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Genealogical DNA Testing
Join Mary Henderson of the Association of Professional Genealogists for an introduction to DNA testing for genealogy purposes. After a brief overview of basic genetics, Mary discusses the types of DNA tests available — autosomal, Y, X and mitochondrial — and provides an overview of DNA testing companies including ancestry.com, familytreedna.com, 23&me and My Heritage. Using an example of the DNA test result page provided by each company, Mary offers tips on how to navigate the findings.
Mary Henderson has 45 years of experience with traditional, document-based genealogy, and 6 years of experience with genetic genealogy. She volunteers her services to adoptees seeking their birth parents and is a member of the Association of Professional Genealogists.
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Nerd Nite #57 - Stand Back, We’re All Going To Do Science!
Learn about the many ways you can join people across the world in addressing some of the biggest social and scientific challenges in the world today through community and citizen science apps, websites, hikes, photos, and more!
About Justin:
Justin Schell directs the Shapiro Design Lab at the University of Michigan Library, where he facilitates, among other things, a variety of citizen and community science projects. In addition to this work, he has a background as a documentary filmmaker, community archivist, and reformed trombonist.
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Exploring the Mind | The Psychology of Germs, Disease, and Disgust
Infectious diseases and the pathogens that cause them have been a serious problem throughout human history, with millions sickened and killed each year. In the modern world, hygiene and vaccinations help us manage this threat, but we also possess mental and physical defenses against germs. In this talk, Joshua Ackerman, Associate Professor of Psychology at U-M, discusses the emerging thinking on a set of defensive strategies grounded in our psychology – emotions, thought processes, and actions collectively called the “behavioral immune system.”
Feeling grossed out or avoidant when seeing spoiled food or sick people can help prevent infection, but these reactions also negatively affect our interactions with people, groups, and environments that in reality pose no danger. Disease-related thinking also spills over into how we see the world more generally, influencing aspects of our lives from cultural taboos to the products we buy. The psychology of germs, disease, and disgust may help us understand why.
This program was part of the "Exploring the Mind" series, a partnership with The University of Michigan Department of Psychology.
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Exploring the Mind | Sickness and Memory: How the Immune System Changes the Brain
Join Dr. Natalie Tronson, Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of Michigan, as she describes the way immune system changes during illness can interfere with memory formation, and how this affects the development of post-traumatic stress disorder and dementia.
Memory is critical for the ability to function in the world. By storing and retrieving information about the relationships between places, events, and outcomes, our memories allow us to adjust our behavior to act in accordance with the current situation. We use our memory to navigate around our environment, efficiently finding our way to work and back home; to avoid dangerous places and things, to find food, and to recognize families, friends and colleagues. This central role of memory in our everyday lives means that disorders of memory are particularly impactful. Deficits in memory are one of the first and most notable symptoms in Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias, because they severely impact the ability for individuals to function independently in the world. Excessively strong memories are also problematic. For example, persistent memories of trauma contribute to post-traumatic stress disorder, leading to individuals avoiding places that trigger retrieval of those memory. But how do memory processes go bad? One thing we know about memory systems is that many different factors in our lives can change how well memory is stored. Stress can make some memories stronger, and some memories weaker. Illness also changes how well we can learn and remember information. This flexibility in how memory systems work also means that they are vulnerable to disruption by stress and sickness.
Natalie Tronson is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of Michigan. After her undergraduate degree from the University of New South Wales, in Australia, Dr. Tronson moved to the United States and completed her PhD at Yale University, followed by a post-doctoral position at Northwestern University. Her research focuses on how the brain stores and retrieves memory, how memory is changed during stress and illness, and sex differences in these processes. Dr. Tronson’s research combines behavioral approaches and molecular analyses in an animal model of memory, with the goal of identifying new ways to prevent and treat memory disorders including post-traumatic stress disorder and dementia.
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Exploring the Mind | Do the Roots of Psychopathy Lie in Early Childhood?
The cold and calculating psychopath captures our imagination in movies and books, but what do we know about psychopathy and its development? In this talk, Luke W. Hyde briefly describes what we know about psychopathy in adults and examine an early risk factor for psychopathy in children and teens. The lecture includes a description of recent findings which aid our understanding of the development of psychopathic traits via “nature” and “nurture", and presents research identifying potentially malleable and preventable risk factors for this dangerous outcome.
Luke W. Hyde, PhD is an Associate Professor in the Clinical and Developmental areas of the Department of Psychology. He received BA from Williams College and PhD in Clinical and Developmental Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh with a concentration in cognitive neuroscience. He research focuses on the development of antisocial behavior (e.g., aggression, rule breaking) in youth and the impacts of adversity on youth and families. Much of this research has focused on how experiences like parenting and living in a dangerous neighborhood impact children’s brain and behavior leading to psychopathology.
Dr. Hyde’s research has been funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, the Brain and Behavior Foundation, and the Avielle Foundation. This research has been recognized by early career awards from the Society for Research in Psychopathology, the Association for Psychological Science, and Division 7 (Developmental Psychology) of the American Psychological Association.
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Graduate Students of Color | Panel on Life in S.T.E.M. at U-M
Graduate and professional students of color at the University of Michigan host a panel to discuss their challenges, victories, and strategies behind their ascension into the realm of S.T.E.M (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics).
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An Afternoon with Ninja Brian
Join musician, comedian, and theoretical physicist Brian Wecht for an informal interview followed by a meet & greet / signing.
After spending many years as an academic working on string theory and particle physics, including a year as a postdoc at U-M, Brian left a faculty job at Queen Mary University of London to become a full-time musician and YouTuber. Brian’s comedy bands Ninja Sex Party (song topics: unicorns, dinosaurs, sex), and Starbomb (song topics: video games, nerd culture, farting), and the associated gaming channel Game Grumps (song topics: none), have garnered an audience of millions, toured around the world, and been counted among the Top Ten Sex Artists in Australia by Spotify.
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A2CAF | Maris Wicks: Gorillas, Guts, and Gastropods
Maris Wicks will be at AADL to talk about her art exhibit Gorillas, Guts, and Gastropods and to kick off the Ann Arbor Comic Arts Festival (A2CAF). We'll journey to the jungles of Africa, to the inside of human intestines, and to the sanctuary of slugs and snails…all with cartoons! Fascinated by life on this big blue marble we call Earth, Maris Wicks shares the wonders of the world through her science-y comic strips and graphic novels. After the talk, stick around for some hands-on comics-themed activities and mingling.
Her books include Primates (2013) (written by Jim Ottaviani), Human Body Theater (2015) — a 240-page rollicking romp through the major systems of the human body (told in comics format, of course), as well as Spongebob Comics, Marvel Comics, and DC Comics. Her newest book is Coral Reefs (2016). Recently, she was in Antarctica as a part of the USAP Artists & Writers grant, working on a graphic novel about life and science in Antarctica.
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Nerd Nite #52: Is It Cold In Here or Is It Just Me?
Maris Wicks — Is It Cold In Here or Is It Just Me?
Everything you ever wanted to know about Antarctica, and probably some stuff you didn’t (like that time I pooped in a bucket).
About Maris:
Comic book artist and writer with an insatiable appetite for science. Especially science in strange places
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Chasing New Horizons: Inside the Epic First Mission to Pluto with Mission Leader Alan Stern and Co-Author David Grinspoon
If you wanted to design and fly a robotic spacecraft on a 9 year voyage, 3 billion miles from Earth, the farthest journey of exploration our species has ever attempted… HOW WOULD YOU DO IT?
Join mission Leader Dr. Alan Stern and co-author Dr. David Grinspoon as they discuss their new book, Chasing New Horizons.
On July 14, 2015, something amazing happened. More than 3 billion miles from Earth, a small NASA spacecraft called New Horizons screamed past Pluto at more than 32,000 miles per hour, focusing its instruments on the long mysterious icy worlds of the Pluto system, and then, just as quickly, continued on its journey out into the beyond. Nothing like this has occurred in a generation—a raw exploration of new worlds unparalleled since NASA’s Voyager missions to Uranus and Neptune—and nothing quite like it is planned to happen ever again. At a time when so many think that our most historic achievements are in the past, the most distant planetary exploration ever attempted not only succeeded in 2015 but made history and captured the world’s imagination.