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Feeding the Future
How do we produce enough food to satisfy the growing demands of our growing population? How can we achieve this while also ensuring the stability of our food system despite growing ecological…
Why Linux
It’s a subtle day in Portland suburbia – a hint of rain on the stormfront. I’m okay, working on Windows, my childhood operating system. Just then, thunder claps and the roar reverberates into my…
Run MATLAB Code on Any Operating System
1.1 Directory SeparatorsDirectory separators are the characters computers use to delimit path components. Most operating systems use “/” as the directory separator, but Windows operating systems…
Ohio's Tropical Fruit
When you think of tropical fruits, what first comes to mind? Likely you envision exotic treats like pineapples or mangoes from places like Central America; you probably don’t think of the forests…
Mushrooming in the Midwest
According to the eccentric forums of the mushroom realm, I hail from the mecca of fungi. Every year in the Pacific Northwest,…
Customizing MATLAB Properties
Getting PropertiesA comprehensive list of user-manipulatable settings can be obtained by executing the following command at the MATLAB prompt: get(0,’Factory’) One of my least favorite…
Creating publication-quality molecular graphics
1.1 Avogadro and Adobe IllustratorI am currently working on a figure for a publication which requires the chemical structure of paranitrophenylphosphate, C6H6NO6P. I use Adobe Illustrator to create…
You smell like a stinkbug
While maybe not the best compliment I have ever received, other entomologists will sometimes tell me I smell like a stinkbug. They know what stinkbugs smell like, and they assume I smell the way I…
The new age of pre-print publishing
Peer-reviewed publication is a fundamental aspect of science and provides a means to referee research before it is disseminated to the greater public. And owing to their importance, publications…