P.C. Shannon

This is the first leap year we've had in eight years. There wasn't a February 29th in 2000 because century years where the century number is divisible by four aren't leap years. So the last time that happened was way back in 1600. The year is most easily approximated as being 365.25 days long, but obviously that's not exact, so we're constantly having to make minor adjustments. Most of us never notice expect for the scientists who keep really accurate clocks, like the atomic clocks run by the government or those aboard GPS satellites. Even these two systems can't completely agree on what time it is and can differ by 10 or 20 milliseconds. Trivial to most of us, but this does present problems for systems that rely on precise timing, like long range fiber optic communications links. Or airliners, which use GPS, and ground-based air traffic control systems, which use the atomic clocks.

I just read this article about Yahoo and Sendmail teaming up to verify the identity of e-mail senders. This is a big issue for spammers, who often forge their indentities. Incidentally, that’s how e-mail borne viruses spread, too. If you get a message from Joe containing a virus, it most likely was not sent by Joe. Viruses these days spoof the sender’s address, the same way spammers do. Spammers just fake it. But in the case of a virus (and continuing the previous example), it came from from a third person who’s address book had both you and Joe in it. With new measures in place to verify a sender’s identity (which will drastically reduce, but not completely eliminate spam — it will make things a lot easier for filters, too), viruses will no longer be able to spoof the sender’s indentity. While that won’t completely stop viruses (they can just use the real sender’s information), it will make it much easier to track down infected computers, and perhaps even trace viruses back to the original author.

This stem cell silliness has produced the most unlikely victors. First Korea, and now New Jersey. Looks like California may not be far behind either. There may be some hope for this country after all.

I’m in the process of applying for an IGERT fellowship, and part of the application calls for a 1-2 page summary of research interests and goals. I wrote a first draft as best I could, having never attempted such a thing before. I felt like it was the biggest turd I’d ever written, but I showed it to my adviser and he said it was a good start. I guess I often forget that most people aren’t as concerned with wordcraft as I am (I did want to be a writer for a number of years). Moreover, scientists tend to think of writing as peripheral to their work, so being good with words gives me a leg up in a competitive field.