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German Research Foundation report suggests framework for gene banking and genetic testing

Scientists complain that restrictions on access hinder research, undercut development goals

With jobs scarcer than ever before, more chemists are moving into life sciences

Techniques developed after attacks detailed at American Chemical Society meeting

Pathfinder in pharmacology brought rigor to the study of drug effectiveness

NIH awards $350 million for biodefense and emerging diseases research

Click for larger version of survey graph (27K) A survey of 314 of our readers provides a picture of their science-reading habits. The majority, 56%, spends more than three hours per week reading primary research articles in print and online, and 10% read more than 10 hours per week. We asked respondents which multidisciplinary journals they read frequently. Naturally, The Scientist came out on top - these are readers of The Scientist after all - with 80% reading or skimming more than half t

Foundations | Little Green Bacteria Click for larger version of notes (68K) When I first heard Paul Brehm [then at Tufts University] mention green fluorescent protein at a seminar in the late 1980s, I got excited; I knew it had the potential to be an expression marker. I talked with Doug Prasher, who was trying to isolate a gfp cDNA, and we promised to keep in touch. But we lost track of each other after I married and went to do my sabbatical at my wife's university. In September 1992, I

Protein folding raises some of biology's greatest theoretical challenges. It also lies at the root of many diseases. For example, the fundamental question of whether a protein's final tertiary conformation, sometimes called the native state, can be predicted from its primary amino acid sequence is also of vital importance in understanding the protein's potential capacity to form disease-inducing aggregates. MISS A FOLD, PROMPT A DISEASE Here's a list of protein folding-related disease catego

Research Briefs Eating for Two, or an Entire Lineage; Serine at the Start of Life; Interdisciplinary Research Eating for Two, or an Entire Lineage Courtesy of Randy Jirtle Duke University researchers give a new twist to the old adage, "You are what you eat." By feeding female agouti (Avy) mice methyl-rich supplements such as folic acid and vitamin B12, Randy Jirtle and Robert Waterland reduced agouti gene expression in their offspring. This change, caused by direct methylation of a transp

My alarm clock was blinking an erroneous time, but I ignored it; I had just taken a much-appreciated nap, and I needed to get back to a yeast cell biology conference at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. I was staying 10 miles away at a Vincentian seminary that housed students like me. My fan was running, and my cellular phone recharger was pulsing red. I had no idea that the power was coming from a backup generator. I was probably one of a few people of about 50 million, from Canada to New Jers

Connecticut group seeks better pay and working conditions