NewsBlog: Calif. law protects researchers Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 30th September 2008 10:42 PM GMT] California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a state bill Sunday (Sept. 28) that aims to protect academic researchers - especially those who use animals in their studies - from the types of attacks that animal rights groups have employed in the state recently. The law, called... Click to continue View comment (1) | Comment on this blog NewsBlog: US science funding frozen Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 30th September 2008 04:29 PM GMT] The financial crisis befalling the nation has proven that its tentacles reach even into the scientific community. On Saturday (Sept. 27), the US Senate decided to freeze federal funding of any program except those relating to veterans affairs and national security by passing bill HR 2638. This leaves many US science agencies including NASA, the National... Click to continue View comments (2) | Comment on this blog NewsBlog: HHMI picks new president Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 29th September 2008 10:50 PM GMT] The Howard Hughes Medical Institute has chosen a University of California, Berkeley, biochemist and stem cell researcher to serve as its next president. Robert Tjian, an HHMI investigator since 1987, will replace outgoing president, Thomas Cech, on April 1, 2009, when Cech leaves his post. HHMI sent an E-mail to its investigators earlier today announcing the decision. "Bob... Click to continue Comment on this blog NewsBlog: Should conflicts mean no NIH grant? Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 29th September 2008 05:23 PM GMT] If you've been following the news of NIH-funded researchers seemingly entangled in webs of unreported, underreported, or misreported financial ties to industry over the past year or so, you know that the buck often stops at the desk of Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA). You might have also noticed that many of the subjects of Grassley's recent inquiries are psychiatrists who are funded by NIH's National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). In... Click to continue View comments (3) | Comment on this blog NewsBlog: Zerhouni resigns as NIH head Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 24th September 2008 03:40 PM GMT] The 15th head of the National Institutes of Health, Elias Zerhouni, will step down from his post, he announced today (Sept 24). In a conference call with reporters today, Zerhouni said that he would be leaving NIH at the end of October as a part of what he called "the natural cycle of tenures for this position." "It's with mixed emotions that I move on," he said. President George W. Bush... Click to continue View comments (7) | Comment on this blog NewsBlog: A new twist on nanoparticle behavior Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 23rd September 2008 04:02 PM GMT] Researchers hoping to develop nanoparticles as medicines or carriers of therapeutic molecules have much more to worry about than the type of material they plan on miniaturizing, according to a study in this week's issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. Researchers in Ireland found that the corona, or cloud of proteins and other biomolecules that... Click to continue View comments (4) | Comment on this blog NewsBlog: Who's advising McCain on science? Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 23rd September 2008 02:27 PM GMT] While Democratic Presidential hopeful Barack Obama unveiled an impressive stable of science policy advisers last week, his opponent John McCain has yet to ante up. As Wired reported on Wednesday, the Obama science team includes Nobel laureates ... Click to continue View comments (10) | Comment on this blog NewsBlog: Haitian HIV clinic weathers storms Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 17th September 2008 04:08 PM GMT] The trio of hurricanes that raked across Haiti recently left the HIV/AIDS clinic that I visited there earlier this year battered but not broken. While Gustav, Hanna, and Ike wrought widespread destruction across the country and killed hundreds of people, the Haitian Study Group on Kaposi's Sarcoma and Opportunistic Infections (GHESKIO) clinic in Port-au-Prince continues to function, according to the center's director ... Click to continue Comment on this blog NewsBlog: McCain changes stem cell tune Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 15th September 2008 04:17 PM GMT] US Republican Presidential candidate, John McCain, appears to be backing off from his strong support of federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, according to his responses to an online questionnaire on national science issues. "While I support federal funding for embryonic stem cell research," Senator McCain (R-AZ) wrote in response to a survey from science advocacy... Click to continue View comments (4) | Comment on this blog NewsBlog: Is systematic biology dead? Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 8th September 2008 03:43 PM GMT] Systematics and taxonomy, sciences involved with identifying and organizing living things into distinct groups and establishing the relationships between those groups, are in serious danger of going extinct, according to a report released last month by a committee focused on science in the... Click to continue View comment (1) | Comment on this blog NewsBlog: Lancet retracts stem cell paper Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 5th September 2008 08:48 PM GMT] UK-based medical journal The Lancet has retracted a paper reporting on a clinical trial of a stem cell therapy for urinary incontinence, which has been mired in allegations of misconduct. In this week's issue of the journal, editors Sabine Kleinert and Richard Horton write that authors of an Austrian government inquiry "raise doubts as to whether a trial... Click to continue View comments (4) | Comment on this blog NewsBlog: Obama: Yes to stem cells, funding Posted by Bob Grant [Entry posted at 2nd September 2008 04:10 PM GMT] As controversy and rumors swirl around John McCain's newly-tapped running mate like tropical depression-force winds and the Republican National Convention sputters to a start, Barack Obama vowed to lift the ban on stem cell research and set targets to reduce carbon emissions, and promised to double basic research budgets over the next decade. His promises are spelled out in responses to a science policy survey issued by research and... Click to continue View comments (2) | Comment on this blog

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