Faculty of Science

At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Here are some of the best questions from Dr. Petra Schweinhardt’s May 9 talk, “The pain-reward connection.”

Q: Why are opioids released higher up in the brain? (more…)

At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Here are some of the best questions from Dr. Mark Ware’s May 2 talk, “Just say know: what marijuana has taught us about pain control.”

Q: What can you tell us about smoked cannabis for chronic neuropathic pain? (more…)

At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Some of the best questions are posted here. Here are questions from Dr. Michael Sullivan’s April 25 talk, “Helping people with pain resume occupational involvement.” (more…)

Text and photos by Prof. Prakash Panangaden, School of Computer Science.

Giving a talk in Sofia, Bulgaria.

I was curious about the etymology of the word “sabbatical” after just completing one last August. There is the obvious connection to “sabbath”, which suggests a once-every-seven-years cycle. Apparently it comes from the Hebrew “Shmita” and means the land is to lie fallow once every seven years, with activities like planting and harvesting forbidden. So much for etymology!

Perhaps no other academic practice is so open to misunderstanding as the sabbatical. For many outside the University it is deemed to be a year long “holiday.” I remember thinking to myself as I hauled my suitcase off yet another luggage carousel on my way to give yet another talk that I would slug anyone who asked me “how was your vacation?” Mine was anything but a fallow time. I counted 37 lectures that I gave in my sabbatical year, very few of which were repeats. I racked up far too many frequent flyer miles, travelling to Australia, Bulgaria, Germany, Iceland, New Orleans and even Toronto. I was based in Oxford for the whole year so even Toronto was a trans-Atlantic trip. But was it all just a travel junket? (more…)

At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Some of the best answered or unanswered questions are sent to the presenter for posting here. Here are questions from the third and fourth lectures in the series.
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Academics and academic administrators are always looking for ways to measure and quantify performance.  That is, how can we tell if someone is doing, or not doing, excellent science?  This is easy to assess in hindsight – excellent science is that which advances the field – but it is a surprisingly tough question to answer in real time, because the scientists doing the work are studying right at the boundaries of what is known.  The scientific method provides the rules for the game, but it does not keep score: there are no infallible scorekeepers regarding the importance of just-discovered knowledge.  This is why we enlist the work of other active scientists to assess quality, called peer review.  It is a cumbersome method.  We do this for publishing scientific papers, for decisions on hiring, on tenure, to prepare nominations for awards, and so forth.  The real-time assessment of science and of scientists is a lot of work. (more…)

At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Some of the best answered or unanswered questions are sent to the presenter for posting here. Here are questions from the first two lectures.
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Text by Ingrid Birker.

Robert Lang, one of the world’s leading artists in origami—Japanese paper folding—just happens to be a physicist who loves animals and math. He puts mathematics into his folded animal sculptures by using his MacBook Pro, TreeMaker and ReferenceFinder — two freeware programs he created — and Wolfram’s Mathematica, to convert simple stick figures into full-blown origami crease patterns.

According to Lang, “The cool thing about origami is that it is a very mathematical art. In many arts, there’s pure artistic skill. In origami, it’s almost half and half. You can do things with pure art, you can do things with pure math, but if you put them together, you get far more satisfying results than either one alone.” (more…)

Text by Ingrid Birker. Photos by Torsten Bernhardt.

Typical of a museum junkie, my favourite things in life are leftovers from the past. Most often these historical items are not large or monumental, or even striking. Often, the relics that I am most attracted to are small, rough and left behind by unknown sources. At the Redpath Museum in Montreal, where I have worked since 1981, some leftovers are imbedded into the pillars of century-old columns that hold up the lecture hall. These marks were made by students who listened to countless hours of discourse, and were compelled to leave behind a remnant of their own existence. So they carved their initials into the wood. Often they noted their degree and the year it was granted. For instance, SB Fraser, proudly capitalized his name and graduating degree in “MED” in 1907. Above his inscription is the scratching left by HL Snyder from Shawinigan Falls. He carved his rank as “#2 C.A.U.C. ’44”. It seems that he was training for the army as well as studying and probably served in WWII. Other engravers were clearly sardonic such as: “Chris Columbus 1492.” (more…)

(By Martin Grant, Dean of Science)

As we come out of a long strike by our support staff, like everyone at McGill, I am pretty tired and not in the mood for fun or even a holiday – but boy oh boy do I need one, as does everyone else here.  With that thought in mind, I would like to suggest a few family-fun things for the holiday season, in the spirit of the advice of Sam the Christmas Dog which I suggested last year: see family and friends, relax and have fun, and don’t take yourself too seriously.  So, to get everyone out of their bah-humbug moods, here are some ideas for Holiday fun for kids of all ages! (more…)

At the equator

Martine Dolmière is the Faculty of Science’s Internship and Field Studies Officer, and helps coordinate our Canadian Field Study in Africa Program. She was so interested to see the kinds of things our students see that she recently spent part of her own vacation in Kenya and Uganda. Her hosts were Professors Lauren Chapman (Biology) and Colin Chapman (Anthropology), who conduct their field research in Uganda and also teach in the CFSIA program.

We left Montreal on a Wednesday evening. Flying through London allowed us to have a long lay over and to have a chance to hop on the tube (the metro) for a short downtown visit. We reached Entebbe (Uganda) 48 hours after leaving Canada.  As we were stepping off the airplane we were pleasantly surprised by how comfortable the temperature was.  We rode to Kampala with Robert (our cab driver). On the way to the city we were stopped couple times by armed soldiers. Finally I asked Robert why so many checkpoints were erected on the road to the capital. The new elected president of Uganda, Yoweri Kaguta Museveni was arriving by airplane the same day we landed.  We passed his convoy as we were approaching the city limits. (more…)

In my office I keep two ties for emergencies.  I do not mean emergencies like preventing a fire or helping someone with a health problem.  Rather I mean occasions where I should be wearing a tie, but regrettably I have shown up to work without one.  One tie is black, one is purple.  I have never worn the purple tie, though I may one day.  I have worn the black tie once.

In the fall of 2009, I received a call that I was to be interviewed on television on very short notice.  Usually such interviews involve our Principal or one of our Vice-Principals, but they were unfortunately unavailable.  Being without a tie I looked at my two emergency ties, and picked the black one. (more…)

By Ingrid Birker

In May 2011, when the accumulated rainfall of 102 mm (three times the amount of rain that fell last May) caused the Richelieu River to breach its banks and force over 1,000 people to leave their homes, McGill  installed six high-volume water dispensing and refilling stations. Known as “BYOB”, these large, blue, mobile water kiosks were bought from WaterFillz with the money raised by Class Action 2011. This proudly marks McGill as the first place in the province where you can get municipal water easily rather than searching for a tap in a bistro or café or awkwardly trying to refill your bottle in a bathroom sink. Ready to use, the BYOB is hooked up to a power supply and promotes the consumption of municipal water, which is tested more frequently and rigorously than bottled water. Bottled water is heavily marketed as a smart and healthful choice, but the truth is that it is no purer or safer than local tap water and is much more expensive. At McGill the new BYOB lets us carry a refillable water container and confidently know that we can find six locations near our work, class, or recreational areas where we can easily refill it. This wonderful “blue” addition to the landscape will help McGill reduce the consumption of bottled water on campus — making it a truly “green” initiative. Bottled water creates enormous quantities of waste, most of which is not recycled and ends up in landfills, and each litre of bottled water requires 3 litres of water to produce.  It was not hard to imagine the need for easily accessible drinking water during the hot week of Convocation ceremonies and I spent a few hours talking to people filling up at the BYOB stationed outside McLennan Library. The overall consensus was positive.
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A great University is on the one hand as rigid and hierarchical as a seminary, on the other hand as open and anarchic as a commune.

Our values include the explicit openness to all ideas – except for one: that all ideas are equally good. We believe the quality of ideas can be measured like stones on a scale.  Measuring, we identify – and at a great University, we recognize, respect, and reinforce – excellence and achievement.  We are hierarchical to provide a rigorous structure to do that appraisal; we are anarchic so that the ideas to be appraised can be proposed. (more…)

By Antonia Di Paola-Belliveau

Convocation preparations.

Walking onto campus this morning I noticed that the flooring for the convocation tent was being set up.  It felt like someone just punched me in the stomach and tears came to my eyes.  It hit me then and there that one of my own was going to walk across that stage and take her place as one the Science graduates of this great University.  I had been there before watching my husband Tom receive his PhD in Chemistry, my sister Giuseppa and her husband Tony both receiving their PhD in Chemistry and many friends and students that I have been blessed to meet during my time here at McGill. Now my daughter Janet will be starting on her road with a BSc in Chemistry.  Who would have thought oh so many years back when I first started at McGill that this day would come to pass.  On May 30^th she and her classmates will take that walk from Redpath Hall to the convocation tent and across that stage in front of many family and friends to receive their diploma as a reward for their hard work and dedication.  To the McGill 2011 graduating class and to all their families I send my congratulations for a job well done!!

Love you Janet!

Antonia Di Paola-Belliveau works in the Faculty of Science as Assistant to the Dean (2003-), but has deep connections with the Department of Chemistry, where she worked as a research technician for Bernard Belleau (1976-1986) and Robert Marchessault (1986-2003)

Spring Convocation ceremonies for the Faculty of Science take place Monday, May 30, 2011. See www.mcgill.ca/students/graduation/convocation for details.

Today, like on most days, I walked to work.  Walking is a funny thing.  While walking, one kind of falls forward while pushing backwards against the planet Earth with one’s feet in an intricate two-step dance. The Earth pushes back, and one is propelled forward in a sort of lurching way.  It is kind of clumsy, and takes babies a while to learn it.  But, like everyone else, I did not think about this while walking, I thought about my work for the day, my family and friends, and some things about science.  It was kind of a semi-related jumble of thoughts as I tried to figure various things out, particularly my thoughts about something odd that has confused me for a long time about life elsewhere in the universe. (more…)

At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Three of the unanswered questions are sent to the presenter for posting here. Here are questions from Dr. Ariel Fenster’s lecture “Nuclear power — energy for the future?” (April 20, 2011).
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At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Three of the unanswered questions are sent to the presenter for posting here. Here are questions from Dr. Paul Wiseman’s lecture “The dance of the molecules in cells” (April 13, 2011).
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Jimi Hendrix performs for Dutch television show Hoepla in 1967. Source: Wikimedia Commons, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Netherlands license.

Last year, I was attending a reception at a McGill event.  I was standing in the back – perhaps too far in the back – and a colleague asked me if I had ever thought about writing a book about the physics of Jimi Hendrix’s guitar sounds.  Huh, I said – just before a microphonic feedback howl announced that the reception’s speeches were about to begin.

My colleague said Hendrix’s playing must involve complex nonlinear dynamics (yes, my colleague was drinking the wine offered at the event).  The second thing I told my colleague was that, unlike most guitarists these days, Hendrix played so loud that he literally played the room, but, however that might be, room acoustics are linear, not nonlinear.  Then I stopped, because my colleague was right, there was something nonlinear going on in Hendrix’s playing.  The answer is not enough for a book, but fits a blog entry well. (more…)

At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Three of the unanswered questions are sent to the presenter for posting here. Here are questions from Dr. Donald Smith’s lecture “Biofuels — sustainable energy as the oil runs out?” (April 6, 2011).
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At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Three of the unanswered questions are sent to the presenter for posting here. Here are questions from Dr. Scott Bohle’s lecture “From Jesuit’s bark to synchrotrons – the rise and fall of an antimalarial” (March 30, 2011).
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(By Ingrid Birker, Science Outreach Coordinator)

"View in mts 10 m. N. of Kootenai Pass". Painting by George Mercer Dawson, 1862-1863.

The other day I was attending a meeting in the Dean of Science’s office, located on the second floor of Dawson Hall. I peered out, and the first thing I saw was a dell of trees—some exotic and some local, some wizened with age and some youthful and upright—where preschoolers love to play. From the Dean of Arts window, just across the hall, I can view the new outdoor skating rink created on the field in front of the Redpath Museum. About 150 years ago the view from this window would have shown a pasture with a few grazing Holstein cows on either side of a muddy track leading up to the Arts Building. At that time, Dawson Hall, located to the east of the Arts Building, would have been the home of the Dawson family, headed by McGill’s fourth Principal, Sir John William Dawson; today, Dawson Hall houses administrative offices of the Faculty of Science and the Faculty of Arts. The Dean of Science office occupies the Dawson family’s Drawing Room, a place where they would have withdrawn from daily life and academics. The historical photo showing Principal Dawson and his wife poised for their 50^th Anniversary was taken in the Dean of Arts’ office which was Principal Dawson’s study. Beside them to the left, on the mantle above the granite fireplace, rests a small carved Haida totem, made from green- tinted ‘BC Jade’ or serpentine from the northern Rockies. It was collected by their son, George Mercer Dawson, when he explored and worked in western Canada in the 1880s, meeting First Nations people and studying their languages and customs. While studying the coal deposits of the Queen Charlotte Islands in 1878, he studied, photographed, and prepared a comprehensive report on the Haida people. He also published papers about the First Nations of the Yukon, northern British Columbia, and Vancouver Island, and the Shuswap people of central British Columbia. (more…)

At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Three of the unanswered questions are sent to the presenter for posting here. Here are questions from Dr. Amir Raz’s lecture “From the chemistry of chicken soup to the chemistry of the brain and behaviour” (March 23, 2011).
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At the conclusion of each Mini-Science lecture, audience members submit their questions to the evening’s presenter, who answers as many as possible on the spot. Three of the unanswered questions are sent to the presenter for posting here. Here are questions from Dr. Joe Schwarcz’s lecture “Chemicals for better and for worse” (March 16, 2011).
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Years ago McDonald’s introduced a lettuce and tomato hamburger called the McDLT, where the (hot) hamburger was kept on one side of the container and the (cold) lettuce and tomato on the other.  The patented container was intended to keep the hot side hot and the cool side cool.  When you received your order, you would combine the two sides.   The burger was similar to, and presumably a competitor to Burger King’s whopper, distinguished by the unique packaging.  The product sought exclusion or at least a reprieve from the second law of thermodynamics – but physical laws, unlike those for speeders and tax evaders, brook no exceptions, as we shall see.
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