Articles of exceptional interest

One of the goals of the Bioscience Resource Project is to draw attention to research articles and documents of exceptional quality and interest. The links may take you to other websites.

Food and Agriculture section

1. Still No Free Lunch: Nutrient levels in US food supply eroded by pursuit of high yields. (2007)

This report summarises findings from the primary literature on trends in the yield density of modern cultivars grown under typical conditions.This report is from The Organic Centre

2. CAFOs Uncovered from the Union of Concerned Scientists and a Pew Commision Report: Putting meat on the table: Industrial Farm Animal Production in America (2008)

Concentrated animal feeding operations of swine, cows and chickens are spreading across the globe and their sizes are increasing. Two reports examine critical questions about them: are they safe for the environment and public health, and are they necessary to produce affordable food?

3. Report to the Agribusiness Accountability Initiative Conference on Corporate Power in the Global Food system (2005)

Vertical integration, horizontal integration and the removal of governments and individuals from decision-making in the global food system. A short summary and overview. "The dream of many scientists doing basic research, research that usually requires a huge input of private and public capital, is that their efforts will someday help feed the hungry people in the world. If present structural arrangements continue their current trends, this dream of scientists will remain just that-a dream."

4. The Rome Declaration on World Food Security (1996)

We, the Heads of State and Government, or our representatives, gathered at the World Food Summit at the invitation of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, reaffirm the right of everyone to have access to safe and nutritious food, consistent with the right to adequate food and the fundamental right of everyone to be free from hunger.

We pledge our political will and our common and national commitment to achieving food security for all....

5. An assessment of the total external costs of UK agriculture (2000)
Jules Pretty et al.; Agricultural Systems 65:113-136

Externalities are social, enviromental or economic costs of an activity that are not included in the product price of that activity. Quantification of externalities helps identify negative impacts as a guide to policy. Though this study excluded the costs of long-term and chronic illnesses due to pesticide exposure, the authors estimated current methods of UK agriculture cost society £208 per hectare per year. The authors consider this a lower boundary figure.

6. Can the Poor Help GM crops? Technology, Representation and Cotton in the Makhatini Flats, South Africa (2006)
Harald Witt et al.; Review of African Political Economy 33: 497:513

The adoption of Genetically Modified (GM) cotton in South Africa's Makhathini Flats since 1998 is one of the most widely cited GM success stories. Witt, Patel and Schnurr find instead that the privileging of GM adopters and lack of choice appears to better explain patterns of uptake.

7. Stopping the rot in nutrition science (2006)
by Barrie Margetts

The Editor-in-Chief of the scientific journal Public Health Nutrition on commercially motivated and sometimes fraudulent nutrition research.

8. Breeding Resistance to Special Interests (2006)
by Professor Stephen Jones

Biotechnology, more than anything else, is about ownership. So where does that leave publicly funded plant breeders who do not wish to diminish farmers rights?

9. Sex, Lies and Herbicides: the truth about atrazine (2005)
by Professor Tyrone B Hayes

The remarkable story of one Professor's visit to Washington and why he went there. At the link click on: From silent spring to silent night: endocrine disruption, amphibian declines and environmental justice

10. Science, law, and politics in FDA's genetically engineered foods policy: scientific concerns and uncertainties (2005)
by David Pelletier; Nutr. Reviews 63: 210-23

This paper discusses the urgent need for nutritionists to define safe, unsafe, desirable and indifferent levels of nutrients and toxins in food plants. This is necessary so that breeders can select and reject appropriate lines and enable regulators to make scientifically informed decisions.

General Science section

1. A New Trade Framework for Global Healthcare R&D. (2004)
by Tim Hubbard and James Love; PLoS Biol 2(2): e52

It is a widely held belief that the private sector plays a key role in the development of new medicines and other bioscience innovations and that patents are necessary to incentivise their investment. The granting of monopoly patents is however only one way to finance R&D and it has become increasingly difficult to ignore the shortcomings of the patent system. Patents, among other problems, inhibit data sharing in science, restrict access to medicines and focus R&D on diseases of wealthy patients. This article is a good introduction to the reports and organisations calling for alternative systems to finance R&D. Among the possibilities discussed are that governments offer prizes instead of patent protection.

2. Sex, Lies and Social Science (1995)
by Richard Lewontin

A social science report is examined in detail. From 1995 but a wonderful read nevertheless ($3 or a subscription required)

3. Unbalanced Research (2001)
by Carl Persson, J. Erjefalt, L. Uller, M. Andersson, L. Greiff; TRENDS in Pharmacological Sciences 22:538-541

If you work in the biological sciences you probably work on one of the following model systems: Arabidopsis, Drosophila, C. elegans, cell cultures, etc. Model systems are easy to work on and easy to get funded, but without a great deal of care they can lead you seriously astray. Do we give this possibility the consideration it deserves?

4. Boundaries of Science (1994)
by Thomas F. Gieryn

One of the great articles about science. A monument to clarity and the perfect advert for sociology of science. If you have never read an article originating from science and technology studies, this may change the way you think about science forever.
Handbook of Science and Technology Studies ed S. Jasanoff, G. Markle, J. Peterson, T. Pinch; Sage publications

5. Writing Differently (2006)
by Christopher Grey and Amanda Sinclair; Organization 13:443-453

Why is reading out of ones field so difficult? Are all those long words really necessary? Writing in the journal Organization, Grey and Sinclair do some soul-searching.