tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32769132011-04-21T17:03:26.470-04:00LagniappeA medicinal chemist talks (and talks, and talks. . .) Opinions are my own (as far as I can tell!) There's no way my employer would pick me to speak for them.
Dereknoreply@blogger.comBlogger4361100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-928688032003-04-18T22:40:00.000-04:002003-04-18T22:40:20.263-04:00Traffic?
I notice that traffic continues at this site while I get everyone changed over to the new one. If you're reading this, you're not getting the latest, not for weeks now. I've moved the site, and this one won't be updated. For more Lagniappe, go here. Same blog, with a new site and a new name!Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-921082242003-04-06T17:57:00.000-04:002003-04-06T17:58:54.000-04:00Lagniappe has moved! Here's the new site.Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-919837292003-04-04T09:44:00.000-05:002003-04-04T09:44:27.780-05:00Ready To Move
Well, things are just about ready for the changeover. The next couple of days will be devoted to getting some new posts up at the new site, and making sure that everything's working the way it should. Drop by on Sunday night (EST) and I'll have the new URL up and more information. Leaving Blogspot will feel a bit strange, but I'm looking forward to a wider readership (and archives Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-918163652003-04-01T22:35:00.000-05:002003-04-01T22:42:27.000-05:00Beginning of the End?
If reports tonight are to be believed - always a good question - then the final assault on Baghdad may well have started. Who knows how long it will take, but here's hoping that it's short. As Phil Carter's excellent site points out, the whole thing is to make the other army fight on the coalition's terms. A "fair fight" is the absolute last thing you want, since the object Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-916811802003-03-30T21:56:00.000-05:002003-03-30T21:56:17.043-05:00Atmosphere
So far, there hasn't been much in the Iraq conflict that overlaps with what I have made the themes of this site. And that's a good thing (no, I mean a good thing for everyone, not just for those of you who'd have to read it!) No chemical weapons (yet,) no biological ones either (yet.) I'm still half-expecting to see some of this brought out when things get more desperate for the Iraqi Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-915188412003-03-27T21:36:00.000-05:002003-03-27T21:36:47.000-05:00News of the Blog
I'd like to express my appreciation to everyone who keeps dropping by the site. I know that I haven't provided much for your trouble this week, but it's been hard to write about things with the world in the state it's in. I can tell that other blogs are feeling the same internal pressures - it's a strange time. This period is going to have a definite feel to it when we all Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-914516332003-03-26T21:34:00.000-05:002003-03-26T21:35:00.000-05:00Biology, Put to Bad Uses
I mentioned the other day that I haven't covered biological warfare agents in any great detail. For those interested, a good source of what has gone on in this area is the book
Biohazard. It's a truly alarming account of the Soviet biological weapons program written by a Kazakh scientist who held a high position in it.
A good deal of the stuff he recounts in this book Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-914065082003-03-26T07:10:00.000-05:002003-03-26T07:10:02.903-05:00Signal to Noise
Posting will continue to be light here as the war goes on. Here's hoping for a victory as quickly as possible (and, personally, I'm encouraged by how things have gone so far.) Two sources I'm using for breaking news are the blog collective The Command Post and the one-man show The Agonist. These folks are combing pretty much all available sources.
But that brings up a key point:Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-913209912003-03-24T22:19:00.000-05:002003-03-24T22:19:35.996-05:00Cipro in Iraq?
News reports have surfaced that some Iraqi soldiers have been found to be carrying the antibiotic Cipro as part of their kit. This has immediately led to speculation that there is some connection with the possible use of anthrax.
Unfortunately, that can't be ruled out. Iraq most certainly seems to have produced a nightmarish amount of anthrax during its biological weapons program,Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-912565572003-03-23T22:30:00.000-05:002003-03-23T22:30:24.560-05:00How Do You ID a Chemical Weapons Plant?
As I write, there are reports all over the news wires that a suspected chemical weapons facility has been found in Iraq. If this holds up - and there's no certainly that it will, just as there's no certainly about any early reports in any war - how can the presence of these weapons be confirmed?
Well, if there's still some in the pipeline, that's the Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-911258092003-03-21T09:58:00.000-05:002003-03-21T09:58:21.890-05:00Still in War Mode
Like everyone else, I'm spending my time trying to keep up with what's happening. So far, no sign of any chemical or biological components, which is very good news.
I haven't spent much time talking about the latter weapons, except for a post on ricin and its mechanism of action back in the first week of January. It's an even scarier topic than chemical warfare, but (Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-910519952003-03-20T06:07:00.000-05:002003-03-20T06:07:21.996-05:00War Footing
I have several items to write about, but I'm holding off as the Iraq campaign gets under way. That's partly because I assume that everyone is going to be somewhere else keeping up with the news, and partly because I'm going to be occupied keeping up with it myself. To give a local example here at Lagniappe Central, my wife's mother landed in Tehran yesterday afternoon on a Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-909647642003-03-18T21:57:00.000-05:002003-03-18T21:59:49.000-05:00Antisense Ungood
Antisense company Isis Pharmaceuticals had a bad day yesterday. Well, actually, they've probably had several bad days recently, it's just that yesterday the rest of us got to hear about it. The stock had the bad day today. They've been plugging away for years at antisense technology, where a complementary "backwards" strand of nucleic acid is intoduced to gum up the expression ofDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-908961912003-03-17T21:55:00.000-05:002003-03-17T21:58:33.000-05:00France and the European Court
No, despite what the last couple of days have been like around here, this isn't going to be about Iraq (at least, not directly.) A co-worker pointed me to this article at Genomeweb. It's about the EU's Biotech Directive, which is an attempt to get the various member countries in line on matters of biotech policy and intellectual property law.
That's no small order, Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-908347552003-03-16T22:54:00.000-05:002003-03-16T22:54:57.076-05:00Chemical Attack
As we draw closer to the resolution of the Iraq situation, it's time for me to make good on my promise to update the chemical warfare posts that I did last fall (which are here, starting on the post dated Wednesday, Sept. 11. The date was not completely a coincidence.)
I think it quite possible that a military campaign in Iraq would cause Saddam Hussein's forces to use Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-906854152003-03-13T22:04:00.000-05:002003-03-13T22:09:22.000-05:00It's Here, Too
I've noticed that my traffic is down the last week or two, off a good 20%. And although this hasn't been the most content-heavy week in Lagniappe history, I'm assuming that the reason for the decline is the impending war, for which this blog isn't really a source of information.
It's hard not to write about it. I didn't have this site going before September 11, but it's easy to Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-906270882003-03-12T22:24:00.000-05:002003-03-12T22:24:36.936-05:00Vaxgen and Its Numbers
The March 7 issue of Science has a summary of Vaxgen's presentation of their HIV vaccine results, under the discouraging headline of "Vaccine Results Lose Significance Under Scrutiny." The contents of the article will hold few surprises for readers of the posts here from the last week of February. The pitfalls of subgroup analysis are discussed, sometimes in exactly the Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-905851832003-03-12T08:39:00.000-05:002003-03-12T08:39:24.530-05:00Welcome Back
Paul Orwin, on the blogroll at left, has landed a faculty position and is back to blogging after a hiatus of several months. I'm always glad to see a dormant site return to life.Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-905599872003-03-11T21:27:00.000-05:002003-03-11T21:28:53.000-05:00A Quick One
Blogging time is in short supply tonight. Work and home are keeping me busy, and my blog items are part of the slack that disappears under those conditions.
I continue to get regular hits on this site from Baghdad, at least according to Geobytes. I'm now wondering if this is some Western journalist posted there. I wouldn't mind an e-mail from whomever it might be, since I'm quite Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-904966902003-03-10T22:06:00.000-05:002003-03-10T22:06:35.810-05:00I Claim Stuff That's Good For What Ails You
The U. of Rochester patent defeat that I wrote about on Friday has some pretty interesting implications for Ariad's attempt to sew up the NF-kB transcriptional pathway. Much as I'd like for Rochester to have lost on general principles, the general principle that you can patent medical methods of treatment (and entire biological pathways) remains intact.Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-904299282003-03-09T21:15:00.000-05:002003-03-09T21:18:24.000-05:00Couldn't Resist
My post on Scifinder and modern literature searching the other day reminds me of a story. Back in about 1985 or so, I became the grad student in my group who searched CAS (Chemical Abstracts Service) Online. We got a 90% discount, but it was still considered something that the boss wasn't going to let everyone go wild with.
As I mentioned, trying this out for the first time, I Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-902763542003-03-06T21:46:00.000-05:002003-03-06T21:48:56.000-05:00Holy Mackerel
Well, according to my Geobytes data, I had a hit on this site Tuesday from. . .Baghdad. I only wish I could have seen it in my referral log to see what led them here. . .I'm picturing the Google strings now. . .Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-902751902003-03-06T21:24:00.000-05:002003-03-06T21:34:10.000-05:00What's A Patent Buy You?
There have been some very large sums transferred over the answer to that question. Yesterday's decision in the long-running dispute over the University of Rochester's COX-2 patent may be ready to join the list. That's the enzyme behind money-spinners like Vioxx (from Merck) and Celebrex (now Pfizer's.)
It's beyond doubt that the university team discovered the enzyme, andDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-902742792003-03-06T21:06:00.000-05:002003-03-06T21:08:13.000-05:00Ker-thunk. Ker-thunk. Ker-thunk.
Schering-Plough was out with yet another revised earnings forecast. I've lost count of how many times they've done this in the last few months, but it's easy to remember what direction they've all been. (I have some SGP stock; believe me, it's easy to remember. It's a rule, by the way, that every time at least one financial news source has to run the news under Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-902120192003-03-05T21:32:00.000-05:002003-03-05T21:37:55.000-05:00Life of a Salesman
Unfortunately, I'm even more pressed for time tonight than I was last night. I have to present details of a project tomorrow to various higher-ups, which is always a bit of a tightrope act. After all, every drug research project has potentially fatal problems. Really, all of them do. It's just a question of whether any of these are going to grow to the size that they'll be Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-901500312003-03-04T21:37:00.000-05:002003-03-04T21:39:54.000-05:00Old Paper
Little time to blog this evening - I've got some work to do here at Lagniappe Control, and I'm going to work early tomorrow to prepare some spiffy-looking overheads. At least, they're supposed to be. This is another time when it would be convenient to be able to talk about my work, because it's touched recently on several very interesting points. Unfortunately, a long discussion of Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-900865142003-03-03T21:43:00.000-05:002003-03-05T21:39:50.000-05:00Ready For These?
Robert Staendart from the University of Illinois at Chicago writes that the graphics from the Ready.gov site include some chemical structures, and they're interesting choices. On the page that link takes you to is a compound that would probably be made from 4-piperidinone, an intermediate that's an old friend of mine (and to many other medicinal chemists.) This structure is Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-900269752003-03-02T21:49:00.000-05:002003-03-02T22:04:23.000-05:00Another New One!
I can strongly recommend Living Code, a new blog on the Corante site. The author is a former Immunex employee who definitely knows what he's talking about, both on the science and the pharma-business end. Welcome!
(And while adding that one to the blogroll at left, I fixed the link to N.Z. Bear, who's at a new address.)Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-900265462003-03-02T21:40:00.000-05:002003-03-02T21:51:27.000-05:00Insider Stuff, From Outside
It's been a while since I wrote about Imclone. The ongoing story, as many will recall, has Merck KGaA (no relation to the US Merck) using their drug, Erbitux, in a colorectal cancer trial in Europe. On Friday, the Wall Street Journal ran an interesting piece pointing out that Imclone's stock has run up 43% since the end of January. You'll have noticed that this Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-898773372003-02-27T22:02:00.000-05:002003-02-27T22:02:52.950-05:00Turncoats
There are some other interesting approaches to treating HIV that relate to the ones I spoke about yesterday. I went into the topic of using RNA interference to go after the CCR5 receptor, which seems to be a very important cell-surface protein involved in infection by most strains of HIV. As I mentioned, the researchers had to administer heaps of the siRNA ("small interfering RNA") to Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-898146212003-02-26T22:31:00.000-05:002003-02-26T22:31:23.873-05:00The Latest RNA News
Regular readers will know that to me, that's an exciting headline. Yep, I live in my own world, a fact that my wife will cheerfully corroborate.
But this could be worth getting excited about; at the very least, it's the beginning of something that eventually will be worth it. I've mentioned RNA interference (RNAi) before on the site (see January 21,) as well as my conviction Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-897739432003-02-26T08:37:00.000-05:002003-02-26T08:37:41.030-05:00Fun With Clinical Data
Regarding Vaxgen's data, reader Ted Arrowsmith points out:
"The analysis by racial group appears to be post-hoc; if not the researchers should have stratified by race (I don't know if they did or not) and performed separate sample-size calculations and accrual totals (which they clearly did not). We don't know how many subgroup analyses the investigators did, but Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-897491162003-02-25T21:22:00.000-05:002003-02-25T21:22:57.310-05:00More On Vaxgen
Greeting to the Instapundit referral hordes. I have a few more things to say about this trial, actually.
For one thing, Vaxgen is also trying out this immunization in Thailand, with results expected in the next few months. This trial is targeted on transmission of HIV in intravenous drug abusers. It'll be interesting to see if the effects in their Asian subgroup translate into a Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-896849082003-02-24T21:54:00.000-05:002003-02-24T21:58:55.000-05:00A Tough One, One of Many
Now, why different ethnic groups should respond so differently to Vaxgen's immunization is a complete mystery. I'm no immunologist, but nothing I know suggests an immediate good explanation for this effect. At the same time, it's certainly not an impossible thing to see, either.
NPR had someone on this evening who worked in Vaxgen's patient enrollment for this trial, andDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-896839662003-02-24T21:39:00.000-05:002003-02-24T21:41:21.000-05:00HIV Vaccines - One Down?
Today's Vaxgen news of a failed vaccine trial is discouraging, but I don't think that it's quite as bad a blow as some of the press coverage makes it seem. It's certainly bad news, don't get me wrong - bad for everyone at risk for infection, and bad, on a smaller human scale, for the Vaxgen researchers (and shareholders.) But the good news is that this isn't the most Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-896298362003-02-23T21:45:00.000-05:002003-02-23T21:45:07.473-05:00More News
Medpundit has a good take on another Times story, on Bayer's problems with Baycol (and with lawyers.) I'll defer to her rather than comment myself.Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-896292982003-02-23T21:35:00.000-05:002003-02-23T21:42:37.000-05:00For Example
Today's NY Times has an article on Novartis, pointing out how they seem to be working to make Basel a one-pharma town. I remember those long-ago pre-1996 days when there were three large companies there. In fact, I had an interview in Basel with Ciba-Geigy back in 1989, and a good meal in their executive dining room, too. Last time I've ever had buendnerfleisch. (If you order it from Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-894760512003-02-20T23:12:00.000-05:002003-02-20T23:14:16.000-05:00Microwave Update
I've had several messages from around the pharmaceutical industry (and several notable silences from companies that I know I have readers in.) Overall, it looks like several places do indeed use (and like) the microwave reactors. No word on explosions, so I'm assuming that one-per-week is an exaggeration. They're far from universal, but they aren't unknown.
I suspect the Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-894090052003-02-19T22:41:00.000-05:002003-02-20T06:38:24.000-05:00Microwaves - Got One?
Another item from the same issue of Nature is on the use of microwave ovens in chemistry. This has been kicking around for years; I remember the odd paper showing up in the mid-1980s. Back then, as the article correctly points out, people just used kitchen microwave units. You'd seal up your flask, toss it in, and blast away on the "reheat" or "cook" settings. Needless to Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-893487832003-02-18T22:34:00.000-05:002003-02-19T21:54:10.000-05:00The Dose Makes the Poison, And How
There's an extraordinary article in the February 13th issue of Nature (p. 691) from two toxicologists, Edward Calabrese and Linda Baldwin, at UMass-Amherst. It'll be the start of some very interesting arguments. It's about dose-response, which I've written about several times on this site. That's because the subject is never far from a medicinal chemist's mind: Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-892790862003-02-17T22:07:00.000-05:002003-02-17T22:11:16.000-05:00These Times
Well, I managed to hose my post tonight on this subject, and there's no time to redo it. The major scientific journals have agreed to look out for information that might be useful to someone wanting to committ bioterrorism, and are going to find ways not to publish it. It's a sad comment on the way things are, but it really is the way things are. As I mentioned last week, I've had theDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-892778392003-02-17T21:45:00.000-05:002003-02-17T21:45:10.490-05:00New Additions
Wecome to the blogroll at left these sites: Coffeeblog, Defense Tech, and Beauty of Gray. And I've finally fixed the link to Max Power and company.Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-892767442003-02-17T21:21:00.000-05:002003-02-17T21:21:25.540-05:00Hmmm
I seem to be getting an awful lot of Google hits for "ricin" and variations thereof these days.This is all just honest curiosity, right? I wouldn't mind an e-mail or two assuring me that that's what it is. . .Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-892168662003-02-16T22:10:00.000-05:002003-02-16T22:11:01.000-05:00It's Just This Chromium Switch Here. . .
I've been wrestling with a complicated, rather expensive piece of equipment at work the last few days. I know I won't get much sympathy from physics types, who have to build all their own stuff for the most part. How can I complain, they're asking, about shiny boxes in matching color schemes, set up by a factory representative, complete with volumes of Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-890686572003-02-13T21:59:00.000-05:002003-02-14T05:01:22.000-05:00Stay Out of Your Basement
Little time to blog this evening, unfortunately. I do have another place to send you, though. Charles Murtaugh has some sensible tips on how to interpret all this duct tape advice we've been hearing. None of them would make for an exciting segment on talk radio or an all-news channel, though, so you're not likely to see anything like this from those sources. Stick with Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-890099402003-02-12T22:06:00.000-05:002003-02-12T22:06:00.013-05:00Is It Time to Buy the Stuff?
The CEO of Transkaryotics announced this week that he's stepping down. I've written several times about TKTX; they're an interesting company in many ways. But they've had some rough going recently, with their hammering at the FDA over their Fabry's disease treatment, and the protracted lawsuit with Amgen. Even if they eventually win that one (a big if,) it might turn Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-889496412003-02-11T21:59:00.000-05:002003-02-11T21:59:13.986-05:00Serves Me Right
No sooner do I get through talking about how I don't use quantum mechanics much then up pops an interesting chemistry application. I know, all of chemistry is an application of quantum mechanics, but this is a bit more direct. It's a paper in the latest issue of Science (Feb 7, p. 867) on the rearrangement of a substituted four-membered ring, a cyclobutane. There's a carbene rightDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-888901632003-02-10T22:30:00.000-05:002003-02-10T22:30:48.786-05:00Something New Under the Sun
Well, under the fluorescent lights, anyway. There's a very interesting experiment reported in the January 29th issue of the Journal of the American Chemical Society (my biologist wife took advantage of a pause in my speech when I announced this, to ask if that was the news all by itself.)
Peter Schultz's group at Scripps has been working for some years now on Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-888274462003-02-09T21:53:00.000-05:002003-02-09T21:53:14.320-05:00Current Events
This blog sort of rolls right along in its scientocentric world, but here at Lagniappe HQ (on the second floor of the scenic Lagniappe Building) I do notice that there are larger stories in the world at the moment.
So I'm working on an update to my chemical warfare posts of last fall, as sort of a quick-reference guide should one be needed - which I most certainly hope it isn't. Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-888268172003-02-09T21:40:00.000-05:002003-02-09T21:40:48.416-05:00Update - The Shapes of Large Molecules
In response to my recent statements about how the structures of proteins don't exactly leap into one's memory, I received the following from Beth Skwarecki over at Loxosceles:
. . .the *exact* structure maybe not, but the simplified diagrams are pretty
memorable. I can tell you without looking that TBP looks like a saddle,
reverse transcriptase looks like aDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-886847632003-02-06T22:29:00.000-05:002003-02-06T22:30:07.000-05:00Back in the Fold
This week, there's an encouraging report of an entirely new therapeutic class of molecules. And they deal with a disease mechanism that's almost never been successfully attacked, so this is good news on several levels.
I mentioned the other day that when large molecules (like proteins) start to fold back on themselves, organic chemists like me start to head for the exits. That'sDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-886237202003-02-05T21:22:00.000-05:002003-02-05T21:22:05.366-05:00How Dare They Buy Low?
Yesterday's Wall St. Journal had an update on Merck's attempt to buy its Japanese partner, Banyu. Japan's a very big market for pharmaceuticals, and all the major companies want to have a presence - Merck has owned 51% of Banyu for a long time now. There are several deals like this between Japanese companies and outside firms - Abbott and Takeda, Roche and Chugai, etc. You Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-885664632003-02-04T21:48:00.000-05:002003-02-04T21:48:47.253-05:00More SSTO Info
Before leaving the aerospace field, for now, I'd like to mention that anyone who wants to learn more about single-stage-to-orbit launch vehicles can start here over at Jerry Pournelle's site. An interesting discussion!Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-885663962003-02-04T21:47:00.000-05:002003-02-04T21:47:35.160-05:00In the Details
Charles Murtaugh discusses Texas Tech's Michael Dini, the professor who's refusing to recommend students unless they believe in the theory of evolution. I've stayed away from this story, but my views match up very well with the ones in his post. I think it's scientifically unwise to refuse to credit evolution; there's just too much evidence. But in many medical fields, your resultsDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-885078712003-02-03T21:50:00.000-05:002003-02-03T21:53:30.000-05:00Pharma Patents, Pharma Prices
There's a very interesting essay ("Animal Pharm") by Thomas Fuller over at his site, covering the topic of pharmaceutical patents and how they're viewed. An excerpt:
I believe that one reason we find it easy to swallow the idea of forced licensing of patents is that they constitute ‘merely’ intellectual property. As I mentioned, we are not taking their drugs orDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-885075722003-02-03T21:43:00.000-05:002003-02-03T21:43:54.356-05:00Why is the Shuttle Wreckage Toxic?
NASA has been warning people not to mess with debris from Columbia, citing potential toxic residue. This refers to the propellant used by various attitude systems (the Reaction Control System, or RCS in NASA-speak, and the Orbital Maneuvering Subsystem, OMS.) It's actually two substances, a bipropellant, since that can give you more power per weight than the Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-884494732003-02-02T21:47:00.000-05:002003-02-02T21:47:45.000-05:00Ad Astra
I've been thinking about the implications of Saturday's disaster, and I have to say that I'm lining up with Rand Simberg on this. The Shuttle program is broken, and has been broken for many years now. (Jay Manifold has been on the same wavelength for a long time.) See also Gregg Easterbrook's piece in Time magazine (but see also the critique of it over at Pathetic Earthlings.) Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-883805642003-02-01T11:24:00.000-05:002003-02-01T11:24:33.403-05:00In Memoriam
I don't trust myself to write coherently about the Columbia situation yet. It seems clear that a major structural problem revealed itself in the heat and stress of re-entry - the wing? the thermal tiles? The debris field in Texas will be large, given the speed and altitude, and it could be a while before we get any coherent picture of what might have happened.
Other than the obvious.Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-883024932003-01-30T21:30:00.000-05:002003-01-30T21:30:13.596-05:00Size Matters
I've been working with some biomolecules that are just large enough to stop being recognizable as friends. I obviously can't tell you what they are, or why I'm working with them, but I hope I can get across what makes them odd.
A "normal" molecule, by synthetic organic standards, is one that we can get our hand around. Molecular weight of up to 500 or 600, say. The largest thing Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-882446442003-01-29T22:10:00.000-05:002003-01-29T22:11:01.000-05:00Optimism, And What It's For
I know that Lagniappe isn't a politics and current events site. Anyone coming here the morning after the State of the Union found, uniquely in the world of punditry, an essay on genetically engineered rodents. I assume that no one was surprised, and that people don't stop by here for political commentary. But there are parts of the speech that I find touch on some of Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-881961762003-01-28T23:06:00.000-05:002003-01-28T23:10:03.000-05:00More on Knockouts, For Those Who Care
So, is anyone wondering how you get a gene knocked out in just one specific tissue? Sure you are! (I'll look the other way while anyone who wants to can discreetly make for the exits.)
Tissue-specific knockouts are harder to do than whole-animal ones (and even those aren't really routine, although they're getting closer.) I mentioned the "Cre/lox" system forDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-881960822003-01-28T23:04:00.000-05:002003-01-28T23:04:59.000-05:00Live Long and Prosper
I spoke just the other day about the role of IGF-1 in life span - well, this is a lively area, and now there's another publication that bears on this issue. In the latest issue of Science (299, 572) researchers at Harvard describe another knockout mouse model. In this one, the insulin receptor itself has been taken out, but very selectively: it's only missing in the fat Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-881320682003-01-27T21:34:00.000-05:002003-01-27T21:34:16.926-05:00Making Big Ones Into Even Bigger Ones
News reports the last few days have it that Novartis has upped its stake in Roche to 32.7%. This odd figure is no accident: Swiss securities law (one of those things that I only wish I was in a position to know better) seems to require an effort to buy the company once you cross 33.3%
Novartis has been accumulating shares for some time; it's no secret. But Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-880723672003-01-26T21:11:00.000-05:002003-01-26T21:16:48.000-05:00How Not to Do It - Part of a Continuing Series
Once in a while I take a break from pronouncing on the Big Issues That Affect Our Very Beings and tell a lab story or two. Previous installments can be found on August 29 and May 15. (That last page also has the infamous patent illustration, which is worth a look if you haven't seen it.)
Every organic chemist has a supply of these stories; when a Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-880615042003-01-26T16:25:00.000-05:002003-01-26T16:29:16.000-05:00New Links
I've added a few new links to the blogroll at left. I can recommend the frozen-North opinions of Colby Cosh, the medical insights of Docnotes, and the techno-futurism of the Z+Blog. (That last one is courtesy of Virginia Postrel.)Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-879925892003-01-24T23:26:00.000-05:002003-01-24T23:26:29.956-05:00Food and Population, Revisited
Norman Borlaug, mentioned two days ago, isn't a household name, but he should be. One of my far-flung correspondents sent along a link to a 1997 profile, by Gregg Easterbrook in the Atlantic. It's an excellent summary of his work, and the recent obstacles that have come up to continuing it.
On exactly the same subject, there's an interesting article in today's WallDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-879366172003-01-23T22:49:00.000-05:002003-01-23T22:50:41.000-05:00Making Little Ones Out of Big Ones
The latest issue of Science has an article (299, 350) by researchers at Harvard and NIH titled "What Are the Right Targets for Psychopharmacology?" Longtime readers of this blog (a hardy breed) may recall my cri du couer last February 14th on this subject. These authors lay it all out, and a discouraging picture it is:
It is well known that there is a severe Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-878760312003-01-22T21:48:00.000-05:002003-01-23T09:28:49.000-05:00He Should Know
Today's Wall Street Journal has a fine article from Norman Borlaug, Nobel Prize winner for his "Green Revolution" work, and a good candidate for the person now alive who has done more to alleviate human suffering than any other. It's called "Science Vs. Hysteria," and it takes the European Union (and anti-biotech groups) out in the back yard and beats the dust out of them with a Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-878749942003-01-22T21:26:00.000-05:002003-01-22T21:26:26.486-05:00More on IGF
I've had quite a bit of mail on this subject - I guess the idea of an anti-aging therapy hits a nerve with a lot of people. No venture capitalists have contacted me yet, though. One reader pointed out something I should have thought of: if a company does develop something like this - or any anti-aging therapy - the clinical trials required to show efficacy are going to be a real Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-878210292003-01-21T22:52:00.000-05:002003-01-21T22:54:20.000-05:00Though Some Have Called Thee So
The January 9 issue of Nature has a very interesting article (p. 182) on a subject I've written about before: longevity. (See the August 1, June 3, and May 14 posts.) In 1997, it was shown that (partially) disabling a particular gene in everyone's favorite roundworm, Caenorhabditis elegans ("See-elegans" to its friends) makes them live twice as long. That attractedDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-877851592003-01-21T10:19:00.000-05:002003-01-21T10:19:13.793-05:00A Word From Our Sponsor
Well, that'd be me. I just wanted to mention that I have a column today on TechCentral Station, summarizing the autism/thimerosal controversy.
(I'm at home this morning, thus the rare mid-morning update. This afternoon I'll be back at the Wonder Drug Factory, though.)Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-877600982003-01-20T21:34:00.000-05:002003-01-21T19:23:47.000-05:00Dueling Enzymes
There was a good example last week of the importance of running your clinical trials the right way. (I last spent some time talking about this issue back when Imclone's drug was shot down.) This latest case is even more clear, because it involves virtually the same drug, but from two different companies.
Genzyme and Transkaryotic Therapies had been racing through the approval Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-877065762003-01-19T21:56:00.000-05:002003-01-19T21:56:09.320-05:00Per Bacteria Ad Astra
There's a bacterium called Deinococcus radiodurans that has been puzzling people for a long time now. It's not the cause of any disease (that I'm aware of!) and it doesn't clean up PCBs or extract gold out of seawater. What it can do is survive higher doses of radiation than any other organism. Much higher doses. One thousand times the dose that kills everything else known Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-876168582003-01-17T19:53:00.000-05:002003-01-19T16:44:21.000-05:00As Close to Instapundit as It's Going to Get Around Here
Two updates in one day! Hold on to your hats.
I mentioned the Medpundit discussion on gene therapy below; now Charles Murtaugh has expanded it on his site. Highly recommended. He's right that (so far) it just looks like extraordinarily bad luck that both of these events happened, hitting the same gene. No doubt the retrovirus inserted Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-875861472003-01-17T07:20:00.000-05:002003-01-17T07:21:22.000-05:00Blame Canada?
Over at Asymmetrical Information, Jane Galt has a post inspired by my recent Canadian-reimportation rant below. Her answer to why pharmaceutical companies don't make the economic argument is that they'd almost certainly lose, which could well be right, unfortunately. She followed that up with a vigorous defense of pharma marketing, and a good look at how some of the numbers that areDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-875686862003-01-16T22:08:00.000-05:002003-01-16T22:21:54.000-05:00If You Want Something Done Right. . .
. . .do it yourself, especially if you're waiting for Blogger to fix it. I've manually put in links for my missing archives over to the left, because I can't get the site to do it automatically. It gave up listing them back in October, and no workaround has restored them (even though they still live on the server, fortunately.)
I've also added to and Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-875685202003-01-16T22:04:00.000-05:002003-01-16T22:05:06.000-05:00Lipitor, And How It Got That Way
While I'm linking, I should mention this article at Fortune about Lipitor. That drug is the single reason that Pfizer went after Warner-Lambert a couple of years ago. The article is a good pocket history of the entire class of statins, and a not-atypical look at how blockbuster drugs get discovered and marketed. There's hardly a major drug in the world that hasn'tDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-875682622003-01-16T21:59:00.000-05:002003-01-16T21:59:52.713-05:00Gene Therapy Revisited
I was going to write about the latest troubles with gene therapy (I last wrote on this subject on October 14.) But the discussion between "Dr. Smith" and Charles Murtaugh over at Medpundit is a better place to read up on the topic. Let's hope that this retrovirus vector issue gets straightened out, because it's going to be hard method to replace.Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-875116062003-01-15T22:09:00.000-05:002003-01-15T22:09:14.053-05:00Inhale, By Any Other Name
The former Inhale Therapeutics has officially changed names to Nektar. I can understand the reason for wanting a new name, since the company does more than work on inhaled forms of drugs - but changing from something that means the wrong thing to something that sounds like a destructive alien robot from a 1950s film isn't that big a step up.
Inhale, er, Nektar is more Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-874510202003-01-14T21:36:00.000-05:002003-01-14T21:38:44.000-05:00Idle Hands
Light blogging schedule tonight - taking care of our two children cuts into time for vital stuff like this. My boy is 4-and-a-few-months and asking questions nonstop; a good 40% of his sentences start out "What if. . ." I try to give reasonable answers (although it's not easy when the question is something like "What if a rocket ship fought a velociraptor?" I did mention that he was a Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-874130602003-01-14T06:57:00.000-05:002003-01-14T06:57:32.630-05:00Get Real
So Glaxo SmithKline has become the first major drug company to officially throw down the gauntlet to their Canadian buyers. No doubt most readers are familiar with the whole drug-reimportation issue: many prescription drugs are much cheaper in Canada, by government decree. So, as the slightest knowledge of economics (and human nature) would predict, there's a thriving business in Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-873310422003-01-12T21:29:00.000-05:002003-01-12T21:29:02.103-05:00Easy Parts and Hard Parts
I've been reading George Dyson's interesting history of Project Orion, the late-1950s attempt to design a spacecraft powered by sequential nuclear explosions. (A borderline crazy idea, it very likely would have worked. The big question became whether it should be allowed to work at all.)
He quotes his father, Freeman Dyson, about the early days of the project:
"Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-872722782003-01-11T14:05:00.000-05:002003-01-11T14:05:05.810-05:00Anniversary
I don't usually post on the weekends, but I noticed last night that today (January 11) is the one-year anniversary of Lagniappe. It's been one of those (increasingly frequent!) quick years. I'm glad, but a bit surprised, that I'm still finding enough material to write about. Actually, the supply still looks pretty good. I made a list early on of things that I should get around to Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-871959322003-01-09T21:19:00.000-05:002003-01-09T21:19:28.313-05:00Back in the Stacks
I don't want to give the impression that there are hundreds of gems buried among the papers that no one references. Sometimes no one references them because they're not worth very much, or because no one can get ahold of the actual article. I had a old reference turn up the other day from the local "Proceedings" journal of an obscure Egyptian university - I should have Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-871436452003-01-08T21:40:00.000-05:002003-01-08T21:40:30.423-05:00More Ricin
I've had some interesting e-mail on the subject, which I thought I'd address here for the curious. One person mentioned the possibility of ricin dissolved in DMSO. I have to say that that's a nasty thought, because DMSO certainly does increase skin permeability. But I don't know how soluble a large peptide like this would be - even in DMSO, which is generally a solvent of last resort Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-871431492003-01-08T21:29:00.000-05:002003-01-08T21:29:59.596-05:00The Library of Babel
Spent some quality time in the library at work today, digging into another aspect of a project that I'm working on. As you get deeper into the literature on a given scientific subject, some things happen over and over. There will be articles that everyone refers to, the standards that are like showing a form of ID: "Yes, you can take me seriously, because I'm referring to theDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-870933812003-01-07T22:33:00.000-05:002003-01-07T22:33:26.106-05:00Ricin
There's a report today that British authorities have rounded up several terrorist suspects in London - and that they had small quantities of ricin. So, what is the stuff, how bad is it, where did they get it, and what did they plan to do with it?
Ricin's a protein from castor beans - yep, the same ones used to prepare castor oil. The parent plant is sometimes used as a warm-weather Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-870393802003-01-06T22:12:00.000-05:002003-01-07T22:34:02.000-05:00And Another Thing. . .
I've been staying away from all the Clonaid / Raelian hoo-hah. As soon as I realized who was behind this, I rolled my eyes and braced for the worst. I first read about the Raelians in Donna Kossy's extraordinary book Kooks (which I see is now in a second edition, which I must purchase very soon indeed.) With that as background, it's hard to take anything these people say Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-870382092003-01-06T21:49:00.000-05:002003-01-06T21:49:01.216-05:00Compare and Contrast
Dwight Meredith over at PLA pointed out to me that the UC-Davis study on the prevalence of autism in California is online. It hasn't been published in a journal yet, and the JAMA paper I mentioned last week doesn't reference it. But the editorial comment in the same issue does.
As it should, since there's certainly an issue to be resolved. The Davis authors feel that their Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-869886862003-01-05T22:43:00.000-05:002003-01-05T22:43:00.510-05:00Ratio Rationalizations
We spend a lot of time in drug discovery thinking about ratios. As we accumulate data about our compounds, we start ranking them by how selective they are - "This one's 10x versus the other receptor subtype and that one's 50x," you'll hear someone say, or "We've got to get compounds at least 100-fold over that other enzyme or side effects are going to kill us." Generally Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-868947192003-01-03T17:24:00.000-05:002003-01-03T17:25:07.000-05:00Greetings
. . .to those of you visiting via the Washington Post web site. As you may have gathered from a look around, I'm a medicinal chemist in the pharmaceutical industry, and I spend my time going on about that line of work and science in general. As far as I know, I'm the only person in this position who's blogging - and there aren't too many other scientists in general, actually. You'll Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-868583672003-01-02T22:30:00.000-05:002003-01-02T22:30:16.270-05:00A Prophetic Vision
I seem to be recovering from my virus - of course, saying that so publicly almost ensures that I'll be on my flat on my back in the morning, wheezing at the ceiling and wondering if this is how Gregor Samsa felt.
But at least I have some idea where to get good medicines (although it's going to be a bit of a wait.) Take a look at what Jay Manifold over at A Voyage to Arcturus Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-868579582003-01-02T22:19:00.000-05:002003-01-02T22:21:46.000-05:00The Rate of Autism
There's a new study out in JAMA (free full text here) on the incidence of autism in the US population. Before getting to what the article actually says, it's worth seeing what the media are saying it says. The New York Times headlines it "Study Shows Increase in Autism", and Yahoo runs it as "Study Confirms Marked Rise in Autism."
The AP ("CDC Study Finds Autism To Be Less Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-868076112003-01-01T21:13:00.000-05:002003-01-01T21:13:32.506-05:00Urgh
Light blogging tonight - light everything tonight, because I'm in the grip of some sort of respiratory virus. And there's not much you can do with those except ride them out, unfortunately. (I caught a tremendous one two years ago, just in time to be thoroughly sick for a trip to a Keystone research conference in Colorado. Do not, in case you're thinking about it, fly to a week-long meeting Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-867710622002-12-31T21:41:00.000-05:002002-12-31T21:46:07.000-05:00Happy New Year
No one in my line of work is going to miss 2002. I'll be going into details over the next week or so, but it was mostly one big mudslide in the pharmaceutical industry, from start to finish. We generally don't have two years like that in a row, but y'know, we generally don't have years like this at all, so who knows what 2003 will bring? Here's hoping we do a little statistical Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-867148832002-12-30T17:41:00.000-05:002002-12-30T17:42:53.000-05:00Back on the Air
After a (reasonably) refreshing holiday break, Lagniappe is back. Thanks to everyone who kept doggedly hitting this site during the last few days - I admire your persistance.
I notice from my site's counter that I get a small but steady flow of Google hits for various miracle cures. I said some nasty things about the Budwig flaxseed-oil diet a while back, for example, and I stillDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-864998482002-12-24T21:22:00.000-05:002002-12-24T21:22:14.456-05:00Merry Christmas to All. . .
. . .and to all a good night. I have plenty of presents still to wrap, and a slice of homemade lime pie to eat (have to fortify myself for all the cutting and taping, you know.)
Seasons' Greetings to everyone. I'll try to post a little bit for Friday, but otherwise Lagniappe will resume on Monday (unless some large-scale science or pharmaceutical news crops up.)Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-864153182002-12-22T20:51:00.000-05:002002-12-22T20:51:30.050-05:00Clearance Sale
While I'm on the subject, I'll mention some details that will be familiar to my fellow medicinal chemists. The body has a lot of mechanisms to deal with foreign substances. We assume that all our drugs are going to be handled by them, one way or another, and we just try to keep the stuff around long enough to work. (And that's usually the case - once in a while you'll come across aDereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-864089872002-12-22T17:25:00.000-05:002002-12-22T20:14:44.000-05:00Thimerosal - A Chemical Point
I haven't posted on this issue recently (although I'm working on a column for TechCentral Station,) but Dr. Manhattan has been writing some good pieces on it (check the comments sections for more.)
There's one thing I'd like to add, as an organic chemist. A persistant statement that I see about thimerosal is that it's "49% ethylmercury by weight." This makes it Dereknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3276913.post-863156562002-12-20T07:34:00.000-05:002002-12-20T07:37:01.000-05:00Trials of Trials
As I mentioned yesterday, I think the kind of study that compared diuretics with other hypertension medicines was a very good thing. So why don't we see more of these?
There are several reasons. It's worth thinking about the different levels of testing, and what questions they're designed to answer. At the first level, you have questions about specific drugs - is Drug A safe to Dereknoreply@blogger.com