Dance processes that are imperceivable to the human eye |
Goal
Despite the traditional outreach efforts, there remains a divide between the scientific community and general public. We leverage dance as a mode of science communication to bridge the gap.
Win-sum lawHuman Computer Interactions |
A DANCE OF Rebecca Gellman'S PHD THESIS
FALL 2022 NEW RELEASE
As populations around the world industrialize, the bacteria in our guts have to respond to a change of diet (lower fiber, higher fat and sugar). This leads to a mass extinction event in our intestines where some bacteria die out, and others bloom in their place. My project focuses on two genera of bacteria that exemplify this pattern: Bacteroides and Prevotella. Prevotella species make up a large proportion of the non-industrialized microbiota. However, they quickly decline in populations as they industrialize. Bacteroides, in contrast, is typically found at low abundances in non-industrialized populations, but expands as populations industrialize. Rebecca's main question: what causes these bacteria to switch off like this? The answer: Carbohydrates! Bacteroides and Prevotella both break down complex carbohydrates for energy. However, Prevotella species typically specialise in plant carbohydrates; they consume dietary fiber that we can't digest. When people consume a diet low in fiber, these microbes lose a vital source of nutrients. Bacteroides, on the other hand, is more of a generalist, consuming both plant fibers and the carbohydrates found in the host intestinal mucus. On an industrialized diet (in the absence of fiber), Bacteroides can survive just fine. It turns out that it's possible to adjust the relative amounts of Bacteroides and Prevotella present in the gut by changing the kinds of carbohydrates present in the host's diet. In the future, hopefully we'll be able to use this knowledge to keep our gut microbiomes healthy!
A DANCE OF Colette Kelly'S PHD THESIS
Spring 2021 NEW RELEASE
Dance has the power to crystallize and highlight for the viewer concepts more thoroughly understood through movement, and thus to motivate a response to environmental problems. In “N2O in Drag,” we use dance to explain why nitrous oxide (also known as laughing gas) is a powerful greenhouse gas, what techniques geochemists use to study it, and how the gas is produced in an important region of the ocean. Three faux queens represent each of the three atoms in the nitrous oxide molecule, and a fourth andro-queen, “Miss Spectrometer,” represents the mass spectrometer, an instrument used to measure the isotopic composition of each atom in the nitrous oxide molecule. This project is a collaboration between a choreographer (Colette Kelly), dancers (Cansu Culha, Rebecca Gellman, Kelsey Foster, and Kelly), a composer (Stephen Cole Dobbs) and a filmmaker (Connor O’Keefe), all graduate students at Stanford, to describe nitrous oxide cycling in the eastern tropical North Pacific Ocean.
A Dance of Cansu Culha's PhD thesis
Winter 2021 New release
Cansu Culha, a PhD candidate at the Stanford Geophysics Department, researches the signatures of magmatic processes in crystalline structures. Ultimately, in order to decipher what leads to volcanic eruptions, she quantifies their sensitivity to small changes in space and time that they might experience. To learn more, check out the dance above and explore her research on her website.
Ocean trilogy
debut event
Ocean Trilogy is a multidisciplinary performance and educational outreach program highlighting the challenges confronting the ocean, and also the innovations and new possibilities from cutting-edge ocean research.
Art-SCI hosted SpecktorDance company's Ocean Trilogy Performance, a workshop on using dance to communicate science, and a reception to explore the role of dance in science communication. We polled the audience members and learned that dance creates AWARENESS and INSPIRATION. When combined with other communication methods like spoken word, dance enhances public UNDERSTANDING of the scientific concepts. |