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The Hayflick Limit: why humans can't live forever1 month ago in Genomics, Medicine, and Pseudoscience
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Course Corrections4 months ago in Angry by Choice
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The Site is Dead, Long Live the Site2 years ago in Variety of Life
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Does mathematics carry human biases?3 years ago in PLEKTIX
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A New Placodont from the Late Triassic of China5 years ago in Chinleana
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Posted: July 22, 2018 at 03:03PM6 years ago in Field Notes
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Bryophyte Herbarium Survey6 years ago in Moss Plants and More
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Harnessing innate immunity to cure HIV8 years ago in Rule of 6ix
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WE MOVED!8 years ago in Games with Words
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post doc job opportunity on ribosome biochemistry!9 years ago in Protein Evolution and Other Musings
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Growing the kidney: re-blogged from Science Bitez9 years ago in The View from a Microbiologist
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Blogging Microbes- Communicating Microbiology to Netizens10 years ago in Memoirs of a Defective Brain
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The Lure of the Obscure? Guest Post by Frank Stahl12 years ago in Sex, Genes & Evolution
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Lab Rat Moving House13 years ago in Life of a Lab Rat
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Slideshow of NASA's Stardust-NExT Mission Comet Tempel 1 Flyby13 years ago in The Large Picture Blog
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in The Biology Files
Lindau: the glowing joy of discovery
Last year's chemistry Nobel Prize was one of the most softball predictions ever made for the Nobel Prize. The Green Fluorescent Protein (GFP) has become so widely used in chemistry, biology and medicine that it is easy to forget that someone had to discover it and develop the technology. Every year Roger Tsien's name used to be on everybody's favorite candidate list along with Martin Chalfie's and Osamu Shimomura's. Then last year, he along with Shimomura and Chalfie finally put the tortuous process and spilling of ink to rest.
A post about GFP is a writer's dream for indulging in pretty pictures. I will restrict myself to two. GFP has become a poster boy for the science of biotechnology. Its barrel shaped ß-sheet structure shown above has become iconic in the scientific world. This is most emblematic in the odd and many varieties of glowing animals that now grace the covers of everything from scientific journals to websites and children's textbooks. If as some have predicted, we happen to "domesticate" biotechnology in the next few decades, it is very likely that one of the first things that our children would do would be to produce glowing pet rabbits, dogs, mice and cats. Along with a few other icons like DNA and the fruit fly, the image of glowing animals and fluorescent proteins is now deeply ensconced in our imagination as an example of what humans can do by manipulating biological systems. Perhaps one day our children can become friends with transgenic, green, glowing human beings, without the hulk-like physique and temper tantrums...
...more
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