CharonY

I would go for Lindt (at least for a number of their chocolate varieties), but I noticed something weird and I wonder if anyone could verify. It appears to me that the Lindt chocolate in the US (even if manufactured outside) is sweeter than what you would get in Europe. Has anyone else been able to compare it?

We had a UZ rotor ending up in a concrete wall. In the concrete wall of the adjoining room that is (though the wall dividing the room was not made of concrete). Regarding engineers, I think there are different flavours of engineers (and no, I have not licked them). I would not necessarily characterize someone that "only" apply knowledge to do or build something a scientist (somewhat following the reasoning why technical staff are often not characterized as scientists). Yet in many engineering projects problems have to be overcome and during that course new information may be generated. In that case it would be fall under the domain of science. Or joint projects between scientists and engineers. E.g. biologist and physicist that unravel how e.g. insects walk and engineers that build a functional model out of that, that in turn may be used to improve predictive models and so on.

I am not sure where the problem is. I only skimmed the article and from what I saw it appears the authors observed a long-lasting antibody response (which was the goal of their work). However the associated T-helper cell response was not found.

I guess you are looking for a coomassie type prestain? I do not use them myself, but you essentially you can use coomassie under acidic conditions to your sample. Check out Judd 1979 Analytical Biochemistry as an example.

Actually I think that it is one of the strengths (and quite possibly also weakness) of the former German system. You do not declare a major as such, but you decide what you study beforehand, which results kind of a fixed curriculum. So as a biology student you got basic physics, mathematics and chemistry (with lab courses as appropriate), but also had to have genetics, zoology, botany, microbiology and so on. In the second two fourth semester you got to choose e.g. between in-depth courses in either biological discipline. Quite often there is a slight split between molecular biology courses and more "whole-organism" biology. There was no bachelor after that but you had to finish four more semester of the so-called main studies. These basically consisted on roughly month-long lab courses on a specific subject (e.g. ethology of ponies, song learning in zebra finches, bacterial proteomics, etc.), four days a week, 9 hours a day. And usually one day with lectures, mostly accompanying these courses. The advantage is of course that as a biologist in that system you tend to have a well-rounded education in biology and at least the basics in the other natural sciences (which, for most is unfortunately limited to the first four semesters. You could take more in the main studies, but usually only few are offered specifically for biologists). The disadvantage is, of course that you get fixated on biology alone. That is, you are trained to become a biological scientist and get basically primed for an academic career. A bachelor or even master is usually a much broader affair.

That was what I mentioned before. Reviews are a special case. But yeah, impact factors are overall a lousy measure. Unfortunately it is one of the few one really has. Otherwise people of a specific field can rank according to their own measure of prestigious journals (as Severian did), but for certain fields it is not easily applicable.

You can overexpress genes in bacteria. However more often than not the results are not quite what you expect, because e.g. the increase of aconitase will result in further shifts in other enzymes. I am almost sure that it has been done already, but my bet is that there are pleiotropic effects.

In addition to what Mokele said I just wanted to add that the Nature journals overall have an impact of around 10-29. So in specific areas there are higher ranked journals. And as always review journals tend to get a higher impact, however, often they will be treated as a special case.

I am not sure what you envision in detail, because just being able to predict folding, even accurately itself does not necessarily yield meaningful information, much less the creation of a product that can be commercialized. It can at best lead to the formulation of something specific useful properties. But once it is at that stage (whatever it is) I can guarantee that either the process or the product itself will be patented. But again, you do not really need a lot of people to do that.

Problem is that the biotechnology job market is not precisely flooding with jobs. The buzzwords sound good, but in all reality there are not that many jobs around. Even if there was a breakthrough (which will in all likelihood done in an academic basic research institute), chances are that one or two companies acquire the patent or at least production rights and roughly 10 PhDs will get a job in that company (and a larger number of technicians). If it wasn't just fantasy at this point. I will just refer to the biotech boom in the 90s were around 80% of all start ups failed.

Well. It depends on your handwriting a lot. And whether you use words that are in the standard library.

I would expect that uracil RNA would be slightly more flexible than thymine RNA, but I am not sure. There are ways to calculate that, though, if you really wanted.

The thing is, at some point it is about money. Not about getting rich, as some may think, but rather to be able to continue the work one wants to do. For instance, if the goal is getting an academic appointment, the problem is to get a faculty position and eventually tenure. The overall chances are low, even under optimum conditions and the older you get the lower the chances become. Industrial positions may be more viable, if you had already some job experience of some kind. But even there age can be a factor. Again, one has to consider that there is always a realistic chance to be jobless around mid-forty if you try for academia and do not manage to obtain a faculty position by then. It is likely also to be true for industrial positions up to some point. Again, I am not talking about getting rich. I am talking about making a living. You may be interested and hard-working as can be, but if you got no job, a PhD is worth zilch.

I think that was answered a couple of times already. Short answer: DNA does have thymine instead of uracil (you actually have to see it that way) because thymine (which is basically methylated uracil) ensures higher fidelity in DNA as compared to using uracil (which is more promiscuous with regards to base pairing, in addition cytosine can deaminate to uracil, which, if uracil instead of thymine was used in DNA, would lead to a mutation). Fidelity is less a problem in RNA than in DNA.

Hm my first guess was that the reagents were bad and you co-isolated DNA with the RNA. But alcohol precipitation should precipitate RNA as well as DNA. Even if the majority of the precipitate is DNA you will remove all the RNA together with the pellet. Did you already isolate from the same sample volume RNA earlier and got less nucleic acids in your precipitate? It is probably too late already for quantitative analyses, especially if you are using an amplification method downstream (e.g. QPCR or for microarrays). You may want to check what you really got in your pellet, i.e. ensure that it is really DNA or whether there may be cross-contamination by proteins or anything similar. Edit: scratch the protein bit. I somehow missed your 260/280 ratio. 1.9 is actually a good indicator for RNA, especially if using a nanodrop (and if the solution is somwhat acidic). As you are aware the "rule of thumb ratio" for RNA is 2.0 and DNA 1.8. Depending on calibration and acidity of the buffer (as well as ionic strength) I do have found that in the nanodrop the ratio to be closer to 1.9 for RNA. It is hard to evaluate that, though as the ratios are relatively close. But if you had loads of DNA I would actually have expected lower ratio.

Actually I think I stated that in one of the above posts. There is no disagreement regarding physical disabilities and any special accommodations that come with it (e.g. scribe or quiet room). The only point of discussion is whether those with a learning disability of any kind should get additional exam time (and, maybe also how easy this would be exploitable). One possible solution we were discussing wast to get rid of time limitation altogether. If you mean all kinds of exams, that may be. If you are referring to written ones as compared to orals, I am not so sure. I knew people who perform stellar under one but have difficulties in the other.

Apparently that happens all over. I agree. The problem is that they are more time intensive. And it is not easily applicable to early undergrads. In Germany to get a diploma (roughly a masters degree) you had to work around 9 months on an own project and write it up. That was actually the main evaluation point which decides whether you will get a PhD position or not.

800 with only two faculty members? Nasty.

When I was a student the written exams mainly just required you to pass. However the important ones, that is those that count against your diploma were all oral. And there were also a number of "unimportant" orals where you only had to pass. But in Germany these were all lab courses with fewer participants. At least in this Uni (in the US) there are few of those on the undergrad (or even graduate) level. And I am afraid of trying that in a basic class with 80 participants. This is a good idea. When I set up the first exam (for my boss that is) I actually tried to do this, but one is required to use a software here, that only allows you to set up points for the correct answer. Absolutely agree with that. I think at some point most just do not care anymore. It is too much of an hassle, it does not further your career and it is easier just to pull as many students through as possible (and hence get good evaluations) and then select for good candidates on the graduate level. Quite often from overseas, too. I am not sure whether this is a good tactic, but I have the feeling that this is what it boils down to. Especially in research unis in which getting funds is more important than evaluate your students fairly.

That is something I also would like to do. I only see three problems. One is that you do not know whether they actually wrote it. The second one is that it takes more time to correct and evaluate. Well and the third is that you will likely get bad evaluations. While most (undergrad) students complain that it is all only memorization, truth is that most actually feel more comfortable with that kind of lecture/exams. I have talked with an established prof about it and he mentioned that in his younger days he actually tried to set up lectures that were designed to teach concepts and test understanding and use of them. He got the worst evaluation ever and did not try it on undergrad levels anymore. Even on graduate levels it is not that easy. Maybe a mix: only one or two questions that test understanding but a long time-limit (e.g. 6hs) with access to books and other material (in most exams cheat sheets are allowed, anyway). With respect to the op I would still suggest that all would work under the same constraints, even if it is a week. That is, those with a disorder should not return it, say a month later if the others only got one week.

Chomczynski is the acid phenol-chloroform method. Standard phenol-chloroform yields DNA as well as RNA. In fact, this is something that may have happened. One thing to check is whether the pH is right. If it is basic, then the DNA will be coextracted in very high concentrations. And are you sure not to have any protein contaminations? Otherwise it is possible that there is indeed an extremely high DNA to RNA ratio. An easy cleanup would be DNAse digest on silica spin columns. Though each cleanup will result in loss, obviously. But the first thing to do is to check the reagents. Edit: cross posted, but just wanted to add that depending on sample, protocol and intended use not always DNaseI digest is required. But obviously one needs to check it via PCR to be sure.

Even if you sterilize yourself (which is kind of possible) chances are that you will be colonized by the selfsame bacteria. If I recall correctly the microbiota of skin was not that complex and (numerically dominated) by relative small number of genera. Unless your skin properties change rapidly the original biota will form itself again over time.

I might actually agree on this, however shouldn't then all students have more time? It is a weird coincidence that those with extra time all scored above average. If it is correct to state that time should not be an issue in an exam shouldn't all have the opportunity to use their knowledge to the maximum efficiency? Or shorten the exam so that all have the ability to finish in time, regardless of a counselor's report? Shouldn't foreign students get a flat increase because they are not working/learning in their native language? Of course one could still argue that time is in fact a factor. Because you could also test how fast someone understands a question and manages to apply his/her knowledge to solve that. Truth be told, most exams are directed at memorization of some sorts. And just for the record, a colleague of mine is mildly dyslexic. He stated that he had just to study harder than others and wouldn't have had it any other way (of course I am not sure whether he would have said the same, if he was still a student). That is clear. But what I mentioned above is the guideline of the university. Essentially someone just has to perform poorly in aptitude, achievement and information processing in a standardized test. In my opinion the chances for abuse are enormous. Personally I am not sure whether I consider it fair towards the other students. In my uni in Germany we had a first year drop out in Germany of around 50% and then in the second year (where there were big math, chemistry and physics exams) once again 60%. However, in hindsight I assume that most drop outs were simply due to self-selection. That is, the candidates realized that their idea of uni was not quite realistic. While the results are the same technically it is not the uni that is selecting. What I am trying to say is that drop out by own choice is not the same as being selected e.g. with exams or other means. though I am not sure whether that would be a good thing either. I prefer lab performance to see whether someone really understand the lecture. This is rarely feasible, though. And while I am off-topic: in Germany they introduced tuition fees now, but only around 200-500 bucks or so per semester.

Also cloning is often used in different contexts meaning different things. For instance, one definition of cloning is the artificial creation of a population of genetic entities. This is relatively easy done by separating undifferentiated cells, for instance. I think in the US it is legally defined as the asexual reproduction by means of introduction of genetic material from a somatic cell. I am not perfectly sure, though.

CAFFEINE SHOCK DAY! (and yes, it should be all caps.)