Wanted – input on voting for resolutions for the #UCDavis Academic Senate #OccupyUCDavis

Well today I am finally getting around to voting on some UC Davis Academic Senate resolutions relating to the Occupy UC Davis pepper spray incident.  For those not familiar with this – first – I offer you my undying love – second – here are some of my previous posts on the theme:

I wrote a lot about the pepper spray incident here and on twitter – I felt in many ways like I had to report on what was going on for the outside world.  Here are some of my key posts:

And then Winter break happened and things calmed down a bit at UC Davis.  Plus, I got busy and needed to go back to running my lab and doing some work.  Not that nothing happened during this time.  Lots did in fact.  The best place to find out about what happened is the Davis Enterprise which continued coverage of everything going on (see list on the right side of this page).

Catching up to today – now the issue (for me and other faculty/members of the Academic Senate) is that we have to vote on some resolutions regarding the pepper spray incident.

Below are the three for which I am supposed to vote.  I am asking anyone out there for input on these.  All of them seem pretty, well, lame to me and I am inclined to vote no on all of them.  But I am reserving judgement and looking for feedback from others out there.  Any comments / suggestions welcome.

#1 Motion Concerning the Chancellor’s Judgment



TO: Professor Linda Bisson, Chair, Davis Division of the Academic Senate


Dear Chair Bisson


The undersigned members of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate hereby petition you to put the following motion of non-confidence in the leadership of the Chancellor to a vote of the entire membership of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate at the earliest date that is feasible under Senate rules.


Motion:  In light of the events on the quadrangle of the UC Davis campus on the afternoon of Friday November 18, 2011, in light of Chancellor Linda Katehi’s email to faculty of November 18 in which she admitted that she had ordered the police to take action against the students who were demonstrating on the quadrangle and said that she had had “no option” but to proceed in this way, and in light of the failure of Chancellor Katehi to act effectively to resolve the resulting crisis in the intervening days,


Be it therefore resolved that the Davis Division of the Senate of the University of California lacks confidence in the leadership of Chancellor Katehi, and


Be it also resolved that the result of the vote on this motion be communicated to the Board of Regents and the President of the University of California.


Thank you for your attention to this matter.   


Yours sincerely,


View signatories

#2: Five-Resolution Vote of Confidence


To:  The Davis Division of the Academic Senate  
Re: Petition for Ballot on Issues


We, the undersigned members of the UC Davis faculty, petition the Davis Division of the Academic Senate to hold a vote on the issues below.


Preamble
Whereas non-violent political protest, free assembly, and free speech are constitutional rights valued at the UC Davis,


And whereas the response of the UC Davis Police Department to peaceful protestors on November 18, 2011 was appalling,  


And whereas in the UC Davis culture it is customary for representative(s) from the highest levels of the administration to engage in direct dialogue with demonstrators, 


And whereas prior to November 18, 2011 Chancellor Linda Katehi worked diligently to elevate the national and international stature of the Davis campus,


And whereas the presence of an accomplished scholar at the top post has helped UC Davis attract and retain outstanding scholars, including faculty members serving at the highest levels of administration,


And whereas in the last two years, Chancellor Linda Katehi developed a bold plan for campus growth that includes an aggressive fund-raising campaign that will alleviate the burden imposed by ever decreasing state financial support,


And whereas Chancellor Linda Katehi apologized to University community for the events of November 18, 2011,


And whereas Chancellor Linda Katehi publically stated that she will ensure that such events do not recur,


And whereas the events of November 18 transformed Linda Katehi into a Chancellor who engages in a full and open dialogue with students, staff, and faculty,


And whereas Chancellor Katehi moved expeditiously to replace the flawed communications in the two days following the events with a campus-wide dialogue through a series of town hall meetings with students, staff, and faculty,


And whereas a Chancellor with first-hand experience of the horrific events of November 18, 2011 is better qualified to deal with its aftermath,


And whereas dispatching police before engaging in a direct dialogue with protesters, while running counter to the UC Davis culture, does not outweigh the Chancellor Katehi’s impeccable performance of all her other duties,


And whereas Chancellor Katehi’s resignation would have devastating effects on the moral and academic standing of the campus, thereby making it highly unlikely that UC Davis could attract a Chancellor of her stature,


And whereas it is time to promote a constructive healing process rather than risk more harm by pressuring the Chancellor to resign:


Resolution:


Be it therefore resolved that the Davis Division of the Academic Senate:


Condemns both the dispatch of police in response to non-violent protests and the use of excessive force that led to the deplorable pepper-spraying events of November 18, 2011.


Opposes all violent police responses to non-violent protests on campus.


Demands that police deployment against protesters be considered only after all reasonable administrative efforts to bridge differences have been exhausted, including direct consultation with the leadership of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate.


Accepts Chancellor Linda Katehi’s good faith apology.


Expresses confidence in Chancellor Linda Katehi’s leadership and efforts to place UC Davis among the top 5 public universities in the nation.



View signatories

#3: Motion Concerning Police Actions


TO: Professor Linda Bisson, Chair, Davis Division of the Academic Senate


Dear Chair Bisson


The undersigned members of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate hereby petition you to put the following motion to a vote of the entire membership of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate at the earliest date that is feasible under Senate rules.


Motion: 


Be it resolved that that the Davis Division of the Senate of the University of California hereby (1) condemns both the dispatch of police and use of excessive force in response to non-violent protests on November 18, 2011; 
(2) opposes violent police response to non-violent protests on campus; 
(3) demands that police deployment against protestors be considered only after all reasonable efforts have been exhausted and with direct consultation with Academic Senate leadership.


Thank you for your attention to this matter. 


Yours sincerely,


View signatories

Interesting 2011 pub on origin of multicellularity in cyanobacteria

Just a quick one here.  There is an (openaccess) publication I thought people might find interesting: The origin of multicellularity in cyanobacteria.  Schirrmeister BE, Antonelli A, Bagheri HC. BMC Evol Biol. 2011 Feb 14;11:45.

In particular it has some very nice figures on phylogeny of cyanobacteria and the evolution of phenotypes in the group.

Figure 1. Phylogenetic tree of 1,254 cyanobacterial species. 
Figure 4. Phylogenetic tree of a cyanobacterial subset

Some of the same authors also have a paper on the need for better phylogenetic sampling of genome data in the group:

Evolution of cyanobacterial morphotypes: Taxa required for improved phylogenomic approaches. Schirrmeister BE, Anisimova M, Antonelli A, Bagheri HC. Commun Integr Biol. 2011 Jul;4(4):424-7. Epub 2011 Jul 1.

Though I note, I am a bit annoyed and surprised they did not cite my “Phylogeny driven genomic encyclopedia” paper in this pub …

Biodiversity Museum Day on Sunday, Feb. 12

Biodiversity Museum Day on Sunday, Feb. 12

UC Davis will celebrate “Biodiversity Museum Day” on Sunday, Feb. 12 when four museums or centers that engage in education and research involving insects, vertebrates or plants will host open houses.  The Bohart Museum of Entomology, the Museum of Wildlife and Fish Biology and the Botanical Conservatory will be open to the public from 1 to 4 p.m., while the Center for Plant Diversity will be open from 2 to 4 p.m.  “This will be a fun day where people of all ages can visit UC Davis and check out a number of our research and teaching collections,” said Tabatha Yang, education and outreach coordinator for the Bohart Museum and Museum of Wildlife and Fish Biology. “Each collection is special and an important scientific resource. I think people will be amazed.”
http://entomology.ucdavis.edu/news/biodiversitymuseumday.html

Converting repeated emails into FAQs: Today’s = How to Get Figures/Details from 2009 GEBA paper

OK I am now officially completely driven insane by email.  As part of my attempt to reduce email communication with people I am going to start posting some of the emails I get often into FAQs.

Today’s email relates to the 2009 paper on a “Phylogeny driven genomic encyclopedia of bacteria and archaea” for which I was the senior and corresponding author.  The email is asking for higher resolution figures that were published in the paper.  This person and many others have asked for a higher res. version of our “genome tree” which was Figure 1.  Here is the version from the paper

But alas, as a JPG when you zoom in you can’t see the text very well.  And about 30 or so people, maybe more, have asked for a higher res. version.  Well, the simplest way to get this figure with legible fonts when zoomed in is to get the PDF of the paper and zoom in on it.  But that may not be for everyone – so here is a link to the PDF of the figure that I posted on postures (Blogger does not allow PDF uploads).  I also posted PDFs of the other figures.

Many people also ask for the treefile (which is basically a coded version of the phylogenetic tree for viewing and analysis).  I am directly posting the treefile below and have also submitted it to “Treebase” (which we should have done before).  Enjoy … and in the future I will be pointing people to this page when they ask for the figure/treefile. Not sure this will have saved me anytime but am sick of writing a lot of this in emails back to people …

#NEXUS
BEGIN trees;
TREE ‘Tree1’ = 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′:0.074921,’Zymomonas_mobilis_subsp_mobilis_ZM4’:0.113715):0.03071):0.187787):0.027917,((‘Rhodospirillum_rubrum_ATCC_11170′:0.169238,’Magnetospirillum_magneticum_AMB_1’:0.125062):0.055149,(((‘Gluconobacter_oxydans_621H’:0.101123,’Gluconacetobacter_diazotrophicus_PAl_5′:0.059111):0.060663,’Granulibacter_bethesdensis_CGDNIH1′:0.085514):0.032014,’Acidiphilium_cryptum_JF_5′:0.120348):0.145099):0.055072):0.09899,(((((‘Rickettsia_bellii_RML369_C’:6.4E-4,’Rickettsia_bellii_OSU_85_389′:6.24E-4):0.053585,(((‘Rickettsia_typhi_str_Wilmington’:0.015422,’Rickettsia_prowazekii_str_Madrid_E’:0.012042):0.039247,((‘Rickettsia_felis_URRWXCal2′:0.00684,’Rickettsia_akari_str_Hartford’:0.024586):0.00502,(((‘Rickettsia_rickettsii_str_Iowa’:0.0,’Rickettsia_rickettsii_str_Sheila_Smith_’:0.0):0.00663,’Rickettsia_conorii_str_Malish_7′:0.002765):0.00386,’Rickettsia_massiliae_MTU5′:0.00794):0.008218):0.002179):0.00446,’Rickettsia_canadensis_str_McKiel’:0.030982):0.03239):0.199956,(‘Orientia_tsutsugamushi_Boryong’:0.012903,’Orientia_tsutsugamushi_str_Ikeda’:0.003049):0.386268):0.180586,((((‘Anaplasma_phagocytophilum_HZ’:0.123173,’Anaplasma_marginale_str_St_Maries’:0.120008):0.159306,((‘Ehrlichia_ruminantium_str_Gardel’:0.002292,’Ehrlichia_ruminantium_str_Welgevonden’:0.002453):0.053871,(‘Ehrlichia_canis_str_Jake’:0.027749,’Ehrlichia_chaffeensis_str_Arkansas’:0.027236):0.031378):0.134774):0.151991,((‘Wolbachia_pipientis’:0.072061,’Wolbachia_endosymbiont_of_Drosophila_melanogaster’:0.04265):0.018425,’Wolbachia_endosymbiont_strain_TRS_of_Brugia_malayi’:0.077353):0.269684):0.141145,’Neorickettsia_sennetsu_str_Miyayama’:0.697366):0.171539):0.064736,’Candidatus_Pelagibacter_ubique_HTCC1062′:0.549831):0.056614):0.089191,’Magnetococcus_sp_MC_1′:0.339568):0.063213):0.093791,((‘Acidobacteria_bacterium_Ellin345′:0.221486,’Solibacter_usitatus_Ellin6076’:0.235193):0.269435,((((((‘Geobacter_sulfurreducens_PCA’:0.05188,’Geobacter_metallireducens_GS_15′:0.04331):0.045927,’Geobacter_uraniireducens_Rf4′:0.08407):0.035503,(‘Pelobacter_propionicus_DSM_2379′:0.107415,’Geobacter_lovleyi_SZ’:0.104313):0.062144):0.11137,’Pelobacter_carbinolicus_DSM_2380′:0.218315):0.102231,(((((((‘Desulfovibrio_vulgaris_subsp_vulgaris_DP4′:2.75E-4,’Desulfovibrio_vulgaris_subsp_vulgaris_str_Hildenborough’:2.47E-4):0.096556,’Desulfovibrio_desulfuricans_subsp_desulfuricans_str_G20′:0.130391):0.041935,’Lawsonia_intracellularis_PHE_MN1_00′:0.194671):0.108731,(‘GEBA_Desulfohalobium_retbaense’:0.206905,’GEBA_Desulfomicrobium_baculatum’:0.21572):0.039647):0.204436,’Desulfotalea_psychrophila_LSv54′:0.368324):0.05185,(‘Desulfococcus_oleovorans_Hxd3′:0.325853,’Syntrophobacter_fumaroxidans_MPOB’:0.267991):0.045811):0.045242,’Syntrophus_aciditrophicus_SB’:0.335728):0.039815):0.036306,(((‘Sorangium_cellulosum_So_ce_56_’:0.340758,’GEBA_Haliangium_ochraceum’:0.326975):0.069132,((‘Anaeromyxobacter_sp_Fw109_5′:0.05281,’Anaeromyxobacter_dehalogenans_2CP_C’:0.046187):0.14976,’Myxococcus_xanthus_DK_1622′:0.199974):0.121235):0.065096,’Bdellovibrio_bacteriovorus_HD100′:0.487944):0.045793):0.04331):0.033782):0.033693,’GEBA_Denitrovibrio_acetiphilus’:0.52279):0.036282,(((((((‘Sulfurimonas_denitrificans_DSM_1251′:0.23347,’Arcobacter_butzleri_RM4018′:0.208618):0.040632,’Sulfurovum_sp_NBC37_1’:0.230443):0.030751,(((((‘Campylobacter_jejuni_subsp_jejuni_NCTC_11168′:0.001263,’Campylobacter_jejuni_RM1221’:9.27E-4):6.61E-4,((‘Campylobacter_jejuni_subsp_doylei_269_97′:0.006051,’Campylobacter_jejuni_subsp_jejuni_81116′:3.16E-4):0.001123,’Campylobacter_jejuni_subsp_jejuni_81_176’:9.26E-4):3.5E-4):0.119606,((‘Campylobacter_curvus_525_92′:0.03145,’Campylobacter_concisus_13826′:0.037212):0.061724,’Campylobacter_fetus_subsp_fetus_82_40′:0.097271):0.023098):0.020182,’Campylobacter_hominis_ATCC_BAA_381′:0.16927):0.075991,’GEBA_Sulfurospirillum_deleyianum’:0.136694):0.07072):0.026032,((((((‘Helicobacter_pylori_HPAG1′:0.003032,’Helicobacter_pylori_26695′:0.004293):9.24E-4,’Helicobacter_pylori_Shi470′:0.004956):0.002035,’Helicobacter_pylori_J99′:0.00625):0.008252,’Helicobacter_acinonychis_str_Sheeba’:0.010673):0.199339,’Helicobacter_hepaticus_ATCC_51449′:0.121696):0.062387,’Wolinella_succinogenes_DSM_1740′:0.107844):0.108511):0.052813,’Nitratiruptor_sp_SB155_2′:0.132215):0.401479,(‘Aquifex_aeolicus_VF5′:0.291771,’Sulfurihydrogenibium_sp_YO3AOP1′:0.270137):0.202377):0.049843,’Elusimicrobium_minutum_Pei191’:0.667875):0.034753):0.023181,(((((((‘GEBA_Dyadobacter_fermentans’:0.115999,’GEBA_Spirosoma_linguale’:0.124662):0.074785,’Cytophaga_hutchinsonii_ATCC_33406′:0.182703):0.054101,’Candidatus_Amoebophilus_asiaticus_5a2′:0.332349):0.041954,((‘GEBA_Pedobacter_heparinus’:0.181859,’GEBA_Chitinophaga_pinensis’:0.30193):0.037197,(((((‘Flavobacterium_psychrophilum_JIP02_86′:0.059237,’Flavobacterium_johnsoniae_UW101′:0.052582):0.072716,’Gramella_forsetii_KT0803′:0.133872):0.034419,’GEBA_Capnocytophaga_ochracea’:0.123672):0.087924,’Candidatus_Sulcia_muelleri_GWSS’:0.665368):0.057908,((((‘Bacteroides_fragilis_YCH46′:0.0,’Bacteroides_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33L’:5.32E-4):0.001131,(‘Bacillus_cereus_ATCC_14579′:0.002251,’Bacillus_weihenstephanensis_KBAB4′:0.013987):0.004118):0.001515,’Bacillus_cereus_ATCC_10987′:2.57E-4):0.020967,’Bacillus_cereus_subsp_cytotoxis_NVH_391_98’:0.013733):0.085584,(((‘Bacillus_subtilis_subsp_subtilis_str_168′:0.015012,’Bacillus_amyloliquefaciens_FZB42′:0.015183):0.020109,’Bacillus_pumilus_SAFR_032′:0.040049):0.011797,’Bacillus_licheniformis_ATCC_14580’:0.023456):0.065389):0.021459,(‘Geobacillus_thermodenitrificans_NG80_2′:0.011367,’Geobacillus_kaustophilus_HTA426’:0.01873):0.094956):0.020796,((((((((‘Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_Mu3′:0.0,’Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_Mu50′:1.67E-4):1.67E-4,’Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_N315’:1.67E-4):0.0,(‘Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_JH9′:0.001001,’Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_JH1’:0.0):3.34E-4):5.16E-4,(((‘Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_MRSA252′:6.67E-4,’Staphylococcus_aureus_RF122’:3.35E-4):0.0,(((‘Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_NCTC_8325′:6.77E-4,’Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_USA300_TCH1516′:0.0):0.0,’Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_USA300’:0.0):0.0,(‘Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_COL’:6.68E-4,’Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_str_Newman’:3.33E-4):3.34E-4):1.67E-4):0.0,(‘Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_MSSA476′:0.0,’Staphylococcus_aureus_subsp_aureus_MW2’:0.0):3.34E-4):1.51E-4):0.032187,((‘Staphylococcus_epidermidis_ATCC_12228′:3.35E-4,’Staphylococcus_epidermidis_RP62A’:1.66E-4):0.023543,’Staphylococcus_haemolyticus_JCSC1435′:0.025193):0.012868):0.014679,’Staphylococcus_saprophyticus_subsp_saprophyticus_ATCC_15305′:0.045225):0.208482,((((((((((‘Streptococcus_pyogenes_SSI_1′:1.69E-4,’Streptococcus_pyogenes_MGAS315’:3.35E-4):3.86E-4,(((((‘Streptococcus_pyogenes_M1_GAS’:3.34E-4,’Streptococcus_pyogenes_MGAS5005′:1.67E-4):3.34E-4,(((‘Streptococcus_pyogenes_MGAS8232′:6.78E-4,’Streptococcus_pyogenes_MGAS10750′:8.62E-4):1.67E-4,’Streptococcus_pyogenes_str_Manfredo’:5.01E-4):3.34E-4,’Streptococcus_pyogenes_MGAS10394′:5.01E-4):0.0):1.67E-4,(‘Streptococcus_pyogenes_MGAS9429′:5.01E-4,’Streptococcus_pyogenes_MGAS2096′:0.0):5.01E-4):0.0,’Streptococcus_pyogenes_MGAS10270′:5.09E-4):3.34E-4,’Streptococcus_pyogenes_MGAS6180’:5.01E-4):2.83E-4):0.032705,((‘Streptococcus_agalactiae_2603V_R’:5.02E-4,’Streptococcus_agalactiae_A909′:0.0):5.02E-4,’Streptococcus_agalactiae_NEM316′:0.0):0.032531):0.009744,((‘Streptococcus_thermophilus_LMG_18311′:4.96E-4,’Streptococcus_thermophilus_CNRZ1066′:6.75E-4):0.001002,’Streptococcus_thermophilus_LMD_9′:8.46E-4):0.042346):0.010989,’Streptococcus_mutans_UA159’:0.053241):0.014154,((‘Streptococcus_suis_98HAH33′:1.41E-4,’Streptococcus_suis_05ZYH33’:0.003069):0.045053,((((‘Streptococcus_pneumoniae_D39′:0.0,’Streptococcus_pneumoniae_R6’:0.0):0.001089,(‘Streptococcus_pneumoniae_TIGR4′:7.57E-4,’Streptococcus_pneumoniae_CGSP14′:0.001274):5.04E-4):1.79E-4,’Streptococcus_pneumoniae_Hungary19A_6’:5.78E-4):0.025464,(‘Streptococcus_gordonii_str_Challis_substr_CH1′:0.013866,’Streptococcus_sanguinis_SK36’:0.013168):0.014048):0.01685):0.015608):0.079689,((‘Lactococcus_lactis_subsp_cremoris_SK11′:0.001565,’Lactococcus_lactis_subsp_cremoris_MG1363′:8.56E-4):0.005333,’Lactococcus_lactis_subsp_lactis_Il1403′:0.005458):0.157584):0.124114,’Enterococcus_faecalis_V583’:0.096988):0.030082,(((((‘Lactobacillus_acidophilus_NCFM’:0.017053,’Lactobacillus_helveticus_DPC_4571′:0.025039):0.047802,(‘Lactobacillus_gasseri_ATCC_33323′:0.008251,’Lactobacillus_johnsonii_NCC_533’:0.00468):0.081515):0.035749,(‘Lactobacillus_delbrueckii_subsp_bulgaricus_ATCC_BAA_365′:0.001075,’Lactobacillus_delbrueckii_subsp_bulgaricus_ATCC_11842’:9.47E-4):0.095385):0.189762,((‘Lactobacillus_casei_BL23′:1.67E-4,’Lactobacillus_casei_ATCC_334′:1.71E-4):0.13496,’Lactobacillus_sakei_subsp_sakei_23K’:0.116042):0.029638):0.037981,(((((‘Lactobacillus_brevis_ATCC_367′:0.113171,’Lactobacillus_plantarum_WCFS1′:0.09989):0.023598,’Pediococcus_pentosaceus_ATCC_25745’:0.140539):0.018317,(‘Lactobacillus_fermentum_IFO_3956′:0.075472,’Lactobacillus_reuteri_F275’:0.062813):0.114981):0.022679,((‘Leuconostoc_mesenteroides_subsp_mesenteroides_ATCC_8293′:0.031056,’Leuconostoc_citreum_KM20′:0.035589):0.124121,’Oenococcus_oeni_PSU_1′:0.234536):0.131959):0.021585,’Lactobacillus_salivarius_UCC118’:0.124879):0.034651):0.077386):0.111668,(((‘Listeria_monocytogenes_EGD_e’:0.00208,’Listeria_monocytogenes_str_4b_F2365′:7.75E-4):0.001511,’Listeria_welshimeri_serovar_6b_str_SLCC5334′:0.003974):0.001047,’Listeria_innocua_Clip11262′:0.001031):0.107265):0.033808):0.044404,’Lysinibacillus_sphaericus_C3_41′:0.152339):0.036331):0.021337,’Oceanobacillus_iheyensis_HTE831′:0.18896):0.019902,(‘Bacillus_clausii_KSM_K16′:0.093196,’Bacillus_halodurans_C_125′:0.066964):0.053506):0.027554,’Exiguobacterium_sibiricum_255_15′:0.211271):0.115095,’GEBA_Alicyclobacillus_acidocaldarius’:0.223192):0.06559,(((((‘Clostridium_acetobutylicum_ATCC_824′:0.123954,’Clostridium_novyi_NT’:0.114099):0.023517,((((‘Clostridium_perfringens_ATCC_13124′:5.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Tropheryma_whipplei_str_Twist’:6.79E-4):0.478476):0.120846,’GEBA_Acidimicrobium_ferrooxidans’:0.43829):0.090081,(((‘GEBA_Cryptobacterium_curtum’:0.142154,’GEBA_Eggerthella_lenta’:0.088587):0.047811,’GEBA_Slackia_heliotrinireducens’:0.117231):0.104268,’GEBA_Atopobium_parvulum’:0.269623):0.198082):0.036936,(‘GEBA_Conexibacter_woesei’:0.383152,’Rubrobacter_xylanophilus_DSM_9941′:0.357989):0.109409):0.087352,(((((((((‘Synechococcus_sp_WH_7803′:0.023543,’Synechococcus_sp_CC9311’:0.044194):0.014221,((‘Synechococcus_sp_CC9605′:0.022222,’Synechococcus_sp_WH_8102′:0.025798):0.006423,’Synechococcus_sp_CC9902’:0.032326):0.022152):0.016325,(((‘Prochlorococcus_marinus_subsp_marinus_str_CCMP1375′:0.058394,’Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_MIT_9211’:0.053438):0.019947,((‘Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_NATL2A’:0.00276,’Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_NATL1A’:0.002109):0.070906,((‘Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_MIT_9515′:0.013908,’Prochlorococcus_marinus_subsp_pastoris_str_CCMP1986’:0.016702):0.023743,(((‘Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_AS9601′:0.005031,’Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_MIT_9301′:0.005416):0.003975,’Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_MIT_9215′:0.011185):0.004908,’Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_MIT_9312’:0.010415):0.020455):0.117983):0.022565):0.040798,(‘Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_MIT_9313′:0.00429,’Prochlorococcus_marinus_str_MIT_9303′:0.003453):0.043557):0.012995):0.046129,’Synechococcus_sp_RCC307’:0.067465):0.195828,(‘Synechococcus_elongatus_PCC_7942′:3.21E-4,’Synechococcus_elongatus_PCC_6301’:0.00142):0.098101):0.061386,(((((‘Nostoc_sp_PCC_7120′:0.004827,’Anabaena_variabilis_ATCC_29413′:0.003501):0.036361,’Nostoc_punctiforme_PCC_73102′:0.042386):0.086848,’Trichodesmium_erythraeum_IMS101’:0.151445):0.024405,(((‘Cyanothece_sp_ATCC_51142′:0.088208,’Microcystis_aeruginosa_NIES_843′:0.108904):0.018975,’Synechocystis_sp_PCC_6803′:0.111161):0.027275,’Synechococcus_sp_PCC_7002’:0.127272):0.053965):0.023778,(‘Acaryochloris_marina_MBIC11017′:0.127345,’Thermosynechococcus_elongatus_BP_1’:0.138774):0.035212):0.017944):0.063385,(‘Synechococcus_sp_JA_3_3Ab’:0.023735,’Synechococcus_sp_JA_2_3B_a_2_13_’:0.025648):0.172906):0.056598,’Gloeobacter_violaceus_PCC_7421′:0.211642):0.301851,(((((‘Roseiflexus_castenholzii_DSM_13941′:0.02822,’Roseiflexus_sp_RS_1′:0.017828):0.118476,’Chloroflexus_aurantiacus_J_10_fl’:0.154341):0.066504,’Herpetosiphon_aurantiacus_ATCC_23779′:0.219302):0.124086,(‘GEBA_Sphaerobacter_thermophilus’:0.242004,’GEBA_Thermobaculum_terrenum’:0.272557):0.055029):0.055648,((‘Dehalococcoides_sp_CBDB1′:5.54E-4,’Dehalococcoides_sp_BAV1′:8.51E-4):0.017643,’Dehalococcoides_ethenogenes_195’:0.014048):0.50406):0.083393):0.032459):0.039409):0.035188):0.022061):0.039665):0.054226,(((‘Thermosipho_melanesiensis_BI429′:0.127803,’Fervidobacterium_nodosum_Rt17_B1’:0.188887):0.074834,(((‘Thermotoga_maritima_MSB8′:0.007577,’Thermotoga_sp_RQ2′:5.3E-4):0.005057,’Thermotoga_petrophila_RKU_1′:0.006656):0.159923,’Thermotoga_lettingae_TMO’:0.230211):0.037393):0.080613,’Petrotoga_mobilis_SJ95′:0.362128):0.246177):0.287154,((‘Thermus_thermophilus_HB8′:0.001498,’Thermus_thermophilus_HB27’:0.001224):0.144321,(‘GEBA_Meiothermus_ruber’:0.114423,’GEBA_Meiothermus_silvanus’:0.077947):0.086289):0.12529):0.1212895,(‘Deinococcus_geothermalis_DSM_11300′:0.043888,’Deinococcus_radiodurans_R1’:0.07314):0.1212895);
END;

New openaccess paper from my lab on "Zorro" software for automated masking of sequence alignments

A new Open Access paper from my lab was just published in PLoS One: Accounting For Alignment Uncertainty in Phylogenomics. Wu M, Chatterji S, Eisen JA (2012) Accounting For Alignment Uncertainty in Phylogenomics. PLoS ONE 7(1): e30288. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0030288

The paper describes the software “Zorro” which is used for automated “masking” of sequence alignments.  Basically, if you have a multiple sequence alignment you would like to use to infer a phylogenetic tree, in some cases it is desirable to block out regions of the alignment that are not reliable.  This blocking is called “masking.”

Masking is thought by many to be important because sequence alignments are in essence a hypothesis about the common ancestry of specific residues in different genes/proteins/regions of the genome.  This “positional homology” is not always easy to assign and for regions where positional homology is ambiguous it may be better to ignore such regions when inferring phylogenetic trees from alignments.

Historically, masking has been done by hand/eye looking for columns in a multiple sequence alignment that seem to have issues and then either eliminating those columns or giving them a lower weight and using a weighting scheme in the phylogenetic analysis.

What Zorro does is it removes much of the subjectivity of this process and generates automated masking patterns for sequence alignments.  It does this by assigning confidence scores to each column in a multiple seqeunce alignment. These scores can then be used to account for alignment accuracy in phylogenetic inference pipelines.

The software is available at Sourceforge: ZORRO – probabilistic masking for phylogenetics.  It was written primarily by Martin Wu (who is now a Professor at the University of Virginia) and Sourav Chatterji with a little help here and there from Aaron Darling I think.  The development of Zorro was part of my “iSEEM” project that was supported by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.

In the interest of sharing, since the paper is fully open access, I am posting it here below the fold. UPDATE 2/9 – decided to remove this since it got in the way of getting to the comments …

Fun visit to the #UCDavis Bohart Entomology Museum w/ my daughter’s Daisy Troop (led by my wife)

Kudos to the UC Davis Bohart Museum of Entomology for the tour they gave to the Daisy Troop my daughter is in (which is run by my wife and a friend of hers). I got there a little late and embarrassed myself by thinking one of the dads was one of the museum workers and introducing myself (even though I know the dad pretty well).  Oh well, live and let learn.  The visit went great – the kids got to play with bugs, got to open the stacks and even pull out drawers of various bugs (note – the general term, not the Homoptera).  The museum staff were wonderful and the museum itself is very nice.  A great kids activity in Davis and good for adults too.  Always great to see passionate science education and outreach.

Interesting new metagenomics paper w/ one big big big caveat – critical software not available "

Very very strange.  There is an interesting new metagenomics paper that has come out in Science this week.  It is titled “Untangling Genomes from Metagenomes: Revealing an Uncultured Class of Marine Euryarchaeota” and it is from the Armbrust lab at U. Washington.

One of the main points of this paper is that the lab has developed software that apparently can help assemble the complete genomes of organisms that are present in low abundance in a metagenomic sample.  At some point I will comment on the science in the paper, (which seems very interesting) though as the paper in non Open Access I feel uncomfortable doing so since many of the readers of this blog will not be able to read it.

But something else relating to this paper is worth noting and it is disturbing to me.  In a Nature News story on the paper by Virginia Gewin there is some detail about the computational method used in the paper:

“He developed a computational method to break the stitched metagenome into chunks that could be separated into different types of organisms. He was then able to assemble the complete genome of Euryarchaeota, even though it was rare within the sample. He plans to release the software over the next six months.”

What?  It is imperative that software that is so critical to a publication be released in association with the paper.  It is really unacceptable for the authors to say “we developed a novel computational method” and then to say “we will make it available in six months”.  I am hoping the authors change their mind on this but I find it disturbing that Science would allow publication of a paper highlighting a new method and then not have the method be available.  If the methods and results in a paper are not usable how can one test/reproduce the work?

Q & A about Elsevier, my blog retraction, and #OpenAccess

Jop de Vrieze has written an article related to the Elsevier boycott for ScienceInsider:

Thousands of Scientists Vow to Boycott Elsevier to Protest Journal Prices

In the article, one of the things he discusses is my blog post (which I then “retracted) suggesting people ignore any papers published in Elsevier Journals: Boycotting Elsevier is not enough – time to make them invisible (UPDATED/RETRACTED).

In his article he wrote:

One scientist who strongly supports the boycott is Jonathan Eisen, a microbial genomicist at the University of California, Davis, and the Academic Editor-in-Chief of PLoS Biology, an open access journal. On Tuesday, Eisen urged readers of his blog to go one step further, by no longer paying attention to research published by Elsevier. “In essence, ignore them – consider them dead – make them invisible,” he wrote. But after readers protested that no paper should be ignored just because of where it’s published, Eisen quickly retracted the entire post, which he said had been written “at midnight, with a cat on my lap.” “The response to my post helped make me realize that the semi-sarcastic attempted tone was not coming through correctly,” Eisen writes in an e-mail to ScienceInsider.


de Vrieze did a good job of representing my point of view.  But I thought it might be useful to all of the Q&A in the email with him.  Fortunately, he said this was OK to do so … here are my full answers to his questions:

If you would have adjusted your blog, what would have been the main points your would have reconsidered?

Oh – my blog post was really just a thought question written in anger in the middle of the night. I could have written it better but in the end, the idea behind the post was wrong-headed. Any scientific publication or presentation, no matter where it is made, should be considered a contribution to science. The name of the journal or the
publisher does not matter (nor from my point of view does it matter if something is in a journal per se). Thus even though I was being a bit tongue in cheek in the post suggesting we ignore publications in Elsevier journals – clearly my tone was not coming through and I decided to retract the post.

I note – following the recommendation of Ivan Oransky who runs the Retraction Watch site I left up the original post (though I changed it
to strikethrough font) and posted an explanation for the retraction.
I also tried to chase down twitter and blog and Google+ discussions of my post to say I was “retracting” the post and to explain why and what I had been trying to say.

I also note – I had sense knocked into my head on this by people on twitter like @drugmonkey -so the response to my post helped make me realize that the semi-sarcastic attempted tone was not coming through correctly

For your article you might want to check out the discussions happening on Google+ and on Drug Monkey’s blog.

https://plus.google.com/u/0/103101121348859087349/posts/B8f1XyuY7Gk

https://plus.google.com/u/0/106772544387169323774/posts/TszquaTKeoA

What do you think is the value of this petition?

I support the petition. I think scientist’s and others (humanities too …) need to take a stand against some of the publishing policies and political actions (e.g., support of the RWA) of Elsevier. I note – I already do not review for or publish in or edit for any of their journals. And I think if 1000s of scientists really followed through on this Elsevier might be forced to change their policies.

What do you think needs to change in the system?

I should note – I am personally not against for profit companies and not agains the notion that people can make a profit off of publishing.

The problem I have is really two fold.

  1. I think that research and publications that are supported by taxpayer money should be made available broadly to the public. 
  2. I think there is abundant evidence that more openness in science is beneficial to the progress of science – open data (e.g., Genbank) has revolutionized certain fields. True open access publishing frees up the literature so that not only can anyone access it but also allows anyone to remix and utilize the literature in creative ways (and potentially make a profit from doing so). Open release of software is critical for cases where software is used in scientific publications. And so on. Openness aids in the progress of science.

Thus with #1 and #2 above, I think it is imperative that we move towards more openness. The challenge is – how do we get there? And how do we pay for it? (Note – I am not saying above that being open has no cost – I am saying it is beneficial and politically wise). The problem with Elsevier in my mind is they take government subsidies that pay for journal charges, salaries of their reviewers and editors, and subscription fees for libraries – and in return – amazingly – they generally take ownership of the literature. This seems to be an unsound trade.

So – the question is – can we become more open and afford it? Yes, I think it is pretty clear that there is more than enough money being spent currently on publishing broadly that could be reallocated to open publishing. The success of PLoS and Biomed Central and the move of some societies to release publications rapidly (e.g., ASM) indicates that this is possible (though I note – Science still lags in this area).

I think we are still figuring out exactly how to set up a new system – but the old system of signing over the ownership and / or publishing rights for papers is no longer needed and it is not helpful to scientific progress.

Who should take the first, or most important steps? Scientists? Publishers? Libraries? Institutions?

Everyone. We all need to work together to come up with a system that retains the good things in the old system (e.g., scientific societies, good peer review, paper editing, etc) while being more open. We need to change hiring policies, library subscription systems, peer review, journal search algorithms, and so on.

What, if publishers like Elsevier would disappear, would give scientists a mark of quality or relevance of scientific publications?

Well – the name of a publisher and the name of a journal is a crude mark of quality at best. What should be measured is the ACTUAL quality of publications not a surrogate for quality. Certainly, everyone is busy and surrogates of quality end up being used a lot. But we need to develop systems that measure article quality better and also help people find the right articles for them. There are many examples of things in the works to help do this. The PLoS commenting system was/is an attempt at this. So is Faculty of 1000. I think post-publication peer review is going to be critical. The cream should rise to the top and the more we can do to make sure this happens quickly the better.

Boycotting Elsevier is not enough – time to make them invisible (UPDATED/RETRACTED)

Update: The original post here was written at midnight, with a cat on my lap.  I thought this post conveyed some tongue in cheek aspect of this idea to ignore work in Elsevier journals. (one could view it as a midnight middle finger to Elsevier over some of their policies).  But clearly, based on the responses I am seeing that did not come across.  I accept the error of my ways.  Drug Monkey is right – no work should be ignored – no matter where it is published.   I could explain in more detail what I was trying to convey – but in the end that is like explaining a bad joke.  Instead, I am therefore retracting my blog post.  That is one for Ivan Oransky I guess. Now back to your regularly scheduled programs.

There has been much written in the last few days about multiple calls to boycott journals published by Elsevier due to Elsevier’s generally problematic publishing policies and support of SOPA/ RWA, etc.  People have called for people to not only boycott publishing in Elsevier journals but to also stop reviewing for them, editing for them, and also to try to get libraries to stop subscribing to them.  Some good reading in this area includes:
I think these are good steps.  But I also think they are not enough.  I am therefore calling for people to go one step further – to stop helping promote articles published in Elsevier journals.  Don’t blog about papers in Elsevier journals.  Don’t tweet about them.  Don’t use Elsevier papers for journal clubs.  In essence, ignore them – consider them dead – make them invisible.  Not completely of course.  Any work should be considered a contribution to science or math or whatever your field is.  But there are LOTS and LOTS of things to do with your time.  And if you like to share – to communicate – to discuss – it is easy to find non Elsevier articles articles for those purposes (even better – pick open access articles ..)

This may be a minor thing in the fight for more openness in publishing, but it should help.  After all, for many scientists, the worst thing that can happen is to be ignored.

How are these @kejames re: #PLoSOne cc: @boraz @edyong209 @danielaphd