Archive by date | March 2010

Another day, another ‘climate-gate’ inquiry

The University of East Anglia has announced details of the team that will be looking into the scientific papers produced by its Climatic Research Unit, following last year’s email theft and subsequent controversy.

Furious rows ensured after emails from the CRU published on the internet were taken by some as showing that Global Warming was a huge conspiracy. A number of inquiries have followed.

This particular inquiry is investigating the scientific publications of the CRU, which have been questioned by a number of climate sceptics as some of the emails published contained statements that they took to indicate manipulation of data*.

“The shadow hanging over climate change and science more generally at present makes it a matter of urgency that we get on with this assessment,” says Lord Oxburgh, the former chair of the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology, who has been selected to head this inquiry (press release).

Quotes of the day

“We developed a method of showing video to an octopus, which was the first time this has been successful with any cephalopod.”

Renata Pronk, of Macquarie University in Sydney, tells the BBC why it’s useful for researchers to have octopuses that can watch television in their labs and how this can be used to show their ‘episodic personalities’.

“To diversify the STEM fields we must take a hard look at the stereotypes and biases that still pervade our culture. Encouraging more girls and women to enter these vital fields will require careful attention to the environment in our classrooms and workplaces and throughout our culture.”

The American Association of University Women’s Why So Few? report finds stereotypes are still holding back women in science (report, NYT coverage).

“We welcome interactions with industry that are positive and collaborative. But where I think the line should not be crossed and where we are not going to allow our full-time or part-time faculty to engage is in marketing.”

Philip Pizzo, dean of Stanford medical school, tells the New York Times why the school is banning even volunteer teaching staff from giving speeches paid for by drug companies.

“Paleontologists have stumbled across a scientific first that’s sure to inspire both fascination and disgust: coprolites, or fossilized fecal matter, bearing the distinct impressions of a creature’s teeth.”

Wired discusses how a crocodilian turd came to have shark teeth marks on it.

Clinical trials ‘are excluding gay people’

People in homosexual relationships are routinely excluded from clinical trials, especially those related to sexual health, according to a new study.

An analysis of US clinical trials by researchers from the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia searched for trials involving the terms “couples”, “erectile dysfunction” or “hypoactive”. Of the 243 studies they found, 37 explicitly excluded lesbians and gay men, they report in the New England Journal of Medicine.

“Most gay and lesbian patients are probably unaware that their sexual orientation is being used as a screening factor for clinical trial participation,” says study author Brian Egleston. “This is a potentially significant issue, both for patients and the medical research community.”

Industry sponsored and multi-region trials were especially likely to exclude lesbians and gays. Although their may be legitimate reasons to exclude potential trial participants based on sexual orientation, the authors say researchers should be “held to careful scientific reasoning” if they wish to do this. In addition, requiring patients to be in heterosexual relationships may also exclude unmarried or unpartnered hetro- and homo-sexual people.

“It’s not unusual in studies to decide who your target population is and exclude people who are not in this target population,” Susan Cochran, of the University of California, Los Angeles School of Public Health, told ABC. “The bigger problem is if everyone just decides they’re going to exclude sexual minorities. Then their health issues are never dealt with.”