
Gene Regulation, Illustrated - okket
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/sa-visual/gene-regulation-illustrated/
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nkurz
I've seen those before! The bottom set (with the coiled DNA and the mice) are
my wife's illustrations. The process is interesting: both the mice and the DNA
are 3D models rendered with Lightwave3D. Usually Jen (Scientific American's
art director, and the author of the blog) creates a hand-drawn "sketch", then
Emily creates the models and a rough "render", and then she and Emily go back
and forth for several iterations of revisions.

Perhaps disturbingly to those who might take for granted the accuracy of the
illustrations, a lot of time is spent searching the web for reliable
references. Sometimes there are pre-existing line drawings from published
papers, and sometimes it involves reading the text of the scientist's
dissertation and trying to figure out what's actually happening. If anyone has
questions on how the graphics are made, ask here and I'll get answers.

Or if you happen to be looking for similar custom scientific illustrations,
here's Emily's website: [http://cooperhawk.com](http://cooperhawk.com).

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microDude
Thanks! I never thought about how these drawings were made and your wife's
website is very delightful to browse.

Does your wife get follow on work from the science community once a piece is
published? For example, having the piece reproduced for conference journals.

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nkurz
She occasionally gets follow-on work with the original authors, but it doesn't
seem that common. Reproduction varies for different publications, but usually
she retains the reprint rights. I think she usually charges 10% of the
original fee for anthologies and such. The original is usually priced by page
size and complexity. An complex full page illustration like this one was
probably about $2K, so reprint rights would be about $200.

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refurb
A great analysis of the Mukherjee article referenced in this article.

"...the word “epigenetics” isn’t just being abused in the wider press. It’s
been abused by scientists as well..."[1]

[1][http://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2016/05/12/epi...](http://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2016/05/12/epigenetics-
for-the-spirit)

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designium
It's scary to see how certain traits can be passed on to next generations
without altering the genes.

