My favorite trait, and the one I’m quite thankful to have, is what’s know as the photic sneeze reflex. Sometimes called the Peroutka Sneeze Gene or even ACHOO syndrome (how droll), this reflex causes one to sneeze when exposed to bright light. I had always assumed everyone had this ability, but scientists estimate it affects 18 to 35 percent of the population. Try it out: the next time you need to sneeze but are not quite there, look out the window at the sun or at a light-bulb and if it pushes you over the edge then you have the phenotype! The photic sneeze reflex has intrigued great thinkers as far back as Aristotle. We still don’t know which gene is responsible for it, but we do know only one copy is needed, and it isn’t on either the X nor Y chromosome. How it works is still unexplained by science, but many experts now agree that crossed wires in the brain are the cause.

Here’s one you may have tested back in high school biology: The gene that detects the odor of cyanide. Do you remember your teacher passing around a vial and asking if you could detect a sweet almond smell? That’s what cyanide smells like to around 20 to 40 percent of the population. Studies have also found that men are less likely to smell cyanide than woman. About 18%-20% of men are not able to smell cyanide at all, whereas only 5%-10% of woman cannot. The rest of the population is able to detect the smell in significant quantities, but only 40% can smell it in trace amounts.

Quick, clasp your hands together! Now look down at your thumbs. Most people place their left thumb on top of their right one. Try clasping your hands so that the opposite thumb is on top and you’ll notice it doesn’t feel quite right. As random as it may seem, hand clasping with the left thumb on top is a dominant phenotype.

Do you have caveman fingers? Some people have hair on the second (middle) joint of one or more of their fingers. If you have hair on any of these middle joints then you posses the dominant phenotype. I was just kidding about the caveman thing–it doesn’t mean you’re less evolved, the absence of this hair is just based on a recessive allele.

Speaking of digits, next time you’re barefoot or in sandals, look at your second toe. If it’s longer than your big toe you have what is called morton’s toe (or sometimes “Greek foot”). Although this is a dominant genetic trait, it’s part of the genotype of only 10% of the world’s population (and can be a real hassle when sizing Five Fingers)!

There are many other common and observable phenotypes, but these are some of my favorites. To learn more about genetics check out Wikipedia’s series on the subject (be sure to scroll down to Related information at the very bottom).

Sources:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=why-does-bright-light-cau

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photic_sneeze_reflex

http://www.helium.com/items/1532959-human-genetic-traits-with-complete-dominance?page=2

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morton%27s_toe

“Sneeze” by wise.adam
“Green Poison” by ohsoabnormal
“sparkle Toes” by Robert S. Donovan
“Gravestone Sculpture 2″ by fallingribbons
“tiiiiiiiiiny camera, maaaassif lens” by Abulic Monkey

I think Celemony has just changed digital audio manipulation forever. Watch this video, its so awesome! They’ve created what they call “Direct Note Access”, which i call arpeggiation, or breaking a chord down to its individual notes. This may seem simple but was never possible before! We’ve always wanted it, but to my knowledge nobody had yet done it (or at least not in a consumer product with a simple GUI to boot!).

Today we lost the last of the great 3 masters of science fiction. Arthur C. Clarke passed away at 1:30am local time in Sri Lanka, where he’d lived for over 50 years, of breathing complications. He was 90 years old.

Pay your respects to this science fiction (and science fact) legend by re-reading your favorite novel of his. If you’ve never read him, do yourself a favor and try any of his extensive bibliography.

There is a good semi-obit at BBC News, and you can learn more about this amazing man at his wikipedia article.

With the loss of the great Gary Gygax just two short weeks ago, this is truly a sad month for us geeks.

Godspeed you, Sir Arthur C. Clarke.

The fact of the matter is creating a profile of the “School Shooter” type is impossible. Find out why at livescience.com:

a la livescience.com:

But again, most mentally-disturbed individuals don’t pick up a gun and use it. “You can’t say they have isolated themselves and they are depressed, so they are going to turn into a mass murderer,” Nelson told LiveScience. “The problem is now you’ve labeled literally tens of thousands of people incorrectly, because most people who are depressed, isolated and can’t talk, don’t become mass murderers.”

General

Adam’s website is mostly cool things he’s either made or collected over the years, and the general section basically introduces this, and gives you some background on the inventive and funny Mr. Savage. There isn’t a lot to see here, so let’s move on…

Commercial

Adam has worked in the Special Effects industry for years, and this section displays some of the work he’s done for various companies. Among them are a laser cut acrylic crane for First Union Bank, a torture device for Pizza Hut’s Mr. Bill, and a half-scale model of the Mars Viking Lander, which I particularly like, since I’m fascinated with Mars. He also talks about his work on the Coca-Cola commercial “Contraption” which was nominated for a Clio, but I can’t for the life of me find a version of it anywhere online *sigh*.

Design

This Section showcases Adam’s skill in sculpture and design. He has some great work here, especially if you have eclectic taste. I like the Frankenstein Biker Heart, Dolphin Spine, bionic eye, M1900 9-barrel, and of course the map of Middle earth.

TV Show

The TV Show pretty much just has some shots from the show. Nothing new to see here so we’ll move on.

Film

Adam has worked on some of my favorite films, like Star Wars, Space Cowboys,
A.I., and Bicentennial Man.

The eye-checker and robot pieces are two of my favorites from Bicentennial man. The eye-checker is extremely well done.

He’s also made some tiny sets for films like Space Cowboys and Titanic. Adam also showed off his fake radiator in one of the Mythbusters special.

Well, thats all there is to Adam Savage’s site. There isn’t a whole lot to write about, because its all visual! Go check it out, its worth the time, and if you did follow along, I hope you enjoyed perusing his collected works as much as I did. Stay strange people!

The best part is that it is not a flashy mindless thrown-together sort of TV show. The hosts Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman are Visual Effects professionals who attack every myth using the scientific method, use physics and science researched by a crack team of behind-the-scenes specialists, and test each myth tirelessly and thoroughly to make sure their findings are correct.

I love the show so much that I’ve made DVDs of every episode, and I encourage you to watch every episode you can, however you can get your hands of them. The subject matter is fascinating. The hosts, including the “build team”, are hilarious, with Adam and Jamie having a classic Double Act relationship. You’ll probably even learn something while watching. And lets face it, these guys are doing things we can only do in our wildest dreams.

So, now that I’ve professed my affliction for this marvelous show, we can get down to what sparked all this. For some reason I came across links to both the M5 website (M5 is Jamie Hyneman’s visual effects company), and Adam Savage’s website. These weren’t hard to find mind you, I just hadn’t ever looked for them before. Both websites have a lot of really neat stuff for both Mythbusters fans, and those just interested in the cool, weird, unusual, and funny.

First, lets highlight some neat pages at M5…

Portfolio

The Portfolio, as you might imagine, makes up the bulk of the site. Here you will find a comprehensive list of Visual Effects projects M5 has undertaken over the years. There are Commercials, Films, and Prototypes. This area is still in progress, so some of the project pages are lacking description or images, but most are there. M5 has created puppets, models, robots, and all manner of gadgets over the years.

Of particular interest are This ingenious Chef Boyardee rolling can, The massive Monkeybone set, The famous 7-Up vending tank, and of course this great vintage shot of young Hyneman!

I’d like to see video links here, maybe from youtube/google video, alas not today.

Inside M5

This section is really neat because it gives us a sneak peek into M5I’s inner workings. As you’ve seen on Mythbusters, there are artifacts stuffed and dangling all over the place from past builds and projects. We also see some build tools like band and table saws, caulk, paint supplies, and CAD equipment. Also hanging out in M5I is a chatty rat, I believe from the Junkyard Wars commercial, and one of the guys from Naked Lunch looking like an alien autopsy photo. I’m not linking these, to encourage you to hunt them down yourself.

Staff

The staff section has a little bit about a couple of the people that make M5 function. As a side note, I stumbled upon this page by Cris Rocha who is apparently renting his family’s Villa, lol.

Departments

The Departments section gives us a look at the different areas of M5 that go into creating these crazy concoctions. Among them are the Modelshop, Moldmaking, Machine shop, Painting, Woodshop, Robotics, Electronics, Welding, and Fabrication.

The Machine shop is where their two-time champion BattleBot Blendo was constructed.

Press

The press area is that last area of the M5I site (besides Contact, which is just for companies wanting to hire M5). In this section you can view Article excerpts from magazines M5′s creations have been featured in.

Well, thats about all the fun stuff on the M5 Industries page. I really enjoy looking at the projects they’ve done in the past. I hope you do too!

I’ve decided to split this into a two-parter, and Adam Savage’s website has some really zaney stuff, so check out part two here.