The Faculty of Science is celebrating McGill’s 200th anniversary with a student art exhibition on the theme of “Science!”. McGill students at all levels and all faculties are invited to submit works in any medium, expressing what science means to them.
Faculty of Science bicentennial committee member, Torsten Bernhard, says the aim of the exhibition is to celebrate science in all its forms.
Henry Reiswig, the former Biology professor and curator of Invertebrate Zoology at the Redpath Museum, died on July 4, 2020. You can read his obituary here:
His daughter Amy says: "He died in his lab in the garage, with microscope slides on the warmer, doing what he loved: science."
The glyphosate-based herbicide Roundup has been found to trigger the loss of biodiversity among phytoplankton communities in freshwater ponds. In their experiments, scientists found that while some populations developed resistance to the herbicide and were able to survive exposure at high levels, this came at a cost, with a 40 percent loss in biodiversity.
"The ubiquitous presence of glyphosate in the environment has sparked concerns over its potential health and ecotoxicological effects," Andrew Gonzalez, from Canada's McGill University, said.
Using a new microscopic "fishing" technique, scientists from the Montreal Clinical Research Institute (IRCM), Université de Montréal and McGill University have successfully snagged thousands of proteins that play a key role in the formation of the cell skeletons or cytoskeletons. Cell skeletons, whose primary function is to give the cells their shapes, are also involved in things like muscle contraction. They are made up of an interlocking network of protein filaments that connect the cell nucleus to the cell membrane.
Crowdmark – an online grading tool developed especially to handle large classes – has been attracting a growing following across North America, with members of McGill’s own Faculty of Science among its most ardent enthusiasts. Kira Smith, reporter-at-large for the OSE, went undercover to find out more.
The greater vulnerability of sea creatures may significantly impact human communities that rely on fish and shellfish for food and economic activity, according to the study published in the journal Nature.
McGill University marine ecologist Jennifer Sunday is bringing cutting-edge DNA analysis to the formidable task of tracking ocean species along Canada’s Pacific coast.
Are human disturbances to the environment driving evolutionary changes in animals and plants? A new study conducted by McGill researchers finds that, on average, human disturbances don’t appear to accelerate the process of natural selection. While the finding may seem reassuring, this unexpected pattern could reflect the limited number of species for which data were available.
New work from the Alanna Watt lab identifying pathophysiological cellular changes that may contribute to ataxia of the Charlevoix-Saguenay region, or ARSACS. This work arises from a very fruitful collaboration between labs at McGill including the Brais lab (Neurology and Neurosurgery) and the McKinney lab (Pharmacology and Therapeutics).
New work from the Gregor Fussmann Lab in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: One of the basic tenets of ecological theory is that connectivity among small populations over a larger landscape (metapopulations) promote species persistence. In this experiment we investigate to what degree and under what conditions this theory holds true when parasites are added to the equation, using lab-based populations of guppies and their ectoparasite Gyrodactylus turnbulli.
Ecosystems are a complex web of interactions. These ecological networks are being reorganized by extinctions and colonization events caused by human impacts, such as climate change and habitat destruction. In a paper published this week in Nature Ecology & Evolution, researchers from McGill University and University of British Columbia have developed a new theory to understand how complex ecological networks will reorganize in the future.
McGill Newsroom
The research has implications for understanding human developmental disorders such as autism
Adult songbirds modify their vocalizations when singing to juveniles in the same way that humans alter their speech when talking to babies. The resulting brain activity in young birds could shed light on speech learning and certain developmental disorders in humans, according to a study by McGill University researchers.
Guidance addresses key scientific, ethical, social, and policy challenges raised by new technologies and emerging areas of stem cell discovery and application
