Apr 2010
Study: Discoveries in Non-Human Species Could Directly Benefit Man
28/04/10 12:37 Filed in: GenomeWeb Daily Scan
The uncovering by deep homology of human genes in diverse model organisms such as yeast, worms and plants has prompted some scientists to propose that useful insights into the aetiology of human diseases such as cancer could be learned from these species. S. Pelech challenges this notion and argues that outside of insights into the most basic mechanisms of cell division and death, regulatory pathways with these highly conserved genes in these model organisms actually control very different processes and extrapolations from research findings with them can be very misleading. Read More...
Free Personal Genome, with a Catch
27/04/10 12:35 Filed in: GenomeWeb Daily Scan
Blogger Iddo Friedberg at Byte Size Biology asked if people are willing to have their genomes sequenced for free if it was also made available for public research use along with some personal information, such as age, height, sex and disese history? However, wiith so many SNPs in the human genome, and over-riding factors such as epigenomic, transcriptional, translational and post-translational regulation affected by external factors, S. Pelech wonders just how useful knowledge of the sequence of one's genome will actually be in the near future. Read More...
Paul Nurse on Funding
26/04/10 12:33 Filed in: GenomeWeb Daily Scan
Paul Nurse proposed that the most elite scientists should receive more funding, because it is these individuals that are the most likely to make the big breakthroughs that will drive science forward. S. Pelech disagrees and argues that even with more limited funding, the greater the number of different scientists involved in the discovery process, especially with cross-disciplinary expertise, the better the prospects for scientific advancement. Read More...
Rocket Scientists, Brain Surgeons, and All That
15/04/10 12:31 Filed in: GenomeWeb Daily Scan
Success in science is proposed by blogger Zen Faulkes at NeuroDojo to depend more on perseverence than genius. S. Pelech agrees and notes that high curiosity and a real passion for their work gives leading scientists an edge. Read More...