Has hypoxia adaptation in the Ethiopian highlands mirrored that seen in Tibet and the Andes? Is there a genetic definition for an Ashkenazi Jew? These are two questions on human diversity that can now be answered, thanks to new research articles published in this month's Genome Biology. In the first article, the University of Pennsylvania's… Read more »
"A Lamarckian contribution to natural selection doesn't make much sense to me," says father-of-(modern) epigenetics Andy Feinberg as he opens his talk at the Keystone Symposium on Epigenomics. Admittedly, expressing skepticism toward Lamarck's theory on the heritability of acquired traits is hardly controversial in the 21st century, but a number of better accepted theories were… Read more »
Aquatic Biosystems, previously Saline Systems, was relaunched today with a broader scope to incorporate all aspects of basic and applied research on aquatic organisms and environments. The first articles published today in Aquatic Biosystems include research by Patricia Assuncao et al. on the molecular taxonomy of new strains of Dunaliella, and research by Steve Ferguson… Read more »
Antimicrobial Resistance and Infection Control (ARIC) has launched with BioMed Central today. Led by Andreas Voss, ARIC is a global forum for the scientific community working on the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of healthcare-associated infections. Healthcare-associated infections are on the rise because of changes in healthcare systems and the spread of antimicrobial-resistant strains of both… Read more »
On January 24th an editorial entitled Supporting the advancement of science: Open access publishing and the role of mandates, written by Lisa Phelps, Bernard Fox and Francesco M Marincola, has been published on Journal of Translational Medicine (JTM). It deals with a very relevant issue which could undermine the survival of the Open Access system: the… Read more »
BioMed Central is collaborating with the London Gastronomy Seminars and the Centre for the Study of the Senses, University of London, to host an evening exploring how flavour shapes our world. Flavour and the New Nordic Cuisine is a seminar to celebrate the launch of Flavour, a new interdisciplinary journal from BioMed Central covering the… Read more »
The year has started positively for Gut Pathogens with the news that the journal will receive its first Impact Factor in June 2012. Gut Pathogens is aiming to be ranked in the first quartile of Gastroenterology and Hepatology journals. Gut Pathogens, an internationally recognized journal, boasts an Editorial Board consisting of leading researchers from around… Read more »
An international symposium on Infection, Immunity, and Cancer was held January 16-17, 2012 at Kyoto University, Kyoto Japan. The symposium brought together speakers from Japan, the USA, Taiwan, Germany, and Australia. The symposium was organized by Prof. Masanori Hatakeyama of Tokyo University and Prof. Masao Matsuoka of Kyoto University. The setting of this symposium was an opportune occasion for the… Read more »
Fibrogenesis & Tissue Repair welcomes Professor Ian Dixon as a new Section Editor for Cardiovascular Diseases. Ian will join the four current Section Editors in helping to promote the journal and will oversee some of the journal’s peer review processes. Ian is a Professor of Physiology at the University of Manitoba, and Principal Investigator of… Read more »
Arthropods such as insects can be devastatingly efficient pests and disease vectors, posing significant challenges to the agricultural and medical communities. Pesticides used to be a common solution to dealing with pests but, with more stringent environmental regulations on pesticides and increasing pest resistance to the chemicals, new solutions are required. Many arthropods have evolved… Read more »