Man, those physical chemists sure can throw a good chemical biology meeting. I finally got a chance to join in the 'Functional Motions in Enzyme Catalysis' session, and it was well worth the wait. Though each of the three talks was excellent, what was particularly interesting were some of the commonalities that emerged in the lectures and the subsequent panel discussion.

* Vern Schramm pointed out that the conversations throughout this symposium were completely different than what would have been discussed 10 years ago. Things are moving fast.
* As Richard Schowen particularly noted, the question of protein dynamics is big, and is only going to get bigger. One of the seemingly few sources of controversy in the field (or one of the linguistic barriers, as Peter Wolynes suggested) is whether dynamics plays a direct role in catalysis or not.
* Investigations of protein folding and dynamics is growing more and more interdisciplinary.
* It seems the people in the field are adapting well to the significant conceptual shifts. One person even said that, at the beginning of the meeting, he was convinced of one idea, but by the end of the meeting, he needed to rethink.

And for the rest of my thoughts on this, you'll have to stay tuned to the journal in the next few months...

Instead I'll close the conference with two funny quotes from the afternoon, both courtesy of Rudolph Marcus:

"We've got an equation! Now we can test it!"

"Among friends, who cares about a factor of 10 or 100..."

It's funny - often before an ACS meeting, I wonder why I'm going when - as the criticism goes - it's such a big meeting and so impersonal. Yet every time I come away amazed at how much I've learned and what lovely people I met. Looking forward to the next one.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 12:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

First, a couple of thoughts:

* Finally I found some people at the meeting today! Or maybe it just helps to use rooms that seat 70 instead of 700.

* The folks in the Division of Chemical Information get a huge thanks today. Their talks (these, and these) were super interesting, they were friendly, and they answered my ultra-stupid questions with grace.

Now, to the main event:

When you sign on as 'press' for the week, you receive some handouts describing all of the press conferences taking place during the meeting. One of the briefings was about a new way to make biodiesel from algae. For some reason I took this to mean metabolic engineering to improve hydrocarbon production, or something, and had never been to a press conference before, so I was pretty psyched up for the whole thing. Unfortunately, as you can see here if you have 7 minutes to kill, it was a bit frustrating, to say the least. It wasn't clear who the woman was that was talking, but she basically read the statement we had already received and then refused to answer any questions, either from lack of knowledge or because the information was proprietary. The three things I actually learned are 1) they may (or may not) have applied for a patent for their new catalyst, 2) there is a transesterification involved, and 3) 'green' doesn't mean the same thing to everyone (particularly note the moderator's reaction - priceless!). I am not normally one to make fun, but this was really a mess. Good luck to you, United Environment and Energy LLC - I hope you have found a commercially viable biodiesel conversion process that will save us all, but this wasn't one to stop the presses for.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Today I unexpectedly ventured far from my comfort zone to learn about ketosamines and 2-deoxyglucose in cancer treatment on one hand, and boronic acid-based sensors on the other, so I will not attempt to explain the details here as I would undoubtedly get many things wrong. Instead, I have an important question for you.

I got into an interesting conversation this afternoon with two card-carrying chemical biologists (by which I mean, they not only do chemical biology research BUT read our editorials!!) who were curious about our recent editorial calling for the more judicious use of 'data not shown'. One scientist made the point that it is reasonable to use this term when you have the data, and the data could be produced upon the request of an interested referee or reader, but it's obvious from the text how the data look and so there's no great need to show every tiny detail. The other scientist said that it's better for all relevant information/data to be available in the paper, so that it can easily be reproduced and so it's not necessary to call on the author to produce the data at some later point (especially considering that online Supp. Info. is pretty unlimited these days).

The question is: what data should be shown? What is completely obvious and really just takes up space? What may be completely obvious but is still critical to be included? What do people think is obvious but is not? For example, does just listing NMR peaks and splittings constitute 'data not shown', and should we obtain copies of all the original spectra? What about showing the data points/plots used to calculate IC50 values vs. just listing the numbers? Are you annoyed if people include too much information? How could methods be presented more clearly? Why do we need all this data shown - do we not trust each other to do/interpret the work properly, or not trust each other to report our work accurately, or is it simply a matter of having a complete scientific record?

Anyway, I may not know much about ketosamines, but I did read somewhere that you need sleep to help prevent cancer, so I'd best get to it!

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 12:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (11) | TrackBacks (0)

So as part of my efforts to 'seek out people I don't know', I went to a session yesterday in the colloid division about membranes and membrane proteins. Two talks by a grad student (Niña Hartman) and postdoc (Cheng-Han Yu) (see here for pictures) from Jay Groves' lab were particularly outstanding. They are trying to figure out how TCR channels and other proteins at the immunological synapse are sorted into patterns. The general idea seems to be that clustering controls trafficking, with all kinds of fancy techniques used to provide evidence. The weirder thing to me is, how does the cell know where the synapse is supposed to be?? Something to ponder.

The funny quote of the day came from the morning carbohydrates session, where Amit Basu pointed out (in discussing the very precise molecular recognition of carbohydrate-carbohydrate interactions as compared to more general adhesion properties) that sugar is not equal to a patch of micro-nano-honey.

Now I've got to figure out where I'm going - definitely no pattern to that yet!
Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Today's carbohydrate session was in honor of Peter Seeberger winning the Hudson Award, with the panel of speakers reflecting Seeberger's interests in oligosaccharide synthesis, antigens and adjuvants, and the complexities of glycosylation as a post-translational modification.

At least 4 different speakers talked in some detail about the importance of sugars in immune responses to bacteria, cancer, and disease. I think they converted me. In particular, Chi-Huey Wong and Geert-Jan Boons are finding new proteins that were either not known to be glycosylated at all or those that are specifically present/upregulated on cancer cells. Can combining these discoveries with new synthetic epitopes for generating immune responses result in the body clearing cancer cells as if they were a bacterial infection? Exciting stuff.

Todd Lowary and Ben Davis both talked a bit about the confusion of different glycoforms. For example, how do you know whether a particular structure is on the biosynthetic pathway to a second glycoform, or whether - as in the case of Lowary's subject, lipoarabinomannan - there are more complex workings in play? Davis just seems to get around the whole thing by developing a continuous number of orthogonal reactions to allow multiple glycan incorporation in what he calls 'post-expression mutagenesis'.

Kwan Soo Kim took us on an interesting trip through the complexities of carbohydrate synthesis, particularly as to whether substituents at the 3-, 4-, and 6-positions can affect the stereoselectivity of carbohydrate coupling at C1. Seeberger is making use of this kind of information in developing his automated carbohydrate synthesizer. He mentioned that he's looking for users to test a beta version of the machine, so feel free to get involved!

After all that glycochemistry talk, I think it's time for dessert.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 07:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I'm in Salt Lake City for the spring ACS. Though I grew up not far from here, the mountains in my town were to the west, so it'll be an adjustment. I hope I don't wander into the lake, or down to Arches by mistake...

I've put off looking at the schedule until just now, and I am completely befuddled. How do I decide between 2, let alone 4-5 different sessions that all sound great? Should I go to all 8 iterations of a continuous topic, and really dive in and learn a lot, or should I bounce around learning tidbits about different topics? Should I go to talks by people I've heard of to get the update on what they're doing, or should I seek out people I don't know? Should I go to morning sessions, or poster sessions, or just not sleep at all? Perhaps the first session tomorrow should include some kind of cloning step, so I can really see everything that's going on.

Anyway, the ACS actually wants us editors to play journalist for the week (at least to get free access to the press room - seems fair, really!), so stay tuned for more on where I end up.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 09:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Many moons ago, I had a few thoughts about how scientific words are pronounced, and particularly wondered if different pronunciations might reflect where scientists were trained, either in a certain field or a specific country. The precursor to this question, though, is where do the words originate?

One obvious possibility is that once a new word or definition appears in print, scientists across the world can see the article and use the new term going forward. This would explain how groups of people use the same word but pronounce it differently, as there isn't anyone flying around to different universities to give speech lessons (although that would be awesome. Count me in!). That's also the rationale behind our recent Commentary on GPCR nomenclature (in our new March issue). However, what happens before the first paper gets published? Are pockets of researchers discovering new phenomena and weird effects, and just calling them all different things? Are some of these discoveries so obvious in their terminology that everyone just happens upon the same name? I imagine that it's a bit like getting glasses, with similar yet subtly different words being thrown around until everyone focuses on a single term.

In contrast to the 'first publication defines a new name' idea, what happens if two competing sets of terminology are published at the same time? I think a related problem happens a lot in biology, where the same proteins (or genes) from different species get different names, and then papers have to spend a lot of time explaining that this protein is equivalent to that protein but not that other protein, etc.. But with two terms for the exact same thing, which one wins out? And is there a way to prevent this kind of silliness, or is that just one of the perverse joys of being in science?

Finally, what about more elusive ideas, like how to develop standards for a new field? How do researchers arrive at a meeting of the minds when each scientist may have a different idea of what is appropriate and/or different abilities to meet those standards? This has been a particular difficulty for scientists working on small-molecule screening, as discussed in our March editorial. What other fields are encountering this problem, and how are you/they dealing with it? In the editorial, we suggest a couple of remedies; if those don't work, I'd suggest you take two aspirin and call me in the morning.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

I just discovered that it looks like a major Canadian funding institute has lost its place in the recent Canadian federal budget (see here and here for coverage). I'm wary of saying more than is supported by the limited information that I have, but it seems like a troubling turn for scientific research if this trend continues?! Anyone know more?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

My sister recently gave me 'a mini guide to the periodic table'. The interesting fact for today is: Neodymium is magnetic, and in fact NIB (neodymium, iron, boron) magnets are so strong that you can put them on either side of your hand and they will stick. That's kind of creepy.

Little things like this make me happy to be a chemist. The more I meet people who aren't scientists (all 3 of them), the more I realize that it's a privilege to be happy doing what you do.

[Addendum, or a quick note of clarification: I don't mean at all to suggest that you need to be a scientist to be happy. Rather, I think it's harder to accidentally become a scientist if you're not fairly passionate about it. Or, just that I was talking to people who don't like their jobs.]

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 11:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

A while ago I posted some ideas about 'people who know things' and 'people who look things up', with a minor reference to 'people who don't know anything but pretend that they do'. I thought it was time to talk about those people.

Upon further reflection, I think a better name for this category of people is 'people who seem to know things, but don't'. The question then is whether the person knows they don't know the thing (and are exaggerating what they actually know for their own reasons) or doesn't (and thus is genuinely trying to be helpful). This also makes me think there should be a category called 'people who don't seem to know things' (which would then be broken down into people who do know things but aren't convincing and people who really don't know things... however, that's a topic for another day).

It's hard to quibble with people who are trying to be helpful, although I have run my share of wild goose chases inspired by some well-intentioned coworker. It's easier to quibble with people who are aware that they might not have all the information, and yet pretend to be knowledgeable. My sympathetic interpretation is that they are scared to admit they don't know things. This reminds me of the age-old complaint from undergraduates, that when they ask a question in class, they frequently feel like the professor will offer stipulations or qualifications or possible answers when the 'real' answer is, in fact, 'I don't know'.

It's funny... though I think this hypothesis is probably applicable to most scientists, it seems counterintuitive: in the broadest sense, our mission in life is to find out things that no one knows yet. So why is it scary? In this job, I have to admit that I have rediscovered my joy of admitting that I do not know things. Since it's impossible that I could ever begin to know (in great detail) the various topics that I read about every day, I ask lots of questions. People are always excited to explain things to me.

So, what to do about these pretenders? In my opinion, it is great to offer ideas and suggestions, but not at the expense of making someone believe information that's not correct. So, stop pretending. Feel free to admit you aren't an expert on everything. Or set a new year's resolution of being an inquisitive and engaging person and go out and learn what the real answer is.

As a bit of journal promotion, one way that we're hoping to help people learn things is via a new content type called Primers (see here for the first one, published in our Feb issue which is now online [Hooray, as always], and here for our January editorial, which talks about why we're doing this). These are perhaps most akin to mini-mini-reviews - short and sweet summaries of basic topics in chemical biology. I particularly wanted to draw your attention to it here because it's going to be a bit tricky to strike the right balance between topics that are obvious to everyone (not good), topics that are obvious to only some people (good) and topics that aren't obvious to anyone (great). So if you have a topic in mind - perhaps you went to a talk recently and were lost after the first 5 minutes because some concept wasn't explained, or perhaps you've never grasped the distinction between some related ideas, or similar - let me know!

I'm off to learn what the rest of the day holds...
Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 02:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

One year in high school I was a 'secret Santa', where I was anonymously responsible for getting presents for another person. Last year in the NPG office we had a gift exchange where people randomly got silly things and then we played an elaborate game to decide who got what. There are many kinds of these little holiday adventures, yet none to do with science. Why not?

I could imagine a lab surprising another lab by cleaning all their glassware, or the delivery of a big drum of silica with a red bow on top. What about people getting each other gilded, monogrammed pipettes? Or making up those paper coupons that are alternately endearing and/or scream out 'I didn't know what to get you' that are good for one hour of literature searching, or one extraction, or the use of the last unbroken, unscratched 50 mL RBF (if there is even such a precious, precious thing)? Perhaps graduate students could arrive to find tiny presents in their lab coat pockets from the science Santa? Maybe that only works if you leave them by the hood...

Anyway, I was thinking recently about what science presents I wanted for the holidays, and suddenly realized

"What could be better than the January issue of Nature Chemical Biology?!?"

We've got not one, but now two pages of research highlights. We've got 10 crystal structures, 8 protein blobs, and 2 mice on our table of contents. We've got single amino acids, peptides both short and long, and proteins doing all kinds of cool stuff. Not only is the issue full of goodies, but we give you a couple of other things to look forward to in the year to come.

With all this inspiration, I think it's time to look for packages of reagents that will fit on a sleigh...
Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 01:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

One of the most frequent questions I am asked at conferences is 'what do you do all day?' It's always hard to envision what someone else's job is like; this is probably particularly true with me because I'm outside of the 'normal' scientific careers of academia and industry. I thought one simple way to try to tell you all what my day is like would be to give you a blow-by-blow account. So, here goes! Hope it's not too boring...

8:53 - Sorting through some random notes, trying to figure out what I need to tackle first. I'm putting together an agenda for a meeting tomorrow, so that probably takes priority.

9:24 - Got distracted answering an email from someone who disagrees with a decision we made. Also, Josh just got back in the office and is telling us the news from London.

9:57 - Finished email, working on agenda.

10:26 - Finished agenda. Now I've got to send an email about a review I had sort-of commissioned and then need to read several papers.

11:00 - Sent email. Then I talked to Joanne about PubChem and what conferences we might go to next year. Really time to read papers!

11:31 - Debating the merits of a paper. Initial feeling is that sugars are cool.

11:58 - A mini-rant: If there is an article that compromises the novelty of your work, please don't wait until the final paragraph of your 18 page paper to mention it. Needless to say, I recommended rejection. Now reading a second one.

12:28 - Got an awesome review outline from an author for my upcoming focus issue. Very excited! Also had to answer some questions about proofs of an article, and read a couple of papers as possible research highlights. One is not super exciting, one has potential.

1:01 - having lunch; heading to editorial team meeting.

1:57 - lots of stuff to talk about! Now headed to QC meeting of December issue.

3:03 - QC meeting is done, and we continued the editorial meeting. We had to decide what meetings to go to next year and it's hard to pick! Now done with meetings for the day.

3:37 - Hopefully commissioned a News & Views, and did some other random things. Time flies!

4:02 - Making some notes on the review outline from earlier. Also wrote back to someone who has a cool story they want to submit to us.

4:33 - Drowning in production details. It would be better if our production team was in the same office with us.

5:04 - Looking for companies that might want to sponsor a new thing we're doing. Also reading a paper. It would go faster if I picked one instead of doing both, probably!

5:39 - Computer malfunction + working on the last form I have to prepare for that meeting tomorrow. Phew!

6:00 - Sent an email to yet another person about something they're writing for us. And, it's nearly time to go home so I can pretend to have a 'real' life. So, in terms of whether this was a typical day: today was very productive in terms of doing long-term stuff, and working on some projects, but I really didn't make much progress on the manuscripts, or get to look for referees at all. As a result, I'll take some papers home to read overnight and plan to devote much more time to our submissions tomorrow.

Pretty glamorous, huh?!

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 08:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

As we finish up our 4th volume over at Nature Chemical Biology, we've been thinking about new ideas for the journal and new ways to follow up on some old ideas. We've also been getting some feedback recently that our decision letters (the 'reject', 'accept', or 'somewhere in between' emails) aren't as clear as they could be. Our editorial this month tries to shed some light on this issue, but I also thought I would ask you guys a few questions:

What is the ideal way to find out your paper has been rejected, if there is such a thing? Does it help if we explain our thinking - what aspects of the paper we found stronger or weaker than others? Or would you rather just hear 'no' and move on?

If we ask you to call us to talk about the decision, would you? If we ask you to expand the paper prior to review, when would you be willing to do that vs. just go to another journal?

How much do you all know about the editorial process generally? Meaning, do we need to explain that we do a first round of editorial review, or is that obvious?

Do you have any questions about decisions that we could discuss here? We do want our decisions to be as transparent as possible, both so that potential authors and editors can exchange ideas and have a deep understanding of the various fields we cover, and because it should save a lot of time and energy if we can make our editorial processes and criteria plain. So, please ask, explain, instruct! We're currently preparing the January issue, so we need some resolutions to work on.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (10) | TrackBacks (0)

Our November issue is out, and it's a focus on chemical systems biology. My colleague Joanne points out that, from cell phones to social networking and even to Nature Network, life is increasingly interconnected. Thus, this focus issue highlights how networks are coming to chemical biology – and chemists to systems biology.

Do you think, as Randy Peterson suggests, that chemical biologists have reductionist tendencies? As Andrew Hopkins writes, is network pharmacology going to be the next era in drug discovery? What systems are you interested in, and more broadly, how do you define a systems approach? Finally, what do you think of our new term (chemical systems biology)? What terms have you coined, or would like to?

All this reminds me that I've still got to figure out a system for organizing the papers on my desk. So, I'd better get to it!
Catheirne (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I was just over reading this blog + comments at Nature Network which was discussing whether science could ever achieve the kind of coverage and interest that sports do. About halfway through the comments, I ran into this statement from Stephen Curry about why sports are more compelling than science:

The stakes are high and the difference between triumph and disaster is wafer-thin.

However, I would argue these same things are true of science, it's just that both the stakes and the degree of 'wafer-thinness' are different.

One obvious way that triumph and disaster are quantified in science is in publications. So in this scenario, getting a significant paper published = triumph; getting scooped = disaster. But what does it mean to be scooped these days, with online release dates and the (sometimes extremely) different delays in publishing a paper at one journal vs. another? I remember a few times in grad school that I had an idea, and even before I had thought in the slightest about trying it out in the lab, I saw the same (or a very similar) result appear in the literature. On the other end of the spectrum, if you've got a paper coming out (i.e., already in press), but a competitor's paper appears a few days or weeks before yours, does that mean your work was for nothing?

I guess getting scooped is mostly when you're about ready to submit a paper (frantically finishing those last few controls or making bar graphs), but you haven't actually submitted it (thus no 'submitted on' date to your name) and the competitor's paper appears. However, on the longer timescale of science (i.e., weeks and months rather than 4 nicely packaged quarters), that seems pretty wafer-thin to me: After all, if your experiments had just gone a little more smoothly, or if the competitor's revisions had slowed down because the first author was on vacation, etc., etc., you would have had concurrent papers.

So, enough rambling. The point of this post is to ask a few questions:
1. What was your closest call?
2. What defines getting scooped? Where does the distinction come between me-too science and studies that separately contribute even if the result is the same/very similar?
3. Is anyone willing to admit that they have submitted something before the paper was really ready just to get that earlier 'submitted on' date? More globally, is it possible to move away from this mindset? What kinds of changes would there need to be in the publishing world to make that happen?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I've been chatting with some friends these last couple of days, and we've developed a new* theory that could generally be applied to chemistry/chemists, so I thought I'd share. The idea is that there are two kinds of people in the world: those who know things and those who look things up. The first category also includes the subgroup 'people who don't know anything but pretend that they do' (which is a topic for another day).

It's obvious that, in the modern age, it's becoming increasingly easier to look things up. It used to be that you had to go to college or a library (or perhaps to someone's house who had a set of encyclopedias) to learn about the Diels-Alder reaction or the physical properties of mercury. But now you just use a book you have handy, or the internet, or even your phone to find out almost anything instantly. I assume this is why I've never been asked to memorize the periodic table (aaaaah! Chemistry sacrilege!!). Anyway, this inspires a few questions:

1. Given the extent of information that is now available, is it even possible to be a person who knows things anymore, or are we all just people who look things up, with some people looking up less things than others?
2. Does it matter if we don't know things, and just look things up? What information is worth knowing?
3. Do we specifically know less because it's easier to look things up? Meaning, do our minds subconsciously say "what's the point in really *learning* the preferred ionization state of Iridium if you can get the information in 3 seconds and instead use those neurons to remember what time your favorite TV show is on?" And if that's the case, can we reverse that? Do we want to?

I don't have the answers to these questions. It is obvious that it's hard to know where to look some things up if you never *learned* them in the first place, or at least how to use that information once you have it if you never had a place for it in your overall world view. ... Anyway, I'm curious to know what you guys think.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

* OK, you probably have all already thought of this. But, that should mean that your comments are even more thoughtful and inspired??

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (10) | TrackBacks (0)

That's right, it's double issue time! Not because we actually published two issues at once, but because the ACS completely sucked away my ability to blog (but in a good way! More on that soon).

So: in case you didn't see it, our September issue is full of goodies. In addition to exciting executions of exiguamine elaborations, provoking pulldowns of papain-like peptide-pinching proteins, and amazing arrangements of alkaloid architectures, we featured a collection of commentaries and profiles on funding agencies and opportunities that may provide some new ideas about where to apply for funding, particularly for those people who can't seem to get any love from organizations that prefer traditional disciplines (see our editorial for more thoughts on that point).

To be even more timely, our October issue is now online. Since I have already entertained you with some alliterations (or tried, anyway!), I will tell you about this issue in the form of a limerick:

There once was some copper in a cell.
It was sequestered by MymT for a spell.
It got transferred around
(but it always was bound)
and that has nothing to do with potassium channels, folate metabolism, or terpene synthases. Oh well.

Until next time,
Catherine

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

For those of you who don't know, today is International Lefthanders Day. Hooray! A celebration of chirality if there ever was one. I wonder: if we were made with D-amino acids instead of L, would left-handers be righties and vice versa? If we met aliens, would it blow our minds more if they looked just like us or if we figured out that they were just like us except made of D-amino acids? What if you found your alien doppelgänger and you measured your optical rotation and it was exactly opposite? Even worse, what if it wasn't opposite?! Would it mean that one of you had some crystallographic impurities??

Enough of that silliness! Well, one more bit of silliness: I have been watching the Olympics, and the coverage of synchronized diving is very interesting. One unexpected thing I noticed is that, when the dive involves a turn (along the vertical axis, not a flip), it still counts as being synchronized if the two divers turn in opposite directions. Wouldn't it be awesome if the commentators described this as chiral?

Ok, on to even less silly stuff: I am looking forward to the ACS meeting next week. We were talking in the office earlier this week about why people continue to go to such a huge overwhelming meeting when you could go to smaller meetings. However, the ACS meeting is always a great place to meet old friends or that famous professor you've been admiring. Plus, it always keeps me entertained with the huge diversity of topics - I can learn about everything from forgotten aspects of drug discovery to the most recent advances in proteomics, or even try to figure out the basis of left-handedness at sessions like this.

Anyway, I hope to see you there! If you don't see me in some of these sessions, you can probably find me somewhere in Philly, trying to figure out how to use right-handed scissors.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 09:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

It is lovely weather here in Boston, and we are all enjoying it very much. In fact, a friend of mine recently found a patch of wild blueberries, and so this past weekend I made some blueberry pie. Yum!

This little excursion also got me thinking about pi more generally. In my undergraduate days, my study partners and I really struggled in physical chemistry. We had homework assignments every night (unusual for a class at my university) and, even more strangely, we were given the numerical answers. We just had to figure out how to get them. After many weeks of trying all possible equations that we knew for every problem, one of us had an insight: as long as we used pi somewhere, somehow, we could always get to the right answer - sometimes you had to multiply by pi, sometimes dividing, etc., but always pi. We called this the pi factor. (Then the struggle was to figure out _why_ we needed pi in each case... is this the why factor??)

On a related note, I often see papers where an unexpected increase in binding affinity, or the critical requirement of a phenyl ring on a small molecule inhibitor, or similar, is simply explained by invoking pi-stacking. This is interesting to me: since it is often extremely difficult to provide quantitative (or even qualitative) data to confirm or refute the presence of pi-stacking (especially in large/complex systems), I wonder if some shout-outs to this interaction are just another way that people are using the pi factor? In this case, as something that makes intuitive sense, but will not likely need to be anything more than a vague reference?

Perhaps as we continue to learn about this fundamental intermolecular interaction, and methodologies continue to improve, it will not be so easy to call on pi in any ill-defined way. As long as it doesn't jeopardize my dessert...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 01:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Hi all,

Important news first: Our new issue is out today - including a focus on cooperativity. And in the spirit of cooperativity (or lack of time??? You be the judge), I've decided that you all should help me write the rest of the information about the issue. So, please comment and let me know whether you found Jamie Williamson's Perspective on macromolecular assembly more thought-provoking than Adrian Whitty's suggestion that cooperativity is the most basic type of emergent property, or vice versa. Or, if reading about Scientists without Borders made you revisit your desire to join the Peace Corps... All kinds of things to think about.

Otherwise, I'm off to a meeting at an undisclosed location. Theoretically it'll be nice to get out of this Boston heat, but the weather report of my destination sounds just the same... yikes! Silly summer.

Catherine

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 02:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

In the proud tradition of exposing naive minds to new viewpoints and opportunities (like 'Take your daughter to work day', now apparently rebranded as 'Take our daughters and sons to work day') comes the more recent tradition of introducing dog-lovers and -haters alike to our furry friends (or, stated another way: today is 'Take your dog to work day').

While it would be interesting to ponder our increased desire to literally have our creature comforts with us at all times, what I am more amused by is wondering whether there would be any more impractical thing for a chemist to bring to work, as I have visions of energetic dogs running through labs, knocking things off counters with their crazy tails and licking up the resulting mess... Depending on the feline, I could see a 'Take your cat to work day' being equally disastrous, primarily because they could easily get up on the bench and not only push things onto the floor, but also bonk into TLC chambers or step on computer keyboards. The worst, though, might be 'Take your lemur to work day', as any creature that can climb up onto chemical shelves and throw bottles at you is not going to make friends.

Perhaps a better holiday would be 'Take your chemist to work day', where non-science people bring their science friends to 'normal' places, like offices and banks, and clothes stores. It would be a good chance for us science geeks to reacclimate to society at large, and perhaps we could spend some time telling them about all the exciting discoveries we're making? And anyway, a lot less messy than a lemur in the lab.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

It's amazing how discerning our eyes are. I was just looking at the cover of our July issue, and there are some chemicals on it; though they are just long white chains, it's clear to me that they aren't just regular chains... can you all spot the modification? If not, the related paper will give you a pretty good hint.

Some of the other goodies in this issue (from the strictly chemistry point of view) include the synthesis of neopeltolide and an analog of leucascandrolide A, which were then used in some biology experiments that you may or may not be interested in, and the characterization of some isotopically-labeled intermediates that tell us about what some protein or other is doing. There are some other things too, about stem cells and the discovery that humans can reduce nitrate, but they're awfully biological. Maybe you shouldn't even look at them. In fact, I've decided you're not allowed to look at them. So don't. I mean it - stop it right now.

You can look at the report on the recent ASBMB meeting, if only to get psyched up for whatever meetings you might be going to this summer. I'm looking forward to the ACS, if only because I don't have to pay a huge sum to get there on a plane. How are travel costs affecting you? Have you had to turn down any fun opportunities for lack of funds? Do you have any good suggestions for how to get around it (barring repeats of the recent drive from DC to New Orleans)?

Ok, back to work. These issues don't make themselves, you know...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 02:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

In case you somehow were not aware, we are in the midst of the (I think first ever?) World Science Festival. Yes - somewhere in New York City, people are discussing Einstein's dreams, morality, and bioterrorism (not at the same time). If any of you are attending, let us know how it's going. Along with this conference came the announcement of the first ever Kavli Prize recipients. Norway, apparently sick of being overshadowed by it's eastern neighbor, is giving away it's own million-dollar prizes in the modernized categories of neuroscience, astrophysics, and nanoscience (this last to Louis Brus and Sumio Iijima). Along the lines of my previous post, it will be interesting to see how prestigious these new awards will become, and/or whether (as Mitch commented) the work already speaks for itself.

Another event coming up soon, and related to whether or not science speaks for itself, is the release of the updated impact factors from ISI. There's an interesting article in the latest C&E News about whether impact factors are useful/meaningful/accurate (which there's always room to discuss), as well as a proposal for developing a new metric to gauge the 'importance' of a specific article, journal or researcher's body of work. In general, it's quite interesting, but there are several important factual errors. So, just in case these are wider misconceptions, let me clear a few things up:

1) The Nature 'family' of journals (Nature, and the research and review journals that have 'Nature' in their name) do not have editorial boards, or advisory boards; instead, the journals employ full-time, professional editors who are Ph.D. scientists drawn from relevant fields. [A quick correction 05/30: I've learned that the review journals do use advisory boards to help select research highlights.]

2) Our highest priority in considering and publishing new science is the quality of the work, not whether the topic is 'hot', or whether an author has published with the journal before.

3) While we welcome conversations and inquiries about upcoming manuscripts and ongoing research, 'hammering' on an editor (or similarly, overly aggressive comments to referees) is typically counterproductive.

Phew! That's it.

In the end, perhaps Mitch is right, that a good paper is good no matter what, and that people find it and tell other people about it and eventually you can't avoid reading it? Here's hoping all our papers become ones you can't help but love.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Hi all,

Our June issue just went on line. I mean, just like 2 nanoseconds ago. This is brand new information, so hurry and go check it out. Among other goodies, you’ll find a proposal for the future of antibody technology, evidence for a global biosynthetic assembly line, and a beautiful tribute to a great scientist.

This issue is not just for you to sit back and admire, though. This month, we want to get your thoughts on the ways in which we can, do, and could communicate with each other. We also want to know how you integrate the web in your life, and we don’t mean between your toes. At our journal (and many others), the Correspondence section serves as an official venue for comments (and sometimes responses) on papers that we have published, as well as providing a forum for general conversations of interest to the community. In addition, in discussing specific papers, a growing number of journals like the PLOS fold and Biology Direct offer an opportunity to comment alongside the paper to raise technical or conceptual concerns, or theoretically to talk about new ideas raised by the article (my fairly minimal search turns up mostly the former, though). Faculty of 1000 also offers a forum for professors to highlight papers that they think their peers should be aware of. In regards to more informal topics, Nature Network has seen some great online discussions and happy hours, LinkedIn offers opportunities to establish a scientific network, and Nature Publishing Group is increasingly making a place for itself on spots like Second Life and Facebook. Similarly, the number of science blogs seems to have exploded in recent years, covering both scientific topics and things more related to being a scientist than the work itself.

With these growing online options, we are curious about how you all view the future of scientific communication. Here are a few of the things on our collective minds:

1. What should our Correspondence section include? Do you see a continuing need for this formal mechanism of communication?
2. What is the future of scientific correspondence more broadly? i.e., where do you go to find science news and cool papers, or to initiate or participate in discussions, and what do you like or dislike about online discussions?
3. How many of you actually go online to try to initiate or participate in a scientific discussion vs. just downloading papers, buying chemicals, or looking at the latest lolcat?
4. On a related note, what tips the balance for you from just taking in information to contributing it (and vice versa)?
5. For those of you who self-select as chemical biologists, would a chemical biology blog offer something unique as compared to other blogs, news sites or discussion groups you know of? Would you read/participate in a chemical biology blog?

Like Neil (and the chemistry team), we’d really love a ‘deluge of posts’ about this, whether you’re out on your own limb or not (yes, another reference to the platypus…). Thanks for your help!

Catherine (and the rest of the Nature Chemical Biology team)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 03:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

First of all, I hope you'll all excuse the somewhat overreaching title of this post - the coincidental timing of this and the previous post, however, seemed to merit some comparison.

Second of all (and the point of this post): The National Academy of Science has elected 72 new members and 18 foreign associates (which is the maximum that can be elected in any given year, apparently), of which a pleasantly surprising number are chemists (such as Frances Arnold, Steven Boxer, Steven Buchwald, Ken Dill, Michael Grunstein, Eric Jacobsen, and Tim Swager). Go chemists! It is perhaps worth noting, however, that only a small number of these folks have mustaches (which bodes well for Ken Dill; to be explained later).

The NAS site also tells us that 'election is considered one of the highest honors that can be accorded a scientist or engineer'. What do you guys think? Are you more impressed by someone who is in the HHMI? Or someone who's won a Cope Award, the Priestley Medal, or the Nakanishi Prize? How do you think the Kavli Prize will stack up (to be awarded for the first time in May)? Do you think NAS membership (or, in fact, most of these awards) would be more or less impressive if the rationale for who was picked was more transparent? Or do you find that the people doing great work come to be well-known and well-respected regardless of these external trappings?

In any case, it's clear that chemists are doing some moving and shaking (and shaving) these days. Congratulations to the new NAS members.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

In case you weren't aware, today is 'World Laboratory Day'. This website tells us that "World Laboratory Day celebrates the place where great discoveries, inventions, and medical cures are born. It's also where mad scientists dwell." I was actually going to go in a completely different direction upon hearing the name of the holiday - something more to do with celebrating your international collaborators, thanking that company 3,000 miles away for making the small molecule you want to do assays with, or sharing the candy that someone brought back from a recent conference overseas... I also have to take issue with the poor grammar of the sentence (gosh, I really have become a nerd!), which suggests to me that mad scientists dwell in World Laboratory Day, which seems a bit unusual (unless World Laboratory Day is frozen in time like Brigadoon, perhaps? Ok, enough randomness.).

Although a lot of screen time is given to mad scientists in movies, TV shows, and even the news (nothing says 'Watch the 11:00 news' like a scientist raving about time machines or cloning him/herself), I don't see a lot of true scientific content devoted to these beloved figures. For example, a friend of mine suggested there could be a journal just for research from mad scientists (plots to take over the world, new kinds of poisons, etc., which would have the side benefit of making it extremely easy to fight terrorism (by arresting all the corresponding authors)), but there could also be conference sessions or entire conferences devoted to 'Ways to create living matter using a corpse's brain' or 'How to accidentally change the size of your family members so that they get lost in your back yard and hilarity ensues'. What about special grants programs for people working on cloning dinosaurs into frog eggs, or switching faces back and forth? Really, I think this is a whole section of the science community we've been ignoring for too long. Unfortunately, most of these ideas don't really tie in to chemistry very well... perhaps we chemists are just too normal for all that silliness?

Anyway, I'm off to see if I can find some nice European chocolate. Hooray for globalization!

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Hey everyone, our May issue is now online. Check it out!

In the review in this issue about reactive oxygen species, Christine Winterbourn makes an interesting comment. She says:

"The early days [in free radical research] were notable for healthy and at times vigorous debate on how free radical chemistry could be rationalized with biological observations. Such debate is still needed today."

This comment made me think about something I read a couple of months ago in a plane magazine*, which was an interview with Gary Taubes. In describing his new book, he says:

"If I had my druthers, I'd have the public health authorities institute something more akin to the legal system to decide what we know is so and what we don't. They'd get a jury made up of 12 exceedingly good scientists, none of whom have worked in the fields of nutrition, obesity and chronic disease. Teams of competing experts would present the evidence for or against a particular belief - say, the healthfulness of low-fat diets, or whether salt causes hypertension. The jury would be able to cross-examine witnesses - i.e., those researchers who believed their studies provided some useful evidence. And then maybe the jury would deliberate for as long as it took to give an answer. If they didn't believe some particular piece of advice was justified, but they couldn't say it wasn't, they'd suggest what experiments had to be done to know for sure."

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

*Sadly, I don't remember the airline, so can't reference this properly. Feel free to tell me!

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 01:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

In case you didn't know, today is National Bunsen Burner day.* Let the partying begin!!

A celebration of Bunsen's contribution to the scientific lab does beg the question, though (with apologies to Shakespeare): Would a burner by any other name burn as hot? Would it be as useful for melting things in test tubes, or making spotters from pipettes? With more apologies to Bunsen, I'm going to venture a 'yes' on that one, but this could just be because my last Bunsen burner was not very useful (too sensitive to drafts), so I can't imagine how things could get much worse.

On a somewhat related note, when I was in graduate school, we received word that the EPA would be coming through the lab to make sure we were obeying all the rules about proper handling and disposal of chemicals. While of course we were completely in compliance with these rules already, we wanted to be absolutely certain that we were following the EPA guidelines to the fullest extent, in particular in regards to the extent to which things needed to be named (or labeled) throughout the research space. As a result, we spent a fair amount of time labeling anything that had previously escaped our notice, such as chairs ('Chair'), doors ('Door'), walls ('Wall')... you get the idea. In the end, the EPA was very happy with us (and the chemistry department in general). Phew! Actually, the only group on campus that got any significant fines was the art department, who were happily throwing oil-based paint down the drain. Oops...

Anyway, back to the main idea: what are you going to do to celebrate such an exciting holiday? Adjust your Bunsen burner's air vents? Sterilize/dry some flasks? Cook dinner by burner? Let me know if you think up any good ideas.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

* An especially funny quote from the description of the holiday reads:

Spend a few minutes today to appreciate the value of this important scientific tool. We will let you determine how many minutes to spend in reflection.

It's nice that I am allowed to determine my own actions. Thank you, holiday write-up person, for empowering me.

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 03:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

First things first: our April issue is now online. This is (as always, duh) a great one, including a comparison of cryogenic crystals conveying complex and coordinated connectivity in conduits, a synthetic sugar system to screen symptoms of severe sickness, and a pair of protocols to prepare and prove proper Phytophthora products.

We've also included a few photos from our recent symposium, and summarized some of our thoughts from and experiences at the meeting in our editorial this month.

On the topic of scientific gatherings, I thought it might be interesting to hear from you all about conferences you look forward to. For example, in contrast to my recent question about conferences that are a bit scary, what are your favorite conferences, and why? Is it all about the content, or have different ways of getting your daily recommended allowance of science made a big impression on you? What would you most like to do at a conference, if you could plan one yourself? We're in the midst of planning our next symposium, so we'd love to hear any fun ideas you've got tucked away...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Just a quick thought:

I was always told that my interest in free food would wane as I moved beyond graduate school. However, our office is closing briefly for remodeling, and they have promised us free pizza today to entertain us while we pack up our stuff. In thinking about whether I could just work from home the entire day, I realized: no, I really want some free pizza. So, here I am at my desk...

Does it ever end? :)

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 09:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

As I promised a couple of weeks ago (where does the time go?), I wanted to ask you all for input on another topic that I think about a lot.

In particular, there is obviously a great group of people who get their Ph.D.s, do postdocs, and then decide that they are crazy enough to dedicate themselves to academia.* These people then have an obvious interest in making themselves/their research known to the external world through publications, websites, conferences, etc., as this is the way they are evaluated for tenure, awards, grants, etc.

However, there is another great group of people who are highly educated and trained, but decide they are not crazy enough to become professors. For simplicity's sake, let's say they all go to industry (to big pharma, small biotechs and start-ups). These people (or their companies), in stark contrast to professors, mostly have a significant interest in not making themselves/their research known to the world. The company websites don’t list contact information. The things that do get published or presented are often projects that failed or are out of date,** or come from the rare companies doing basic research.

This is really frustrating for us because these great minds are basically disappearing into a black hole, even though we would value their input as review writers, referees (particularly when people are claiming to have a new drug or method for drug discovery), or general sources of information. And since there are so many people in industry, it would really broaden our options if we needed an expert in one particular field (where there might be only a couple of professors working on the topic) or if we just want a completely different point of view. Finally, from what I hear, it's also valuable to many industrial people to serve in these writing and refereeing capacities in term of their internal evaluations.

So the question for the day is, how can we find these non-academic scientists?? Sadly, I have no suggestions to kick this one off, so please help!

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

*I say this in the kindest way possible. You have to admit, though, it's a little crazy at times...
**And, there’s no guarantee that the person you’re searching for is the corresponding author, and no one else’s contact information is given…

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBacks (0)

It turns out that today is holy experiment day. Technically, this apparently means that we're supposed to test whether God exists or will reward our desires (perhaps by praying for more places that serve yummy salsa on the East Coast, and then seeing if more appear?). However, a more fun (and nerdy) interpretation refers back to the original Batman series, in which Robin (Batman's sidekick, for you uninitiated) would continually make weird comments of the format 'Holy -insert random word here-, Batman!' Being fairly young when this show was on TV (in reruns), I thought this (and the cheesy 'Pow' and 'Blam' graphics of the fight scenes) was the highlight of the show. So, 'Holy experiment day, Batman!' just screams out to me...

The thing I wondered about is, what might inspire Robin to shout such a thing? Had he perhaps wandered into a giant science fair? Did he mistakenly go to the ACS meeting? Or was he shipwrecked on the island of Dr. Moreau?

On a related note, what's your scariest vision of a collection of scientists? For example, what conferences are you too intimidated to go to, and why?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Just in case you hadn't spotted this (among other naturejob listings), Nature Chemical Biology is looking for a locum (temporary) editor. All the details are here - the most important one, perhaps, being the deadline of March 17th. The only down side is that you'd have to put up with my dumb jokes all day long...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, it seems only appropriate that I announce our March issue - a Focus on Metals - on National Battery Day. In case you haven't already seen the new content (alas, it actually went live on Friday, so this post is slightly old news), there are some great pieces inside. In particular, you can ponder the irony of iron being so good for you but tetanus being so bad for you as you read this commentary and this review, which discuss the biological and chemical roles of iron enzymes. Alternatively, you can check out the progress that synthetic chemists are making in designing fluorescent metal sensors in this review. There's other good stuff as well, but too much to mention in one blog, so you'll have to check it out yourself.

As a side note (still considering the overlap of metals in biology and batteries), I wonder if anyone is trying to evolve those nanowire-making bacteria to make batteries directly instead? I also spotted this semi-recent paper where the authors are using virus templates to deposit metals for battery electrodes. Seems like the crossover between metals and biology is getting charged up in all kinds of directions...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I just happened across this delightful science article, which discusses some of the advanced physics that would allow fairy tale things like people climbing each other's hair and stealing each other's voices to be true, or potentially true.

I always like a good science-is-stranger-than-fiction story, but what I found amusing about the article is that the 'not-true-to-life' aspect that the author chose to focus on, for example in the case of the little mermaid, is not that:

a) there is a mermaid living under the sea who
b) gets her body magically transformed (her fins turned to legs, but also her lungs changed to breathe air, and her head changed to a dino size in relation to her body (you know what I mean if you've seen the movie))
c) by a witch who
d) communicates with eels.

However, I don't mean to disparage the article - baby steps, right? And anyway, I'm excited about the prospect of my own flying carpet.

On a related note, there are many chemical mysteries to be solved in fairy tales: For example, what kind of poison did the Queen give to Snow White that put her into a sleep/coma but immediately reverses when she was kissed by a prince? What kind of pigmentation would make the Wicked Witch of the East's skin green (and, for a biological mystery, how did she get it?)? What was in the mushroom that made Alice shrink or grow? Any and all explanations (or additional mysteries) welcome!

Catherine (Associate Editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

As many, many studies and articles have told us, there are not enough women in science, and in chemistry in particular. Similarly, those who are in the field are not getting the awards, opportunities, or promotions that they deserve. While a discussion of the reasons why this is happening would probably be redundant, I'm not sure that I have seen a discussion of simple ways to move forward. So, I would like to suggest a meeting of the minds to put forward some very simple ideas that we could start doing right now, and don't require governmental funding or a revision of the tenure system, etc. I'll kick things off with a couple of thoughts:

1. Although we probably know a lot of great women doing science, I wonder how often we talk about them. For example, I was recently at a conference and asked a fellow scientist who she knew in a particular field that was doing great work. She (note: a woman) gave me the name of a man (note: a man).* In retrospect, there are also some women doing great work in that field. The point is: keep tabs on other great women and help to spread the word. Great!

*Of course many situations are more complicated than just "I have two scientists that are relevant in my head and I picked the man", but I think the general idea may hold.

1 (part 2). On a related point, the 'word' we should be spreading is not that they are really nice, or that they have a cute child, or that what is happening in their respective two-body problem, but that their scientific contributions are important, and that they have some profound insights into their field. Let's get away from talking about women's personal lives, as I can only hold so much information in my tiny brain, and it would be more useful to know about their professional interests and successes.

2. Nominate a woman for an award.

3. If you are a woman, ask questions at talks (and introduce yourself first).

4. In terms of getting opportunities to work with a journal (assuming that my experience holds true on a broader scale): if you are in a position where you might be expected to have a website, PLEASE put one together and keep it updated on a ~yearly basis (this actually holds for men too). While of course you can find out a lot about someone by their publications, having a clear, concise message about what you're interested in really makes a big difference. After all, these days it's not clear just by looking at a paper whether the topic is something near and dear to a particular scientists' heart or whether they were perhaps just helping out with a technique, etc. Knowing what really drives someone makes it much easier for me to feel confident that you are the right person to ask to write a Review article, or to referee a paper, etc.

What else can we do?

Catherine (Associate Editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 03:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0)

I've been looking at some JACS ASAPs today, and several of the entries got me to thinkin'. For example, this paper just wouldn't be the same if they had been trying to make a Smith diode, or even a Schmidt diode, for that matter. And in this case, think how confused you'd be if you mistook their acid for a Lewis acid or a carboxylic acid! Finally, consider how happy Shvo will be to know that his catalysts have continued to provide interesting questions for scientists around the world, just like these folks.

After pondering these situations, I decided that although there are a multitude of reactions, processes, catalysts, numbers, and constants named after people, there really need to be more. Think of the increased recognition that people would get for their efforts, the increased ability to communicate with other scientists just by quickly throwing out a name or two, and the incredible difficulty of organic classes that require you to learn all of the named reactions. This is going to be great.

As a word of caution, however, this one points out that you have to be careful with what you pick, because you can't then later pick something else.

(Just imagine the confusion:

"Can I borrow some Grubbs' catalyst?"
"Yes, here you go."
"No, I meant Grubbs' catalyst!!"

Considering that I'm no longer in the lab, it's going to be hard for me to lay claim on anything too useful. Perhaps I can pick putting nanoparticles in agar gels as 'the Goodman method', mostly because I can't imagine that anyone else has ever bothered to do that. So, the question for you is, what do you want named after you? A reaction? A catalyst? A football stadium? Hurry up and pick, or all the good ones will be gone...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Hey everyone - our February issue is online. This one has a bunch of surprises - a copper enzyme with a new metal binding site (using methionine and tryptophan), a report that cisplatin and oxaliplatin are site-selective, and a thiamine diphosphate-dependent enzyme that lacks an otherwise strictly conserved active site residue. One of the articles (which uses high-content screening to look at phosphorylation in cells) resulted in our Tetris-like cover; I wonder when we'll find a manuscript that inspires Donkey Kong?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I was at the store this weekend and spotted 'Nanoglue', complete with little cartoon particles on the label. However, the actual packaging and internet hype (yes, that's the complete record of things I could find) leave me sadly lacking in actual information to pass on... I can only imagine that it's meant to glue very small things together, or that it's meant to be used by very small people (since I could see the bottle, it's obviously not the product that's nano-sized)?

I guess I thought we (that's the universal 'we') were still embroiled in fights about where and when nanotechnology was safe, or whether we might all perish from exposure to these tiny, tiny dots of destruction. Have you all heard about any resolution to this discussion, or are nanoparticles just somehow less offensive in adhesives?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

As I noted in my entry last year, January is a time for New Year’s resolutions. This year I have several:

1) Don’t get dosed with dorsomorphin. It seems to do weird things to you, especially if you are a zebrafish.
2) Try not to have my DNA damaged, unless there is some MutY handy to repair it.
3) Keep my supply of chlorinating enzymes stocked in case I need to spice up some of my natural products.
4) Carry powder with me at all times in case I need to get the chemical fingerprint of any molecules I find.
5) Finally, stay away from bars in case any chemicals get knocked out (I don’t want to be implicated, you know).

In case you want to get motivated for your own resolutions, you could always search for more inspiration in our January issue…

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

It’s often said that chemistry is much like cooking, but with a tastier product, and perhaps often argued that a good chemist, like a good cook, knows just how much a ‘pinch’ of salt, chili powder, or BuLi is required in order to get a good result.

I certainly think this is true, and am always pleasantly surprised that the actual skills I learned in graduate school come in handy in the kitchen. For example, I am a master of pouring just the right amount of solvent… although now the solvent is almost always water. So boring.

One scenario for which I didn’t necessarily expect the similarity to carry over is in the trepidation of using new reagents. In the lab, this was a bit more rational of a response – perhaps the compound is explosive, or smelly, or has gone bad? In the kitchen, however, it feels a bit silly to be worried about using somewhat exotic plants or spices for the first time. Yet I think the consequences of misusing foods are pretty real as well – aside from the obvious lack of dinner if you’ve added too much of a particular spice or too little of a thickener, there’s the frustration of wasting the rest of the ingredients, and having to clean up the whole mess. If you’re really venturing into the unknown, the results can become more serious (as with chemicals) – the improperly cooked vegetable may acquire a terrible smell, or there’s always the possibility that you could give yourself food poisoning if you’ve really botched the job.

What tips and tricks do you chefs use when attempting a new dish? Would we perhaps feel more comfortable if recipes were written as synthetic methods? And while there are obvious reasons to try a failed reaction again in the lab, do you all give failed meals a second try?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 08:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Today I have a chemical conundrum for you: My cat was recently prescribed Clavamox (consisting of amoxicillin trihydrate and clavulanate potassium), and the vet warned me to keep the pills in their opaque packaging until their use because they turn brown and disgusting (and presumably become less effective) when exposed to light. I have of course heard of light-sensitive drugs in the form of photodynamic therapy, or in regards to the idea that milk should be protected from light, but I hadn't run across light-sensitive antibiotics (not sure whether that's a testament to my poor chemical knowledge or my good health). From a very speedy search, it seems that amoxicillin, and not clavulanate, is the delicate compound in the mix.

So, the question for you all, as I am too lazy (I mean busy. Busy!) to figure it out myself, is: why is amoxicillin light-sensitive?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Ho ho ho! Meeeeeeeerry DNAzymes!

That's right, good people of the scientific community: it's time for the December issue of Nature Chemical Biology. You may think it's a bit early for the holiday theme, but our local junk food store is already selling green and red M&Ms, candy canes, and other highly-sulfated sugars, so I'm just jumping on the bandwagon...

Anyway, in honor of this momentous occasion, I have composed a little ditty (ok, I have butchered the words of the perennial favorite 'the 12 days of Christmas'):*

On the 1st day of the issue, my advisor gave to me: a paper on N2O3.
On the 2nd day of the issue, my advisor gave to me: 2 folding tags, and a paper on N2O3.

... I assume you can build the rest with these items?
3 News & Views
4 serine mutants
5 days of fun
6 teaching jobs
7 kinase binders
8 advertisements**
9 graphite sizes
10 years making progress
11 voltage readings
a 12-month subscription

... and a paper on N2O3 indeed! Hope you enjoy the issue.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

*For those of you who do not believe in/support/enjoy this holiday, please feel free to sing these alternate lyrics as loudly as possible whenever anyone tries to advocate the event by singing the real words. Actually, that goes for those of you that do go in for Christmas, because who doesn't want to sing about our journal?!

**Lame, I know. Sorry. There wasn't anything else that was 8!!

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 09:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Josh's blog a long time ago now on how to write a cover letter made me think it might also be useful to provide some thoughts on how to referee a paper - hopefully we can again get some other editors, as well as you guys as authors and referees, to chime in on what is helpful/successful (or not).

First, to clarify what we do before we send the paper to referees: we evaluate whether the manuscript is within the scope of the journal (that is, assuming the results are true, would our journal be the right place to publish it?), whether it's likely to be of broad interest (does it have larger implications, or is it in a big field that everyone is thinking about?), and whether it's likely to be a significant advance (this one is certainly most difficult for us, as non-experts, to evaluate, but if the vast majority of the ideas have already been published, it's probably not a big advance). It is not our job to evaluate the data, although we do consider whether the right data are present (if the author is trying to make a conclusion about a biological process, for example, there usually needs to be biological data in the paper). With the exception perhaps of the first point (journal scope), we do need feedback from our referees on these same issues, in addition to evaluating the data and determining whether the data support the conclusions (and whether they are sufficient to support the conclusions). There is also more information available here.

In addition to those general ideas, there are a few specific tips I thought I would pass along. I'll go from most to least obvious, if I can figure out which ones are which:

1) If you are asked to referee a paper, and are really too busy to take it on, then decline. You may think that the editors will be annoyed with you if you say no, but we find it much more annoying to have to send 8 emails to someone to get them to provide a report that's already 3 weeks late. Even more annoying is when that 8th email still does not produce any response, and we have to either make a decision on the paper without all the facts we need or find someone else, which then delays the process for at least another 2 weeks. A quick, polite 'no' will let us move on to someone else.

2) Similarly, if you do agree to look at a paper, a 3 sentence report ("This paper seems really good") is usually not helpful. However: if you have truly assessed the paper on all conceptual and technical merits within your expertise, and found NO problems at all, it is fine to say something to that effect without belaboring the point.

2b) We identify referees based on their knowledge of some particular field or technique, but are often pleasantly surprised by their comments on an additional aspect of the work. While this is not necessary or standard, I think it would be super cool if referees would tell us in the confidential (editor-only) comments which methodology/techniques they felt qualified to evaluate. This would especially be helpful in cases like #2 above, where no specific comments are provided.

3) Please do not make personal attacks on the author/coauthors. If you have some reason to dislike them on a personal level at the outset, don't agree to review the paper. If you discover in the process of reviewing the manuscript that they have not included the 12 references that make their work completely uninteresting, please just say something like, 'The authors have unfortunately failed to reference several pertinent papers (refs 1, 2, n as necessary). As a result, the novelty of this particular contribution is not clear.' Or if they have missed several important control experiments, please just point them out without suggesting that the authors are stupid or hiding information, etc.. It is possible they are stupid or hiding something, but it's more likely that the experiment was just overlooked. I guess the summary here is: write a report that you would be happy to receive, even if the overall message is a negative one. Similarly, keep in mind that you serve a valuable role not only in assessing the paper, but improving it, which often makes for the most exciting papers we publish.

4) Please use the 'remarks to the editor' field - that's where you can tell us confidentially that you have a paper in press on the same topic, or that you don't feel qualified to comment on a particular aspect of the work; additionally, we often find that referees make their most candid assessment of the manuscript within the confidential comments. However, please do include some measure of your overall assessment of the paper in the remarks to the authors. Our authors can get quite confused when we reject papers because, from what they can see, there were not any problems ('the work seemed well done', etc.) when in reality the referees told us confidentially that the paper was not an advance, not appropriate for the journal, or similar. If you hate it, but are worried about hurting the author's feelings, you could say something like 'I was not convinced that this paper represented an important advance in this field.' After all, it is/should be the authors job to convince you of just that.

5) If you find that there are technical problems, please suggest specific experiments/controls that the authors could/need to do to conclusively prove whatever it is that they are trying to prove. If there are conceptual/logic problems, please suggest alternate hypotheses that would need to be ruled out, or factors they have not taken into consideration, in addition to just noting that the paper is flawed or not conclusive. This is helpful for you, too: If we don't know exactly what the authors need to do to merit another round with the referees, we will be more likely to send the paper back to you (thus taking up more of your time) than if we (and the authors) have better guidelines about how to revise.

6) Finally, please keep in mind that, if you agree to look at a paper, you have signed on for life. It is extremely disruptive for the process if we have to find new referees at the second or third round, etc., both because we have to actually find someone new and because that new referee has a significant extra burden of trying to figure out what the history of the paper is. As I implied above, we do strive to limit the amount of time that referees need to spend with a particular paper, and we do limit the number of times we will contact you with new manuscripts. So unless you have come down with pneumonia or have moved to the arctic circle where no internet is available, please stay active in the process.

Well, that's what you need to know - at least, as far as I can judge. What have I forgotten?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 09:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

In case you've been lax in your chemistry-doing this week - get to it! It's National Chemistry Week, after all!

The theme for this year is 'the many faces of chemistry,' which seems to actually refer to the many different careers that chemists have. People often think that being an editor is a pretty unusual job for a chemist, but at least we still spend our time thinking about science even if we're not doing actual experiments. Surely there are more unusual ways people are using their chemistry talents - what interesting jobs do you all have or want that would benefit from having a chemistry background?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 02:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Good news - our November issue has gone live. This one has a nice orange and black cover in time for Halloween, but more importantly, has some interesting science, including a story of sulfur sitting on a sugar sidechain, a synthesis of a smelly Streptomyces shape, and a saga about small signalling structures starting S-guanylation. We also announce some changes to the journal in our editorial; the most significant, perhaps, is that we will no longer be publishing Letters starting in 2008.

The issue also includes a commentary that talks about the intersection of science and art. In particular, David Goodsell is a practicing professor who creates artwork that, by faithfully capturing the molecular details of biomolecules, and their concentrations, locations, and functions, provides new insights into the workings of biological systems.

Along those same lines, I have been thinking recently about how people really internalize an understanding of different chemical and biological systems. Since (like many people, I assume) I learned about biology by looking at drawings that show a small nucleus and a couple of folds of the ER in a vast, otherwise empty cytosol, my first response to Dr. Goodsell's images is always, 'Gosh, it's so crowded in there!' A friend also recently passed along this YouTube video of people recreating protein synthesis in an elaborate outdoor dance (and, of course, there's always the integrin dance which I discussed a long time ago). Finally, I will never forget an organic professor I had who taught us about the relative flexibility of 5-membered rings vs. 6-membered rings by linking his arms together at various points and flapping them all around. What explanations or images have stuck with you guys such that you will never forget about 'random science thing X'? Or - what topics need to have their own imagery/dance/art to help you understand/remember how the process works?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

We are currently finishing up our next issue (to be sent off to the production team where it magically becomes a 'real' journal (i.e., one that you can hold in your hand and show to your mom)) and so for the past couple of days our eyes have constantly been on the calendar. In particular, at this time of the month, our thoughts change from something vague, like, 'did I remember to ask this scientist to write a review article for the journal' or 'how can I best explain that paper in a 200-word Research Highlight' to something more specific, like 'did we see the proofs of the Research Highlights yesterday' or 'did that author get back to us on whether her images were the wrong size,' etc.

Having such defined deadlines is great for keeping things organized, and it reminds me how hard it was for me to ever get anything done as a postdoc since there were few (if any) external deadlines. Am I the only one who needs structure? Or if you all similarly find the vague concept of 'needing to get things done' uninspiring, what are your tips and tricks for buckling down and getting something finished?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

My continued search into the literature revealed this interesting contribution, which focuses on the development of imaging agents that target hydroxyapatite (a calcium salt related to bone growth and calcium deposition in general). The overall idea is that if we had near-infrared contrast agents that were targeted to microcalcifications (which also usually consist of hydroxyapatite), we could better detect the early stages of breast cancer because the agents would be easy to visualize in live subjects. Bisphosphonates are known to bind hydroxyapatite, but making these compounds hasn't been easy, either because of poor solubility, or the poor yields or harsh conditions of known reactions. John Frangioni and his colleagues now report both a new, facile method for the synthesis of these compounds and concomitant conjugation to a known NIR contrast agent, and also their application to imaging in pigs. It seems pretty interesting, in particular as I've never made any C-P bonds myself.

The other aspect of the paper which intrigued me is the use of 'large animals' in the title. While I don't think anyone would argue that pigs are large animals (and P.S.: love the graphical abstract), I found myself wondering: how large of an animal can these compounds really be applied to? People? Horses? Bears? Even... dinosaurs? (which, as I still like to nurture my third-grade self, seems about the biggest animal you could ever imagine. Sorry, blue whale). It made me further think that maybe we're missing an opportunity to have more nerdy science lingo: similar to the generic 'gazillion' to mean a very large number, maybe we could use the prefix 'dino' to indicate a very large size of something? Then, as kind of the antithesis of 'nano', we could have dinotechnology (although maybe we've already had this one?), dinorobots, dinomachines... In more common usage, you could say someone has a dinohouse (instead of a mansion), a dinohead (for someone really egotistical), or a dinocollection of ... well, whatever you have a lot of. What do you think? Will it catch on? Will it be, dare I ask, a dinophenomenon?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I've been searching the literature today, and came across this interesting paper about platensimycin. This antibiotic was only initially reported last year, but there are already a bunch of total and partial syntheses of it. So why do we need yet another synthesis of it? Because we always need more ways to synthesize molecules. Duh. This one, however, it particularly fun because it reports the synthesis of a key intermediate for platensimycin without using protecting groups (in 8 steps; ~10% yield compared to 10-16 steps and ~5-11% yield) and in a much more scale-up friendly manner (several steps are quantitative and require no purification). It makes me wonder if this protecting group-free idea (recently also reported by Baran et al.) is catching on, or if Tiefenbacher and Mulzer just have their eye on the prize (in terms of thinking about the chemical engineering side of making the molecule). What do you guys think? And is it even possible to dissect those two motivations?

The other fun thing about this paper is that it's one of those syntheses where I want to get out my molecular model kit to see how all these 3D transformations occur.

Finally, another interesting thing I discovered in looking deeper into this story is that the molecule was only initially reported (in the literature) on May 18th, 2006, and the first total synthesis of the molecule was submitted for publication September 21st of that same year. Clearly, someone either has magic hands or had advance knowledge of the structure. For those of you in the synthetic field, how critical is it to get inside information on new structures that are found? And what's the source in general - a friend who does this research, a talk at a conference, your own culture of bacteria? And what's the price of this knowledge, or is it, like this synthesis, free?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Finally, another way to inject some Hollywood into science: an adaptation of the 'six degrees of Kevin Bacon' game, or if you prefer, just 'six degrees of separation' in general. This one references Stuart Schreiber partially because he's obviously a great scientist in the field of chemical biology, but mostly because the alliteration is nice. If you fall into the California chemical biology contingent, you could play 'Six degrees of Schultz'; whichever floats your boat.

While knowing how I'm connected to Schreiber (me to Vince Rotello, to Harry Wasserman, to Gayle Schulte (then at Yale), to Schreiber; 4 degrees of separation) and Schultz (me to Scott Singleton, to Peter Dervan, to Schultz; 3 degrees of separation) is fun, the non-specific one seems more pervasive amongst conference attendees or just any scientists who are meeting and finding out, yet again, how small the world of science truly is (as when I randomly discovered my current coworker's undergraduate TA was one of my good friends in my postdoc lab). Even amongst people you already know, it's fun to find out how interconnected you are (for example, Nina Goodey, my undergraduate study partner (just moved to Montclair State), connects to me through Steve Benkovic (her postdoc advisor) who was also Singleton's postdoc advisor; perhaps we should rename the game 'Six degrees of Scott Singleton'? Also nice alliteration).

Are there any rules that would need to be changed to adapt this game to the wide world of science? Does someone have to work for someone else, or can just being at the same university at the same time (and presumably knowing each other) count? What about collaborating with someone? Can you count the person who hosted your visit to a university, or invited you to give a talk? These last two are certainly less easy to know about or verify, so perhaps a rule would be that there has to be evidence of the connection in the literature? (in which case, perhaps my connection to Schreiber would be more appropriately recapped as JACS 2001, 123, 7626; JOC 1989, 54, 2785; JOC 1992, 57, 2641; JACS 1987, 109, 4718). What do you guys think? And how do you connect?

While you think about that, I’ve got to go see if I can convince someone to make it six degrees warmer in here…

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 03:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

This year is speeding by, as evidenced by the fact that our October issue has gone live. This one is a focus on 'molecular metrics', which deals with all the different ways that cells and biological systems count and measure both physical objects and states (such as changing times or other conditions). The pieces range from discussions of how flipping a single amide bond can control a host of downstream processes to how the length of limbs (and zebrafish fins in particular) and telomeres are controlled or functionally deciphered, with many stops in between. The cover also features some cells gearing up for an architectural career, so check it out!

My perception that this year is just completely getting away from me makes a nice parallel with thinking about how individual cells and brains and proteins measure time. I'm sure my feeling that it really should be, oh, May or so, is part of a cellular defense mechanism, because if we tried to store memories of what happened every day, our brains would quickly explode or just get full. However, it is a bit disconcerting to feel so out of whack with the continually advancing calendar. My solution? I'm hoping that we do develop Pensieves, and then I can store my memories in there, leaving room to keep the recent weeks and months in my brain. In that case, it'd be nice to look back once in a while and, as Paul Simon so eloquently said, see what's become of me.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 12:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, I didn't want to disrupt the flow of the ACS entries, so I'm a bit late in telling you that our September issue has gone live. This month we've assembled articles on alternate approaches to antibiotic action and applications, an assortment of antitumor agents that associate with and antagonize mRNA-altering appliances, and also advances in the artificial assembly of antibacterial and antifungal asymmetric asterriquinones and ACP-dependent architectures.* Phew! And, in keeping with the title of this entry, the spine includes pages 517-592, so I hope you enjoy it! If not, feel free to go out and get yourself an Orange Crush (and, in case you read this wikipedia entry, be aware that I am sticking with the misconception as being much more entertaining than the truth).

* Yes, I am well aware that you may need to go look at the issue to make sense of all these silly sentences. Don't you think that's the point?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 03:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Continuing my proud tradition of not blogging in real time at ACS meetings, here are my memories of a lovely Sunday:

I went to my first ever session in the chemical toxicology division, which was a session on zebrafish organized by Peter Dedon. Knowing a bit about his background (in DNA structure/damage/etc), it was quite a surprise to find Dr. Dedon bringing this group of people together; it turns out that the simple explanation is: scientific curiousity. How delightful.

Leonard Zon gave the first talk about using zebrafish as a model system for stem cells, some of which (that prostaglandins increase the number of stem cells in bone marrow) was recently published. In some of his new work, he's discovered a pre-cancer phenotype (a cell cluster) as well as a molecule that can reverse the clustering. As comes as no surprise, we didn't get to see the structure of the molecule.

Patricia McGrath* gave a very informative talk about zebrafish in general, and outlined some of the ways that her company can monitor what these fish are up to for screening applications. She also gave out plastic fish, to the delight of everyone except the people who arrived too late to get them. There was also randomly a plastic fish sitting next to me - hard to know whether it was there just to get information, or perhaps to protest animal testing? In any case, it made for a good neighbor.

John Stegeman gave a great talk which highlighted the importance of carefully thinking through your biological model system: he's found that there are significant differences in the cytochrome P450's in zebrafish vs. humans; this is important because these Cyp450's are the enzymes that process drugs and other foreign molecules, meaning that bioavailability and identity of any metabolites could be quite variable.

The final speaker, Jackie Lees, closed out the session by discussing cancer in fish.( Who knew??) She's discovered an interesting correlation between cancerous cells, the presence or absence of p53, and ribosomal proteins. While their initial theory was that the ribosome was just not producing p53, it seems there may be more complicated mechanisms at work.

Overall, it was a really good session. And fish (plastic or otherwise, except for the ones with electrodes in their heads) are cute.

In other chemical toxicology news, Joanne Kotz (the senior editor at Nature Chemical Biology) has organized a session in the same division on Thursday morning, focused on understanding the full scope of what drugs do, including intended and unintended interactions. If any of you are still around that day, check it out!

Finally, I need your help: I was walking out of the convention center, and passed a room labeled 'CHED - DUCK'. I glanced in and all I could see was people eating ice cream. Can anyone explain?

Catherine Goodman (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

* I can't seem to find a website for either Dr. McGrath or Phylonics, the company. However, I was amused to discover that if I just searched for 'McGrath', this website was the first result. Coincidence? Or a convenient way to get rid of the test subjects?...

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 11:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In the interest of getting chemists involved in the current phenomenon of reality TV, I have a few ideas of new shows that some silly network can use (although, on the off chance that they do, I'm claiming rights...*)

Idea #2: Along the lines of American Idol, graduate students would get to compete to become America's favorite Ph.D.** We would start with an incoming class at some prestigious university (or at least, one that is willing to have a reality show determine who graduates?!). Then the students would have to face certain challenges, like completing oral exams or giving a seminar to the department, followed by an audience vote to determine who failed (and thus, gets kicked out of the program, or perhaps sent to the Masters' track). Depending on how squeamish the school is, or how scientifically-illiterate the audience is expected to be, the relevant professors could perhaps pick a subset of the students to be voted on to help weed out the worst students. In the weeks (or months?) when there aren't any elimination competitions, the students could compete for prizes, like who gets first choice of graduate advisor, or who gets to keep the office they had as a TA. The final student would win... a professorship somewhere? The postdoc of their choice? A 30-city tour to present their thesis? Ok, some of the details aren't quite fleshed out...

What I think would be really interesting is that, with an audience vote, the best scientists are by no means guaranteed to succeed, as the stereotypical ideas of what a 'good' (or 'smart', etc - insert random complimentary word here) scientist does (such as reading a lot, and working hard in the lab) would not make for interesting TV.*** Thus, there would definitely be an element of strategy on top of the science - how do you engage an audience and get them to vote for you? In my mind, it somewhat relates to currently existing questions about how scientists are evaluated - what are we recognizing/rewarding, and what should we be rewarding? Well, perhaps that's another show in the making...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

* In all fairness, this is really an idea that arose in grad school, so my two friends would get in on the rights as well.
** And, kudos to Propter Doc, who suggested a similar idea in response to my last post. In fact, given the timing of graduate school vs. postdoc appointments, his/her idea may work better in practice...
*** I think a similar problem would also apply with Propter Doc's idea (of a professor picking his Next Top Postdoc), as working hard unfortunately doesn't always equate with getting good results, etc.

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Big news, everyone! The website for our next symposium (Feb 22-23, in NYC) is now up and running, and those of you with any interest in chemical neurobiology (or chemical biology in general) should check out the program and/or register (because, while we will have more space than last year, we do anticipate that the spots will go quickly).

One thing that's been interesting to notice in the meetings I've attended this year is the specific pronunciation of some scientific words. Some distinctions are more obvious than others, or can be more clearly traced to one group of people:

Ligand - pronounced 'lih-gand' by chemists and 'lie-gand' by biologists (in my experience, anyway)

Chromatography - my analytical professor in grad school took great delight in mocking the American pronunciation of 'chroma-TAW-graphy' as compared to his British version of 'chro-MA-TA-graphy'

but the origin of the differences between other pronunciations seem more subtle. For example:

Artemisinin - can be pronounced 'AR-temisinin' or 'arte-MIS-inin'

Sonogashira - I am more familiar with 'so-NAH-gashira' but recently heard 'so-NO-gashira'

For many of the words in this second group, it seems that the pronunciations used must be closely tied with where a scientist received their training on the topic. It makes me think that an ambitious linguist would be able to determine many people's scientific pedigree without prior knowledge of their training. Although, whether the end result would be of any interest is a separate question?? Perhaps it's better to call the whole thing off.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0)

In the interest of getting chemists involved in the current phenomenon of reality TV, I have a few ideas of new shows that some silly network can use (although, on the off chance that they do, I'm claiming rights...)

Idea #1: Along the lines of Iron Chef (or really any competition show), there should be a chemistry showdown. Each chemist would be given a lump of coal and all the reagents, catalysts, glassware, etc. they want. Then, the first person who can get an NMR of a target molecule wins a prize. (A postdoc fellowship? Travel reimbursement for that conference in Greece? The use of a grant writer for that next R01? An R01?? (Maybe that's the grand prize)) Of course, the molecule can't be too complicated, as otherwise the show would potentially never end. The show could feature theme weeks, where instead of having eel or artichoke as the ingredient you must include, the chemists would be given morpholine, or undecanoic acid, or julolidine hydrobromide and have to work those molecules into the final product somehow. Alternatively, again given a certain starting molecule, the chemists could create as many distinct molecules as possible within a given time limit.

I think this would allow returning chemists to develop a big following, as viewers would get to know the chemists and what their preferences are for reactions and reagents (such as 'oh, he's reaching again for the osmium tetroxide! He does love to oxidize things.' or 'It looks like... yes! She is doing a Michael addition. What a clever use of the double bond.' ...)

What do you guys think? Would you watch?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 10:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

In all the hubbub of attending a meeting last week, I forgot to point out that our August issue has gone live. This issue is jampacked with research, including the elucidation of enzyme endeavors, thiamin taken from treated turf, and Hsp90 and HuR having helpful or highly complicated roles in the cell (there are all your tongue-twisters for the month).

In addition, this issue includes several articles on high throughput screening, which are all free throughout August. In particular, a Commentary by Inglese, Shamu & Guy proposes guidelines for minimal information that should be included when reporting the results of small-molecule screens. For those of you involved in screening, what do you think of these suggestions? Is there anything you would do differently, or anything that's lacking? Finally, what other fields could benefit from a discussion of publication guidelines?

We'd be very interested to hear any feedback you all have about the issue via posts or email, and about these guidelines in particular. Until then, happy screening!

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 02:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

(ed's note: at the request of the GRC, this post has been removed.)

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

(ed's note: at the request of the GRC, this post has been removed.)

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 02:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

(ed's note: at the request of the GRC, this post has been removed.)

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 02:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I thought I'd present my thoughts to you in a slightly more formal way today. Thus, my attempt at a manuscript in blog format:

Protons are interesting
C.M. Goodman

Abstract: Protons are bizarre little things, aren't they?

Introduction: This train of thought started when I spotted this interesting paper in JACS from Hans-Heinrich Limbach and colleagues about figuring out what protons are doing in enzyme active sites. In particular, they use an aprotic solvent system as a model to figure out how the pKa of the NH in the pyridine ring of PLP (basically vitamin B6) is affected by an intermolecular (protein to PLP) hydrogen bond. The lack of water in both the alternate solvent system and the active site, then, similarly serve to modulate the pKa of the hydrogen.

Introduction part 2: The additional fuel for this thought process comes from another great teacher I had, Craig Martin, who taught one of my graduate school classes on biomolecular structure. In one of the first classes, he asked us, "Why does DNA form a double helix?" He let us go on and on about the base stacking, and the specific hydrogen bonds that form between the complimentary base pairs, etc., and then finally told us that it's all because of water (and the entropy thereof). Base stacking could still happen without a duplex, and the bases could form hydrogen bonds with water molecules, but the good ol' H2O would be restricted, and so the double helix is better for all involved.

Results: uh... I've got nothing.

Discussion: This paper and Dr. Martin's wise words got me thinking about how little I really think about protons and water, and thus sent my train of thought into a station I like to call 'What's going on there?' Aside from people who are really 100% focused on what water is doing (i.e., what the structure of water is, etc.), and that alternate group of people who are doing insanely water-sensitive reactions (and thus have to worry about water ALL THE TIME), how much do you all really think about how water is affecting the surface of your protein, or the conformational equilibria of peptides or natural products, or so on? What other scenarios require an all out consideration of water? And how will uncovering the structure of water change the way that we think about this topic, or it is so specific for each case that we'll always be searching for a better understanding of water? Finally, what are the best (or at least your favorite) ways to track down what protons are doing?

Conclusion: Ok - all this talk of water has gotten me really thirsty. I'm off to the water fountain...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 07:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Like many in the US, I spent yesterday evening watching an impressive display of fireworks to celebrate our independence day. Even though I'm a chemist, I've spent surprisingly little time thinking about how fireworks are made, or how all those swirly patterns are produced (although this site was really interesting). It got me thinking, though; how and when do people decide that they want to devote their life to making fireworks? Are they analytical chemists who want to do something more with the sodium D-line than measure it? Are they inorganic chemists who get tired of just making compounds and then storing them in the freezer? Were they encouraged by their high school guidance counselor to explore their passion for exploding things? (we had a similar conversation in the office about the thought process involved in becoming a professional eater like the folks who competed yesterday in the Coney Island hot dog eating competition...)

In recent years, my favorite fireworks have been the ones that look like Saturn - you know, the big globes with the rings around them (although I doubt Saturn is as brightly colored). My least favorite fireworks, until last night, were the 'maroon' shells - the ones that just explode as a dot of light but with an incredible noise. However, as much as I value my hearing, those annoying fireworks have been supplanted by a new and creepy design. I'm not sure of the name, but the explosion results in a bunch of white starry things, which then veer off in directions that make no sense according to the original trajectory. It made me think I was looking at either a) UFOs or b) (and more disturbingly) a bacterial swarm assay. Yuck. I apologize to the person who must have spent 5 years developing these, but I am not a fan.

In any case, now that we have fireworks that look like E. coli, we need to get some chemistry into the patterns (aside from the fact that the whole thing is based on chemistry, obviously...). What about a giant TLC plate where spots develop? Or a beaker-shaped outline of lights?

What would your fireworks look like if you were a fireworks-ician (fireworks-alist? fireworks-ist?)

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

I was looking through recent literature this past week and found a few things in JACS that I thought were particularly interesting.

The first comes from Kelly Damm and Heather Carlson, and substantiates my feeling that NMR is the coolest technique ever invented. In this case, they were trying to figure out the best way to incorporate protein flexibility into structure-based drug design. The authors previously established an MD method to generate multiple protein conformations of a single protein; the resultant ensemble worked better in assigning known inhibitors or non-inhibitors appropriately than a static structure. But all those calculations take a lot of time, and so Damm and Carlson went to the pdb, pulling out 90 static structures of HIV-1 protease (bound to a variety of ligands) and one NMR structure, which is actually an ensemble of 28 structures. What they discovered is that the success of these two ensembles was quite similar in identifying inhibitors, but that the NMR structure was less specific to a given ligand and so was more able to identify the essential features of the ligand and extrapolate to new classes of compounds. So, they suggest NMR structures as useful tools for SBDD. Go NMR!

Two communications also caught my eye: one, from Scott Miller's group, extends his work on small, peptide-based catalysts to an Asp-catalyzed asymmetric epoxidation. In this case, putting the Asp carboxylate into a protected tripeptide known to form beta-turns resulted in a catalyst that could turn over nearly 20 times, with 97% yield and 92% ee in optimized conditions. He wrote a nice review on the rationale for this work now three years ago, but I would still recommend it. The second is work from John Klassen's lab: Amidst the ongoing controversy of what gas-phase analysis of proteins really means, they seem to have put together a nice method for monitoring ligand binding sites, and determining whether the sites are identical (linear slope of ligand released over time and temperature) or not (non-linear slope).

Well, that's my weekend reading. Now back to watching Wimbledon...

(ed's note: Dr. Carlson alerted me to the fact that the study was actually about HIV protease, which I fixed 07/05)

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

The joy of this job is that we are constantly reading about new research, whether its newly submitted manuscripts or just keeping up with current literature. The downside, of course, is that all of these things are written in prose. Where's the poetry in science, I ask? (as did Feynman) You can find one recent example in a News & Views in our July issue, but I think this is only the start of something good, as Herman's Hermits told us.*

Since all cultural revolutions have to start small, I thought I would suggest the idea of chemistry haikus, since a) they don't have to rhyme, b) they aren't very long (remember the 5-7-5 motif?), and c) they don't have the tendency for the downward spiral in the same way that limericks do...

The idea is easy. Instead of writing down that your reaction went with 0% yield, try this:

Water gets in and
Messes up everything. Bah!
It's time for a break.

Or, when your rotation student tends your reaction overnight and you return to a mess, sum it up with these few words:

All at once I find
My nice halogenation
Didn't work at all

Finally, for those of you bioorganic folks, I think the starter 'Oh stupid peptide' could take you a long way... For example:

Oh stupid peptide,
why won't you make a helix?
It isn't that hard

Oh stupid peptide,
please come off the resin now.
TFA ran out.

You see how it works. So, with these suggestions as your rallying battle cry, go forth and be poetic! And let me know what good ideas you come up with to describe your scientific adventures.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

(*ed's note, 01/31/08: a reader who is a more knowledgeable music fan than I am (or just not as inept at using the 'interweb', perhaps) pointed out that this song was actually by this group, not the Beach Boys, as previously indicated. Oops!)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 09:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBacks (0)

Hi all,

It's the one time of the month when you can count on me for a blog entry... our next issue has gone live. This July is our third official focus issue, and we're talking all about natural products, and particularly my favorite class of biomolecules, the terpenes. The issue is free for about a month, so check it out!

This was a pretty fun issue for me as, among other things, I got to go to Germany and chat with some folks at the Hans Knoell Institute working on all things natural products. In chatting with some other scientists (and Maggie Smallwood in particular) at a subsequent terpene meeting (Terpnet), I discovered that there are still some strange differences in the ways that the general public perceives and regulates metabolic engineering, which you may see reflected in our editorial. We also got a look from Phil Baran and Tom Maimone into the most exciting methods for and significant achievements in terpene synthesis in the last decade.

One of the reasons that I am so fascinated by terpenes has to do with an advanced organic class I took in college. The professor, Seiichi Matsuda, gave us a handout of 88 terpene structures. It was then our responsibility to figure out how to form all these different structures from oxidosqualene just by varying the path of cyclization or the subsequent proton and methyl shifts. The idea that there were enzymes that could control all of these different processes, ending up with only one product (or as a commentary in the issue suggests, a few more) pretty much blew my mind at the time and biosynthesis has entertained me ever since.

Anyway, we hope you like the issue. And if you have any great ideas for upcoming focus issues, we'd love to hear them!

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 09:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In honor of a recent discovery of Andy Mitchinson's secret talents (you'll see...), I thought I'd check out what the internet had to tell me about that dangerous place known as the intersection of science and song. Everyone has heard some of the more common science-inspired songs ('She blinded me with science', or Kate and Ann McGarrigle's charming NaCl), but I was also amazed to discover a vast array of normal songs that have been reappropriated as science teaching tools (here's an example) and, even better, the Science Songwriter's Association, a group of folks who just like singing about science. A quote from Feynman (below) indicates how they might have been inspired to not only write science songs but to band together against the void of science in song:

Our poets do not write about it; Our artists do not try to portray this remarkable thing. I don't know why. Is no one inspired by our present picture of the universe? The value of science remains unsung by singers: you are reduced to hearing not a song or poem, but an evening lecture about it. This is not yet a scientific age.

My favorite find on the 'Find Songs' page was this quote about Carl K. Winter, Ph.D.:

He's been called the Elvis of E. coli.

I'm really not sure what that means, but I find it hilarious.

So, the remaining question is, if you were to write your own science song, what would the title be? Strangely, for most of the ideas I can come up with, it's much easier to imagine them as country songs... Anyway, here are some titles I'll be working on...

Ozone, you broke my alkene heart in two

Crying over spilled butyl bromide

Chromophore (to the tune of Kodachrome)

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

Ok, I just like that title too much to let the obvious joke go. Sorry for the near repeat!

Anyway, unlike Stuart, (and as you all probably know by now) I am not averse to pointing out things in relation to our journal. In particular, our June issue has just appeared online. The brain in question relates to a paper about the dynamic/reversible glycosylation of proteins in the brain. I especially like the eyes at the top, which I imagine to be googly, like the muppets.

For those of you folks who actually get the hard copy of the issue, you should also have received a copy of Nature's recent glycochemistry and glycobiology insight, and two of our News & Views pieces discuss other recent sugar-focused work, so hopefully any sugar cravings you're having will be saturated.

In other news, our Editorial this month discusses the journal's presentation of chemical structures. I recently told you all about our most recent addition to the chemical functionality (the 3D visualization tool), but what else could we be doing that would help chemists and biologists think about chemistry? How do you all (as chemists) use the web now to improve your understanding of or ability to communicate chemistry? Or does online chemistry just seem ... well, insane?

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 07:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

So I've just returned from Germany, one of many lands of superior chocolate goodies... Oops - that's not related.

Anyway, while I was riding the train across central Germany, and eating some food of some sort, I noticed that I was getting my daily dose of Natrium (that's Sodium for us Americans, in case that isn't clear...). It made me wonder how much easier it would be to learn the periodic table if the names actually matched the symbols. Unfortunately, since most of the original names appear to have Latin roots, it's unlikely that any particular current language is using all of the 'real' names. (although please correct me if I'm wrong?!)

So, since changing the symbols seems unlikely, I suggest we revert to the original names of these crazy elements. Let's call them Natrium and Wolfram, and Aurum, Argentum and Kalium. Ok, maybe not Kalium, as that sounds like something out of Superman.

Alternatively, we could make up new names entirely, like Nancy and William, Aurelius and Agamemnon... what do you guys think? Is Na by any other name still as reactive?

In any case, hope you like the food for thought.
Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Hi all,

It's my favorite day of the month - yet another issue of Nature Chemical Biology is available for your viewing pleasure. Our May issue features some interesting stuff, including iron-sulfur clusters, probes for hydrogen peroxide, and ground states of stem cells (yet another tongue twister?).

In addition to the primary research articles, our editorial focuses on collaborations - both how they can help catalyze and elevate research as well as a few cautionary notes for the planning stages. What have you all found to be important considerations in starting a new project with someone, whether they are in your lab, in your department, or a national or international peer? What have you gained from the experiences? As collaborations seem to be central to many current research efforts, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I recently started studying Japanese. It is super fun, and I highly recommend it. Every time I pick up my books, however, I am momentarily stopped by the realization that I am quite spoiled to be able to do this 'for fun,' whereas a huge number of scientists (chemists and otherwise) are effectively required to learn English to communicate with other scientists. This topic has come up before, and in fact our September editorial touched on the problems involved in writing English (but made the case that unclear writing, due in part to unclear thinking, is equally prevalent with native English speakers). I just don't think the topic is brought up enough, though, given the tremendous amount of work required to become conversant in a second language (or third, or fourth...).

So, the point of this blog, basically, is to say: I am amazed at and grateful for the outstanding efforts of all the non-native English speaking chemists, biologists, physicists, etc., that allow a united scientific language.

There are more things I could say, but I will (mostly) leave it at that. In the interest of improving scientific interchanges, however, I have a few questions: how can we improve our ability to communicate between languages, be they Japanese or French or Finnish, or the language of chemists and biologists (where I would argue that a mention of vinyl benzene or TUNNEL assays is almost equally incomprehensible)? When should we be expanding our communication skills? Should universities in the United States go back to their requirement of proficiency in a second language, and how do schools in other countries handle this?

I'd be very interested to hear your thoughts. I bet they're good - in fact, I really think so.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 11:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

I'm not sure whether this technically counts as an ACS-related post, because I wasn't actually at the conference this day. But, I was at the University of Chicago, which would have been unlikely if I hadn't already been in Chicago for the meeting. And, this blog may be a bit rambling, which is due to the fact that I left my brain in Chicago, so it all comes together...

One extra fun thing about visiting the campus relates to some family history: my grandfather wanted to be a chemist, and actually spent some time as a graduate student at the University of Chicago before dropping out due to lack of funds. It was very interesting to think of what the campus must have looked like when he was there, or what he might have worked on. It also brings to mind some comments that I've heard in passing over the last couple of years; to sum up, it's the idea that scientific results only have to age by a certain amount before people forget about them, attempt the same (or almost the same) experiments again, and publish them as new information. Perhaps some poor graduate student will get their Ph.D. by figuring out what the length of time 'x' is that governs this phenomenon (and then the next poor student will write up the same report 'x' years later, and so on, and so on...)

While I was treated to some fascinating stories by Jun Yin, Chuan He, Sergey Kozmin, Joe Piccirilli, and David Lilley (who was also there visiting), what I most want to discuss here is the interesting lunch I had. Dr. Kozmin took me over to the faculty club, and specifically to the 'chemistry table.' Not surprisingly, perhaps, this consisted of a long table (~20-25 seats) where chemistry professors came and ate lunch, with later arrivals sitting further down the table, and so on, and so on. While I'm sure most departmental topics were curbed by my presence, there was lots of general discussion and just a sense of familiarity. On the way back to the chemistry department, I was chatting with Dr. Kozmin and our lunchtime neighbor, Robert Haselkorn, about this practice, and they both indicated that these lunches are a great way to discuss anything related to departmental affairs, and that in the end, the chemistry faculty don't need to have very many official faculty meetings because everything gets sorted out at lunch (or, perhaps, that issues that are raised in formal meetings but have been previously discussed rise from the ashes of the lunchtime conversations, much like their own beloved mascot?). I think this is a lovely idea, as it provides an opportunity to discuss things in a more casual way, and with less of a time limit (although I guess it's possible that if you don't go to lunch, you miss out on the decision-making).

I'm all for casual and comfortable discussions. Do you all know of other examples where faculty (or industrial teams, or similar) get together in a similar way? Do you wish that there were more opportunities like this, or do you like more formal meetings where everything's on the record? Or at least can you recommend some good faculty clubs? After all, I've got visits to plan...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The extra challenge (for me and other chemical biologists or biological chemists or what have you) of the spring ACS meeting is that the biological section basically closes down. This year, the entire program was 5 sessions, which were actually all sponsored by another division. So while, at the fall meeting, it's quite easy to scoot around between enzymes, folding, imaging, etc. within a few pages of the printed program, the spring meeting requires some extra work to find sessions dealing with biologically-related questions.

Don't fret, though - the scientists who want to talk about these things are still a part of the meeting, and can be discovered in nooks and crannies of the other divisions. Kind of like how rampaging dinosaurs will figure out a way to overcome their female-only DNA to take over the world. Or, to imagine a different definition of that infamous line (in my blog title, you know), perhaps I mean that us Nature editors will still be able to locate these hidden sessions.

That last idea was certainly true for a great program put on by the CHED division, focused on 'Exploring and Exploiting Nature with Biomimetics'. Not only was this program part of an unusual division,* but it was set in a room in the basement of the North/South building at the end of a hall and around a corner, etc. Too bad there wasn't also a wardrobe to climb through to reach this magical land of graduate student-invited talks. I didn't get to see as many of the talks in these three sessions as I would have liked, but they were full of the heavy hitters in the field, including, for example: Ron Breslow, Julius Rebek, Larry Que Jr., Paul Wender, Laura Kiessling, Dirk Trauner... the list goes on and on. Wender gave a nice talk about function-oriented synthesis, in which the complexity of natural products is pared down to the minimum functionality required. In addition to simplifying the synthesis of these molecules, he suggests that we can use this process to better understand the function of the molecule, allowing the design of new (and even simpler) compounds. Eric Kool, on the other hand, is all about making things more complex. He is designing an orthogonal genetic system based on xDNA (expanded DNA, in which each base contains an extra ring). Once that works, maybe we can design some xDinosaurs?

Anyway, congrats to the graduate students for putting together such a great lineup. And now, I've mixed up enough pop culture references for one day.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

* To be fair, the sessions were cosponsored by the Biological division, so I didn't have to look that hard.

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 03:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, I've never been one to follow the trend, so I decided to write about the ACS after it was actually over. Forget this real-time blogging stuff! (and if you're only reading this blog for the ACS content, keep reading for the next few days).

I wanted to offer my congratulations to Drs. Puglisi and Williamson for putting together a great series on the Biophysics of RNA. I went to 2 different sessions (both were outstanding), and the remaining sessions were always high on the list of the 5 concurrent sessions I wanted to go to. On Tuesday afternoon, I caught Dan Herschlag's talk, who "wants to set forth principles and physical organic parameters to make RNA folding less mysterious." And indeed, his talk was a great tour through different forces and conditions that need to be considered in elucidating RNA folding. He was also very gracious when I went up after the talk and asked, basically, "can you explain your whole field to me during the coffee break?" In fact, he and the other speakers I cornered got me pretty interested in the topic, so if I ever leave my current job you may find me back at the bench in an RNA lab.

Aside from just being nice people in general, the RNA crowd made a nice counterpoint to the person who found my phone and promptly downloaded nearly $300 worth of games (and as you can imagine, it wasn't in an attempt to spruce it up for me before giving it back...). I guess I'm learning to appreciate all those silly contraptions people have for keeping their phone nearby, as my track record with phones and the ACS isn't so great...

Well, here's hoping the next ACS organizers keep up the good work, or at least that I stop losing things...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 09:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Hello from Chicago!

I'm one of the editors attending the ACS, and arrived in Chicago last night. Actually, late last night, since my plane (and Josh Finkelstein's - check out his post for more details on our flight crew) was 2 hours late. But, this turned out to be extremely important, because it allowed me to 1) have time to read the entire current issue of Nature and 2) see some additional experiments that are going on right here in Chicago firsthand. What am I talking about, you may ask? Let me explain (and let me also offer the disclaimer that I last took physics in 1997, so be nice):

One of the news items in this issue of Nature discusses Newton's second law. In this piece, we learn that Alexander Ignatiev is trying to prove the existence of modified newtonian dynamics by observing whether a small piece of the world (literally, two spots at the north and south poles a few centimeters across) moves in the absence of external force. This is quite difficult because normally everything on the earth is moving due to the movement of the planet. While there are a multitude of challenges to overcome, it seems that Ignatiev is excited about the prospect.

So excited, perhaps, that it seems local Chicago folk have picked up on his enthusiasm. In particular, last night I was looking for some dinner and found a place that would give me a burger to go. After I finally got the enormously oversized bag, I was ready to head back to the hotel through the restaurant's revolving door. Unfortunately, as I stepped into the space, apparently someone else on the other side was one moment ahead of me, and started pushing on the door before I could get all the way in. Once she saw me (and noticed that my hand, holding the burger bag, was close to being forever separated from the rest of me), she stopped her forward motion briefly, allowing me to think that I could at least get my hand and said bag out of the door before both were pulverized. Then, while I was still obviously fumbling to get the elephantine bag out of the door, she apparently noticed a unique opportunity to test Newton's first law, which states:

An object at rest will remain at rest unless acted upon by an external and unbalanced force. An object in motion will remain in motion unless acted upon by an external and unbalanced force.

Upon this realization that she could actually be the first to demonstrate modified newtonian dynamics, she started pushing on her part of the revolving door again, no doubt expecting that the object at rest (the door on my side) would somehow stay at rest, even given the external and very unbalanced force being applied to it.

Alas, Newton wins again. And I ended up with burger salad.

But thanks, Chicago, for inviting me to take part in your scientific pursuits. I look forward to more scintillating experiments during the rest of the conference.

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 07:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Hello chemists of the world!

In honor of spring (well, one day early), our April issue is alive and blooming. Unfortunately, the bloom in question is a fungus, so that's not something you want to put in a vase, but it still looks pretty nice!

We're pretty excited about our issue this month because this marks the first issue where you'll be able to see in 3D! That's right - the chemical compounds that accompany each paper can now be viewed as balls and sticks, zoomed in or out, and rotated around thanks to jmol. It's like going back to organic class, but without the work (and without always running out of carbon atoms just before you finished).

In honor of this occasion, those of you who'll be at the ACS next week can stop by the NPG booth and get a 3D poster and glasses (I'm planning on wearing my 3D glasses throughout the meeting - it's all the rage, you know). And for those of you who aren't going, but want a 3D poster, let me know and I'll send you one (at least until we run out, and then maybe after that too).

See you in Chicago!
Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 03:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

Hi all,

I don't know how it's possible, since I'm pretty convinced that it's still early-mid January, but somehow our March issue has gone live. This issue is jam-packed with interesting science, including zebrafish-insect hybrids, vitamins gone wild, and click chemistry crossed with kinases (try saying that three times fast!).

In addition, we have (as always) our editorial, which for this month focuses on the unique challenges of publishing in interdisciplinary fields. In our experience, these challenges primarily arise from the different interests and expectations of widely varied scientists, whether in a collaborative or author/referee relationship. In putting together the editorial, we heard a few anecdotes of scientists from different fields trying to coordinate their sense of what aspect of a research project is most interesting, or what conclusions are reasonable based on a given data set. Do you have any experiences that stem from this intellectual divide? Or do you have any advice for scientists looking to get started in your field? Or, most importantly, what would you do with your own fish-insect hybrid?

As always, thanks for reading!

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

While all of us are familiar with a certain amount of brevity (via acronyms, such as ASAP) in our daily writing, it seems that the internet chat lingo and texting revolution is finally starting to catch up with even me, for whom writing this blog is by far the most technological thing I've ever done (even my email software knows that :) is a smiley face!). And now that I'm starting to tell people things 'BTW' or to send them emoticons, I've been thinking more about what could be done with this shorthand.

What I've come up with is labicons. Chemicons? I don't have a perfectly catchy title, so you all will have to make some good suggestions. Anyway, the point is that chemists don't have a great way to communicate without spelling out all kinds of things. Here are the new abbreviations I've thought of,

\/ = Extraction (or extract)
|| = Running a column
[] = Running a TLC
() = Stir/stirbar
C- = Round bottom flask (look sideways) (this one, to be fair, is not much more concise than RBF)
L! = Measuring something (probably liquid)
ooo = reflux/heating in general (get it? It's the bubbles)
XX = Crystallize/crystallization

I can't figure out 'rotovap,' which seems like the major remaining thing that chemists stereotypically do.

Now, you might be wondering when you would use these silly things, but I think they will really come in handy. For example, imagine you (as a professor) are off at a conference, and you get an email from your student about a problem in the lab. The whole thing could be wrapped up quite quickly:

Student: My rxn didn't go. ??
Prof: Did you ooo?
Student: Yes. No XX.
Prof: Try \/, EtOAc
Student: Thanks!

Or, for students who are meeting up with friends for a beer after a hard day in the lab, but work in different buildings:

Josh: Ready?
Stu: Got to ||
Josh: OK. I'll [] till then

Or, for people in the same lab that want to complain about a labmate without being heard:

Stu: I can't find my C-!
Josh: Check with Terry. He took all my ().
Stu: Argh...

You get the idea. Well, see what you think (and definitely chime in if you figure out how to say rotovap!). In the meantime, I'm off to ooo my lunch...

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 01:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBacks (0)

I went to visit my sister recently, and her daughter has a toy pancreas. No, really! For a children's toy, it's pretty non-descript: it's similar in shape and size to a yellow squash, but (I think) has a little face on it. Somehow, I am not able to enlighten you with a picture (the all-powerful internet has failed me), so you'll have to imagine it. Not only is it funny that she plays with it in general, but that she, at 4 years old, could quite happily request it. "Mom! I want my pancreas!" or "Mom! Jack took my pancreas!" Actually, it's starting to sound like an episode of ER...

Hospital dramas aside, I also knew about these stuffed microbes, which are equally hilarious. I think what's happening is that someone who feels very strongly about increasing the numbers of scientists in the US (or anywhere, really) has decided that targeting high school students is not working. The kids are already turned off to science at that point. So, they think, let's start earlier. Get these 4-year olds to appreciate the difference between the Ebola virus and sleeping sickness! Get them to love their kidneys, and we'll have a new generation of microbiologists and doctors ready to go. Even the physicists have their mascot...

In all this, though, I wonder: where are the chemists? I did find a Marie Curie finger puppet, but I think we need to step it up in order to really promote chemistry among our kindergarteners. The problem, of course, is to identify chemistry-related items that could be translated into plush toys. Individual atoms may be difficult to make interesting, since they would all be quite similar. What about glassware? Wouldn't every child love a stuffed round bottom flask? I think molecules would also work, but manufacturers might balk at all the little pieces...

What do you think would make a good toy? And, more importantly, what have I done with my pancreas?...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, everyone, it's time for the February issue of Nature Chemical Biology, available at news-stands everywhere. And with Valentine's Day just around the corner (at least according to stores hawking oodles of heart-shaped merchandise), I thought it would be an appropriate time for a little poem in your honor. Thus the title. To figure out my little jokes, you'll have to check out the issue.

If you've been reading for the past few months, you'll have seen examples of our Elements pieces, which first started last June. These one-page articles profile important people, places, and events within the field of chemical biology, and aim to provide food for thought on some of the important issues of the day or just a glimpse into the psyche of notable scientists. Coming up with names or topics to write about may not be a far cry from putting famous scientists into Wikipedia, like this (see Josh's discussion on this), but it does occur at a much slower rate, with only 12 candidates per year. Who or what do you think should be featured in an Elements? What should the rationale be for who gets picked next? Let me know; otherwise, I may have to reevaluate whether you're as sweet as isofagamine, and no one wants that...

Catherine

Catherine Goodman (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 07:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I don't eat bread very often, so I have started to store it in the fridge to prevent little beasties from growing on it. In the process of restocking my fridge after being away for the holidays, I discovered that my current loaf of bread has gotten distinctly harder, which led me to ask the question: 'why, oh why, would my lovely bread go stale like that?' The answer, of course, is all about chemistry. As I learned in 'The Science of Cooking,' the starch granules that are present in flour (particularly those consisting of amylose) are crystallized. When the bread bakes, the crystals melt, and then are not able to form again quickly when the bread cools. But over time, the crystals grow, resulting in a tan brick where you used to have some yummy bagels. Two funny things which may undermine my whole fridge-strategy for storing bread are that this process is catalyzed by water and the rate of starch crystallization is fastest at 4 °C! Who knew?!?

On the other hand, it's entirely possible that both processes (both going stale and growing other life forms) are so drastically affected by preservatives that it may be a moot discussion these days, but that's a topic for another time...

Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 03:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Welcome to 2007, everyone! To get things started with a bang, we at Nature Chemical Biology put together a focus issue on RNA, the biomolecule with the most Golden Globe and Emmy nominations... oops, I mean Nobel Prizes... for 2006. It will definitely be helpful for me, as one of my new year's resolutions is to figure out what all the new varieties of RNA are.

On a related RNAi note, I've been wondering if the International Federation of Competitive Eating will start doing random drug tests to see if people are knocking down their levels of TRP channels, the receptors that sense capsaicin. After all, if people can't sense that peppers are hot, that's a pretty big advantage in eating a bunch of them at once! Fortunately, this problem would only apply to a small subset of eating contests, as I don't think there's any way to genetically regulate how many hot dog buns you can stuff down your throat. I'll keep you posted if I see any new regulations arise...

Best wishes for the new year!
Catherine (associate editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

I've just been reading an interview with Marvin Minsky in today's local newspaper about the future of artificial intelligence, and it got me thinking. His current premise is that emotions are not distinct from rational thought. Instead, they are complementary ways to interact with the world. The example he gives is that being angry is one way to deal with problems because you intimidate people or make them go away. Thus, problem solved!

He further goes on to suggest that once we know more about how emotions, or alternate thought resources in general, are hard-wired (in this rational, complementary way), we'll be able to design robots who can also experience emotions.

Putting these two ideas together, I think that someone should be designing emotional robots that can deal with your problems. For some reason, I also think that they should be small enough to fit in your pocket and be pulled out in times of need, much like some of the characters in anime. They would also fly to the source of trouble with crazy faces and lines streaming out behind them to indicate how fast they are going (in case you don't know what I mean, check this out).

The big question, though, is: what would these robots do that would be distinct from what normal robots might be capable of? My choices for now (one for each pocket) are: 1) a robot that is horrified at finding spiders inside that would take them away and 2) a robot that becomes angry at people littering (such as the woman on the way to the subway this morning) and convinces them of the importance of using trash cans.

What robots would you want?

Catherine (assistant editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 12:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

sym•po•si•um n. pl. sym•po•si•ums or sym•po•si•a 1. A meeting or conference for discussion of a topic, especially one in which the participants form an audience and make presentations. 2. A collection of writings on a particular topic, as in a magazine. 3. A convivial meeting for drinking, music, and intellectual discussion among the ancient Greeks.

For those of you who might have missed it, we (Nature Chemical Biology) hosted our first annual symposium in Boston on November 10-11. The conference focused on the chemical biology of the cell, and included scientific sessions on the nucleus, metals and metabolites, the cytoplasm, and the membrane. While there was no music or ancient Greeks to be found, this convivial meeting included a substantial amount of intellectual discussion, both during and after the actual sessions. In a conference packed with great presentations, Antoine van Oijen made his mark on the conference as the only molecular physicist in the room, although his talk focused instead on single molecule fluorescence imaging of DNA replication. Akihiro Kusumi’s talk on membrane domains included several amazing images that required 3-D glasses to see properly (pictures of which you’ll no doubt see in advertising for our next meeting). Jeremy Nicholson delighted with an analysis of biomarkers in urine (his own, at times), pointing out the overwhelming significance of non-genetic factors in determining a patient’s metabolic profile. Two inveterate chemical biologists, Carolyn Bertozzi and Jim Rothman, spoke in a final session designed to look to the future, identifying progress made and challenges ahead in the field.

The meeting definitely demonstrated the power of applying chemistry and chemical tools to learn new information about biological systems. Additionally, the disparity of the speakers and attendees across scientific disciplines made for interesting and thought-provoking questions and discussions. The Museum of Science was a great venue, with beautiful views of the city skyline available for those rare moments of quiet reflection.

While approximately half of the delegates were from Massachusetts (with a few more from nearby Connecticut or New York), there was also interest from around the United States and around the world. We thank all of the attendees, whether traveling 10 minutes on the subway or 10 hours in a plane, for their participation and enthusiasm.

We are already planning our next symposium, and look forward to another exciting event!

Catherine Goodman (assistant editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

For those of you who are looking to get started on your holiday shopping, I have the perfect suggestion. It's... the December issue of Nature Chemical Biology! It may not have the charm of that 100th tie or the universal appeal of old fruitcake, but it is jam-packed full of articles, reviews, perspectives, commentaries, and other goodies. This issue is actually a focus on drug discovery, so if the issue itself isn't enough, perhaps it will give you some ideas for other presents to buy for your loved ones. After all, who doesn't want some synthetic antibodies, treatments for parasitic diseases, or thoughts on new paradigms of drug discovery, whether they focus on academic-industrial partnerships or new ideas in integrating interdisciplinary techniques in general or in relation to cancer therapeutics? I could go on, but it's probably just easier if you check it out!

This issue is our first official focus, so we'd love to know what you think about it or other topics that we should cover. Happy holidays, everyone!

Catherine Goodman (assistant editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 11:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, everyone, that wonderful time of the month has come again. Yes, the next issue of Nature Chemical Biology has gone live. The November issue is a spotlight on membranes, so for those of you who get your kicks by using the alkyl chain tool in Chemdraw, please check it out. It's also our biggest issue so far, meaning that you may need to get an extra ream of paper before you hit the website.

For those of you physical chemists, Gerald Feigenson discusses a huge problem confronting the field of lipid dynamics: how can we make sense of the membrane in an atomistic way when there are so many things in there? Even excluding all the proteins, there are so different lipids that it seems impossible to develop any kind of detailed model that would include them all. Instead, he suggests that the use of only a few components as representative of larger classes will allow us to make phase diagrams of multi-component behavior. By learning about general principles in this way, we can hope to move towards more complex systems. Although he seems pretty positive about where we're heading, it looks to me like the physical chemists of the world will be in business for a while yet...

Unrelated to the membrane focus, but of relevance to those of you working hard to make chemical libraries: Tarun Kapoor and coworkers investigate the chemical space around one privileged scaffold, and see (literally) amazing results. Starting with only 100 molecules, they identified 22 candidates that resulted in perturbed cell division phenotypes. This research, along with other recent reports, demonstrates that one good scaffold in the hand may be worth two (or many more) in a random microarray. And by the way, if you like the part of the story about Polo-like kinases, be sure to check out David Glover and team's efforts in the previous article. In contrast to Kapoor and his colleagues, they use computational modeling to suggest good starting points for designing inhibitors of the kinase.

It's an exciting time for the crossroads of membrane science and chemistry, as things are getting more molecular/atomistic as the years go by. We hope you like the issue!

Catherine Goodman (assistant editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 06:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, October is finally here, and with it, our October issue. The hunt is over! There is some cool stuff in this issue, including two papers that describe the action of a small molecule in combating cancer and disease: The first paper, by Paul Hergenrother and colleagues, describes a small molecule caspase-3 activator that causes apoptosis (with cancer cells high in procaspase-3 especially sensitive to the compound), while the second paper, by Joel Gottesfeld and coworkers, reports a small molecule that reverses the gene silencing that causes Friedrich's ataxia by changing the epigenetic code on the associated histones.

Even in the midst of all that great science, the topic on my mind today is related to our editorial, which discusses the current crisis of poor science teaching in high school (and college) in the United States. This can be traced to a number of factors, including the lack of scientific knowledge among a significant proportion of science teachers, the lack of teaching methods that properly demonstrate how the scientific method is utilized in real research environments, and the lack of a reward structure for good teaching at the collegiate level.

One of the easiest changes to put into action, in my mind, is getting more high school science teachers that actually know something about science. I should point out here that there are certainly many great teachers at this level who do have a science background, and in fact can be very enthusiastic and inspiring teachers. Indeed, one great way to start making headway on this problem would be to find out how these folks got interested and invested in teaching, and what ideas they have to improve the current situation.

In thinking about whether I would be willing to teach high school chemistry, several significant deterrants immediately came to mind. I'm curious to know your thoughts as to whether these are global concerns, and what solutions might be available. I'd also be very interested to know more about what other countries are already doing to address/prevent these problems.

If it was easier to get a teaching certificate as part of your bachelor's degree, would teaching be more appealing?

Is it outdated to think that, for a science teacher at the high school level, having a teaching certificate is more important than a science degree?

If teacher's salaries were commensurate with entry level jobs in industry, would that alter enthusiasm for teaching as a career?

How can we get away from classrooms that feel like babysitting nightmares, or at least the expectation of that?

How do other countries handle/prevent unruly students?

How can public service efforts like Teach For America be expanded or improved?

I'm sure some of these questions hint at some of the reasons that I am not standing in front of a group of teenagers right now (for instance, I never have been a very enthusiastic babysitter). Yet there is something exciting about the idea of being the next John Keating (Oh captain, my captain!, but minus the whole getting fired thing), and nurturing young, enthusiastic kids through difficult problems in life and chemistry. The current situation is far from an idyllic ivy league prep school, however, as more and more students are losing interest in and understanding of science. This lack of science literacy has a real impact on national and global policy: wouldn't it be great, for example, if you overheard a thoughtful conversation on the pros and cons of genetically modified crops on the subway and didn't immediately know that you were listening to scientists? The situation is a serious one. As always, I welcome your thoughts on this topic.

Catherine Goodman (assistant editor at Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 12:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Well, this blog is slightly overdue, since the ACS meeting has been over for nearly a week. But, I think I'm still adjusting back to East Coast time, so clearly I couldn't be expected to muse on all the interesting talks I saw until now?! Also I've been at a loss without my phone, although I have to say, a phone is easier to recover than your heart (but thanks, Tony, for the title suggestion), especially when you just leave it at a friend's house...

Anyway, as a final wrap-up from me on the meeting: I went to the "Biocatalysis in polymer science; New materials" session for the afternoon on Thursday, and I have to say that I was impressed both by the quality of talks and the number of people listening to them, as Thursday at an ACS meeting does have the reputation of being a bit of a ghost town.

Three talks that particularly interested me:

Atanu Biswas (of the USDA), who is studying soybean oil as a source of polymer starting materials and biodegradable synthons. These oils, which contain multiple double bonds, have proven difficult to substitute in the past, as all kinds of polymers and crosslinked species are generated. He and his colleagues previously tackled the problem of creating monomeric, functionalized oils by first creating the epoxidized molecule, and then reacting it with amines. In this talk, he reported the use of DEAD to generate hydrazine-substituted molecules. They then utilized these compounds in further reactions to generate Diels-Alder products and some polymers.

Sabine Wallner (a postdoc in Richard Gross' lab) is studying the metathesis of sophorolipids, natural surfactants consisting of two sugars and a lipid chain that sometimes cyclize spontaneously to form a 26-atom ring. Successful polymerization of these compounds, which are excreted by cells, would result in a biodegradable polymer with many potential uses. What was especially interesting about this talk is that ROMP is normally facilitated by ring strain in the monomeric material. Yet the cyclic sophorolipid is unlikely to be strained because of the very large ring size. In any case, they've gotten polymers of up to 100 kD, indicating that there is a lot to learn about this system.

Finally, HN Cheng (from Hercules Incorporated, also one of the chairs of the session) gave a great talk on the application of lipases to create polyamides. Their rationale for the project was to create nylon with an additional amine in the backbone so that it would be water soluble. This isn't possible with regular polymerization conditions, as the secondary amine would react to form a branch point. He told us that his team had been busy trying to make proteases do this reaction, since it's just the reverse of their normal function, but with no success. When they tried lipases, though, they got nice polymers both because the formation of amide bonds is not so different from ester bonds, and because the cleavage of these bonds is not possible for the lipase. By careful choice of starting materials, they were able to create multiple polymers that just wouldn't be accessible with standard synthetic techniques.

In addition to the good talks of the session, I was impressed with the discussions that ensued - clearly everyone was paying attention and there were some helpful suggestions for the authors. Congrats to the POLY section for an exciting meeting.

Catherine Goodman (Assistant Editor at Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I went to the carbohydrate-protein interactions and glycolipids session this morning (I'm at the ACS, in case you forgot). It was a great session! Even with the best efforts from the session chair, there were so many questions that we got way behind (which unfortunately meant that I missed George Wang's talk due to a previous engagement). One particularly interesting part of the morning was yet another tribute to Emil Fischer, who seems to have done more work in his life than occurs in a year at most universities. In this particular story, Jacqueline Gervay-Hague was discussing the troubles with substituting sugars at the alpha position, and had tried to use trimethylsilyl iodine in combination with an alcohol to activate the center and incorporate the alcohol as a substituent. To her amazement, her student didn't form the ester, but instead purified the iodated sugar. They looked back in the literature for any precedent of stable iodo-substituted sugars, and found that Fischer not only made them, but crystallized them back in 1910. The secret? The alpha-substituted sugar is stable, whereas the beta-functionalized position reacts right away. They have since used this insight to couple unprotected lipids to TMS-protected sugars; with the right purification conditions, they get the unprotected final product in one step.

Catherine Goodman (Assistant Editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 05:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

After my recent trip to San Diego, I'm heading back to California for the ACS meeting in San Francisco. The meeting looks great (especially for us chemical biology types); if you want to see what I'll be up to (and some of the other NPG editors), check out our editor's choice site (I know, Josh already told you that).

What's on my mind at the moment, though, is the overall organization of the meeting.

Can we make any sense out of the variation in assigning anything from 20-45 minutes to each speaker? Is it the ongoing conflict of wanting to accommodate more speakers versus really giving them the chance to say something? Is it a statement on the standards of behavior for the different subsections? Or is it all about the seniority of the speaker? Of course we wouldn't see graduate students giving plenary lectures, but I have seen some pretty established/respected professors lined up for 20 minute slots.

As a side note: The bonus of finding a session filled with 20-minute talks by professors is that it's likely that you will come out of the session with 8 times more information in your head than was there going in. The bad part about risking your time on a session without professors is that information may have actually leaked out of your head by the time you can gather your wits enough to leave. (Please note that I say this as one who gave a student seminar not that long ago...)

How can graduate students get more out of the meeting than just a rambling haze of science, intermingled with rambling hazes revolving around drink tickets redeemed at their friends' poster sessions? Certainly my first ACS meetings were overwhelming, with the number of talks that I 'must see' filling more hours than I had and the uptake on new scientific information limited to the first day or two before my brain got full. Students and postdocs on the job hunt seem to be much more focused and calm. Perhaps the secret is going in on a mission?

How can everyone get more out of the poster sessions? These events have become so huge that it's almost impossible to find anyone or anything on purpose. My recent experiences have pretty much relied on wandering around and looking for interesting stuff, regardless of whether it's related to my work at all. To be fair, I've met some great people and found out about amazing work that way, but theoretically poster sessions could serve a much more important function of meeting people in your field to share ideas and experimental advice.

What are your thoughts on ACS meetings? How do you get the most out of them? What, in fact, does it mean to 'get the most out of them' when there are talks to be listened to, jobs to be interviewed for, free pens to be accepted, a new city to be seen...? Let me know, and I'll try to put your advice into practice. Alternatively, you can wait for the meeting updates and see how my new secret plan works.

Catherine Goodman (Assistant Editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 11:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I’ve just gotten home from the 20th Protein Society meeting in San Diego where, I have to say, I was completely overwhelmed by the quality of the talks I saw. I was also overwhelmed by the beautiful weather, and I frequently found myself asking why I (and everyone, in fact) don’t move to San Diego immediately. One thing that could be keeping people away is the creepy way that the hotel staff use your name when you’re wearing your nametag (‘Here’s your hot chocolate, Catherine!’ … Augh!).

Unlike some of Hollywood's recent offerings, there were several movies that got my attention during the meeting. One was in a talk by Ron Milo, who is incorporating fluorescent proteins into human genes with retroviruses to monitor what individual proteins are doing and, on a larger scale, assess variability in a population of cells. While not really movies, both Vijay Pande and Dave Baker gave demonstrations of their community-based computational projects, Folding@home and Rosetta@home. While I'm familiar with Baker's work in protein design, this was my first time seeing him talk; all I can say is that I'm starting a countdown to when he wins the Nobel Prize. Pande's talk on protein folding assessed by multiple short simulations instead of one long computational run impressed as well in his acceptance of the Irving Sigal Young Investigator Award. Tim Springer never fails to entertain with his integrin signaling interpretive dance (to clarify: he's not the one dancing). I've seen the movie before on his web page, but seeing it in the context of the whole talk was excellent. Finally, Barbara Imperiali demonstrated the power of caged phosphorylation sites in preventing/facilitating cell migration.

As a result, I would like to send this letter on to all involved in the movie enterprise (or at least the recent offering from Samuel Jackson and company):

Dear Hollywood,
I think you can do better.

Sincerely,
Catherine Goodman (Assistant Editor at Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 02:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In the editorial in August’s Nature Chemical Biology, we share our thoughts on peer review. As you can imagine, the exact timing of an editorial on this topic coincides with the peer review trial and debate going on over at Nature, but the thoughts within the article (as well as many related ideas) are frequently on our minds. My most recent inspiration, however, comes from a trip to a convenience store to buy some toothpaste. The veritable cornucopia of choices (even within a single brand!) made me wonder: if we need 50 different kinds of toothpaste to satisfy what seems a fairly simple concept (of cleaning our teeth), how will we, in the face of an equally overwhelming number of choices, ever come to an agreement on a system as complex and important as peer review? I guess one comforting thing is that until we can figure out a better way to conduct this process, our current method seems to be working pretty well.

Some major questions on our minds:

How do we make sense of all the different options being proffered as changes to the current peer-review system?

How long do new ideas need to be tested before we agree that they are better or worse than the current system?

Is it a reasonable expectation that scientists make time to referee papers on a voluntary basis, as is being explored in the Nature trial?

How would we prevent scientists from encouraging their friends to submit overly positive reviews?

What rewards could/should there be for acting as a referee?

Can/does science exist outside of a political environment, where professors need to worry about the good opinion of their peers?

Obviously, this topic is of great significance to us, and we have many ideas of what the answers to these questions could be. But we already know what we think about it - tell us your thoughts!

Catherine (Assistant Editor, Nature Chemical Biology)

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 04:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Each month, Nature Chemical Biology includes an editorial; these typically center around an issue of general importance to chemical biologists and seek to raise questions that will be significant in the further development of the field. In the July issue, we talk about how universities and departments may support the development of chemical biologists . As science has expanded from the strict disciplines of chemistry, biology, and physics, certain challenges of redefining scientific borders and academic structure have been met. Yet the experience of researchers working in chemical biology suggests that they face a uniquely difficult task in finding a home for themselves and their work. Everyone involved would benefit from brainstorming on how the integration of chemical biology can be improved or made easier. As such, we would like to initiate conversation among our readers as well as those who have gone through similar fundamental shifts in scientific organization.

Some of the thoughts on our mind:

What is your experience in starting a lab/changing fields/getting funding for chemical biology research?

Are there specific changes that your university has made or could make to support you?

Do you think chemical biologists can continue to work within the confines of diverse (other) disciplines, or do you support the move toward chemical biology departments?

How can we find common ground when self-identified chemical biologists work on extremely disparate topics or use widely varying techniques?

It is our hope that, by sharing ideas and concerns, we can improve the overall understanding of and support for our growing community.

Posted by Catherine Goodman at 02:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)