biomedicine

tags: book review, biotechnology, biomedicine, stem cells, ethics, Cloning: A Beginner's Guide, Aaron Levine Would you drink milk from a cloned cow? Should we clone extinct or endangered species? Are we justified in using stem cells to develop cures? When will we clone the first human? Ever since Dolly the sheep was born, questions like these have been part of the public consciousness, and now, cloning is poised to revolutionize medicine, healthcare, and even the food we eat. Regardless of what certain politicians do to slow the progress of scientific research, cloning is here to stay, and…

tags: researchblogging.org, H-index, impact numbers, scientific journals A friend, Ian, emailed an opinion paper that lamented the state of scientific research and the effect this has had on science itself. In this paper, by Peter A. Lawrence, a Professor of Zoology at University of Cambridge, the main point is that modern science, particularly biomedicine, is being damaged by attempts to measure the quality and quantity of research being produced by individual scientists. Worse, as this system careened out of control, it gave rise to a new and more damaging trend: ranking scientists…