Twitter isn't for everyone but as a tool for outreach, awareness, and public or media relations it has a niche among the online tools. The biotech and life sciences sctor is slow to adopt it but we have been using it for some time now with a great deal of success.
For instance:

• Every story that Genome Alberta publishes to our GenOmics news site is headlined on Twitter
• Our bi-weekly GE³LS Digest and GenOmics newsletters are headlined and linked on our Twitter feed 
• We are followed on Twitter by  science writers, researchers, life science companies, government agencies, NGO's, and communications professionals
• Genome Alberta tracks a similar range of people, companies and organizations
• Genome Alberta is part of an International online community on Twitter
• Using our Twitter feed we are able to cross-link everything we publish and we can see increased traffic to our site as the links move through the social network 
• And we find many interesting stories, news items, information, and contacts on Twitter

Every 2 weeks we share some of our Twitter finds here on our blog pages. All the links are checked to make sure they are 'safe' and the '@links' will take you to the profiles of some very interesting people.
Dip your toes into the social media world and follow us online as @mikesgene

@jensmccabe    CLINICAL mHealth - coming soon to your local Best Buy? http://mobihealthnews.com/7210/nj-hospital-best-buy-pilot-retail-mhealth-devices/

 

@gw_dailyscan    How Craig Venter is Like Coach K: The Daily Scan Blogger ... http://bit.ly/b8x2yD

 

@ralphmercer    best uses for Social Media in the Military post http://facebook.com/smformil 

 

@DrBondar    The art of the bumper sticker: make a biological statement without saying a word: . http://bit.ly/d5NvST

 

@WhereBioBegins    You can turn our thermocycler into a dog... http://bit.ly/brvhYN #RNAi

 

@enniscath    'Earthworms form herds and make "group decisions"' - like in Tremors?! http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8604000/8604584.stm

 

@fusedlogic    The opening of the Lois Hole Hospital for Women -- http://ow.ly/1wzRo  (v @YourAlberta) #ableg #alberta #yeg Fantasic facility!

 

@IAmBiotech    Biotech News Roundup: GENE PROVIDES GLIMPSE INTO A SMOKER’S FUTURE http://ow.ly/1wvtF

 

_@ColinS_  Systemic issues in science journalism - the reinforcing cycle of niche reporting: http://wp.me/pQf2A-33

 

@wyattsgirl    Obama names Raju Kucherlapati to bioethics panel... http://www.prokerala.com/news/articles/a127395.html

 

@sharonpianchan    Kaiser: "The best journalists will always be first and foremost storytellers…All the new technology in the world won’t change that."#ASNE10

 

@kejames    'Science is part of our culture. Indeed it is the one truly global culture, common to all faiths & nations.' ~Lord Rees http://bit.ly/ae8nND

 

@EnvBC    The Great Forest Die-Off - Pine beetle’s bite still stings - greatest environmental disaster in North America -http://bit.ly/bWAaUW

 

@AccessDNA    Genetic effects of marriage between cousins exaggerated http://bit.ly/acpuMS for more on consanguinity see http://bit.ly/aMqJiv

 

@NatureNews:  Anonymizing patient records for genomics http://ff.im/-iVCrw

 

@dgmacarthur    The second paragraph of this article is one of the worst explanations of GWAS I've ever seen: http://bit.ly/cWNXCK

 

@UofC_Science    The Faculty of Science is on Facebook too! Check us out: http://bit.ly/9nmrQU

 

@theAGU    Cool Earth Day event, "Illuminating the science: Art and climate change" next week in NYC, organized by @EarthInstitute http://bit.ly/bXDm94

 

@sciencebase    Getting teens interested in science, the "easy" way - http://bit.ly/bTO3AL 

 

@PR4Science    The Guardian - How science is becoming cool. Good read http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/apr/13/science-cool

 

@BIOConvention    Check out the full list of breakout sessions scheduled for #bio2010 http://tinyurl.com/ycal87u To browse sessions... http://bit.ly/awqyhw

 

@TimesScience  Babies with three parents may be key to preventing genetic disorders http://bit.ly/aWK7zW

 

@matthewherper  Your genes are like nanocomputers that you can program any way you want.” Were that only true. --MARK KLEIN, M.D. http://nyti.ms/d8SMv7   

@jensmcabe  Jen S, McCabe is CEO and Co-Founder of Contagion health
@gw_dailyscan belongs to the Genome Web Daily Scan
@ralphmercer is Ralph Mercer who is active in social media, a frequent conference speaker and works with Canada's Armed Forces on the Library of the Future.
@DrBondar Carin Anne Bondar lives in B.C. and calls herself a "biologist with a twist".  Visit her website at http://carinbondar.com 
@WhereBioBegins started off as a web mystery which was eventually revealed as a social media project from Sigma Aldrich
@ennniscathis Cath Ennis a British-Canadian scientist, blogger and "grant wrangler" living in B.C.
@fusedlogic is Walter Schwabe from Edmonton. Fusedlogic is a social media company founder by Walter. 
@IAmBioTech is part of the BIO organization based in Washington, D.C. and promotes the biotech industry
@_ColinS_is Colin Schultz at “wannabe science writer” living in London, Ontario and you can read his blog at http://colinschultz.wordpress.com/ 
@wyattsgirl  is Kenna Shaw who still wants to be a scientist but toils for the NIH in the U.S.
@sharonpianchanSharon Chan is Technology Reporter at the Seattle Times and National President for the Asian American Journalists Association
@kejames hails from the U.S. but now lives in the U.K. where she is a scientist with the Natural History Museum and Directrix of the Beagle Project
@EnvBC is the Twitter account for Environment B.C.
@AccessDNA calls itself a consumer resource for genetics. www.accessdna.com/about 
@NatureNews belongs to Nature Magazine in London, England at http://www.nature.com/news
@dgmacarthur  works in evolutionary genomics in the U.K. and blogs about the genetic testing industry at http://scienceblogs.com/geneticfuture
@UofC_Science- what else but the University of Calgary Faculty of Science
@theAGU is the official Twitter account for the American Geophysical Union
@sciencebase one of our favourites for interesting ideas and links. David Bradley is a science writer in the U.K. who also blogs at www.sciencebase.com
@PR4Science works in science communication and lives in Victoria B.C.
@BIOConventionis one of the many online tools used the annual BIO Convention which is being held this year in Chicago

@TimesScience belongs to the Science section of the Times in London, England

@matthewherper Matthew Herper who writes for Forbe Magazine in New York