The Scientist articles from December 2005

The Scientist archives from December 2005

Top 5 grouches of 2005.(Editorial)
December 5, 2005... To close out the year, in this issue on page 14 we review major research developments in 2005, and on page 18 we discuss the issues that have had an impact on infrastructure and business in the life sciences. As ever, science marches on. ...

Nanotechnology's dilemmas: now is the time to wrestle with the ethics of this Pandora's box.(OPINION)
December 5, 2005... Nanotechnology can learn much from history. As the biotechnology industry recently discovered, ignoring public policy and social issues--namely, possible heath and environmental hazards from genetically modified foods--invites a public...

Citations make the president.(Amanda Goodall)
December 5, 2005... Amanda Goodall, a doctoral student in strategic management at Warwick Business School, UK, had a hunch, based on her experience working for college officials in both the United States and the United Kingdom: The world's elite research...

Darwin on trial--and in a museum.(exhibitions on scientific discoveries)
December 5, 2005... If you didn't know better, you'd have been forgiven for being suspicious of the timing of the opening of the American Museum of Natural History's (AMNH) exhibit on Darwin in the middle of last month. After all, it was just two weeks after the...

The biggest stories in bioscience 2005: five events that will continue to shape the life-science landscape.
December 5, 2005... Life scientists have been challenged more than ever this year not just to critically analyze data, but to better interpret those data for an increasingly critical public. Here at The Scientist, we looked for touchstone events for the life...

The year that was: foundations, regulations, and approvals were the industry and policy highlight of 2005.
December 5, 2005... In a year in which several Big Pharma players felt pain as the Vioxx imbroglio settled out--take August's $253 million settlement against Merck, for example--news in funding, policy, and strategy, from government agencies to biotechs,...

A new view of translational control: how P-bodies, stress granules, and other cytoplasmic foci manage the cellular currency.
December 5, 2005... The bank note that Dominique Weil used to buy ice cream for her family at the beach this past summer may have traveled a long way. The note, a product of international treaties and detailed artistry, could have crossed a dozen international...

Cancer research in flames: tracking inflammation's role in promoting malignancy could lead to better treatments.(Vision)
December 5, 2005... One problem with the current war on cancer is that much of it focuses on destroying the malignant cell itself while paying little attention to some of cancer's allies that are more prone to attack. Cancer undoubtedly starts and ends with...

Promoting antibody diversity: research closes in on the action of AID.(Hot Papers)(activation induced deaminase)
December 5, 2005... The immune system produces a huge variety--hundreds of billions--of high-affinity antibodies. Immunologists have been asking how B cells accomplish this for decades, and in the past five years, the answers have come, all in a rush. A single...

N. Touret et al., "Quantitative and dynamic assessment of the contribution of the ER to phagosome formation.(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... N. Touret et al., "Quantitative and dynamic assessment of the contribution of the ER to phagosome formation," Cell, 123:157-170, Oct. 7, 2005. Aligning an impressive array of methods, this study provides strong evidence against the...

D.T. Nair et al., "Revi employs a novel mechanism of DNA synthesis using a protein template.(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... D.T. Nair et al., "Revi employs a novel mechanism of DNA synthesis using a protein template," Science, 309:2219-22, Sept. 30, 2005. This article reports the fascinating finding that Revi, a member of the translesion synthesis family of...

M.R. Macbeth et al., "Inositol hexakisphosphate is bound in the ADAR2 core and required for RNA editing".(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... M.R. Macbeth et al., "Inositol hexakisphosphate is bound in the ADAR2 core and required for RNA editing," Science, 309:1534--9, Sept. 2, 2005. This work reports the fascinating but surprising finding that the RNA editing enzyme ADARz...

Hormonal sibling rivalry.(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... Proteins that stimulate and repress appetite appear to be cut from the same cloth. Stanford University biologists report that a newly discovered appetite suppressing hormone, called obestatin, is produced by posttranslational modification of...

Worms sniff out harm.(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... Worms learn: If something makes you sick, don't eat it again. Researchers at Rockefeller University have found that worms can learn to avoid substrates scented with bacteria that have made them ill in the past. (1) The neurotransmitter...

AFM: not just for material anymore: atomic-force microscopy finds its footing in the life sciences.(atomic-force microscope)
December 5, 2005... The atomic-force microscope (AFM) was developed 20 years ago, but only recently has it become a significant tool for biologists. Irene Revenko, applications scientist at Santa Barbara, Calif.-based AFM manufacturer, Asylum Research, says when...

A buyers' guide to transposon kits: jumping genes make many genetic applications easier.
December 5, 2005... If you thought transposons were mere genetic curiosities, think again. In the hands of research scientists, genetic elements akin to those that give Indian corn its unique coloration can be used to sequence genes and genomes, create libraries...

Protein solution structure in three days or less? Emerging methods will accelerate NMR structure determination of small proteins.(VISION)
December 5, 2005... More efficient protein structure determination is a major goal of the US structural genomics projects. X-ray crystallography shines in its ability to determine structures quickly from data gathered at synchrotron beam lines, but only a...

Measuring protein concentrations in live cells: Yale group demonstrates new method using cytokinesis.(Tools & Tech)
December 5, 2005... One of the bottlenecks of systems biology has been the dearth of tools available for measuring the concentration of individual proteins in vivo--data that's essential for mathematical modeling of biological pathways. Now, Jian Qu Wu and...

Reconstructing mammalian cell lineages: computational technique tracks cell fate in mice and men.(Tools & Tech)(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... Adult nematode worms contain 959 somatic cells, and thanks to Nobel laureate John Sulston and colleagues, scientists know the lineage of every one of them. Cell fate maps have never been built for higher metazoans, however. "People thought it...

Mapping MAPK activation: R&D Systems macroarray monitors kinase isoforms.(Tools & Tech)(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... Mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs)--serine/threonine protein kinases involved in inflammation and growth and implicated in chronic pain, cancer, and stress-are a hot topic these days. In the past five years alone, more than 21,000...

Agilent launches ChIp-on-chip: microarray detects DNA-binding events with high sensitivity.(Tools & Tech)(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... Chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP), or location analysis, is an antibody-based method for identifying the segments of DNA recognized by a particular transcription factor in a native chromatin environment. Chip involves a number of...

GFT NMR proves its structural genomics mettle: researchers use technique to solve eight protein structures in on month.(Tools & Tech)(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... G-matrix Fourier transform (GFT) NMR, a technique developed several years ago for rapid collection of nuclear magnetic resonance data, has been used to determine the structures of eight proteins in less than a month. (1) "People usually work...

Mining the ubiquitin pathway: attacking new drug targets could address unmet needs.(Vision)
December 5, 2005... In October 2004, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry to Aaron Ciechanover, Avram Hersko, and Irwin Rose "for the discovery of ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation." Their seminal work in the 1970s and...

US animal lab limit dropped.(Update)(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... The US Senate recently dropped a proposed amendment from the Agriculture Appropriations Bill to restrict research institutions from purchasing laboratory animals from Class B dealers. The "Class B amendment," introduced by Sen. Daniel Akaka...

Aussie job cuts worry scientists.(Update)(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... Australia's major government science body, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), plans to cut up to 25% of its research support staff during the next three years to save about $30 million (Australian) per...

Ethiopian biotech institute planned.(Agricultural Biotechnology Research Institute )(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... Ethiopia plans to open its first Agricultural Biotechnology Research Institute (ABRI) by next year. The institute, funded by a World Bank loan, will be part of the Hotela Agricultural Research Center, about 45 kilometers from Addis Ababa. "We...

US weighs biodefense measures.(Update)
December 5, 2005... The US Senate plans to offer new incentives to the pharmaceutical and biotech industries to develop more vaccines, drugs, and countermeasures against a range of pathogens. Prominent among the biodefense measures before Congress is the...

Italian academics protest reforms.(Update)(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... Last month, the Italian Parliament approved a debated reform proposed by University and Research Minister Letizia Moratti that eliminates permanent contracts for all but professors and establishes a national exam for those who wish to qualify...

Acrylamide study sparks German debate.(Update)(Brief Article)
December 5, 2005... Scientists from the University of Hanover Medical School in Germany recently published a study in Deutsches Arzteblatt that implied levels of the carcinogen acrylamide in the body might not be as strongly influenced by consumption of...

Design species / taxa discrimination assays.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... Use AlleleID to design diagnostic qPCR and microarrays for pathogen detection and bacterial identification. Align sequences and design oligos to detect the species or strains of interest from the mix. To design taxa or species specific...

New! 96-well integrin arrays.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... Chemicon Integrin-Mediated Cell Adhesion Arrays for Integrin Profiling or Screening * Individual or combined alpha and beta integrin arrays * 12 x 8 strips of individual integrins * Colorimetric or fluorimetric formats *...

A wider range of snake venom proteins.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... NOW AVAILABLE for Hemostasis applications, highly purified Snake Venom Proteins. Included are: Batroxobin, Botrocetin[R], Convulxin, Ecarin, Noscarin, Protac[R], Protease A, Reptilase[R], RW Factor V Activator, RW Factor X Activator, and...

An automated method to monitor cell behavior.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... ECIS[TM] Electric Cell-substrate Impedance Sensing is a powerful new method to study cell behavior in tissue culture. The approach provides real time, quantitative measurements of: * Cell Morphology * Endothelial Cell...

Cell culture.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... Cell Signaling: * Pre-screened HUVEC, HMVEC for VEGF-R2 activated signaling. Primary Cells: * HUVEC, HMVEC, HEK, HEM, etc. > 60 normal human and animal cell types * Large lots and matching cell sets * Optimized and...

New catalog * new website new products.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... Available Now--2005 Oxford Biomedical Research Catalog Introducing hundreds of new antibodies, proteins and assays for the following: * OXIDATIVE STRESS ASSAYS Isoprostane, MPO, Antioxidants.... * VASCULAR BIOLOGY tPA, uPA, PAl.......

Nanofil[TM]--sub-microliter injection system.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... A new micro syringe designed for mouse injection, offering the smallest metal needle in the world (110 micron OD). Unique design allows a variety of tips to be used, making application possibilities endless. Nanoliter injections can be...

Affordable flow cytometry & direct counting.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... Once again Guava is making flow cytometry accessible to anyone in the lab. The new Guava EasyCyte Mini[TM] is easy to use, affordable, compact, and equipped with blue laser and multi-color detection. Optimized, turnkey cellular assays include...

Pre-owned lab equipment.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... * Savings of up to 80% off manuf. list * Remanufactured with warranty * Turn unwanted equipment into cash * Get more for your budget whether buying or selling, or if you just want a quote PEGASUS SCIENTIFIC, INC (800)...

Gift array 2005! Science-based fashion.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... Neckties and Scarves--100% silk StaphScrubs--New! BioBoxers--100% cotton BioNotes--Awareness note cards MicroArray design based on original work described in The Scientist. Dozens of patterns, including Neurons, Stem Cells, Foodborne 6,...

A leading global custom peptide company.(GUIDE)(Company Profile)
December 5, 2005... GL Biochem, founded in 1998, has total of 140 plus chemists directly involved in peptide synthesis and HPLC purification. We probably possess one of the biggest capacities with state-of-the art facilities in custom peptides production which...

Free posters: lineage markers & cytokines.(GUIDE)
December 5, 2005... The 2005 eBioscience catalog features products such as IL-23, Foxp3, DC-Sign, Nanog, TLRs and TrueBlot, a simple to use IgG detection for IP/WB to reduce interference by heavy Posters available: TLR, Costimulation, Th1 Th2, Mouse/Human CD,...

Just check it! Toxicology comes to rave parties in Vienna.
December 5, 2005... It's just past midnight and a Vienna rave is at full-throttle, packed with sweaty dancers pulsing to an electronic beat. Off to the side, visible through the flickering lights, a long queue snakes out from a covered booth. The ravers in line...