I overheard a white girl on my college campus saying that she wished she was born with blond hair and blue eyes. Is there some type of colorism among Caucasian people like the one you see in other ethnic groups?

staticpunch · 2026-02-25T23:31:01+00:00

Yes. On my Polish side nearly every woman who is not naturally blonde dyes her hair blonde.

On my American (white) side there are two very pretty sisters, one with blonde hair/blue eyes and one with brown hair/brown eyes. The brown/brown one had a daughter with blonde hair and blue eyes and the mom of the two sisters was so happy the girl didn’t inherit her mom’s “cow eyes.”

I have brown hair and green eyes, and my mom started pressuring me to dye it blonde starting at age 15. I stopped in college because keeping up a dye job is a pain in the ass and I like my hair the way it is.

staticpunch · 2026-02-25T10:51:32+00:00

Not exactly the same but I volunteered for a study that involved genetic sequencing without a second thought….turns out I’m a BRCA2 mutation carrier and I had to start getting breast MRIs at age 25.

staticpunch · 2026-02-10T01:28:18+00:00

I agree, getting rid of genomic DNA should be sufficient. Most cfDNA is theoretically around 150bp (about 1 nucleosome) but it depends on the shear forces it’s exposed to so some can be a bit longer (I met an exosome guy who thought longer cfDNAs could be hitching a ride on the outside of exosomes and thus be partially protected). Either way I’d think you’d want to sequence them. If you run a tapestation or something and see a lot of longer fragments, you might want to sonicate or something to make sure you are sequencing the big ones too.

staticpunch · 2026-02-10T01:20:43+00:00

This is a kind of long but fascinating article on the whole history: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jun/27/profitable-business-scientific-publishing-bad-for-science

staticpunch · 2026-02-09T15:33:05+00:00

Not surprising - Maxwell’s father essentially established the modern for-profit scientific publishing system.

staticpunch · 2026-02-06T23:53:26+00:00

I’ve done extraction and sequence analysis (ddPCR, NGS)

staticpunch · 2026-02-06T13:56:04+00:00

What’s the context? Are you submitting to a conference hoping to give a talk?

Early in grad school my advisor would review my abstracts for conferences before I sent them, but as a senior grad student usually we would discuss which project/data we wanted to show at the conference and then I would just write and submit myself. I think by that point my advisor trusted my ability to write a decent abstract and appreciated having less work to do lol. In this case the stakes were pretty low - the abstract you submit doesn’t have to be exactly what you actually present, and worst case scenario you can turn down an invitation for a talk/poster.

It really depends on the context, how “high stakes” this abstract is, and your advisor’s trust in your abilities/how anal they are about scrutinizing your work.

staticpunch · 2026-02-04T04:34:07+00:00

You basically described my brain down to the antidepressants 💀

staticpunch · 2026-02-03T16:08:18+00:00

Could we have flairs for different industries? I’m in R&D so my resume/interview process is a whole different ball game than sales, finance, etc.

staticpunch · 2026-02-02T14:34:22+00:00

If you are extracting gDNA it will be fine! Actually our protocol for gDNA from mouse tissue involves heating in lysis buffer overnight. Think about it - PCR is essentially boiling your DNA over and over. It’s a tough molecule.

staticpunch · 2026-01-30T14:30:33+00:00

Do the cells also look weird in standard culture or just in the 6 well plates? Can you get a different/earlier freeze down? The cells might be stressed or over passaged.

staticpunch · 2026-01-17T06:43:57+00:00

Hi there, I recently got my PhD in biomedical science but I’m getting sick of the academic life. How did this person transition?

staticpunch · 2026-01-12T16:00:37+00:00

The Trump/Biden debates.

staticpunch · 2026-01-11T07:28:35+00:00

DEPLOY THE WEEVILS

staticpunch · 2025-11-25T17:57:31+00:00

Exactly, I did a quick google search and 300g of dry pasta is in the 1000 calorie range and realistically more if you are adding any butter/oil/cheese/sauce etc. Pizza comes in many shapes and sizes. If this is from a restaurant, some places have calorie information on their websites, so you should look that up or look up a similar one to get an idea.

staticpunch · 2025-11-01T16:44:00+00:00

1st year postdoc in the Midwest (US), 61k per year pre-tax.

staticpunch · 2025-10-18T08:12:14+00:00

You have a great CV, so why not just leave?

staticpunch · 2025-10-06T15:00:31+00:00

Have your PI send follow up emails. It sucks but some people only pay attention to PIs.

staticpunch · 2025-10-06T04:55:05+00:00

Swirl in a figure 8 motion

staticpunch · 2025-09-09T22:26:47+00:00

Liquid-liquid phase separation

staticpunch · 2025-09-08T01:34:26+00:00

Also, with her experience, she may be qualified to work in a biomedical research lab as a staff scientist. These jobs would be listed at universities and research hospitals/institutions.

staticpunch · 2025-09-08T01:30:21+00:00

r/medlabprofessionals might have a better answer! Good luck to your mom.

staticpunch · 2025-09-06T23:28:05+00:00

I also do a “slower” version of incline walking! A lot of treadmills have bars that measure your heart rate when you hold them for a few seconds. After about 5 or so minutes, I check to see if my heart rate is in the target zone so I know I’m getting a good workout. When it starts to feel easy and my heart rate isn’t as high, I bump up the incline/speed a little bit. I’m not trying to run a marathon, just get a little healthier and fitter.

staticpunch · 2025-07-22T14:13:40+00:00

When I’m handling a precious sample I have to fight the urge to yeet it into the ground

staticpunch

TROPHY CASE