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It's here! After more than a month of reviewing, I am pleased to announce the list of posts that will be included in this year's edition - the fifth - of The Open Laboratory!
In no particular order:
Givin' props to hybrids by DeLene Beeland
The decade the clones came: Beware the mighty Marmokrebs! by Zen Faulkes
Can seabirds overfish a resource? The case of cormorants in Estonia by Hannah Waters
The Data Speak by Andrew Thaler
Testing the flotation dynamics and swimming abilities of giraffes by way of computational analysis by Darren Naish
Shark week! by EcoPhysioMichelle
Size really does matter! Well endowed male earwigs have their cake and eat it too... by Carin Bondar
Comparative medicine: what is a wallaby? by The Dog Zombie
But did you correct your results using a dead salmon? by Iddo Friedberg
J.B.S. Haldane and the case of the revivified head by Jeremy Yoder
The First Trilobite by John McKay
Neuronistas vs. Reticularistas by Namnezia
How aqua regia saved Nobel Prize medals from the Nazis by Captain Skellett
Smells From the Past: The Fulton Fish Market by Krystal D'Costa
Oliver Sacks on Vision, His Next Book, and Surviving Cancer by Steve Silberman
Sacrifice on the Serengeti by Eric Michael Johnson
Man's new best friend? A forgotten Russian experiment in fox domestication by Jason Goldman
The antidepressant reboxetine: A "headdesk" moment in science by Scicurious
When a deaf man has Tourette's by Emily Anthes
Why Johnny Can't Name His Colors by Melody Dye
Neurocriminology in prohibition-era New York by Mo Costandi
The Tight Collar: The New Science of Choking Under Pressure by David Dobbs
Laughing rats and ticklish gorillas: Joy and mirth in humans and other animals by Jesse Bering
Rump-Shaking Red-Eyed Treefrogs by Kelsey Abbott
Gut bacteria in Japanese people borrowed sushi-digesting genes from ocean bacteria by Ed Yong
Skull Caps and Genomes by Carl Zimmer
Giraffes - Necks for food or necks for sex? by Brian Switek
The Ape That Wouldn't Grow Up by Anna Barros
Divide and Diminish by Olivia Judson
Living fossils don't exist... by Lucas Brouwers
It's more than genes, it's networks and systems by PZ Myers
Science Is More Like Sumo Than Soccer by Chad Orzel
Ecosystems In the Age of Cassandra by Kristen L. Marhaver
Knowledge is Power by Christina Agapakis
My IVF story: pregnancy and My IVF story: conclusions , combined into a single essay, by Kate Clancy
Dancing with a Giant by Alistair Dove
I have discovered Jupiter by Stephen Curry
When do you move from living to dying? by Pal MD
The Black History Month Post I never wanted to write by DN Lee
Ten Things You Don't Know About Comets by Phil Plait
Poison in the Night by Deborah Blum
Invisibility physics: Kerker's 'invisible bodies' by Dr. Skyskull
There is something out there -- part 1 and There is something out there -- part 2, combined into a single essay, by Mike Browns
A tale of death, derring-do and barometers by Vivianne Raper
Rapid canyon formation and uniformitarianism by Brian Romans
Frickin' Laser Beams: Fact vs Fiction from The Martian Chronicles
Reflections on the Gulf Oil Spill - Conversations With My Grandpa by Christie Wilcox
Dispersants! A multi-part series to enlighten your brains. and Dispersants! Part II: Toxicity and Dispersants! Part III: Do dispersants really promote degradation of oil? , combined into a single essay, by Holly Bik
Oiling The Devil's Darning Needle by Meera of the Science Essayist
Pouring Oil on 'Troubled Waters' by Kevin Zelnio
Tiny Oceans (poem) by Andrew Thaler
Manipulations (poem) by Elissa Malcohn
World View (cartoon) by Abstruse Goose
Black Tide is Rising (poem) by Kevin Zelnio
A Scientific Valentine (poem) by Digital Cuttlefish
To A Rat, On Looking Back On Her Career, In The Lab (poem) by Digital Cuttlefish
In Development (poem) by Elissa Malcohn
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Determining the ultimate composition of Open Lab is no easy task, especially since we started out with an unprecedented nearly 900 entries. Competition was fierce! In the end, these 50 posts (plus 6 poems and 1 cartoon), are representative of the best science and the best writing in the science blogosphere from 2010. Not only is the science accurate and the writing top-notch, but they are highly accessible, and they truly make the reader care about the topic. I hope that this final list succeeds in the goal of showcasing the breadth and depth of the science blogosphere and of highlighting the incredible diversity and talent among science bloggers.
But I could not (and would not) have done it alone! In addition to the hours of time (and cups of coffee and bags of Doritos) I spent reading and evaluating posts myself, forty reviewers gave their time and energy - over winter break, Chanukah, Christmas, and New Years - to respond critically and thoughtfully to the almost nine hundred posts that were submitted. Each post that made it to the final list has been reviewed by no fewer than six individuals across three rounds of review!
My unending gratitude goes to (in no particular order):
Thanks also goes to Andrea Kuszewski, who designed the cover (which will be unveiled at Science Online next week), and thanks in advance to Blake Stacey, who has just begun working with me on designing and typesetting the book. And, of course, to Blogfather Bora, who is not only the Open Lab Series Editor, but a mentor and friend to me, and to us all.
Congratulations on a job well done, everyone!
Finalists: you can look forward to receiving an email from me in the next day or so with further instructions. If you do not, please get in touch by emailing me: thoughtfulanimal[at]gmail[dot]com. For those of you who will be at Science Online, please look for me at the Books and Beer happy hour on Friday evening - I will have a sticker for you to add to your name badges. And you are invited to proudly display one or more of the following badges on your blogs and websites!
Reviewers: You're done! For those of you who will be at Science Online, please look for me at the Books and Beer happy hour on Friday evening - I will have an Open Lab Reviewers' sticker for you to add to your name badges.