An ASBMB History May 2009
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UAN ANNOUNCES 2009 AWARD WINNERS An ASBMB History May 2009 American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology contents MAY 2009 ON THE COVER: ASBMB unveils its society news new history book. 12 3 President’s Message 6 Washington Update 7 Showcasing the National Science Foundation 12 The First Hundred Breast Cancer Years Are the Hardest Biomarkers 16 Premiering in May: 27 A New JLR Thematic Review Series on Proteomics special interest 14 Power to the Postdocs science focus 28 Benjamin Neel: Phosphatases and Disease departments 2 Letters to the Editor 8 News from the Hill 10 Member Spotlight 17 Lipid News 18 Education and Training 22 Minority Affairs Benjamin Neel studies phosphatases and disease. 28 24 Career Insights 26 BioBits resources podcast summary Scientific Tune into this month’s podcasts and hear Meeting interviews with the authors of the JBC thematic Calendar minireview series “Metals in Biology” and “The Biochemical Basis for Triplet Repeat online only Neurodegenerative Diseases.” You can listen to the podcasts at www.asbmb.org/Interactive.aspx May 2009 ASBMB Today 1 letter to the editor A monthly publication of The American Society for tive yet informal and that the views Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Facts and expressed by the speakers are their Officers Gregory A. Petsko President own thoughts and perceptions Heidi E. Hamm Past President Fictions on matters of interest. In regard Mark A. Lemmon Secretary Dear ASBMB, Merle S. Olson Treasurer to the specifics of the question, I Rewriting history is an unsa- Council Members have carefully looked over Norum’s Dafna Bar-Sagi Alan Hall John D. Scott vory process that creates confusing questionnaire (Norum, K. R. (1978) Joan A. Steitz Ann M. Stock paradoxical views between those Kevin Struhl James A. Wells Adrian Whitty Nutr. Metab. 22, 1–7), and yes, the who believe and those who remem- Ex-Officio Members particular question highlighted in Ellis Bell ber. Your ASBMB interview with your letter was phrased differently Chair, Education and Professional Development Committee Daniel Steinberg illustrated some than as Dr. Steinberg stated. The Laurie S. Kaguni of the allusions and illusions (and Chair, Meetings Committee question reads: “Do you think there John D. Scott the “drift” in truth) that underlie is a connection between plasma Chair, Membership Committee “The Cholesterol Wars.” Of course, Craig E. Cameron cholesterol levels and the develop- Chair, Minority Affairs Committee you merely report what Steinberg ment of coronary heart disease?” Joan W. Conaway answered, and the task of verify- James H. Hurley However, it may not be entirely Co-chairs, 2009 Program Committee ing a story remains for some other accurate to label Dr. Steinberg’s Ralph A. Bradshaw venue. If you had the time to do so, Chair, Public Affairs Advisory Committee comments as a misrepresentation Toni M. Antalis you might have seen how the facts Chair, Publications Committee of the truth; rather, it is just his Herbert Tabor were misrepresented in your article. interpretation of an open-ended Editor, JBC Steinberg claimed that Norum’s Ralph A. Bradshaw question. For although Norum’s A. L. Burlingame questionnaire asked: “Do you think questions do not specifically address Co-editors, MCP that the evidence supports cho- Edward A. Dennis a “proof of cause,” they do not Joseph L. Witztum lesterol as a major contributor to discount it either, and as one of the Co-editors, JLR atherosclerosis and heart attacks?” 200+ scientists who took part in ASBMB Today Editorial Advisory Board and he also claimed that the Alex Toker the survey, Dr. Steinberg is simply Chair “experts” said “yes” to that question. relating his belief in what the ques- Greg P. Bertenshaw Craig E. Cameron They did not. This is how misunder- A. Stephen Dahms Irwin Fridovich tion means. It is possible that many Jonathan Gitlin Richard W. Hanson standings begin. of the other survey participants Elizabeth A. Komives Bettie Sue Masters The scientists in 1978 clearly saw Luke A. O’Neill Duanqing Pei believed the connection was causal Carol C. Shoulders Robert D. Wells an ASSOCIATION of food calories as well; we cannot be sure. However, ASBMB Today with elevated blood cholesterol. it is interesting to note that Norum Nicole Kresge Editor They did not elevate the association [email protected] himself pointed out that, because to a PROOF OF CAUSE—as Stein- Nick Zagorski Science Writer a few of the survey participants [email protected] berg implies. We still have concerns hesitated to call any dietary connec- Nancy J. Rodnan Director of Publications about the flow of information today. [email protected] tions “causal,” the answers to the key One vital principle is that major- Barbara Gordon Executive Director question, “Do you think that our [email protected] ity votes do not constitute a logical knowledge about diet and coronary Magazine design & production: Amy Phifer scientific proof. heart disease is sufficient to recom- For information on advertising contact mend a moderate change in the diet Capitol Media Solutions at 800-517-0610 Sincerely yours, or [email protected] William E. M. Lands for the population in an affluent society?” were of great interest. And RESPONSE in this area, 92 percent said “Yes,” Dear Dr. Lands, suggesting a belief that diet and www.asbmb.org cholesterol play a contributory role, Thank you for your input on as Steinberg said. this topic. First, we would like to state that our ASBMB Roundtable Nick Zagorski series is designed to be informa- ASBMB Science Writer 2 ASBMB Today May 2009 president’smessage Too Big to Succeed?* BY GREG PETSKO e hear the phrase “too big to fail” a lot these they had always gone through Wdays. It means that a company is so vital to cycles of rising and falling for, the national economy that its demise would be cata- oh, the previous 5,000 years or strophic, so the government will go to extraordinary so, seems to have been lost on the lengths to keep it afloat. General Motors Corporation, self-styled geniuses who created the mess we’re in. the sinking U. S. car maker, is said to be too big to fail. The real problem, though, is that nobody knows if Lehman Brothers, the investment bank whose collapse that $11 trillion figure is right because nobody knows precipitated financial crises around the world, was what the toxic securities are really worth. They may be too big to fail—although George W. Bush’s Secretary worth anything from close to their nominal value to of the Treasury, Henry Paulson, didn’t realize that in zero, and that’s a heck of an error bar. So let’s look at time. And, as the world credit market tries to become Citibank. Yes, it has $2.3 trillion in assets, but it also unstuck before a global depression sets in, we hear the has big liabilities. How big? It’s unknown. There might same thing about two U. S. bank holding companies, be, say, $1 trillion in liabilities, in which case Citibank Bank of America and Citibank. is in great shape. But there could well be $3 trillion in But what exactly does it take to make a company too liabilities, in which case this enormous bank is actually big to fail? In the case of General Motors, it is the huge broke. And no one, not the chief executive of Citibank number of jobs that would be lost if it went under, but nor the head of the U. S. Treasury nor a gypsy reading that consideration doesn’t apply to a financial services tea leaves, can say which is the case. The banks had firm, at least not directly. In the case of banks, it’s the grown so large and had created such an elaborate web magnitude of the monetary loss that matters. Bank of of interdependent, chopped-up, over-leveraged securi- America has assets of approximately $2.7 trillion and ties that their own financial people had no real idea of Citibank has assets of around $2.3 trillion. The Gross how much debt they were taking on. Domestic Product (GDP) of the United States is $14 In other words, I think Bank of America and Citi- trillion, so each of these banks has assets in excess of 14 bank (as well as Lehman Brothers and most of the other percent of the yearly output of the largest economy on companies at the heart of the global financial crisis) Earth. That’s too big to fail. have become too big to succeed because they are too But I would argue that, if you can be too big to fail, big to be managed. No one individual—or group of you also can be too big to succeed. Your very size can individuals—can assimilate the amount of informa- be your undoing, as it may have been for the huge, lum- tion needed to keep tabs on what goes on at a company bering dinosaurs who weren’t flexible enough to survive that size, so even if they themselves are not crooked or the global catastrophe that our small, furry, mammalian incompetent, they are fated to be hostages to crooked ancestors were able to weather. or incompetent people who work, undetected, at some Consider the two giant banks. Over $2 trillion in lower level of the Byzantine corporate structure. Yet, assets sounds great, right? Well, maybe, but there’s until recently, these companies were touted as the also the small matter of their liabilities. Both banking epitome of excellence, precisely because, through merg- companies hold enormous quantities of so-called “toxic ers and acquisitions, they had grown so enormous.