The Node and beyond–using social media in cell and developmental biology

Vicente, Catarina; Maartens, Aidan; Brown, Katherine

doi:10.1016/j.semcdb.2017.05.009

Cited by 5 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 4 publications

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“…low annual fecundity and high adult survival) should show slower rates of senescence (e.g. [22]). This expectation is supported by the findings of Jones et al [23] who showed that in both mammals and birds, the onset and rate of senescence are predicted by generation time and age at maturity.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Slow life-history strategies are associated with negligible actuarial senescence in western Palaearctic salamanders

et al. 2019

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Actuarial senescence has been viewed for a long time as an inevitable and uniform process. However, the work on senescence has mainly focused on endotherms with deterministic growth and low regeneration capacity during the adult stage, leading to a strong taxonomic bias in the study of ageing. Recent studies have highlighted that senescence could indeed display highly variable trajectories that correlate with species life-history traits. Slow life histories and indeterminate growth seem to be associated with weak and late senescence. Furthermore, high regenerative abilities could lead to negligible senescence in ectotherms. However, demographic data for species that would allow testing of these hypotheses are scarce. Here, we investigated senescence patterns in ‘true salamanders’ from the western Palaearctic. Our results showed that salamanders have slow life histories and that they experience negligible senescence. This pattern was consistent at both intra- and interspecific levels, suggesting that the absence of senescence may be a phylogenetically conserved trait. The regenerative capacities of salamanders, in combination with other physiological and developmental features such as an indeterminate growth and a low metabolic rate, probably explain why these small ectotherms have lifespans similar to that of large endotherms and, in contrast with most amniotes, undergo negligible senescence. Our study seriously challenges the idea that senescence is a ubiquitous phenomenon in the tree of life.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Slow life-history strategies are associated with negligible actuarial senescence in western Palaearctic salamanders

et al. 2019

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The Manchester Fly Facility: Implementing an objective-driven long-term science communication initiative

Patel

Prokop

2017

Seminars in Cell & Developmental Biology

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Science communication is increasingly important for scientists, although research, teaching and administration activities tend to eat up our time already, and budgets for science communication are usually low. It appears impossible to combine all these tasks and, in addition, to develop engagement activities to a quality and impact that would make the efforts worth their while. Here we argue that these challenges are easier addressed when centering science communication initiatives on a long-term vision with a view to eventually forming outreach networks where the load can be shared whilst being driven to higher momentum. As one example, we explain the science communication initiative of the Manchester Fly Facility. It aims to promote public awareness of research using the model organism Drosophila, which is a timely, economic and most efficient experimental strategy to drive discovery processes in the biomedical sciences and must have a firm place in the portfolios of funding organisations. Although this initiative by the Manchester Fly Facility is sustained on a low budget, its long-term vision has allowed gradual development into a multifaceted initiative: (1) targeting university students via resources and strategies for the advanced training in fly genetics; (2) targeting the general public via science fairs, educational YouTube videos, school visits, teacher seminars and the droso4schools project; (3) disseminating and marketing strategies and resources to the public as well as fellow scientists via dedicated websites, blogs, journal articles, conference presentations and workshops - with a view to gradually forming networks of drosophilists that will have a greater potential to drive the science communication objective to momentum and impact. Here we explain the rationales and implementation strategies for our various science communication activities - which are similarly applicable to other model animals and other areas of academic science - and share our experiences and resources to provide ideas and readily available means to those who are actively engaging or intend to do so.

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Science communication in the field of fundamental biomedical research (editorial)

Illingworth

Prokop

2017

Seminars in Cell & Developmental Biology

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The aim of this special issue on science communication is to inspire and help scientists who are taking part or want to take part in science communication and engage with the wider public, clinicians, other scientists or policy makers. For this, some articles provide concise and accessible advice to individual scientists, science networks, or learned societies on how to communicate effectively; others share rationales, objectives and aims, experiences, implementation strategies and resources derived from existing long-term science communication initiatives. Although this issue is primarily addressing scientists working in the field of biomedical research, much of it similarly applies to scientists from other disciplines. Furthermore, we hope that this issue will also be used as a helpful resource by academic science communicators and social scientists, as a collection that highlights some of the major communication challenges that the biomedical sciences face, and which provides interesting case studies of initiatives that use a breadth of strategies to address these challenges. In this editorial, we first discuss why we should communicate our science and contemplate some of the different approaches, aspirations and definitions of science communication. We then address the specific challenges that researchers in the biomedical sciences are faced with when engaging with wider audiences. Finally, we explain the rationales and contents of the different articles in this issue and the various science communication initiatives and strategies discussed in each of them, whilst also providing some information on the wide range of further science communication activities in the biomedical sciences that could not all be covered here.

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The Node and beyond–using social media in cell and developmental biology

Cited by 5 publications

References 4 publications

Slow life-history strategies are associated with negligible actuarial senescence in western Palaearctic salamanders

Slow life-history strategies are associated with negligible actuarial senescence in western Palaearctic salamanders

The Manchester Fly Facility: Implementing an objective-driven long-term science communication initiative

Science communication in the field of fundamental biomedical research (editorial)

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