When I visited Indonesia back in 2003, I spent most of my time on the island of Lombok. On my latest trip, I saved Lombok for the last three weeks. I sorta knew what to expect there, so travel planning was less of a hassle, as compared to Sumbawa or Flores/Komodo. The phrase “Apa kabar?” …
Tag Archives: biology
Komodo & Flores – Last Chance To See? [en]
It’s been a while since I’ve read Douglas Adams’ (et. al.) Last Chance to See, but I remember that it had Komodo Dragons in it. The German edition prominently features a Komodo Dragon on its cover, while the English editions feature the diverse animals that are discussed in the book in a more balanced manner. …
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Back to Wallacea: Sumbawa [en]
After my Singapore stopover, I headed straight to the Indonesian island of Sumbawa. Sumbawa lies between Lombok in the west and Flores in the east. Its location can be classified in many different ways. Amongst others, Sumbawa is part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, the Lesser Sunda Islands, the province of Nusa Tenggara Barat …
Bobr Kurva [en]
I’m using the Czech spelling here, rather than the more common Polish Bóbr Kurwa — meaning (nsfw) and pronunciation are much the same anyway. It’s just because this has happened in Czechia recently: V okolí Padrťských rybníků v chráněné krajinné oblasti Brdy postavil bobr hned několik hrází a vytvořil tak přírodní mokřad. Právě takový chtěla …
Zanzibar Pets [en]
No need for Safari, on Zanzibar the animals come visit you. Like the gangs of red colubuses, who made a big spectacle at Ebb & Flow Apartments in Paje several times: Or this blue monkey (or maybe Zanzibar Sykes’ monkey?) who came to Papaya Guesthouse in Nungwi to play with the local dog: The Sudan …
Tanzania Safari [en]
Ok, I’ve posted way too much about Climbing Kilimanjaro recently. My next tourist activity was a Safari, but let’s make this one shorter and focus on the photos. Fun facts: Being driven around in a vehicle all day and staring at things was not my favorite. That said, I still enjoyed our 4 day Safari …
DNA replication lifehack [en]
I’ve recently posted about these talks on “DNA: The Code of Life” that I found. I really enjoyed them, even though most of the contents were not fundamentally new to me. However, I want to highlight one specific topic that I did learn, and that kinda blew my mind… I had not even been aware …
Biting my style [en]
So I’m working at a huge software company and in my department we have this nice tradition of lunch-talks. The company buys pizza and we all eat it, while one hungry person gives ~1h talk. (Well, that was before the pandemic, now everything is remote and we have to fend for ourselves.) Most of the …
The xkcd guy nails it again [en]
This time, at the intersection of computer science (my occupation) and biology (my hobby): According to Randall, we’re still 2 years ahead of the hype cycle. Anyone willing to join me in switching to CRISPR/Cas9 by then? Update: Thinking about it, told you so.
Esotericism is … [en]
… to belief that A/T/C/G fundamentally differs from 0/1.
Perspective [en]
I love how science puts things in perspective: The earth is a microbial planet, on which macroorganisms are recent additions—highly interesting and extremely complex in ways that most microbes aren’t, but in the final analysis relatively unimportant in a global context. […] Microbial life on this planet would remain largely unchanged were all plant and …
xkcd on Arsenic-Based Life [en]
I’ve enjoyed reading the strips at xkcd for a couple of years now. Today’s comic is a great proof of how quickly xkcd picks up current scientific (and social) topics: This of course refers to the recent Science Magazine article entitled A Bacterium That Can Grow by Using Arsenic Instead of Phosphorus (PDF). Apparently this …