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Registration closes today, Wednesday, August 15, 2012 for the Mouse Molecular Genetics Conference, sponsored by the Genetics Society of America. This is the FINAL date to register for this conference to be held October 2-6, 2012 at the Asilomar Conference Grounds in
Pacific Grove, CA. The Mouse Molecular Genetics Conference is
the leading venue for researchers who apply the methods of genetics and genomics to fundamental problems in mammalian biology, including those related to stem cell biology, early development, and models of human disease. In particular, the meeting showcases the latest technical developments in genetics and engineering of the mouse genome, and this year will feature a session devoted to imaging. For more information and to register, visit the website.
This is the last call for graduate students and postdoctoral researchers who want to develop leadership skills and professional contacts in genetics by applying for early-career leadership opportunities with GSA. Help advise and inform the GSA Board of Directors by serving as an advisory representative to the GSA Board or as a member of one of the Society’s committees. Selected grad students and postdocs will be directly engaged in working with the GSA leadership to develop the Society’s future goals, objectives and activities. Apply online by August 17, 2012.
Congratulations to the four graduate students who received GSA poster awards at the Yeast Genetics and Molecular Biology Meeting, held earlier this month at Princeton University: Birgit Ploier (Graz Univ of Technology, Austria), Zhihao Tan (Inst for Systems Biology and Univ of Washington), Deborah Thurtle (Univ of California, Berkeley),
and Xin Wang (Princeton Univ).
The GSA
Journals
The August 2012 issue of
G3: Genes|Genomes|Genetics is now online.
New articles feature investigations in Arabidopsis,
C. elegans, cotton, Drosophila, fungi, insects, yeast, tomato, and more!
The August issue of
GENETICS
features a new educational resource for genetics instructors called a “Primer.” The first
Primer, written by new Primer Editor
Beth De Stasio, is a companion to a research article also published in the same issue, “A Network of Genes Antagonistic to the LIN-35 Retinoblastoma Protein of
Caenorhabditis elegans,” by
S. R. G. Polley and D. S. Fay. Each Primer
provides guidelines for genetics instructors who want to use contemporary research to teach their students; for example, the first Primer provides background about concepts of reverse genetics and RNA interference (RNAi), suppressor screens, synthetic phenotypes and phenocopy.
For more information and context, please see
the editorial on the new Primer section in the August 2012
GENETICS.
Job Opportunity
The National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has
resumed its search for a new Director to
provide leadership and administrative guidance to the NIGMS. The search committee is co-chaired by Story Landis, Ph.D., Director, National Institute of Neurological Disorders (NINDS) and Eric Green, M.D., Ph.D., Director, National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI).
Applications will be reviewed starting October 1, 2012 and
will continue until the position is filled.
Grants
NIH
has issued the 2013
requests for applications (RFAs) for two NIH-wide
opportunities:
- The
2013 NIH Director's Pioneer Award Program, which supports "individual scientists of exceptional creativity who propose pioneering and possibly transforming approaches to addressing major biomedical or behavioral challenges that have the potential to produce an
unusually high impact on a broad area of biomedical or behavioral research."
Application deadline: October 9, 2012.
- The
2013 NIH Director’s New Innovator Award Program, which "supports a small number of
early stage investigators of exceptional creativity who propose bold and highly innovative new research approaches that have the potential to produce a major impact on broad, important problems in biomedical and behavioral research."
Application deadline: October 17, 2012.
Policy
Congressional leaders from both parties have come to an agreement on a
continuing resolution (CR) that would keep the federal government operating after the beginning of fiscal year (FY) 2013 on October 1, 2012, even though FY 2013 funding bills have yet to be passed. If approved by the House and Senate and signed by President Obama, the CR would enable
continued federal spending through March 30, 2013. This potential agreement applies only to FY 2013 appropriations and would not affect sequestration, which is scheduled to take effect on January 2, 2013, potentially leading to drastic cuts to many federal programs (for example, an anticipated 8-10% cut for NIH extramural funding).
In an editorial earlier this month in
Science, NIH Director Francis Collins reiterated NIH’s support of basic science research. Since 2003, basic science research has received from 53 to 57% of NIH funding annually, and even in fiscally constrained 2012, received 54% of NIH funds. He wrote, “In this time of severe budget constraints, Americans need to know that today’s basic research is the engine that powers tomorrow’s therapeutic discoveries.” Collins also wrote, “The NIH will most assuredly continue its strong tradition of supporting basic research, which it defines as systematic study directed toward fuller knowledge or understanding of the fundamental aspects of phenomena and of observable facts without specific applications in mind.”
Resource
Available
The Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) last month issued the latest article in its
Breakthroughs in Bioscience series, “Conquering Pain and Infection with Drugs from Nature’s Medicine Cabinet.” This article describes the
basic research foundations of the development of natural product-derived medicinal compounds
used in the treatment of pain and infection. The
article is available
online. Print copies also are
available for free for educational or advocacy purposes and
can be ordered online.
The GSA
e-News will be taking a short summer break and will return on
Wednesday, September 5. See you then!
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August Issue
GENETICS
August Issue
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