matrices

      A class of biodegradable polymers which are characterized by anhydride bonds. In vivo, they degrade into non- toxic monomers that are metabolized and eliminated from the body.

    3. Bonferroni

      A statistical analysis test used to counteract false positive results within multiple comparisons. It is used when several independent or dependent tests are being performed simultaneously.

    4. poly(caprolactone)

      A polymer often used to improve a products processing characteristics, and its compatibility with other materials. It can be used to increase biodegradability, or used with a polymeric to plasticize a product.

    5. poly(lactide-co-glycolide)

      A copolymer which is widely accepted for biomedical applications due to its biocompatibility, biodegradation rate, approval for clinical use, potential modification properties, and export opportunities to cultures with unpopular use of animal- derived products.

    1. “Earth system succession”

      This occurs when biotic and/or abiotic change results in the biosphere or geosphere becoming unbalanced. It provides a way to explain the ecological and evolutionary changes observed in the fossil record.

    2. paleotemperature proxies

      Fossils/imprints from the past, referred to as proxies, can be used to determine what the paleoclimate was like. Examples of proxies are coral, pollen, and tree rings. These are analyzed and correlated with current climate conditions.

    3. Geomagnetic Polarity Time Scale

      Earth's north and south magnetic poles have reversed multiple times. Normal polarity occurs when the magnetic north points toward the geographic north pole. The reverse is the opposite. A record of the onset and duration of these reversals has been measured back to the Upper Jurassic.

    4. crown birds

      This is a clade that includes all living bird species and their ancestors, back to the common ancestor and all of the ancestor's descendants that did not evolve to form modern species.

    5. Leguminosae

      This refers to a family of plants that have nodules on their roots that contain nitrogen-fixing bacteria. The bacteria transform atmospheric nitrogen gas into nitrogen compounds plants are able to use.

    1. lithophile elements

      The term lithophile was coined by Goldschmidt to describe elements with affinity for silicates. The Greek word lithophile means rock-loving. These elements are primarily found in regions with higher concentrations of silicate, e.g., the mantle and crust. A few examples of lithophile elements are Li, Na, Mg, Al and Si.

    2. δ13C-δ18O

      The term ‘δ<sup>13</sup>C-δ<sup>18</sup>O’ denotes the isotopic signatures of carbon and oxygen elements. An isotopic signature is calculated from the ratio of stable isotopes (13-C/12-C or 18-O/16-O) and expressed in parts per thousand.

    3. trace-element

      A chemical element which constitutes less than 0.1% of a rock's composition.There is unique geochemical information stored in the variation of concentration of each trace element. Zn, Cd and Sr are a few examples of trace-elements.

    4. Isotope

      Chemical elements that have the same number of electrons and protons but a different number of neutrons are called isotopes. For example, both carbon-12 and carbon-14 have six electrons and six protons, but they have 12 and 14 neutrons, respectively. These isotopic differences change the atom's atomic mass and other chemical properties.

  2. Jan 2020
    1. the fusiform face area (FFA) allows faces to bypass the brain’s usual interpretive channels and helps us identify them more quickly than objects. The FFA is also near the amygdala, the brain’s emotional center.

      i reaaalllly think i should be doing a glossary list.

  3. Nov 2019
  4. Oct 2019
    1. solid waste management systems

      Refers to the range of garbage materials that are discarded as unwanted and useless. Landfills are often used as solid waste management systems.

    1. antigenic peptide bound to major histocompatibility complex (MHC)

      The target for T cell receptors is always a short peptide displayed on the surface of the cells. The protein responsible for displaying the peptides is called the major histocompatibility complex.

    1. pelagic sediments

      These are very fine-grained particles which gradually accumulate on the ocean floor over time. These deposits comprise of both inorganic (by products of volcanic activities) and organic (marine plants and animals) matters.

    2. ocean island basalts

      Basalt is a type of igneous rocks which comprises 90% of all volcanic rocks. When these basalts are formed as a result of volcanic activities inside the ocean and away from the tectonic plate junctions, they are known as ocean island basalts.

    3. radiogenic 4He

      A radiogenic isotope is formed by the process of radioactive decay. For instance, in this case, the stable isotope helium-4 is generated from the decay of a radioactive helium-4 nucleus.

  5. Sep 2019
    1. sp3/sp2 bonded carbon

      Hybridization is the combining or mixing up of atomic orbitals (an expected region of electron density around an atom) to form new hybrid orbitals that have geometries suitable to form bonds. Electrons can be found in s, p, d, and f orbitals. When an s orbital combines with three p orbitals, it results in four sp<sup>3</sup> hybridized orbitals. Similarly, the combination of an s orbital with two p orbitals gives rise to three sp<sup>2</sup> hybrid orbitals.

      Learn more about hybrid orbitals with these videos from Khan Academy.

    2. graphene

      The building block of graphite, which is used in pencil tips. Graphene is a one-atom-thick layer of carbon atoms arranged in a hexagonal lattice (with atoms arranged at the corners of a hexagon). The thickness of graphene is a million times less than that of a single human hair. Graphene is the world's first 2D material and the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded for its discovery.

       Source: Wikimedia

    3. multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs)

      Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are rolled up cylinders of graphene sheets with diameters in the nanoscale. Based on geometry, they are termed as either single-walled (formed by rolling a single sheet of graphene) or multiwalled (multiple sheets of graphene) carbon nanotubes.

    4. covalent intralayer bonding

      A covalent bond is formed by the sharing of electrons between atoms. In the case of graphene, each carbon atom forms covalent bonds with three neighboring atoms of hexagons in a plane, with atoms placed in corners of the hexagon. This type of in-plane bonding is called intralayer covalent bonding.

    5. defects

      A perfect crystal is an idealization and in real materials, atom arrangements do not follow perfect crystalline patterns. Crystal defects can be due to missing atoms, introduction of an impurity, broken crystal patterns along fault lines, or the joining of distinct crystal planes.

    6. wear debris

      Wear is the progressive loss of materials from contacting surfaces relative in motion. The wear process results in the generation of debris—or particles—of various size, shape, color distributions, and chemical composition.

    1. Intraperitoneal CNO

      The CNO was injected into the peritoneum, the thin membrane that lines the walls of the abdominal cavity. It travels through the circulation system, crosses the blood-brain barrier, and affects its target cells.

    2. paraventricular thalamus (PVT)

      A subregion of a part of the brain called the thalamus.

      The PVT has been shown to have a broad range of function, including involvement in fear, learning, arousal, and feeding behaviors.

    3. axonal projections

      The axon is a long, thin part of the neuron that facilitates communication between neurons. Axons extend from the cell body of a neuron to other parts of the brain, allowing communication between different brain regions.

    1. polymer

      Materials made of long, repeating chains of molecules. The term polymer is often used to describe plastics, which are synthetically made, but natural polymers also exist.

    2. single-use plastic food packaging (polyethylene, polypropylene, and polyethylene terephthalate)

      As the most common plastic, polyethylene is used for everything from plastic bags to bulletproof vests. Polypropylene is commonly used in chip bags, microwave dishes, and bottle caps. Some fabric textiles and many water bottles are made of polyethylene terephthalate (PET).

      Plastics are notoriously persistent pollutants. It is estimated that a PET plastic water bottle will take anywhere from 100-500 years to degrade.

    3. circular economy

      An economic system where waste and pollution are designed out, keeping products and services in closed loops or cycles. The circular economy is an alternative to a traditional linear economy in which products and materials are made, used, and disposed of.

    1. colloidal stability

      Refers to the particles' ability to stay dispersed in a fluid without separating from the solution (precipitation) or forming big clusters (aggregation) within a period of time.

    2. diblock copolymer

      A polymer of two different polymer chains chemically bonded together in a specific order. For example, a linear diblock copolymer of the type A-B with 5 A monomers connected to 4 B monomers is a single chain A-A-A-A-A-B-B-B-B.

    3. triblock

      A polymer of three different polymer chains, which are chemically bonded together in a specific order. For example, a linear triblock copolymer of the type A-B-C with 5 A monomers connected to 4 B monomers connected to 5 C monomers is a single chain A-A-A-A-A-B-B-B-B-C-C-C-C-C.

    4. CF sputum

      CF stands for cystic fibrosis, a disease in the lungs.

      Sputum is a mixture of saliva and mucus that is produced because of a disease, such as cystic fibrosis, and comes out of the the human body through the passage formed from the mouth, nose, throat, and lungs.

    5. pulmonary drug delivery

      A pulmonary process is related to lung tissue.

      Pulmonary drug delivery is the insertion of drug molecules to the human body through mouth to reach the lungs and treat lung-related diseases.

  6. Aug 2019
    1. product inhibition

      This is a mechanism to control production in biological settings. This means when something is being made (ex. protein) and reaches a certain concentration then the production is stopped. This can also be called a negative-feedback loop.

    1. postmitotic neurons

      Mature cells that are not capable of cell division.

      Question that is being addressed here is: Compared to immature/developing neurons, does mature cells have a different machinery (or set of mechanisms) to synthesize RNA and different neurotransmittters?

    2. membrane depolarization

      Refers to a process during which a cell undergoes a shift in electric charge distribution. At rest, the membrane of a neuron has a potential of -60 to -70 millivolts (mV). This means the inside of the cell is negatively charged relative to the outside. Depolarization is when the potential becomes less negative than the resting potential.