Take caution. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
> The mother's age had no impact, and daughters seemed to be immune.
When a significant effect is seen in only one of four comparisons (maternal vs paternal, sons vs daughter), then you have to suspect that the effect might be spurious.
That's interesting, I thought there was a correlation between older mothers and autism, and autism has a correlation to geekiness.
My wife had our youngest daughter at 40 (I was 43), and my daughter was diagnosed as autistic at 3 and a half. After lots of therapy she was able to mainstream at age 8, and made the honor roll this year.
This morning she noticed a year in a book her older sister was reading. She exclaimed "That's the year Isaac Newton was born!". I said "okay" not sure if she could be right, and she then whispered to me, "and it's the year Galileo died". I looked it up, and she was right. So I kind of consider her geeky.
Here is one answer in the form of an analogy -- but I preface this by saying that comparing the set of all academic science with the set of all industry science is fraught at best -- academic science is to cottage industry as industrial science is to factory production.
A related consideration is that training grad students and post-docs is a key component of most academic science. The requirements of training often limit the size of teams working on a single project with the PI-trainee relationship dominating the organizational structure.
As the "PI" of a science startup R&D team, I can start and stop new projects at will with varying team sizes and mandates without the consideration that my folks need to produce a body of published work to further their careers.
I can't tell if the author is describing Iron Gall ink (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_gall_ink) but it's not especially hard to make in small quantities if you have the ingredients.
This is indeed a recipe for iron gall ink. Different parts of trees were used in different locations, but gall nuts were common around the mediterranean, hence the name. It is, as you say, easy to make, but it can ruin a good fountain pen due to its corrosiveness.
Outside of the germline, C. elegans does not undergo cellular division in the adult stage. There is a fixed developmental pattern, with exactly 959 cells in the adult hermaphrodite. Also, the connectivity map of the entire nervous system is known.
I do believe that this is a permanent showstopper for modeling C. Elegans reproduction, correct?
I would be very curious to hear if there have been any plans to one day re-visit the model to allow reproduction, and if any thought has gone into how that process could be allowed!
> The mother's age had no impact, and daughters seemed to be immune.
When a significant effect is seen in only one of four comparisons (maternal vs paternal, sons vs daughter), then you have to suspect that the effect might be spurious.