#postdoctoral research

[medsocionwheels]

Data Prep Day!

Finally fully back at work and in R/RStudio today. Today's goal was to set up some basic structural topic models using a dataframe of information about PubMed publications on post-acute COVID-19 sequalae.

No exciting results today, but if you're interested in topic modeling or wrangling data in R, I made a video so you can follow along with me while I code. Not a formal lesson, more of a "come to work with me" thing. Enjoy!

Highlights:

Full Video:

[higherentity]

[pekasnugs]

Seeing the plasma edge of fusion experiments in new ways with artificial intelligence

🧬 ..::Science & Tech::.. 🧬 MIT researchers are testing a simplified turbulence theory’s ability to model complex plasma phenomena using a novel machine-learning technique

[kyreniacommentator]

KAV Offers PhD and/or Postdoctoral Research Scholarship

KAV Offers PhD and/or Postdoctoral Research Scholarship Announcement from KAV, Cancer Research Foundation, for the 2024-25 Academic Year August 5, 2024 Continue reading KAV Offers PhD and/or Postdoctoral Research Scholarship

[jcmarchi]

“The dance between autonomy and affinity creates morality”

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/the-dance-between-autonomy-and-affinity-creates-morality/

“The dance between autonomy and affinity creates morality”

MIT philosophy doctoral student Abe Mathew believes individual rights play an important role in protecting the autonomy we value. But he also thinks we risk serious dysfunction if we ignore the importance of supporting and helping others.

“We should also acknowledge another feature of our moral lives,” he says, “namely, our need for affinity or closeness with other human beings, and our continued reliance on them to live flourishing lives in the world.”

Philosophy can be an important tool in understanding how humans interact with one another, he says. “I study moral obligation and rights, how the two relate, and the role they have to play in how we relate to one another,” Mathew adds.

Mathew asks that we think of autonomy and affinity as opposing forces — an idea he attributes to MIT philosopher, professor, and mentor Kieran Setiya. Autonomy pushes people farther from us, and affinity pulls people closer, Mathew says.

“The dance between autonomy and affinity creates morality,” Mathew adds.

Mathew is investigating one of moral philosophy’s foundational ideas — that every obligation we owe to another person correlates to a right that they have against us. The “Correlativity Thesis” is widely taken for granted, he says.

“A common example that’s used to motivate the Correlativity Thesis is a case of a promise,” Mathew explains. “If I promise to meet you for coffee at 11, then I have a moral obligation to meet you for coffee at 11, and you have a right to meet me at 11.” While Mathew believes this is how promising works, he doesn’t think the Correlativity Thesis is true across the board.

“There isn’t necessarily a one-to-one relationship between rights and obligations,” he says.

“We need folks’ help to do things”

Before coming to MIT, Mathew majored in philosophy and minored in ethics, law, and society as an undergraduate at the University of Toronto. Upon graduating in 2020, he was awarded the prestigious John Black Aird Scholarship, given each year to the university’s top undergraduate.

Now at MIT, Mathew says his research is based on the value of shared responsibility.

“We need folks’ help to do things,” he says.  

When we lose sight of moral values, our societal connections can fall away, he argues.

“Mutual cooperation makes our lives possible,” Mathew says.

His research suggests alternatives to the idea that rights demand obligations.

“Morality puts a certain kind of pressure on us to ‘pay it forward’ — it requires us to do for others what was once done for us,” Mathew says. “If we don’t, we’re making an exception of ourselves; in essence, we’re saying, ‘I was worthy of that help from others, but no one else is worthy of being helped by me.’”

Mathew also values the notion of paying it forward because he’s seen its value in his life. “I’ve encountered so many people who’ve gone above and beyond that I owe them,” he says. 

A valuable social compact

Mathew has been extensively involved in “public philosophy.” For example, he’s organized public events at MIT, like the successful “Ask a Philosopher Anything” panel in the Stata Center lobby.

Mathew’s work leading the local chapter of Corrupt the Youth, a philosophy outreach program focused on bringing philosophy to high schools students from historically marginalized groups, is an extension of his belief in our shared responsibility for one another — of “paying it forward.”

“The reason I discovered philosophy was because of my instructors in college who not only introduced me to the subject, but also cultivated my enthusiasm for it and mentored me,” he says. “Our moral theorizing should take into account the kinds of creatures we are: vulnerable human beings who are constantly in need of each other to get by in the world.”

Morality, Mathew says, gives us a tool — the social practice of forgiving — through which we can coexist, repair relationships we damage, and lead our lives together.

Mathew wants moral philosophers to consider their ideas’ practical, real-world applications. His experiences derive, in part, from notions of moral responsibility. Those who’ve been given a lot, he believes, have a greater responsibility for others. These kinds of social systems can consistently be improved by paying good deeds forward, he says.

“Moral philosophy should help build a world that allows for our mutual benefit,” Mathew says.

[dr-afsaeed]

Subscribe Youtube Channel For New Jobs and Scholarships

Subscribe Youtube Channel For New Jobs and Scholarships

[esseindiablog]

Another day, another exciting scholarship! Government of Mexico is looking for international students like you to study there FREE of cost 🤑🇲🇽

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (SRE), through the Mexican Agency for International Cooperation for Development (AMEXCID), has developed a scholarship program to contribute to nations' sustainable development by fulfilling objectives and commitments adopted in international agendas. 🔥

✅ Benefits

1. For Master's scholarships, mobility at the Bachelor's and Master's levels, and Master's level research, a monthly stipend of 4 (four) times the monthly value of the the Federal Economic Measurement Unit (UMA), currently equivalent to $12,614.80

2. For Doctoral scholarships and research stays at the doctoral and postdoctoral levels, a monthly stipend of 5 (five) times the monthly value of the UMA, currently equivalent to $15,768.50

3. Medical Insurance

4. Payment waiver for Mexican visa

5. Transport

📅 Deadline : 21st July 2023

📌 Check out eligibility here - https://esseindia.com/study-visa/

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#mexico #🇲🇽 #mexico🇲🇽 #méxico #government #scholarship #scholarships #freeeducation #free #education #goabroad #abroad #studyinmexico #trending #trendingreels #explorepage #explore

[danielkrizmath]

Daniel Kriz Math - An Esteemed Mathematics Specialist

Daniel Kriz, a distinguished mathematical researcher, has lent his expertise to numerous high school and undergraduate mentoring programs spanning various universities throughout the United States. Daniel Kriz served as a program advisor in the University of Minnesota, Duluth REU program and as a mentor in the MIT PRIMES program.

[aqeons]

Aarhus University, Denmark is seeking online applications for various Postdoctoral Positions at their different Departments. We have compiled a list of postdoc opportunities presently available at Aarhus University, Denmark.

[somuchstrdst]

x

[grison-in-space]

you know what else fucks me up about the US election? one of the things that has left me reeling in bewilderment and grief this month?

I'm a scientist, y'all.

That means that I am, like most American research scientists, a federal contractor. (Possibly employee. It's confusing, and it fucks with my taxes being a postdoctoral researcher.) I get paid because someone, in the long run ideally me, makes a really, really detailed pitch to one of several federal grant agencies that the nation would really be missing out if I couldn't follow up on these thoughts and find concrete evidence about whether or not I'm right.

Currently, my personal salary is dependent on a whole department of scientists convincing one of the largest and most powerful granting agencies that they have a program that is really good at training scientists that can think deeply about the priorities of the agency. Those priorities are defined by the guy who runs the agency, and he gets to hire whatever qualified people he wants. That guy? The Presidential Administration picks that one. That's how federal agencies get staffed: the President's administration nominates them.

All of the heads of these agencies are personally nominated by the president and their administration. They are people of enormous power whose job is to administer million-dollar grants to the scientists competing urgently for limited funds. A million dollars often doesn't go farther than a couple of years when it's intended to pay for absolutely everything to do with a particular pitch, including salaries of your trainees, all materials, travel expenses, promoting the work among other researchers, all of it—so most smart American researchers are working fervently on grants all the time.

The next director of the NIH will be a Trump appointee, if he notices and thinks to appoint one. NSF, too; that's the group that funds your ecology and your astroscience and your experimental mathematics and physics and chemistry, the stuff that doesn't have industry funding and industry priorities. USDA. DOE, that's who does a lot of the climate change mitigation and renewable energy source research, they'll just be lucky if they can do anything again because Trump nigh gutted them last time.

Right now, I am working on the very tail end of a grant's funding and I am scurrying to make sure I stay employed. So I'm thinking very closely about federal agency priorities, okay? And I'm thinking that the funding climate for science is going to get a lot fucking leaner. I'm seeing what the American people think of scientists, and about whether my job is worth doing. It's been a lean twelve years in this gig, okay? Every time the federal government gets fucked up, that impacts my job, it means that I have to hustle even harder to get grants in that let me support myself—and, if I have any trainees, their budding careers as well!—to patch over the lean times as much as we can.

So I've been reeling this week thinking about how funding agency priorities are going to change. I work on sex differences in motivation, so let me tell you, the politics reading this one for my next pitch are going to be fun. I'm working on a submission for an explicitly DEI-oriented five year grant with a cycle ending in February, so that's going to be an exercise in hoping that the agency employees at the middle levels (the ones that know how to get things done which can't be replaced immediately with yes men) can buffer the decisions of those big bosses long enough to let that program continue to exist a little while longer.

Ah, Christ, he promised Health & Human Services (which houses the NIH) to RFK, didn't he? We'll see how that pans out.

I keep seeing people calling for more governmental shutdowns on the left now, and it makes me want to scream. The government being gridlocked means the funding that researchers like me need doesn't come, okay? When the DOE can't say fucking "climate change," when the USDA hemorrhages its workers when the agency is dragged halfway across the country, when I watch a major Texan House rep stake his career on trying to destroy the NSF, I think: this is what you people think of us. I think: how little scientists are valued as public workers. Why am I working this hard again?

This is why I described voting as harm reduction. Even if two candidates are "the same" on one thing you care about, they probably aren't the same level of bad on everything. Your task is to figure out the best person to do the job. It's not about a fucking tribalist horse race. A vote is your opinion on a job interview, you fucks. We have to work with this person.

Anyway, I'm probably going to go back to shaking quietly in despair for a little longer and then pick myself up and hit the grind again. If I'm fast, I might still get the grant in this miserable climate if I run, and I might get to actually keep on what I'm trying to do, which is bring research on sex differences, neurodivergence and energy balance as informed by non-binary gender perspectives and disability theory to neuroscience.

Fuck.

[medsocionwheels]

Let's Talk Imposter Syndrome in Academia

Or really, about how it doesn't immediately disappear once that degree is in hand. Sometimes I have to remind myself that grad school is over and I'm the one in charge now.

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A post shared by Dr. Heather Sue M. Rosen (@medsocionwheels)

[mindblowingscience]

Bats are incredibly diverse animals: They can climb onto other animals to drink their blood, pluck insects from leaves or hover to drink nectar from tropical flowers, all of which require distinctive wing designs. But why aren't there any flightless bats that behave like ostriches—long-legged creatures that wade along riverbanks for fish like herons—or bats that spend their lives at sea, like the wandering albatross? Researchers may have just found the answer: Unlike birds, the evolution of bats' wings and legs is tightly coupled, which may have prevented them from filling as many ecological niches as birds. "We initially expected to confirm that bat evolution is similar to that of birds, and that their wings and legs evolve independently of one another. The fact we found the opposite was greatly surprising," said Andrew Orkney, postdoctoral researcher in the laboratory of Brandon Hedrick, assistant professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences, in the College of Veterinary Medicine.

Continue Reading.

[weirdly-specific-but-ok]

doctor who but i've never watched it

and so it begins again. the people asked for it. the people got it. i will ensure the people regret it.

i have never watched this show, or seen an edit, but i am a thorough researcher and i feel that i've got the essence of it.

this is what i have gathered. academicians worldwide take note.

Firstly, so I don't anger anyone, I accept and acknowledge that the tardis is blue and not yellow. My misinformation was from a Drarry fanfiction, and I had hitherto regarded Drarry fanfiction as the absolute truth.

There are doctors, and there are at least fifteen of them. At least two of them are David Tennant, which I can respect.

I'm not sure why the doctors are doctors, because I can find no trace of any medical procedure except for one doctor who licks things, which he learned from the previous doctor. If this is sufficient reason, I apologise for doubting their credentials.

On the other hand, if they are doctors thanks to a postdoctoral degree, this is also fine, though I have never seen anyone study anything. There is however a doctor, and there were people upset about her, but the fandom pointed out she set the tardis on fire, which is apparently a very doctor thing to do. Setting things on fire is absolutely something any research scholar would love, so again, apologies for doubting their credentials.

At least one doctor is gay. It is probably one of the David doctors, which checks out. He says someone, I think a dentist, is hot. I envy the maybe-dentist.

A t least one doctor is trans. I was unable to find them. But they exist. Oh yes, the fandom assures me they exist.

David Tennant as well as Ncuti Gatwa were fanboys, first of the show, and second of David Tennant, and thus they got into acting. Just a fun tidbit from me, since I am now the authority on this fandom.

There are time machines with which the doctors have sex by piloting them, which is questionable because the time machines are only partially sentient. I am not sure if the time machines are the tardis. But the tardis is blue, and not yellow, of that I am certain.

There was a stage play. Or maybe that was a metaphor for the production budget of the early seasons. I am not sure, but toddler David Tennant watched it. I assume no one took a 3 year old to a stage play, so through scientific deduction, it must have been a metaphor.

At some point, Death is an agony aunt and they have to spill secrets to it, or drown in a lake of human skulls. Who is this they? It's so obvious that the fandom sees no need to explain it, and neither do I. I do know it though. Of that you may remain certain.

A David doctor has a niece and she likes being his niece.

A David doctor has a best friend named Donna. He kisses her head. She supports his fruitiness. It is wholesome. It killed him when he lost her.

Slight tangent, but younger David doctor looks like Andrew Garfield. Current David in photos does give Ben Barnes energy. Any Wolfstar shippers, I believe you've found the Wolfstar kid. It is David Tennant.

A lot of people are David Tennant. A reliable Pinterest post on Doctor Who, clearly well researched, gave me the statistic that 15% of Doctor Who is David Tennant. From the amount of David Tennant that I ran across in my research, I don't understand it but I don't doubt it, either.

Speaking of Andrew Garfield, he in involved in this somehow. I am not sure how, but you cannot escape Andrew Garfield. He is even a part of fandoms he never acted in.

There is an individual named Catherine, I think she is the actress, but she could be a character. She seems to have much less knowledge about Doctor Who lore than I do. David Tennant finds it funny. Maybe he would find me funny, too.

The doctors installed some things in the tardis, from a wheelchair ramp to a jukebox. I don't know why a jukebox was needed. If I'm honest I don't know what a jukebox is. I don't know what the tardis is. But it is blue, and not yellow.

There is a French catchphrase.

Something happens in Wales. I don't know what it is, but something always seems to be happening in Wales in these fandoms, so I don't doubt it.

There is an old Doctor Who in a wheelchair, and he is happy to see a David doctor.

They go around in space, and do things. Who is this they? You and I both know the answer, so we needn't talk about it.

The show intro is "doo wee doo".

There is an alien who is not a mouse, the alien is The Meep, and uses the definite article as pronouns. David doctor is supportive of this, which is very good.

I found baby Yoda in the show, but apparently they call it a 'goblin' there, and someone doesn't like it.

There is a lot to do with time. There is a time hole, and things happen, and people die and are resurrected. There is danger, but it is fun.

They have CGI, and it is not good, which is the best thing about it. Who is they? Please stop asking me. It is rather obvious and something I definitely know.

Someone's boyfriend dies and the boyfriend is then resurrected but then gets lost with his boyfriend but then is reincarnated as a girl who would still call herself the someone's boyfriend but then she is replaced by the boyfriend but he's different now. I apologise for any errors that have crept it, but the tardis is blue and not yellow.

Someone named Martha is a doctor, and someone is very proud of her for it.

The eleventh and twelfth doctors like bow ties.

David Tennant wants to be ginger. David Tennant always gets what he wants. Who can refuse David Tennant? David Tennant is then ginger.

A David doctor gets a happy ending.

Someone yelled at Neil Gaiman about this. It was a mistake. He said that since it had already been done, he wouldn't want to give David's character a happy ending in S3, that would be a trifle unoriginal.

A lesson to be learned, Good Omens fandom, just a bit of advice from your son, do not yell at Neil Gaiman, it does not go well. Rumour has it he murdered the people who complained about him always wearing black. Of course, there is the fact that he doesn't exist, but that doesn't seem to have stopped him.

The doctors manifest in the previous doctor's clothes, which is apparently so last season. The tardis also manifests. I don't know where, or how. But it is blue, and not yellow.

I know, there was a lot of lore, so many of you thought I wouldn't be able to gather it all. But look how much research I did! I've got it better than maybe-actress-maybe-character Catherine, I'm sure :"]

Anyway, all the major plot points are covered above, so anyone who hasn't watched Doctor Who, feel free to refer to this and impress your Whovian friends with your knowledge! [not to be judgemental, but what a dreadfully Dr Seuss name, I rather like it]

[wachinyeya]

A historically and culturally significant lake in California's San Joaquin Valley that first disappeared in 1898 has returned after last year's atmospheric rivers flooded the region.

Tulare Lake, known as Pa'ashi — or "big water" — to the local Tachi Yokut Tribe, was "once the largest body of freshwater west of the Mississippi River," per Earth.com.

Vivian Underhill, who published a paper on Tulare Lake as a postdoctoral research fellow at Northeastern University, noted it was mostly sustained by snowmelt from the Sierra Nevada mountains and was 100 miles long and 30 miles wide at its peak.

The lake served as a key resource for Indigenous Peoples and wildlife and was once robust enough to allow steamships to transport agricultural goods throughout the state.

However, government officials persecuted and displaced the indigenous communities in the late 1800s to convert the area for farming through draining and irrigation.

"They really wanted to get [land] into private hands so that indigenous land claims — that were ongoing at that time — would be rendered moot by the time they went through the courts," Underhill told the Northeastern Global News. "It was a deeply settler colonial project."

While Pa'ashi periodically reappeared during the 1930s, '60s, and '80s, the barrage of atmospheric rivers California experienced in 2023 revived the lake despite the region receiving just 4 inches of rain annually. According to Underhill, Tulare Lake is now the same size as Lake Tahoe, which is 22 miles long and 12 miles wide.

Its resurgence has led to the return of humid breezes at least 10 degrees cooler than average and native species, including fish, amphibians, and birds. Lake Tulare was once a stopping point for migratory birds traveling a route known as the Pacific Flyway.

"Something that continues to amaze me is — [the birds] know how to find the lake again," Underhill told the Northeastern Global News. "It's like they're always looking for it."

The Tachi Yokuts have also returned to Pa'ashi's shores, once again practicing their ceremonies and planting tule reeds and native sage.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Although the benefits of diverse forest systems are well known, many countries' restoration commitments are focused on establishing monoculture plantations. Given this practice, an international team of scientists has compared carbon stocks in mixed planted forests to carbon stocks in commercial and best-performing monocultures, as well as the average of monocultures.

Their work is published in Frontiers in Forests and Global Change.

"Diverse planted forests store more carbon than monocultures—upwards of 70%," said Dr. Emily Warner, a postdoctoral researcher in ecology and biodiversity science at the Department of Biology, University of Oxford, and first author of the study. "We also found the greatest increase in carbon storage relative to monocultures in four-species mixtures."

[...]

Accordingly, the researchers were able to show that diversification of forests enhances carbon storage. Altogether, above-ground carbon stocks in mixed forests were 70% higher than in the average monoculture. The researchers also found that mixed forests had 77% higher carbon stocks than commercial monocultures, made up of species bred to be particularly high yielding.

"As momentum for tree planting grows, our study highlights that mixed species plantations would increase carbon storage alongside other benefits of diversifying planted forests," said Dr. Susan Cook-Patton, a senior forest restoration scientist at The Nature Conservancy and collaborator on the study. The results are particularly relevant to forest managers, showing that there is a productivity incentive for diversifying new planted forests, the researchers pointed out.