A positively negative control

Last week, with a sufficiently large—I hope—collection of root images cached, I indulges in a few extras. I entertained a visit from a friend (Mike Blatt) and his wife (Jane), washed out reagent bottles, and fitted in two experiments. Well, not really experiments, more like explorations.  One afternoon, I imaged celery xylem stained either with […]

A himmer of glope

March 31 is International Transgender Day of Visibility (Fig. 1). Please do something nice for your trans friends today (and everyday). As for the title of today’s post, maybe it is the other way around? Last week, I was shut out from tweaking the calibration of the liquid crystals (discussed here) because the software glitch […]

Blog nog

Drink up! Whether you celebrate surrounded by dozens of your relatives or you let the day glide by quietly, I hope you are warm, fed, and happy. Alert readers will know that I missed posting last Sunday. I was traveling. Technically, I reached home late that afternoon but with respect to the travail part of travel, I […]

I smell rabbits

At least one rabbit anyway. About a month ago, I wrote about falling down a hole chasing not a rabbits but root hairs. In efforts to coax fast scarlet into staining roots uniformly, I incorporated the dye into the agar medium, inside of which the roots grow. Alas, giving the roots continuous exposure failed to […]

The unexamined assumption …

… bit me. Of course, they always do. Examining an assumption reveals either that it is ok, to a first approximation, or that it isn’t; in the first case, the conditions are accepted as a reasonable compromise and, in the second case, conditions are changed. Without any check, unfortunate conditions come along for the ride, […]