Imagine my delight when I searched YouTube for "microfluidics" and got 275 results. Go ahead, I'll wait while you conjure up a picture of me grinning madly...

Anyway, the field is obviously growing rapidly, but I was surprised to see that the multimedia is being dispersed across the web. I can't decide whether this video explosion is due to the field's popularity or whether young researchers are actually finding that YouTube is useful tool for dissemating their research. Granted, most of the comments are along the lines of "Cool!" or "Science is great," so it may just be that bored people are stumbling across some pretty pictures—don't get me wrong, though, that's fantastic.

Well, regardless, here are two interesting microfluidics videos:

This one actually contains a lot of great information, including formulas, although I wouldn't go so far as to call it self-contained. The user who posted this doesn't seem like a company or research group, so it's not really a promotion item, which I can appreciate. He's just a nice fellow who happens to do research that he's proud of so he put it on youtube. Better than posting a video of yourself lip-synching to AC/DC, right?

This one is a little different because of the C. Elegans. There's nothing better than watching an animal work its way through a maze. Here, the Wheeler Lab has posted their group's research. I can definitely appreciate the quality and content here. Great job!

To quote the impassioned Dr. Steve Brule, "...go make some computer technologies of your own! Get out of the house and go do it!"

How effective are videos and other multimedia in research articles? The most obvious benefit lies in experimental work. It may be easier to show rather than tell how an experiment is done. The best example of this is at the Journal of Visualized Experiments (JOVE), where a procedural video essentially is the peer-reviewed article. The benefits to researchers is immediate and potentially immensely helpful—but only if the videos are completely and wholly transparent and valid. That begs the question: when a reviewer "peer reviews" a video, does he or she reproduce the procedure to verify its veracity? Is this beyond the call of duty for a reviewer? Note: I'm not suggesting that any of these videos are flawed. To the contrary, they look incredibly pertinent and accurate.

Like many other journals, BMF offers the chance to publish video as well. A link to the video (mpeg, wmv, or avi) is embedded in the PDF as well as on the abstract page. This article offers a three videos of data, not of a procedure. Regardless, it's encouraging to see researchers taking advantage of multimedia capabilities. This article comes to BMF from National Taiwan University.

AIP is pretty excited about having more and more Chinese contributors to their journals. In fact, it looks as though Biomicrofluidics and its editors will be supporting and promoting a few upcoming meetings in China. There is a conference in Hong Kong January 5-9 2009: Advances in Microfluidics and Nanofluidics. "It should be the best Asian conference on Microfluidics and Nanofluidics," according to BMF's editor, Hsueh-Chia Chang. The conference website in now up and you can find the full speaker list and other helpful info there.