Meet This Issue's Contributors

Michael Kastan began working on DNA-damage response as a graduate student more than 20 years ago. In this issue, the hematology-oncology chair at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital writes about the promise of manipulating DNA-repair mechanisms to target more than cancer (see p.24), "The field has matured enough to the point that we can think of how to intervene" in new ways, he says.

Jo Handelsman, who writes on page 20 about using metagenomics to discover new antibiotics, is a HHMI investigator in the plant pathology department at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Metagenomics allows researchers to mine the genomes of soil bacteria that are not yet culturable. "A microbiologist's yearning is always to capture organisms in culture, so it's an odd digression from our normal routes," she says.

The Scientist is pleased to introduce Alison McCook, our new News Editor. Her byline will be familiar to The Scientist readers, ...