BioData

      SciencegeekGirl recently compiled a list of all sorts of science geek resources. On her list is Biocompare’s Funniest Science Videos. I suggest checking these funny and informative videos out when you have a minute.

      My personal favorite is this GTCA song from BioRad:

     In June I commented on the autism – vaccine controversy and the role that Oprah had in promoting it. Seven moths later, I am revisiting this issue. 12 years ago, Andrew Wakefield and his colleagues first published his findings in The Lancet providing ‘evidence’ suggesting they had tracked down a shocking cause of autism – that being the MMR Vaccine. Last week The Lancet published a retraction of Wakefield’s paper stating that “it has become clear that several elements of the 1998 paper by Wakefield et al are incorrect.”

     Steven Novella of Science Based Medicine has a detailed article about this which I highly recommend reading. I can only agree with Novella’s conclusion: “I applaud the Lancet for finally retracting the Wakefield study and removing it from the published record. It should not, however, have taken this long.”

     Got to wonder what Jenny McCarthy and her pal, Oprah have to say about this.

This week’s quote comes from Wernher Von Braun.

     John Bochardt recently posted tips for editing laboratory reports in the Lab Manager blog. In the article he quite correctly points out that many laboratory professionals have difficulty in writing reports and that the process often takes longer than it should with the result being a poorly written report.

      I recently saw this PhD comic and thought I’d share this with you. For those of you that are working or have ever worked on a thesis, you are bound to have one (or two or three) of these days.

Cecilia’s Adventures in Thesisland, Pt. 1

This week’s quote comes from Archimedes.

     We are now entering our third year at BioData. Since the beginning, listening to our customers has been our top priority. BioKM was developed primarily with feedback from our customers- the every day bench scientist. Your continuous feedback allows us to fulfill our goal of providing you with the best platform for research management. Here are some customer suggestions that you can look forward to seeing in BioKM in 2010.

Join us on January 28, 2010 at 3 PM (EST) for a live webinar. Avi Wener will review the laboratory management system and explain its benefits as well as demonstrate its ease of use. Signup to reserve a spot for this free live webinar. To find out more about BioKM visit our website or email info@biodata.com.

This week’s quote comes from Carl Sagan.

Our weekly compilation of science news for the week of January 10, 2009.

A deadly scorpion provides a safe pesticide: Scorpions deliver a powerful, paralyzing venom – a complex cocktail of poisonous peptides that immobilize animal prey on the spot. Some of the toxins in this cocktail damage only insects, which is why a Tel Aviv University researcher is harnessing them to create a safe and ecologically sound pesticide.

For those of you attending Science Online 2010 (#scio10), Janet Stemwedel (aka Dr. Free-Ride) of Adventures in Ethics and Science poses an interesting question: “For which topic do you expect online civility to collapse the fastest?”

     Laboratory notebooks are essential for reproducing experiments. For years we have been raised in our labs knowing that every action must be written down in our lab notebook.

     Take a look at this picture of a lab space, which I’m sure looks familiar to most of you. Side note: I strongly suggest you check out this image titled “A well-organised mess” on Flickr. It was posted by easternblot who commented on each item in the picture in great detail.

     Notice those notebooks on the shelf at the top right of the picture? Those are the accumulation of three years of hard work. THREE. YEARS. All the work of this researcher is sitting on a top shelf in a room off the lab. What happened if there was a fire? There goes three years of research. How can we guarantee the survivability and security of that data? When that researcher eventually leaves the lab, what insures that the data won’t leave with him?

This week’s quote comes from Bryce Lynch of Max Headroom. “Deities,” written by Michael Cassutt.

Our weekly compilation of science news for the week of January 3, 2009.

Gene identified for canine compulsive disorder: A canine chromosome 7 locus that confers a high risk of compulsive disorder susceptibility has been identified.

Bitesize Bio’s Suzanne Kennedy has put out a list of upcoming conferences in the life sciences located in the USA.