Changing World of Science & Communications

Social media is wonderful. The opportunity to find interesting blogs cannot be underestimated. I am constantly impressed by people who have the ability to intermix photos with a compelling story.

Here are 2 blogs that I recommend:

1. My niece and her husband as they begin their life in their first home.on their blog nuestrahome.blog.com.  I am particularly impressed by Urgent Garden Updates. Gotta love the combination photo and tagline ’I got Andy these future pickles the other day. And I am totally impressed by A Rain Event. What a magnificent, thoughtful blending of craftsmanship, writing and photography.

2. The second is written by Rajiv Chopra. He has a way with words. I especially liked his post Lunch at the BOP (Base of the Pyramid). He also has a photography blog of places he has traveled called Down That Winding Path.

One of my most favorite meetings is just around the corner – Experimental Biology. This annual event brings almost 14,000 researchers together from 5 societies – anatomy, biochemistry, nutrition, pathology, and pharmacology. I am a member of the American Society for Nutrition (ASN).

This year ASN will have two symposia on social media and changing communication styles.

The World has Changed and So Must Your Communication Style

(sponsored by the ASN Public Information Committee )

8:00-10:00, Monday, April 22, Room 151 A/B of the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center

Chair: C Kapica and Co-Chair: J Gassaniga-Moloo

Speakers:

• C Kapica, the Awegrin Institute: “The new world of nutrition science communications”
• M McGuire, Washington State University: “Techniques for getting to the point in 3 minutes or less”
• L Troy, University of Massachusetts: ‘Techniques for getting to the point in 3 minutes or less”

Social Media and Mobile Technology for Nutrition Education and Research

(sponsored by ASN Student Interest Group)

10:30-12:30, Tuesday, April 23, Room 151 of the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center

Chair: SS Martinez

Speakers:

• CJ Boushey, University of Hawaii Cancer Center: “Mobile technology for research”
• L Wright, University of South Florida: “Online and mobile technologies for dietetics/nutrition care and practice”
• D Silverman, Eastern Michigan University: “Social media, online learning and mobile technology for higher education”
• I Smith, Porter-Novelli : “Using social media for dissemination of scientific information”
• M McBurney, DSM Nutritional Products LLC: “Using social media in the food and supplement industry”

If you want to be ‘twitterpated’ about nutrition, follow #EB2013 and watch for tweets from David Despain (@daviddespain) who will be officially blogging for ASN and Julia Bird (@juliakbird), Michael McBurney (@MIMcBurney), and @DSMNutrition who will be blog for TalkingNutrition.dsm.com

Watch for tweets from Sarah Gold (@SpinnerSarah),  Rachele Pojednic (@strongprocess), and Allison Knott (@ChoiceHabitLife).

My mother had type 2 diabetes. It contributed to cardiovascular disease, including two bypass operations during her life. Although she tried to watch her diet and manage her blood glucose levels, she was a brittle diabetic. She constantly struggled with hypoglycemic episodes, especially when her activity levels changed – family visits to their home, trips to other households.

A new study from Joslin Hospital may help others with diabetes. For years, scientists have focused on carbohydrate intake. Over 30 years ago, the glycemic index was introduced. The GI evaluates the blood glucose response to a standardized carbohydrate load (usually 100g of available carbohydrate (AC) where AC = total carbohydrate minus dietary fiber content). The interesting feature of the GI is that it favors carbohydrate-rich foods containing fructose over glucose. Thus, a pre-sweetened ready-to-eat-cereal, e.g. Frosted Flakes has a lower GI than the unsweetened cereal, e.g. Corn Flakes. Why? Because the AC of Corn Flakes consists predominantly of glucose from starch whereas Frosted Flakes has sucrose (sugar) which consists of fructose and glucose.

Two excellent reviews of the GI have been written by Dr Julie Jones, Professor Emeritus, College of St Catherine:

• Glycemic Index: The State of the Science, Part 1 – The Measure and its Variability. 2012 Nutrition Today 47:207-213. doi: 10.1097/NT.0b013e31826c4fc4
• Glycemic Index: The State of the Science, Part 2- Roles in Weight, Weight Loss, and Satiety. 2013 Nutrition Today 48:7-16. doi: 10.1097/NT.0b013e31827d8515

However, I digress. The important insight is that the Joslin report shows that individuals with diabetes, and their healthcare professionals, should not solely focus on the amount (or type) of carbohydrate being consumed.

The gut is integral to glucose homeostasis. Digestion and absorption takes time.  The 42% increase in insulin levels reported by Dr Howard Wolpert may derive from the stimulatory effect of fat on the release of gut hormones, like glucagon-like peptide 1. Almost 8o years ago, this intestinal impact on glucose homeostasis was coined the ‘incretin’ effect.  The fact is that intestinal hormonal responses to luminal fat and glucose stimulate the pancreas to secrete more insulin as blood glucose levels rise. Assuming of course that the pancreas is capable of producing more insulin. Increased insulin secretion will help move glucose from the blood into tissues, primarily muscle and fat, to normalize postprandial blood glucose levels. Assuming that these tissues are responsive to insulin. When muscle and fat are insulin resistant, then elevated insulin AND glucose levels will persist. The composition of one meal can affect metabolic responses to the following meal, i.e. the ‘second meal effect‘.

Our bodies are complex. Our diets are variable. The entire sequence of eating, digesting, absorbing and metabolizing or storing is an exquisitely beautiful sequence. So much to still understand.

The headline says it all. Grant Steen, a member of WebMedCentral Ethics Faculty, is seeking volunteers who have committed scientific fraud to share their personal experience.  He is looking for a 3,000 word (or less) blog. Be prepared to share specifics. And your story could become a chapter in a book. Specifically, he is looking for first-person accounts and answers to these questions:

• What actually happened?
• What is the scientific story behind the transgression?
• How did you (or a colleague) fabricate or falsify data?
• What was the short- or long-term goal of the deception?
• Did you perceive any significant obstacles to fabrication or falsification?
• Did the research infrastructure fail in any way?
• How was the fraud discovered?
• Do you believe that the scientific enterprise was damaged?
• What was the aftermath for you and for your collaborators?
• What are your thoughts and perceptions now?

For more details on the request, and how to reply, see the RetractionWatch post. RetractionWatch is a grass-roots driven blog that tracks retractions of scientific journals. It was founded by Ivan Oransky (@ivanoransky) and Adam Marcus (@armarcus). As

While on the topic of scientific integrity and fraudulent behaviors, it is relevant to recall definition of integrity. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines integrity as ‘adhering to a code of especially moral values‘.

Biologist Jim Woodgett, writing in Nature, is quoted on RetractionWatch:

The scientific community must be diligent in highlighting abuses, develop greater transparency and accessibility for its work, police research more effectively and exemplify laudable behaviour. This includes encouraging more open debate about misconduct and malpractice, exposing our dirty laundry and welcoming external examination. A good example of this, the website Retraction Watch (retractionwatch.wordpress.com), shines light on problems with papers and, by doing so, educates and celebrates research ethics and good practice. Peer pressure is a powerful tool — but only if peers are aware of infractions and bad practice.

We must be vigilant. We must also be transparent. This raises the topic of conflict of interest. In 2009, the Institute of Medicine has issued a consensus statement on Conflict of Interest in Medical Research, Education and Practice.  Everybody should be aware of these codes. We also need to apply them to our daily lives. Many professional societies, e.g. the American Society for Nutrition have published Conflict of Interest Guidelines for its Authors, Reviewers and Editors.

While I applaud Grant Steen, Ivan Oransky, and Adam Marcus for holding science accountable, I hope their ‘well soon dries up’. Not because people don’t report suspect science but because fraud disappears.

Blogging has gotten into my blood. The opportunity to communicate science to an interested audience (although small) is exhilarating. But it takes discipline. And it requires effort. For these reasons, I am very proud of the fact that @juliakbird and I have published something almost every working day to TalkingNutrition.dsm.com for over 2 years. Our twitter handle is @dsmnutrition.

Unfortunately, this blog doesn’t get the same attention. Often I think about posting something but the record speaks for itself. I will write no more. The reality is that posting a blog is somewhat akin to that introductory chemistry course I took eons ago. One has to overcome the Activation Energy (see image below).

What is the catalyst? Today it is the article by Andy Sernovitz entitled “How Dow Chemical made storytellers out of scientists“. He writes about the factors that make scientists ideal for social media – innate curiosity, passion, and expertise.

The ‘piece de resistance’ is the video by @Abby _Klanecky (Abby Klanecky, director of digital and social media at Dow Chemical). The video is not short, it is almost 30 minutes long. If you are a scientist and you have ever wondered about blogging and tweeting, I can tell you it is rewarding.

More importantly, listen and watch the video with @Abby_Klanecky and decide for yourself.

@mimcburney

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The first of a series of blogs on open access has been published by Nature. Chris, a professor and an editor of four journals – one of which is open access – expresses his thoughts in ‘Open Access: Is it as Good as it Looks?‘ . It is an excellent read.

I was particularly struck by this comment

The urge to make a profit and publish as many papers as possible may become irresistible for some of these journals.  Some may succeed, some will fail.  What happens to the content of failed non-print journals?

Just yesterday I was at a meeting where a senior USDA official spoke to me about starting a new peer review journal. Starting them is easy. The challenge is keeping journals (and professional societies dependent upon the revenue stream) alive. In the past when a publisher went out of business, I could find hard copies of published papers in libraries. Sometimes a more economically viable publisher acquired and continued publishing the same journal.

Fast forward to 2012. If an electronic journal closes shop, who will maintain the servers with this content? Will the papers published electronically be lost and forgotten? This is an important consideration. Science is not and should not be disposable, throwaway.