On April 22, something truly remarkable happened. Scientists and non-scientists alike marched in protest in more than six hundred locations around the world, including Stockholm. Never before have the advocates of science been so united, and so public in their concern. What prompted this extraordinary event? Story by: Matthijs Dorst The troubled history of Science Let’s take a step back. ...

Story by: Joanna Kritikou Remember the ice bucket challenge? It actually directly funded a major breakthrough in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) research. Whole-exome analyses of 1,022 familial ALS (FALS) cases and 7,315 controls were conducted, making it the largest ever study of genetically inherited ALS. Researchers identified a significant association between loss-of-function NEK1 variants and FALS risk. Even though NEK1 ...

The Wall Street Journal reported last March that Elon Musk is backing up a neuroscience tech called Neuralink that has the modest aim to enhance the human brain by connecting it to a computer. The Silicon Valley billionaire and CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has been discussing the “neural lace” concept since 2016 as means to make humans keep pace ...

Scientists do science. Artists make art. Writers write. Right? You cannot get scientific credit without the long slog through a lengthy education, and dodging the daily struggles of academia. Or can you? What happens when contributions come from an “outsider”? What makes a scientist? And who decides? Story by: Caitrin Crudden In the 17th century, our view of the world ...

In the 1960s Summer Olympic Games in Rome, Danish cyclist Knud Enemark Jensen collapsed during a road race and died of an alleged overdose of amphetamines and a vasodilator that he took as performance enhancers. The case raised an international discussion that swelled into the very first doping scandal. The war on doping had officially begun. Story By; Marianna Tampere ...

SpaceX (Space Exploration Technologies Corporation) is a company that develops space rockets to send payloads, containing cargo or passengers, into space. SpaceX’s ultimate vision is to give people the opportunity to live on other planets, with Mars as the first goal. The company is currently working to land a spacecraft on Mars as early as 2018. Story By: Patrick Bjärterot ...

For so many of us, the essence of happiness lies in the taste of a piece of good chocolate. However, my friend doesn’t much care for it. Could such almost criminal dislike of chocolate be explained by genetics? Indeed, scientists have been puzzled by the origin of complex human traits ranging from personal behavior to the occurrence of diseases since ...

Having completed a systems biology post-doc in the US, Seattle, Karolina appreciates the accepting working environment in Sweden. “I think here at KI everyone’s opinion matters. There is more hierarchy in the US, so if you are somewhere up on the ladder, your opinions matter more.” In addition, she admires seeing students and professors intermingling and having the possibility to ...