How to succeed in science: a concise guide for young biomedical scientists. Part II: making discoveries

Making discoveries is the most important part of being a scientist, and also the most fun. Young scientists need to develop the experimental and mental skill sets that enable them to make discoveries, including how to recognize and exploit serendipity when it strikes. Here, I provide practical advice to young scientists on choosing a research topic, designing, performing and interpreting experiments and, last but not least, on maintaining your sanity in the process.     

How to succeed in science: a concise guide for young biomedical scientists. Part I: taking the plunge

Biomedical research has never been more intellectually exciting or practically important to society. Ironically, pursuing a career as a biomedical scientist has never been more difficult. Here I provide unvarnished advice for young biomedical scientists on the difficulties that lie ahead and on how to find the right laboratories for training in the skills that you will need to succeed. Although my advice is geared towards succeeding in the United States, many aspects apply to other countries.     

Starving to succeed

Cancer cells rely on the efficient and effective turnover of cell signaling molecules to ensure their continued survival, and hence depend on specific amino acids (AAs) for their growth and metastatic capabilities. This dependence has been exploited by the recent, successful development of the proteasome inhibitor, bortezomib, which inhibits the degradation of proteins; and suggests that inhibitors of other essential steps in the mechanisms of cellular protein turnover may provide novel therapeutic targets. The provision of free AAs within cancer cells is controlled by aminopeptidases which are responsible for the cleavage of AAs from the amino terminus of proteins or peptides. Recent studies have demonstrated that the expression of aminopeptidases is upregulated in cancer cells compared to normal cells, providing a rationale for further study and development of clinical grade aminopeptidase inhibitors.     

How to (or not to) communicate science

Protagonists for 'the public understanding of science' still sometimes fail to recognize that there is also a need for 'the scientists' understanding of the public' and that for most of science most of the time we are all public. 'Science' is communicated to 'the public' through popular books, museums, TV, the Internet, but far too often the present state of scientific belief is presented uncritically as the onward march of truth as discovered by Euro-American males. This has contributed to a widespread public concern, if not mistrust, in many areas of science, not least genetics and neuroscience. Although researchers often criticize the media for misrepresenting their work, the hype and simplifications often begin with the press releases put out by the researchers, their institutions and the scientific journals themselves. I conclude by looking more optimistically at the ways in which, by bringing natural science into theatre, novels and other art forms, the fragmentation of our culture may be diminished.     

How to eradicate fraudulent statistical methods: statisticians must do science

The two steps necessary for the clinical expression of a mutagenic disease, genetic damage and viability, are countervailing forces and therefore the dosage response curve for mutagens must have a maximum. To illustrate that science is common sense reduced to calculation, a new mathematical derivation of this result and supporting data are given. This example also shows that the term "context-free" is a snare and a delusion. When statistical methods are used in a scientific context where their assumptions are known to fail and where there is a reasonable presumption of intent to deceive, they are fraudulent. Estimation of low-level mutagenic risks by linear extrapolation from high-dose data is one example of such a method that is widely used by Executive Branch agencies. Other examples are given of fraudulent statistical methods that are currently used in biomedical research done by or for U.S. government agencies. In the long run, it is argued, the surest way to eradicate such fraud is for biostatisticians to do their own science.     

How science will help us move forward in 2021

In 2021, the genetics and genomics community needs to communicate to policymakers how the field of human genetics and genomics is transforming biomedical research and medicine, including its essential role in combatting COVID-19. This is important for ensuring that policies enable a thriving scientific enterprise and provide resources for research advances.

In 2021, the genetics and genomics community needs to communicate to policymakers how the field of human genetics and genomics is transforming biomedical research and medicine, including its essential role in combatting COVID-19. This is important for ensuring that policies enable a thriving scientific enterprise and provide resources for research advances.     

How academic biologists and physicists view science outreach

Scholars and pundits alike argue that U.S. scientists could do more to reach out to the general public. Yet, to date, there have been few systematic studies that examine how scientists understand the barriers that impede such outreach. Through analysis of 97 semi-structured interviews with academic biologists and physicists at top research universities in the United States, we classify the type and target audiences of scientists' outreach activities. Finally, we explore the narratives academic scientists have about outreach and its reception in the academy, in particular what they perceive as impediments to these activities. We find that scientists' outreach activities are stratified by gender and that university and disciplinary rewards as well as scientists' perceptions of their own skills have an impact on science outreach. Research contributions and recommendations for university policy follow.     

Chimpanzees fail to plan in an exchange task but succeed in a tool-using procedure

Planning has long been considered a uniquely human capacity. Lately, however, it has been shown that apes and a corvid species act now to derive a material future benefit. Since primates are highly social animals and their sociality is considered a strong selective force that resulted in complex cognitive capacities, planning is also expected in social situations. Unfortunately, prompting from social partners cannot be excluded in a social setting. Therefore, we controlled for this factor by testing the capacity to plan in chimpanzees using an exchange paradigm, that involves both a material and a social component, and a tool-use paradigm, similar to the one used on two other ape species. All chimpanzees failed to plan in the exchange task, but three individuals showed planning behavior in the tool-use task. Our methods controlled for the fact that chimpanzees were not prompted by the visibility of the reward at the moment of planning and also could not repeat a previously acquired routine. The best interpretation for our results is that chimpanzees can plan. However, planning was limited to the situation where the action to attain the future benefit only depended on a chimpanzee's own behavior.     

Data-intensive science applied to broad-scale citizen science

Identifying ecological patterns across broad spatial and temporal extents requires novel approaches and methods for acquiring, integrating and modeling massive quantities of diverse data. For example, a growing number of research projects engage continent-wide networks of volunteers ('citizen-scientists') to collect species occurrence data. Although these data are information rich, they present numerous challenges in project design, implementation and analysis, which include: developing data collection tools that maximize data quantity while maintaining high standards of data quality, and applying new analytical and visualization techniques that can accurately reveal patterns in these data. Here, we describe how advances in data-intensive science provide accurate estimates in species distributions at continental scales by identifying complex environmental associations.     

How to Push Forward Science and Technology in China——About Research, Development，and Technological Innovation

It is out of question that China has achieved considerable advancements in science and technology. The worldwide spread of ＂Made in China＂ that gets on the western countries＇ nerves is a good illustration. However, although comparatively better than some other developing countries, we have to face the situation that science and technology in such a great nation as China is still seriously lagged behind, lacking great breakthroughs and top-ranking masters and leaders. That＇s why we feel uneasy in front of international colleagues.     

Sinister strategies succeed at the cricket World Cup

Left-handers occur at unexpectedly high frequencies at top levels of many interactive sports. This may occur either because left-handed contestants are innately superior or because they enjoy a negatively frequency-dependent strategic advantage when rare relative to right-handers. We analysed the batting records from the 2003 cricket World Cup and showed that left-handed batsmen were more successful than right-handers, and that the most successful teams had close to 50% left-handed batsmen. We demonstrate that this was because left-handed batsmen have a strategic advantage over bowlers, and that this advantage is greatest over bowlers that are unaccustomed to bowling to left-handers. This provides a clear mechanism for negative frequency-dependent success of left-handed batsmen. Our results may also support a historical role for negative frequency-dependent success in fights and other contests in the maintenance of left-handedness by natural selection.     

Contributing more to science

Scientists have a crucial role in educating the public about the importance of science if we are to have any hope of facilitating future innovation. A few notable scientists have taken this duty to heart, altering their career tracks to promote science and education.