Do You Want to Be Able to Crap Gold?
That might not be possible, but ingesting isotopically-enriched food would make your waste even more valuable.Posted on April 25, 2008 7:37 AM • 1 Comments •
The Scientific Activist
Reporting from the Crossroads of Science and Politics
Search this blog
This Blog and the Old Site
The Scientific Activist
Profile
An Oxford graduate student by day and a scientific activist by night, Nick Anthis isn't letting his Ph.D. research in protein structure get in the way of defending scientific and social progress.
Subscribe via Email or RSS
Stay up to date on the latest from The Scientific Activist, or any of your other favorite Seed bloggers, via e-mail, and never miss a post again.
See updates in real time with The Scientific Activist's RSS feed.
Recent Posts
- Video Primer on Animal Research
- US to Consider No Longer Calling Mandela, ANC "Terrorists"
- McCain's Own Agents of Intolerance
- More Political Interference at the EPA
- The Gas Tax Suspension: Political Pandering of the Worst Kind
- Pervasive Political Interference at the EPA
- China Behaving Badly
- Senate Passes Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act
- South African Unions Prevent the Delivery of Arms to Unstable Zimbabwe
- Do You Want to Be Able to Crap Gold?
Recent Comments
- Organic Chemistry on Senate Passes Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act
- Tom Holder on Video Primer on Animal Research
- Asia on Video Primer on Animal Research
- James on Video Primer on Animal Research
- brian t on US to Consider No Longer Calling Mandela, ANC "Terrorists"
- KeithB on McCain's Own Agents of Intolerance
- Azkyroth on McCain's Own Agents of Intolerance
- Nick Anthis on McCain's Own Agents of Intolerance
- Joshua on McCain's Own Agents of Intolerance
- Mike on McCain's Own Agents of Intolerance
Most Popular Posts
- Why Are Veins Blue? (17 Apr 08)
- Metric System (Apparently) a Plot by Liberal Communist Anti-American Immigrants (13 Oct 07)
- Bush Administration Muzzled Surgeon General (11 Jul 07)
- A Sun Ray a Day.... (19 Jun 07)
- Study Finds Alcohol and Tobacco More Harmful than Marijuana, LSD, or Ecstasy (23 Mar 07)
- A Shocking Decrease in Funding of NIH Grants (12 Sep 06)
- Psychedelic Psilocybin Psychology (14 Jul 06)
- Cloning - Who Cares? (10 Jul 06)
- An Inconvenient AP Story for Republicans (28 Jun 06)
- Organic People Chemistry (16 Jun 06)
- Oxford Scientists Bite Back at Animal Rights Activists (26 Feb 06)
- NASA Science Censor Resigns (08 Feb 06)
- George Deutsch Did Not Graduate From Texas A&M University (06 Feb 06)
- Caught in the Line of Fire: Animal Rights Activists Take Over Oxford (15 Jan 06)
Useful Resources
News for a Scientific Activist
- Curbs to be relaxed on stem-cell consent - Times Online
- A crash course in true political science - International Herald Tribune
- Experience With Syria Exemplifies Challenge That Detection Presents - Washington Post
- Bihar Science Congress uncertain - Hindu
- Chris Mooney: Lab geeks need to toughen up, get involved - Dallas Morning News
- Global warming - The Daily Star
- Attacking Earth Day and a Soap Opera Kiss (and the case of the ... - Atlantic Free Press
- Not an Emergency - Washington Post
- Leading climatologist demystifies the science of global warming - Santa Cruz Sentinel
- Longevity High on Agenda for International Science Congress in Croatia - ITTF
Recommended Reading
Donate to the Cause
For additional details on these science-related causes, click here.
Science Advocacy
Scientists and Engineers for America
(donate here)
The National Center for Science Education
(donate here)
Alliance for Science
(donate here)
Kansas Citizens for Science
(donate here)
Kansas Alliance for Education
(donate here)
Science Education
ScienceBlogs/DonorsChoose Challenge
(donate here)
South African Education and Environment Project
(donate here)
Project Exploration
(donate here)
Animal Research
The Foundation for Biomedical Research
(donate here)
Americans for Medical Progress
(donate here)
HIV/AIDS
The Stephen Lewis Foundation
(donate here)
Security
Federation of American Scientists
(donate here)
Conservation
Blogroll/Links
Election 2008 The Good Stuff
- Aetiology
- Bad Astronomy
- A Blog Around the Clock
- Daily Kos
- Dispatches from the Culture Wars
- Migrations
- NASA Watch
- The Panda's Thumb
- Pharyngula
- Pure Pedantry
- RealClimate
- Research Blogging
- Respectful Insolence
- Sciam Observations
- ScienceBlogs
- Of Two Minds
- Afarensis
- Bad Astronomy
- A Blog Around the Clock
- Blogs for Industry
- Celcias
- Climate Change Action
- Cosmic Variance
- Deltoid
- Denialism Blog
- DeSmogBlog
- Dispatches from the Culture Wars
- Dot Earth
- Effect Measure
- Engineering Science
- Evolgen
- Greg Laden's Blog
- Hope for Pandora
- The Intersection
- Island of Doubt
- It's Getting Hot In Here
- The Lay Scientist
- Migrations
- Mike the Mad Biologist
- MindFull
- Nanopublic
- NASA Watch
- Page 3.14
- The Panda's Thumb
- Pharyngula
- Prometheus
- Pure Pedantry
- RealClimate
- Respectful Insolence
- Responsible Nanotechnology
- Sandwalk
- Sciam Observations
- ScienceBlogs
- Science Progress Blog
- Sex Drugs & DNA
- Speaking of Research
- Stranger Fruit
- Sustainablog
- Synthesis
- Terra Sigillata
- Thoughts from Kansas
- Adventures in Ethics and Science
- Cocktail Party Physics
- Jacks of Science
- Liberal Debutante
- Mind the Gap
- Neurophilosophy
- Of Two Minds
- Uncertain Principles
- Aetiology
- Badscience
- Cognitive Daily
- The Daily Transcript
- Everyday Scientist
- Gene Expression
- GreyThumb
- The Loom
- Nature Blogs
- Not Exactly Rocket Science
- PLoS Blog
- Pondering Pikaia
- Research Blogging
- Science Blog
- Sciencebase Science News
- Stan's NMR Blog
- Stem Cell Research Blog
- Atheist Revolution
- Blogzilla
- LivePaths
- Media Matters
- NY Times
- Oxford Internet Institute
- PressThink
- Slate
- Wired Blogs
Archives
- May 2008 (5)
- April 2008 (7)
- March 2008 (7)
- February 2008 (16)
- January 2008 (7)
- December 2007 (3)
- November 2007 (7)
- October 2007 (15)
- September 2007 (16)
- August 2007 (17)
- July 2007 (20)
- June 2007 (7)
- May 2007 (3)
- April 2007 (4)
- March 2007 (12)
- February 2007 (4)
- January 2007 (16)
- December 2006 (5)
- November 2006 (22)
- October 2006 (9)
- September 2006 (16)
- August 2006 (28)
- July 2006 (34)
- June 2006 (38)
- June 2006 (old site)
- May 2006 (old site)
- April 2006 (old site)
- March 2006 (old site)
- February 2006 (old site)
- January 2006 (old site)
Other Information
biology:
Why Are Veins Blue?
Here's a hint: blood isn't blue. Ever.Posted on April 17, 2008 7:30 AM • 28 Comments •
An Integrin Is Identified as a Co-Receptor for HIV
Scientists identify the alpha-4 beta-7 integrin as a co-receptor for HIV, offering a potential new drug target.Posted on February 11, 2008 8:23 PM • 3 Comments •
Integrin Phosphorylation as an Off Switch for Integrin Activation
A tiny modification can make a big difference in proteins involved in cell adhesion and migration.Posted on December 31, 2007 3:30 PM • 0 Comments •
Stem Cells from Down Under
Awkward? Probably. But, menstrual blood stem cells show some early promise.Posted on November 29, 2007 7:45 AM • 3 Comments •
Best Headline Ever: "Creature from Hell Promises Salvation"
Researchers discover methane-metabolizing bacteria that thrive in extreme environments and may have implications for global warming.Posted on November 22, 2007 6:25 PM • 3 Comments •
Embryonic Stem Cell Debate Over; Thousands of Researchers Now Jobless
The media mangles otherwise interesting and significant stem cell findings.Posted on November 21, 2007 7:54 PM • 22 Comments •
2007 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine: Knockout Mice
Awarded for the knockout mouse to Mario R. Capecchi, Martin J. Evans, and Oliver SmithiesPosted on October 8, 2007 9:21 AM • 2 Comments •
Ask a ScienceBlogger: A Sun Ray a Day....
Although extended unprotected exposure to the sun damages your skin and eyes, a small daily dose is important for maintaining general health and wellbeingPosted on June 19, 2007 1:41 PM • 10 Comments •
More Trouble for the Schatten Lab, but One Potential Success
The U.S. Office of Research Integrity announced this week that it has found a former postdoc in Gerald Schatten's lab, Park Jong Hyuk, guilty of research misconduct for falsifying images in a manuscript on deriving embryonic stem cells from cloned...Posted on January 12, 2007 7:43 AM • 0 Comments •
My Second Scientific Paper: Matrix Protease Activity in Tumor Cell Invasion
The second paper from my undergraduate work at Texas A&M University was recently published in Molecular Cancer. The abstract can be found here, and the pdf of the full paper here. Molecular Cancer is an open access journal, so a...Posted on December 19, 2006 7:39 AM • 3 Comments •
More on Edible Cotton Seeds
Last month, I wrote a post about a research group at Texas A&M University that reported genetically engineering "edible cotton seeds" by using RNAi technology to stably and specifically knock out production of the gossypol toxin in the seeds of...Posted on December 18, 2006 7:39 AM • 3 Comments •
Congratulations to Daniel Rhoads
Via A Blog Around the Clock comes news that Daniel Rhoads, who writes the informative blog Migrations (and formerly A Concerned Scientist), has successfully defended his dissertation. So, after a few minor revisions, it looks like it won't be too...Posted on December 3, 2006 2:57 PM • 2 Comments •
They Probably Won't Taste as Good as Cotton Candy...
But, a recent report in PNAS demonstrates that edible cotton seeds could be a real possibility, thanks to new transgenic crop biotechnology.Posted on November 29, 2006 7:39 AM • 1 Comments •
Social Insects: More KGB than Brady Bunch
Social controls play a surprisingly large role in encouraging altruism in insect colonies, according to a paper in last week's issue of Nature.Posted on November 16, 2006 7:43 AM • 5 Comments •
The Structure of the Living Cell
Oxford's Iain Campbell discusses the past and future of structural biology.Posted on October 17, 2006 10:20 AM • 4 Comments •
My First Scientific Paper: The Stabilization of Blood Vessels by Protease Inhibitors
My first appearance in the peer-reviewed scientific literature provides an opportunity to learn a little bit about blood vessel development.Posted on October 16, 2006 10:20 AM • 7 Comments •
2006 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine: RNA Interference
The 2006 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was announced this morning, with one half going to Andrew Fire and the other half to Craig Mello, both for the discovery of RNA interference (RNAi). The discovery of RNAi added a...Posted on October 2, 2006 9:38 AM • 0 Comments •
Where Do Babies Come From? Find the Answer and More in Coming to Life
Nobel Laureate Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard's Coming to Life: How Genes Drive Development is an understated primer that lays out the current state of the art of developmental biology, shocking the reader with just how much we know about how each one of us came to take our unique but fundamentally similar shapes.Posted on August 21, 2006 7:45 AM • 7 Comments •
Amphibian Disease Heats Up
What do global warming and epidemic diseases have in common? Apparently they have a lot, at least when it comes to amphibians.Posted on August 8, 2006 7:55 AM • 0 Comments •
Absolutely Terrifying
Australia is a scary place now, with more creatures that can kill you than anywhere else. Apparently, though, it used to be even more terrifying, with "killer kangaroos" and "demon ducks of doom" roaming about.Posted on July 12, 2006 7:59 PM • 2 Comments •
Ask a ScienceBlogger: Cloning - Who Cares?
In 2006, cloning for cloning's sake isn't where it's at. Instead, the future of cloning lies in its applications to biomedical research. Today, that means, among other things, the prospect of using cloning to generate unique lines of embryonic stem cells.Posted on July 10, 2006 7:45 AM • 6 Comments •
