Scientists are making use of social media in their day jobs too. This past April, researchers from Stanford University published a paper describing an algorithm they developed to predict the spread of infectious disease and inform vaccine administration using social networking data collected from Facebook. And in October, astronaut Douglas Wheelock checked in to the location-based social media site Foursquare from space, then tweeted about it moments later to nearly 100,000 Earth-bound followers.

From job searches to vicarious space travel – and advice about that blank Western blot too – social media surely is every scientist’s friend.

Leslie W. Chinn (leslie.chinn@gmail.com) is an ORISE fellow at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.