@IAmSciComm - On a Break!さんのイラストまとめ

The main animals are relatively done at this phase, so we moved on to the environment. We knew there were sponges in the area, but not what kind. I drew some placeholder sponges to consult co-author Joe Botting.

Turns out I was dead wrong about the sponge anatomy lmao.

Today I'll be tweeting about the process behind my latest image—the 460 million years old wonder "worm" Mieridduryn bonniae!

The paper only came out yesterday, so if you want to read the science, go to this thread by @jopabinia. https://t.co/y03i9AqqdR

We were fortunate to work together with Lili Chin (@lilita_yaya) for the upcoming article in Frontiers for Young Minds (@FrontYoungMinds).

Have you ever worked together with an artist to better communicate your science? #SciComm #ArtInScience #AcademicTwitter #AcademicChatter

Art can help bridge the gap between scientists and the general public. A great illustration can say more than a thousand words. One of my favorite artists is the phenomenal Lili Chin (@@lilita_yaya). #mamboandshimmy

Cats respond to various parts or tissues of this plant: leaves, stem (wood) and fruit galls. Cats do not respond to the normal kiwi fruit, only the galls. Galls are deformed fruits, and are the result of a little midge (P. matatabi) depositing eggs in the flower bud.

Or, after some of the magic of @lilita_yaya (more about her on Friday!). Please note that we decided to still refer to the response as the "catnip response", even though it's also seen in reaction to other plants. Catnip pretty much started it, so some credit to catnip!? (:

The other plants that we tested were silver vine (Actinidia polygama), valerian (Valeriana officinalis) and Tatarian honeysuckle (Lonicera tatarica). To be more specific, we tested the barkless wood of the latter, roots of valerian and dried fruit gall powder of the former.

A more interesting question I wanted to answer was if there were alternatives to catnip and if catnip non-responders might respond to those other plants. The internet was a good resource to find plants that I could test. Plenty of anecdotes, but cat bio-assays were never done.

@DennisRenMD

Day 2 recap!
I talked about scicomm through podcasting, with some great advice from professionals at the end:
https://t.co/wVAV0OjRwx

And participating in all sorts of scicomm events:
https://t.co/biCjXx98mu

Looking forward to tomorrow!

Tweets by @AckermansNicole