As runners-up, the jury chose Emily Choy, a postdoctoral fellow who is doing research about the effects of climate change on seabirds in the Arctic, and Ada McVean, a master’s student who has an active and ongoing presence as a well-versed science communicator on the radio, on TV and on various social media platforms.
Read the entire article here: https://reporter.mcgill.ca/challenging-times-mcgill-researchers-step-up-to-help
Our guest this week, Ada McVean, is pursuing a Master’s of Chemistry at McGill University in the Damha Lab (alongside our good friend James Thorpe from Ep. 30!). Her current research is focused on creating small modified nucleic acid-based inhibitors (or SNuBs) of Cas9 using click chemistry, to interrupt the normal functioning of the CRISPR complex. Questions Answered Why might we want to prevent a CRISPR complex from editing our genes? How do SNuBs interrupt a ribunucleic threesome? If gene editing is a play, who are the characters and what sorts of hijinx do they get themselves into? Can Turtles breathe out of their butts? How do lava lamps produce their magically entrancing goopy light show? Will wearing a hat speed up the balding process? and many, many, many more!
Listen here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/5OCtjggihVNQVNQckMgsdx?si=U3V5arJnQeODCw_DR9kVsw&utm_source=copy-link&nd=1
In this preview of a new Harbinger Society Presents the panel buries Federalism as writer Nora Loreto (Sandy and Nora Talk Politics), chemistry researcher Ada McVean and podcaster extraordinaire Aliya Pabani (We Are Not the Virus) join host Andre Goulet to discuss what the colliding crises in long-term care, homelessness and academia tell us about the limitations of government in an increasingly fake country after almost a year of pandemic trauma.
Listen to the episode here: https://www.spreaker.com/user/8993462/xhsp-ep9-preview
Ada McVean’s mother, Theresa, died on April 14, 2019 — the day before the Ontario Disability Support Program deposited her bi-monthly cheque.
McVean, a 24-year-old McGill student, thought it might help cover her 44-year-old mother’s funeral expenses but learned she’d would have to pay it back.
Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) staff said they’d need the money to offset the costs of covering her funeral; they paid to ship her body from the hospital to the funeral home, cremation, and the cardboard box the ashes came in.
“I couldn’t just not give my mom a funeral,” McVean said, explaining that even the most basic service cost $8,000.
Read the entire article here: https://www.orangeville.com/news-story/10136856–my-mom-wasn-t-lazy-she-got-sick-orangeville-woman-shares-story-of-how-odsp-kept-her-mother-trapped-in-poverty/
Montreal’s summer sunsets have been particularly glorious of late.
Images of bright orange and pink skies have been cropping up on social media and online, but is it really different from what we’ve seen in previous summers?
Ada McVean, a science communicator for the McGill Office for Science and Society, says yes.
Read the whole article here: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/what-s-the-science-behind-montreal-s-recent-vibrant-sunsets-1.5667591?cmp=rss
Ada McVean 