

So you created a living organism engineered to produce a specific molecule for an intended use? - pierrefar
http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=968

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timr
What amazes me about this, is not the science (old news; undergrads are doing
this stuff today, and I imagine a fair number of his bio-science readers were
yawning at the description), but the fact that he's so _shocked_ about it.

Much of the described method relies on technology that is 10-20 years old. Has
biomedical research done such a poor job of marketing itself that people are
basically clueless about what's possible, or is this just another example of
routine technological illiteracy?

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mechanical_fish
This is the tragic fate of scientists and technologists. You work like a dog
for your whole life to achieve a seemingly impossible goal -- eradicating
polio, cloning sheep, storing the Library of Congress inside a cigar box,
traveling to the moon. Against the odds, you succeed. Ten years later...
everybody just yawns. Custom-designed organisms are, like, soooooo boring.
What's on TV?

It's like Feynman said: "Mathematicians can only prove trivial theorems,
because any theorem, once proved, is trivial." And he thought he was kidding!

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timr
Well, of _course_...taken from the broadest possible perspective, it's
obviously amazing that we can engineer living things to do our bidding.
Whoopty-doo.

From that perspective, it's also freaking amazing that we can keep our food
fresh in mechanical ice boxes, that we can flush our onesies and twosies into
oblivion at the flick of a lever, and that we can fly around the sky in our
_giant metal birds._

I don't think it's particularly unreasonable to expect people to be familiar
with a technology that is almost old enough to drink.

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mnemonicsloth
I'm in school now, and this is new information to me. Where do you go to learn
about the envelope of what's possible in biotech? EDIT: Preferably without
having to digest the whole curriculum.

Also, how do I get one of those giant metal birds, and what do you feed them?

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timr
If you just want to read, there are a few books that are detailed, but still
accessible. Any one would give you a much better understanding of what's
possible:

* Human Molecular Genetics by Strachan and Read -- this is a tome, but it's a great introductory reference to the field. (A lot of first-year grad students read this book when coming to molecular genetics from engineering and CS, incidentally.)

* Molecular Biology of the Cell, by Alberts et al. -- an even bigger tome, but one you'll find on every researcher's bookshelf.

* Genes NN by Lewin (where NN is an ever-increasing roman numeral; you can estimate the amount of time someone has been in the field by the size of the roman numeral on their copy) -- this is more of an undergraduate introduction to molecular genetics. The other books (especially MBC) are more useful as references, but this book is fairly accessible to newcomers.

* Recombinant DNA by Watson et al. -- I hesitate to include this in the list, because it's now sadly outdated (written in 1992), but I still think it's one of the best-written, most accessible introductions to things like transgenics, genetic engineering, etc. Describes everything in a friendly, Scientific American style. It's also small. If you want a quick, friendly introduction to what was state-of-the-art 15 years ago, this is a great book.

I know that most of these books are kind of thick, and that you said you
didn't want to digest the whole curriculum, but I don't tend to read pop-
science books in this field. I don't have much of an opinion on any particular
popularization of molecular genetics. But if you want to gain a real
understanding of molecular biology, these are the books you'd most likely be
told to buy for molecular genetics 101 at your local university.

PS: the giant metal birds eat Acme brand exploding bird seed, naturally....

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yters
Any good sources for all the sciences?

Also, is there an overview of how computer science impacts all the other
academic disciplines?

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car
The technique described in the comic is the creation of hybridoma cells to
make monoclonal antibodies.

Wikipedia has a nice introduction:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monoclonal_antibodies>

Jerne, Koehler and Milstein got the Nobel prize for this in 1984:
<http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1984/>

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whacked_new
I don't get it... was this supposed to be funny?

