News

In their Technical Comment on “Predicting reaction performance in C–N cross-coupling using machine learning (Reports, 13 April 2018),” Kangway Chuang, Postdoctoral Fellow in the Keiser Lab, and Mike Keiser, Assistant Professor In-Residence, report that Ahneman et al.'s “experimental design [was] insufficient to distinguish models trained on chemical features from those trained solely on random-valued features in retrospective and prospective test scenarios, thus failing classical controls in machine learning.”

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A major goal of the Kampmann Lab is the identification of new therapeutic targets for neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease. The lab has developed a CRISPR-based screening platform to identify genes and pathways controlling disease processes in neurons and glia from human patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells. The Innovative Genomics Institute, directed by CRISPR pioneer Dr. Jennifer Doudna, named Dr. Martin Kampmann an IGI Investigator, and supports the Kampmann lab to facilitate the translation of research insights to therapeutic strategies. Kampmann lab members... Read more ...

In a new “In Focus” article in ACS Chemical Biology, IND Assistant Professor In-Residence Mike Keiser and postdoc Kangway Chuang stress caution when applying machine learning to experimental research models. With new machine learning methods broadly accessible to the research community, Keiser and Chuang emphasize the continued importance of designing strong control experiments and argue that a “hypothesis-driven approach” to research design is “now more critical than ever”.

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New Tourette disorder genes come to light

By Michele Solis (UCSF News)

In the largest DNA sequencing study of Tourette Disorder (TD) to date, UC San Francisco researchers and their collaborators have unearthed new data suggesting a potential role for disruptions in cell polarity in the development of this condition. 

In their new study, published online September 25, 2018 in Cell Reports the researchers focused on “de novo” mutations, or rare mutations that arise anew at conception, rather than being inherited from parents... Read more ...