It’s quite easy nowadays – install this new Firefox plugin and click “random email”. Read your inbox by clicking “check”. Take care as everything is being lost if you delete cookies!
CC-BY-NC Science Surf , accessed 24.03.2026
Sex and drugs and rock and roll
We should have listened to our parents — but so far I did not see a major adverse potential of cannabis. This might have been wrong having heard last year the terrible story of a friend who lost her son by drug induced psychosis. Last week I even learned that this may be Continue reading Sex and drugs and rock and roll
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An editor is one who separates wheat from chaff and then prints the chaff I
Here is a little tale that could have happened every day. An author sends a major paper to a major journal. The major journal has a major editor that asks other major reviewers before writing a major email. Continue reading An editor is one who separates wheat from chaff and then prints the chaff I
CC-BY-NC Science Surf , accessed 24.03.2026
Human parthogenesis
Stem cell researchers now believe that the human ES cell line SCNT-hES-1 (you may renember Hwang who claimed having first cloned a human by somatic cell nuclear transfer) is derived by parthogenesis – the result of a dividing human oocyte.
They test the origin of the Hwang cells by genome-wide SNP analysis as the initial DNA fingerprint was doubtful Continue reading Human parthogenesis
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Allergy transplantation
A new paper in Transplantation takes up an old question – can you passively transfer asthma or allergy? It seems so – the current study reports in 5 of 42 patients elevated IgE plus allergy symptoms. This is in line with earlier reports. Sorry to say — you can get allergy also by bone marrow transplantation.
Addendum 10/6/08
Blood
A total of 16 nonallergic recipients with allergic donors were reported to develop allergic disease posttransplant, however, conclusive information was available for only 5 cases. Allergic disease was reported to abate in 3 allergic recipients with nonallergic donors, however, conclusive information was available for only 2 cases. Problems in interpreting the reports include incomplete data on allergic disease in the donor or recipient pretransplant, not knowing the denominator, and the lack of controls. In summary, review of the literature generates the hypothesis that allergic disease is transferable
Addendum 14/7/22
Ann All Asthma Immunol
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How to lie with statistics
The current Greenpeace campaign attacks German car manufacturer Porsche as building climate killer machines. Porsche responds with large posters – see the online figures – that they Continue reading How to lie with statistics
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Any new paper? A video cast how to stay informed
Following a frequent request, here is a short video how to create your own Pubmed news feed. You simply need the Sage plugin for Firefox; then goto to Pubmed, create your personal RSS feed and import this URL into the bookmark category that Sage is looking for. Here is the show: Continue reading Any new paper? A video cast how to stay informed
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Detecting repoxygen infection
Doping rules are sometimes hard to understand. Sleeping in a low pressure chamber and training at high altitudes is allowed but taking epo is not – although net effects may be the same.
This might be a reason why some athletes are now trying to mimick more closely biology. Repoxygen is a viral vector known for some time that includes the human epo gene under control of a hypoxia control element. Clearly this drug has the potential to be used for doping (“Outlaw DNA“). Continue reading Detecting repoxygen infection
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RNA genes – dark matter of human biology?
I currently hunting some transcripts of unknown function (see below), possibly a RNA gene? while it is difficult to locate any good annotation server. So far I tried RNAz based on a PNAS 2005 paper – another one was RNA Genie. Next step will be the new Gingeras paper that describes even a new class of RNA genes. Finally this may not even be a RNA at all but an alternative leading exon … Continue reading RNA genes – dark matter of human biology?
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Question of the year in genetics
Nature genetics asked about 30 eminent scientists “What would you do if it became possibe to sequence the human genome for only $1,000?”. Unfortunately, this initiative has been launched 4 weeks too early as I believe some may have responded differentially if they could have a chance to read the ENCODE papers… The majority of scientists seems to follow the idea of Continue reading Question of the year in genetics
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The world needs only five computers
The history of this quote is difficult to trace. cnet believes it is wrong to attribute it to IBM Chairman Thomas J. Watson. Continue reading The world needs only five computers
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spickmich & meinprof
spickmich.de (for high school) and meinprof.de (for universities) are two large German portal sites that allow a rating of teachers and university professors.
Finally, now several German courts decided that online voting is legal – I wouldn´t believe that 20 years ago but think it will improve teacher student relationship if done in a responsible way.
CC-BY-NC Science Surf , accessed 24.03.2026
Galaxy – a must have
Manipulating large SNP datasets has always been a hassle, a lot of cut & paste, quick & dirty database resorts and no documentation after all. Only by the last week, I learned form the ENCODE papers that there is now a web service that helps with all kind of these tasks. Check out Galaxy — a “must have”.
CC-BY-NC Science Surf , accessed 24.03.2026
Design flaws plus delivery flaws equal faux conclusions
— the title of a letter in the most recent Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. So there is no need to comment further studies in the same issue. Continue reading Design flaws plus delivery flaws equal faux conclusions
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Food for thought
“Wer einmal aus dem Blechnapf frißt” (Fallada) – following my linux box post yesterday here is my lunch box for today. I think it is as good as the Japanese BentÅ box, isn´t it?
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