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Jef Akst

Jef Akst

Jef (an unusual nickname for Jennifer) got her master’s degree from Indiana University in April 2009 studying the mating behavior of seahorses. After four years of diving off the Gulf Coast of Tampa and performing behavioral experiments at the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga, she left research to pursue a career in science writing. As The Scientist's managing editor, Jef edited features and oversaw the production of the TS Digest and quarterly print magazine. In 2022, her feature on uterus transplantation earned first place in the trade category of the Awards for Excellence in Health Care Journalism. She is a member of the National Association of Science Writers.

Articles by Jef Akst

Cysts stall stem cell trial?

Jef Akst | | 1 min read

Just over a week after the linkurl:Geron Corporation;http://www.geron.com/ announced that the linkurl:US Food and Drug Administration;http://www.fda.gov/ (FDA) had linkurl:placed a hold on its stem cell trial;http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/55898/ aimed at treating patients with spinal cord injury with human embryonic stem cells (hESCs), the company linkurl:revealed a reason:;http://www.geron.com/media/pressview.aspx?id=1188 microscopic cysts. Human embryonic stem cellsImage: Wikimedi

Bird sex gene found

Jef Akst | | 3 min read

Researchers have cracked the long-time mystery of how sex is determined in birds: A dose-dependent effect of a single gene on one of the sex chromosomes does the trick, according to a study published this week in Nature. Image: Wikimedia commons, linkurl:HerbertT;http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Take_five.jpg "It's a major advance," said physiologist and geneticist linkurl:Art Arnold;http://www.physci.ucla.edu/html/arnold.htm of the University of California, Los Angeles, who was not invo

Safety review for obesity drug

Jef Akst | | 2 min read

The linkurl:US Food and Drug Administration;http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=1&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fda.gov%2F&ei=4_iTSozKI4nKlAeUkPnGAg&usg=AFQjCNEC-Qs0EIMQO8U_uagEsakq0iVJIg&sig2=UIOXgDn12FgqwiQKkj4lXg linkurl:announced yesterday;http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm180057.htm (August 24) that it was reviewing reports of liver injury -- including 6 cases of liver failure and 27 hospitalizations -- in patients taking the weight loss drug orlistat, mark

Four years in jail for Hwang?

Jef Akst | | 1 min read

Disgraced stem cell researcher Hwang Woo-suk may face jail time, if South Korean prosecutors have anything to do with it. The prosecutors told the Seoul court today (August 24) that fabricating research findings on human stem cell lines and misusing more than $2 million in state funds calls for a four-year prison term, linkurl:reports Reuters;http://tiny.cc/5eIME . Pro-Hwang protest at Seoul National University in February 2006Image: Wikimedia commonsAfter linkurl:suspicion was raised about Hw

Student fudged immunology data

Jef Akst | | 2 min read

A former graduate student studying the link between immune function and symptoms of high cholesterol at the linkurl:Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center-Shreveport;http://www.sh.lsuhsc.edu/index.html fudged data in three published papers and one manuscript under review, according to linkurl:a report by the Office of Research Integrity (ORI).;http://ori.hhs.gov/misconduct/cases/Wolfort_Ryan.shtml Image: Wikimedia commonsRyan Wolfort admitted to "fabricating tabulations and the assoc

Human stem cell trial on hold

Jef Akst | | 2 min read

The linkurl:Geron Corporation;http://www.geron.com/ linkurl:announced on Tuesday;http://www.geron.com/media/pressview.aspx?id=1187 (August 18) that its stem cell study of spinal cord injury -- the first-ever clinical trial using human embryonic stem cell (hESC)-based therapy -- has been put on hold by the linkurl:US Food and Drug Administration;http://www.fda.gov/ (FDA) pending the review of some newly submitted animal data. Human embryonic stem cellsImage: Wikimedia commons, Nissim Benvenisty

Battle of the nostrils?

Jef Akst | | 3 min read

When the nostrils sense different smells, they may be duking it out for the brain's attention, according to a study published online today (August 20) in Current Biology. Such rivalry, well-documented in other sensory systems, has never before been shown for the olfactory system. Image: Flickr/linkurl: tuexperto_com3;http://www.flickr.com/photos/21626156@N02/2509246163/ "It's an interesting study," said linkurl:Jay Gottfried,;http://www.northwestern.edu/cnadc/gottfried/people.html a neuroscie

Worm glue to repair bones

Jef Akst | | 3 min read

Mimicking an adhesive naturally produced by marine worms, researchers have created a new glue that may help surgeons reconstruct shattered bone, they reported today (August 17) at the linkurl:American Chemical Society (ACS) 238th National Meeting;http://portal.acs.org/portal/acs/corg/content?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=PP_TRANSITIONMAIN&node_id=2053 in Washington, DC. Sandcastle wormImage: Russell Stewart"It's a wonderful advance," said biophysicist linkurl:Bob Baier;http://www.sdm.buffalo.edu/home.a

Two stem cell lines lead studies

Jef Akst | | 3 min read

In a decade of research on human embryonic stem cells (hESCs), scientists have largely depended on just two cell lines, greatly limiting the diversity of research in the budding field, according to a linkurl:survey published;http://bert.lib.indiana.edu:2146/nbt/journal/v27/n8/full/nbt0809-696.html in the August issue of Nature Biotechnology. Human embryonic stem cellsImage: Wikimedia commons/PLoS Nissim Benvenisty"It's been sort of common lore that those [two lines] have been the most widely u

Stem cell fraud . . . again?

Jef Akst | | 2 min read

Stem cell researchers at the University of Minnesota are once again under investigation for falsifying data.

Contract research on the rise

Jef Akst | | 4 min read

The global economic crisis has got most businesses pinching pennies just to stay afloat, and the drug development industry is no exception. But at least one area of the biotechnology sector -- contract research organizations (CROs) -- is on the rise. Image: Wikimedia commons, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Public Health Image LibraryCROs first showed up in the biotech industry in the late 1970s and quickly took on a significant role in research and development (R&D), eventually ex

Proteomic profiling

Jef Akst | | 2 min read

By Jef Akst Proteomic profiling Courtesy of Gerard Drewes The paper: M. Bantscheff et al., “Quantitative chemical proteomics reveals mechanisms of action of clinical ABL kinase inhibitors,” Nat Biotech, 25:1035–44, 2007. (Cited in 69 papers) The finding: Gerard Drewes and his colleagues at Cellzome, a German biotech company, created nonspecifically binding compounds called “kinobeads” to