Day: April 11, 2025

  • Large Language Models: Transforming the Field of Scientific Discovery

    Large Language Models: Transforming the Field of Scientific Discovery

    Large Language Models: Transforming the Field of Scientific Discovery

    The recent Scope Large Language Models (LLMs) have been used as powerful tools for changing the way scientific research is conducted. These models have massive amounts of data trained within them, causing human-like responses and creating queries that respond to human nature. As LLM models mature even more, they become more of a thinking space for scientists implementing literature to experiment with planning-based projects. As these models evolve, a drastic amount of scientific discovery creates more access to better research and more knowledge.

    Foundations of LLMS

    LLM models are artificial intelligence systems trained on massive datasets. Their idea is to help create and automate easy activities. ChatGPT, in which various people use this LLM model for emails and essays, has been successful in the LLM atmosphere. As the linguistics have changed, the LLM’s dataset has been applied to it.

    Scope of Scientific Discovery

    As LLMs evolve, the scientific community has been growing, helping the chemistry, physics, and biology industries. For example, Gemini and Grok AI, incubated by Google and Twitter, understand various concepts of physics, which makes them a very reputable source of information. With fantastic datasets, various scientists are beginning to use them for research and other expertise.

    Google has begun to incubate research for medicinal research. In a sense, many chemical compounds have been simulated through AI, making medicinal research easier. Various compounds are being created and put into medicine to treat patients. Many automated factories produce millions of combinations daily, allowing them to make more medicine for patients.

    Contributions to Biology

    In the scope of biology, LLMs are redefining research methodologies by assisting in fields ranging from genomics to ecology, transforming the way scientists look at research concepts within those fields. The ability of LLM models to analyze patterns and genetic sequences and summarize complex findings makes them a necessary tool for research.

    • Genomic Data Analysis: LLMs can decode massive genomic datasets, helping researchers identify rare patterns linked to traits or diseases.
    • Ecosystem and Evolution Modeling: LLMS processes environmental patterns and data to understand the impacts of climate change and how species affect environments.
    • Protein Folding: Due to the increasing sum of information passed through LLMs, various models can create vast predictions with remarkable accuracy, which creates more medicines and disease detection.

    Contributions to Physics

    LLMs make a vast contribution to physics. Various Machine Learning algorithms are used in the creation of these LLM models, which makes mathematical concepts such as linear algebra second nature to them. In Physics, various mathematical concepts and abstract reasoning methods are used by researchers, which takes a large sum of time; hence, the LLM model comes and helps mediate that issue.

    • Equation Solving and Abstract Reasoning: LLMs are trained to understand and manipulate theoretical physics models, which help with concepts such as quantum mechanics.
    • Automated Simulation: After computational simulations, physicists use LLMs to generate different simulating methods by giving different computations and suggestions.
    • Data Analysis: LLMs use different libraries of code for data analysis that are crunched into massive Excel documents or CSV files that physics can use to make equations.

    Contributions to Chemistry

    Of all the vast fields of science, chemistry stands out as the field that actively uses LLMs to its advantage. AI is currently shaping the future of molecular science, drug discovery, and design. LLMs augment the workflow of chemistry, transforming the methods of experimentation, documentation, and simulation.

    • Medicine Discovery: LLMs assist in finding potential medications by predicting molecular interactions. This can generate thousands of outcomes, which can be used to discover more medicines to cure more diseases.
    • Chemical Reaction Prediction: LLMs predict the outcomes of chemical reactions, which helps chemists find optimal conditions and other information when experimenting.
    • Polymer Design: Currently contributing to the design of polymers, nanomaterials, and semiconductors, which can increase the chances of durability and flexibility based on the use cases of the experimenter.

    Future of LLMs’ Contribution to Science

    As more information and LLMs progress, their science scope can be expanded. Since these models have massive datasets, they can be used to give predictions and simulations rather than simple assistance and computational processing. Based on LLM’s ability to perform natural language processing, it can broadly test categories of science that cost vast amounts of money and time.

    There are still some challenges, as there are many debates about the ethics and transparency of these models, which can hinder research. However, as these models advance, they have more time to mature, which leads to vast amounts of innovation. More mature models can produce better solutions due to their vast dataset and reputability.

    Large Language Models are not only a technical term but also a shift in how research and knowledge are produced.

    References

    Alley, E. C. (2019, October 21). Unified rational protein engineering with sequence-based deep representation learning. nature methods. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41592-019-0598-1

    Gómez-Bombarelli, R. (2018, January 12). Automatic Chemical Design Using a Data-Driven Continuous Representation of Molecules. ACS. https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acscentsci.7b00572

    Schwaller, P. (2019, August 30). Molecular Transformer: A Model for Uncertainty-Calibrated Chemical Reaction PredictionArticle link copied! ACS Publications. https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acscentsci.9b00576

    Vaswani, A. (2017, June 12). Attention Is All You Need. arXiv. https://arxiv.org/abs/1706.03762

     

  • What a cat-astrophia! Diving into the GT Cat Community – Pro or Against Cats?

    What a cat-astrophia! Diving into the GT Cat Community – Pro or Against Cats?

    This article was made in collaboration with Rachel Weng.

    Tucked among the brick pathways, buzzing scooters, and campus fields of Georgia Tech is a quieter, fuzzier community. These consist of those with soft paws and watchful eyes. The Georgia Tech Campus Cats have become quite a beloved icon of the Institute in addition to Buzz and the Ramblin’ Wreck. They have quickly gained popularity among the students and many have started to care for them. While these cats may charm students and campus pedestrians, they also affect the urban ecology and species management.

    The Georgia Tech Campus Cats Program started in 2001 with a mission to humanely manage the feral cat population on campus. They do so through a method called a trap, neuter, and release (TNR) program (Budd, 2024). Volunteers trap the cats, get them spayed or neutered, and then return them to their original location. This method helps control the population while allowing the cats to live out their lives in familiar territory. Over the years, the program has grown into a tight-knit community of students, staff, and alumni committed to the well-being of these feline residents (Budd, 2024).

    Since Fall 2023, Campus Cats have become more active and involved in supplying food and water. According to data gathered through iNaturalist, the most common cat sightings have been East campus with 14 sightings, Tech tower with 11 sightings, Central campus with 8 sightings, and Tech Parkway with 8 sightings. These are followed by West campus and the retention pond with 6 sightings. And lastly, the recycling area with 4 sightings, and the student center with 2 sightings.

    map of cat sightings on gt campus
    An overview map of cat sightings around GT

    Feeding stations are often placed around areas the cats are sighted in and monitored to ensure they stay healthy without becoming overly dependent on humans. Volunteers are encouraged to post on the iNaturalist community page and follow ethical practices to minimize environmental impact. And come springtime, aka “kitten season,” the population can temporarily increase as new litters appear, aligning with the national trend of increased feline births due to longer daylight hours and hormonal cycles (Mulkey, 2024). 

    Unfortunately, as lovable as they are, free-roaming cats are considered invasive species, and known as non-native animals that can disrupt ecosystems. Studies show that domestic and feral cats kill billions of birds, mammals, and reptiles each year in the United States alone (Arnold, 2023). Even well-fed cats may instinctively hunt, which threatens local wildlife, especially in urban greenspaces like Georgia Tech’s EcoCommons and Retention Pond areas.

    This creates a paradox: the cats are part of the Georgia Tech experience, yet they challenge the ecological balance. The TNR strategy used by the Campus Cats Program helps address this issue. Research into TNR programs shows promising results. For example, two Australian TNR studies showed that there was a 30% reduction in cat numbers over 2 years, and a 50% reduction over 5 years (Spehar & Wolf, 2019). This highlights TNR’s potential effectiveness when consistently implemented. However, the success of TNR often depends on the percentage of cats sterilized and the community cooperation to be effective. This makes Georgia Tech’s ongoing effort important to long-term population control.

    If you spot a cat on campus, you should try saying hello from a distance, especially if you are allergic, but don’t try to pet or feed them unless you’re a trained volunteer. You could also volunteer with the Campus Cats Program to help with feeding, data tracking, or TNR operations by joining their GroupMe – GT Cat Pics. Or if you feel particularly attached to a campus cat or multiple, consider adopting! Some of the cats are friendly or young enough to be rehomed. Listings can be found on the GT Campus Cats website at https://www.gtcampuscats.org/. Lastly, know that you can spread awareness simply by educating others about responsible cat ownership to help prevent more stray animals.

    Georgia Tech’s cats remind us that even in a high-tech environment, nature finds a way to sneak in. It lives in how we understand and coexist with all living things, even those with whiskers and tails.

    Sources Cited

    American Bird Conservancy. (n.d.). Cats | Invasives. American Bird Conservancy; American Bird Conservancy. Retrieved April 7, 2025, from https://abcbirds.org/threat/cats-and-other-invasives/

    Arnold, C. (2023, June 6). Cat-astrophe. NOEMA; Berggruen Institute. https://www.noemamag.com/cat-astrophe

    Budd, A. (2024, June 3). Cat-alysts of community: Georgia tech campus cats | news center. Georgia Tech News Center . https://news.gatech.edu/features/2024/05/cat-alysts-community-georgia-tech-campus-cats

    Campus cats list. (n.d.). Georgia Tech Campus Cats. Retrieved April 7, 2025, from https://www.gtcampuscats.org/campus-cats-list

    Georgia tech cat sightings. (n.d.). iNaturalist. Retrieved April 7, 2025, from https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/georgia-tech-cat-sightings

    Mulkey, S. K. (2024, March 18). Kitten season is out of control. Are warmer winters to blame? Grist. https://grist.org/science/kitten-season-animal-shelter-cat-wildlife/

    Wolf, P. J., Rand, J., Swarbrick, H., Spehar, D. D., & Norris, J. (2019). Reply to crawford et al.: Why trap-neuter-return(Tnr)  is an ethical solution for stray cat management. Animals : An Open Access Journal from MDPI, 9(9), 689. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani9090689

  • A Tiny Frog with a Mighty Voice – The Puerto Rican Coqui

    A Tiny Frog with a Mighty Voice – The Puerto Rican Coqui

    On my spring break trip to Puerto Rico, I had the opportunity to explore El Yunque National Forest and listen to the calls of the coquí. Afterwards, I began to become more aware of their calls while exploring Puerto Rico, particularly hearing them in less city-like areas. These tiny frogs are not only common in Puerto Rican rainforests, but are also an important part of the island’s cultural identity. 

    The Puerto Rican coquí (Eleutherodactylus coqui) is a small arboreal frog, typically brown, yellow, or green in color, and they measure about one to two inches in length (National Wildlife Federation, n.d.). Despite their size, coquíes are well known for their loud and distinctive nighttime calls, which sound like “co-kee.” These calls produced by males are used to attract females and establish territory among competing males. According to researchers, the “co” part of the call is intended to repel males, while “quí” serves to attract females (Discover Puerto Rico, n.d.).

    Native to Puerto Rico, the coquí lives in the island’s forests, particularly in El Yunque. The coquí’s reproductive method is different from other amphibians. Unlike many frog species that lay eggs in water, coquís lay their eggs on land, often in moist leaf litter or bromeliads. The male coquí plays an important role in parental care by guarding the eggs and keeping them moist through his moist skin. This is vital for their development as it prevents the frogs from drying out or desiccation. In addition, these frogs do not undergo a tadpole stage. Instead, they hatch directly into tiny frogs with short tails (National Wildlife Federation, n.d.). 

    While the coquí seem harmless and are beloved in Puerto Rico, their introduction to other regions, such as Hawaii in the late 1980s, has caused ecological disruption due to their high population density and loud calls. In Hawaii, the absence of natural predators and favorable climatic conditions have allowed coquí populations to reach densities three times the estimates reported from native populations in Puerto Rico (Woolbright, 2006). This overpopulation has led to the consumption of many native invertebrates, and as a result, disrupting local ecosystems and threatening endemic species (Beard & Pitt, 2005). Additionally, the loud calls of male coquíes, reaching up to 100 decibels, have become a source of noise pollution, affecting the life for residents and impacting property values (Beard et al., 2005). There are also 13 species of coquí, each with its own unique call, and they sing at different times throughout the day. As you might imagine, the constant chorus can become quite loud and even overwhelming at times.

    In Puerto Rico, coquíes have profound cultural importance that goes beyond their biological characteristics. They are often honored in mythology, song, and art, and many Puerto Ricans identify the sound of coquíes with home. It’s clear the Puerto Rican coquí is far more than a small frog. Whether heard echoing through the rainforest or symbolized in island art, the coquí continues to be a defining voice of Puerto Rico.

    Video of Coqui Sounds Taken from Puerto Rico

     

    Sources cited

    Beard, K. H., & Pitt, W. C. (2005). Potential consequences of the coqui frog (Eleutherodactylus coqui) invasion in Hawaii. Diversity and Distributions, 11(5), 427–433. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1366-9516.2005.00178.x

    “Coquí in the Rainforest.” Discover Puerto Rico, https://www.discoverpuertorico.com/coqui. Accessed 2 Apr. 2025.

    “Puerto Rican Coqui.” National Wildlife Federation, https://www.nwf.org/Educational-Resources/Wildlife-Guide/Amphibians/Puerto-Rican-Coqui.

    “The Sounds of the Coquí Explained!” Discover Puerto Rico, https://www.discoverpuertorico.com/article/sounds-coqui-explained. Accessed 2 Apr. 2025.

    Westrick, S. E., Laslo, M., & Fischer, E. K. (2022). The big potential of the small frog Eleutherodactylus coqui. eLife, 11, e73401. https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.73401

    Woolbright, Lawrence & Hara, Arnold & Jacobsen, Christopher & Mautz, William & Benevides, Francis. (2006). Population Densities of the Coquí, Eleutherodactylus coqui (Anura: Leptodactylidae) in Newly Invaded Hawaii and in Native Puerto Rico. Journal of Herpetology – J HERPETOL. 40. 122-126. 10.1670/79-05W.1. 

  • Evolution of Programming

    Evolution of Programming

     

    The Origins (1840s-1940s)

    1843: Ada Lovelace’s Algorithm

    The history of programming begins with Ada Lovelace, a British aristocrat that was educated in mathematics and science. In 1843, Lovelace created the very first machine algorithm for Charles Babbage’s Difference Machine. This conceptual leap is what gave birth to the idea of programming languages.

    1936: Alan Turing’s Theoretical Foundation

    Alan Turing published a paper in 1936 that is now regarded as the founding work of computer science. Turing introduced the concept of a universal machine that could follow instructions. This revolutionary idea eventually evolved into plans for an electricity-powered computer that could run programs, mathematically defining what computation meant.

    1940s: First Programming Languages and Electronic Computers

    • Konrad Zuse’s Plankalkül: Considered the first programming language for computers, created in the early 1940s to store codes for routine, repetitive tasks
    • Assembly Language (1949): A programming language that simplified computer instructions
    • Shortcode (1949): Developed by William Schmitt for the BINAC and UNIVAC computers
    • ENIAC: The first programmable, electronic, general-purpose digital computer, which required physical rewiring to program

    The First Programming Languages (1950s-1960s)

    Early 1950s: First Compiler Languages

    • Autocode (1952): Developed for the Mark 1 computer at the University of Manchester, it was the first language that could be translated into machine code
    • Assembly Language: Further evolved as the first step away from machine code, using symbolic representations of machine instructions

    Generated image

    Mid to Late 1950s: Foundation of Modern Programming

    • FORTRAN (1957): Developed by John Backus at IBM, FORTRAN (FORmula TRANslation) was the first widely used high-level programming language, designed for scientific and engineering calculations. Remarkably, this language from the 1950s is still used today in supercomputers and scientific computations.
    • ALGOL (1958): Created by American and European scientists, ALGOL became the foundation for many renowned languages including Pascal, Java, C, and C++
    • LISP (1958): Created by John McCarthy, introducing many ideas still central to programming today, including recursion and tree data structures. Originally intended for AI, companies like Boeing and Genworks still use it.
    • COBOL (1959): Developed by a team led by Dr. Grace Murray Hopper, COBOL (Common Business Oriented Language) was designed for business applications like credit card transaction processors, traffic signals, and phone calls. It’s still used in banking and gaming today.

    1960s: Programming Becomes More Accessible

    • BASIC (1964): Developed by students at Dartmouth College (Beginners All-Purpose Symbolic Instruction Code), it was designed to make programming accessible. Later further developed and marketed by Bill Gates.
    • PL/I (1964): IBM’s attempt to create a language combining the best features of FORTRAN and COBOL
    • APL (1966): A highly symbolic language focused on array processing
    • SIMULA (1967): The first object-oriented programming language, introducing concepts like classes and inheritance

    The Structured Programming Era (1970s)

    • Pascal (1970): Designed by Niklaus Wirth and named after French mathematician Blaise Pascal, it was created explicitly to encourage structured programming. So easy to learn, it was used by Apple early in its history.
    • C (1972): Developed at Bell Labs by Dennis Ritchie for the Unix operating system, combining low-level access with high-level abstractions. Many modern languages like C#, Java, JavaScript, Perl, PHP, and Python are derived from C.
    • Smalltalk (1972): Developed by Alan Kay, Adele Goldberg, and Dan Ingalls at Xerox PARC. It pioneered the graphical user interface and pure object-oriented programming. Its principles are present in Java, Python, and Ruby, used by companies like CrowdStrike and Logitech.
    • SQL (1972): Originally called SEQUEL, it was developed by Raymond Boyce and Donald Chamberlain for viewing and altering information in databases.
    • Ada (late 1970s-early 1980s): Named after Ada Lovelace, it was designed by Jean Ichbiah’s team at CUU Honeywell Bull. A high-level programming language extended from Pascal, Ada is used for air-traffic control in various European countries and space programs.

    The Rise of Personal Computing (1980s)

    • C++ (1983): Bjarne Stroustrup modified the C language at Bell Labs to create C++, adding object-oriented features, classes, templates, and virtual functions. It’s now used in MS Office, Adobe Photoshop, and various types of high-performance software.
    • Objective-C (1983): Developed by Brad Cox and Tom Love as another object-oriented extension of C, later becoming the foundation for Apple’s operating systems.
    • Perl (1987): Created by Larry Wall, initially for text editing. Today its primary uses include database applications, data processing, graphic programming, and system administration.
    • Haskell (1990): Named after mathematician Haskell Brooks Curry, this primarily mathematical programming language is used in industries that need complex calculations and record-keeping.
    • Visual Basic (1991, but conceptualized in the late 1980s): Microsoft’s attempt to make Windows programming accessible. It allows users to drag and drop sections of code via a graphical user interface (GUI). Parts of Visual Basic are used in applications like Word and Excel.

    The Internet Age (1990s)

    • Python (1991): Created by Guido Van Rossum and named after the British comedy Monty Python, it emphasizes code readability. Today Python is one of the most popular programming languages worldwide, used by giants like Google and Spotify.
    • Ruby (1993): Created by Yukihiro Matsumoto as a high-level programming language primarily for web applications development. Today it’s used by companies like Groupon.
    • HTML (1993): Not strictly a programming language, but fundamental to web development
    • Java (1995): Developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems with the promise of “write once, run anywhere.” It’s one of the world’s most popular programming languages, used in everything from cell phones to parking machines.
    • JavaScript (1995): Created by Brendan Eich, now ubiquitous in web development. Used for web development, PDF documents, and desktop widgets, it’s on almost every major website, including Adobe, Gmail, and Mozilla Firefox.
    • PHP (1995): Originally known as “Personal Home Page” but now stands for “Hypertext Preprocessor,” it was developed by Rasmus Lerdorf. Used for building and maintaining web pages and server-side development, PHP powers huge platforms like Facebook, Wikipedia, and WordPress.

    The Modern Era (2000s-2010s)

    • C# (2000): Microsoft developed C# in an attempt to combine elements of Visual Basic and C. It’s now used in all the company’s products.
    • Scala (2003): Created by Martin Odersky, it can work with Java, giving it an advantage in Android development. Scala is used by social media and entertainment giants like Twitter, LinkedIn, and Netflix.
    • Groovy (2003): An easy-to-learn language developed by James Strachan and Bob McWhirter, used by companies like Starbucks, Craftbase, and Transferwise.
    • Go (2009): Developed by Google to resolve challenges faced by large software systems. Go is popular with big tech companies like Uber, Dropbox, and of course, Google.
    • Rust (2010): Mozilla’s language designed for memory safety without garbage collection
    • TypeScript (2012): Microsoft’s statically-typed superset of JavaScript
    • Swift (2014): Developed by Apple to replace C, C++, and Objective-C, intended to be easier and more versatile. Swift can be used for cloud applications, mobile, and desktop. Language platform Duolingo used it to launch a new app.

    The AI and Cloud Native Era (2010s-Present)

    • Julia (2012): Designed for high-performance numerical analysis and computational science
    • Kotlin (2011, widely adopted late 2010s): Modern alternative to Java, particularly for Android development
    • WebAssembly (2017): Not a traditional language, but a binary instruction format for a stack-based virtual machine
    • Dart (2011, popularized with Flutter 2017): Google’s language for multi-platform development
    • Python’s resurgence: Becoming the dominant language for data science, AI, and machine learning

    The Future of Programming

    As we look ahead, programming continues to evolve in exciting new directions. Low-code and no-code platforms are democratizing software development, making it accessible to those without traditional programming skills. Meanwhile, AI-assisted coding tools like GitHub Copilot are revolutionizing how developers work by generating code from natural language prompts. The emergence of quantum computing is driving the development of specialized quantum programming languages to harness this powerful new paradigm. Simultaneously, domain-specific languages are becoming increasingly sophisticated, offering tailored solutions for specific industries and problems. These trends collectively point to a future where programming becomes both more specialized and more accessible, continuing the remarkable journey that began with Ada Lovelace’s algorithm nearly two centuries ago.

     

     

     

    Citations

    Aron, Jacob. “Alan Turing.” New Scientist, www.newscientist.com/people/alan-turing/.

    Hamilton, Tim. “History of Programming Languages.” Praxent, 4 Oct. 2022, praxent.com/blog/history-of-programming-languages.

    The Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica. “Ada Lovelace | Biography & Facts.” Encyclopædia Britannica, 23 Nov. 2018, www.britannica.com/biography/Ada-Lovelace.

  • If Vibranium Were Real: The Chemistry Behind Wakanda’s Supermetal

    If Vibranium Were Real: The Chemistry Behind Wakanda’s Supermetal

    Sources: 

    “What Exactly Is Vibranium Metal?” – ever-roll.com
    “The Science of Wakanda Forever” – blogs.iu.edu/sciu
    “What Would It Take to Make Real Vibranium?” – snexplores.org

  • IRON MAN: Powered by PHYSICS (And a Little Genius)

    IRON MAN: Powered by PHYSICS (And a Little Genius)

    Sources

    “Engineering in Iron Man’s Suit” – physicsinmarvel.wordpress.com
    “The Physics of Iron Man” – science-abuse.net
    “Iron Man’s Suit Defies Physics — Mostly” – WIRED.com


    IRON MAN: Powered by PHYSICS (and a little genius)

  • The Cat-astrophic Health of Persian Cats

    The Cat-astrophic Health of Persian Cats

     

    These adorable flat-faced cats have existed since the 1600s from Mesopotamia which was later called Persia, giving these cats the name Persian. Today, they are an expensive and highly sought-after breed with prices going from $1,000+ for a single kitten. But the subject at hand that I would like to focus on is the health issues that Persian cats face, and why they are more susceptible to diseases. This topic is very near and dear to my heart, since I happened upon owning a Persian cat at the beginning of the school year. 

    Meet Sammy, my cat that my sister got me from craigslist (long story). Cute, right? In a Garfield/ grumpy cat sort of way. The biggest problem I faced was how often he tears up. It sounds like a simple issue, but it was occurring constantly. Every night when I would pet him, he would build up a brown layer of crust around his eyes. It didn’t matter if I cleaned his face a few hours ago, it was inevitable that the tears would stain his fur again. This led me to do some research.

    Persian cats have a very distinctive feature- their flat face. Scientifically, it is called a brachycephalic structure, which leads to tear ducts that are not fully developed. Typically, cats have ducts to drain excess liquid in their eyes to their nose. In this case, flat-faced cats have tears that cannot drain properly, leading to the fur around their eyes to be stained. The staining comes from the tears oxidizing to turn into a reddish brown color. The official diagnosis for this is called epiphora- which is a cause for concern for most cats but is a common occurrence for Persian and Himalayan cats.

    Having watery eyes is not the only consequence of the brachycephalic facial structure. Some of the others include: brachycephalic airway obstruction syndrome (BAOS) which can cause respiratory problems; maxillary dorsal rotation (rotation of the upper jaw upwards) and brachygnathism (the top jaw is abnormally short). This can cause dental problems, and make it harder for the cat to groom himself. Exophthalmos, when the eyeball protrudes, can lead to an increased risk of corneal ulcers. Cats with the more severe forms of brachycephaly are highly likely to develop these conditions. 

    This leads us to the age-old question- is it unethical to breed these kinds of cats? There are even more loveable breeds of dogs with this condition: pugs, bulldogs, shih tzus, boxers, etc. Would the solution be to stop the breeding of these animals? I love Sammy, but I still believe we should end the breeding and continuation of brachycephalic animals. Choosing a pet for aesthetic reasons, especially when it compromises their quality of life, just feels fundamentally wrong to me. At the end of the day, our love for animals should include decisions that prioritize their health over our preferences.

    ____________________________________________________________________

    Künzel W, Breit S and Oppel M (2003) Morphometric investigations of breed-specific features in feline skulls and considerations on their functional implications. Anatomia, Histologia, Embryologia 32: 223

    Monnet E (2004) Brachycephalic Airway Syndrome. World Small Animal Veterinary Association conference 2004, 6-9th Oct, Rhodes, Greece. Available from VIN Associate, accessed 8.2.11

    O’NEILL, D. G., ROMANS, C., BRODBELT, D. C., CHURCH, D. B., ČERNÁ, P. & GUNN-MOORE, D. A. 2019. Persian cats under first opinion veterinary care in the UK: demography, mortality and disorders. Scientific Reports – Nature doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-49317-4