Work for L'OBS

I had the pleasure of working on a piece for French magazine L'OBS a couple weeks back. The article was an interview with author and sociologist Alondra Nelson, and centered around the use of genetic tests by African Americans. Using companies like African Ancestry, African Americans can use these tests to trace the roots that were cut off by the slave trade hundreds of years ago.

The tests can provide African Americans with a more in-depth understanding of their family origins. As the article points out, Africa is made up of dozens of countries, and many more languages and cultures- a fact that the term "African American" doesn't quite acknowledge. Narrowing one's roots down to a particular region or even tribe can be an exciting undertaking, that was impossible until recent advancements in genetic mapping. And by proving the family ties, it may also be used by descendants of slaves to help in obtaining reparations from companies whose wealth is directly attributable to slavery.
Here's the spread:

Thank you to Catherine!

Serving a life sequence- updated

I did an illustration for MIT Technology Review last week, that is up on the site. It follows the story of a man that was able to sequence his son's complete genome, before the baby was even born.

 Many parents have this done on babies that they know are unhealthy, as a way to determine a possible cause of the health problems. The man in the article admitted that this was more for fun than for any practical health reasons. Which raised the question among some, of whether it's unethical to do this on a fetus when it's medically unnecessary. As one person interviewed for the story explained, "discovery of a bad mutation could lead parents to an 'irrevocable action.'" A baby enclosed in a playpen seemed like a good way of conveying the idea that genome sequencing can help babies when there's some medical problem, but it can also hinder the child if it's used to predict hypothetical conditions that don't yet exist.

The magazine is out now, where the piece is featured as well. I also did a small spot for the story, a few pages later, which you can see above. Here's a link to it. Thank you to Colin, the AD on this!

I know that dude

This little spot was in the Wall Street Journal weekend edition a week or so back. It was for the "Mind and Matter" column, on a recent finding that reveals that a certain region of the brain is responsible for facial recognition. Ever walk into a room, see someone a few yards away and think to yourself "I know that dude." Apparently that's the CA2, a subfield of your hippocampus. It's when your CA2 isn't working properly that things can get embarrassing.

Spots can be more challenging than half or full pages sometimes, trying to convey a complex subject in such a tiny space. I prefer to go pretty graphic with them. Here's what the page looked like:

You can read it here. I've had a few of these spots in the WSJ over the last several months, for both the "Mind and Matter" and "Ask Ariely" columns. Here are some of them:

About transgenic "glow-in-the-dark" mice that were injected with cocaine in order to study it's effect on their brains. Article here.

For an "Ask Ariely" column on why the letter writer found it acceptable for birds to eat from his bird feeder, but not squirrels. Article here.

Another "Ask Ariely" column, about how to keep people from dropping garbage on the ground, instead of using the receptacle a few feet away. Article here.

And for another "Mind and Matter" column, on a study that found that a person's environment (such as living in poverty) can have a greater effect on their intelligence than their DNA. Article here.
Thank you to Kelly, AD on the Hippocampus piece, and to Keith, AD on all the others!



Jeff Spicoli demonstrates the usefulness of the CA2 subfield of the hippocampus.

Know your enemy

I should have posted this earlier in the week, but I've been really busy. I believe it ran last weekend in The Chronicle of Higher Education. The author of the article suggests that having enemies, and even creating new ones where none exist, is part of our human biology. Early humans evolved by fending off hostile animals, as well as hostile bands of fellow humans. We battled "others" to protect our tribesmen and resources, and we battled them to steal and secure new (their) resources. Today, we have a pronounced ability to make enemies. An almost genetic need to have one, even if only to swell our patriotic pride. (We'll get all those evildoers someday. U-S-A, U-S-A, U-S-A!) You need a subscription to read the article, but it's online here.

This was a really fun piece to work on. Thanks so much, Ellen!