SoNYC and Story Collider
Last night the live stream or The Story Collider, which gives select scientists and science communicators an opportunity to share their experiences on a particular topic. This month’s event is all about reproduction and includes a talk from SoNYC co-organizer, Jeanne Garbarino. You can attend The Story Collider in person on December 12th or watch out for the podcasts of the stories which are shared via theFacebook page.
#Open Lab
From verbal stories to the written word – this week saw the release of the list of blog posts that have been selected for 2011’s Open Lab anthology. Comprised of a selection of 51 of the best examples of science blogging from this year, Sciam blogger, Jennifer Ouellette, explains how making the final selection was a difficult task:
I am not kidding when I say winnowing down 720 entries was an incredibly painful process. I absolutely could not have done it without the help of all the volunteer reviewers (a full thank-you list will be forthcoming later). Even so, Bora and I engaged in much mutual handwringing, particularly over the last 10-12 cuts we were forced to make.
We would also like to congratulate Nature Network blogger, Eva Amsen, whose post Make history, not vitamin C made it into the anthology. Well done, Eva, keep up the great blogging in 2012! You can find a list of the other blog posts here.
Antibodypedia
Nature Publishing Group (NPG) announced this week a partnership withAntibodypedia, an online searchable database of publicly available antibodies against human proteins. It also links these publicly available antibodies with data demonstrating their efficacy and published studies in which they have been used. A new website for Antibodypedia is live here..
Chris Surridge, Associate Publisher and a Nature Protocols blogger, announced this partnership at the American Society for Cell Biology’s (ASCB) Annual Meeting. He said:
“Antibodypedia allows scientists to draw on the research literature, supplier benchmarking and peer-reviewed data from colleagues to find the antibody best suited for their own experiments.”
You can find out more in the press release.
Nature Outlook: Influenza
Cover Art: Nik Spencer
Our centuries-old battle against influenza occasionally erupts into mass death – the 1918 pandemic alone killed at least 50 million people. In light of this, the latest NatureOutlook supplement is all about influenza. What makes this virus such a tough opponent is its ability to mutate so that vaccines and drugs quickly become obsolete. Can new research offer hope for defeating this pathogen for good? You can read the whole, free supplement here.
FameLab
FameLab, set up in 2005 by Cheltenham Science Festival, is an international competition for science communicators and the last heats took place this week at Kings College London. A winner and a wildcard from each heat made the final on Wednesday. Nature Network London has been featuring interviews with the winners and wildcards. First up was wildcard and Imperial PhD student, Ned Yoxall. Next we heard from Babraham Institute PhD student, Harry Armstrongand and from Harry Cliffof the High Energy Physics group at the University of Cambridge. Finally, the last interview with the London winner, Imperial virologist Lucy Thorne:
How did you become interested in communication and have you ever done anything like this before?
I really enjoy trying to get people interested in science and I’ve done university outreach work in the past so I volunteered this year as a demonstrator for the Society of General Microbiology at the Cheltenham Science Festival. It was a great day and made me realise how much I enjoy it but Famelab is the first time I’ve done any competitive science communication and on such a large public scale so it was a bit nerve-wracking!
Find out more about Lucy’s FameLab experience in the London blog and good luck in the final which will be held at the Royal Institution in the New Year.
YuleTubeCalendar
If you haven’t already been enjoying out sciency advent calendar, then it’s not too late to catch up! To celebrate our love of both science and music we’ve created an online #YuleTubeCalendar.
Check back each day in the approach to Christmas to reveal a new YouTube video which relates to a science story from 2011. Can you guess which story we’re referring to? Leave your answers in the comments, or join the online conversations by tweeting; the hashtag is#yuleTubeCalendar.
Finally, we have also created some simple instructions if you would like to join the fun by creating your own calendar to share. You can add videos, images or even link to other blog posts to create your own round-up of 2011.