Archive by date | November 2011

Researcher confesses to stealing lab notebooks

Researcher confesses to stealing lab notebooks

In two sworn affidavits dated 16 and 21 November, researcher Max Pfost admitted to stealing laboratory notebooks from his employer the Whittemore Peterson Institute (WPI) in Reno, Nevada, and giving them to Judy Mikovits, the institute’s former research director. He states that he retrieved “between 12-20 notebooks” from a locked desk in Mikovits’s former office on the morning of 30 September. This was one day after Mikovits was fired from her post for insubordination. He says he stored them in his mother’s garage in a “multicoloured Happy Birthday” bag.

Fukushima closes in on cold shutdown

Fukushima closes in on cold shutdown

Over the past few days there’s been buzz around whether the melted-down reactors at Fukushima Daiichi are near “cold shutdown”. Since the nuclear crisis began, achieving cold shutdown has been the major goal of the Japanese government and the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), which runs the plant. Loosely speaking, it would mean that the stricken reactors at the plant no longer require active cooling and that the immediate nuclear crisis is more or less over.

Researcher arrested over missing lab notebooks

Researcher arrested over missing lab notebooks

On Friday 18 November, Mikovits, a chronic fatigue syndrome researcher, was arrested and jailed by Ventura County police in relation to a lawsuit brought by her former employer, the Whittemore Peterson Institute (WPI) in Reno, Nevada claiming that she had absconded with lab notebooks and proprietary information. She is being held without bail and may face extradition to Nevada.

As lawyers and patient advocates line up to debate who is right and who is wrong in this bitter dispute, there is still the question of what will become of a US$1.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) that is held by WPI with Mikovits as the principle investigator.

FDA revokes approval of breast cancer drug

FDA revokes approval of breast cancer drug

It’s finally official: the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has withdrawn its approval of the drug Avastin (bevacizumab) to treat advanced breast cancer. Avastin retains its approval for some other colon, kidney, and brain cancers.

Ruth’s Reviews: And the winner is….

Ruth's Reviews: And the winner is….

Last night, at a ceremony in London, Gavin Pretor-Pinney was named as this year’s Royal Society Winton Book Prize winner. His winning book, The Wavewatcher’s Companion, is his second, and followed naturally in the footsteps of The Cloudspotter’s Guide. He told me “many waves are revealed by clouds”, and that the act of watching clouds and waves is “rounding and calming”. When I asked if he had a trilogy in him, Pretor-Pinney said he was uncertain but that: “what interests me is the ordinary, finding what’s exotic in our surroundings, seeing the miraculous in what is around us.” The Wavewatcher’s  … Read more