This week’s list is more fun than science. Fitting with the Finals week here at Temple.

A synthetic yeast chromosome. Made by undergrads.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v509/n7499/full/509168a.html
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/344/6179/55

Crowdsourcing at it’s best:
http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/career_magazine/previous_issues/articles/2014_05_05/caredit.a1400112
Turns out “big science” can be fun, too.

Your pick: either cool dudes are having a “chilling” effect or are men stink up biomedical studies.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/344/6183/461.full

Very disturbing news: working harder leads to better results.
http://news.sciencemag.org/education/2014/05/scienceshot-why-asian-american-students-outperform-their-white-peers?rss=1
The author needed to hypothesize as to why the outperforming student group spends less time hanging out with their friends. Really?!

Now we know the reason Dracula is forever young
http://news.yahoo.com/studies-young-blood-rejuvenates-aging-mice-191130330.html
http://news.sciencemag.org/biology/2014/05/young-blood-renews-old-mice
http://www.bbc.com/news/health-27282832
You decide which kind of story telling you prefer. Or maybe the actual paper?
http://www.nature.com/nm/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nm.3569.html
How can I get hold of a batch of K-Creb AAVs?

Were the Terminator movies a beginning of a new film genre: futumentary?
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/stephen-hawking-transcendence-looks-at-the-implications-of-artificial-intelligence--but-are-we-taking-ai-seriously-enough-9313474.html
It would not be smart to dismiss Stephen Hawking…

Stem cell therapy for “broken heart" monkeys
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature13233.html
Note that the trial was non-randomized.

And apparently only trials with design flaws show effectiveness of stem cell therapies for myocaridal infarction in humans.
http://www.nature.com/news/doubts-over-heart-stem-cell-therapy-1.15122
http://www.nature.com/news/false-positives-1.15119

Finally, an excellent review on functional annotation of the human genome
http://www.pnas.org/content/111/17/6131.full

Now onto the easy stuff:

How to think like a scientist:
http://www.pnas.org/content/111/17/6119.full
Imagination IS important (see my post from last week :-)

Not completely surprisingly but very disturbingly, a professor’s reaction to a letter from a prospective graduate student depends on the name on that letter:
http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/career_magazine/previous_issues/articles/2014_04_29/caredit.a1400107

Have a great weekend everyone.