The graphical abstract is an effective way to convey a complex message in an eye pleasing format that is easily digested. I wanted to creat[...]e a neuroscience-based one as it would be an extension of my work with creating graphic designs and would take advantage of my current studies. From the initial, crowded to the final, clean abstract, I'll go through my thought process and provide links to useful resources.

Justified text is awesome. Clean lines align well with other elements and it doesn't produce a crazy jagged edge. But without hyphens, prob[...]lems quickly arise. Some lines have super large spaces between words and the end look is quite ugly. There are several solutions: css, server-side, and javascript.

And here it seemed I'd forgotten to write about the last exhilarating weeks in Singapore. Fear not! Beautiful buildings, a Hong Kong speed-[...]run, and more food await the eager reader.

Made a small app that allows browsing of Nobel Laureates. Also provides link to their Wikipedia and Pubmed. Might expand to include picture[...]s or some publications. Enjoy!

Created a small app, implemented in python and PHP, that crawls authenticated Facebook page for Youtube videos and adds them to a specified[...] user's Youtube playlist. Useful for groups that post a lot of youtube videos and want a centralized playlist to share with others. I'll go over some of the implementation details in this post.

Archived everything in my inbox. It's awesome. Continues my general trend of simplifying. Logging off websites, only checking the news for [...]brief periods, and focusing on a core set of hobbies. Eliminating distractions and reducing information overload are doing wonders to fight off stress and keep me humming along.

James J. Polk expanded the territory of the United States by about one-third during his tenure. A remarkable feat. Not only that, but i[...]t was done through an astonishing three ways: territorial conquest, gold and negotiation.

Some thoughts on why we should demand less rhetoric and more pragmatism/details from our presidents.

"You can't prove other stars exist!" We lived in fear. Those in the past cannot understand this fear. Swirling un[...]der the sea of anxiety is hatred, a deep abhorrence for the past and all it held. I skittered along the barren floor, my features obscure and hidden by the dearth of light. A hundred, thousand, countless years ago there was light, said the old text. But none was to be found. They warned of a time when no 'stars' would twinkle in the sky, but they were wrong. There were never stars.

What happens when the universe changes, forever hiding information about its past.

Before finishing my adventures in Singapore, I was asked to put together a final report describing my experiences and where the program cou[...]ld improve. Rather than bore you with details, I've included a link to download the report. This is a draft form and I'll update the link with a finished version in the future.

Scott Adams recently wrote about citizenship and how the Internet [...]will bring the fall of territory-based national governments, and by extension wars. In this post I briefly highlight where he errs and give reasons why country divides will only grow sharper in the coming decades, in part due to competition for dwindling water, oil and other resources along with increasingly fraught intranational civil relations.

The chef's ingredients are scattered throughout the Guild Wars 2 map, but the profession is a cheap way to get 10 levels quickly. Because I[...] am OCD and would rather not read text when I can browse a spreadsheet, compiled information from a couple of sources that is more easily searchable.

We have entered into unknown territory, the nebula around us swirls with shades of pink, purple and orange and the light of stars long[...] dead. It is a breathtaking sight. There are several young stars drifting through the ether that flare and burn the sky. It has been two years since our last encounter with a solid planet and some of the crew was starting to lose it. Luckily for us, we'd been given some ridiculous suits.

A tale that examines that pressing question of all explorers: How far would you go, and what would you sacrifice, for knowledge?

Like many people, I was programmed to like my job, least I grow bored or suicidal. But this was the future! The biologist were supposed[...] to engineer out man's desires and policy makers slowly outlaw this barbaric practice. But it is hardly surprising that didn't happen.

A story about the future of prostitution.

Marina Bay Sands, Sydney, Haw Pa Villa and more! The good times keep rolling in Singapore.[...]

When coding, writing up blog post, or doing any other task, I generally have used Notepad++. It is a great program that au[...]tomatically detects, based on the extension, the type of code you are writing and parses the file accordingly. It is light and gets the job done, but it always felt like it could be taken to the next level. Enter Sublime Text 2, a program that seems to have everything I am looking for in a text editor and then some.

quicklinks is a new homepage for those looking for efficiency over lavish use of big buttons commonly seen in Firefox, Opera and other brow[...]ser's homepages. As quicklinks is still a little rough around the edges and needs to be updated, I've added it to GitHub to allow me to update it easier.