Quick Picks on ScienceBlogs, July 11

There's so much good stuff on ScienceBlogs today that I'm moved to do something drastic: namely, to post, and point out the contributions that have been rocking my morning.

This one got by me the first time, but I'm glad I found it: a Retrospectacle article about how to cook up your own vitamin C. Shelley says the store-bought stuff loses potency over time (any chemists out there who can support or debunk this claim?) Wild...and very DIY.

Pharyngula reveals that the annoying, cranium-penetrating sound that mosquitoes make is actually a love song of sorts - a fact that only increases his disgust with the little buggers. Having been to Minnesota once, I can imagine his pain.

Jonah at The Frontal Cortex makes a short and sweet post about a recent study concluding that psychedelic psilocybin mushrooms frequently cause deeply spiritual feelings in people taking them, and that the mushrooms might, therefore, have valid therapeutic applications.

Terra Sigillata forwards a call for participants in an NIH study of long-lived families. If you have two or more relatives over the age of 80, and live near Pittsburgh, Boston, New York, or southern Denmark, check it out for a chance to help science figure out, in Abel's words, "what allows some of us to live so well."

The World's Fair posts a highly entertaining review of the McSweeney's kid-friendly science title Your Disgusting Head.

Effect Measure contributes a sobering overview of bird flu's spread, and last but not least, Pure Pedantry is completely on fire. I can't decide which I like more - his funny/serious piece on in-vitro meat, or his serious/serious piece reviewing evidence against the idea that adult humans grow new brain cells.