Join DIYbio NYC this Wednesday while we screen the PBS documentary ‘Naturally Obsessed’. We’ll kick things off around 8pm, but come early to get a good seat. Following the movie stick around for a lively discussion about what it is to be a scientist and how the concept has been changing over the past few years.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Time: 8:00pm – 10:00pm
The Resistor Hackerspace
87 3rd Avenue, 4th Floor
Brooklyn, NY

Space is super-generously donated by the Resistor Hackerspace in downtown Brooklyn.

NATURALLY OBSESSED tells a vivid, suspenseful story about a trio of students going for their PhD degrees. They are in a race to beat the competition to discover the switch that controls appetite in the human body – but the pressure is on, as each student also struggles with a personal challenge. Rob, a perennial dropout, dares himself to stay the course. Kilpatrick has to choose between the easy life and academic success. Gabriele hovers between high aspirations and self doubt. Their guide and mentor, Larry, is a young professor deeply committed to passing on the baton of science. He urges his students to apply their creativity to solve tough problems, while encouraging them to accept the emotional roller coaster of doing science.

NATURALLY OBSESSED opens a penetrating view of laboratory life, provides unique insights into what it’s like to do biological research and honestly portrays the quid-pro-quo of the apprentice system, by which students working for their PhD degree work under a master scientist at the frontiers of biomedical research. Drawn from three years of filming, live action scenes capture the day-by-day experiences of doing science, highlighting the ups and downs of the mentor-student relationship, the collaboration that science depends on, and the self-knowledge that success requires. The film was shot at the Shapiro laboratory at the Columbia University Medical Center. In a way that the lay person can easily understand, it presents a picture of the lab’s advanced techniques in genetic engineering, protein chemistry and x-ray crystallography, which are paving the way for a new generation of structure-based drugs – “designer drugs” — specifically targeted to correct malfunctioning, disease-causing, proteins. (The remarkably successful HIV protease inhibitor was the first of the kind.)

Robert Carlson bridges both the NYC Resistor and DIYBio worlds – he’s an electrical engineer who turns E. coli into circuits! He famously discovered the Carlson curves, the biotech equivalent of Moore’s Law. They show that biotech is advancing at a pace consistent with digital tech.

Come join us at the NEW NYC Resistor space for an afternoon talk by Rob and discussion afterwards.

DATE: Saturday, March 13
TIME: 2:00pm – 4:00pm
LOCATION: NYCR

Here’s a video of Robert from the Economist that appeared on the DIYBio blog recently: http://diybio.org/2010/01/01/rob-carlson-discusses-diybio-and-open-source-biology-on-the-economist. And an excerpt from his Wired article where he wrote about the emergence of DIYBiology in 2005:

The era of garage biology is upon us. Want to participate? Take a moment to buy yourself a molecular biology lab on eBay. A mere $1,000 will get you a set of precision pipettors for handling liquids and an electrophoresis rig for analyzing DNA. Side trips to sites like BestUse and LabX (two of my favorites) may be required to round out your purchases with graduated cylinders or a PCR thermocycler for amplifying DNA. If you can’t afford a particular gizmo, just wait six months – the supply of used laboratory gear only gets better with time. Links to sought-after reagents and protocols can be found at DNAHack. And, of course, Google is no end of help.

Still, don’t expect to cure cancer right away, surprise your loved ones with a stylish new feather goatee, or crank out a devilish frankenbug. (Instant bioterrorism is likely beyond your reach, too.) The goodies you buy online require practice to use properly. The necessary skills may be acquired through trial and error, studying online curricula, or taking a lab course at a community college. Although there are cookbook recipes for procedures to purify DNA or insert it into a bacterium, bench biology is not easy; the many molecular manipulations required to play with genes demand real skills.

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.05/view.html?pg=2

Ever wanted to purify your own DNA? Well, come by this Wednesday night and try it!

On November 18th at 7PM a bunch of us biopunks from DIYbio NYC will be hosting a DNA extraction party at the NYC Resistor space. Hopefully this will be the start of a beautiful friendship (bioborgs, anyone?)

Everyone who shows up will get to make DNA from their very own cheek cells, and take it home with them in the form of a cheesy necklace if so desired. All we ask is that you bring your enthusiasm, and perhaps a tasty post-experiment snack.