Although the Watson scandal was more public and hit faster, there has been another crisis brewing at CSHL for going on a year now that has been discussed in whispers at meetings and through emails, but let’s organize all of these free associations and questions into a single place and ask the big question:
What is going on with neuroscience at CSHL?
This is an entry that should have been written back in June, a time that pre-dates my involvement with Action Potential! Back then, nature.com incorporated and launched a new free service called Scintilla that collects data from hundreds of news outlets, scientific blogs, journals and databases and then makes it easy for the user to organize, share and discover exactly the type of information in which he or she is interested.
Scintilla incorporates interesting features from several different Web 2.0 technologies including The Hype Machine (aggregation), Google Reader (checking selected sources), last.fm (recommendation engine based on other users’ activities), and del.icio.us (social network based around content). It is pretty slick and easy to use. For the content producers, here is a statement from NPG. They even have an interesting solution for science bloggers concerned about losing advertising revenue to those reading through this service.
Give it a try and tell me what you think.
In a statement issued today, Dr. James Watson resigned as Chancellor of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. This is an important event for CSHL, which is now relieved of making more difficult decisions regarding Dr. Watson’s future. Although Watson’s fund-raising abilities were unparalleled, and he built the lab to what it has become today, in order for CSHL to move forward, he had to leave.
No, Action Potential is not going to start giving dating advice…yet. I just needed a catch-all title for a catch-all blog entry. After last week’s ugly Watson debate, I figured that I would return to research science and have a little fun updating you on some recent primate research. The usual caveat applies to this entry, as with many of mine, that the neuroscience links are tenuous. Of course, that depends on your definition of neuroscience. Since mine is quite broad, it looks like we can proceed.
James Watson, current chancellor of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, shared the Nobel Prize in 1962 for his contributions leading to the discovery of DNA structure. I guess his expertise in molecular biology and genetics has also provided him with a unique insight into the relationship between intelligence and race.
Have a busy schedule ahead of you, but wishing you could stay current with cutting edge neuroscience discussion? Well fret no more. Nature, in partnership with The Dana Foundation, has launched Neuropod, a neuroscience-based podcast.
Each month, Kerri Smith will report on some of the interesting happenings in the world of neuroscience research. This month, Kerri discusses the relationship between cognitive enhancement and warfare, how stress contributes to memory formation, learning from brain imaging, and why chili peppers might have a future in anesthesiology.
Remember to check back each month for a new episode, or better yet, sign up for the free RSS feed to have the podcast delivered straight to your desktop (paste this link in your media player). Let me know what you think of this format, as we want your feedback to make this feature an interesting and entertaining tool.