Outreach — Borniger Lab

It doesn't count if no one understands it…

Science is for everyone. Anybody fascinated by life's interesting questions and the current research surrounding them deserves to become part of the public discourse on science. Traditional news media do a generally terrible job at relaying scientific findings to the public in an unbiased, factual manner.

Here lies the opportunity for scientists to interact with the public directly. It is our job to not only do the work, but to make the work understandable. Writing up your research in an easy to understand fashion also makes you reflect on the key findings and implications of your results. Additionally, we can use this platform to provide advice on career development, applying to graduate schools, and how to navigate academia. In college, I started writing science articles for a general audience (several are linked below; full list in CV), which I continue as a hobby today.

A good platform that I’ve joined is Skype a Scientist, a service that connects scientists with classrooms all over the world via skype. If you have an event I may be interested in, please contact me via email (bornige@cshl.edu).

Screen Shot 2018-08-31 at 10.33.33 AM.png — Do cigarettes have long lasting effects on children's sleep?

This is a summary I wrote for Frontiers for Young Minds, detailing how early life exposure to nicotine alters sleep in adulthood (click link above; image: Frontiers for Young Minds).

Screen Shot 2018-08-31 at 10.42.28 AM.png — Photoperiod and brain blood flow: Changing day length to alter cerebral perfusion

This is a summary of our research on how day length (photoperiod) alters blood flow to the brain in white-footed mice (click link above; image: JCB).

Screen Shot 2018-08-31 at 10.50.53 AM.png — Melatonin: An old hormone with new tricks

This describes some exciting findings relating melatonin with relapse rates in multiple sclerosis. (click link above.; image: Jooyeun Lee)

Screen Shot 2018-08-31 at 10.54.40 AM.png — Messing with the ‘Flip-Flop’ Switch: Why Getting Sick Makes You Sleepy

This is a piece describing why we so often feel tired and low energy during periods of sickness (click link above; image: Jooyeun Lee)

Screen Shot 2018-08-31 at 11.00.57 AM.png — Leaping into the unknown

I wrote a piece for *Science* about switching career paths from anthropology to neuroscience, and the hardships that came with that. (click link above; image: Robert Neubecker).

Screen Shot 2018-08-31 at 11.22.31 AM.png — Snark-hunters once more: Rejuvenating the comparative approach in modern neuroscience

I wrote this to highlight the myopic approaches of modern neuroscience, and emphasize that we need to take advantage of more of the available nervous systems on the planet (click link above; image: Frank Beach, 1950).

Banner Image: tomato-lectin-DyLight-594 labeled capillaries (red) in mouse hippocampus (credit: JCB).