Welcome to a new episode of our STEM interviews. Today I have with me Jade Simon from the University of Toronto. And she’s going to talk about her dinosaur research and also her lovely flatmate or life partner we can already see in the camera. It’s so lovely to have you with us. Thanks. Thank you for having me. Can you just as a start, summarize the research project that you’re working on for our audience? Sure, yeah. I’m a PhD candidate, University of Toronto and the Royal Ontario Museum. And I studied theropod dinosaurs. And I look at their bones under the microscope, basically, and look to see how old they were when they died. So I study the changes in their anatomy through their lifespan, and also there, the called ontogeny, and then I look at how that might impact whether we’re looking at lots of different species, or whether we’re accidentally naming young animals as their own individual species, and getting them a little bit confused that way. Okay. So you’re basically finding your species or saying, Hey, you know, these two species see these two samples are actually the same species. They’re just like, 50. Yeah, apart from each other. Exactly. Yeah. So it’s like if you had a puppy and an adult dog, but you didn’t know if you were like, from another planet, you might think those are different species, until you learn that one is just the young version of the other. Yeah, and right now, there’s a lot of work kind of doing that in dinosaurs, because it’s pretty recent. The actual histology, looking at the bones under the microscope is a somewhat recent field. So we’re sort of untangling that. What did the young ones look like? What is the kind of sub adults look like? What are the adults look like? Nice? And how can you actually distinguish that because under the microscope is still going to look like two different samples? How do you find how do you actually say, Hey, no, this is actually the same species? How do you do that? That’s a great question. So when we’re looking at the bones to try to decide what we think the animal is, a lot of these species actually look pretty similar. And so they’re split on really fine differences. And so when we look at the bones of the microscope, we can actually see the cellular level of detail of the bone tissue. That’s how well, a lot of fossils are preserved. And we Yeah, yeah. And we can look at the vascularity. So the blood canals and how dense those are through the bone, we can look at the actual lacunae, the little spaces where the bone cells used to be, and the matrix they lay down around themselves as they’re building up the bone. We can look at all of that, and these lines of arrested growth that develop sort of like tree rings, very similar to that actually, yeah. Yeah. So they, the bone grows outward, and you get these pauses in growth, that indicate a slowdown, and you can use as a sort of an annual marker, and you can figure out how relatively mature you can’t always get the exact age, but we can figure out like, Okay, this one’s very mature. This one’s very, yeah, and sorted out that way. So how old did dinosaurs get? What’s like the oldest dinosaur that we? Yeah, what’s the lifespan? That’s a really good question. So we actually somewhat recent fields, so we don’t have a ton of age data for lots and lots of different dinosaurs. But we do have a good sample for very well known charismatic Triceratops. We all have samples for T-Rex. Okay, so previous research is showing that the oldest T-Rexes that we have that have been sampled are somewhere in their late 20s to 30s. But that’s probably not as old as they could get. That’s just the old and we have in the fossil record. Yeah. So with dinosaurs, and especially with something like a large predator, a lot of them are kind of like live fast, die young. So they’re, they’re dying at an age that we’re not sure if that’s their maximum age, or we’re getting kind of a skewed sample of the population. So so far, late 20s, early 30s for something like a large theropod and smaller dinosaurs have a slightly smaller, slightly shorter sorry, life span, okay, yeah, and then things like sauropods, the really big ones. They have a slightly longer so a couple of maybe a couple decades more than something like a T-Rex. Yeah. Okay. I mean, that makes sense. Otherwise, you have all this biological mess, and then it just dead after like, 20 years. Yeah. Okay, that’s so cool. So if you actually find like a species where you said like, Okay, this used to be once one species, this used to be another one, but actually, it’s the same did you find this year? It has been shown in other works. So right now I’m trying to do that. I’m trying to figure out that question for a group of theropods called Oviraptors, or they are very silly looking, they have a beak, they don’t have any teeth. They’re feathered, they have like crests on their head, like kind of look like a big cassuary-like thing. And they’re, they’re really well known for brooding on their nest. If you’ve been to one of the larger national history museums, you may have seen a dinosaur on a nest, because a lot of museums have a cast of some of these really famous dinosaurs on top of their eggs. A lot of those are Oviraptors. And we don’t know very much about their growth and their diversity. So there hasn’t been very much of the histological work done on Oviraptors. So that’s what I’m tackling for my dissertation. And we think that we’re pretty close to being able to write up some results showing a couple a couple of things are probably actually the same issues and just different growth, growth morphs. I’ve just finishing up some of my data collection. And currently we’ll be right at writing that soon. Yeah. So that’s the fun part, how the analysis and discussion and how does it look to other fields and other species and other samples? But yeah, no, that’s so cool. Amazing. So did you actually go out to the field yourself and took the samples? Where did you for these? For my specimens? I’m sorry, for my dissertation? No. So paleo paleontology is interesting, it’s pretty rare to dig up something that you then work on for your degree, because the field collection process takes so long, so we collect something in the field, it’s been prepped in the lab, and then it can be researched. So there’s several steps. And that can take a very long time during the priority of the specimen. We’re talking many, many years. Yeah. So usually, for a masters or a PhD, you start with specimens that are already in museums or in the institution you’re working at. And then you dig to gain experience. So I have been on several digs. They just weren’t for the material I was currently working on. Okay, more established, more established, paleontologists have gotten to a point where they are doing that. So not not early career, folks. But it’s so cool. It’s so interesting to know, you have like 100 million old specimens there. And there’s a lot of specimens in collections. So we I mean, we have things in field jackets from, you know, several past years that just haven’t had time to move through the preparation process in the lab yet. Yeah. Okay. So you got to think you got to stay in the field and actually do your own like, digging experiment and then actually prep the stuff yourself and find your own research question or, I would love to do that. So we do we come up with at the PhD level, most of us, depending on institution, we do come up with our own research questions. And we kind of figure out where the specimens that we could use for this. But yes, I would like to be a paleontologist, professionally after my PhD. I would like to be a field paleontologists, if possible, there’s not very many job opportunities. Okay. field work and research in a very small field. But I would really, really like field work and research and teaching. If I can, if I can find it sounds good in that nice. Yeah. Especially because you have a bit of a challenge when it comes to field work yourself, which is why you have a dog sitting next to you or sleeping, actually. How does it work for you? How does your disability disable you from field work? Or how’s it another challenge? Well, already big challenge. Yeah, that’s a really good question. I have a difficult time in the field with some aspects, mostly heat and sort of like logistics of of hiking and walking. And I have not actually done a field seasons since my disabilities have progressed to the point that they’re at now. So it’ll be interesting to see kind of how that goes. But I am really excited to get back out there and, and see how, like what I can do to adapt it for myself. But previously, when I’ve done field work, I just have to really bring a lot of extra supplies. Okay, yeah. Yeah, I bring a lot of extra like, electrolytes and salt and things like that to add to my water because one of my disabilities affects my heart rate. Yeah, and so that’s actually what Basil’s main job is, is to detect my heart rate and to alert me if my heart rate goes way too high. So she’ll kind of come over and talk at me and let me know Hey, your heart rates going crazy. How does she now? And how does that work? Yeah, it’s fascinating that there’s like a whole science that could be like looked at at service dogs and how they’re trained and how that works. But she does it based on scent. So I trained her using saliva samples, when my heart rate was at different levels. And so she is learned to alert me at certain levels, whether I’m in it that’s different depending on whether I’m sitting or standing. So it’s mostly the increase that she’s noticing, so she can smell when my heart rate kind of starts to increase. And so come over and let me know. And it’s Yeah, I’m very, very impressed with her. Yeah, yeah. And she also does some mobility tests for me. So she’ll pick things up, and she does help me get around. So one way I kind of move around more easily is using a mobility harness with her. And I use a lot of braces. So I have leg braces that I use for hiking and camping and for field work, and things like that. But yeah, it’ll be really interesting to see my next field season hopefully will be this coming summer, we’ve had two that we’ve missed now with COVID. So that’s, that’s why I haven’t really been able to test out all these new measures that I have in place to help help with my disabilities. Okay. And how does it work in the lab? Is she with you in the lab, or does she sit next to you in the microscope? And basically this way? Yeah, up to? Yeah, yeah, she absolutely does. Yeah, so she has a lab coat and goggles and boobs and section. Yeah, she has her whole set of PPE. And I think that Yeah, there was a recent like, article in blog, Toronto that had her image on it. I was just seeing really quickly if I had it, but I don’t have it pulled up. But yeah, so she has all of her own PPE personal protective equipment. And she comes into certain labs with me, she doesn’t have full access to everywhere in the museum, but she comes into the lab where I cut up my fossil specimens and make sense sections and yeah, she sits on a on a mat there and just sort of watches me and wait, but I have anything goes wrong. Okay. But I’m sure it wasn’t easy to get her the lab access, right? I guess. Yeah, it must have been a bit tricky to overcome bureaucracy with this. Yeah, it was interesting. I had thought about it a lot before I approached the museum in the university about service dog access, because it’s not something you see very often so I wasn’t sure how quite to approach it. Thankfully, I did find Joey Ramp who’s a neuroscientist and service dog handler. She does a lot of advocacy with her service dog service dog Sampson on social media, very, very popular and wonderful. And she actually has put guidelines into place for labs on safety protocols, what kind of equipment and what kind of training should be required in order to open up a lab to a service dog. That way the university isn’t just kind of floundering around saying oh there’s there’s no there’s no protocol for this there’s no way to do this. So it’s really really helpful to have that so I took that basically to the university and the ROM and talked about Okay, here’s what I’ll do she’ll be trained not to lick objects when we’re out working and you know no Don’t mouth pippette, please. yeah. Yeah, not to approach people and not you know, to stay on her mat unless she needs to alert me and yeah, she does pick up the she picks up items for me at home. So one important change is teaching her that she can only pick up something if I tell her she can’t pick up things in the lab. Yeah, right. So if I dropped something in the lab, she has to know like I don’t just pick that up automatically for mom because it could have something on it that she shouldn’t encounter. So we’ve gone through that training and she’s doing really well and the museum and the university were actually pretty supportive once once I had the thing to show them on the protocol. Okay, yeah. And yeah, this like this, did this let you become an advocate for disability and STEM as well. This whole procedure of Yeah, having to go through this and having to convince people well, yeah, yeah, it’s really it’s opened it’s really made it very clear to me that there’s there’s more need for for more people pushing for this. Joey’s work is amazing. And she’s doing a lot. I think the more the more scientists we have in different fields who have who are disabled in some way, or have, you know, have mobility devices or have service dogs, the more of us that are vocal about the access barriers that we’re facing, I think the better things will be. So if we can try to push and be visible, it’s harder and harder for other people to say, Well, I didn’t think there were any disabled people in this field, or I didn’t think this was a problem. We’re here trying to talk about it. So that really Yeah, it really made me much more passionate about talking about these things. Being very public about about all of this, it’s pretty recent for me in the last couple of years, but I’ve started to be a lot more public about this stuff. Yeah. Just hoping to, to improve access, especially in museums, universities are starting to shift. museums are sort of behind the curve on that, because I don’t think they’re, there’s not quite the same institutional. Like demands. There’s not often students at every Museum, right? It’s a very different environment. So excited to kind of push for that through through the museum route as well. Okay, we have to stop pause here because you’re frozen. Oh, no, I didn’t want to interrupt you. Say just turn your camera off for a second and then turn it back under helps. Yeah. Oh, dear. Excellent. All right. Okay, so yeah, let’s just move on. Okay, so what kind of projects do you do to advocate for disability in STEM or in then museums? Is there anything particular that you support social media? I don’t know, showing the dog? Yeah, you go. Yeah, I do a lot of outreach with Basil, are very adorable, sleepy face. Already, as she’s very cute. So yeah, I tried to be as visible with her as possible as part of it. But I do a few structured things. So through the ROM, I’ve been invited to do a few of their outreach. What is it called? Sorry, a few of their outreach, like virtual events for families and kids. So one of them was like the ROM kids show. And then they recently did a workshop through their summer camp that was virtual. So they’ve had me on to talk about what are service dogs? And what do they do? And what do I do? And how service dogs like factor into science and museums and all of that. So that’s been really fun and has been, it’s been really cool to get questions from kids. Who, who by and large, like, from their feedback just didn’t don’t really see disabled scientists, and they have good questions. So that’s been really helpful. And yeah, that’s been one of my favorite outreach opportunities that I’ve had so far. I’ve also contributed to some of the literature that’s starting to come out a little bit so mostly as an interviewee at this point, but I would love to actually write about this at some point myself. Yeah. But Basil and I were featured in recent Nature Communications article on service dogs’ access in science, and ,okey , it was really nice to be able to provide sort of perspective on museums, because a lot of the other responses that they have been highlighting for the last couple of years are University based. So it was really great to add like a museum aspect to that idea. And then I also serve on the DEI Committee for the society of Vertebrate Paleontology. And through that, I’ve been trying to start to organize around more disabled scientists, disabled paleontologist tries to at least reach out to the student body and membership at that organization. So sort of the start. I’d like to build that into something more where we actually have more of a support network for disabled paleontologist to talk about what are our fieldwork options? What are our access needs, what needs to change in paleontology? Let more disabled scientists participate. Right now. It’s kind of the very early stages. Yeah, we’re just starting the community. Oh, that’s so cool. That’s so good. Good luck with it. Definitely, definitely. Important, I guess. So what do you think are the steps that need to be done right now to increase inclusive inclusivity in STEM? So great question. There’s so many things. Yeah, I think one of the most important first steps is bringing disabled people into positions where they are, are actually able to make some of these decisions, or at least have their voices heard. So bringing disabled people into decisions about fieldwork, logistics, and about how meetings are planned. I have not often seen a meeting organized from any sort of society that asks its membership, what are accommodations that would be helpful. From a disability standpoint, it’s often left, not just in conferences, but across the board, universities, everywhere businesses, accommodations for disabled people are often left up to the individual disabled person. So they have to encounter a problem, and then try to tell someone about the problem. And we also then have to come up with the solution and tell like people what the solution is and hope that it gets implemented. So this conference, so yeah, it’s a lot. It’s a lot of active stuff. And it’s a lot of work on individual disabled people, rather than kind of preventatively, taking a look at how do we set this up? Is there a way to make it more accessible? I think captions and remote access are really good examples of that, that we’ve seen throughout the pandemic, where a lot of things have become more accessible for a lot of disabled people through the last year and a half or so. And unfortunately, that is starting to go away pretty rapidly as we try to move into a post COVID, even though we’re not post-COVID a lot of remote, or a lot of remote options are being removed, and it’s actually causing a pretty increased access barrier. So I think I think just considering more of those things, having disabled people in the room to talk about that, because it might not occur to someone who’s non disabled, that there are benefits to remote access. I know, I know, a lot of us have struggled with, like virtual class and virtual teaching. But there are upsides as well, we actually need to be listening to more of disabled sciences for that. Yeah, that sounds so important. Absolutely. And what are the what is the feedback that you, for example, get on social media? Is there a lot of understanding in the field? Or are people rather like really careful of No, I don’t want to intrude? I don’t want to ask too many questions. Because, you know, it’s sort of a mix of both of you just mentioned, yeah, so some people are very receptive, I got a lot of positive feedback. Last year after our first, it was the first time we actually purposely included disability in a workshop discussion of diversity in paleo at our society conference. And it’s been sort of mentioned before, but this is the first time we were like, this is a whole set of the DEI issues that need to be talked about. And I got a lot of positive feedback from folks saying, Oh, I never thought to include an access statement for service dogs on the museum website. That’s a great idea. So that was really awesome. So there’s been a lot of feedback like that. That gives me a lot of hope for increased access, or at least increased receptiveness to some of these changes. And then some of it is pretty clearly uncomfortable. So there is a there’s an interesting taboo around disability where a lot of non-disabled people are very uncomfortable talking about it, and very uncomfortable with the language of disability. And it’s not like malicious or anyone’s fault whatsoever. It’s because culturally, most of us don’t get exposed to disability and disability, right and the language around that. And yeah, so like anything we don’t know, it’s uncomfortable, and there’s this fear of like offending people. And to the point where I have, honestly, I have quite a lot of interactions with people trying to correct me on the terms I use as a disabled person. They’re worried yet, they’re worried that I’m creating some sort of offense, unfortunately, rather than just kind of being open to it. So there’s there is interesting pushback on me even saying I’m a disabled scientist? Instead of saying I’m a scientist with disabilities? So it’s, it’s kind of runs the gamut. Yeah, there is. As a communicator I asked myself why? That’s a great question. Yeah, I, there’s an interesting debate between mostly non-disabled people who want to advocate for disabled people over what’s called person first language versus identity first language. So person first would be person with a disability, and identity first with the disabled person. Now, decades ago, in one of the initial pushes for disability rights as a civil rights issue, person first language was very important because there was a big push to see disabled people as people, because that wasn’t really happening for a long time. And so it’s important the history of person first language is important. But currently, right now, most the majority of disabled people prefer identity first language, because there’s a common feeling that we shouldn’t have to remind anyone that we’re people first, that that should be a given, and that our disabilities are inherent to how we move through the world. And if we aren’t able to talk precisely, and say things like disabled person, if we’re not able to talk in that way about it, it’s going to be much harder to actually confront the access barriers that we face in an inaccessible society. Yeah. And so by leading with disability, we’re sort of saying, there are problems here that need to be addressed that are mostly in society, rather than inherent to me as the disabled person. The access barriers aren’t 100% in society, especially as a person with chronic illness, I have access barriers within my own body. But most of the problems I face are not my disability, they’re the fact that society is not accessible for me. Yeah. So that becomes a issue. But yeah, I get a lot of kind of confusing feedback on like, people trying to police how I, I, as a disabled person, talk about disability. Okay, yeah, the feedback really runs the spectrum. Excellent to kind of odd. Okay, what do you do? are you just saying as it is, or do you sometimes just think like, I’m not ready for this better right now? Or just, oh, it depends. Usually I just say, Oh, I understand why person first language is important. However, most disabled people prefer identity first. And that’s how I choose to talk about it. And I’ll usually link to articles that that do show the kind of breakdown in percentages of identity first language preference. So I sort of take that route, I have like a standard reply dress. Of course, yeah. Awesome. All right, this has been absolutely amazing. Now, at the end of our interviews, we always have like a couple of random questions that more or less have something to do with science. It just to get to know you personally, a bit more, even though we already know a lot about you know, challenges you face every day. Can I just start these? Sure. Yeah. Okay. The first question is, what was your favorite subject at school? Oh, history. Oh, my gosh, it was really hard to choose geology. Also anthropology. I was really, really interested in archaeology for a long time. But it’s uh, yeah. You have that at school? Well, I didn’t have like a full unit on it. But we were exposed to it within I think geology and geography was the class where we were exposed to it then. Okay, yeah. But I was always really interested in rocks. So any of the earth science topics that we went over? I was definitely the kid who was like, in the gravel in the playground when it used to have gravel. like picking through looking for fossils, instead of like playing on the playground equipment. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Okay. The next question, and one sentence, what are you truly passionate about? I am very passionate about increasing access for disabled scientists. Yes. And I can I can completely support that. And yeah, I think you’re doing a great job with this. It’s amazing. It’s amazing to me. What do you do in your free time? I train Basil a lot. I do a lot of Basil training. I cook and I spend a lot of time taking care of my body because of my chronic illnesses. I do a lot of medical maintenance. It’s okay, because I’m sort of an anatomy nerd. So, you know, it fits in with my other Okey. So you still have to train her. Is it always I just like to keep her like, on top of things? Like this? Yeah. Oh, yeah, no, that’s perfect. That’s exactly what you would call it is maintenance training, but she is actually still in training. She’s only she’s only 20 months old. Okay, so she’s and she’s doing incredible with her training. So I am still actively training her and then all service dogs require maintenance training, where you spend at least a little bit of time every day kind of doing basic commands with them and keeping up on their, on their their training. Yeah. And do you do that on your own or someone helping you with this? I do a lot of it myself. Yeah, I trained I had a service dog before Basil and I trained that that service dog as well. And it was quite a learning process. And I had help from from friends and trainers and a lot of online resources that helped teach you how to do this. But yeah, so far, I have been training Basil, partly on my own and also consulting with training group in Toronto for help with the tasks. Yeah, well, it’s, it’s incredible. It’s absolutely amazing. It’s pretty fun. It’s one of my one of my favorite hobbies is his dog training. So okay, yeah. Yeah, okay. What is your favorite movie, including dinosaurs? Oh, gosh, that’s a really bizarrely difficult question. I don’t want to I don’t want to give the like very stereotypical answer of Jurassic Park. One of the originals Jurassic Park really did have a huge impact on me. I know that’s like the answer. Every paleontologist tries not to give, because it’s too obvious. But it had a huge impact on me. I have a signed like picture of Laura Dern who played the the Paleo botanist in it. And I distinctly remember multiple parts of the movie where I was like, that’s the girl being a scientist in a movie, so it was even more of her than the dinosaurs really. So okay. I never even thought to be honest. Okay. That’s Yeah, that’s amazing. Absolutely. Okay, and the last question is, what would you do if you were donated $10 million to your project? Your research project. With my research, Oh, wow. As a PhD candidate, or can I pretend I am, you can do whatever you want. It’s a million dollar for imaginary position, wherever you are, I would absolutely start a histology lab based very much on the one that I’m at currently at the Royal Ontario Museum, and also the one that I worked at at the Museum of the Rockies, I would love to start my own histology lab, and try to provide as much access as possible to that kind of equipment and specimens that could be used for histological study, I would also open a lab setting with multiple different lab types. So like her rock cutting labs, imaging lab, chemistry lab, for specifically for training service dogs in lab settings, to try to create a training program that service dog handlers could then access preferably for free or with scholarships, so that they could then have something to show to institutions that are trying to keep them out by saying that service dogs can’t be in a lab. Honestly, that would be my dream is to run my own lab and also have it open to service dogs who are training so that they can go to their institutions and be in their lab safely. That’s amazing. That’s a great idea. I was I would just give you the $10 million right away. It would be such a fun lab to work in. Can you imagine working in a lab with like multiple service dogs and lab coats with their goggles? Nice. Thank you. Okay, Jade, thank you so much for taking the time has been an absolute pleasure talking to you. Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I’m so glad that Basil could join us as well. Me too, even though she slept through. That’s fine. People are gonna love it. Okay, thank you so much. Yeah, Thank you. Thank you for watching with STEMcognito. Find more videos using the search box or the drop down menus above. If you think there’s something wrong With this video, please use the Report button to inform the STEMcognito team. 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