April 2010
5 posts
“After all, the best part of a holiday is perhaps not so much to be resting...”
– Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows, Ch. 1
1 tag
A connection between HIV prevention and food?
So how can you prevent uninfected women contracting HIV through sex? You could convince them to change their behavior – don’t have sex, have sex with one person, use a condom. Great if it works, but consistently changing human behavior is really, really difficult. Is there a way to make sex less risky? Dr. David Katz is a biophysicist from Duke University and our recent seminar speaker. He...
2 tags
The last week of classes
The last week of semester brings mixed emotions, not the least of which is relief. Teaching and advising students is one of the most rewarding aspects of being a professor and I wouldn’t give it up for the world, but there are few purer joys in life than hard work stopping. I have had several undergraduates tell me how much I must be looking forward to the long summer holiday and they are dead...
2 tags
Thermal Analysis
Tomorrow I will be giving a guest lecture in a food analysis class on thermal methods. Most people think of analysis as Bunsen burners and test tubes but a lot of the interesting stuff is concerned with physical rather than chemical measurements. I’ll be talking about differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). In this method you very precisely measure the amount of heat it takes to warm or...
1 tag
Senate
I spent most of today at faculty senate meetings. University governance is complicated. The board of trustees is ultimately in charge but they delegate the responsibility of running the place to the administration - Graham Spanier and on down through vice presidents, deans and department heads. Then there is the faculty (including me). We advise the administration on a lot of issues and have...
