• Question: What is the strangest thing you have ever ddone being a scientist?!

    Asked by lucygill22 to Chris, Emily, Martin, Natalie, Tamsin on 22 Mar 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Martin Coath

      Martin Coath answered on 22 Mar 2010:

      I am not sure QUITE what you mean by strange. I mean – ALL science is a bit strange 😀

      If I described most of what I do every day you would think I was a bit crazy anyway.

      I have done my fair share of wacky scientific entertainment involving explosions, throwing water ballons off of scaffolding, making cheese on stage (see my profile picture with me in the chef outfit) and all that stuff – which is fun.

      At the moment I am doing a VERY strange thing which is writing a performance that combines music and science:

      http://www.lolaperrin.com/live.html

      I am working with a brilliant piano player and composer called Lola Perrin to produce a science lecture that is also a musical composition! Now that IS strange!

    • Photo: Emily Cook

      Emily Cook answered on 22 Mar 2010:

      Lie for half an hour in a dark room with my breasts hanging in a bowl of milk.

      This was helping collect data for a breast cancer detection system that uses light and infra-red rays rather than X-rays so would be much safer for women. I was a healthy volunteer to test how repeatable measurements were.

      I had to lie face down on a bed and it was quite relaxing – I fell asleep at one point.

      The system used lights and detectors attached in a hemisphere around the bowl to get a 3D image.
      The milk was a fatty liquid to make sure all the light got to the tissue and the hemisphere was all filled. I haven’t seen the results yet….

    • Photo: Natalie Stanford

      Natalie Stanford answered on 22 Mar 2010:

      I don’t think I’ve done anything particularly strange as a result of being a scientist. My birthday presents have got a lot stranger though. My friends always get me something yeast-related (last time they got me a packet of dried bakers yeast – exciting stuff) as a joke. They seem to find it a little odd that that is the Eukaryote of choice for my study.

    • Photo: Chris Cooper

      Chris Cooper answered on 22 Mar 2010:

      oh – nice question…..

      I don’t know about me personally, but the weirdest thing I experienced was at an important scientific conference was when the lead speaker got up and said that he had done an experiment with himself as the guinea pig. He covered himself with some bacteria that made a gas that was supposed to be good for the body. So the bacteria didn’t get removed, he then didn’t wash for two years!

      The gas the bacteria were producing – nitric oxide – is an intermediate in the pathway that Viagra activates. Some of the measurements he was making were certainly very strange, but I can’t mention them here.

      Needless to say he was given a wide berth at the bar later that evening ….

    • Photo: Tamsin Gray

      Tamsin Gray answered on 24 Mar 2010:

      That’s a tough one. I dressed up as a giant banana this year at New Year and went ice skating down a runway which was pretty strange but not really in the name of science.

Comments

  • Photo: Natalie

    Natalie commented on :

    Emily, I think you win in the odd stakes with that one. How can my yeast produce compete with breasts in milk??

  • Photo: Martin

    Martin commented on :

    Nitric oxide has wide and powerful neuro-modulatory effects well beyond, well, y’know, the well known ones Chris alludes to in his answer! I would think long and hard before exposing myself to it. 😉

  • Photo: Chris

    Chris commented on :

    Actually nitric oxide is not too toxic if used at low doses. For example it is used to treat new born babies with lung difficulties. I am sure the dose is higher than this weirdo got on his skin. The big problem seems to be when we inhibit its formation in the body. Too little is worse than too much. Despite a LOT of money invested Glaxo have just closed down their program on nitric oxide inhibitors.

    The most bizarre new data is that the nitrate in beetroot juice seems to improve exercise performance – possibly via nitric oxide release. A new route for 2012 success?

  • Moderator - Sophia commented on :

    Those are brilliant! But I think the man who covered himself in bacteria and then didn’t wash for TWO YEARS is more weird than Emily’s milk. He sounds mad. Can we get him to take part in the next I’m a Scientist?

  • Photo: Chris

    Chris commented on :

    http://www.nitroceutic.com/ is the company and David Whitlock the man. But he only seems to have published his sensible papers recently, not what he talked about at the conference!

  • Photo: ebaker406

    ebaker406 commented on :

    no offence but why would you tell 13/14 year olds about the .. thing you do…. emily :S :L ox