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In My DNA: How Our Lifestyle Impacts Our Genetic Code

April 23, 2020

by Jessica McAnulty

Someone who loves to participate in marathons may say “running is in my blood”. Or someone who adores sweets (like myself) may claim “it’s in my DNA”. Individuals have tossed around this saying to help describe their interests. But what if our lifestyles or diets are actually affecting our DNA?

DNA, an abbreviation for deoxyribonucleic acid, is our genetic makeup. We have thousands of genes coding for proteins and cellular machinery that allow our bodies to function...

Ellen Brennan presents her poster at the AAAS meeting

ComSciCon-Michigan alum Ellen Brennan knows to just say “Yes, and…” to scientific discovery

April 20, 2020

by Donna McDermott

**Editor's note: This post is part of a series highlighting members of the ComSciCon community who recently attended the AAAS Annual Meeting, which took place from February 13-16, 2020 in Seattle, WA.

Ellen Brennan spent five months poking brain cells with a tiny wire, yet all she had to show for it was a bunch of weird data. “I went through my notebook,” she says, “to find anything worth talking about.” But instead of finding the typical signals of...

Science Communication allows us to better ‘digest’ all sorts of science

April 16, 2020

by Taran Lichtenberger

Edna Chiang, a fourth year microbiology PhD student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, studies the gut microbes of hibernating ground squirrels, but the research’s bigger picture is way beyond the...