Translational research was the focus of a feature I wrote for Nature Reviews Drug Discovery (you have to register, but it's free for now). New funding in the UK and the US is meant to build the infrastructure to support the human experimental work necessary to "translate" promising basic research into medical practice. That infrastructure is less about facilities and more about career structure that rewards teamwork and sharing the cost burdens of clinical research.

For Nature, I reported on a diversity in science program at the University of North Carolina that's unusual in two ways: it's been around for 30 years and it supports postdoctoral fellows rather than graduate students. The program's express intent is to groom postdocs for academic research positions, to help universities (especially those in North Carolina) diversify their faculties.

This week I wrote about new treatment options for enlarged prostate, called benign prostatic hyperplasia, for the LA Times, including recent evidence that Viagra and Botox can help. If new drugs -- or new uses for old drugs -- isn't enough for you, check out the related shorts on advances in surgery, lifestyle factors, and herbal medicines, namely saw palmetto. In addition to researching the literature, I learned that urologists are funny. Unfortunately, some of their juicier quotes weren't appropriate for a newspaper audience.

I profiled Marja Makarow, a Finnish scientist who is now leading the European Science Foundation, for Nature. In doing so I learned the word sisu. It refers to a Finnish personality trait -- think resiliency -- that means "the ability to move through stone." Makarow has it. Shouldn't everyone who works in policy?

I wrote several articles for a Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine newsletter. I profiled six "new recruits" for the Dean's Discovery Report (click Spring 08 for PDF), including Steve Negus, a drug abuse researcher I know from my scientist days. I wrote the "patent spotlight," about a chemist who makes marijuana-like compounds and has brought in more licensing revenue to the university than anyone else. And I wrote the "back page," about a faculty member who was once an auto mechanic and now restores vintage cars.

I profiled Dave Tapolczay, the new chief of technology transfer at the UK's Medical Research Council (MRC), for Nature. This is no small shakes, as licensing revenue from MRC intellectual property ran to $92 million last year, and start-up companies based on ideas developed by MRC-supported scientists the (17 in the last two decades) create both jobs and revenue for the country.

I covered a symposium on predictive toxicology, diagnostics, and personalized medicine, all under the rubric of Toxicogenomics for the New York Academy of Sciences. The symposium was fascinating, with five speakers covering a wide array of practical applications of human genetics. For example, using a genetic marker to predict which patients will suffer a serious side effect -- even so-called idiosyncratic ones -- after taking a pharmaceutical. Also in breast cancer patients , predicting who will benefit from chemotherapy and who will not -- and therefore shouldn't be subjected to its side effects. Unfortunately for you NYAS nonmembers, you can only view the opening screen of the web presentation (the e-briefing).

I wrote about artificial sweeteners for the LA Times Health section. My article was a follow-up to a widely reported study in rats that found aspartame-eating rats ate more food and gained more weight than sucrose-eating rats. The study's authors say it's Pavlovian conditioning, a topic near and dear to my heart. I talked to researchers who study obesity in humans for their take on the study and how it might--or might not--apply to us.

I profiled the new head of a new academic consortium in Scotland for Nature. Mike Tyers moved from Canada to lead the Scottish Universities Life Sciences Alliance (SULSA), one of several "pooling" initiatives whereby the universities and the Scottish government fund new research positions and core facilities to foster collaborative research.

I wrote an article for the Los Angeles Times that digs a little deeper into the science of influenza and the flu vaccine. After hearing about the new recommendations for vaccinating all US children for flu every year, as proposed by an advisory panel at the Centers for Disease Control, I wondered, who really dies from flu? As a parent, do I have to worry about this for my relatively healthy kids? I was assigned to write A Closer Look, a column that regularly takes a look at the facts and opinions about topics in the news. With epidemiology -- the main science here -- estimates substitute for facts and opinions are mixed.

I have another careers piece in Science, about drug discovery and development called A Complex Team Sport . It's an overview of what kind of skills and mindset are best suited for a job in drug discovery and development, and what's needed to get hired. Typically these careers are in the pharmaceutical industry, but I also included some government and university programs that train and hire scientists.

My favorite article of the week is Nurturing Women Scientists for Science magazine. It's about institutional efforts to increase the numbers of women in science in both academia and industry. What used to be a pipeline problem (fewer women with science degrees) has become a hiring and retention problem. Women in science is a perennial feature for the magazine and I've read many of them over the years. I was pleased to have the opportunity to write it.

I profiled Sir Leszek Borysiewicz a couple weeks ago in Nature. He's the new head of the Medical Research Council in the United Kingdom (analogous to the US National Institutes of Health).

I covered a scientific conference on Inflammation in the Central Nervous System for the New York Academy of Sciences about the double-edge nature of the immune system. With very different examples, the three speakers described how therapies targeting immune function produce problematic effects, secondary consequences of tinkering with a very complex system. (Only the introductory page is accessible to nonmembers.)

I wrote two stories for my local newsweekly, the Spotlight. One piece was about online dating (but it's not available online!). It was part of a package on finding love; the reporter I partnered with, Jennifer Farnsworth, wrote about speed dating and other offline ways to meet people. A second piece profiled a military catholic boys school here in Albany: the Christian Brothers Academy. I spoke to Brother Aloysius who has work at the school for 50 years (talk about perspective).