The transition from one-size-fits-all medicine to personalized medicine will take time, but the seeds of change have already been planted. Using oncology as a launching pad, it will soon be a reality that biomarker analysis will differentiate patients and guide prevention and treatment in a clinically meaningful way. By embracing that change, it may be possible to improve patient care while bringing down long term health care costs – a win-win for a society in the midst of a chronic debate over health care reform.
Read MoreBiology in Architecture
The trappings of ongoing and impending climate change, however – increasing temperatures, rising sea levels, and more frequent extreme weather events – render our current infrastructure paradigm both structurally and energetically unsustainable. Fortunately, there is a solution, and it’s a fun one: to more smartly incorporate biology into architectural design.
Read MorePotentially Pandemic Pathogen Research: Legitimate Threat or a State of Fear?
With exploding human populations and a globalized economy, the threat of pandemic disease and fear surrounding such pandemics is a pandemic in itself. Human beings have never been so connected, and it has never been easier for an emerging infectious disease to spread across borders and across oceans. Frightening diseases such as high pathogenicity avian influenza and ebola appear regularly in the news and threaten to cause high mortality in the countries where they emerge as well as abroad. How do we as a society deal with the threat of these dangerous, potentially pandemic pathogens? The answer to that question is more controversial than you might think.
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