Archive for May, 2008
This week, Francis Collins stepped down from his post at NHGRI; members of Congress continued work on a supplemental funding bill that could include more money for R&D; the first World Science Festival kicked off in New York City.
David Michaels speaks at a Center for American Progress event to discuss his book,
Doubt Is Their Product, explaining the “tricks of the trade” used by cigarette makers, drug companies, and climate change deniers to delay regulation that would make Americans safer.
This week, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute stepped in with $600 million in grant funding to 56 biomedical researchers pursuing high-risk, high-return work. The federal government should also fund researchers who “swing for the fences.”
Why the economic side of the global warming debate needs a more balanced ledger.
It won’t be long before computers will outsmart humans and take over basic problem-solving tasks. But because we don’t understand the exponential growth of computational power, we can’t see it coming.
As food worries grow, so does the appeal of a single federal Food Safety Administration to deliver effective oversight of what America eats.
President Bush signed the Genetic Information Non-discrimination Act into law on Wednesday, which will protect Americans from prejudicial treatment by employers or insurance companies based on their DNA. But this groundbreaking piece of legislation isn’t just important because it allays public concern.
Presidents and candidates for the office voluntarily release their medical records. But with advances in screening and treatment for many kinds of medical conditions, how do we know we’re getting the full story on the health of the Commander-In-Chief? (And do we want it?)
In his new book,
Doubt Is Their Product, Michaels chronicles the “tricks of the trade” that mercenary scientists and product defense firms employ to delay or prevent regulation of chemicals that kill. Their tactics put them in the good company of cigarette companies and global warming deniers.
Manufacturing Uncertainty [17:16m]:
Play Now |
Play in Popup |
Download (9)
The U.S. Energy Information Administration released new numbers this week on U.S. carbon dioxide emissions from energy sources, and it turns out that our surprising 1.3 percent emissions decrease in 2006 was, indeed, a fluke caused by a milder winter and summer.
New proposals to revive literary scholarship with scientific methods could build a bridge between two long-separated academic worlds. The result could be a better understanding of both science and literature.
The British parliament has passed a bill that authorizes inserting genetic material from humans into cow eggs in order to study diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.
As Congress considers the supplemental funding request and the spending earmarks that will accompany it, it’s worth looking at what states themselves spend on R&D.
The Environmental Protection Agency identifies key steps to cope with the shrinking Rocky Mountain snow mass and subsequently depleted sources of water in the West.
The global food crisis is the result of many intersecting factors, and alleviating the current hardships and preventing future crises will require a multi-pronged slate of solutions, including additional investment in agricultural research to increase food production yields in a safe and transparent manner.
A roundup of some of the science and technology policy events happening around Washington D.C. from May 19 to May 23.
Ramping up computing power for climate modeling can help researchers better understand and predict meteorological phenomena around the world, answer policy questions about the impact of climate change, and save lives from natural catastrophes.
The media is abuzz with news of researchers at Cornell University successfully creating the first genetically engineered human embryo, and critics argue that this is a first step towards “designer babies.” But this is not necessarily a slippery slope, and we must consider that the potential rewards of this work are immense.
Yesterday, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles B. Rangel (D-NY) introduced H.R. 6049, the Energy and Tax Extenders Act of 2008. Among other extensions, the bill would renew the Research and Development Tax Credit for the 13th time since its inception in 1981. But extending the R&D tax credit for one more year is insufficient; it should be made permanent.
Two writers claim there is no assault on the scientific information that informs public policy and don’t even bother engaging the facts of the case.
New legislation would lift the federal ban on funding for new lines of embryonic stem cells and create an ethical oversight mechanism for all research in the area.
Science Progress Editor-In-Chief and Jonathan Moreno explains why researchers need access to more embryonic stem cell lines.
President Bush’s latest request for Iraq war funding totals approximately $135.4 billion. What if we spent that money on domestic scientific research and development? Boosting R&D by the numbers.
“The future is likely to be very similar to the past, regardless of who the President is,” said Dr. John Marburger, the President’s science advisor at the AAAS S&T Policy Forum last Thursday. He was talking about funding, but let’s hope things are very different for scientific integrity under the next administration.
A roundup of some of the science and technology policy events happening around Washington D.C. from May 12 to May 16.
Part 3 of coverage of Tuesday’s House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on the Renewable Fuel Standard, with the perspectives of witnesses on biofuel production and rising food prices.
Part 2 of a break down of Tuesday’s House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on the Renewable Fuel Standards, with a look at what witnesses had to say about the economic and environmental concerns.
Tuesday’s House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing pitted environmentalists, corn producers, oil refiners, grocery manufacturers, and renewable fuel advocates against one another in a contentious debate over the future of the Renewable Fuel Standard.
Science Progress tries to make sense of it all. First up, what’s right with the RFS and ways to make it better.
While cellulosic ethanol is not a silver bullet for solving the country’s need for sustainable transportation fuel, there is a sufficient supply of biofuel feedstocks that do not compete with food crops.
Advocates and critics of nanoscience research often compare the technology to the creation of genetically-modified organisms, yet the more apt analogy is to the space program. But there are limits to the analogies used in shaping emerging technology policy.
In a Washington Post column, former George W. Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson takes on claims that the administration has engaged in a “war on science.” He asserts that, “for the most part, these accusations are a political ploy.” Considering his qualifying phrase it seems that some of them are not ploys. Disappointingly, Gerson does not tell us which ones. Instead, he makes a careless historical argument to support his claim claim that liberalism threatens human equality.
The Associated Press reports that over 200 million children worldwide do not have access to basic health care. As a result, about 10 million children, most from the developing world, die each year from treatable illnesses.
Death tolls continue to rise, a product of poverty, poor infrastructure, and a negligent government. Better forecasting for the North Indian region would be a start for protecting citizens from future cyclones. Democracy in Burma probably wouldn’t hurt, either.
Last week, at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania researchers announced that they had used a genetically engineered virus to introduce a gene into the retinas of young adults with a form of congenital blindness that has no treatment, Leber congenital amaurosis (LCA).
Thousands of scientists, engineers, corporate executives, and college presidents across the country have mobilized in an effort to convince Congress to set aside a small piece of this year’s wartime supplemental funding bill to boost science research funding.
Before you send off that swab of DNA to learn your fate, even in light of the recent passage of the Genetic Information Non-discrimination Act, consider the legacy of genetic screening and testing.
One wonders how much of a public health crisis we need before we rethink our vaccine exemption policies—particularly given that misconceptions floating around about a connection between vaccines and autism are driving more parents to opt against MMR.
Dr. Arno Motulsky, who is now 87, essentially launched the field of pharmacogenomics, which studies how an individual’s genetic makeup affects his or her response to medication, in 1957. The New York Times Science section recently featured an interview with Dr. Motulsky, who has a hopeful but cautionary attitude about the future of genetic medicine.
The Genetic Information Non-discrimination Act (H.R. 493) moved another step closer to becoming law yesterday. Although the House passed the bill last year, a reconciled version had go through again, as the Senate added an amendment when it passed the bill last week.
Vaccine safety has grabbed headlines in recent months, as some parents, fearing alleged links to autism, exempt their children from vaccinations. Multiple studies have demonstrated there is no such link, but there is more to understand about how vaccines keep kids safe, and how public health ensure the safety of vaccines.
Safe Vaccines and Healthy Children [12:51m]:
Play Now |
Play in Popup |
Download (4)
A roundup of some of the science and technology policy events happening around Washington D.C. from May 5 to May 9.
The Environmental Protection Agency continued its fall from grace at a Senate hearing earlier this week that investigated political meddling with the Agency’s toxic chemical policies. But in the midst of a rain of criticism, there were suggestions of future policy that could better allow the EPA to protect citizens from hazardous materials.
On Tuesday, the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations held a hearing on a contaminant in blood thinner heparin that caused 81 deaths. Federal regulators now believe the contamination was deliberate, identifying a Chinese subsidiary of Scientific Protein Laboratories. It is no longer realistic to expect the FDA to make informed decisions if it does not have the resources to undertake foreign inspections.
