Next week, in the first major contest of the 2020 U.S. presidential campaign, Democratic Party voters in Iowa will pick the candidate they want to face off against President Donald Trump. One of the top contenders, Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, has come out with a proposal to keep so-called junk science, supported by industry, out of federal policy decisions. Many…
Meet Lea Starita, a Seattle-based genome scientist who is working to understand how our individual genes impact our health. Here, she answers some questions about her work. Dr. Lea Starita is a research assistant professor of genome sciences at the University of Washington, as well as co-director of the advanced technology lab at the Brotman Baty Institute for Precision Medicine.…
Under the agreement, the Coriell Institute for Medical Research will continue to store, distribute Allen Cell Collection The Allen Institute has extended its contract with the Coriell Institute for Medical Research for the storage and distribution of its Allen Cell Collection, a cutting-edge collection of gene-edited human induced pluripotent stem cell lines. This collection was launched in 2016 with five cell…
attaaaggtt tataccttcc caggtaacaa accaaccaac tttcgatctc ttgtagatct … That string of apparent gibberish is anything but: It’s a snippet of a DNA sequence from the viral pathogen, dubbed 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), that is overwhelming China and frightening the entire world. Scientists are publicly sharing an ever-growing number of full sequences of the virus from patients—53 at last count in the Global…
The human gene catalogue is essentially complete, but we lack an equivalently vetted inventory of bona fide human enhancers. Hundreds of thousands of candidate enhancers have been nominated via biochemical annotations; however, only a handful of these have been validated and confidently linked to their target genes. Here we review emerging technologies for discovering, characterizing and validating human enhancers at…
In another blow to the decades-long quest for an HIV vaccine, researchers are pulling the plug on the largest ongoing clinical trial after a review in January found the experimental injections provided no protection from the virus that causes AIDS. The $120 million study, conducted by the HIV Vaccine Trials Network (HVTN) based at Seattle’s Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, was launched…
Next week, many of the world’s most distinguished scholars, researchers and thinkers will descend on Seattle to discuss leading-edge research and current thinking on some of the most critical public issues of our time. The 186th annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, to be held in and around the Washington State Convention Center from Feb. 13-16, offers…
For those who track cancer statistics, this year started off on a positive note with word that lung cancer deaths continue to decline in the United States [1]. While there’s plenty of credit to go around for that encouraging news—and continued reduction in smoking is a big factor—some of this progress likely can be ascribed to a type of immunotherapy,…
Growing up at a United Nations refugee camp in Kenya, Abdiasis Hussein recalls waking up at 5 a.m. to wait in line at a water station. Chatting with his friends animatedly as he waited, Hussein collected about five to 10 gallons of water to last his family of 12 for the day. While the food ration provided enough for his…
Medical researchers at the University of Washington are receiving a new boost to get their ideas off the bench and into the public domain. A new center is being created with $4 million in matching funds from the National Institutes of Health for promising biomedical discoveries. The Washington Entrepreneurial Research Evaluation and Commercialization Hub (WE-REACH) will provide project funding to fuel four…
