351. Girls only
Save This Post as PDFI think, it is a scientifically proved, established fact that women are so much more explicit in conversations between each other than men, isn’t it? 
Via uzhas_sovka.
350. V for Vendetta
Happy Easter (and Pesah), everybody!
Via uzhas_sovka.
349. The question of quality
Last time we had a nice, surprisingly long discussion trying to answer the question how much should you publish in order to be considered a successful postdoc 
From Michal’s point of view, this is not quantity but quality of your publications that should matter.
Actually, I completely agree with this point of view – that’s how it should work in the idealized world. However, the quantity of papers that you publish per year still matters. Imagine that people from hiring committee in the place where you are applying to are not quite familiar with your work, while the average number of citations per paper of yours is about 10 (typical situation for a good fresh graduate student, isn’t it?). There are hundreds of applications similar to yours that they go through. In practice, it means that in the first round hiring committee will probably choose people with longer list of publications. Or, what is more probable, they will choose people with larger overall number of citations, presumably a good measure of quality of your work.
I wouldn’t be I if I wouldn’t try to quantify the problem – quantify the quality of our work So, the first question I would like to ask is as follows: how good is the total number of citations as a metrics of the quality of your work? If not, is it possible that some other metrics work better? For example, I’ve heard that it is virtually impossible to get permanent position if your h-factor is below 10 Is h-factor is good enough to quantify the quality of your work?
Bonus video: Worst jobs in science 2007, ABC News version.
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348. Trading olympiad
As usual, no physics today, True Geeks, only fun very distantly related to physics is allowed!
Interactive Brokers has just announced that the 2009 IB Collegiate Trading Olympiad is now over. What is the idea of the olympics? Naturally, an unspecified number of guys – mostly, students of various universities – each create a piece of software for online real-time trading and compete with each other trying to generate the largest profit. To enter the olympics, you don’t have to deposit a non-zero amount of your personal hard earned money to the IB account, while the prize money that you get after winning the competition are very much real: being the 1st will bring you $100000, the 2nd and 3rd – $50000, etc.
(click on the Fig. to see a bigger version)
This year, the Number One is Kevin Warner (who was also the 3rd in 2008!) – $150000=$75000/year would be a kind of nice addition to your fellowship if you are a student, wouldn’t it? My warmest congratulations!
The winner shares his strategy:
With respect to crude, I didn’t have a particular directional opinion, but rather was levered to profit from a big outright move (either way) or from a change in the price and implied volatility relationships between it and its products – RBOB gasoline and heating oil.
I bet this strategy is rather popular among WS professionals in 1000 dollar suits who make their billions in the same rather simple way
(By the way, last year he has played with volatility options – also, rather popular at that time.)
Regarding olympics, interestingly, a) Ahmed Taha (the number 2) was the leader for the entire competition, b) not all prizes were awarded – probably, not so many people were successful enough , c) to get $10000 you had to devliver a 30% gain for 2 months, d) and you had to deliver 260% gain for two months to become Kevin Warner.
Via uzhas-sovka.livejournal.com and pythagoruz.blogspot.com who ended 29th
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347. Numerical simulation of vortices: video of the day
A video by New Scientist magazine featuring some really nice simulations of developed turbulence in the presence of vorticity field.
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