Genome Alberta's Official Newsletter
Genome Alberta Newsletter GenOmics - February 2, 2010
- February 2, 2010 -
In this Update:
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Genomics News
Genome Alberta Volunteer Day
On January 15th Genome Alberta brought together staff and Project Managers from around the province to volunteer our time with the Calgary Inter-Faith Food Bank. We spent the morning in the Food Bank’s warehouse unloading, sorting, and stacking food then got together for lunch. With Project Managers and staff scattered around the province we don’t always get the chance to be in one place and with Christmas out of the way we found a day to meet and to do some corporate volunteer work. For a complete look at the day and a glimpse of staff pushing around brooms, visit the blog posting on the event.
New Genome Alberta Board Member
Genome Alberta and its board of Directors is pleased to welcome Dr. Randy Goebel as our newest Board member.
Randy is currently President and CEO of iCORE, Alberta Informatics Circle of Research Excellence, professor of Computing Science at the University of Alberta, and principle investigator in the Alberta Ingenuity Centre for Machine Learning. Randy has experience working on research projects in crew scheduling, pipeline scheduling, and steel mill scheduling, as well as scheduling and optimization projects for the energy industry in Alberta. His current research includes work on systems biology, machine learning, and visualization.
Randy has held appointments at the University of Waterloo, University of Tokyo, Multimedia University (Malaysia), and has had research collaborations with DFKI (German Centre for AI Research), NICTA (National ICT Australia), RWC (Real World Computing project, Japan), ICOT (Institute for New Generation Computing, Japan), NII (National Informatics Institute, Tokyo), and is actively involved in academic and industrial collaborative research projects in Canada, Australia, Europe, China and Malaysia.
You can find a complete listing of our Board members at http://genomealberta.ca/about/board/
OGI Announces New Board Members
Ontario Genomics Institute (OGI) Board of Directors has announced the appointment of four new directors:
- Mr. Paul Lucas, President and CEO of GlaxoSmithKline Inc. in Canada (Toronto);
- Dr. Roderick R. McInnes, Director of Research of the Jewish General Hospital Lady Davis Institute for Medical Research (Montreal);
- Mr. Gregg Szabo, Vice-President, Specialty Products at Merck Frosst Canada (Toronto); and
- Dr. James Tiedje, Director of the Center for Microbial Ecology
The full press release can be found at the Ontario Genomics Institute website.
Genome Atlantic Project Gets Big Boost
A plant that was once considered a weed is now showing promise as an alternative source of oil for fish and animal feeds, and even jet fuel. Camelina (False Flax), known for its hardy growing nature and high oil content is the subject of a unique research project linking researchers across Canada, and as far away as Germany. The project received $2.8 million from the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency – Atlantic Innovation Fund on Monday, a significant part of its $6.1 million budget. We have posted the story and a related video for you on GenOmics.
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GenOmics Top Stories
You can find our GenOmics News site on Facebook at http://facebook.genomealberta.ca and you do not have to be a registered user to read the stories. In every edition of our GenOmics newsletter we will be posting a selection of the stories that have made it on to the site. If you would like your own stories posted on GenOmics you can either register to use the application or send the information to mspear@genomealberta and we will consider doing a story posting to suit your needs.
Biotech VC trends to watch in 2010 and beyond.
Genomic Surveillance of Pandemic H1N1
2010 Weston Youth Innovation Award
- Kick Off the New Year with a New Camera!
- Unreliable evidence? A look at DNA forensics
- Call for Abstracts: Human Genome Meeting 2010
- Synthetic biology cells produce light show
- Why DIY Bio?
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Found on Twitter
Twitter is a unique site where you have 140 characters to say what you need to say. Registered twitter can choose who to follow or read to make sure they are getting information they are interested in. Genome Alberta can be found on Twitter as @mikesgene and we currently have 400 followers from the biotech, communications and political community. In each edition of our GenOmics newsletter we’ll bring you a selection of some of the ‘tweets’ we come across from our Twitter followers. Here is the current selection of tweets and at the end of the list we’re also giving you a rundown of who the users are behind the @????? names. We also have a more complete roundup of some of the more interesting postings on Twitter, because believe it or not, the world of biotechnology has staked out some territory on Twitter. Or would that be Twittory? Territwitter? Anyway, the list will appear every 2 weeks on our blog and the first posting is up now on our blog pages.@genomicslawyer Australia Issues New Privacy Guidelines for Health Practitioners on Disclosing Genetic Information w/o Patient Consent: http://bit.ly/4GKqkK
@bmahersciwriter NY to allow using DNA databases to identify suspects through their relatives http://is.gd/6ZV41 Civil libs breach, or useful advance.
@kejames Good point from @ajcook: ...funders should also publish research. See eg http://bit.ly/bBhj7Z Addresses publication bias too.
@wellcometrust 10 yrs ago today: 1st release of the Ensembl genome browser, giving genomics researchers a leg up http://bit.ly/cYd5yx
@Imparo Albertans to benefit from reduced prices for existing generic drugs http://bit.ly/9EdUa8 #abgov [A retweet function on page would be useful]
@suehuff Processes that force a win-lose, prevent dialogue for win-win. Processes must change for politics to change. #rebootab #ableg #abed
@genomicslawyer is a lawyer in North Carolina who advises people and companies in genomics and biotechnology on legal compliance and commercialization strategies. He also writes a regular blog that is often a feature story on our GenOmics News site.
@bmahersciwriter is the Twitter name for Brendan Maher, a Writer and Editor for Nature.
@kejames is actually Dr. Karen James. She is based in London, England and is a Natural History Museum scientist & Beagle Project Science Director.
@wellcometrust is the Twitter account for the Wellcome Trust, an independent Medical Research Charity.
@Imparo belongs to Troy Wason a communications specialist based in Calgary and former Senior Communications Officer with the Alberta Government Caucus.
@suehuff is a Trustee with the Edmonton Public School Board and when Genome Alberta’s Communication Director Mike Spear was a CBC producer, Sue was a regular freelance contributor.
Other featured people in this week’s roundup of interesting tweets include Open Access Publisher BioMed Central, Robyn Quinn a Victoria based science communications specialist, and Mary Canady who is involved in biotech marketing and business development in San Diego.
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GE3LS Digest
For more information about GE3LS Digest, please visit http://www.genomealberta.ca/ge3ls/newsletters.aspx
Lack of GMOs costs lives, claims leading scientist – January 20, 2010
Many human lives have been lost due to the reluctance of some countries to accept genetically modified crops, former government chief scientific adviser, Sir David King has claimed. Addressing the annual City Food Lecture in London's Guildhall this week, Sir David cited the example of flood-resistant rice which had taken over five years to develop using conventional breeding techniques and genetic markers, when it could have been done in two using GM technology. The drop in rice production in 2007, due to flooding just after planting, was a major factor behind the price hike in 2008 that led to food riots and starvation in some parts of the world, he said. Yet the "submergence-tolerant" rice gene had been known about for years. Had gene-splicing been used to insert this into commercial varieties, it would have been available within two years. But because of sensitivities about GM crops, the International Rice Research Institute had opted for conventional breeding, and the first commercial strains were only just becoming available.
The human genome ten years on: time to take stock – January 4, 2010
Ten years ago this June, Bill Clinton and Tony Blair announced that the first draft of the human genome had been completed by scientists. The politicians were a tad premature -- the draft was not published until 2001, the "finished" genome sequence took several more years, and a few small segments are still unread. But the achievement remains a huge landmark in self-knowledge for our species, and an anniversary that deserves the great attention it is certain to get. A lot has happened in the first decade of the genomic age, and as Sir Mark Walport, the director of the Wellcome Trust, said this morning on the Today programme, the anniversary is an opportune moment to take stock of developments in genetics and to debate their meaning. As Walport put it: "The quantity of genetic information that's being discovered is absolutely mind-boggling... Clearly that does have implications for our society and how we use that information."
The Areas of Our Expertise: Why We Can’t Separate Science and Ethics – December 18, 2009
In his often-cited 1997 essay “Non-Overlapping Magisteria” the evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould made a provocative proposal to resolve the perceived conflict between science and religion:
No such conflict should exist because each subject has a legitimate magisterium, or domain of teaching authority—and these magisteria do not overlap… The net of science covers the empirical realm: what is the universe made of (fact) and why does it work this way (theory). The net of religion extends over questions of moral meaning and value. Gould’s non-overlapping magisteria principle, which he abbreviated as “NOMA,” was more an effort to find common ground on which the warring parties might both stand in the evolution debates than it was to clarify broader questions about the organization of knowledge. Even so, the NOMA proposal generated its fair share of reaction from across the political and philosophical spectrum, from religious fundamentalists to atheist philosopher Richard Dawkins.
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Events
For more information on any of these event visit Genome
Alberta’s event page at http://genomealberta.ca/
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The Human Genome Project Ten Years Later: Has The Promise Been Realized?
Where: Heart & Crown Irish Pub – 67 Clarence St., ByWard Market, Ottawa
When: February 16th, 5:30 – 7:30pm
What: When the calendar ticked over to the year 2000, the Human Genome Project was heralded as one of the most important achievements of all time. Why have the grand predictions faded? Has media coverage been accurate? Where do health-care professionals fit in the genetic picture?Join Dr. David Castle, Dr. David Secko and Dr. Ahmed-El-Sohemy for a discussion around the promise and the reality of the Human Genome Project. The event will be moderated by Genome Alberta’s Director of Corporate Communications Mike Spear.
There is no charge for the event but you must RSVP for the event: mwei2@uottawa.ca
You can also visit Genome Alberta’s calendar of events for more information.
National Bioscience Educators’ Conference 2010
Where: Red River College, Winnipeg Manitoba
When: February 16th – 18th
What: This conference will provide an opportunity for secondary school science teachers to hear from some of Canada’s leading bioscience researchers and to learn about activities and programs that will help with their delivery in the classroom. Laboratory workshop sessions will permit participants to gain some experience in performing lab activities that complement the current educational curriculum. Information about academic and career choices for students will be highlighted.
For more information go to the conference website at http://bioscienceeducation.ca/our-programs/national-bioscience-educators-conference/
5th Annual Canadian Genetic Epidemiology & Statistical Genetics Meeting
Where: Kingbridge Conference Centre, King City, Ontario
When: April 14-16, 2010
Website: http://canadiangeneticepi.
lunenfeld.ca/DEFAULT.ASP?page= home
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