Welcome!

My name is Jef (Jennifer) Akst. I am an aspiring science writer interested primarily in animal behavior. Currently, I am a biology graduate student at Indiana University studying mating behavior and sexual selection in seahorses. (Check out my website for more information.)

Science has always been a passion of mine…from junior year in high school, when I was finally freed of those pesky physical education and foreign language requirements and voluntarily enrolled in five (five!) science classes, to a whirlwind bachelor’s degree in biology at the College of William & Mary to my current graduate endeavors at IU, science has dominated my academic life.

But for the past couple of years, I’ve been intermittently nagged with the worry that I was not as interested in biology as I should be. My studies have grown so focused that I feel I have begun to lose perspective on the rest of the biological community and where my work falls within it. And while I still find seahorses fascinating, minor (and not so minor) setbacks in the research can really dull the excitement I once felt for the sciences. While other students in my programs talk about their research with an enthusiasm that, to me, seems warranted for nothing short of winning the lottery, I haven’t felt ‘all jazzed up’ about anything biological in years.

I’ve struggled with whether or not this was a problem. On the one hand, it seems slightly outlandish to dedicate several years of one’s life (and an infinitely greater number of headaches) to something that could be qualified as a mere interest. On the other, it seems equally ridiculous to expect any one topic of study to generate an interminable excitement that would carry one through to retirement.

So while science remains interesting to me, my passion has clearly dwindled, and I justified this with the gross generalization that it’s just a job, and no one actually likes his job anyway, right? Who really cares? More importantly, who cares if I don’t?

But recently I’ve been feeling excited again. I’ve started to take an interest in science writing. Taking a step back from the ever-narrowing scope of my research has allowed me to once again see science as I used to: a captivating and contemporary field that is constantly churning out hoards of remarkable new research. It has restored my passion for the science that was, in all honesty, starting to bore me. I am once again exploring areas of science outside my particular specialty and LOVING it.

So I’ve decided to start a blog. Not only will it keep me in tune with a much broader focus of behavior than my own research, I get to share what I learn with all of you, and the idea of sparking an enthusiasm for science where disinterest and distrust once resided, motivates me beyond anything I could have predicted. Hopefully you will find these tales of the amazing things animals do as remarkable and noteworthy as I do. Please feel free to leave comments about any of my articles and/or e-mail me with additional questions. Happy reading!