Sites of interest on the World Wide Web—edited by Rick Neubig

Biotech news

All the electrons fit to print—and then some—can be found on an array of sites about biotech news. From the spare text links at the Yahoo Finance site (http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/n/biotrx.html) to the busier sites at BioSpace (http://www.biospace.com), bio.com (http://www.bio.com/), BIOTECHS.COM (http://www.biotechs.com/), and Bioworld Online (http://www.bioworld.com/), you can find up-to-the-minute press releases and other information about the biotech industry sector. Most information is available to all surfers, but some links, such as those containing details of clinical trial and patent information, may require a paid subscription. BioSpace also has an interesting feature of links to regional biotech information (http://www.biospace.com/biotechhotbeds.cfm). These days you can even follow the Martha Stewart trial from some of these pages.

Neurotransmitter transporters

Three articles in this issue highlight aspects of neurotransmitter transporters in the pathogenesis and therapy of neurological and psychiatric disorders. While there are many Web sites illustrating structural and functional properties of G protein–coupled receptors (another major drug target family), there is a paucity of such sites related to neurotransmitter transporters. The Transport Links Page, a UCSD site, however, provides genomic, sequence, and functional information about a wide array of transporters, from bacteria to humans (http://www-biology.ucsd.edu/~msaier/transport/). This includes ion channels (Class-1 transporters), potential driven transporters (Class 2), and several other groups. Included are non-ribosomally synthesized transporters such as gramicidin and valinomycin. The neurotransmitter transporters most familiar to neuroscientists, and the ones discussed in the articles in this issue, are part of the large Class-2 group (2.A.22), and are described at the NSS (Neurotransmitter:Sodium Symporter) link on the Protein Transport Database page (http://tcdb.ucsd.edu/tcdb/tcfamily.php?superfam=2.A). A more visual look at neurotransmitter transporters and their role in synaptic transmission is available on the site of author Randy Blakely’s Neurotransmitter Transport Animation site at Vanderbilt University (http://medschool.mc.vanderbilt.edu/blakely/html/animation.html).

Open-access publishing

Late last year a significant event occurred in the area of biomedical research publishing. A group of outstanding scientists, including Harold Varmus, former Director of the NIH, initiated an experiment. The Public Library of Science (PLoS) (http://www.plos.org) released the first issue of PLoS Biology, an open-access journal. All articles can be viewed online for free at PLoS Biology online site (http://www.plosbiology.org). In addition to the free online access, hard-copy subscriptions are available at cost (currently $160 per year). Interestingly, library and individual subscriptions are priced identically. Another group promoting open access publishing is BioMed Central (http://www.biomedcentral.com/). They are a for-profit company, but the cost of publishing is derived from article processing charges to the authors rather than to the “subscribers.” For more information about the open access publishing information concept and adherents, see http://www.plos.org/about/openaccess.html.

Another perspective on advantages and disadvantages of open-access publication has been presented by Margaret Reich of the American Physiological Society (http://www.the-aps.org/publications/tphys/2003html/Aug03/plos.htm). As noted, this business model for scientific publication differs from current models. Open-access publication is paid for by author fees (which may in the future need to be high relative to the page charges currently assigned to authors in subscription-based journals if the journal is to cover its costs). In some cases (e.g., PLoS), costs have been covered by grants and cash contributions to the publishers from interested parties.