Transducing the Genome: Information, Anarchy, and Revolution in The Biomedical Sciences

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What has made the Human Genome Project so deeply appealing? In one sense, it's just another large-scale, big-budget effort to keep a gang of nerds busy and out of trouble for a few years. Geneticist Gary Zweiger looks askance at this and explains how the confluence of information systems, big science, and business exemplified by the HGP is actually accelerating the pace of beneficial change for all people. Transducing the Genome: Information, Anarchy, and Revolution in the Biomedical Sciences draws deeply on Zweiger's experience in biological science and biotech commerce to illuminate the scientific, economic, and legal issues relevant to the search for a more complete understanding of human genetics. Brimming with pro-capitalist optimism, he believes that the information revolution spawned the biotech explosion and will soon lead to better, cheaper solutions to a very broad range of health problems:

Knowledge of our internal information network will come mostly from an explosion of new genomic database analyses. A growing army of mathematicians and information scientists will develop increasingly powerful and more useful algorithms and computational processes for finding biomedical knowledge in these databases. A growing regiment of biologists and medical professionals with training in mathematics and information sciences will lead these knowledge discovery missions.

Zweiger assuages the reader's fears of gene patents with a brief foray into intellectual property law. It does seem unlikely that biotech patents will pose any more problems than standard pharmaceutical company practice. Combining scientific, legal, and business expertise, Transducing the Genome provides the most comprehensive overview of the birth of biotech yet written. --Rob Lightner

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"Captivating... hard to put down."Choice

"A bracing insider's account of why gene structure matters to science and commerce."American Scientist

How genomics is bringing biology into the Digital Age

In this important book, a scientist gives us an inside account of the historic paradigm shift under way in the life sciences as a result of the Human Genome Project and provides a philosophical framework in which to understand biology and medicine as information sciences. In a story told on many fascinating levels, Gary Zweiger introduces us to the visionaries who first understood genes as information carriers and chronicles how their early efforts led to the birth of the new science of genomics. He provides insights into the uneasy collaboration of private, government, and academic efforts, the role of the pharmaceutical companies, and the influence of venture capitalists on one of the most ambitious and potentially significant scientific undertakings in history. Most important, he explores the profound impact that the transducing of biological information into a digital format already has had on biological research and medicine, and the equally profound effect it is sure to have on our understanding of ourselves and all living creatures.

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In a story told on many fascinating levels, Gary Zweiger introduces us to the visionaries who first understood genes as information carriers and chronicles how their early efforts led to the birth of the new science of genomics.

Customer Reviews:

The role of corporate entities in the biomedical sciences........2006-04-02

I had actually bought Transducing the Genome because I was looking for a history of genomics. While there are elements of that subject included in the book, Zweiger has really written more of a history of the field and the various players who are driving the research and change. The book looks at issues of origins, purposes, patents, the effect of computer technology on the field and finally the future potential applications.

Zweiger (employed at the time of writing by Agilent) clearly is writing from a point of view. He strongly believes that the capitalist model will take care of itself and that competition and reward will lead the way to a better future for all. He takes issue with people who oppose genome-related patents, arguing for the general benevolence of the industry and the fraternity of science. While I may (generally) agree with him, I would have preferred that he either shed the disguise of neutrality on the subject and explain his personal point of view or that he present more compelling arguments from the "other side". Most of the counter-points that he raises in the question of patenting are straw men and far too easy for him to dismiss.

While the book was very interesting, I was also a little bit lost in the structure from time to time. While the individual chapters were excellent reading, I felt that the whole did not hang together as well as it should have or could have.

This would make a particularly good book if you are interested in the biotechnology industry and the ethical issues surrounding the debate between non-profit and private sector science.

Great biotech and biomed insights.......2004-02-09

Zweiger, a biotech industry insider, provides an excellent window into the science and business of genomics, proteomics, and bioinformatics. This is an excellent primer for people considering a career in this field or who just want to know what it is all about. His writing is both clear and to the point, and, generally, provides a strong basis for understanding both the issues, legal, business and otherwise, and the underlying science. I highly recommend this book.

There are better books on this very interesting subject.......2004-01-27

This books has some interesting material but lacks clarity, depth and focus. Basic explanations about a given subjects come often in the wrong order. Whenever the books attempt to explain anything, very little can actually be understood, as the author tries to keep the level of explanations too low, and therefore ultimately hopelessly useless. Written with the businessman mind, and not with a scientific one.
Much better book are from Watson and Berry or from Ridley.

Absolutely the best.......2002-07-08

I've looked at many books on this subject and this is absolutely the best account of the genomics/proteomics revolution in biology and medicine. Zweiger relates many interesting details of the race to sequence and profit from human genes. Especially noteworthy is his honest and unbiased descriptions and the insightful manner in which he explains the science, business and legal issues. This is full of thought provoking science, useful business analysis, and other insights. I do admit though that a 2 of the 15 chapters were a bit too dense for me, a business student, nonetheless most messages come through loud and clear.

Boaring.......2002-01-21

This is the 5th or 6th book that I'm reading about genomics. I do not have a scientific or biological background but I deal a lot with this area in my profession (Investments and company building). I purchased this book because I needed to get up to spead and understand what the scientists are talking about. It seems that I will not get this from this book. If you are interested in learning about the history of the area, who were the important inventors, companies, first gene banks etc you will like the book. However, if you are interested in understanding how genes work, what is mRNA, how do proteins work and what are amino acids, you will not get that here. The book is nicely written, and the author is very knowledgable and intelligent but I needed specific knowledge not stories which is why I'm reducing 2 stars.

Book Description

This volume represents the proceedings of the European Science Foundation History of Chemistry in Europe 1789-1939 conference held in Strasbourg in October 1996. Leading scholars investigate the ways in which the chemical industry developed throughout much of Europe prior to, and in some cases during, World War II. Emphasis is placed on fertiliser production, which stimulated research into electrochemical and high pressure processes and polymer chemistry. The main focus is on the interwar period, when political strategies for self-sufficiency dictated that innovations were to be based on the availability of raw materials, and the needs of new user industries. Commercial factors also played an important role, particularly the mergers which led to the formation of companies such as IG Farben and Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI). Nevertheless, smaller and independent companies also produced many new products. While much of the European chemical industry was dependent on coal and coal tar products, there were strong moves towards the foundation of science-based biochemical industries. This book is unique in its close examination of technologies, particularly chemical engineering and the control of processes, research in industry, and countries that were not mentioned in previous literature. It is enhanced by contributions from specialists in business and engineering history, as well as by historians of chemistry and technology. Audience: This work will be of great value to historians of chemistry, business, engineering and technology.

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Algebraic geometers have renewed their interest in the interplay between algebraic vector bundles and projective embeddings. New methods have been developed for questions such as: What is the geometric content of syzygies and of bundles derived from them? How can they be used for giving good compactifications of natural families? Which differential techniques are needed for the study of families of projective varieties? These questions are addressed in this cohesive volume, where results, work in progress, conjectures, and modern accounts of classical ideas are presented.

The Geometrization of physics: Lecture notes from a course at National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu, Taiwan, June-July, 1981

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The Geometrization of physics: Lecture notes from a course at National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu, Taiwan, June-July, 1981
Richard S Palais
Manufacturer: Institute of Mathematics, National Tsing Hua University
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B0007AYVC6

Helices and Vector Bundles: Seminaire Rudakov (London Mathematical Society Lecture Note Series)

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Helices and Vector Bundles: Seminaire Rudakov (London Mathematical Society Lecture Note Series)

Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Binding: Paperback

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This volume is devoted to the use of helices as a method for studying exceptional vector bundles, an important and natural concept in algebraic geometry. The work arises out of a series of seminars organized in Moscow by A.N. Rudakov. The first article sets up the general machinery, and later ones explore its use in various contexts. As to be expected, the approach is concrete; the theory is considered for quadrics, ruled surfaces, K3 surfaces and PP^T3(C).

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Lectures on K(X)
Raoul Bott
Manufacturer: Harvard University
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Binding: Unknown Binding
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Lectures on Vector Bundles (Cambridge Studies in Advanced Mathematics)

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Lectures on Vector Bundles (Cambridge Studies in Advanced Mathematics)
J. Le Potier
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Binding: Hardcover

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Fourier-Mukai Transforms in Algebraic Geometry (Oxford Mathematical Monographs)

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This work consists of two sections on the moduli spaces of vector bundles. The first part tackles the classification of vector bundles on algebraic curves. The author also discusses the construction and elementary properties of the moduli spaces of stable bundles. In particular Le Potier constructs HilbertSHGrothendieck schemes of vector bundles, and treats Mumford's geometric invariant theory. The second part centers on the structure of the moduli space of semistable sheaves on the projective plane. The author sketches existence conditions for sheaves of given rank, and Chern class and construction ideas in the general context of projective algebraic surfaces. Professor Le Potier provides a treatment of vector bundles that will be welcomed by experienced algebraic geometers and novices alike.

Lectures on Vector Bundles over Riemann Surfaces. (MN-6)

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A fine overview

Lectures on Vector Bundles over Riemann Surfaces. (MN-6)
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A fine overview.......2002-10-26

Following up on the prior book "Lectures on Riemann Surfaces", the author, in this book, makes heavy use of sheaf theory to study complex analytic vector bundles over Riemann surfaces. The use of sheaf theory will seem quite natural to the reader who has read the first book, and even those who have not but have a background in complex function theory will recognize sheaf theory as a generalization of the concept of analytic continuation. The power of sheaf theory is made very apparent in this book, and the reader can see clearly some notions from the 'classical' theory, such as the Riemann-Roch theorem, generalized to the case of vector bundles over Riemann surfaces.

In the first chapter, the author first considers sheaves over a commutative ring R with an identity element and sheaves of modules over these kinds of rings. A 'free sheaf' of rank m is defined as being one isomorphic to the direct sum of m R-modules. A 'locally free sheaf' of R-modules or rank m over a topological space M is defined, naturally, as one that is free when restricted to the open sets of a covering of M. The author then discusses carefully the notion of how to get a cohomology 'set' via the sheaf of (non-Abelian) groups defined by the presheaf of the general linear group. This discussion leads to a fiber bundle that represents the locally free sheaf. This is then used to obtain 'analytic sheaves', which are sheaves of modules over the sheaf of rings of germs of holomorphic functions. The elements of the cohomology set are called 'complex analytic vector bundles of rank m' over the Riemann surface M. Coherent analytic sheaves are then brought in order to make up for the fact that analytic sheaves are generally not locally free.

The local structure of coherent analytic sheaves is studied in chapter two, wherein it is proved first that every coherent analytic sheaf of a locally free sheaf is locally free. The author then show how to construct exact sequences of coherent analytic sheaves and shows explicitly how they are described in terms of locally free analytic sheaves for the case of the complex projective line. He then proves that every vector bundle over the projective line admits non-trivial meromorphic sections.

Given a sheaf over one Riemann surface M, an analytic mapping from M to another Riemann surface induces a sheaf on the other, and the author studies these induced sheaves in chapter 3. The author then generalizes the projective line results from chapter 2 to the case of a coherent analytic sheaf over an arbitary compact Riemann surface.

In chapter 4 the author proves the famous Riemann-Roch theorem for the case of vector bundles over compact Riemann surfaces of genus g. This leads straightforwardly, as the author shows, to a form of the Riemann-Roch theorem for coherent analytic sheaves. Then, after defining the notion of a dual bundle to a complex vector bundle, the author proves a version of Serre duality for vector bundles.

After a lengthy discussion of how to extend a complex analytic line bundle to a complex analytic vector bundle of rank 2, the author in chapter 5 discusses how to determine which line bundles can be subbundles of a given vector bundle. This leads to an extension of the notion of a divisor, and the author then gives a classification of rank 2 vector bundles.

For line bundles, the vanishing of its Chern class guarantees that it has a 'flat' representative. The situation for higher rank complex vector bundles is more complicated, due to the general linear group not being abelian. The author shows how to find conditions for the admission of flat representatives in these bundles in chapter 6. This is followed naturally by a discussion of flat vector bundles in chapter 7, wherein a notion of a 'flat sheaf' of rank n is formulated. Flat vector bundles are shown to have a 'characteristic representation', which is viewed as the fundamental group of the Riemann surface acting as operators on complex n-space. This is then used to obtain a "sheafified" deRham complex for a flat vector bundle. The notion of a 'period' of a differential form makes its first appearance here.

Chapter 8 covers basically the same subject as chapter 7, but from an analytic viewpoint. The DeRham sequence in this viewpoint involves, as expected, the sheaf of germs of flat sections of the bundle and the sheaf of germs of holomorphic sections of the bundle. The author shows how the 'Prym differentials' arise as differential forms that generalize the Abelian differentials on a compact Riemann surface. He also discusses how the analytic properties of flat sheaves can be studied by considering an exact sequence involving instead the sheaf of germs of meromorphic functions on the Riemann surface. Sections of the flat vector bundle in this case give rise to the meromorphic Prym differentials, which intuitively can be thought of as meromorphic differential forms which have zero residues at each point of the Riemann surface.

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"Contains papers presented at the 35th Taniguchi International Symposium held recently in Sanda and Kyoto, Japan. Details the latest developments concerning moduli spaces of vector bundles or instantons and their application. Covers a broad array of topics in both differential and algebraic geometry."

Representations of Fundamental Groups of Algebraic Varieties (Lecture Notes in Mathematics)

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Representations of Fundamental Groups of Algebraic Varieties (Lecture Notes in Mathematics)
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Singularities, Representation of Algebras, and Vector Bundles (Lecture Notes in Mathematics, Vol 1273)

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Singularities, Representation of Algebras, and Vector Bundles (Lecture Notes in Mathematics, Vol 1273)
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Esta novela de gran vigor y asombrosa belleza es una conmovedora saga acerca de los seres humanos, sus relaciones y los límites del amor. A través de la magnifica narrativa de Jean M. Auel, regresamos a los albores de la civilización moderna, y en compañía de una nina Ilamada Ayla, penetramos en la cruda y a la vez hermosa Edad de Hielo y en el mundo que los hombres y mujeres de esa época compartieron con quienes se Ilamaban a si mismos, el Clan del oso cavernario. Un desastre natural deja a la niña errando sola por una tierra desconocida y peligrosa, hasta que la encuentra una mujer que pertenece al Clan, un grupo de gente muy distinta de la suya. A medida que Ayla aprende acerca del modo de vida del Clan y sobre los métodos curativos de Iza, la mayoría acaba por aceptarla y hasta Iza y Creb, el viejo Mog-ur, llegan a quererla. Es el brutal y orgulloso joven, destinado a ser su próximo líder, quien percibe en su manera de ser diferente, una amenaza en contra de su autoridad. Entonces, desarrolla hacia la extraña chica que vive entre ellos y que pertenece a los Otros, un odio constante y profundo, y está decidido a vengarse.

Customer Reviews:

Ayla Carves her Path to Humanhood........2006-04-06

This is a marvelous book; it deals with Ice Age and the coexistence of Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon.
It is the first volume of a powerful series. Fortunately for Spanish reading public all of them are translated and available.

Ms Auel gives the reader a vivid and lucid reconstruction of a long forgotten era.

Ayla is a Cro-Magnon orphaned by an earthquake and adopted by a Neanderthal female, from this point on, a strange world unfolds. It's a discovery trip for Ayla and the reader. At the same time allows us a deep insight into "otherness".

In a present world that is shrinking and cultural differences arise every minute, Ms Auel's work show the human common traits that make us kin to every other human being, even if it is as distant related as a Neanderthal.
Don't miss this experience.
Reviewed by Max Yofre.

Una imagen de la edad de piedra.......2005-01-18

Sumamente interesante, el libro te crea una imagen de como pudo haber sido la vida durante la edad de piedra. Te describe con sumo detalle las personas, sus vestidos, hogares, herramientas y todo el entorno incluyendo flora y fauna. Cuando inicias el libro, no te detienes y quieres leer capitulo tras capitulo para saber como la pequeña huerfana logra sobrevivir a cada peligro en un mundo tan hostil. Este solo libro me impulsó a comprar toda la serie.

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Clan del Oso Cavernario, El - Los Hijos de La Tierra
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El clan del oso cavernario (Bolsillo)
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El Clan Del Oso Cavernario/the Clan of the Cave Bear

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Muy interesnte e ilustrativo
great and fascinating book

El Clan Del Oso Cavernario/the Clan of the Cave Bear
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Customer Reviews:

Muy interesnte e ilustrativo.......1999-02-25

Es un libro extraordinario no solo por la ambientación prehistórica, sino por la profundidad con que retrata el alma humana a través de cada uno de los personajes.

great and fascinating book.......1998-11-28

the minutely description of the landscape, the persons, implements and the life, made me translate in the time to the prehistory. this is a great, fascinating and educational book. in my university is a text for students.

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El Clan Del Oso Cavernario
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