How do you interpret the following situation: we have a life extension technologist whose all endeavors is about pushing this issue to its very limits and making things possible but on the other hand this very life extensionist himself is not driven by actually living as long as he can. It seems that SENS theorist… Continue reading Are life extensionists mainly driven by a desire to actually live a long time?
Vadlo, the beta biomedical search engine wants to scale up!
forwarded, nonpersonal mail from Maya Kennard (you might get that email too): Resource link/Story suggestion for your website:Title: VADLO – Biomedical Search Engine Description: Vadlo is a search engine for the biology/biomedical scientists, educators, clinicians and reference librarians. References Also check the Daily cartoons! The idea is that we feed them with searches and links and… Continue reading Vadlo, the beta biomedical search engine wants to scale up!
Make it really simple: animated human prehistory for 23andMe users
New 23andMe website animation on human prehistory made by Ariana Killoran. Ariana created all the Genetics 101 films for 23andMe and the narrator was her pa. With these films the company clearly sets a new standard in popular scientific animations and videos. Homo Erectus: Neanderthal:
Who’s first? Happy First Birthday, commercial personal genomics!
What do you think, which company launched the first commercial and comprehensive personal genome service (based on a genome-wide SNP scan) on the market and exactly when? We have 2 candidates here in the ring deCODE Genetics (founded in 1996, Iceland) and 23andMe (founded in 2006, USA), the Amundsen and Scott of personal genomics. (please… Continue reading Who’s first? Happy First Birthday, commercial personal genomics!
Nature Personal Genomics Very Special
The newest Nature issue concentrates on personal genomics and its consequences via many types of articles some of them with free access. I only read 1 piece so far by Erika Check Hayden, who has the exclusive freedom at Nature to always pick the best stories and write on any of them, but being a… Continue reading Nature Personal Genomics Very Special
“blogs.nature.com v1 is live” and beyond
A new, completely rewritten, integrated nature.com website blogs.nature.com has been launched by the Natureplex people – informed his Twitter pals Euan Adie: Also, blogs.nature.com v1 is live! Tequila and donuts all round. Early n’ often release v2 coming on the 18th so get any bug reports in now. Suggest good science blogs that are not… Continue reading “blogs.nature.com v1 is live” and beyond
Golden day for 23andMe: Time’s 2008 Invention of the Year
This is a golden day for 23andMe despite all crisis worries: Mountain View, CA (PRWEB) October 30, 2008 — TIME Magazine announced today that the Personal Genome Service™ from 23andMe, Inc. has been named 2008’s Invention of the Year. 23andMe was chosen as the year’s most significant invention for its exceptional work in making personal… Continue reading Golden day for 23andMe: Time’s 2008 Invention of the Year
Poll: How will the global economic crisis affect the chances of technological life extension within the next 25 years?
assuming we are heading into a global economic crisis…
For your free information (FYFI): it’s Open Access Day!
October 14, 2008 is the world’s first Open Access Day and OA itself means free online access to peer-reviewed research articles. Although we have other, slower methods, like personal homepages, emails to authors, institutional repositories to get the same article we were unable to get via closed access journals, OA is the internet-savvy solution that… Continue reading For your free information (FYFI): it’s Open Access Day!
My body is my thesis: The 2009 AAAS Science Dance Contest
The 2009 AAAS Science Dance Contest is for hidden artists disguised as scientists, nerds and shameless self promoters who are tempted to dance their PhDs, upload it to YouTube and enjoy microcelebrity. A real thesis live, non-profit but for fun and a one and only chance to make a fool out of you. This is… Continue reading My body is my thesis: The 2009 AAAS Science Dance Contest
Green fluorescent protein wins the Chemistry Nobel Prize!
Green fluorescent protein (GFP) is something really familiar for many biologists, now it will be familiar for the whole world for a period via the Chemistry Nobel Prize: From the Nobel Press Release: The remarkable brightly glowing green fluorescent protein, GFP, was first observed in the beautiful jellyfish, Aequorea victoria in 1962. Since then, this… Continue reading Green fluorescent protein wins the Chemistry Nobel Prize!
HealthMap & data fusion: detailed Google Tech Talks intro
The Google Tech Talks channel on YouTube slowly but irresistibly became my private university in current tech trends. Here is a recent talk on the amazing HealthMap by its developers John Brownstein, Clark Freifeld, Mikaela Keller. According to the about page: HealthMap brings together disparate data sources to achieve a unified and comprehensive view of… Continue reading HealthMap & data fusion: detailed Google Tech Talks intro
2008 Nobel Prizes on Nobelprize.org: Live webcasts, feeds, Twitter, widgets
It’s Nobel time! Hands up: how many of you have checked so far the official website of the Nobel Foundation called Nobelprize.org? And please try to recall how you usually found out who won the particular Nobel prizes in the past years. This year the first announcement, for the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine,… Continue reading 2008 Nobel Prizes on Nobelprize.org: Live webcasts, feeds, Twitter, widgets
23andMe on Twitter & now offering services in Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Israel
Finally 23andMe, my first personal genetics service provider, is on Twitter which could mean that from now on first-hand company information will flow even more continuously compared to what the regularly/daily updated eminent corporate blog can offer. Microblogging is always quicker blogging! Based on the first 4 tweets (on the photo) the guys will not… Continue reading 23andMe on Twitter & now offering services in Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Israel
Mountain View – Budapest: 20 days to get my 23andMe profile!
I ordered my first commercial genetic profile from 23andMe on the 9th of September online, FedExed my 2 ml saliva from Budapest to 23andMe, Mountain View on the 12th of September. I got the results today. That said within 3 weeks since the birth of the idea I purchased more than 500 000 SNPs of… Continue reading Mountain View – Budapest: 20 days to get my 23andMe profile!
Science X2 signals: big pharmas, stem cells, mobile MRI
The Institute for the Future‘s X2 project is all about tracing future trends in science and technology As the steward of the Biomedical Sciences and Biotechnology Group I collect signals in these fields on which some forecasts can be based later on. Here are some issues I found future sensitive enough recently: GlaxoSmithKline collaborates with… Continue reading Science X2 signals: big pharmas, stem cells, mobile MRI
Even ugly handwriting can fit the informal nature of SciFoo
I had problems with my handwriting since elementary schools, or at least my teachers had continuous problems with it. Even during my university years I was asked sometimes to read out loud my essays, papers to them otherwise risking bad grades. Maybe it’s because I am a hidden right-handed using my left hand for writing… Continue reading Even ugly handwriting can fit the informal nature of SciFoo
Superstruct launches with Superthreats, a forecasting game for the masses!
If you are particularly fascinated by the future and enjoy playing games the following is something you should be involved and interested in. Superstruct, the world’s first massively multiplayer forecasting game started today with Superthreat scenarios by 2019. Game founder Jane McGonigal writes in a message sent to the members of Facebook Group the dedicated… Continue reading Superstruct launches with Superthreats, a forecasting game for the masses!
Sergey Brin, Gly2019Ser & a real chance against Parkinson disease/aging!
It was already known that amongst the Google top people Sergey Brin is the one who is most interested in pushing biotechnology and the biomedical sciences: in his Stanford years he was interested in biology courses according to The Google Story, he married Anne Wojcicki (who graduted from biology at Yale), Google invested $4.4 million… Continue reading Sergey Brin, Gly2019Ser & a real chance against Parkinson disease/aging!
Aquincum Institute of Technology, Budapest, IT & BT shaking hands
There is a nice initiative now in Budapest dedicated to the present and future of high technology: a new private university momentarily dubbed as Aquincum Institute of Technology (AIT) will be built near to the Graphisoft Park in Óbuda (Aquincum) concentrating on competitive information-/biotechnology (mainly bioinformatics) education and entrepreneurship. The main instigator of the project… Continue reading Aquincum Institute of Technology, Budapest, IT & BT shaking hands
The Google Chrome Experience on Mac OS X with CrossOver Chromium!
Following Matt Cutts’s tweet I am now writing my blog post using the CrossOver Chromium browser which is a Mac and Linux port of the open source Chromium web browser. Google Chrome (Windows-only so far) is built with open source code from Chromium that means I have now a functional Google Chrome clone under Leopard on… Continue reading The Google Chrome Experience on Mac OS X with CrossOver Chromium!
My personalized genetics: 2 ml saliva FedExed to 23andMe!
As the second operation of building my genetically well informed future yesterday (2 days after completing the order) I collected 2 ml of my saliva with the help of 23andMe’s Oragene DNA self-collection kit manufactured by DNA Genotek. First operation has been the sequencing of the D-loop of my mitochondrial DNA out of 5 ml… Continue reading My personalized genetics: 2 ml saliva FedExed to 23andMe!
Just ordered my 23andMe kit for $399+shipping!
It was time for me to enter personally into the age of commercialized-personalized genetics/genomics and not just to talk about it! New price, new customers! Here is my suggestion to the sales department of 23andMe! 23andMe Democratizes Personal Genomics With New Analytical Platform
Google’s Chrome browser launches & loves tabs & users
Google Chrome Google on Google Chrome – comic book My time with Chrome on the Windows partition of my old MacBook mirrored in Twitter, echoed by FriendFeed:
What change would you make if society tolerated only 1 change at a time?
Nikola Tesla (portrayed by David Bowie) says in The Prestige: “Society tolerates only one change at a time”. If this was true what only change (difference) would you make? The change could be technological, scientific, economical, political, any kind…a change that would make room for all the other changes.
Science Blogging 2008 in London by Nature Network
Looks like this August is the center of my science related social life in 2008: starting with the bottom-up BioBarCamp unconference in Palo Alto followed by the top-down Sci Foo Camp unconference in Mountain View and now The Science Blogging Conference in London on the 30th. This conference is an interesting mix: on one hand… Continue reading Science Blogging 2008 in London by Nature Network
Sci Foo Camp 2008: words and recommendations
SciFoo Camp is over for about 2 weeks now and I hope I’ll have time to write about it later. Here is what happened to me during the check-in process. 5 words or phrases that describe your interests and expertise: robust life extension, bioDIY, mitochondria, stem cells, Coen Brothers 3 people we should invite to… Continue reading Sci Foo Camp 2008: words and recommendations
Leaving New Orleans: freebies from me
Ok, I am officially done with New Orleans and moved to the Bay Area for the next couple of days to come, BioBarCamp and SciFoo Camp. On the photo some things I left behind and contributed with them to the culture of this special city.
The marketing problem of life extension technologies
If “Science has a really serious marketing problem” as Larry Page observed, then life extension technologies face even bigger marketing problems. I am definitely not a marketing expert but realized the problem early on when thinking about the lag-phase period of a robust life extension technology. So I made a short email interview with Dave… Continue reading The marketing problem of life extension technologies
Do you want a startuppy job: ask CoNotes or not!
Andrew Chen, founder of CoNotes said that to my mailbox: “I’m basically trying to solve the problem that startups have in hiring the right people. A lot of it has to do with marketing (it’s hard for startups to get prominence over big named companies particularly in university settings), but also fit.“ And that is… Continue reading Do you want a startuppy job: ask CoNotes or not!
Friendfeedization of my blog (and a puzzle)
It’s not about the TechCrunch post with the similar name here, but about my and the Life Scientists‘ FriendFeed life:
BioBarCamp: we have room for 55 plus Campers!
BioBarCamp is due in circa 3 weeks and we have now 45 BioBarCampers signed up on the list of attendees and our host the Institute For The Future has the capacity for around 55 more campers, roughly for 100 people in general. We already have a very valuable mix: researchers, biologists (grad, postdoc, PI), coders-engineers-bioinformaticians,… Continue reading BioBarCamp: we have room for 55 plus Campers!
Life extension people & session at SciFoo 2008, Googleplex!
Last year I was probably the only SciFoo Camper with an explicit life extension commitment. I suggested & held a session which was related a bit to partial immortalization but was rather about the systems biology perspective in general, illustrated with some examples. So throughout the terrific SciFoo Camp 2007 life extension as a conversation… Continue reading Life extension people & session at SciFoo 2008, Googleplex!
Hourglass, a blog carnival devoted to the biology of aging
Finally Chris over at Ouroboros came up with the idea and the quick implementation of Hourglass, a blog carnival devoted to the biology of aging/biogerontology. For some reason I am not an explicit supporter of blog carnivals – many of my posts were chosen by carnival editors but I never hosted one -, but Hourglass… Continue reading Hourglass, a blog carnival devoted to the biology of aging
The decellularized matrix hack: skipping many steps in tissue engineering
The concept of decellularizing complex organs in cadavers and reseeding the remaining matrix structure with differentiated, stem or progenitor cells, growing in a bioreactor and transplanting back to the organism could turn out to be a real technological shortcut in the field of tissue engineering. It is not a brand new story on the web,… Continue reading The decellularized matrix hack: skipping many steps in tissue engineering
Understanding Aging Conference is over but it is the end of the beginning
I try to cover some interesting, sciencey points on the conference in later posts, right now just a brief, subjective human- and strategy focused summary: Congrats to Aubrey de Grey and the team, everything went well and if finally a worldwide consensus is around the corner claiming that robust healthy lifespan extension is technologically possible… Continue reading Understanding Aging Conference is over but it is the end of the beginning
Aubrey de Grey on Aging 2008, the disease, the cure and the implications
This is how my Macbook saw Aubrey de Grey’s talk exactly 1 week ago on the AGING preconference at UCLA.
Resharing FriendFeed: What is the optimal length of a presentation?
My tweet was based on my recent Understanding Aging Conference experience where I was part of the audience and not a presenter. So the context is scientific presentations. Of course the chat continued on FriendFeed.
Halcyon Molecular: whole genome sequencing well under $1000?
Halcyon Molecular is a quite ambitious startup, don’t you think? What we do: Halcyon Molecular is developing an ultra-low-cost DNA sequencing technology. Our single molecule approach does not require PCR amplification and will allow for megabase read lengths with simultaneous determination of methylation pattern. We aim to sequence entire human genomes de novo for well… Continue reading Halcyon Molecular: whole genome sequencing well under $1000?
Going to LA to end aging for 3 days & maybe more
It is just good to go to a conference where the overwhelming majority of attendees think (and many of them act) that by science & technology we can actually get rid of aging related health problems and develop a robust life extension technology. I sense a lot of freedom here which I sense since the… Continue reading Going to LA to end aging for 3 days & maybe more
