Friday’s Elk, January 22, 2016

Posted on by Matt Kristoffersen

Greetings–

In advance of the blizzard coming to my part of the world (and maybe yours), here are a couple stories, a video, and even a podcast for your wintry enjoyment:
 

Obama’s Three Big Science Plays

The cancer “moonshot” that Obama announced at his State of the Union address last week was the last of three high-profile projects in biomedicine he’s personally unveiled over the past three years. At Stat, I get some prominent scientists to gaze into their crystal ball and figure out what kind of legacy Obama is leaving behind with these trio of initiatives. One important lesson: actual moonshots are really expensive.
 

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Telling Jewels From Junk in DNA

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The New York Times, January 21, 2016

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When you learned about genes in high school, chances are it went something like this:

Our DNA holds about 20,000 protein-coding genes. To make a protein, a cell makes a copy of the corresponding gene, in the form of a single-stranded molecule called RNA. The cell uses the RNA molecule as a template to make the protein. And then the protein floats off to do its job.

That’s certainly true. But there’s more to the story.

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Obama’s big bet on science: It’s about far more than a cancer ‘moonshot’

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STAT, January 18, 2016

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To anyone who follows science, President Barack Obama’s announcement of a “moonshot” to cure cancer last week brought on a strong sense of déjà vu. It was, in fact, the third time in less than three years that he has launched a high-profile effort to solve a complex biomedical problem.

A year ago, in his 2015 State of the Union address, Obama announced the Precision Medicine Initiative, which is intended to usher in what he called “a new era of medicine — one that delivers the right treatment at the right time.”

And in an April 2013 speech at the White House, Obama unveiled the BRAIN Initiative, which he described as “the next great American project,” designed to help figure out how the brain works.

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Friday’s Elk, January 15, 2016

Posted on by Matt Kristoffersen

Greetings–

Here are a couple pieces for your weekend reading…
 

Stopping the Salamanders to Save Them

Over the summer, I wrote in the New York Times about an impending ecological disaster. The United States is home to 190 species of salamanders, the greatest diversity of these amphibians in any country. Scientists worry that a newly discovered salamander-killing fungus in Europe could drive American salamanders extinct if it shows up in the U.S. Continue reading “Friday’s Elk, January 15, 2016” →

Searching for Cancer Maps in Free-Floating DNA

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The New York Times, January 14, 2016

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Loose pieces of DNA course through our veins. As cells in our body die, they cast off fragments of genes, some of which end up in the bloodstream, saliva and urine.

Cell-free DNA is like a message in a bottle, delivering secrets about what’s happening inside our bodies. Pregnant women, for example, carry cell-free DNA from their fetuses. A test that analyzes fetal DNA has proved to be more accurate in screening for Down syndrome than standard blood tests.

In 2012, Jay Shendure, a geneticist at the University of Washington, and his colleagues were able to reconstruct the entire genome of a fetus from cell-free DNA in a pregnant woman’s saliva.

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