hear trees shoot the breeze take the forest floor, fungal roots confabulate
by James Penha
“The Last of Us” television series has energized discussions and imaginings of mushroom networks, but I prefer to consider in this poem not monsters but the beneficent “wood-wide web” that forester Peter Wohlleben describes in “The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate – Discoveries from a Secret World”. That book explores how trees communicate and form alliances via their roots and associated fungi.
I myself was first exposed to this idea not from Wohlleben nor from scientific treatises, but from Richard Powers’ novel “The Overstory”, itself inspired by Wohlleben and the complementary work of Suzanne Simard.
Expat New Yorker James Penha (he/him🌈) has lived for the past three decades in Indonesia. Nominated for Pushcart Prizes in fiction and poetry, his work is widely published in journals and anthologies. His newest chapbook of poems, American Daguerreotypes, is available for Kindle. His essays have appeared in The New York Daily News and The New York Times. Penha edits TheNewVerse.News, an online journal of current-events poetry. You can find out more about James’ poetry on his website https://jamespenha.com and catch up with him on Twitter @JamesPenha
and soon haiku too will wiggle syllables through computer wormholes
By James Penha
“In an experiment that ticks most of the mystery boxes in modern physics, a group of researchers announced on Wednesday that they had simulated a pair of black holes in a quantum computer and sent a message between them through a shortcut in space-time called a wormhole… In their report, published Wednesday in Nature, the researchers described the result in measured words: ‘This work is a successful attempt at observing traversable wormhole dynamics in an experimental setting.'”
Quote from The New York Times article ‘Physicists Create ‘The Smallest, Crummiest Wormhole You Can Imagine’ from November 30, 2022.
Expat New Yorker James Penha (he/him🌈) has lived for the past three decades in Indonesia. Nominated for Pushcart Prizes in fiction and poetry, his work is widely published in journals and anthologies. His newest chapbook of poems, American Daguerreotypes, is available for Kindle. His essays have appeared in The New York Daily News and The New York Times. Penha edits TheNewVerse.News, an online journal of current-events poetry. You can find out more about James’ poetry on his website https://jamespenha.com and catch up with him on Twitter @JamesPenha
mother tongue day the students trying to script an alien language
by R. Suresh Babu
Kids should not ignore their mother tongue. If they do, they are going to lose connection with their tradition and environment. To make a country scientifically advanced, we need to learn and teach science in vernacular languages.
R. Suresh Babu is a graduate teacher of English and a teacher counsellor in a Government Residential School in India. He is an alumnus of the Regional Institute of Education, Mysuru in India. His works have been published in Cattails, Failed Haiku, Wales Haiku Journal, Akitsu, Presence, Under the Basho, Poetry Pea Journal and Podcast, The Asahi Shimbun, World Haiku Series, The Mamba, Kontinuum, Haikuniverse, Cold Moon Journal, Chrysanthemum, tsuri-dōrō and The Mainichi. He is a contributing writer to the anthology, We Will Not Be Silenced of the Indie Blu(e) Publishing. He has done the art works for the Haiku anthology Bull-Headed, edited by Corine Timmer. You can follow him on Twitter @sureshniranam
Once upon a time, I heard science as stories. I recall them well.
Storytelling and narrative are fundamental in almost every aspect of our lives. We are storytelling animals, narrative helps us to make sense of the world.
The ethnologist Kurt Ranke and communication scholar Walter Fisher both independently coined the idea that humans are “homo narrans” – storytelling animals who are persuaded to make decisions based on the coherence and fidelity of stories. Psychologist Jerome Bruner describes this ‘narrative mode of thought’ as being concerned with human wants, needs, and goals. Stories “help people make sense of the facts by framing them with particular narratives about how the world works” (Davidson, 2017).
The consequence of humans organising our thoughts through stories is that they tend to stick in the brain.
Numerous studies have shown that narrative and storytelling increase interest in and recall of information, and can be effectively employed in science communication. Hong & Lin-Siegler (2012) found that adding narrative to bare facts “increased student interest in science, increased their delayed recall of key science concepts”. Narrative “improves information processing, increasing recall of and interest in, the story” (Martinez-Conde et al. (2019).
Framing scientific information as stories increases the impact and power of the communication, but narrative can do more than just stimulate interest and improve recall. A study by Morris et al. (2019) found that “narratives framed as stories consistently outperformed factual narratives for encouraging action-taking in all audiences.”
“Plenty of creatures are intelligent but only one tells stories”
It’s a lovely statement that perfectly encapsulates the importance of narrative and storytelling to our place as a species. It’s also 17 syllables long.
Hong & Lin-Siegler (2012) How learning about scientists’ struggles influences students’ interest and learning in physicshttps://doi.org/10.1037/a0026224
With the release of his book Science Communication Through Poetry, Dr. Sam Illingworth, Associate Professor in Academic Practice at Edinburgh Napier University, presents a guide to all things science poetry. Read on for The Sciku Project’s review!
Reflections and wishes
I didn’t really know what I was doing when I started The Sciku Project. For most of my career I’d been the stereotypical scientist, focussing on the intricacies of my subject at the expense of other things. (I’ve mentioned before my frustration at a curtailed English literature and language education.) I was hooked on one form of poetry and I was passionate about using it to communicate science. But I was a bit clueless about how.
So I researched and read up and studied and learnt and designed and built and wrote and created until eventually, a little over 5 years ago, The Sciku Project was launched into the world.
At that point the real education began. Since then I’ve:
Read, written, edited, published and promoted hundreds of sciku.
Researched the advantages of using poetry for science communication (instead of only instinctively believing that it is beneficial).
Learnt how to effectively use social media and how to promote the site (even if I’m still a bit rubbish!).
Developed workshops and discovered approaches that get people excited and participating (as well as things that don’t!).
Explored, practiced and taught haiku structure and form beyond the three core traditions (17 syllables, cutting word and seasonal reference).
Discovered how to read and enjoy other forms of poetry, and seen first-hand how poetry of all forms can be effective at communicating science.
And that’s just the tip of the educational iceberg! I’ve come a long way and am proud of what I’ve learnt and achieved (whilst being the first to admit I could and should do and learn more).
I wonder how much further along would I be if I’d had Sam Illingworth’s latest book Science Communication Through Poetry to read back when The Sciku Project was nothing but an idea in my head?
Science Communication Through Poetry
Three things you should know before I go any further: (i) A copy of Science Communication Through Poetry was kindly provided by the publisher Springer Nature; (ii) I’ve worked with Sam a few times over the years, as a reviewer for Consilience (the science poetry journal that he founded) and on a workshop and poetry competition I organised in 2021; and (iii) The Sciku Project is referenced in the book itself, as is my 2017 Science article about the site’s inception.
With those disclaimers in mind, here’s what I think of Sam’s latest book:
Science Communication Through Poetry is the book I wish I’d had before I started The Sciku Project.
I’m not exaggerating. In Science Communication Through Poetry Sam lays out all of those things I’ve learned in my years of running The Sciku Project, and so much more to boot.
A bit of Fry and Learning
Science Communication Through Poetry is split into three broad sections. The first third of the book covers the what, why, where and how of science poetry: the benefits of writing science poetry, how to find and read poetry, how to write your own science poetry and how to share your poetry. (If I’d has this 5 years ago things would have been a lot easier!)
Dr. Sam Illingworth, Associate Professor in Academic Practice at Edinburgh Napier University, UK (source).
Poetry can be intimidating for the beginner. I’ve recently read Stephen Fry’s The Ode Less Travelled. It’s undeniably excellent and beautifully written, but it’s also heavy going if you aren’t already invested in understanding the underlying structures of a great many forms of poetry.
Wisely Sam avoids going into too much detail. Meters, feet and iambs are all very briefly introduced in the context of a few example forms of poetry without scaring the newcomer away. For someone just starting out on their poetry journey it’s perfect, enough to engage and interest without overwhelming. The Ode Less Travelled is suggested as further reading and I wish I’d read Science Communication Through Poetry first before diving headfirst in Fry’s poetry bible.
“Poetry is truth dwelling in beauty”
Robert Gilfillan’s statement about poetry and truth strikes at the heart of one of the fundamental roles of poetry: to convey knowledge and truth. Plato said something similar (“Poetry is nearer to vital truth than history”), as did the French priest and poet Joseph Roux (“Poetry is truth in its Sunday clothes”).
But if poetry can illuminate truths, then can we use poetry to ask questions of scientific discourse and of science itself?
It’s this question that the middle portion of the book seeks to answer. The chapters cover two research methods using science poetry: Poetic Content Analysis (“analysing poetry written about a specific topic or theme”) and Poetic Transcription (“creating poetry from other qualitative data” such as interviews or survey responses).
The front cover of Issue 1 of Consilience, the science poetry and science art journal that Sam Illingworth founded in 2020 (source).
This was completely new for me. I’ve never used poetry as more than just a communication tool (and for my own pleasure!) but Sam shows why and how you can use poetry as a research method to “interrogate both science and scientific discourse”. I found it absolutely fascinating. Sam walks the reader through the steps, providing a worked through example of each research method.
After reading these chapters I want to try the research methods out myself and feel like, with the book alongside me at each stage of the way, I could actually do so. It’s an impressive achievement given I’ve only ever used quantitative statistics. (I’m a Generalized Linear Model fanboy, yet here I am excited by the prospect of trying qualitative analysis!)
It’s an example of the importance and power of taking an interdisciplinary approach, the core argument that lies behind everything the book advocates.
Don’t forget the biscuits!
The final third of the book is about how poetry can be used as a way of creating dialogue between scientists and non-scientists, through collaboration and workshops. There’s lots of very practical advice and suggestions, as well as worked through examples which provide a fantastic framework for those getting started.
I really admire Sam’s six-point manifesto for collaboration:
Begin at the start.
Grant agency.
Reward involvement
Be humble
Encourage evolution.
Listen.
The manifesto nicely complements Sam’s advice on not leaving participants or facilitators of workshops in a HUFF: be Humble, be Unaesthetic, be Flexible, be Fair. These stood out for me as great examples of the ethos that runs through the book. It’s clear Sam is passionate about his subject and that he cares deeply about sharing his enthusiasm with others, engaging and enabling them to experience that joy.
I also like how practical some of the advice is. This sentence on p145 genuinely made me chuckle:
“I also had to remember to bring the notebooks and biscuits to each session, both of which were critical for effective delivery of the workshops.”
We’re all human and sometimes the smallest things, such as bringing along biscuits to a workshop, can make all the difference in how an audience engages and participates. The advice Sam gives, from the big picture to the minor details, speak of his depth of experience and practical knowledge of engaging scientists and non-scientists with science and poetry.
This experience shines through in the many examples of fabulous things Sam’s done with science poetry, but I never felt that it comes across as bragging. Every stated achievement is balanced by an admittance of some other failure or area where something could have been improved. It comes back to the constant of his manifesto and HUFF: be humble.
Conclusions
Communicating science through the medium of poetry is still a relatively new practice. Sam Illingworth shows just how impactful it can be, leading the charge for this interdisciplinary approach. I believe Science Communication Through Poetry is a fantastic resource for both the novice and experienced science poet and communicator.
It’s accessible, engaging and constantly interesting, encouraging the reader to have a go themselves. Dotted throughout the book are exercises you can try out for yourself. I found the ones I tried thoroughly enjoyable. They pushed me to try forms of poetry beyond my normal comfort zone and to seriously consider ways in which I can take everything I’ve been doing with The Sciku Project to the next level.
I wish I’d had Science Communication Through Poetry to refer to over the last 5 years, I’d have returned to it again and again for advice and inspiration.
I’m very glad to have it for the next 5 years and beyond.
Fungal filaments Humming under forest floor Trees communicate.
By Gauri Sirur
Trees communicate with each other through an underground network of mycorrhizal fungi. The fungal strands colonize the tree roots, and form a web connecting the roots to each other.
The relationship between the fungi and trees is usually symbiotic. The fungi take a share of the sugars that the trees produce during photosynthesis. In return, the trees receive nutrients such as phosphorous and nitrogen that the fungi synthesize from the soil.
Through the network, trees share food — carbon-rich sugars, nitrogen, and phosphorous — with other trees. They also send out warning messages about predators such as aphids and caterpillars. Or about pathogen attacks. This buys their neighbors time to activate their defenses.
All is not sugar and spice, however. Both trees and fungi try to extract the maximum amount of nutrition from the other while giving the minimum in return.
Trees are more likely to help their kin than an unrelated tree. Or to release toxic substances to harm an unwanted neighbor.
festive parasites regulating virulence to preserve their hosts
Mistletoe is a parasitic plant often found growing on hardwoods, such as apple trees. Whilst able to photosynthesize itself, the majority of a mistletoe plant’s water and nutrients are taken from its host, putting strain on the host plant.
The burden of parasitism can be particularly hard on the host when environmental conditions are tough, for instance during a drought. Research by Nabity et al. (2021), however, has shown that the desert mistletoe (Phoradendron californicum) is able to adjust the balance between autotrophy (the amount it obtains resources for itself through photosynthesis) and heterotrophy (the amount it takes resources from its host).
During dry periods the researchers found that desert mistletoe plants increased the amount of photosynthesis they performed, limiting the burden they place on their environmentally stressed host, the velvet mesquite (Prosopsis velutina). In this way mistletoe plants increase the chances of their host plants surviving the harsh environmental conditions and, as a result, increase their own chances of survival.
The researchers also demonstrated evidence of competition for xylem resources between mistletoe plants on the same host, some of the first evidence of intraspecific competition in parasites. The mistletoe plants are able to detect other mistletoe plants on the same host and can adjust their virulence accordingly. Possible ways that mistletoe could detect one another include via scent (chemical compounds released through a plant’s pores) or through chemical compounds traveling along the host’s xylem.
The research also suggests that levels of relatedness between mistletoe plants sharing the same host may even affect virulence. More research is needed to clarify this, however, and to investigate whether the plants can actually detect relatedness or whether mistletoe’s method of seed dispersal simply means that plants sharing the same host are likely to have higher levels of relatedness than mistletoe plants on separate hosts.
Australian science poems oft explore life death theories space horses
By Michael J. Leach and Rachel Rayner
We recently conducted a novel study to describe the demographics and characteristics of contemporary Australian science poetry. Twelve contemporary Australian poetry or science writing anthologies were used to identify science poems matching a set definition built from our research. After finding 100 contemporary Australian science poems by 73 poets, we proceeded to collect and analyse data on poem characteristics as well as poet demographics.
The specific scientific topics addressed in the 100 science poems were visualised in a word cloud – an image that uses font size to show the relative frequency with which words appear in a dataset. This sciku presents some of the standout features from our word cloud of contemporary Australian science poetry topics.
Word cloud from ‘The demographics and characteristics of contemporary Australian science poetry’ by Michael J. Leach and Rachel Rayner, published in Axon: Creative Explorations, 2020.
Other results from the study showed the state of New South Wales produced the most science poets; however, the Australian Capital Territory had more poets per capita. Finally, contrary to usual publication statistics, there were more science poems written by female-identifying poets than male or non-binary individuals.
Full details of our study can be found in a peer-reviewed research paper:
Michael J. Leach (@m_jleach) is a poet and Senior Lecturer at Monash University. Michael’s poems have appeared in the Antarctic Poetry Exhibition, the Medical Journal of Australia, GRAVITON, and elsewhere.Check out an earlier sciku of Michael’s here.
Rachel Rayner (@RaeRay4) is a science communicator at experimental PR and communications company, AndironGroup. Rachel connects with audiences through various means – whether articles, educational activities, live shows, broadcasts or poetry.
If you enjoyed Michael and Rachel’s sciku then make sure you check out their longer poems in the first issue of Consilience here!
A group of scientists at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute conducted a study of Humboldt squid using remote operated vehicles. They wanted to determine how a group of squid could execute complex behaviors in low light deep sea conditions. For instance, the squid avoid body contact with each other even when pursuing the same prey.
Burford and Robison (2020) found that the squid used specific color patterns on their bodies primarily when they were hunting in groups. Normally, such color changes would not be visible in the deep sea; Humboldt squid are bioluminescent which researchers hypothesize essentially provides backlighting to highlight the color changes.
The complexity of the color changes prevented the researchers from translating exactly what the squid are communicating. However they were able to document that the patterns are a consistent and effective communication method. After observing repeated patterns, they think that the visual language of the squid may be evolved enough to use syntax.
Teena Carroll is a mathematics professor at Emory & Henry College in Southwest Virginia and has been a poet longer than she has been a mathematician. @Teena Carroll
lab reunion – we play Chinese whispers with only our minds
by Nishant Mehrotra
The idea of communicating with our thoughts alone is the stuff of science fiction that, thanks to a team at the University of Washington (Seattle) and Carnegie Mellon University (Pittsburgh), may soon become a reality. In their work (Jiang et. al., 2019), the researchers demonstrate the feasibility of multi-person brain-to-brain communication for the first time. Their system, BrainNet, is an exciting first step towards the future where the Internet might have human brains directly linked to it.
Nishant Mehrotra (@NMehrotratweets) is an electrical engineer by profession, but a poet by (his) admission. He blogs at nm30.blogs.rice.edu about RF and wireless research.
Viewers, be aware! YouTube: a corrupted source for climate info.
How do you find out about scientific advances? The news? Internet sites? Social media? YouTube? Where you gather information from can have a huge impact on your opinions and the way you act.
Whilst there’s a broad scientific consensus around anthropogenic climate change and the need to address this global challenge, public opinion remains divided. Yet politicians and companies will only act in response to climate change if public consensus makes it in their best interests. And, of course, public opinion depends on what information is available…
Published research in scientific journals is rarely accessible and comes couched in technical language – a barrier to anyone without specific training in the relevant field. Instead most people rely on the news media and, increasingly, on the internet. Yet where traditional news media outlets have checks in place to ensure that the information they present is accurate, online it’s a whole other story.
Which makes research by Joachim Allgaier (2019) at Aachen University in Germany especially worrying. Using key climate search terms he analysed 200 videos about climate and climate modification. Only 89 of the videos supported the scientific consensus, whilst 4 were videos of climate scientists discussing climate topics with deniers. The remaining 107 videos contained views that opposed scientific consensus: 16 denying anthropogenic climate change and 91 videos propagating climate conspiracy theories.
More worryingly still, many of these videos use genuine scientific terms (such as geoengineering) to bolster the credibility of their output, whilst twisting the meaning and usage of those terms to meet the arguments being made. It’s a strategy to help the output avoid being considered as conspiracy theories but it further confuses the issue and can hoodwink the unwary. Viewers beware!
Oxytocin is often known as the ’hugging hormone’ and is important for attachment forming in relationships. Shared activities between two individuals in a relationship can help with bonding and release oxytocin. But what sort of activities can promote this?
Melton et al (2019) investigated the impact of two activities on couple’s oxytocin levels: playing board games and attending art classes. Both activities resulted in an increase in oxytocin in both men and women but there were interesting differences between the activity, sex and location of the activities.
The greatest increase in oxytocin was in men during the art class. Interestingly, greater levels of eye contact were observed between couples playing board games but greater physical contact observed during art class, whilst couples in a novel setting and doing a novel activity also released more oxytocin than couples in a familiar environment. These results show that whilst joint leisure activities do result in increased oxytocin, the type of activity and the novelty can affect the amounts.
Orchestras have a vast array of instruments, yet composers frequently employ a solo instrument within orchestral passages. Hansen & Huron (2018) have investigated whether a solo is used to convey or enhance a sad effect.
By characterising orchestral passages as featuring a solo or not and then investigating the differences between they were able to assess the impact of a solo on the emotion of the piece. Whilst they acknowledge that composers might use a solo for a number of reasons, their results suggest that there is an association between sadness-related acoustic feature and solos. Indeed, pieces of music with sad characteristics are twice as likely to feature solos.
Car accidents frequently occur when drivers are distracted. New research suggests that the temptations offered by mobile phones is too much, even when driving children.
A survey of 760 adults from the USA by McDonald et al (2018) found that 47% of respondents have driven children aged between 4 and 10 whilst on a hand held phone without hands-free. The statistics get worse: 33% of parents had read text messages, 26% had written text messages and 13% had used social media whilst driving with children.
It’s a widely recognised stereotype that different people and cultures can have varied concepts of ideal interpersonal space. Yet it seems that personal space can vary within individuals as well.
Research by Vagnoni et al (2018) has found that interpersonal space size increases following listening to a conversation with aggressive content. This suggests that interpersonal space might be a way of protecting yourself from an aggressive confrontation.
In films and tv programs aggression and threats are used in interrogations to get information out of a suspect. This approach is often common in police and armed forces around the world and yet evidence suggests that this it’s not effective.
Christiansen et al (2018), building on the work of Alison & Alison (2017), studied UK police interviews with 48 terrorist detainees across 181 interviews and coded the interpersonal behaviours of both the detainees and the interrogators across the categories authoritative, passive, confrontational and cooperative.
They found that adaptive interviewer behaviour was positively associated with adaptive detainee behaviour, leading indirectly to increased information. The study suggests that the greater the interviewer’s interpersonal skills the more likely the detainee was to respond and the more useful information was obtained. Similarly authoritative and confrontational behaviours resulted in a less cooperative detainee and less useful information. It seems that building a rapport seems more effective that intimidation.
Vocal communication is an important element of behavioural interactions within many social species. Przewalski’s horses produced more whinnies and squeals in response to negative contexts (agonistic interaction, social separation), but more nickers in positive contexts (anticipation of food or affiliative interactions).
Przewalski’s horses are the closest living relative of domestic horses and a comparison between the species revealed both similarities and intriguing differences in their vocalisations, suggesting that the expression of emotional valence (positive or negative) might be species specific as opposed to conserved across species. Maigrot et al, 2017.
Being able to understand vocal expression of animals could lead to the increased welfare of captive species and a better understanding of animal interactions and group behaviour, which in turn might help to aid population management or conservation in endangered species.
Many of us enjoying waking up to the sound of birdsong. But whilst we might enjoy the various trills and tweets as the sun rises, the Adelaide’s warbler’s song actually improves over the course of the morning. To appreciate the best of its voice, perhaps the early bird doesn’t catch the worm! Schraft et al, 2017.
Aggressive interactions between individuals can be dangerous and energetically expensive and it is important that the two competitors are able to communicate effectively to avoid such costs. When competing cichlid fish engage in agonistic interactions they are known to communicate via visual cues, but new findings suggest they also use chemical cues by urinating during encounters. Bayani et al, 2017.
Complete locked-in state is a condition where patients are suffering from motor paralysis but retain their mental processing abilities. The inability to control their own body movements has made communication with people suffering from this condition effectively impossible. However, by using functional near-infrared spectroscopy measure changes in frontocentral oxygenation patients were able to answer yes and no questions. Chaudhary et al, 2017.
