Genetics & Politics

Crop Genetics Team Wins Food Prize, Amid Dissent

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 18:53:43 -0700

Crop Genetics Team Wins Food Prize, Amid Dissent:

Robert Fraley of Monsanto shares the prize with two other scientists prominent in the field of genetically modified crops.

From the link,

The winners of the 2013 prize were part of teams that independently developed methods three decades ago for putting foreign genes into the DNA of plants.

The key was a soil microbe called Agrobacterium tumefaciens, which can inject its own DNA into plants, causing a tumorlike growth called crown gall disease. The researchers disabled the tumor-causing part of the bacterium and inserted the gene that they wanted to be carried into the plant’s DNA.

Scientists from the three teams, which were fiercely competing with one another, presented their results at a conference in Miami in January 1983.

150 Years of Misunderstanding the Civil War

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 17:26:07 -0700

150 Years of Misunderstanding the Civil War:

As the anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg approaches, it’s time for America to question the popular account of a war that tore apart the nation.

Interesting questions,

But in recent years, historians have rubbed much of the luster from the Civil War and questioned its sanctification. Should we consecrate a war that killed and maimed over a million Americans? Or should we question, as many have in recent conflicts, whether this was really a war of necessity that justified its appalling costs?

"Myriad was able to isolate the BRCA genes in the first place largely because it had access to..."

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 16:24:50 -0700

“Myriad was able to isolate the BRCA genes in the first place largely because it had access to government-financed public databases.”

- Eleonore Pauwels, from “Our Genes, Their Secrets” [New York Times]

Once again, public financing was lost in the conversation.

Neymar’s dribbling to create space and then moving between...

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 15:05:39 -0700

Neymar’s dribbling to create space and then moving between two defenders before he passed it to Jo for Brazil’s second goal against Mexico.

ucresearch: A view of Halley’s Comet from the Lick Observatory...

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 01:06:05 -0700

ucresearch:

A view of Halley’s Comet from the Lick Observatory on June 6, 1910

"Will we accept, at some point, that there are limits to the quantification project, just as there..."

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 18:42:11 -0700

“Will we accept, at some point, that there are limits to the quantification project, just as there are to all taxonomic schemes? Or will we be drawn into ever more complex and expensive quests — CERN mark two, Hubble, the sequel — as we try to root out every lingering paradox? In Douglas’s view, ambiguity is an inherent feature of language that we must face up to, at some point, or drive ourselves into distraction.”

- The Limits of Physics by Margaret Wertheim [aeon]

UC and Native Americans: Unsettled remains

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 17:51:21 -0700

UC and Native Americans: Unsettled remains:

The burden for this impasse should be shouldered by the university. Throughout the 20th century, anthropologists from Berkeley and other UC campuses abused their scientific privilege by digging up graves without respect for the descendants of the dead; encouraging amateur archaeologists all over the state to send skeletal remains to the nearest university; failing in many cases to document the sites of excavation; indiscriminately mixing up body parts; and promoting racist ideas about native inferiority.

The Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology, which serves as curator of Berkeley’s collection of human remains, is currently closed for a “profound transformation” of its galleries, educational programs and storage facilities. According to a Hearst staff member, the collection of body parts will be moved from a dank basement in the Hearst Gym to “new and improved storage” in Kroeber Hall. There will be a visitors room for native groups to hold ceremonies, and a Native American advisory committee — selected by the university — will be established.

These are small steps in the right direction. But in addition to these mostly cosmetic changes, and to complying with the bureaucratic procedures spelled out in the repatriation law, the university should take responsibility for, in Heizer’s words, “a human ethical” issue, namely, how so many well-educated, well-meaning professors and administrators eagerly violated the rights of the dead and tormented the living.

Peter Suber’s book about open access is now available in...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 03:46:02 -0700

Peter Suber’s book about open access is now available in multiple open access formats, roughly one year after the publication date. [Google+]

PDF/ HTML/ ePub/ Mobi

Summary at MIT Press website.

Sometimes we actually learn things in high school Jessica Lee...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 02:56:00 -0700

Sometimes we actually learn things in high school

Jessica Lee evokes the late and great Notorious B.I.G. for her parting wisdom in an interesting way, keep an eye on the chemical symbols on the left,

(F) - Flourine
(U) - Uranium
(C) - Carbon
(K) - Potassium
(Bi) - Bismuth
(Tc) - Technetium
(He) - Helium
(S) - Sulfur
(Ge) - Germanium
(Tm) - Thulium
(O) - Oxygen
(Ne) - Neon
(Y) - Yttrium.

I will never not love or appreciate the part-time nerds and the full-time G’s of this world.

h/t: ColorLines, song (censored version)

UC Berkeley professor Steven E. Brenner lets you construct a...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 02:29:00 -0700

UC Berkeley professor Steven E. Brenner lets you construct a personalized annotated version of a text he wrote for the journal Nature on mitigating the potential dangers of genome leaks. [Comp Bio | Berkeley]

From the FAQ at the link above,

What is this document?

Collected jetsam. I submitted a rough piece to Nature, and the editor there helped whip it into shape and cut it down to size. Along the way, bits of text were left on the cutting room floor. I’ve collected some of those elisions that help motivate or explicate my points, as well as expanded on some queries I received. This document does not purport to be a full-fledged support of every detail in the piece.

Why are you providing this annotation in such a weird form?
Natureowns the copyright on my piece, and they were firm that I could not post the text anywhere else for 6 months, even for the sole purpose of providing the annotation. This print overlay was designed as a method that could be used by anyone to make an annotated version, without any special technology beyond a PDF viewer and a printer. Let me know if you have better ideas for how to legally distribute the annotations.

Interesting method to say, I‘m not finished and it probably beats a blog post.

Heading to the function with the homie who’s too cool to care....

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 22:59:00 -0700

Heading to the function with the homie who’s too cool to care. (at Lynwood, CA)

My reading list for the next year.

Sat, 15 Jun 2013 20:41:48 -0700

My reading list for the next year.

Dude.

Sat, 15 Jun 2013 11:35:18 -0700

Dude.

By way of cyberpunkculture: Bio hacking - Control a living...

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 20:23:01 -0700

By way of cyberpunkculture:

Bio hacking - Control a living insect from your smartphone!

This comes with some serious limitations, would it be a bit more ideal to come up with models (perhaps) that utilize optogenetics?

Modifying a roach to respond to stimuli for minutes at a time is fun, but controlling the memories, happiness levels or motion (among other things) of mice is another.

Just think about what kind of impact that may have on students who are curious about neuroscience.

"A more important consequence than random coin tosses is the uncertainty that is the basis of the..."

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 19:40:23 -0700

“A more important consequence than random coin tosses is the uncertainty that is the basis of the random DNA mutations necessary for evolution. A truly indeterminate local physics guarantees that this process has some “noise,” and that mutation is always possible in principle. The chemistry of DNA replication involves, after all, exchanges of electrons and atoms, which are quantum objects.”

- The Rise of the Uncertain [Nautilus]

Science prizes: The new Nobels

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 16:20:31 -0700

Science prizes: The new Nobels:

The launch of several science mega-prizes is making some researchers millionaires but others question whether such awards are the best way to promote their field.

This seems like a fantastic and expensive way to solve zero of the problems that you aim to address.

"I don’t mean to be shallow, but your dorsal thorax looks amazing. If you see this before our life..."

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 16:08:29 -0700

“I don’t mean to be shallow, but your dorsal thorax looks amazing. If you see this before our life cycle comes to its imminent end, want to meet up by the fountain and lap up some melted rocket-pop syrup from the sidewalk, then listen to my calling song followed by my courting song, head off to the nearest branch to fulfill our biological imperative to spawn hundreds of larvae in tree slits, and then get brunch? I was the cicada with wings, noise-making tymbals, and a mischievous smile. To prove you’re who I’m posting about, tell me what you were molting.”

- Craigslist Missed Connections for Cicadas [The New Yorker]

h/t: @_inundata

How am I supposed to answer “Are we screwed?” | Generation Anthropocene

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 15:49:00 -0700

How am I supposed to answer “Are we screwed?” | Generation Anthropocene:

Like any good scientist, I can’t give a firm answer to this question, and truthfully no one can. Anyone who claims to be able to foretell the apocalypse is, at best, overstepping the bounds of scientific certainty. But I love that my friends THINK I might know the answer. We scientists are supposed to know stuff—valuable stuff. Like whether or not the world’s going to end.

My personal and scientific opinion is that the answer is “No”. The world is not going to end. Yes, things are going to change, and they’re going to change fast, but the world’s not all coming to a screeching halt. The Earth will continue spinning on its axis, the planet will keep revolving around the sun, and winter is still coming (once a year, Game of Thrones fans).

Which is not to say that climate change doesn’t matter. I think it matters a lot. In fact, I think it’s arguably the most important issue facing the world today. But, let’s be honest— we scientists have to start approaching this whole “climate/apocalypse” question with a bit more nuance.

The first step should be to ask ourselves, “Why does climate matter?” Forget global warming for a second. Why does climate matter?

"I join the judgment of the Court, except [the portions] going into fine details of molecular..."

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 15:11:22 -0700

“I join the judgment of the Court, except [the portions] going into fine details of molecular biology. I am unable to affirm those details on my own knowledge or even my own belief.”

- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, concurring in part that isolated genes cannot be patented. (via englishprof)
Maybe he read Evelyn Fox Keller…

"Making an argument for overhauling the nation’s immigration system Friday to a crowd of conservative..."

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 14:39:57 -0700

“Making an argument for overhauling the nation’s immigration system Friday to a crowd of conservative activists, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush claimed immigrants were “more fertile” and thus a great benefit to American society.”

- Successful rebranding of the Republican Party as something other than very old and very white and very out of touch continues apace, I guess. (via jakke)

I hope that’s not how he views his wife.