I was recently called by an editor at NewScientist asking for some background on the field of fitness in bacteria, and particularly the issue of multi-resistant bacteria persisting in the environment (or clinic) in the absence of antibiotic selection. The reason for the question arose due to the upcoming publishing of an interesting paper in PLoS Genetics: Silva...

The idea of an enemy sleeper agent is a central plot device in many a spy novel or movie, and certainly the idea of going to ground behind enemy lines is not unheard of in many theatres of conflict. The idea in all cases is to remain undetected until re-activated to cause harm behind enemy defences. The trick to identifying if there are latent sleepers...

Welcome to The Gene Gym on SciLogs.com. I'm going to take great license to wander around numerous areas that overlap, nudge, cajole and nestle up against the main theme of my blog, which is of course bug and drugs. So firstly, a brain dump: A colleague and I once – rather drunkenly – planned a letter to The Lancet [a popular medical journal] in which...

IN the last week Ben Goldacre’s ire has been felt, and rightly so, because what the Ire of Goldacre has been pointing at is a systematic bias in the publication of science and medical information. Ben’s focus relates to the way in which big pharmaceutical companies manipulate an overwhelmingly positive academic publication record, accusing them of selectively...

IMAGINE your excitement as a budding young researcher taking on your first piece of research as part of an undergraduate summer studentship; you're working on a gene that makes a type of medically important bacteria resistant to a key group of antibiotics, the tetracyclines. The gene in question is described in a peer-reviewed specialist journal, but...

When I was an undergraduate you couldn't get a journal article online, about the most you could hope for was a table of contents (ToC). Getting access to scientific articles meant a visit to the library with a photocopy card and a great deal of patience. 'Bagging' a photocopier was an artform in itself - I think everyone thought they knew of a secret,...