Liza Gross - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Liza Gross

PLoS Biology, 2009

To test the effects of temperature on food web structure and productivity, Mary O'Connor (above, ... more To test the effects of temperature on food web structure and productivity, Mary O'Connor (above, checking temperatures) and colleagues placed five microcosms of food webs (shielded from full sunlight and UV) in eight independent water tables, each filled with a temperature-conditioned water bath.

PLoS Biology, 2006

Munc18-bound syntaxin readily forms SNARE complexes with synaptobrevin in native plasma membranes.

PLoS Biology, 2006

HIV-1 particles assembling at the surface of an infected macrophage.

PLoS Biology, 2006

RAG transposition, thought to be rare, is actually robustly stimulated by the correct hairpin tar... more RAG transposition, thought to be rare, is actually robustly stimulated by the correct hairpin targets. One structure, however, inhibits transposition by preventing target capture. Freckleton RP, Harvey PH (2006) Detecting non-Brownian trait evolution in adaptive radiations.

Sociology of the Sciences Yearbook, 2011

Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed... more Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone (Albert Einstein).

PLOS Biology, 2021

A new collection of evidence-based commentaries explores critical challenges facing scientists an... more A new collection of evidence-based commentaries explores critical challenges facing scientists and policymakers working to address the potential environmental and health harms of microplastics. The commentaries reveal a pressing need to develop robust methods to detect, evaluate, and mitigate the impacts of this emerging contaminant, most recently found in human placentas.

Sociology of the Sciences Yearbook, 2011

Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed... more Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone (Albert Einstein).

PLoS biology, 2018

The stories of science are told many ways, in many places. Scientists share the ups and downs of ... more The stories of science are told many ways, in many places. Scientists share the ups and downs of the research process over raucous conference cocktails and long hours on the road, across lab benches and conference call lines, and around campfires after long days in the field. These stories underlie every scientific paper yet rarely appear alongside the tables and graphs. To read the often dull, sometimes tedious reports that fill the scientific record, you'd never know that science is a human endeavor, like any other, shaped by tragedy, comedy, and (mis)adventures. In this issue of PLOS Biology, we highlight the deeply human side of research in a new collection, "Conservation Stories from the Front Lines." These narratives present peer-reviewed and robust science but also include the muddy boots and bloody knees, ravaging mosquitoes, crushing disappointment, and occasional euphoria their authors experienced. We deliberately sought stories of triumphs and tragedies, successes and failures, and invited a diverse group of scientists to submit contributions written in their own voices. Rather than cling to a standard structure, we asked authors to choose their own format to best present their ideas, experiences, results, and conclusions in a style that is compelling, concise, and accessible. Our focus in this collection is conservation-science that speaks to the management and preservation of species and ecosystems. Contributions range from perspectives on an existing body of research to the presentation of novel research findings. Authors were encouraged to breathe life into their scientific stories by incorporating narrative elements such as characters, scenes, conflict, and resolution. Karen Lips describes the agony of watching the rainforest frogs she studied for years suddenly and mysteriously disappear [1]. Nick Haddad shares epiphanies about the recovery of rare species gleaned from humbling struggles with his health [2]. Elizabeth Hadly confesses her fear that the days when government leaders acted on evidence of human-driven planetary emergencies may be gone [3]. Emmanuel Frimpong urges us to consider how the ecological role of an overlooked fish warrants a new approach to freshwater fish conservation [4]. And Sergio Avila-Villegas reveals how a painful encounter with a jaguar changed the trajectory of his life and his life's work [5]. Stories are powerful, even transformative. Most of us are aware of that power, based either on personal experience or on stories we know from the media and entertainment industries. But we can go beyond intuition and look to the scientific study of stories. Compared with argumentative or evidence-based communication, narratives focus on causal linkages among a sequence of events influenced by the actions of specific characters. They often carry an emotional punch and relate these events in a way that resonates with readers. As a result, narrative has the power to improve comprehension, increase topical interest, influence real-world beliefs, and achieve persuasive outcomes [6].

PLOS Biology, 2021

A new collection of evidence-based commentaries explores critical challenges facing scientists an... more A new collection of evidence-based commentaries explores critical challenges facing scientists and policymakers working to address the potential environmental and health harms of microplastics. The commentaries reveal a pressing need to develop robust methods to detect, evaluate, and mitigate the impacts of this emerging contaminant, most recently found in human placentas.

PLOS Biology, 2018

What is it about stories that captures the human imagination? Writing coaches will tell you that ... more What is it about stories that captures the human imagination? Writing coaches will tell you that readers care more about what happens next than they do about beautiful prose. Neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga says that stories help us make sense of the world. In the 1970s, Gazzaniga identified a brain region in the left hemisphere, which he dubbed "the interpreter," that tries to fit everything into a story, even filling in missing gaps, in a deep-seated need to create order from chaos [1]. Trouble is, our reliance on story to interpret the world also makes us vulnerable to conspiracy theories and false narratives that happen to dovetail with our values and worldview. Scientists and science educators have long wrestled with the challenges of communicating evidence that contradicts people's personal, religious, or political beliefs, particularly regarding evolution, vaccine safety, and climate change. A perfect case study of people's tendency to create their own narratives in the face of incomplete information is the recent viral response to a photo of a starving polar bear. The photographers intended to show what the future of climate change might look like: polar bears depend on sea ice to hunt seals, walruses, and other prey. As more sea ice melts, bears will lose their hunting platforms and likely starve to death, placing the species' survival at risk. But people interpreted the image through their own personal lens. Some recognized the effort to illuminate the costs of climate change while others seized on the photo to deny climate change by pointing to healthy bears as evidence that the species is doing fine. The photographers recently said they were shocked by the response and realized they'd "lost control of the narrative" [2]. Against this backdrop, we asked an Arctic mammal expert and two social scientists to weigh in on the challenges and pitfalls of communicating scientific evidence around climate change. Their contributions appear in the collection publishing this week, "Confronting climate change in the age of denial" [3]. Sue Moore and Randall Reeves draw on decades of research on marine mammals to set the record straight on the likely impacts of climate change on wildlife populations in the Arctic. "Marine mammals are ecosystem sentinels, capable of reflecting ocean variability through changes in their ecology and body condition," Moore, a biological oceanographer, and Reeves, a marine mammal biologist, write in "Tracking arctic marine mammal resilience in an era of rapid ecosystem alteration" [4]. They explore the life history traits of endemic and migratory Arctic species to gauge their capacity to adapt to ecosystem changes caused by rapid warming and identify potential winners (bowhead and gray whales) and losers (polar bears and walruses). The authors propose a framework to facilitate rapid assessments of population status and guide management and conservation efforts. The framework enhances traditional approaches, they argue, by including ecological indicators-including geographic range and behavior-and physiological

PLoS biology, 2018

The stories of science are told many ways, in many places. Scientists share the ups and downs of ... more The stories of science are told many ways, in many places. Scientists share the ups and downs of the research process over raucous conference cocktails and long hours on the road, across lab benches and conference call lines, and around campfires after long days in the field. These stories underlie every scientific paper yet rarely appear alongside the tables and graphs. To read the often dull, sometimes tedious reports that fill the scientific record, you'd never know that science is a human endeavor, like any other, shaped by tragedy, comedy, and (mis)adventures. In this issue of PLOS Biology, we highlight the deeply human side of research in a new collection, "Conservation Stories from the Front Lines." These narratives present peer-reviewed and robust science but also include the muddy boots and bloody knees, ravaging mosquitoes, crushing disappointment, and occasional euphoria their authors experienced. We deliberately sought stories of triumphs and tragedies, successes and failures, and invited a diverse group of scientists to submit contributions written in their own voices. Rather than cling to a standard structure, we asked authors to choose their own format to best present their ideas, experiences, results, and conclusions in a style that is compelling, concise, and accessible. Our focus in this collection is conservation-science that speaks to the management and preservation of species and ecosystems. Contributions range from perspectives on an existing body of research to the presentation of novel research findings. Authors were encouraged to breathe life into their scientific stories by incorporating narrative elements such as characters, scenes, conflict, and resolution. Karen Lips describes the agony of watching the rainforest frogs she studied for years suddenly and mysteriously disappear [1]. Nick Haddad shares epiphanies about the recovery of rare species gleaned from humbling struggles with his health [2]. Elizabeth Hadly confesses her fear that the days when government leaders acted on evidence of human-driven planetary emergencies may be gone [3]. Emmanuel Frimpong urges us to consider how the ecological role of an overlooked fish warrants a new approach to freshwater fish conservation [4]. And Sergio Avila-Villegas reveals how a painful encounter with a jaguar changed the trajectory of his life and his life's work [5]. Stories are powerful, even transformative. Most of us are aware of that power, based either on personal experience or on stories we know from the media and entertainment industries. But we can go beyond intuition and look to the scientific study of stories. Compared with argumentative or evidence-based communication, narratives focus on causal linkages among a sequence of events influenced by the actions of specific characters. They often carry an emotional punch and relate these events in a way that resonates with readers. As a result, narrative has the power to improve comprehension, increase topical interest, influence real-world beliefs, and achieve persuasive outcomes [6].

PLOS Biology, 2016

Until Dustin Hoffman's uncanny performance as an autistic savant in Rain Man, few outside medical... more Until Dustin Hoffman's uncanny performance as an autistic savant in Rain Man, few outside medical circles knew much about autism. Hoffman's humane portrayal of a socially inept man prone to nervous tics and obsessive ruminations, punctuated by stunning feats of math and memory, challenged us to accommodate people with special needs and reconsider our notions of normalcy. (For the record, only about one in ten people with autism are savants.) Such compassionate views of autistic people were hard to find a decade later, after the British gastroenterologist Andrew Wakefield unleashed a panic with a now thoroughly discredited, retracted 1998 paper that linked the measles virus in the measles, mumps, rubella vaccine to autism. Suddenly, autism became a parent's worst fear [1]. Wakefield paved the way for a rotating roster of unsupported theories that linked vaccines to autism, and many parents stopped vaccinating their kids. Celebrities like Jenny McCarthy encouraged parents to see autism as far scarier than a deadly disease like measles and blamed an expanded vaccine schedule for skyrocketing autism rates. It didn't matter that experts attributed the increase to clinicians' heightened awareness and new diagnostic criteria that saw autism as a constellation of neurodevelopmental conditions, from the severely disabled to the highly gifted, now called autism spectrum disorder (ASD) (Fig 1). Pediatricians hoped parents' fear of vaccines-and corresponding stigmatization of autism-would finally subside when scientists figured out ASD's causes. Unfortunately, unraveling the causes of such a complex range of conditions has proved challenging. Still, researchers have associated mutations in over 100 genes with ASD and have linked alterations in the structure and function of brain regions with autistic traits [2]. Many studies have focused on genes involved in the formation of synapses, the junctions between brain cells [3].

PLoS Biology, 2009

To test the effects of temperature on food web structure and productivity, Mary O'Connor (above, ... more To test the effects of temperature on food web structure and productivity, Mary O'Connor (above, checking temperatures) and colleagues placed five microcosms of food webs (shielded from full sunlight and UV) in eight independent water tables, each filled with a temperature-conditioned water bath.

PLoS Biology, 2006

Munc18-bound syntaxin readily forms SNARE complexes with synaptobrevin in native plasma membranes.

PLoS Biology, 2006

HIV-1 particles assembling at the surface of an infected macrophage.

PLoS Biology, 2006

RAG transposition, thought to be rare, is actually robustly stimulated by the correct hairpin tar... more RAG transposition, thought to be rare, is actually robustly stimulated by the correct hairpin targets. One structure, however, inhibits transposition by preventing target capture. Freckleton RP, Harvey PH (2006) Detecting non-Brownian trait evolution in adaptive radiations.

Sociology of the Sciences Yearbook, 2011

Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed... more Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone (Albert Einstein).

PLOS Biology, 2021

A new collection of evidence-based commentaries explores critical challenges facing scientists an... more A new collection of evidence-based commentaries explores critical challenges facing scientists and policymakers working to address the potential environmental and health harms of microplastics. The commentaries reveal a pressing need to develop robust methods to detect, evaluate, and mitigate the impacts of this emerging contaminant, most recently found in human placentas.

Sociology of the Sciences Yearbook, 2011

Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed... more Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone (Albert Einstein).

PLoS biology, 2018

The stories of science are told many ways, in many places. Scientists share the ups and downs of ... more The stories of science are told many ways, in many places. Scientists share the ups and downs of the research process over raucous conference cocktails and long hours on the road, across lab benches and conference call lines, and around campfires after long days in the field. These stories underlie every scientific paper yet rarely appear alongside the tables and graphs. To read the often dull, sometimes tedious reports that fill the scientific record, you'd never know that science is a human endeavor, like any other, shaped by tragedy, comedy, and (mis)adventures. In this issue of PLOS Biology, we highlight the deeply human side of research in a new collection, "Conservation Stories from the Front Lines." These narratives present peer-reviewed and robust science but also include the muddy boots and bloody knees, ravaging mosquitoes, crushing disappointment, and occasional euphoria their authors experienced. We deliberately sought stories of triumphs and tragedies, successes and failures, and invited a diverse group of scientists to submit contributions written in their own voices. Rather than cling to a standard structure, we asked authors to choose their own format to best present their ideas, experiences, results, and conclusions in a style that is compelling, concise, and accessible. Our focus in this collection is conservation-science that speaks to the management and preservation of species and ecosystems. Contributions range from perspectives on an existing body of research to the presentation of novel research findings. Authors were encouraged to breathe life into their scientific stories by incorporating narrative elements such as characters, scenes, conflict, and resolution. Karen Lips describes the agony of watching the rainforest frogs she studied for years suddenly and mysteriously disappear [1]. Nick Haddad shares epiphanies about the recovery of rare species gleaned from humbling struggles with his health [2]. Elizabeth Hadly confesses her fear that the days when government leaders acted on evidence of human-driven planetary emergencies may be gone [3]. Emmanuel Frimpong urges us to consider how the ecological role of an overlooked fish warrants a new approach to freshwater fish conservation [4]. And Sergio Avila-Villegas reveals how a painful encounter with a jaguar changed the trajectory of his life and his life's work [5]. Stories are powerful, even transformative. Most of us are aware of that power, based either on personal experience or on stories we know from the media and entertainment industries. But we can go beyond intuition and look to the scientific study of stories. Compared with argumentative or evidence-based communication, narratives focus on causal linkages among a sequence of events influenced by the actions of specific characters. They often carry an emotional punch and relate these events in a way that resonates with readers. As a result, narrative has the power to improve comprehension, increase topical interest, influence real-world beliefs, and achieve persuasive outcomes [6].

PLOS Biology, 2021

A new collection of evidence-based commentaries explores critical challenges facing scientists an... more A new collection of evidence-based commentaries explores critical challenges facing scientists and policymakers working to address the potential environmental and health harms of microplastics. The commentaries reveal a pressing need to develop robust methods to detect, evaluate, and mitigate the impacts of this emerging contaminant, most recently found in human placentas.

PLOS Biology, 2018

What is it about stories that captures the human imagination? Writing coaches will tell you that ... more What is it about stories that captures the human imagination? Writing coaches will tell you that readers care more about what happens next than they do about beautiful prose. Neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga says that stories help us make sense of the world. In the 1970s, Gazzaniga identified a brain region in the left hemisphere, which he dubbed "the interpreter," that tries to fit everything into a story, even filling in missing gaps, in a deep-seated need to create order from chaos [1]. Trouble is, our reliance on story to interpret the world also makes us vulnerable to conspiracy theories and false narratives that happen to dovetail with our values and worldview. Scientists and science educators have long wrestled with the challenges of communicating evidence that contradicts people's personal, religious, or political beliefs, particularly regarding evolution, vaccine safety, and climate change. A perfect case study of people's tendency to create their own narratives in the face of incomplete information is the recent viral response to a photo of a starving polar bear. The photographers intended to show what the future of climate change might look like: polar bears depend on sea ice to hunt seals, walruses, and other prey. As more sea ice melts, bears will lose their hunting platforms and likely starve to death, placing the species' survival at risk. But people interpreted the image through their own personal lens. Some recognized the effort to illuminate the costs of climate change while others seized on the photo to deny climate change by pointing to healthy bears as evidence that the species is doing fine. The photographers recently said they were shocked by the response and realized they'd "lost control of the narrative" [2]. Against this backdrop, we asked an Arctic mammal expert and two social scientists to weigh in on the challenges and pitfalls of communicating scientific evidence around climate change. Their contributions appear in the collection publishing this week, "Confronting climate change in the age of denial" [3]. Sue Moore and Randall Reeves draw on decades of research on marine mammals to set the record straight on the likely impacts of climate change on wildlife populations in the Arctic. "Marine mammals are ecosystem sentinels, capable of reflecting ocean variability through changes in their ecology and body condition," Moore, a biological oceanographer, and Reeves, a marine mammal biologist, write in "Tracking arctic marine mammal resilience in an era of rapid ecosystem alteration" [4]. They explore the life history traits of endemic and migratory Arctic species to gauge their capacity to adapt to ecosystem changes caused by rapid warming and identify potential winners (bowhead and gray whales) and losers (polar bears and walruses). The authors propose a framework to facilitate rapid assessments of population status and guide management and conservation efforts. The framework enhances traditional approaches, they argue, by including ecological indicators-including geographic range and behavior-and physiological

PLoS biology, 2018

The stories of science are told many ways, in many places. Scientists share the ups and downs of ... more The stories of science are told many ways, in many places. Scientists share the ups and downs of the research process over raucous conference cocktails and long hours on the road, across lab benches and conference call lines, and around campfires after long days in the field. These stories underlie every scientific paper yet rarely appear alongside the tables and graphs. To read the often dull, sometimes tedious reports that fill the scientific record, you'd never know that science is a human endeavor, like any other, shaped by tragedy, comedy, and (mis)adventures. In this issue of PLOS Biology, we highlight the deeply human side of research in a new collection, "Conservation Stories from the Front Lines." These narratives present peer-reviewed and robust science but also include the muddy boots and bloody knees, ravaging mosquitoes, crushing disappointment, and occasional euphoria their authors experienced. We deliberately sought stories of triumphs and tragedies, successes and failures, and invited a diverse group of scientists to submit contributions written in their own voices. Rather than cling to a standard structure, we asked authors to choose their own format to best present their ideas, experiences, results, and conclusions in a style that is compelling, concise, and accessible. Our focus in this collection is conservation-science that speaks to the management and preservation of species and ecosystems. Contributions range from perspectives on an existing body of research to the presentation of novel research findings. Authors were encouraged to breathe life into their scientific stories by incorporating narrative elements such as characters, scenes, conflict, and resolution. Karen Lips describes the agony of watching the rainforest frogs she studied for years suddenly and mysteriously disappear [1]. Nick Haddad shares epiphanies about the recovery of rare species gleaned from humbling struggles with his health [2]. Elizabeth Hadly confesses her fear that the days when government leaders acted on evidence of human-driven planetary emergencies may be gone [3]. Emmanuel Frimpong urges us to consider how the ecological role of an overlooked fish warrants a new approach to freshwater fish conservation [4]. And Sergio Avila-Villegas reveals how a painful encounter with a jaguar changed the trajectory of his life and his life's work [5]. Stories are powerful, even transformative. Most of us are aware of that power, based either on personal experience or on stories we know from the media and entertainment industries. But we can go beyond intuition and look to the scientific study of stories. Compared with argumentative or evidence-based communication, narratives focus on causal linkages among a sequence of events influenced by the actions of specific characters. They often carry an emotional punch and relate these events in a way that resonates with readers. As a result, narrative has the power to improve comprehension, increase topical interest, influence real-world beliefs, and achieve persuasive outcomes [6].

PLOS Biology, 2016

Until Dustin Hoffman's uncanny performance as an autistic savant in Rain Man, few outside medical... more Until Dustin Hoffman's uncanny performance as an autistic savant in Rain Man, few outside medical circles knew much about autism. Hoffman's humane portrayal of a socially inept man prone to nervous tics and obsessive ruminations, punctuated by stunning feats of math and memory, challenged us to accommodate people with special needs and reconsider our notions of normalcy. (For the record, only about one in ten people with autism are savants.) Such compassionate views of autistic people were hard to find a decade later, after the British gastroenterologist Andrew Wakefield unleashed a panic with a now thoroughly discredited, retracted 1998 paper that linked the measles virus in the measles, mumps, rubella vaccine to autism. Suddenly, autism became a parent's worst fear [1]. Wakefield paved the way for a rotating roster of unsupported theories that linked vaccines to autism, and many parents stopped vaccinating their kids. Celebrities like Jenny McCarthy encouraged parents to see autism as far scarier than a deadly disease like measles and blamed an expanded vaccine schedule for skyrocketing autism rates. It didn't matter that experts attributed the increase to clinicians' heightened awareness and new diagnostic criteria that saw autism as a constellation of neurodevelopmental conditions, from the severely disabled to the highly gifted, now called autism spectrum disorder (ASD) (Fig 1). Pediatricians hoped parents' fear of vaccines-and corresponding stigmatization of autism-would finally subside when scientists figured out ASD's causes. Unfortunately, unraveling the causes of such a complex range of conditions has proved challenging. Still, researchers have associated mutations in over 100 genes with ASD and have linked alterations in the structure and function of brain regions with autistic traits [2]. Many studies have focused on genes involved in the formation of synapses, the junctions between brain cells [3].