Blog Archives

October 31, 2014

10/31/2014

The latest issue of Cell has plenty of treats and tricks...

How nerves in the retina prevent vascular growth:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S009286741401174X

Multiple enhancers cooperate - in trans - to activate one gene:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867414011829

A virtual in situ hybridization for all transcripts at once:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867414012264

A very cool - if not always practical - trick to image single protein:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867414012276

I must admit I find quality and breadth of these papers haunting...

This adds to the long and sometimes contentious literature on sirtuins in aging:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/acel.12220/abstract;jsessionid=EAEB65E032A1930B93083989FD7D84FF.f03t02
Many days I think I could use some of that SRT2104 thing

OK, so Michael Douglas must have known what he was talking about a couple of years back:
http://www.pnas.org/content/111/43/15544.full
Bad genes…

Perception is reality, even when it comes to quality of science:
http://www.pnas.org/content/111/43/15316.full
But really, why should science be different from all other human enterprises?

It’s that time of year again.
http://news.sciencemag.org/people-events/2014/10/dance-your-ph-d-finalists-announced
Think about it: you could have been watching these instead of that baseball stuff… Scary, isn’t it?

Have a fun Halloween everyone.

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Let’s go easy on actual science this weekend...

A nice - if not entirely groundbreaking - method to detect enhancers acting in specific sub-tissues.
http://dev.biologists.org/content/141/21/4194.full
That’s one case where small size and fast development of the zebrafish embryos is not much of an advantage...

The headline on CNN made me wonder- maybe that bone had some sort of informative wear-and-tear? A peculiar shape?
http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/23/health/genome-45000-year-old-bone/?cid=ob_articlesidebarall&iref=obinsite
Nope. It had DNA.
http://www.nature.com/news/oldest-known-human-genome-sequenced-1.16194
Low and behold, Nature did a much better job keeping the language scientific - but even they could not resist using the word “trysts”…

A rather brilliant piece on “networking”, with a good bit of irony intended.
http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/career_magazine/previous_issues/articles/2014_10_23/caredit.a1400264
Can’t think of anything to add to it.

A question every undergrad should be asking: what are my tuition dollars paying for?
http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/career_magazine/previous_issues/articles/2014_10_21/caredit.a1400262
Prestige? “Network”? A beautiful campus, a dorm with a view and an fancy gym? A shot at a Med School (realistic or remote)? What if the answer was “education”- would you then see as many adjunct faculty teaching you?

Guys: when somebody calls you “lame” they really mean “evolutionarily advanced”
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/346/6208/405.full
They’re just not smart enough to know it. And please be kind when you watch your favorite “football" team. Remember, these are the fellas who could not grasp the meaning of the compound word foot-ball - so they grasped the ball instead.

Have a good weekend everyone.

Darius

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October 18, 2014

10/18/2014

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A very cool paper analyzing the enhancers of sonic hedgehog
http://dev.biologists.org/content/141/20/3934.full
Again I wish we had a dev bio journal club...

Finally, the excellent biotin ligase tagging system published in zebrafish
http://dev.biologists.org/content/141/20/3934.full

A useful read on the T-box family of genes:
http://dev.biologists.org/content/141/20/3819.full

Computer and chimp trying to out-cheat one another:
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/346/6207/340.full
After browsing through this paper, I am convinced that both would beat me handily. No juice for me.

Apparently there is a genetic component to human height:
http://www.bbc.com/news/health-29480803
Who knew. What’s next, eye color genetics?

Have a good weekend everyone.

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October 5

10/5/2014

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An outstanding review on wnt in tissue renewal and regeneration:
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/346/6205/1248012.full
With only a single zebrafish citation?

I think “the awesome power of yeast genetics” has officially been officially supplanted by “the awesome power of genome sequencing”
http://www.nature.com/news/fast-genetic-sequencing-saves-newborn-lives-1.16027

This is almost creepy: neurostimulation after spinal cord injury makes rats walk on two legs
http://stm.sciencemag.org/content/6/255/255ra133.full
I recommend watching one or more supplementary movies. You will need something like a VLC player if you use a newer Mac.

A promising Ebola drug:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v514/n7520/full/nature13777.html
Those who follow the news know that Zmapp has been already successfully used on human patients, too. Do you think it expedited the publication of primate data in Nature?

A must-read for everyone thinking about grad school:
http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/career_magazine/previous_issues/articles/2014_09_30/caredit.a1400245
My take? 1992 was a better year to get your PhD than 1999. Anyone betting that 2020 is going to revert back to the good old days?

And here is my little bit of public/social policy:

Apparently (and contrary to some bigmouths) unemployed women have fewer babies:
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2014/09/24/1408975111.full.pdf+html
Would it be OK to use the genetic term "negative selection”?

I think the worst part about the mess below is that elected public officials who try to micromanage and ridicule science feel that they have the support of their electorate.
http://news.sciencemag.org/policy/2014/10/battle-between-nsf-and-house-science-committee-escalates-how-did-it-get-bad?rss=1
And there are quite a few of them. Science funding is not about to improve anytime soon.

By the way, even walruses know that global warming is real:
http://news.sciencemag.org/sifter/2014/10/mass-walrus-gathering-on-alaskan-shore?rss=1
Is too much to ask that a politician be as smart as a walrus?

Darius

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Weekly sciencey bits

Disclaimer: This started as a "weekend reading list" meant to encourage students in the lab to think about science and their own future in it. Do not take it seriously: I myself may no longer agree with whatever I wrote here last week.
- Darius

October 31, 2014

October 25, 2014

October 18, 2014

October 5

Weekly sciencey bits

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