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posted by CoolHand on Tuesday May 12 2015, @01:56PM   Printer-friendly
from the too-many-cooks dept.

We know that bacteriophages are viruses that infect and replicate within bacteria. We know that they are the most abundant organisms on Earth. But we don’t know much about their genetic architecture.

A team of professional scholars and budding scientists–chiefly college freshmen–have joined forces under the aegis of SEA-PHAGES (Science Education Alliance-Phage Hunters Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science), which is run jointly by the University of Pittsburgh and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, to study the little-known genetics of bacteriophages. In a new paper recently published in the journal eLife, the authors show that phages do not form discrete populations as previously suggested but are rampantly exchanging genes with each other to generate a broad spectrum of genetic diversity, albeit with some types being a lot more prevalent than others.

Of the nearly 3,000 authors, 2,664 were students from among 81 colleges and universities that participate in the SEA-PHAGES undergraduate science program, created by Pitt’s Graham Hatfull and colleagues and funded by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. This paper is believed to have the second-highest number in history of authors on a scientific paper, trailing only that which describes the discovery of the Higgs boson. That paper has more than 6,000 authors.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150511114422.htm

[Abstract]: http://elifesciences.org/content/4/e06416

 
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  • (Score: 1) by Ox0000 on Tuesday May 12 2015, @03:19PM

    by Ox0000 (5111) on Tuesday May 12 2015, @03:19PM (#181962)

    I get that and I think learning more about bacteriophages would be good for humanity; but let me ask the question in another way: how much did each 'author' contribute to the paper and what is the threshold for one's name to be included as an author? Could I have my name included as well? I saw a documentary on bacteriophages once...

  • (Score: 3, Informative) by ikanreed on Tuesday May 12 2015, @03:33PM

    by ikanreed (3164) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday May 12 2015, @03:33PM (#181968) Journal

    The paper was a collation of various distinct bacteriophage genome sequencings with information from each author about the particulars of each studied phage. Presumably every author was responsible for characterizing their own previous research so that there is context to the sequences they've got stored.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 12 2015, @06:08PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 12 2015, @06:08PM (#182031)

    Most of the authors seem to be students that participated in a high school or college class that isolated bacteriophage from various areas, then sent the bacteriophage to be sequenced.