Congratulations again to Eusociality on passing her qualifying exam… We all knew you had it in you! Anyways, I would like to start off my first blog post of the semester by apologizing to all those out there anxiously awaiting (probably no one) my nonexistent blog post last week. Not to make excuses, but sometimes biochemistry tests and medical school applications take precedence. Needless to say I have been keeping myself busy with this new research project and incessantly obsessing over every second I haven’t received an interview invitation.
In other news, being the science nerd that I am I recently forced myself to take a break yesterday and went to go see the new movie Contagion. As an undergrad majoring in biological sciences I was probably most proud of myself for understanding the various scientific conversations taking place in the movie. More than anything though the most disturbing part of the movie is the truth that it conveys. It is scary to think that we are essentially only a few mutations away from a disease that could wreak havoc on society. The spread of disease is becoming even more of a dangerous thing nowadays with antibiotic resistance on the rise and the spread of disease exacerbated by foreign travel. In a society that is constantly on the move containment is virtually impossible. Efforts to quarantine and contain a disease are often futile as seen in the spread of the H1N1 strain. Even scarier than any disease in many ways is the way in which people will overreact that the movie conveys. Disaster will inevitably occur somewhere and human nature will always make it worse. Maybe it is survival mode that kicks in for humans, but the movie Contagion does an excellent job of portraying the best and worse of humanity that can come out in disaster situations.
^^^^Check out the Beta Sheets in 0:38
