Hi Everyone,

So how does one start their first blog? An introduction is a good start.

My name is Sverre, and I am sure many of you are wondering how to pronounce it? I tell everyone the easiest way to do it is think “very” and put an S in front of it.

I live in New Jersey and work for Bioscience Technology selling custom marketing plans that help companies generate qualified leads, brand their image, and talk about their products.

But I didn’t always live in New Jersey. I am a transplant from Maine. Adjusting to New Jersey has been fun. There is nothing like sitting in bumper to bumper traffic

on 287 no matter what time of day you drive. On a positive note I do enjoy the location. The close proximity to New York is nice, and being able to get down to water on the Jersey shore is a bonus.

So you are probably asking yourself why I left Maine in the first place. I met my amazing fiancé at a wedding in Connecticut, and the rest is history.

It took me two years, but I have found a way to make the traffic on 287 a little more bearable. Books on tape! I am currently listening to Alan Alda’s Never Have Your Dog Stuffed, which is a memoir about a time period in his life. I must say I enjoy fiction much more than non-fiction. Escape is bliss.

The reason for my blog is to discuss current topics and events relating to the life sciences field. For example I just read a very interesting article about 10 minutes ago on sofa composting.

At first glance of this title I pictured someone with an old sofa that is rotting beneath them. The study was done at the University of Manchester. It talks about certain fungi having the ability to break down Polyurethane plastics and turn them into soil. Unfortunately the article does not mention the name of the fungi. It also discusses that if one increases the amount of fungi the degradation time increases. In the study they did not just take a sofa and throw it in the backyard to see what happens. They took pieces of Polyurethane plastics and put them in soil containing fungi and bacteria. They found that the fungi broke down the Polyurethane plastics. The scientists are in the process of investigating ways to apply their findings to Polyurethane waste management. Really interesting stuff!

In the future I will talk about tradeshows, current news and am open to topics that readers are interested in reading about. If you have a topic that interests you, please send me an e-mail Sverre.st.john@advantagemedia.com

So enough for my first blog, want to keep it short and sweet!

Best,
Sverre

I'm a little late to the party, but Time magazine seems to be all over our industry lately. Coming back from LabAutomation 2010, one of the biggest impressions I was left with was the excitement of one vendor whose product photo accompanied the number four scientific discovery of 2009 (according to the editors of Time), "A Robot Performs Science."

Lab automation is nothing new to most researchers, but fully automated experiments are something else entirely. The brief story describes "Adam," a robotic system designed at Aberystwyth University in Wales. Adam and its counterpart "Eve" are projects of the Computational Biology research group at Aberystwyth University. The two so called Robot Scientists are parts of a multidisciplinary research project involving expertise from Computer Science and Microbiology (www.aber.ac.uk/en/cs/research/cb/projects/robotscientist/). Adam is used to investigate yeast functional genomics, while Eve is involved in drug screening. According to the article in Time, Adam became the first robotic system to make a novel scientific discovery with virtually no human intellectual input. Adam was the first to complete the cycle from hypothesis to experiment to reformulated hypothesis without human intervention.

Anyone who has had the chance to attend LabAutomation, and anyone working with these types of instruments, can certainly understand the excitement.

On a broader level, it's pretty cool to see bioscience receive mainstream attention, and I can see many benefits from having the general public gain a better understanding of the work you all are doing. It occurs to me that the more people who know how important your work is, the more funding opportunities you will find.

As I mentioned above, this attention is not a singular instance. The editors of Time chose bioscience related discoveries as five of its top ten scientific discoveries of 2009, and over the past six weeks, Time has run stories on aging, epigenetics, and even a recent study that appeared in Nature on gene therapy and color blindness. Even cooler to me, and a certain point of pride, is that we've covered all of these topics either online or in the pages of this magazine.

That provides a perfect transition to let you know of some recent changes at Bioscience Technology. By now, those of you who receive our eNewsletter, The Life Science Pulse, have probably noticed the increased frequency that it now shows up in your in box. The Pulse is now sent out Monday through Friday with special highlight topics every Wednesday.

Finally, we've extended the deadline for entries to the Bioscience Technology Researcher of the Year competition to April 16. Winners will now be announced in the June issue. This year's contest is judged by Mike May, PhD, Suzanne Tracy (Editor in Chief, Scientific Computing) and C. Shad Thaxton, PhD (2009 Bioscience Technology Researcher of the Year). Visit https://www.regonline.com/bioscience_technology_2010_researcher_of_the_year for your chance to win $2,500 and be the subject of the June cover story. Feel free to contact me with any questions you may have on this process.

It’s that time of year again. It’s time for all of you to start thinking about your 2010 Bioscience Technology Researcher of the Year entries. The competition celebrates and rewards innovative, breakthrough, and benefit-driven research, along with the products used to achieve research success. The competition is open to researchers working in academic, government, institutional, or industry labs who have made a significant breakthrough in the past year.

Winners will be chosen by an independent panel of judges. Mike May, PhD, returns to help judge this year’s competition, and he is joined by last year's Bioscience Technology Researcher of the Year, C. Shad Thaxton, PhD, Northwestern University, and Suzanne Tracy, Editor-in-Chief of Scientific Computing.

Just like last year, we’re providing cash prizes of $2,500 for first place, $1,500 for second place, and $1,000 for third place. The first place winner will also be the subject of our May issue’s cover story. Second and third place winners will also be the subject of a brief profile, and honorable mentions will be named in the issue.

Just a brief overview of the last year's competition because I feel it may help those of you looking to enter this year's competition. The majority of entries came from academia, but biotech and pharma companies were also represented. I was excited to see a few international entries come in, and I hope that's a trend that continues in 2010.

I can tell you from experience, that the hardest part of this competition was deciding the winners. Every entry we received featured some pretty impressive research. Thaxton was named the 2009 Bioscience Technology Researcher of the year for his work in creating synthetic high density lipoproteins. Our second place winner, Carrolee Barlow, chief scientific officer, BrainCells, Inc., won for her work on neurogenesis as a target for small molecule therapies to treat various neurological conditions. Ian Macreadie, CSIRO Molecular and Health Technologies, was a third place winner for developing an assay to screen for chemo preventative agents for Alzheimer's disease. In addition to the three winners, the judges and editors chose 12 entries as honorable mentions.

So get those entries in. We’ve changed the submission process for this year, and it should be even easier to enter. Just visit www.regonline.com/bioscience_technology_2010_researcher_of_the_year to start the process. And, as always, should you have any questions or concerns about this year’s competition, feel free to contact me at robert.fee@advantagemedia.com. Best of luck to all who enter.

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2009 will be remembered as a year of up and downs for science. We all, naturally, felt the effects of a down economy in the early part of the year. But based on all the vendors I’ve seen at trade shows in the second half of the year offering their own stimulus packages, things started looking up as we headed into 2010. I think it’s time for some renewed optimism.

Certainly, new stem cell regulations can be seen as a good thing. Shortly after his inauguration, President Obama signed an order that expanded the use of stem cells for government-funded researchers. Combine this with the Obama administration’s emphasis on health care and sciences, and it looks like increased government support (read funding!) will continue in 2010.

H1N1, or swine flu, made a lot of headlines throughout the year. It was declared a pandemic early this past summer. By fall, vaccinations started rolling out—just in time for flu season. It’s still a scary bug and has infected many, but it seems the worst fears have not come true. As we head into winter and peak flu seasons, let’s hope it stays that way.

Bioscience Technology has seen its fair share of events in 2009 as well. We launched our Researcher of the Year competition in May, and awarded it to C. Shad Thaxton for his work in cardiovascular disease. In 2010, we’ll continue this award program. Instructions for entering will be posted shortly on our Web site and in the January issue of Bioscience Technology.

The most useful change to our readers is the newly redesigned Web site. Even if you’ve had the chance to check out the new site, believe me, you haven’t seen anything yet. We’ll soon add even more functionality into the site that will make it even easier to find the tools and technologies you need to accomplish your research goals. The online Buyers' Guide will be updated in 2010, and we’ll be adding tools to help you post your research, solicit comments, and interact with your peers. Some of this is already in place. If you get a chance, check out the community section on www.biosciencetechnology.com and post in our forums.

Keep me posted on how the new year is going for you and your research. I wish you all a happy and successful 2010.

“I have never seen a real robot and know nothing about robotics as a science or technology, even though I invented the word.”

As rejections go, this excerpted rejection from Isaac Asimov to longtime laboratory automation enthusiast Jeff Hurst is pretty interesting. Hurst had personally invited Asimov to be the plenary speaker at the very first conference and exhibition for laboratory automation back in 1997.

Coming full circle some 14 years later, famed Twilight Zone actor and film writer Bruce Sterling has accepted the opportunity to speak – and he is ready to entertain at LabAutomation2010, Jan. 23-27, at the Palm Springs Convention Center, Palm Springs, CA, USA.

Of course, the concept of laboratory automation is a bit more established nowadays with more than 4,000 participants from 40 countries gathering in the warm and sunny Palm Springs next month at LabAutomation2010.

Sterling will be joined by three other elite plenary speakers:

- Kei Koizumi, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy
- R. Graham Cooks, Henry B. Haas Distinguished Professor of Analytical Chemistry, Purdue University
- Hod Lipson, Associate Professor Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Cornell University

All four plenary speakers will be interesting, but I am actually looking forward to Hod Lipson’s presentation on self-aware robots. Check out this video of a robot learning how to walk posted on TED: http://www.ted.com/talks/hod_lipson_builds_self_aware_robots.html

Truth be told, the plenary speakers at LabAutomation2010 are really just the tip of the ice berg. The five-day event offers highly concentrated scientific sessions, short courses, breakfast panels, and posters not to mention the exhibition – which features more than 250 multi-national companies displaying the coolest technology and automation innovation for research and discovery.

The exhibition is free. To register for the scientific sessions, go to: https://www.labautomation.org/LA10/index.cfm.

Be sure to check-out all the smart-savers opportunities.  There’s even a $200 flight discount program:
https://www.labautomation.org/LA10/discounts.cfm.

Regards,
Greg Dummer, CAE
ALA Executive Director

I have always been amazed at what benefits animals had for science. Although I still don’t know if I side with people using animals for research; I sure wouldn’t want research to be done on me first; as selfish as that may seem. However, I think I first became interested in the benefits animals provided for science when cloning first came onto the scene. Although the first cloned animal was a tadpole, Dolly was of great interest for me. Now cloning animal genomes has been taken to dogs and horses, and even human genomes are underway.

However, probably the most common animals used within laboratories are mice and rats. I remember I couldn’t read a press release without it talking about the success drugs have had within animal models, which were usually mice/rats. Of course there were the occasional zebrafish models and monkey models, however, mice/rats take the cake. Now, a new rat is being introduced into laboratories around the world for life science studies: introducing the naked mole rat.

These cute, buck teethed, furless rodents have been used in various research studies from pain research, stroke research, cancer research, and aging research.

While being sensitive to touch, hence they have no fur, naked mole rats are insensitive to pain. A research from the Univ. of Illinois at Chicago found that these shrewish rodents lack Substance P, which is a chemical that causes burning sensations for mammals. This makes the rodent insensitive to acid, and numb to foods like chili peppers and lemon juice. The researchers are hoping that this new knowledge, on top of previous studies and knowledge, may lead to new insights into inflammatory pain and inflammatory disease.

These rodents are also being used in cancer research by the Univ. of Rochester. While naked mole rats can live up to 30 years, researchers at the Univ. of Rochester claim that they have never been found with cancerous tumors. In fact, the rodent can never really contract the deadly disease thanks to a gene called p27, which according to the researchers “human and other animals have, and which prevents cells from crowding together,” and a gene called p16. The p16 gene prevents cells from multiplying.

Since cancer can obviously find its way around the p27 gene, since humans and most animals can contract the disease, the p16 gene forms a double barrier for the rodent, allowing it to withstand the disease. These naked mole rats have become a staple in cancer research for this reason in hopes to find answers to genetic questions that one day may suppress the disease for humans.

Also in recent news, these blind creatures hold clues to surviving strokes. It turns out that these adorable, furless rodents’ brain tissue can withstand extreme hypoxia, according to a press release issued by the Univ. of Illinois at Chicago, for periods exceeding a half-hour. Studying African naked mole rats that live tight, foul areas underground, John Larson and Thomas Park found the creatures to show systemic hypoxia adaptations, which they believe to be a result of evolutionary adaptations for surviving in a chronically low-oxygen environment. This importance of this study is that these tiny creatures may help these researchers identify the mechanisms that allow longer neuronal survival after such accidents or medical emergencies, which may suggest ways to avoid permanent human brain damage.

All these research studies, plus the fact that naked mole rats live 10 times longer than any other laboratory mice or rat makes them valuable to the field of science.

Pretty cool if you ask me.

- Lindsay Hock, Managing Editor, R&D

B2B Connectivity for Companies Lasered in on Laboratory Technologies: Cutting a Wide Swath Across Multiple Disciplines

How do business and scientific leaders at well-established, large, small and start-up companies find time to connect and explore strategic relationships? It’s difficult at best. Time consuming. And, once due diligence kicks-in, costly. But here’s one solution that efficiently and cost-effectively starts the process – the FREE Biz-Dev Business Development Forum at LabAutomation2010 next month in Palm Springs.

From forensics and food science, to energy research, drug discovery, bioinformatics, quality control and clinical diagnostics – LabAutomation2010 creates real, practical synergistic connections.

LabAutomation2010 is a five-day conference and exhibition attracting more than 4,000 participants from more than 40 countries. The 14th edition of this event is January 23-27 at the Palm Springs Convention Center, Palm Springs, CA, USA.

Of the many educational and networking offerings of the event, of particular value to those interested in venture projects or partnerships are the free business-to-business aspects of LabAutomation2010. Some 250 multi-national companies comprise the exhibition. And, as a free service aside from the exhibit hall, LabAutomation2010 offers the opportunity to participate in the Biz-Dev Business Development Forum. Biz-Dev provides a dedicated time and place away from the exhibit floor for companies, suppliers, technology providers and original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to explore business partnerships and collaborations. You can sign-in for free today and see all the C-level executives already participating in program. Go here: http://www.labautomation.org/LA10/bizdev/index.cfm

To learn more about LabAutomation2010, go here: http://www.labautomation.org/LA10/index.cfm

And, finally, according to Leroy Hood, MD, PhD, President, Institute of Systems Biology, LabAutomation2010 is the top science and business meeting kicking off the new year.

“The LabAutomation Conference and Exhibition is a fascinating experience,” says Hood. “It provides a wonderful venue for sharing ideas with scientists and engineers around the world. Laboratory automation is a critical component of high-throughput data measurements of modern biology and medicine. The LabAutomation Community has a unique culture, is an integral component of high-throughput data measurements for genomics, proteomics, and phenotypes and thus provides a crucial foundation for modern biology and medicine.”

And this news just in, ALA has selected eight start-up companies from around the world to participate in its annual Innovation AveNew at LabAutomation2010, to read more about these unique companies from the US, Europe and Asia, go here: https://www.labautomation.org/news/pr112409.pdf

The LabAutomation2010 conference and exhibition is an annual event produced by the Association for Laboratory Automation (ALA); www.labautomation.org

My kindest regards,
Greg Dummer, CAE
ALA Executive Director