The Great Heard of Migrating Viruses by Ed Yong [Nat Geo]
Run.
“…the lack of predictability in genomic medicine is rather sobering. For certain genes and diseases, we can or will be able to make accurate and clinically useful predictions; but for many, we can’t and won’t.”
Caroline Wright lays out six reasons for the difficulties in genomic prediction. They’re all pretty obvious to me but the last reason may be a bit of a surprise.
![Skeleton of Jerboa by Richard Lydekker, from Royal Natural History Volume 3 (1893-96) [Wiki]
Kim Cooper utilizes jerboas to explore fundamental questions in cell biology, skeletal growth and evolution. I had the great pleasure to meet Kim and watch her present her work on jerboas back in February of this year. Read about this work at the Node.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/45e4ffb357ebe1ec65af9c053f1ea242/tumblr_mlp9egqZPN1qzs6yjo1_1280.png)
Skeleton of Jerboa by Richard Lydekker, from Royal Natural History Volume 3 (1893-96) [Wiki]
Kim Cooper utilizes jerboas to explore fundamental questions in cell biology, skeletal growth and evolution. I had the great pleasure to meet Kim and watch her present her work on jerboas back in February of this year. Read about this work at the Node.
![The Science of Ricin [New Yorker: Elements]
Probably the most famous victim of ricin was Georgi Markov, whose death by ricin poisoning seems straight out of a John le Carré novel. A Bulgarian dissident living in London and working for the BBC World Service, Markov left work on a late summer day in 1978 to catch a train home. On the street, Markov was “accidentally” jabbed in the leg by an umbrella-wielding passerby. Soon after, Markov felt sick, developed a high fever, and was taken to a hospital. When he died, four days later, an autopsy found his lungs filled with fluid, his internal organs dotted with small hemorrhages, and an especially high white-blood-cell count. Most shocking, however, was the discovery of a platinum-iridium pellet about one and a half millimetres in diameter lodged in Markov’s thigh. The pellet had been drilled to contain about 0.2 milligrams of liquid.
The pellet contained no trace of poison, so doctors had to figure out what killed Markov through a process of elimination: nerve poisons, bacterial toxins, and plant extracts were all high on the list. Markov’s symptoms most perfectly matched those of ricin poisoning, so scientists injected a pig with an amount proportional to what Markov had received. Within hours, the pig developed the same symptoms that Markov had shown, and an autopsy revealed the same internal damages.
Ricin is a Type 2 RIP (ribosome inactivating protein) which means that it has two protein chains. The Ricin B chain (RTB) is the Gal/GalNAc binding lectin that (you might have guessed) binds to the cells and mediates the activity of the Ricin A Chain. The Ricin A Chain (RTA) features a RNA N-glycosidase that cleaves a specific, highly conserved adenine residue, and this forms the toxic bit of the Ricin. When the Ricin B chain binds to the cell, endocytosis occurs, the RTA is then cleaved from the RTB and the now catalytically active RTA begins to target adenine molecules. As the piece notes, without adenine, cells can’t make proteins and can’t survive.
It’s pretty cool.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/996511bc9c430a74c786b35a9853fba0/tumblr_mlixh5CX2S1qzs6yjo1_400.png)
The Science of Ricin [New Yorker: Elements]
Probably the most famous victim of ricin was Georgi Markov, whose death by ricin poisoning seems straight out of a John le Carré novel. A Bulgarian dissident living in London and working for the BBC World Service, Markov left work on a late summer day in 1978 to catch a train home. On the street, Markov was “accidentally” jabbed in the leg by an umbrella-wielding passerby. Soon after, Markov felt sick, developed a high fever, and was taken to a hospital. When he died, four days later, an autopsy found his lungs filled with fluid, his internal organs dotted with small hemorrhages, and an especially high white-blood-cell count. Most shocking, however, was the discovery of a platinum-iridium pellet about one and a half millimetres in diameter lodged in Markov’s thigh. The pellet had been drilled to contain about 0.2 milligrams of liquid.
The pellet contained no trace of poison, so doctors had to figure out what killed Markov through a process of elimination: nerve poisons, bacterial toxins, and plant extracts were all high on the list. Markov’s symptoms most perfectly matched those of ricin poisoning, so scientists injected a pig with an amount proportional to what Markov had received. Within hours, the pig developed the same symptoms that Markov had shown, and an autopsy revealed the same internal damages.
Ricin is a Type 2 RIP (ribosome inactivating protein) which means that it has two protein chains. The Ricin B chain (RTB) is the Gal/GalNAc binding lectin that (you might have guessed) binds to the cells and mediates the activity of the Ricin A Chain. The Ricin A Chain (RTA) features a RNA N-glycosidase that cleaves a specific, highly conserved adenine residue, and this forms the toxic bit of the Ricin. When the Ricin B chain binds to the cell, endocytosis occurs, the RTA is then cleaved from the RTB and the now catalytically active RTA begins to target adenine molecules. As the piece notes, without adenine, cells can’t make proteins and can’t survive.
It’s pretty cool.
Data scientist John Candido, from The Modern Data Nerd Isn’t as Nerdy as You Think (Wired). By way of Momentary Flow.
This is true but one must also acknowledge that not all research questions or aims are equal, and that accuracy and complexity of some is perhaps far greater than for others.
