They say that music soothes even the savage beast, and while we can’t vouch for any beast-related benefits, we are excited to welcome the brain-tingling Dan McCalley and Shell Space to the stage for this month’s Nerd Nite!
Dan McCalley – “A New Era in Mental Healthcare: Brain Stimulation Therapy for Addiction and Beyond”
A (brief) history of alcohol and drug use throughout human society, a look at our previous (not-so-great) attempts to treat addiction, and a final pitch for how brain stimulation may bring about a new era of medicine for addiction and beyond.
Bio: Dan McCalley, Ph.D. is a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford. His research focuses on developing Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, an FDA-approved depression treatment, for addiction.
Shell Space (Band) – “Nerd Rock”
A musical tour of nerdom, from literature to mathematics and everything in between.
Bio: Shell Space is a six-piece indie rock band birthed in Berkeley. Their songs reference Tilden Park, rectangles, and feldspar
Come one, come all, to the first Nerd Nite of 2024! We’re excited to start off the year with some classic local topics and histories. Featuring talks from trailblazers (both literal and figurative) local trivia gurus, and a UCSF medical researcher, this is one show you don’t want to miss!
Get your tickets here! Wednesday, February 21st Doors 7pm / Show 8pm $10 online / $15 door
Lucas Ho – “Hidden History of the Presidio/Marina”
What are the earthquake shacks? How did Laguna St get its name? Where was Irish coffee introduced to the US? Learn all this, and more hidden history of the Presidio/Marina.
Speaker Bio: Lucas is a software engineer living in San Francisco who was born and raised in the Bay Area. He previously worked with the authors of Walking SF’s 49 Mile Scenic Drive to create a walking tour app, which inspired a walking tour he led, which inspired this Nerd Nite talk.
Joe Gibson – “The Wild World of Trailbuilding”
Have you ever been hiking on a trail and wondered, “how did this get here?” Trail crew leader Joe Gibson will peel back the curtain on the subtle art of trail building, sharing a glimpse of the techniques, philosophy, and science that go into making a hiking trail seem like it has been there since time immemorial. We will explore the arcane profession of trail work, with all of its culture, quirks, and adventure. You’ll never look at a trail the same!
Speaker Bio: Joe Gibson is a writer, photographer, and trail crew leader based in San Francisco. You can follow his project to document trail work and trail workers at trailcrewstories.com and @trailcrewstories on social media.
Jennifer Grandis – “Gender Equity in Medicine and Science”
Gender inequities are found throughout medicine and science. Stories about men and women physicians and scientists from across the US will be shared with the goal of making inequities visible and identifying potential solutions.
Speaker Bio: Dr. Jennifer R. Grandis is a physician scientist who is interested in the impact of gender on career development in medicine and science. She is an ENT surgeon who studies head and neck cancer with the goals of enabling precision medicine studies. She has leveraged her access to head and neck cancer patients and their biospecimens to optimize translational research studies that include developing novel therapies in the laboratory for clinical application as well as generating and interrogating relevant preclinical models to determine the underlying mechanism of clinical findings. In her institutional roles at the University of Pittsburgh and since 2015, at UCSF, she has facilitated collaborations between clinicians and investigators with an emphasis of developing a robust research infrastructure to support clinical and translational cancer studies. She has published over 400 papers in the peer-reviewed literature and been continuously funded by the NIH since joining the faculty in 1993. Dr. Grandis is an elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation the Association of American Physicians and the National Academy of Medicine. She is an American Cancer Society Clinical Research Professor.
We are as always thrilled to welcome our friends of the show!: Beats by DJ&Jelly The San Francisco Public Library Self-help Tarot with Ben Grandis
Hot nerd summer continues! This time featuring: SHARKS (well, their biology at least. No live sharks will be present, we promise); thinking of DNA as nature’s hard drive; and what can you learn about yourself via the cultural phenomenon that is tarot? ALSOtarot readings will be part of the program from 7:15-7:45! Come early for your chance to see what the cards have to say about you! NOTE: our “what happens when you only eat algae for a month?” and “why would someone ever do that??” talk has been rescheduled for August 16 at the Rickshaw Stop. More details for that show soon.
Sharks Aren’t Infesting San Francisco Bay, But They Do Live Here! by Meghan Holst
Sharks don’t infest the waters they are in, they just live there! San Francisco Bay, CA is no exception. In fact, one of the highest-ranking apex predators, the broadnose sevengill shark, uses this bay as a place to pup their young. Sevengill sharks are found worldwide but the population along our coastline is the only population where we can consistently find juvenile sevengills in a pupping and nursery ground year-round! That opens a very unique opportunity to study these sharks at the beginning of their lives. So, why is a pupping and nursery ground important, and what are the conservation needs around this unique shark? Join us to find out!
Meghan Holst is a third-year PhD student at UC Davis in the Graduate Group of Ecology. Meghan has completed a MSc in behavior and physiology of octopuses with an emphasis on how these correlate with welfare. Now she is pursuing a PhD in ecology studying the broadnose sevengill shark in San Francisco Bay. Meghan is equally passionate about conservation science as she is social justice and science communication work. In 2021, Meghan co-founded the 501(c)3 non-profit, Minorities In Aquarium & Zoo Science (MIAZS), and now maintains an executive directorship pursuing the mission to advance aquarium and zoo science by diversifying the professionals and their perspectives within it. Additionally, Meghan co-hosts a science podcast, Sharkpedia, where the primary authors of elasmobranch research are interviewed to communicate their science and strategies to the general public. Meghan intends to continue conducting science, communicating science in fun and interactive ways, and actively working to make the science fields more diverse and inclusive.
Meghan holds a baby shark in the name of science, not song!
Tarot Me A Story byBen Grandis (AKA Beneficent Coach)
Tarot cards have commonly been depicted in popular culture as an occult tool for fortune telling. But what if you could harness them to gain deeper insight into your own mind rather than some theoretical future event? By examining the art of Tarot through a psychology lens, learn how the cards can help you tell your life story in new, bold, and exciting ways. From “The Hero’s Journey” to Jungian archetypes to Rorschach tests, let’s explore how tarot is a powerful way of discovering personal intuition and self-understanding.
Ben Grandis is a Professional Life Coach & Tarot Reader who thrives on compassionate curiosity. He specializes in helping folks from all walks of life get clarity on what they want and how to get there. With a professional background ranging from non-profits, major corporations, and startups, he always brings a people-centric approach towards supporting others in their wellness journey. You can connect with Ben at www.beneficent.coach, on Instagram @beneficent.coach, or by email at .
Come early to experience Ben’s take on what the cards have in store for you!
DNA Data Storage: Using three billion year-old technology to solve a modern dilemma by Brian Bramlett
The generation of digital information has outpaced the growth of storage capacity from early on, and the gap continues to grow exponentially. Meanwhile, no modern technology can store and retrieve data on timescales of more than a couple decades. Nature has evolved its own data storage medium—DNA—could that be the solution? Let’s talk about it!
Brian Bramlett is a Technology Strategist, bringing teams and technologies together to build world-changing platforms. For over 35 years he has worked across a diversity of fields, from Smart Toys to Wearables, and most recently, synergies between semiconductors/computing and synthetic biology.
Brian rocks a t-shirt depicting the tried and true ACGT sequence of a DNA molecule, which is so 3 billion years ago. Binary encoding is the new nerd on the block!
We will also be joined by our partners in nerd-dom: the SF Public Library! Get a library card, don some library swag, and find out what cool events the Library is putting on in between thinking and drinking along to our presenters!
Congratulations! You have happened upon our website, where you’ll find information on all our future and past events (going back to 2010!). We are Nerd Nite SF, a monthly lecture-in-a-bar series where people from all walks of life give presentations on everything from video game design to historic shipwrecks. We’ve hosted mimes, musicians and everyone in between, with the goal of being entertaining, silly, and most of all, educational. Come learn a new fact, make a new friend, or try a new drink! Rickshaw Stop creates a special drink based on the month’s presentations!
