Over the last several months, biochemists have linkurl:questioned the validity;http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/56266/ of a new technique heralded as a "breakthrough" technology when it was linkurl:published in Science;http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;326/5950/252 in October 2009 -- a reactome array of nearly 2,500 metabolites and other substrate compounds tethered to a glass slide that would allow scientists to assess the functionality of hundreds of active proteins simultaneously. Indeed, last week, Science decided to retract the paper, upon the recommendation of an ethics committee at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), where several of the authors (including last author Manuel Ferrer) are based, and two other affiliated institutions.
Some researchers, however, including Nobel Laureate linkurl:Richard Roberts,;http://www.neb.com/nebecomm/researchScientist.asp?id=RRoberts chief scientific officer of New England Biolabs, continue to defend the technique and the potential it holds for studying the metabolic activities of cells. Roberts spoke with The Scientist about why he believes the decision to...
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Image: Flickr, linkurl:Argonne Laboratory;http://www.flickr.com/photos/argonne/3397932229/ |
The Scientist:Richard Roberts:TS:RR:TS:RR:TS:RR:TS:RR:TS:RR:TS:RR:
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