Blog Comments

Kinetica Online is pleased to provide direct links to commentaries from our senior editor Dr. Steven Pelech has posted on other blogs sites. Most of these comments appear on the GenomeWeb Daily Scan website, which in turn highlight interesting blogs that have been posted at numerous sites in the blogosphere since the beginning of 2010. A wide variety of topical subjects are covered ranging from the latest scientific breakthroughs, research trends, politics and career advice. The original blogs and Dr. Pelech’s comments are summarized here under the title of the original blog. Should viewers wish to add to these discussions, they should add their comments at the original blog sites.

The views expressed by Dr. Pelech do not necessarily reflect those of the other management and staff at Kinexus Bioinformatics Corporation. However, we wish to encourage healthy debate that might spur improvements in how biomedical research is supported and conducted.

Applied research funding

What's the Point?

Blogger Hannah Waters wonder why science stories like the NASA arsenic bacterium sometimes get overhyped and "out of hand," and she concludes that researchers feel the need to be "purposeful" while doing their work as government grants with public money requires some ultimate benefit for the public. S. Pelech comments that the real value of basic research is well appreciated amongst those practitioners within the scientific community and it should be funded based solely on its own realistic merits. However, since the bulk of the grant funding for biochemistry and molecular biology research comes from government and charitable agencies that are mandated to improving human health, there is a clear obligation to work towards more practical outcomes with these particular funds. Read More...