Monday, March 9, 2015

Weekly Links March 9 ,2015

“MUST READ”
tags: weeklylinks
o    The junk DNA wars are being waged at the frontiers of biology, but they’re really just the latest skirmish in an intellectual struggle that has played out over the past 200 years. Before Charles Darwin articulated his theory of evolution, most naturalists saw phenomena in nature, from an orchid’s petal to the hook of a vulture’s beak, as things literally designed by God.
DISRUPTION, REVOLUTION
o    At AGBT 2015 the big splash was clearly 10X Genomics and their new technology the GemCode "toaster"; presumably so called because of its diminutive size, and not because your microtitre plate is launched out the top nice and warm! The system is available to order now costing $75K, with a $500 per sample price. Using an input of just 1ng means users can test this even with precious clinical samples. Hopefully the improved structural variant detection 10X are promising will have a significant impact on cancer research, perhaps making translocation   discovery easier.
TOOLS/TECHNIQUES
o    dPCR applications were recently showcased at two CHI events, the Digital PCR Conference in La Jolla and the Molecular Medicine Tri-Conference in  San Francisco. Both events served to highlight the growing importance of this platform in clinical diagnostics.
COMPANIES
o    The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is investing $52 million in CureVac, a German company involved in making vaccines. It is the largest ever investment by the foundation in a company, reflecting a new strategy of not just giving grants but supporting and having a stake in businesses.
The  investment, part of a round of $76 million round for CureVac, will allow the construction of a manufacturing plant
o    Form 10-K/A for THERMO FISHER SCIENTIFIC INC.
o    Annual Report
o    Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) today announced it has extended its distribution channel through a new relationship with Albiogen Ltd., a life science distributor that specializes in next-generation sequencing (NGS), headquartered in Moscow. Albiogen will expand the reach of Illumina's array of next-generation sequencing platforms and solutions across the Russian Federation and Commonwealth of Independent States.
SOMETHING DIFFERENT
o    Setting goals is easy, but prioritizing them is hard. Humans suck at properly weighing what we need to achieve our goals. We take on too much, skip steps, and often, as a result, we give up. Once you commit to a framework to prioritize your goals and cut the junk, achieving your goals gets a lot more realistic. Here's one way to do it.

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