President's Message: Citation corruption

In his monthly column, ASBMB President Steven McKnight takes on journal citation metrics. He writes, in part, "In its present form, this measure of citation impact conspires heavily in favor of what is trendy and faddish." 

Meeting up in San Diego

A sampling of photos from the 2016 annual meeting.

News from the Hill

As the Zika virus begins to infect U.S. citizens on the mainland, ASBMB's public affairs director underlines the importance of funding biomedical research at a level that can weather public health crises without compromising other disease research.

Member Update

David B. Knaff (1941 – 2016)

David Barry Knaff, an expert on redox reactions in plant photosynthesis and professor at Texas Tech University, has died. Knaff led Texas Tech’s biotechnology and genomics department and was a former editor-in-chief of the journal Photosynthesis Research.

Retrospective: Osamu Hayaishi (1920 – 2015)

Osamu Hayaishi, an emeritus professor at Kyoto University who discovered oxygense, ADP-ribosylations and the sleep-inducing action of prostaglandin D₂, has died at the age of 95. The American-born Hayaishi worked between the U.S. and Japan and the principles he discovered are known to operate in many physiologically important processes.

Large donations fund new immunotherapy institutes

A former New York City mayor and a tech billionaire commit to fund separate immunotherapy centers for cancer research.Both centers aim to encourage collaboration to speed up the generation of new cancer therapies.

Fat mice lead scientists to new feeding control pathway

While looking into the role of the O-GlcNac transferase enzyme in learning and memory, an ASBMB member and neuroscientist makes a serendipitous discovery about feeding control in mice.

MCP: AML cells teach other cells not to self-destruct

Residual acute myeloid leukemia cells are thought to contribute to relapses of AML. In a recent paper published in Molecular and Cellular Proteomics, researchers dissect the interplay between these residual cells and their surrounding environment.

JLR: Predicting pre-eclampsia

A recent paper in the Journal of Lipid Research describes a set of biomarkers that could help in the early detection of pre-eclampsia.

JBC: The Venus flytrap’s major protease

New information about the function and structure of a major protease in the digestive fluid of the Venus flytrap offers insights into plant carnivory.