The human genome holds an extraordinary trove of information about human development, physiology, medicine and evolution. Here we report the results of an international collaboration to produce and make freely available a draft sequence of the human genome. We also present an initial analysis of the data, describing some of the insights that can be gleaned from the sequence.

/pdf/initial-sequencing-and-analysis-of-the-human-genome-5dapk1rsx1.pdf

Initial sequencing and analysis of the human genome.

https://www.bioinf.uni-leipzig.de/Leere/WS1516/SeqAnalGen/T-Coffee.pdf

T-Coffee: A novel method for fast and accurate multiple sequence alignment.

With the radical changes in information production that the Internet has introduced, we stand at an important moment of transition, says Yochai Benkler in this thought-provoking book. The phenomenon he describes as social production is reshaping markets, while at the same time offering new opportunities to enhance individual freedom, cultural diversity, political discourse, and justice. But these results are by no means inevitable: a systematic campaign to protect the entrenched industrial information economy of the last century threatens the promise of today's emerging networked information environment. In this comprehensive social theory of the Internet and the networked information economy, Benkler describes how patterns of information, knowledge, and cultural production are changing--and shows that the way information and knowledge are made available can either limit or enlarge the ways people can create and express themselves. He describes the range of legal and policy choices that confront us and maintains that there is much to be gained--or lost--by the decisions we make today.

/pdf/the-wealth-of-networks-how-social-production-transforms-4mt4ax3tfp.pdf

The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom

NOTE The report of the Committee without its annexes appears as Official Records of the General Assembly, Sixty-third Session, Supplement No. 46. The designations employed and the presentation of material in this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Secretariat of the United Nations concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area, or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. The country names used in this document are, in most cases, those that were in use at the time the data were collected or the text prepared. In other cases, however, the names have been updated, where this was possible and appropriate, to reflect political changes. Scientific Annexes Annex A. Medical radiation exposures Annex B. Exposures of the public and workers from various sources of radiation INTROdUCTION 1. In the course of the research and development for and the application of atomic energy and nuclear technologies, a number of radiation accidents have occurred. Some of these accidents have resulted in significant health effects and occasionally in fatal outcomes. The application of technologies that make use of radiation is increasingly widespread around the world. Millions of people have occupations related to the use of radiation, and hundreds of millions of individuals benefit from these uses. Facilities using intense radiation sources for energy production and for purposes such as radiotherapy, sterilization of products, preservation of foodstuffs and gamma radiography require special care in the design and operation of equipment to avoid radiation injury to workers or to the public. Experience has shown that such technology is generally used safely, but on occasion controls have been circumvented and serious radiation accidents have ensued. 2. Reviews of radiation exposures from accidents have been presented in previous UNSCEAR reports. The last report containing an exclusive chapter on exposures from accidents was the UNSCEAR 1993 Report [U6]. 3. This annex is aimed at providing a sound basis for conclusions regarding the number of significant radiation accidents that have occurred, the corresponding levels of radiation exposures and numbers of deaths and injuries, and the general trends for various practices. Its conclusions are to be seen in the context of the Committee's overall evaluations of the levels and effects of exposure to ionizing radiation. 4. The Committee's evaluations of public, occupational and medical diagnostic exposures are mostly concerned with chronic exposures of …

sources and effects of ionizing radiation

BOLD: The Barcode of Life Data System: Barcoding

For the past 3 months, faculty and staff members at the University of Pennsylvania9s Institute for Human Gene Therapy have been trying to understand why a relatively fit 18-year-old with an inherited enzyme deficiency died on 17 September, 4 days after doctors at Penn injected a genetically altered virus into his liver. Last week, they presented their data to a government advisory committee. The patient was the first in a gene therapy trial to die of the therapy itself; his death is the latest blow to a field that has been struggling to live up to the promise and hype surrounding the first gene therapy trials a decade ago.

Gene Therapy Death Prompts Review of Adenovirus Vector

Gene therapy's growing pains

Thousands of papers have reported results obtained using gene arrays, which track the activity of multiple genes simultaneously. But are these results reproducible?

Getting the Noise Out of Gene Arrays

A flurry of reports and congressional hearings, sparked by the death of a volunteer in a study at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia last fall, are due in the next few weeks. The Penn episode points up a central problem: The field still lacks an ideal vector. Many clinicians fear that support for gene therapy will buckle under the onslaught.

Gene therapy on trial.

For the second time in 4 months, a child has developed a leukemia-like disease after receiving gene therapy at the Necker Hospital for Sick Children in Paris. Concerned about the safety of such trials, the panel that monitors U.S. research in the field scheduled a public meeting this week to review the clinical data and weigh its next steps.

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/sci/299/5605/320.full.pdf

Eliot Marshall

Papers

Gene Therapy Death Prompts Review of Adenovirus Vector

Gene therapy's growing pains

Getting the Noise Out of Gene Arrays

Gene therapy on trial.

Second Child in French Trial Is Found to Have Leukemia