Can Fish and Cell Phones Teach Us about Our Health?

What Edmund Wilson can teach us about health system transformation.

R ecently, I stumbled on a biography of Edmund Wilson. An American writer, intellect and social critic, Wilson was known for his publications, including Axel’s Castle and Patriotic Gore, as well as his work with Vanity Fair and The New Yorker. Although he came from a completely different era and discipline, I think his saying that “no two persons ever read the same book” provides valuable insig...

Epithelial cell polarity: what flies can teach us about cancer.

Epithelial cells are polarized along their apical-basal axis. Much of the cellular machinery that goes into establishing and maintaining epithelial cell polarity is evolutionarily conserved. Model organisms, including the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, are thus particularly useful for the study of cell polarity. Work in Drosophila has identified several important components of the polarity...

Our microbial selves: what ecology can teach us.

Advances in DNA sequencing have allowed us to characterize microbial communities--including those associated with the human body--at a broader range of spatial and temporal scales than ever before. We can now answer fundamental questions that were previously inaccessible and use well-tested ecological theories to gain insight into changes in the microbiome that are associated with normal develo...

What haplodiploids can teach us about hybridization and speciation

Most evolutionary theory focuses on species that reproduce through sexual reproduction where both sexes have a diploid chromosome count. Yet a substantial proportion of multicellular species display complex life cycles, with both haploid and diploid life stages. A classic example is haplodiploidy, where females develop from fertilized eggs and are diploid, while males develop from unfertilized ...

Can Osler teach us about 21st-century medical ethics?