Comments on: Did Rosie Redfield just refute #arseniclife on her blog?

By: Science, Blogging and Plagiarism | Changing World of Science & Communications

Wed, 11 Jul 2012 02:48:35 +0000

[...] The part that interests me isn’t the merits of the experimentation. I am intrigued by the fact that Rosie Redfield, the University of British Columbia scientist, prevailed against the Ingelfinger rule. As Ivan Oransky wrote in “Another chink in the Ingelfinger armor? Arsenic life talk forces Science to release paper early, without embargo”: Redfield’s talk tonight is in keeping with her open science approach. She has been refuting the original paper in as public a way as I’ve seen, as Zimmer and others have noted. [...]

By: Another chink in the Ingelfinger armor? Arsenic life talk forces Science to release paper early, without embargo « Embargo Watch

Mon, 09 Jul 2012 00:11:12 +0000

[...] approach. She has been refuting the original paper in as public a way as I’ve seen, as Zimmer and others have noted. She blogged about it, and also posted her submitted manuscript on [...]

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 20:57:06 +0000

Carl, according to Redfield’s latest post she has confirmed that growth is stimulated by As in this organism. This still does not answer the big questions about this study, but it is as much a validation of some of Wolfe-Simon’s claims as the post that you link to above was a refutation of them. I am sure that you will be blogging about this partial reproduction of Wolfe-Simons work with equal vigor as you did for the partial refutation, right?

By: #arseniclife | Svoogle News

#arseniclife | Svoogle News — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 02:31:08 +0000

[...] in modo da ridurre al minimo le false interpretazioni. Come fa notare un lettore a Carl Zimmer, tra i primi a dare risalto all’iniziativa della popolare microbiologa, nel 2009 era accaduto qualcosa di simile, con un paper di chimica [...]

By: #arseniclife « Oggi Scienza

#arseniclife « Oggi Scienza — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 06:49:45 +0000

By: Karen James

Karen James — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 18:40:11 +0000

@Chris “I’m not a biologist so my view that you could just call up the original researchers, FedEx some bacteria over and pop them in a Petri dish may have been a little over optimistic.” Umm… yes. Biology takes a long time. I wouldn’t be surprised if Rosie Redfield and other investigators have been moving as fast as possible (while still being rigorous) since day one. As a biologist (with the caveat that I’ve always worked with multi-cellular organisms) I can tell you that from conception to result in 6 months is actually very fast.

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 20:45:46 +0000

A few years ago there was the discovery that MgB2 is a superconductor at 39 K (which for the uninitiated is really warm for a simple substance). This was a giant paradigm shift that practically every superconductor researcher wanted to find out the properties. Within a few months there were hundreds of minitalks given at a symposium.

There was a similar feeling about cold fusion.

What’s surprised me about taking this long was that arsenic based life is also a giant paradigm shift but except for criticism, no one has really tried to see if it is actually true. Now maybe most biologists think it’s crappy research and not worth their time. Also I’m not a biologist so my view that you could just call up the original researchers, FedEx some bacteria over and pop them in a Petri dish may have been a little over optimistic. In either case it’s good to see we’ll finally get some resolution.

By: Joe Rojas

Joe Rojas — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 15:58:06 +0000

Why do so many insist on using the term “arsenic-based life”? Wolfe-Simon and co-authors proposed that the organism could to some extent substitute arsenic for phosphorous when P was limited. Do we call conventional organisms “phosphorous-based life”? Isn’t carbon the basis of living (organic) chemistry? Srsly.

By: Alexa

Alexa — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 15:56:38 +0000

@Chris

The reason it is taking “this long” is because Dr. Redfield is doing careful, rigorous work, as detailed on her blog.

@Snailbum

I understand your concern, but disagree. Real-time posting is more likely to show the unprocessed results and reflect the reality of the work, while peer-reviewed publications can contain polished, cherry-picked data. There *is* the risk that reposts will misinterpret Dr. Redfield’s results, but at least we can always go back and look at the original data.

By: Quando una ricerca è in diretta sul blog | Scimmia da parte paterna

Quando una ricerca è in diretta sul blog | Scimmia da parte paterna — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 09:30:14 +0000

[...] secondo articolo è di Carl Zimmer ed è intitolato “Did Rosie Redfield just refute arseniclife on her blog?” e racconta di come Rosie Redfield dell’University of British Columbia abbia deciso di [...]