Year: 2015

New Year’s Science Humor: A grant walks into a bar and says…

A grant walks into a bar and says… Is there a method to your mixology? Do I have to give you a timeline of my drinking plans? Funding has been 86’d I’m doing field research studying alcohol dehydrogenase and could use your help… I’d like to order 250K. Your bouncer isn’t going to triage me, …

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Watch Jennifer Doudna and I talking #CRISPR tonight on PBS NewsHour

Crystal_Structure_of_Cas9_in_Complex_with_Guide_RNA_and_Target_DNA

I just finished filming a segment for PBS NewsHour, their national nightly news show along with Jennifer Doudna.   It will air tonight. Take a look. Gwen Ifill interviewed Doudna and me about CRISPR and human genetic modification. I’ve pasted the video in YouTube Above. You can read my interview with Dr. Doudna on The …

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Best stem cell blog of 2015: CIRM’s The Stem Cellar

Kevin-McCormack

When I first started blogging here about stem cells in 2010, frankly it felt pretty lonely out there in cyberspace. Nature‘s great blog by Monya Baker and Natalie DeWitt on stem cells had called it quits late in 2009. For the most part the stem cell blogs and other Internet outlets present early in 2010 …

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Perspectives on Pedersen Lab Human-Mouse Chimera Paper

human-mouse-chimera

A new Cell Stem Cell paper by Victoria L. Mascetti and Roger Pedersen on human-mouse chimera modeling is quite interesting and important. I really enjoyed this short paper, but I do have a reservation about one way that it is being interpreted. The authors show that human pluripotent stem cells (hPSC) including induced pluripotent stem cells …

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CNN blows it on Celltex, controversial stem cell clinic in Mexico

Celltex-Arthritis

CNN stumbled badly on its recent article on Celltex, a Texas-owned stem cell clinic that has seen more than its share of controversy over the years including tangles with the FDA. As a result, the company has moved its clinical operations to Mexico where oversight is more lax. Their customers include American patients in Mexico …

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GOP Congress seeks ban on CRISPR of human embryos

statment_gene_editing-tech

GOP members of Congress want a ban on CRISPR of human embryos. They are moving to block genetic modification of human embryos using the new CRISPR gene editing technology. The new proposed spending bill part way through the approval process with the nugget of good news of a possible NIH spending boost after many years …

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