Cataloguing the Gene Expression Patterns of Dental Plaque Biofilms: A Reference Dental Plaque Transcriptome

The RNA-Seq method has been widely adopted as an alternative to the use of DNA microarrays. In most contexts, the RNA-Seq method is implemented when a single reference organism is being studied. Our project endeavored to establish working methods to enable the generation of cDNA libraries that were...

Surrogate Methods for Profiling Species of the Oral and Gut Microbiome

We engaged in an effort focused on alleviating a substantial barrier facing the human microbiome research community. While powerful, the 16S rDNA gene is insufficiently divergent to allow discrimination of many species and essentially no strains present within communities. The increasing costs of...

The Mobile Lab Is Going to Sunny San Diego

Late one evening in January 2006, the mobile lab pulled into the parking lot at 9704 Medical Center Drive. It was such an exciting evening! Within a few days, we had all the lab supplies on it and began visiting students. The first school in the Washington Area was Patapsco Middle School in Howard...

The Hill School: Day 2

The day started early Tuesday with first period.  Thirty eager students arrived on the bus to determine the results of the amplification of the DNA they extracted the day before.  The PCR ran overnight, copying part of a conserved gene in plants, RuBisCo, that can be used to identify the...

The Hill School: Day 1

The day started early with reagent and lab preparation before we even left for school OR had coffee. We expected to do over 100 DNA Extractions as the first step in the DNA Barcoding. We arrived on campus as the first period was starting –we didn’t have class until after...

The Mobile Laboratory Hits the Road

After a hiatus this summer, the Mobile Laboratory hit the road again today for a trip to Pottstown, Pennsylvania.  Driving through the rolling hills of northern Maryland into southeastern Pennsylvania, it passed small towns and beautiful foliage.  Tomorrow and Tuesday, we will be working...

Sequencing of high yield influenza reassortants at JCVI

As part of the Influenza Genome Sequencing Project, JCVI will be sequencing a large number of high yield influenza reassortants created in the lab of Dr. Doris Bucher at New York Medical College. Dr. Bucher’s lab has prepared the type A H3N2 high yield reassortants  (hyrs) for the influenza...

What Happened to Sorcerer II?!?!

The last time I wrote a Sorcerer II blog was in November when we set sail from Spain to cross the Atlantic Ocean. For all of you that have been worried that we have been at sea for 8 months, relax we made it!! Over the next few days I will update everyone on what has happened and the upcoming plans...

Podcast on Human Genomics

The 2011 Festival of Ideas themed, The Pursuit of Identity, Landscape, History, and Genetics, is held every other year in Melbourne, Australia to inspire scholars and citizens alike in topics ranging from literature and art to science and foreign policy.  JCVI Professor of Genomic Medicine,...

Construction of an Escherichia coli genome with fewer codons sets records

The biggest synthetic genome so far has been made, with a smaller set of amino-acid-encoding codons than usual — raising the prospect of encoding proteins that contain unnatural amino-acid residues.

Public Health is the Next Big Thing at UC San Diego

Researchers have swapped the genome of gut germ E. coli for an artificial one

By creating a new genome, scientists could create organisms tailored to produce desirable compounds

Genetically modified bacteria-killing viruses used on patient for first time

Hair claimed to belong to Leonardo da Vinci to undergo DNA testing

Critics, however, argue that this effort is flawed from the beginning

Students learn about genomics, a life in science, at J. Craig Venter Institute