General Science

If there is one ERV I genuinely love talking about on ERV, its PERVs-- Porcine Endogenous Retroviruses. And you all should care about them too-- Pigs and their PERVs (or, lack of PERVs, or lack of infectious PERVs) might one day have a direct impact on you or your friends/family. Clinical trials involving tissue from genetically distinct pigs has already started Down Under, and apparently research in the US and UK is now considered 'imminent'. Very, very cool update-- Im glad the PERVs are under control and this kind of research can move forward. Of course, there are ethical positions to…
I have to give a huge round of applause to PLoS, specifically, PLoS ONE, and their handling of the XMRV fiasco. Some of you might remember, early 2010 PLoS published the very first 'Umm... XMRV isnt there...' paper, Failure to Detect the Novel Retrovirus XMRV in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. To a scientist, it was interesting, but not that big of a deal. People publish conflicting findings all the time. Eventually we get to the bottom of it. Whatever. Its annoying when you are in it, but its kinda funny to outside observing scientists. The reaction from the initial studys principle…
This is, quite possibly, the biggest science journalism fail in the history of ever. IN THE HISTORY OF EVER. *heavy sigh* OKAY, when we discover new drugs and antivirals and such, we usually dont build these pharmaceuticals from scratch. We steal them from evolution, and try to make them *better* for *our* purposes in the lab-- modify them, concentrate them, purify them, until we have a new drug. You dont go suck on a tree if you have a headache-- you pop a couple aspirin. You dont get a prescription for moldy bread when you have a sinus infection-- you pop a couple antibiotics. We are…
As a scientist and a blogger and a science communicator, I luvs me some open access publishing! I can link to a paper everyone can read, people can leave questions or comments or ideas in my comment section-- its interactive and educational and a lot more fun for everyone (I end up learning a lot answering peoples Qs, or by others answers myself). I also love the idea of open comments on papers. I dont have to hunt down an email and hope an author responds to a technical question or point-- post your question/comment, and either someone on the paper or someone else can answer it for you!…
Id like to take a minute to expand upon my post from yesterday-- What I find odd about 'Science Rock Stars' is the way scientists and rock stars were awkwardly mashed together. Like mixing peanut butter and Twizzlers. They are both good independently, but unless youve got a real, obvious reason to mush them together, its weird. I think it would make more sense, if one was deeply concerned about coolness, to utilize innate 'cool' aspects of scientists lives. As many pointed out in the comments, it would make more sense to interview scientists who were actual rock stars. Or if music was…
It was 75 degrees yesterday. It got down to 24 today. And pretty much everyone else in the country is under a layer of ice/snow. But Im not gonna write about cold scientists. Im talkin about cool scientists. Chris Mooney, the expert on facades, appearances, and stabbing people in the back with a smile (you see, if youre smiling, its civil! we are all about civility, here!) is worried, for some reason, that scientists arent cool. This is not necessarily scientists fault, per se, as very few professions are actually cool. Being a teacher isnt 'cool'. Being a nurse isnt 'cool'. Working at…
Its no secret I love Craig Venter. He is inspiring. He is mother fucking inspiring. Never met him, probably wont ever, but I have a feeling his "CRAIG VENTER IS AN ASS!" reputation is similar to Dawkins "RICKARD DAWKINS IS MEAN!!!!" reputation. And even if he is a complete ass, I am inspired by his ability to be the Willy Wonka of the scientific world.
Long time readers of ERV know that I have a soft-spot for animated depictions of cellular processes. Yes, they are beautiful (to a fault). Yes they are a neat way to explain complex topics to people. But I love them due to the sheer volume of lulz they provide when Creationists try to do them. See, scientists use animations for educational purposes. Creationists use them for misinformation. They present the animations as if they are for realsies video recordings of things going on in cells-- "OOOH! Look how PERFECT it all works! Look how PRETTY it all is! IT MUST BE DESIGNED!", when…
Some of you in the atheisphere remember what happened this past year with 'Tom Johnson' and the 'Youre Not Helping' blog. Quick recap from Jerry:On October 22 of last year, Chris Mooney put up a post at The Intersection called "Counterproductive attacks on religion--exhibit A." The "exhibit" was an excerpt from an earlier comment on that website by someone named "Tom Johnson." Johnson claimed that he was a biologist who had gone to "conservation events" (that is, outreach meetings designed to educate people about conservation), and that atheists had behaved very badly at these events,…
One of the many reasons why I love being a science blogger, is it lets normal people peek into the lives of scientists and our culture. I joked at a recent OKC Atheists meeting that no one would ever make a reality TV show about my lab work-- while it is conceptually awesome, its just not fun to sit and watch (someone needs to do a montage of a Western Blot to the 'Rocky' theme). But I can do little blog posts about the scientific culture, like this one. If there is one word I would use to summarize being a scientist, its 'trust'. Yes, we are highly critical of one anothers work. But we…
Hey. Hey you all remember a while back, when some climate change denialists hacked into someones email, and released all these 'damning' statements on how climate change is all a lie. Except, its not. You know how climate change denialists are normally crazy right wing Christian/Libertarian dipshits? Apparently, crazy left wing hippy freaks arent above doing the exact same thing. A while back, some monkeys at a breeding facility (provide the primates for research) got into a fight. So pics were taken, everything was documented-- the vets got experience dealing with these situations, the…
Geron press release:"We are pleased with the FDA's decision to allow our planned clinical trial of GRNOPC1 in spinal cord injury to proceed," said Thomas B. Okarma, Ph.D., M.D., Geron's president and CEO. "Our goals for the application of GRNOPC1 in subacute spinal cord injury are unchanged - to achieve restoration of spinal cord function by the injection of hESC-derived oligodendrocyte progenitor cells directly into the lesion site of the patient's injured spinal cord. Additionally, we are now formally exploring the utility of GRNOPC1 in other degenerative CNS disorders including Alzheimer's…
WARBLEGARBLETHISISSOCOOLYALL! Where to start? You all are aware of the fact we have 'science education issues' here in Oklahoma? Well not everyone here is sitting on their hands, shaking their heads, bemoaning what a shame it is. A fellow who lives in Stillwater, Monty Harper, is actually trying to do something about it in a really cool way (weve praised him on SciBlogs before)! Monty is a childrens song writer and self-professed science geek, so once a month he and a local scientist put on a show for local elementary school kids (3-5th grades)-- he writes a song about that scientist, and…
This sounds like a science-fiction novel, but the following is totally true: In 1967, a group of folks in Marburg Germany doing research with African Grivets, all got sick. Apparently they picked up a new virus from the grivets, and 7 of the 31 infected people died of hemorrhagic fever. This Marburg virus (close relative of Ebola virus) caused a few more small outbreaks in Africa the next few decades, but it was eventually capitalized on by the Soviet Union for use as a bioweapon. Ironically, the individual in charge of this, Nikolai Ustinov, accidentally stuck himself with the virus, and…
Sure, its traumatic, but some scientists/MDs could have used a lesson like this when they were younger. I've never been very good at math or science. I enjoyed the stories embedded in history and literature but lost interest when it came to periodic functions and the table of elements. So in sixth grade, when each member of my class was responsible for creating an experiment to show at the school's science fair in late April, I felt about as excited as I'd feel today if I were told I had to attend a live reenactment of the entire first season of Grey's Anatomy. My dad, on the other hand, was…
Its time once again for my yearly forced vacation. So I have some time to read/respond to some great emails from readers! Dear ERV-- I am just a random reader of your blog and several other science blogs. I'm sorry to bother you with this, but your contact me page was written in lolcat so I figured you couldn't be too bad, right? :) Feel free to pose this to your readers, forward it, or garbage it- I'm sure your busy but really I'm just kinda lost right now... So, brief about me..I'm in my late 20s and having a "mid-20s crisis" a few years too late. When I was a teenager right out of high…
I didnt know what to say about Venter & Crew making a bacterial genome from scratch. No such luck from the BASTION of child rape, homophobia, misogyny, and flat out stupidity human morality and ethics, the Catholic Church: Church warns cell scientists not to play God Catholic Church officials said Friday that the recently created first synthetic cell could be a positive development if correctly used, but warned scientists that only God can create life. heh. "It's a great scientific discovery. Now we have to understand how it will be implemented in the future," Monsignor Rino Fisichella,…
Okay, Ive been trying to figure out what I can add to the OMFGTHEYMADEABACTERIAFROMSCRATCH hysteria. I cant come up with much more than 'WARBLEGARBLE!!!!!!!', but luckily, many others in the blagosphere didnt totally lose their heads and have some great posts up (leave links to your favorites in the comments, I missed some, I know). I just think its funny that a week ago I was bitching about how this group didnt explain how they synthesized their artificial genes (a few hundred nucleotides for each HIV-1 gene), cause it is really hard to go from "DNA sequence on a computer" to "DNA sequence…
There was something bothering me about Stephen Hawkings position on aliens. Some memory that wasnt resurfacing properly. As I was clicking though Netflix last night, I remembered. Dear Stephen Hawking-- You dont need to worry about aliens invading our planet to escape their own polluted world. The Rock got Sara and Seth to Witch Mountain safely. See?Race to Witch Mountain - Trailer feat. The Rock | Viral/Other | SPIKE.com
Abbies deep, dark secret:Dr. Who makes me cry. Every episode. Every episode I end up bawling for some reason or another. So I always watch it by myself, and I make sure to have some 'Family Guy' or 'Mighty Boosh' ready to cheer me up afterwords. One of the worst is episode 158, "The End of The World". God, to think of everything weve created on Earth, good or bad... the very last thing leftover from our civilization is a recording of Britney Spears singing 'Toxic'... Im not shitting you, it makes me tear up just writing about it. But thats just it, isnt it? Nothing we do is lasting. The…