Archive for December, 2007
Various outlets are lamenting the cuts and paltry increases to Federal science funding in the omnibus spending package passed by Congress and headed for the President’s desk. AAAS calculates that over all, “Federal funding for basic and applied research would decline in real terms for the fourth year in a row.”
The National Research Council of the National Academies convened a symposium Wednesday to explore approaches among “Future Directions in Research at the Intersection of the Physical and Life Sciences.” The intersections up for discussion ranged across the research spectrum: from synthetic biology to geoengineering to bioterrorism.
The most recent Technology Quarterly issue of The Economist highlights emerging technologies, several of which present new challenges to regulators and policymakers.
Senator John Kerry compares the decision to address carbon emissions with economic and policy reforms to Pascal’s Wager. “If we’re wrong,” he explained this morning at an event hosted by the Center for American Progress Action Fund, “we still have global development, clean air, a stronger economy here at home, healthier citizens, and no more addiction to the foreign oil that funds despots and terrorists.”
An interview with Allen M. Hornblum, author of
Sentenced to Science: One Black Man’s Story of Imprisonment in America, on the history and ethics of practices largely hidden from public view.
Healthcare professionals helping patients with mental health problems have an increasing array of treatment and prevention tools at their disposal. But on the horizon is a preventative tool that poses challenging public policy questions about ethics and privacy: personal genomic sequencing.
Synthetic biology, which involves producing artificial life forms from genomes built on lab benches, promises to unleash a variety of chemical wonders, pose a slate of dual-use dangers, and ignite intellectual property battles over patents for the “software of life.”
The Minnesota legislature recently approved funding for biomonitoring research, which will track environmental contaminants found in the tissue of children and adult volunteers. In related news, the EPA eased reporting requirements for companies that dump toxic chemicals into the environment.
Drug-resistant staph, known as MRSA, began making headlines in October, when the CDC released a report indicating that many healthy citizens carry the bacteria, which kills more people each year in the U.S. than AIDS. Two recent stories, one on research on a possible MRSA treatment and another on the threat of the bacteria on factory farms, may put the “superbug” back under the public microscope.
It is estimated that approximately half a million frozen embryos are currently being stored by fertility clinics in the United States. Patients who have not used all the embryos they have created have several options from which to choose in deciding what to do with the embryos. An excerpt from the new report, Future Choices: Assisted Reproductive Technologies and the Law, from the Center for American Progress.
This week saw good news and new thinking on the power of technology to foster open and accountable governance: an article on “Wiki-Government,” a report on the “searchability” of government info, and the launch of a new site offering data on Federal spending.
This history of the San Diego biotech cluster; stem cell grants in CA; simple wireless Internet access to low-income communities; DOE opens test reactor for university experiments.
Creating life in the laboratory is an inevitable scientific milestone, which means we need to discuss safety issues and other repercussions now.
Researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies recently created a chimeric mouse model for human liver disease to study drug efficacy. But research on chimeric models is drawing criticism from those who oppose the research on ethical grounds.
The latest scientific workforce debate underscores the importance of science graduates learning about something other than science.
Presenting at a policy summit last Wednesday, Dr. Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, offered recommendations for tax policies that offer “enterprise-focused” tax credits for Research & Development.
A profile of Shinya Yamanaka; developing a malaria vaccine; providing an overdose antidote to heroin addicts; the Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speeches.
The prolonged closure of a Canadian nuclear reactor that supplies over two thirds of the world’s medical radioisotopes has severely hindered the ability of hospitals nationwide to perform a variety of procedures and diagnostic studies for diseases like cancer and heart disease.
The House Oversight Committee on Bush Administration interference with climate science; Atlantis grounded; framing nanotech; sex difference in math and science; Nobel Peace Prize ceremonies; VCs doubtful on carbon regulation from the government.
Spaceflight exacts a heavy toll on the human body, but the effect of weightlessness on the human immune system poses a considerable obstacle to long missions in space.
Researchers recently cured sickle-cell anemia in a mouse model using iPS cells, highlighting the promise of iPS cells for future research and affirming the importance of preventing the current excitement about iPS cells from hastily ending embryonic stem cell research.
An excerpt from a new history of breast cancer, a disease that has entered the bodies of so many American women and the concerns of nearly all the rest, mostly as a result of how we have detected, labeled, and responded to the disease.
The number of women diagnosed with breast cancer rose dramatically in the 20th century, increasing fear of breast cancer and leading more and more women to choose prophylactic mastectomies. But much of this increase represents overdiagnosis. Americans must recognize the overselling of cancer fear, and must question current practices that are based on the often-illusory goal of reasserting some control over fear.
In the first demonstrated therapeutic application of induced pluripotent stem cells, researchers have cured sickle-cell anemia in mice. Rudolf Jaenisch, one of the authors of the paper announcing the work pointed out that this achievement means that research on human embryonic stem cells must go forward.
A new vision from Bill and Melinda Gates to eradicate malaria; better math curricula start with algebra; gene transfer likely not cause of death in trial; peer-reviewing bioterrorism intel.
Transparency for global health data; the legal status of embryos; the Bali Climate Declaration by Scientists; genome research open access; U.S. science education.
Open government takes a step forward with the launch of Project Sunlight, a website dedicated to tracking and making public the details of government decision making in the Empire State.
Atlantis launch moved; Facebook address online privacy concerns; energy and climate legislation makes headway in Congress; regulating airline emissions; commercial ventures to the moon.
Three young women scientists make history; arguments over the impact of climate change on global health; how not to get funding from the NSF; John Marburger talks with the National Journal; conflicts of interest at the FDA; the ailing Discovery Corps Fellowship program; and what is Evo-Devo?
Policy makers are responding predicatably to reports that students in the United States on average scored lower than their peers in other wealthy industrialized nations on an international science exam, arguing that the test indicates that U.S. students cannot compete in the international workforce. But talking about “competitiveness” makes it easy to gloss over inequities in the educational system connected to race and class.
Policymakers need to give consumers the choice to protect their privacy or allow e-commerce companies to profile their web travels.
Advances in nanotechnology may yield myriad powerful technical applications. But to grapple with the gap between research and regulation, the Center on Nanotechnology and Society held its 2nd Annual Conference on Nanopolicy this past Friday.
The efforts of China’s State Food and Drug Administration to crack down on drug and medical device companies seems to be improving the industry’s reputation and will hopefully make for a safer marketplace.
James A. Thomson and Alan I. Leshner issued a stinging response to those who would claim that the Bush administration’s stem cell policy encouraged the research that led to induced Pluripotent Cells; they call the work “a breakthrough achieved despite political restrictions.”
The future of the Hubble Space Telescope, a new map of Antarctica, post-Katrina mental health, and metaphors for the climate crisis: in this week’s Science Times section of
The New York Times, several stories covering science, health, and technology policy.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is so underfunded and understaffed that it is putting consumers at risk to unsafe foods and drugs, according to a report, “FDA Science and Mission at Risk,” released by an advisory panel to the government agency on November 30th.
An interactive map showing where in the U.S. you can find Flex Fuel cars and gas stations that offer E85. The energy bill currently in Congress provides important provisions to make flex-fuels more widely available.
NASA has a new face on the web; the NIH says gene therapy wasn’t the cause of death in a recent trial; open-source standards and net neutrality can improve global health; and more.
“A new way to trick skin cells into acting like embryos changes both everything and nothing at all.” Alan I. Leshner and James A. Thomson on the new advances in stem cell research, and other news and commentary from the mainstream press.
While pundits and bloggers argue over the political implications of recent breakthroughs in stem cell science, Kathryn Hinsch visits one of the first privately funded stem cell labs and learns that research must continue on all fronts: embryonic, IPS, placental, and adult.
