BC SCIENCE
Saved by @Alex1Powell

Science asked me to -briefly- reflect on what happened in 2020. So, a thread on this year in science, the breakthroughs and breakdowns and where my head is at at the end of this difficult year.

Story is here:
https://t.co/48EDZj4tbk

 First, read @sciencecohen's beautiful, personal story on the vaccines:

“I can stop worrying about my mom dying alone in an intensive care unit, away from all who love her. And she can stop asking whether I’ll let her play mahjong with the girls”

https://t.co/qX2loAuid9
@sciencecohen The rapid development of efficacious #covid19 vaccines was clearly the science breakthrough of the year. But what about all the rest that went on in #covid19 science? My story is labeled “breakdown”, but the picture is complicated.
@sciencecohen Little of what scientists did to respond to #COVID19 was really new. As @florian_krammer told me “We took out all our fancy tools and applied them to this virus”.
What was new was not WHAT scientists did, but HOW they did it: Research was faster, more collaborative, more open.
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer The early diagnostic test from @c_drosten's lab, the @WHO mission report from China showing the virus could indeed be beaten, the collaboration behind the UK’s Recovery trial and the WHO’s Solidarity trial, the preprints being analysed in real time on twitter, ...
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO For me as a science journalist and for many interested people it was an incredible thing to see:
“The process of science was rarely as visible as this year. It was like watching open-heart surgery live on TV: messy but vital and riveting.”
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO But it wasn’t all rainbows and RNA. For all the evidence that was generated, the world often didn’t act on it. As @BillHanage told me: “It’s a little like watching a zombie movie in which half of the people can’t see the zombies and keep demanding to know what the fuss is about.”
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO @BillHanage Some scientists contributed to this. The Great Barrington Declaration, questionable research hyping hydroxychloroquine or suggesting #sarscov2 was less deadly than thought: They all played into the public’s desire for easy solutions, for carrying on as before.
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO @BillHanage Some "may have been driven by a healthy distrust of accepted wisdom or a contrarian spirit, but the effect was reminiscent of industry’s playbook in the fights over tobacco and climate change: Create just enough confusion about the evidence to allow people to carry on as before."
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO @BillHanage Others stood up for sound science and became targets. In Germany, for instance, @c_drosten has gone above and beyond in explaining research in this pandemic. He has rightly won praise, but also received death threats and police protection.
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO @BillHanage Many others spoke out as well and paid a price. Some of the worst vitriol was, once again, aimed at female scientists, who dared to give voice to their expertise.
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO @BillHanage Others decided to remain quiet, to concentrate on lab work and let others do the talking. For a while, @c_drosten seemed almost alone in Germany. But what is a scientist’s role in this crisis if not to explain. That, too, is something we need to talk about it when this is over.
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO @BillHanage And all of this played out in a context that no scientist can afford to ignore anymore: an information ecosystem that helps misinformation and lies spread faster than scientific evidence, weakening our ability to respond to new threats.
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO @BillHanage So yes, science worked faster than ever before and we have a vaccine after less than a year of this pandemic.
But more than 1,6 million people have died of #covid19.
It didn’t have to be this way.
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO @BillHanage Don’t get me wrong: We didn’t know everything and it was never going to be easy to deal with a virus with the specific characteristics of #SARSCoV2. But we knew enough to do more, to act better.
@sciencecohen @florian_krammer @c_drosten @WHO @BillHanage Where does all this leave us? @JeremyFarrar is optimistic. “I think we will look back after the horror of this and say, humanity is incredibly vulnerable,” he told me. “This will inspire a whole generation to come into science.”
I hope he is right. I hope we come out of this with a new appreciation for evidence and truth, with an understanding that we need to transform the information ecosystem we inhabit to be able to live in a shared reality.
But I’m stuck thinking: where would we be without vaccines? Where would we be in a crisis in which we really only have behaviour change to get out of it.
We have a vaccine now against #Sarscov2.
But there won’t be a vaccine against CO2.

More from Science

Max Fagin
Max Fagin
@MaxFagin
November is here, and that means a massive shift is coming. And by "massive" I am of course referring to the redefinition of the kilogram unit of mass that the world has been building up to for more than 100 years. Let me explain:


1/ I've had an unhealthy fascination with metrology (the study of measurement) ever since my 2nd year as a physics major when I took a class devoted to duplicating historic physics experiments, so please indulge me for going into heavy detail (get it?) about the kilogram.

2/ So what actually *defines* a unit of measurement? If you're American, you probably know a mile is 5280 feet and a foot is 12 inches and an inch is 2.54 centimeters etc. But where does this chain of definitions end? Is it turtles all the way down?

3/ It's actually not! For all units (even the imperial units used in America) the answers all end with the Système International (SI) unit definitions established and maintained for over 100 years by the Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (BIMP) in France.

4/ At the base of this tower are the SI base units. Just 7 SI base units define every other unit in existence. They are:

Kilogram, kg (mass)
Meter, m (distance)
Second, s (time)
Kelvin, K (temp)
Ampere, A (electric current)
Candela, cd (luminous intensity)
Mole, mol (quantity)
SCIENCE
Marina Amaral
Marina Amaral
@marinamaral2
And since today is International Day of Women and Girls in Science, let's highlight a few of them - just a few women among thousands of others who helped shape the world we live in today.

Thread.


Dorothy Hodgkin discovered the structure of insulin after 36 years of work.

"I was captured for life by chemistry and by crystals."


Sophia Jex-Blake fought for women's rights to study medicine. She was involved in founding two medical schools for women.

"It seemed discreditable to Great Britain that all her daughters who desired a University education should be driven abroad to seek it."


Alice Augusta Ball developed the "Ball Method", the most effective treatment for leprosy during the early 20th century. She was 23.


Ada Lovelace is regarded as the first to recognize the full potential of computers and as one of the first computer programmers.

“That brain of mine is something more than merely mortal; as time will show.”
SOCIETY , SCIENCE
Advertisement
Billy Bostickson \U0001f3f4\U0001f441&\U0001f441 \U0001f193
Billy Bostickson 🏴👁&👁 ...
@BillyBostickson
Let Uncle Ralph educate you
Synthetic Viral Genomics:
Risks and Benefits for Science and Society

"Alternatively, “No See’m” sites can be used to insert foreign genes into viral, eukaryotic, or microbial genome or vector, simultaneously removing all evidence of the restriction sites that were used in the recombinant DNA manipulation"

By orientating the restriction sites as “No See’m”, the sites are removed during reassembly, leaving only the desired mutation in the final DNA product.

The dual properties of strand specificity & a variable end overhang that can be tailored to match any sequence allow for Esp3I sites to be engineered as “universal connectors” that can be joined with any other four nucleotide restriction site overhangs (e.g. EcoRI, PstX1, BamH1)

Seamless assembly (also called No See’m Sites (85)) cascades have been used to assemble full length cDNAs of the coronaviruses mouse hepatitis virus, transmissible gastroenteritis virus, infectious bronchitis virus and SARS-CoV (Refs: 85,86,87)
SCIENCE , ALL
Jim Bancroft, 6%
Jim Bancroft, 6%
@JEdward02
1/This is a rant I had with someone while texting, and I thought it would make an interesting thread:

2/ Jim, If you come across any information, I still desire to hear any information on the state of our beleaguered union.
FOR LATER READ , SCIENCE
Carlos E. Perez
Carlos E. Perez
@IntuitMachine
The Nature versus Nurture is a debate about scientific doctrine. It is a debate about the correct way of explanation for cognition.

The Representation versus Non-Representation shares the same debate. It is also about the correct way of explanation for cognition.

It is also the difference between thinking in nouns versus thinking in verbs. Nature and Representation have deep roots in Western thinking. It is a functionalist and reductionist way of thinking that meets its limits when analyzing complex adaptive systems.

It is perhaps due to this Western bias that concepts from the study of complex systems have had little traction in modern society. It is of course, more than a Western bias, but a human bias to seek out simple causal explanations of this world.

But the world is complex and messy. Spiral dynamics which is an evolutionary model of individuals and society explains how models of the world shape ourselves and our civilization.
SCIENCE

You May Also Like

Vibhu Vashisth
Vibhu Vashisth
@VIBHU_Tweet
Do you know?

The Golden Shine on the artificial jewellery of modern times is a gift by Nagarjuna.

Now,u might be wondering,who is Nagarjuna?

Nagarjuna was the name of an ancient Indian scholar&scientist whose name is associated with the fields of Alchemy,Chemistry& Metallurgy.


He conducted a number of alchemic and Metallurgical experiments directed towards transforming base elements into Gold.
According to Eduard Sachau's Alberuni's India, Nagarjuna was termed as a Metallurgist who was born 100 yrs before Alberuni's time, who was born in 973 CE.


According to some records Nagarjuna was born in 9th century CE near Somnath,Gujarat and according to some Tibetan & Chinese sources he was born in Vidarbha,Maharashtra from where he later migrated to Deccan region.


Edward Schau quotes in his book,'They have a science similar to Alchemy and Nagarjuna is famous for this science which they call as 'Rasayana'.

Nagarjuna's book 'Rasaratnakara' is one of the earliest documented texts on Alchemy,Chemistry & Metallurgy in Sanskrit.Nagarjuna successfully discovered through his experiments the alchemy of transmutation of base metals into Gold.This was not real gold but a gold like substance.
ALL
Edwin Hayward
Edwin Hayward
@uk_domain_names
Ok, it's high time to look at the REAL effects of Brexit. As the Tories implode & Labour sits on its hands, companies are executing contingency plans, shifting jobs & assets, slashing investments, or redomiciling (accounting exercise). Happening NOW, not in a fantasy future. 1/95

Barden Corporation is closing down its Plymouth factory after 51 years, putting 400 jobs at risk, as its parent company Schaeffler shifts production to various sites outside the UK due to Brexit.

8 health providers have warned of medicine shortages in the event of a no-deal Brexit: "we do not believe that the current medicine supply plans will suffice, and we will have widespread shortages if we do not respond urgently."

Pfizer - $100 million on Brexit prep: "Pfizer’s preparations are well advanced to make the changes necessary to meet EU legal requirements after the U.K. is no longer a member state, especially in the regulatory, manufacturing and supply chain areas."

The Government has spent £4.2 billion pounds on Brexit preparations (£2.2 billion in previous Budgets, plus an additional £2 billion in the most recent Budget.)
POLITICS
Advertisement
Bijay
Bijay
@Bijay_reborn
A small write up on how the OPTION PRICES BEHAVES AT SUPPORT & RESISTANCE


https://t.co/EIbXwcHpHf


https://t.co/zDamXyOhh6
ALL
Sam Rocha
Sam Rocha
@SamRochadotcom
THREAD

I get asked for writing tips a lot. Of all the ones I’ve given, here are a few of the ones that seem to hold true and remain somewhat universal or at least mostly unobjectionable:

#amwriting #writingtips

1. If you are a fast writer (i.e., if you compose first drafts very quickly) then you absolutely must become a slow editor. Much of what I call “writing” is really, for me, editing.

2. If you don’t read you cannot write a lot or well. Sure, maybe you can read like a maniac for a decade and then read less after that, but without some large volume of intake, there will never be a meaningful output.

2.1 I sometimes say that I feel like writing without reading is like trying to run a marathan on a cracker. And sadly I see many students struggling to write when they have simply never read enough to fuel that demand of the task at hand.

3. All writing is writing if one decides to treat it that way. If one takes some degree of intentional will when sending emails, posting on social media and writing notes and marginalia, then all of that can count as meaningful daily writing.
ALL
(\u3063\u25d4\u25e1\u25d4)\u3063 \U0001f499 \U0001d440\U0001d4b6rymo Belfast \U0001f499\U0001f331\U0001f340 \u24cb\U0001f397\ufe0f
(っ◔◡◔)っ 💙 𝑀𝒶rymo Belfa...
@MarymoBelfast
THREAD PART 1.

On Sunday 21st June, 14 year old Noah Donohoe left his home to meet his friends at Cave Hill Belfast to study for school. #RememberMyNoah💙


He was on his black Apollo mountain bike, fully dressed, wearing a helmet and carrying a backpack containing his laptop and 2 books with his name on them. He also had his mobile phone with him.

On the 27th of June. Noah's naked body was sadly discovered 950m inside a storm drain, between access points. This storm drain was accessible through an area completely unfamiliar to him, behind houses at Northwood Road. https://t.co/bpz3Rmc0wq


"Noah's body was found by specially trained police officers between two drain access points within a section of the tunnel running under the Translink access road," said Mr McCrisken."

Noah's bike was also found near a house, behind a car, in the same area. It had been there for more than 24 hours before a member of public who lived in the street said she read reports of a missing child and checked the bike and phoned the police.
CRIME