For the 1 February issue of Nature magazine, I wrote a Toolbox article on interactive figures. Unlike static PDFs or JPEGs, these figures allow users to explore the underlying data and code used to create them, for instance to zoom in on a crowded region of interest, or to probe the robustness of a computational model. Read more
Fluorescence microscopy has transformed the life sciences. By attaching fluorescent dyes or proteins to cellular structures, researchers can image fine cellular morphology; track molecular localization, motion, and dynamics; and more. But fluorescence microscopy also presents significant obstacles. One of those is multiplexing. Read more
The term “genome-editing” has become synonymous with CRISPR-Cas. But there’s more than one way to edit a genome, and each has its pros and cons. Read more
The current focus on single-cell biology reflects the growing awareness among life scientists that all cells are not alike. Read more
“How’s my paper doing?” It’s such a simple question, and in today’s hyperconnected world it’s relatively easy to work out who’s reading and talking about your scientific publications. But are there conversations you might be overlooking? Read more
Scientific publications represent years of work. It’d be nice if somebody read them. Read more
For decades, the research communities surrounding the major model organisms have each had an online place to call home. There was the SGD, MGD, and RGD — the Saccharomyces, mouse, and rat genome databases, respectively; FlyBase and WormBase for Drosophila and C. elegans; and ZFIN, the Zebrafish Information Network. Read more
Timothée Poisot recently travelled to London for MozFest 2017, “The world’s leading festival for the open Internet movement.” There, the quantitative and computational ecologist at the University of Montréal in Canada ran a session entitled “Scientific computing for the terabyte-less.” Here, he tells Naturejobs why life science research needn’t necessarily follow the Big Data model. Read more
Bioinformatics is notoriously complicated, what with its arcane command-line interface, complex workflows, and massive datasets. For the uninitiated, simply installing the software can present a problem. Read more
It’s no secret these days that researchers increasingly are focused on data reproducibility and transparency. Read more
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