Christy Canida, sharing taxidermy (and more) – 24 hours of Lady Ada Lovelace day #ald10
Each hour we are featuring a woman we admire who is currently doing amazing work right in the tech/maker/art/science space. Woman of the hour, Christy Canida. Pictured above with DIY elf ears.
Christy Canida earned her SB in Biology from MIT, and worked in transgenic mouse labs, an aquarium, and the biotech industry before joining Instructables. She loves cutting things up, experimenting with food, and dancing in costumes.
Christy makes amazing things we love to read (and make) and also runs Instructables with the great team there. She’s the originator of the LED rat throwie. You can see all 115+ of Christy’s how-tos and Instructables here.
About today:
Ada Lovelace Day is an international day of blogging (videologging, podcasting, comic drawing etc.!) to draw attention to the achievements of women in technology and science. Women’s contributions often go unacknowledged, their innovations seldom mentioned, their faces rarely recognized. We want you to tell the world about these unsung heroines, whatever they do. It doesn’t matter how new or old your blog is, what gender you are, what language you blog in, or what you normally blog about – everyone is invited.
Who was Ada? Ada Lovelace Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace (10 December 1815 – 27 November 1852) was one of the world’s first computer programmers, and one of the first people to see computers as more than just a machine for doing sums. She wrote programs for Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine, a general-purpose computing machine, despite the fact that it was never built. She also wrote the very first description of a computer and of software.
Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
This just makes me realize how perverted I am to wear a leather jacket.
I respect Christy and her work but this particular piece is not necessarily something I’d show off too eagerly.
Really? LED Rat Throwie? It looks so creepy this is going to give me nightmares!
This just makes me realize how perverted I am to wear a leather jacket.
I respect Christy and her work but this particular piece is not necessarily something I’d show off too eagerly.
Almost forgot: I’m a neuroscience grad student and sadly, I know my way around lab animals, too.