Climategate!

By Martín Bonfil Olivera

Published in Milenio Diario, november 9th, 2009

The scandal was very well timed: one month before the United Nations climate change conference took place in Copenhagen, Denmark, some hackers, probably Russian, broke into the servers of the Climatic Research Unit at East Anglia University, in England. They extracted one thousand e-mail messages and two thousand assorted documents, that were then published over the internet.

The objective? To "prove" that climate change experts manipulate data, hide information, ridicule and insult their adversaries –climate change denialists that oppose the fact that global warming is real, or consider it as natural phenomenon, not caused by human activity– and prevent them from publishing their arguments.

And it's true: some documents seem to show evidence of these kind of manipulations. The issue is being investigated to determine if there has been bad scientific practice. If it's confirmed, it will be punished. Also, published data is being verified, to ensure it's reliable.

But it's very probable that we're dealing with a discredit campaign to weaken the International Panel of Climate Change (IPCC), the United Nations, the scientific community and the governments which, right now, are discussing in Copenhagen the urgency of taking measures to diminish the greenhouse effect emissions to attenuate, as much as possible, the damage global warming is already causing.

Sadly, for people who are not specialists, the exhibition of the dirty laundry of scientists in action can be scandalous. In contrast with the pure and untainted –but false- image of science as an infallible method to discover absolute truths, to see researchers as human beings, who commit mistakes and have envies and political interests is a good way to challenge the results of their investigations. But they forget that the reliability of such results it is not given by the personality of individual scientific people, but by a very hard to manipulate collective, international and public quality control process.

It is easy to discredit something by inventing conspiracy theories and exhibiting isolated and out-of-context data. But, independently of the very high economical and political costs of modifying our industry, to play the fool before climate change is an inadmissible risk.

(translated by Adrián Robles Benavides)

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HIV: genomic confusion

By Martín Bonfil Olivera

Published in Milenio Diario, August 12, 2009

On August 6, the main science note on almost all media was a study of the genetic material of the human immunodeficiency virus, HIV.

The bad news is how this discovery was reported. Some sample headlines: "HIV genome deciphered"( BBC, picked up by newspapers such as Publimetro and radio shows like Hoy por hoy en la ciencia (Today in science), from UNAM and W Radio); "HIV genome, deciphered" ( El Clarín, Argentina). What is the problem? That it is incorrect: the full genome of HIV was decoded about 10 years ago. (A Mexican blog on internet even mentioned that "it has been confirmed that HIV uses RNA -ribonucleic acid- instead of DNA -deoxyribonucleic acid", something that has been known since the eighties.)

Some other media were more precise, though still not so clear: MILENIO Diario mentioned "the first HIV full map", "to create an image, not only of RNA nucleotides, but the forms and folds of the RNA strands". Excélsior, with the information from EFE news agency, used the following header: "AIDS virus genome structure decoded". And Spanish El mundo digital headlined "HIV genome, at bird's eye", and explained that "for the first time, the complete structure of HIV's genome was decoded and they got a clear image of its internal architecture".

Let's explain briefly:

HIV, unlike most organisms, does not have genes made of DNA , the famous double helix molecule, but of RNA, formed by only one chain, not two. The chemical links that form this chain are the "letters" in which genetic information is written, and this is what was deciphered years ago.

The discovery of researchers from North Carolina University headed by Kevin Weeks (and published on Nature magazine) is that the HIV RNA strand folds in a complex way: some parts pair up with others to form double helical stretches, for example.

When the virus penetrates a cell and its genetic information is read, these "knots" and rolls (technically known as "secondary structure") can delay the reading of the genes, and this can be fundamental to control how HIV proteins are manufactured.

In other words, a kind of "hidden code" was discovered on the virus' genome, which can be important not only to fight it, but also to better understand the control of genetic information in all types of organisms.

Unfortunately, to explain this with the necessary detail, more space is required than is normally available in news media. At the very least, we should try to be as precise as possible.

(translated by Adrián Robles Benavides)

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Science in the media

By Martí­n Bonfil Olivera
Published in Milenio Diario, June 3, 2009

The science that appears in the media —newspapers, radio, television, the internet— normally takes the form of news, curiosities, entertainment… science as another form of spending time in a pleasant way.

And it's ok it's like that. It is good that science is present in our daily life, that we know about it, we enjoy it and understand it.

But there are occasions —as happened with the recent influenza epidemic— in which we suddenly remember that science can be a matter of life or death. And we realize that in Latin America we do not have specialized communicators, capable of handling it and putting it into the reach of the public in a clear, rigorous and reliable way.

Science, unlike other journalism "sources", requires a special preparation, because it does not yet form, unfortunately, part of our citizens' culture . That's why I was conforted when I went to two events that seek to put a remedy to that shortage of science journalists.

The first was the seminar "Science, technology and innovation as news", organized in Acapulco, in the Mexican state of Guerrero, by the Scientific and Technological Consulting Forum, an assessing organism of the executive government, and the Mexican Society for Scientific and Technical Popularization (SOMEDICYT).

As already mentioned by my colleague Horacio Salazar, this gathering of scientific journalists served to realize that we are a few and we're isolated and disorganized, but that we have the potential to form networks and associations to make us more professional and increase our numbers.

The second event was the XI Reunion of the Latin American and Caribbean Network for the Popularization of Science and Technology (RedPOP), in Montevideo , Uruguay, where science communicators from Latin America gathered to share experiences and analyze the challenges.

From both reunions I gather the conviction that our labor is necessary, because the need to democratize scientific knowledge will become more urgent day by day, and that it is worth to collaborate in an academic way to make it advance and improve.

After all, what we science popularizers are here for is to serve the citizens that, with their taxes, pay for scientific research. The challenge is to get scientific culture become popular culture.

(translated by Adrián Robles Benavides)

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Virus, science and society

by Martín Bonfil Olivera
Published on Milenio Diario, May 6, 2009

The influenza outbrake that has kept Mexico City - and the whole country - semi-paralyzed since April 24 leaves several points clear.

First, the outbreak was expected. Not necessarily in Mexico, or from viral sub-type H1N1 (the favorite candidate was H5N1 which caused the avian flu outbrake in 2006). But evolution, the nature of these viruses —promiscuity; fragmented genome; human, swine and avian hosts— and the natural history of influenza made it perfectly predictable that sooner or later we would be facing another pandemic.

Second, a problem of this magnitude its not only a scientific or medical matter: it affects the whole of society: economy, politics, diplomacy, daily living (we chilangos, inhabitants of Mexico city, know that well). International organisms (especially the World Health Organization) had the good sense to foresee and prepare measures to contain the inevitable: manuals, international agreements, labs, purchase of anti-viral drugs…

Mexico simply followed these indications —not ideally, but adequately, considering our limitations— when the outbreak data were clear.

Now there's talk of slowness in the response, but one of the bad things about an epidemic outbrake is that it cannot be recognized until it's there. To declare the alert before being sure was too high a risk (there are also those who say that the measures were excessive, but the virus could have been very lethal: H5N1 kills 50% of people infected.)

My usual readers know that I don't support Felipe Calderón, our non-legitimate president. But in this case, the actions of his government, as well as the ones from Marcelo Ebrard's (in Mexico City) were not only appropriate, but successful. The intellectual credit for this is for the international medical community; but the political credit is theirs.

The lessons from this situation are that we have to demand more support for scientific investigation and the reconstruction of a health system that works on prevention and research —not only in health attention. There's also a necessity of a much better communication strategy for authorities. And finally, an urgency to have more well prepared science journalists, to avoid the epidemy of conspiracy theories that only make social reaction much more difficult.

(translated by Adrián Robles Benavides)

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Science doesn't matter

by Martín Bonfil Olivera
Published on Milenio Diario, February 25, 2009
The economy is a Darwinian system. But when neoliberal economists talk about the "principles of the free market" like as if these were natural laws, they forget that the economy is not a natural system, but a human one; therefore, it should be subject to ethics.

Darwin explained that the natural thing is for the more apt to survive and the inept to extinguish. However, we humans consciously choose to go against natural selection, and give glasses to the short-sighted and insulin to the diabetics. Not because it is "natural", but because it's human. It's important to remember this when dealing with the economy, before taking decisions based only in monetary interests.

A clear case is the crisis that currently affects science journalism. Journalism, apart from being a business, has a social function that is fundamental for a democracy, and which gives it sense: to give the citizens information that allows them to form their opinions and take decisions (if not, it's better to sell doughnuts, a much simpler and secure business).

In particular, science journalism democratizes science and allows common citizens, not only business people and scientists, to participate of the discoveries and to be involved in decisions that might have grave social and environment effects.

But the economic crisis has caused numerous media in the world to reduce the spaces they devote to science. One of the most notable cases is CNN, which last December cut the entire staff (seven people) of their science, technology and environment department.

In México, last week Reforma, one of the country's major newspapers, decided to eliminate its science printed pages. They will not fire their reporters, and they assure (just like CNN) that science stories will continue to appear, distributed in other sections of the newspaper, but the "high price of paper" forced them to make the cuts.

Reforma had already cancelled its excellent book supplement, Hoja por hoja. In times of crisis, science —and culture— still don't matter. Unfortunately, the media lack a scientific perspective: in the short term, cuts can be justified; in the long term, only a scientific and technical culture in all citizens can save the country from recurrent economical crises. Bad news. What a shame.

(translated by Adrián Robles Benavides)

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