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Blog Details for "The Molecular Biology Blog"
The Molecular Biology Blog The Molecular Biology Blog Tech tips, technology updates, news and comment from the molecular biology field Articles
Seeing Bacterial Bones with Cryo-EM Tomography
2008-01-14 13:32:00 Until this decade, the notion that bacteria had cytoskeletons that maintained their cylindrical morphologies was not seriously considered. “People more or less thought the bacterial cell was a swimming pool and the chromosome was this ball of spaghetti,? says Stanford microbiologist Lucy Shapiro. The lack of apparent internal organization to bacteria supported this ... More About: News , History , Bones , Tomo
Work Smarter With The Molecular Biologist?s Toolbar
2008-01-14 13:06:00 To (hopefully) make the life of molecular biologists everywhere a little easier, I have put together a Molecular Biologist’s tool-bar for Firefox/IE, which you can download here. It’s main feature is the multi-search box from which you can search Google, Pubmed, Scirus, Wikipedia, SwissProt and others directly, saving you from navigating to the individual sites every ... More About: Software , Work , Toolbar
Curing Alzheimer?s through TNF?
2008-01-11 18:09:00 One of the more dreaded diseases that plague our elders is Alzheimer ’s disease, which robs the afflicted of not just their memories, but their dignities as well. Research on the role of cytokines in disease progression has illuminated a therapy with great potential, according to a recent study. Edward Tobinick and Hyman Gross, ...
Around the Blogs
2008-01-11 15:59:00 Here’s my take on the most interesting blog posts of the last week: More About: Blogs
PlasMa DNA: Free, cross-platform plasmid mapping and analysis software
2008-01-10 18:03:00 If you are looking for some free plasmid manipulation and analysis software, then you need look no further than PlasMa DNA. It’s packed with features, user friendly and looks great. Best of all, it is a cross-platform application - it works on both PC and Mac, and the files produced on one operating system can ... More About: Software , Plasma , Analysis , Free , Cross
The Math of Free Will
2008-01-10 11:13:00 One of the common arguments from religionists against scientific determinism is that of Free Will. Clearly, we humans possess the capacity for making choices, and have some influence over the direction of our lives. Our cells, too, possess the capacity for choice, as do bacteria and even molecules. For us, our choices ... More About: Books , Math , Free will
Meiosis and Mitosis Tutorial
2008-01-09 08:53:00 I recently caught wind of Openlearn, at Open University, which is a UK university that is dedicated to distance learning. Apparently started in 1969, and hosting part-time students who will received real degrees, the OU’s teaching quality was listed as the fifth best in the UK. “Now anyone can access free ... More About: Tutorial , Mitosis
Keeping Your Eyes On The Prize
2008-01-09 06:35:00 It?s easy to get bogged down in the day-to-day of producing experimental results but as a scientist it is your job to do the exact opposite - a good scientist has to think about their work on all levels. Here is a light-hearted reminder of the importance of large scale, small scale, ?out-of-the-box?, lateral and ... More About: Eyes
Get Your Clone 90% Of The Time with Ligation Independent Cloning
2008-01-08 14:36:00 Are you stuck in cloning hell?, Tired of doing ligations that don?t work? Want a faster, more efficient cloning procedure?… You should try ligation independent cloning. A growing number of researchers swear by ligation independent cloning methods because they are simpler and more efficient than conventional cloning and as a recent convert to their ranks, I’d ... More About: Time , Clone , Independent , Cloning , The Time
New Journal Ranking Tool
2008-01-07 11:39:00 Thompson Scientific is great for gaging the impact factors of various journals, but it has had a bit of a monopoly on journal rankings. As with any ranking scheme, there can be more than one valid way of comparing alternatives. Enter a new ranking tool - that’s free - the SCImago Journal ... More About: News , History , Tool , Ranking
Free Mind Mapping Software
2008-01-07 09:46:00 Mind mapping is an extremely useful technique for note-taking, brainstorming and learning. In the past I often tried to use mind-mapping, but the neat-freak in me was never satisfied with the messy maps I would create. However, now there is an alternative to scribbling out mind maps on paper, with the availability Free Mind, a ... More About: Software , Mind , Mind mapping , Mapping
Around the Blogs
2008-01-04 11:30:00 Time for the first ‘Around the blogs’ for the new year! Let’s see what discussions are going on related blogs*… More About: Blogs
Kinase Structures and Autoinhibition
2008-01-03 09:36:00 Here’s a comment on work published about 6 months ago that was relevant to me, given my graduate studies on FAK with Jun-Lin Guan. The relations between protein structures and evolution are quite interesting indeed. As more structures are being solved for multimodular signaling proteins, the regulatory kinetics (on, off, and everything in between) is ... More About: Structures
Alternative Careers For Scientists
2008-01-03 08:12:00 What happens when you finally get the degree you worked so long for and then realize you really don?t want to spend the rest of your life in the lab? Or you get tired of working long hours with few results and low pay? or you succumb to any of the other reasons that might ... More About: Alternative , Careers , Scientists , Alterna
5 Ways to Get More Results This Year
2008-01-02 13:22:00 Happy New Year to all of our readers! We are back, refreshed and raring to go after our holidays and hope that you are too. In the coming year we hope that Bitesize Bio will be your indispensable companion, bringing you articles that keep you informed on the best literature, products, tech tips, news and ... More About: Results
Relating to Historical Contingency in Biology
2008-01-02 13:16:00 Two blog posts recently collided for me. First, in a blog discussion on Macroevolution vs. Microevolution, Allen MacNeill clarified some issues for me (thanks to TUIBG for bringing it back up): Add the newly emerging fields of evo-devo and epigenesis to the foregoing, and it is increasingly clear that macroevolution (i.e. cladogenesis) follows different rules ... More About: Biology , Historical , Contingency
Happy Holidays?
2007-12-20 16:39:00 The Bitesize Bio team will be taking a well-earned rest over the holidays and we would like to wish our readers a very merry Christmas. Myself, Dan, Suzanne and Terry have really enjoyed bringing you the best of molecular and cell biology tips, journal articles, news, comment and other stuff over the last four months ... More About: Holidays , Happy Holidays , Happy
The Big Story of 2007: Cellular Alchemy
2007-12-19 23:08:00 Amid the political controversy and obstructions to conducting stem cell research, scientists this year managed to turn lead into gold… Genetically manipulating fibroblasts to become ESC(embryonic stem cell)-like sort of sounds like alchemy in a way, doesn?t it? The product of these papers, inducible pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, were created by transfecting four factors ... More About: Story , Alchemy , Cellular , The Big Story
Salesman Stories
2007-12-19 07:10:00 Have you ever had a sales person suggest just the right new kit or enzyme that makes your life a whole lot easier? Or on the flip side, how about when a sales person doesn?t get the hint that you are in the middle of keeping track of setting up a 96 well plate of ... More About: Stories , Careers , Salesman
The Challenge of the Two-Body Problem
2007-12-18 16:19:00 This is a rather personal post for me, as I’m getting set to follow my wife abroad, while still seeking a research or lecturing position of some kind, whatever may happen. The situation is sometimes known in academia as the “two-body problem,” and is occasionally lamented as a fact of life for the challenging ... More About: Body , Careers , Problem , Challenge , Halle
Get Inside A Molecular Biologist?s Imagination
2007-12-18 06:57:00 I’ve always thought that it takes a good imagination to study molecular and cell biology since we never actually see much of the molecular processes we study, dissect and hypothesize on every day. Think about the mental models you have of the processes of cytoskeleton polymerization/ de-polymerization or DNA translation for example. Aren’t they amazing? Biovisions, ... More About: Inside , Imagination , Logi
BioChemWeb: Virtual Library for the Molecular Biologist
2007-12-17 19:55:00 Wikipedia gets quite a bit of attention, and the student of the molecular biological sciences regularly needs a more in-depth information resource. There’s Bruce Alberts et al.’s Molecular Biology of the Cell, Harvey Lodish et al.’s Molecular Cell Biology, and David Nelson’s Lehninger Principles of Biochemistry if you have the textbooks handy. An ... More About: Library , Virtual , Logi , The Mole
The Easier Way to Write a PhD Thesis
2007-12-17 07:45:00 For most scientists, writing their PhD thesis will be one of the most time consuming and complicated individual tasks they ever undertake. In my experience, the most common approach taken by students is to bury their head in the sand, get on with the research and only start thinking about the thesis when they absolutely ... More About: Careers , Write
Keeping up on the journals
2007-12-14 17:20:00 As scientists, we have to keep up with new research coming out and follow the journals. We all have our preferred way of doing so though. Sporadic searches on Pubmed are one way, or weekly email updates on specific search terms (also offered by Pubmed) are another. Alternatively, there’s Hubmed for RSS ... More About: Journals , The Journal
Around the blogs
2007-12-14 06:54:00 There was some great stuff in the molecular and cellular biology blogosphere this week - here are my favorites… More About: Blogs
Protein Sociology: Collective Interaction Behaviors
2007-12-13 16:29:00 As always, it’s these odd conjunctions of things that don’t go together that catches the eye. In this case, molecular and sociology. The actual article1 is much more mundane and true to the correct science jargon, and included in a special section of the most recent Nature on “Protein s to Proteomes.” It’s ... More About: Sociology , Collective , Interaction , Interact
Battling Disease ? The Real-Life Hydra?
2007-12-13 13:24:00 A recent article in Science discussed a claim made by Bill and Melinda Gates, where they proposed that malaria could be eradicated from the Earth over the next few decades. Vanquishing disease is seen as the ultimate goal in medical science, and many dream of the day that we will all be living longer ... More About: Life , Disease , Real , Real Life
What?s with Europe?s Opposition to GMOs?
2007-12-12 21:55:00 Nature sends word that there’s a big showdown in Europe looming that could affect the long-term prospects for the cultivation of genetically modified crops on the continent. Specifically, environment commissioner Stavros Dimas said “that he plans to reject applications from Syngenta and Pioneer Hi-Bred International for approval to grow two transgenic strains of maize ... More About: News , History , Position , Rope
Top 10 Scientific Discoveries of 2007
2007-12-12 17:16:00 Time magazine has published it’s top 10 scientific discoveries of 2007. Among this glittering array of multi-disciplinary achievements, advances in molecular and cell biology, namely the re-programming of skin cells into stem cells and the sequencing of J. Craig Venter’s genome, occupy the top two spots. Other bio-related break-thoughs in the top 10 include the building ... More About: News , History , Discoveries
8 Approaches to Random Mutagenesis
More articles from this author:2007-12-12 11:53:00 Random mutagenesis is an incredibly powerful tool for altering the properties of enzymes. Imagine, for example, you were studying a G-protein coupled receptor (GPCR) and wanted to create a temperature-sensitive version of the receptor or one that was activated by a different ligand than the wild-type. How could you do this? Firstly, you would clone the ... More About: Random , Genes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 |
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