Ratree Sritrung 5

Ratree Sritrung 5 is the home-coming event held at Mahidolwittayanusorn School located inside Mahidol Salaya, Nakorn Pathom.

I was the first generation of students who graduate Mattayom 6 from this school, when it was at Wat Rai King, a famous temple in Nakorn Pathom.

It took them 5 years before the school was built at Salaya. The 5th generation students who organized this year event gave a theme to the night as New Land, for their transition from Wat Rai King to Salaya location.

I took Fujifilm S1500 with me and I was surprised to see how well the camera was able to handle the on-stage events. It didn’t do well for the normal flash photography though.

Link: Ratree Sritrung 5 from Mahidolwitt.com website.

Snorkelling

Scholars Science Camp 2009 was organized by the Faculty of Science, Mahidol University at Sattahip, Chonburi province, Thailand between 20-22 November 2009.

Participants of the camp came from various scholarship-supported students at the Faculty of Science. It was the second Scholars Science Camp in my memory at Mahidol University. The previous one was held in 2006 at Parchaubkirikan Province.

More than hundred students were taken to the beautiful sea around Samasarn Island. We spent the morning session on the Khoa Ma Joh mountain, where we have the science rally that includes plant diversity study, pH indicator from flower extract, measuring and calculating area and slope.

The students were also asked to help solving various world crisis, such as global warming, biodiversity, food, water, energy, waste, and pollution. Their presentations were very entertaining with some good idea at the end.

Panelist

Department of Biology and Plant Sciences hosted the third Junior Science Club of this academic year. To celebrate the 200 years of Charles Darwin and his big idea on the Origin of Species by means of natural selection, we asked the editor of the most anticipated Thai-translated version of Darwin’s famous book to join us.

The Junior Science Club is the event that we take turn to organize a special seminar on various topics. The photograph of our latest meeting can be found on the Biology homepage, provided below.

Link: Junior Science Club — Past, Present, and the Future of the Origin of Species

S1500

My previous attempt to replace the old S5100 was ended  within 2 months, as I sold the S5800.

A year has passed, and finally my S5100 was broken. The plastic lock at the battery chamber gave way, snapped in pieces while I was using the camera to take some pictures in October.

The unsatifactory of using S5800 kept me from buying a new camera. I thought I might have to buy a DSLR this time. However, I don’t think the DSLR would be my logical choice, given my purpose with the camera, and where I use my photographs.

The new S1500 price and specification allow me to buy it, with just a brief consideration.

I have used it for a night, during the Loy Kra Tong festival in Thailand here. At a glance, it is smaller than S5100 and have slower responsive. The picture quality is fine with me, so I might finally get my new camera this time.

Funny thing is that S1500 and S5100, both share the number 1 and 5, but just at different places.

GradExpo2009

MUSC GradExpo2009 was a success from my point of view. We have a number of people in the faculty of science coming together, sharing their research idea, exchanging questions.

Comments and feedbacks have been on the positive side. The analysis of the evaluation forms might be available later. I would expect to see suggestion that ask for a similar event in the next year.

SC STAR or Faculty of Science Students with Talent and Achievement in Research presentations were brilliant. The commentators at the end of each student were even better and informative.

Plenty of research posters were available outside of the Lecture building. Not enough time to see all of them.

My favorite part have to be the Grad Expo Night, a party that have Moo Kra Ta (self-fried pork on Korean-style pan) and Karaoke singing contest as the main event.

More information on the event can be obtained from the official website.

Chetana Nagavajara

Stang Mongkolsuk’s Special Lecture 2009 in the 51st anniversary of the Faculty of Science, Mahidol University.

Emeritus Professor Chetana Nagavajara gave us a lecture on the topic of aesthetics in scientific research from his point of view.

With the backgroud in comparative literature, he compared the work in arts and sciences.

Both can be driven by internal forces, such as curiousity. At the end, both could gain satisfaction. Along the way, this could help the others, scientists could solve some of the problems.

At the end, in summary, the unity between the intrinsic satisfaction and the role it can fulfill for the society will bring aesthetics in scientific research.

Link: Department of Biology Homepage

Arabidopsis

Evolutionary Genetics: Concepts and Case Studies is a new textbook (published in 2006) that the Stang’s Library have just acquired.

A few months ago, I requested this title to be available for SCBI 607 Evolutionary Genetics course. At that time, we have only Maynard-Smith’s 1998 Evolutionary Genetics textbook.

Unfortunately, the book arrived just after we have finished the lecture and examination. It will be useful for other group of students, other courses, I hope.

Contents are divided into major 6 parts, including basic and advance topics, as well as, as the title implied, case studies from various aspects.

Fox CW, Wolf JB, editors. Evolutionary Genetics: Concepts and Case Studies. Oxford University Press, USA; 2006.

Proc. Conf. Sci. Tech. 2009

Here is the cover from the Proceedings for the 4th Conference on Science and Technology for Youths 2009 held between 20-21 March 2009 at BITEC, Bangkok, Thailand.

It took almost 7 months to come out. The up-coming issue will be available before the conference even started, according to plan.

Research articles were submitted from scholarship-supported graduate students. Editorial board consists of the committee from the Association of Students supported by DPST scholarship (ASDPST). Papers were peer-reviewed by established Thai scientists around the country.

The hard copies can be found in the library, given that the copies have been distributed. The online version can be obtained from the provided link.

Link: Proc. Conf. Sci. Tech. 2009

Genetic and Succession

I also have some other websites. One of them is www.evolution.in.th, which is the website that new entries will be posted occasionally on evolution and genetics.

Research articles are summarised and posted on the web in Thai, with most of the technical terms translated and tagged. I hope that some students who are not good at English will find the content on the website useful. For other reasons, the website provide the host for my other websites, see the side bar here.

Some new entry from now on, if relevant, I will add comment on the significance of the paper on my research as well. I think this could make the career in science more visible to the public, as well as the students themselves.

Final Exam

Are you ready for the biology final examination?

The question is for the first-year students at Salaya. Those that were not ready for the examination will have less than 2 days to prepare themselves.

It is near the end of the first academic term, but they just cannot go home without having themselves tested against the final examination. It is not the best system to see how much they have learnt or how well they understood the topics.

Some of the students claim to be able to do the exam with just thier highschool knowledge, but underestimate the final examination might earn you lower grades than you have hoped for.

Have a quick quz at our Biology homepage.