East Manchester woman turns fish hobby into business

This is not an article about a scientist, but it is an interesting story on how to follow a passion into a profession.

(Edited to remove incorrect assumption that she lived in England. She's in Pennsylvania!)

YorkDispatch.com: East Manchester woman turns fish hobby into business

His name is Captain Crankypants.

Rachel O'Leary brought him home for her husband, thinking a charismatic and interesting Oscar cichlid would be the perfect fish to invite him into her world of breeding fish and invertebrates.

"I thought he would enjoy a big, mean cichlid," she said. "What he got was a prissy, moody cichlid trying to blend into the back of his aquarium."

Standing in the basement from which she operates Invertebrates by Msjinkzd,

she stared into Crankypants' habitat and gave him a look that said, "We both know how you are, don't we?"

He was in one of his moods, floating against a black wall in his aquarium, playing chameleon. His white stripes had gone dark and he wore a pretty serious look on his mug.

"It's not just you," she explained to a visitor. "It's anything different. ... He ignored Chris (her husband) for a year. He pouts for months on end when you change anything. He'll go on hunger strikes."

In one way, he's just like the woman whose stares he seems to be actively avoiding. O'Leary might not be prissy or moody, but both she and the fish aren't what people expect.

He's a moody cichlid. She's a 32-year-old scientist with a foot-high mohawk.

She's a mother of three who likes baking, an academic with a degree in fine art. She's a heavily tattooed homebody who's more likely to spit out a term like "Cambarellus patzcuarensis" than an expletive.

Hobby turned business: Like a growing number of entrepreneurs, O'Leary conducts most of her business on the Internet, where she has a website and sells through online aquaria networks.

She specializes in rare species, many of which are imported from Asia, India and South America, and she sells retail and wholesale, she said.

Many of her customers are people who have exotic plants and are looking for species to accent their water-garden arrangements.

She started formally selling invertebrates and nano fish, which are generally shorter than two inches, out of her East Manchester Township home about 18 months ago but has been breeding for about eight years.

It all started, she said, after she received a frog for Mother's Day and wanted to fill its habitat with other creatures that wouldn't bite it. Employed as a veterinary technician, she said she has "had a lot of jobs and a lot of interests," but there's always something new to learn about fish and invertebrates.

She developed a voracious appetite for information on the hobby, soon becoming a respected expert in the field who speaks at conventions and serves on the board of the Capital Cichlid Association. She is paid to appear at events for aquatic organizations and fish clubs.

"There's not many people who look like me," she said. "Fish people are typically middle-age men."

But those "fish people" might be an easier crowd to win over than the PTO moms. She said people who share her interests rarely misjudge her because she's respected and her reputation precedes her mohawk.

"I'm focused and thoughtful in what I do, and that's something that trumps my appearance," she said. "People tend to get over it pretty quickly."

A Mountain of a Lady

Huffpost Women: A Mountain of a Lady
[...]
Mary Moriarty Galvani, who died on Friday at the ripe old age of 96, was one of those truly great figures. She was raised in Shakopee, Minnesota and was one of five great kids who would all go on to serve in some capacity in World War II. Her father was an estimable judge whose name was well known across Minnesota. At the age of 7, she became deathly ill with pneumonia. The doctors feared that the disease would mean the end for Mary Galvani, but as she proved time in and time out throughout her life, it would take a hell of a lot more to stop her. She learned two valuable lessons that she would live by through that experience. One, to always treat those around you as if they were kings and queens. The second: that you should never let the truth get in the way of a good story. The combination was deadly and had those she met bedazzled and gleaming till the end.

Although her youth was impressive, Mary was one of those rarest of flowers that bloom late. A scientist at a time when few women attempted the feat, Mary Moriarty Galvani constantly found herself the sole woman in an environment filled with gentlemen. At a plant in Indiana she met her late beloved husband Vincent Galvani, who would go on to develop the trigger for the atomic bomb. However like many women in the 50's she would retire to devote herself solely to the raising of her three beautiful children. But not content with retirement, Mary Galvani decided when her last child was 14 to once again make a proverbial splash onto the scientific scene.

She applied for a high level position in the water plant in 1967as a response to an ad she had seen in a "Help Wanted: Male" classified advertisement. When asked by the St Paul Pioneer Press why she had made the gutsy decision to enter an all male department in her twilight years she smiled and said confidently, "It didn't say women need not apply. So I did." When she walked into the water department for the first time, she was confronted with beady-eyed stares and vicious glances, but when she finally begrudgingly retired, those same men were struck with grief. While there, she patented a process and media for the speciation of strep, which became a much-cited patent in the investigation of e-coli contamination, and has led to the saving of many lives. She had made feminists out of sexists, and she did it without raising her voice, lecturing them, complaining to her supervisors and more remarkably, did it with a smile on her face and a strong right hook ready just in case they didn't evolve

Mary Moriarty Galvani transformed from "one of the guys" to the world's greatest grandmother in 1984 when she was called to Southampton to help her youngest daughter raise a difficult new baby. The one condition her daughter told her: "Leave the cigarettes in Minnesota." Although she had smoked for more than 50 years, she quit and renewed, she moved to New York to take on the role of matriarch to the third generation. Mary Galvani, like an expensive wine, got better with age. Her stories became richer, her delivery more fine tuned and her effect dramatic. While at the end she at times needed a walker to maneuver herself, the woman could outrun most people 30 years younger, and not as a consequence of hordes of vitamins or years of yoga, just from an indomitable spirit that plowed on.

Although I'm only 22-years-old, I've been blessed with an opportunity to meet some of the truly great figures of the 21st century; but none of them compare to Mary Galvani. In fact not a single one of them comes even come close. At the age of 94 she was diagnosed with dementia, the unstoppable plague that is wreaking havoc on our elderly loved ones and sadly is still incurable. She didn't panic; she didn't cry. All she did was to embrace it fully and to take it on as she had all the challenges of her life: with unprotected optimism, strong resolve and a zest for life.

Forced to move to the 80th street residence, it became her new palace, the new employees her father's old confidants, and the friends, new Dukes and duchesses. When she died on Friday from an aneurism that burst while she was surrounded by her family, the entire residence insisted on coming to visit this mountain of a woman. When asked why everyone from the chefs, to the janitors, to the other residents all insisted on visiting this woman, one mid 30's aide on the third floor said, "We are here because we are hoping to get just one more story, just one more chance to hear something from this woman." I said staring at this hopeful and optimistic woman, "you realize that she is no longer with us, right?" And the woman looked at me and smiled, "Mary Moriarty Galvani will never die." I smiled thinking back to what Welles had said about Cornelia Lunt and I too realized that one of the greats had passed. Perhaps, not a famous name, but an indelible figure that neither I, nor anyone who came across will soon forget.

H.B. woman gets National Science Foundation fellowship

Orange County Register: H.B. woman gets National Science Foundation fellowship
A Huntington Beach resident and recent graduate of Cal State Long Beach is set to join the likes of Google founder, Sergey Brin; the co-author of "Freakonomics," Steven Levitt; and Steven Chu, the U.S. Secretary of Energy.
Delora Gaskins, who recently completed two bachelor's degrees, one in chemistry and the other in mathematics, was awarded the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, the oldest fellowship of its kind. Brin, Levitt and Chu along with 30 other Nobel Prize winners are among a select group of people who have received this prestigious award.

Gaskins will take her fellowship to Brandeis University this fall where she will earn her Ph.D in chemistry while working in the laboratory of Irving Epstein.
"It became clear to me while working in the Epstein laboratory that this is really my research passion," Gaskins said. "There are so many interesting dynamical features to explore and I'm so excited to get started."

According to the professor's profile on the university website, Epstein's research focuses on patterns in time and space, primarily in chemical systems.
Gaskins said she wasn't always so clear on which career path to take.

"Reflecting back on it, there were times when I didn't know what I wanted to do in the big picture. But I kept finding things I liked, often in random situations, and then pursued them," she said.

Gaskins, a Marina High School graduate, said finding a Japanese calligraphy group on campus clinched her decision to attend CSULB.

"There's so much intellectual exchange [at Long Beach] and being part of the scientific community helps you grow as a person and as a scientist. I can't emphasize that enough," she said.

Gaskins will receive a three-year annual stipend of $30,000 along with a $10,500 allowance for tuition and fees and will have access to the TeraGrid supercomputer.

Scientist thrives in Miss. environment

Clarion Ledger.com: Scientist thrives in Miss. environment
All her life, Melissa Pringle has been surrounded by strong, determined women.

Her grandmother, Edna Thomas Lobrano, worked as a bookkeeper at Perry Automotive and John Deere in Centreville at a time when most women stayed home and tended to domestic affairs.

Lobrano recently passed away at age 98.

"She was a really strong, feisty woman. She even carried a small derringer in her purse," exclaimed Pringle, laughing. "She was tough!"

Lobrano's tenacity was passed on to her daughter, Jacqueline Lobrano Gordon, a retired medical technologist in Meridian, and eventually her granddaughter, who today is vice president and senior principal scientist at Eco-Systems Inc. in Jackson.

Born in Oxford and reared in Meridian, Pringle had dreams of becoming a doctor like her father. Her interest changed when she enrolled at Millsaps College and was introduced to environmental science by professor Sarah Armstrong.

"I shifted from pre-med, the study of the human body, to the environment as a whole," she said. "I'm fascinated by the interconnectedness of science in all aspects of life. It's like a puzzle, and you have to put all the pieces together."

Upon graduation from Millsaps, Pringle began her graduate studies in oceanography and coastal sciences at Louisiana State University, where she met another influential mentor, professor Margaret Reams.

Pringle conducted her post-doctoral fellowship with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Washington, D.C., in 1998, which also happened to be the International Year of the Ocean.

Pringle launched her consulting career in southern California. Though she enjoyed her work, she missed Mississippi.

"It was time for me to come on home and apply what I learned here," she said.

Eco-Systems, an environmental engineering and consulting firm, has been Pringle's professional home for 12 years.

There, she specializes in policy and management with a focus on natural and coastal resources. She currently serves on the Gulf of Mexico's Action Plan's Resilience Group and assisted in the development of the five-year resiliency plan for the Gulf.

As Eco-System's sole female senior principal scientist, Pringle said working alongside her colleagues is a rewarding experience.

"Engineers do not think like scientists and men do not think like women, but you learn from different viewpoints," she said. "There are times when we may not see eye to eye, but we always try meet in the middle."

At home, Pringle is a wife and mother of three children ages 4, 6 and 15.

She wants to instill in them the same strong-willed determination shown by their trailblazing great-grandmother.

"I can teach my children that hard work pays off," she said. "You can be hardcore and hardworking, but also have the passion and compassion that makes you relatable ... that makes you real."

Naked female scientist tries to tame belugas

[I really don't think whales can tell the difference between naked humans and humans wearing wetsuits, but, I share this article here anyway...

HeraldSun (Australia): Naked female scientist tries to tame belugas
BRAVING sub-zero temperatures, she has thrown caution and her clothes to the wind to tame two beluga whales in a unique and controversial experiment.

Natalia Avseenko, 36, was persuaded to strip naked as marine experts believe belugas do not like to be touched by artificial materials such as diving suits.

The skilled Russian diver took the plunge as the water temperature hit a freezing minus 1.5C.

Belugas are famed for the way in which their faces are able to convey human-like expressions. Certainly, Matrena and Nilma seemed to enjoy frolicking with Natalia.

The taming of the whales happened in the Murmansk Oblast region in the far northwest of Russia at the shore of the White Sea near the Arctic Circle branch of the Utrish Dolphinarium.

An area of the sea is enclosed to stop whales and dolphins getting out, and instructors tame the mammals before they are taken to dolphinariums around the world - a practice many animal conservationists consider cruel.

Belugas have a small hump on their heads used for echo-location and it was thought that there would be more chance of striking up a rapport with them without clothes as a barrier.

The average human could die if left in sub-zero temperature sea water for just five minutes.

But Natalia is a yoga expert and used meditation techniques to hold her breath and stay under water for an incredible 10 minutes and 40 seconds.

There are about 100,000 belugas in the wild.

The first to be held in captivity was shown at Barnum's Museum in New York in 1861, and there are belugas in aquariums and sea-life parks across Europe, North America and Asia.

Their large range of "facial expressions" comes from them having a more flexible bone structure than other whales.

Certainly, these two had a big smile for the naked Natalia.

Esri Appoints Dawn J. Wright as Chief Scientist

PRNewswire: Esri Appoints Dawn J. Wright as Chief Scientist
REDLANDS, Calif., June 16, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Ocean scientist, geographer, and geographic information system (GIS) author Dawn J. Wright will join Esri as its chief scientist on October 3, 2011. She will help formulate and advance the intellectual agenda for the environmental, conservation, climate, and ocean sciences aspect of Esri's work while also representing Esri to the national/international scientific community.

"As a scientist, Wright brings a background of rigor that will strengthen our alignment with the requirements of the scientific community," said Jack Dangermond, Esri president. "In her capacity as chief scientist, she will interface with government, business, industry, and the public and collaborate with them to understand and find solutions for our planet."

A notable authority in geographic information science, Wright has for the past 16 years teamed with scientists worldwide who use GIS to map and analyze terrains, ecosystems, and habitat. She combines her expertise as a geographer and GIS user to map the seafloor; design geospatial solutions for coastal mapping and charting; and advise organizations on oceanography and fisheries, including her current service on the National Academy of Sciences Ocean Studies Board. She has worked with the GIS community to develop data models and create solutions for analyzing the ocean.

"I am honored and excited to serve with Esri in this capacity, and I look forward to helping advance Esri's science vision and scientific strategy as well as new initiatives to strengthen ocean GIS," said Wright.

Wright is currently professor of geography and oceanography at Oregon State University and will continue to be affiliated with the university. In 2007, the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education named her US Professor of the Year for the State of Oregon. She is also a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a new fellow of Stanford University's Aldo Leopold Leadership Program in science communication. Her research interests include geographic information science; ocean informatics and cyberinfrastructure; benthic terrain and habitat characterization; and the processing and interpretation of high-resolution bathymetry, video, and underwater photographic images. Wright received a PhD in physical geography and marine geology from the University of California, Santa Barbara; an MS in oceanography from Texas A&M; and a BS with honors from Wheaton College in Illinois. She is also certified by the GIS Certification Institute as a GIS professional (GISP).

About Esri
Since 1969, Esri has been giving customers around the world the power to think and plan geographically. The market leader in GIS technology, Esri software is used in more than 300,000 organizations worldwide including each of the 200 largest cities in the United States, most national governments, more than two-thirds of Fortune 500 companies, and more than 7,000 colleges and universities. Esri applications, running on more than one million desktops and thousands of web and enterprise servers, provide the backbone for the world's mapping and spatial analysis. Esri is the only vendor that provides complete technical solutions for desktop, mobile, server, and Internet platforms. Visit us at esri.com/news.

First Person Singular: EPA administrator Lisa Jackson

WashingtonPost.com: First Person Singular: EPA administrator Lisa Jackson
My godfather, Father Joseph Verrett, encouraged me [as] a very young girl when he realized that I was academically gifted to be a scientist. very influential in just making me believe that that was totally normal. My pediatrician was a woman, and it just never occurred to me that women weren’t doctors or scientists, ’cause in my family and in our culture there were no limits on what I could do. It wasn’t unusual at all to think about science.

The definition of an engineer is somebody who can formulate a problem and then solve it. And usually the language of science and engineering is mathematics, so it’s the ability to take our problems and challenges, whether it be in the chemical world or the electrical world, and then solve them through problem solving. Some of the science-focused careers have the reputation of being emotionless, and so, in order to be a good scientist, you have to divorce emotions from the equation, and I don’t think that’s true.

Part of my message to young women is that your natural human compassion is actually a strength in solving problems, because it means you see more than just the technical challenges — you see the human challenges. So, when the president talks about energy efficiency, I can explain many reasons why energy efficiency makes sense in terms of controlling pollution and making our country less dependent on foreign oil, but oftentimes it’s about the things that matter most to people, which is the pocketbook, the impact on the health of their children, the impact on air pollution and public health. The best scientists are very much compassionate; they’re very much humanists, and they understand that man and mankind, womankind, are part of the ecosystem, so we have to do our part and protect it.

The politics right now inside the Beltway are very tough. It’s probably as polarized a time as we’ve ever seen, and I work on an issue that I don’t believe is political. We rely very heavily on the science and following the law and being transparent. If you’re going to talk about people’s health, you need to be as transparent as possible. Communities that are overburdened with a lot of pollution — smokestacks or tailpipes; old, dirty diesel trucks — they are keenly aware of the connection between those sources and their health. Oftentimes, communities that are the poorest, that you might think would quote, unquote, worry about more important things, understand that it is absolutely fundamental to their health to have a strong EPA that enforces the Clean Water Act or enforces the Clean Air Act.

What’s amazing about this job is, it doesn’t matter if they voted for this president or not — they care deeply and believe overwhelmingly that clean air means health, and dirty air means sickness and death. And a community can’t thrive without clean water. It’s universal. It’s a very American belief.