Commentary

Leveraging open hardware to alleviate the burden of COVID-19 on global health systems

Publishing date: 2020-05-06 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: With the current rapid spread of COVID-19, global health systems are increasingly overburdened by the sheer number of people that need diagnosis, isolation and treatment.

Ten simple rules for providing effective bioinformatics research support

Publishing date: 2020-03-26 Published on: PLOS Computational Biology summary: None authors: Judit Kumuthini, Michael Chimenti, Sven Nahnsen, Alexander Peltzer, Rebone Meraba, Ross McFadyen, Gordon Wells, Deanne Taylor, Mark Maienschein-Cline, Jian-Liang Li, Jyothi Thimmapuram, Radha Murthy-Karuturi, Lyndon Zass

ElectroPen: An ultra-low–cost, electricity-free, portable electroporator

Publishing date: 2020-02-07 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: None authors: Gaurav Byagathvalli, Soham Sinha, Yan Zhang, Mark P. Styczynski, Janet Standeven, M. Saad Bhamla link to paper: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3000589 Icons made by catkuro from www.

Knowledge-guided analysis of omics data using the KnowEnG cloud platform

Publishing date: 2020-01-23 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: None authors: Charles Blatti III, Amin Emad, Matthew J. Berry, Lisa Gatzke, Milt Epstein, Daniel Lanier, Pramod Rizal, Jing Ge, Xiaoxia Liao, Omar Sobh, Mike Lambert, Corey S.

Ten quick tips for delivering programming lessons

Publishing date: 2020-01-15 Published on: PLOS Computational Biology summary: Teaching well is a craft like any other, and success often comes from an accumulation of small improvements rather than from any single large change.

Nessys: A new set of tools for the automated detection of nuclei within intact tissues and dense 3D cultures

Publishing date: 2019-09-26 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: Methods for measuring the properties of individual cells within their native 3D environment will enable a deeper understanding of embryonic development, tissue regeneration, and tumorigenesis.

Ten simple rules for helping newcomers become contributors to open projects

Publishing date: 2019-09-26 Published on: PLOS Computational Biology summary: Open source projects are nothing but a collaborative effort of community members. The constant involvement of maintainers, contributors, and users make open source software sustainable and keeps the community as a whole going.

Leveraging conservation action with open‐source hardware

Publishing date: 2019-09-05 Published on: The Society for Conservation Biology summary: Data collection by conservation biologists is undergoing radical change, with researchers collaborating across disciplines to create bespoke, low‐cost monitoring equipment from open‐source hardware (OSH).

Nesting box imager: Contact-free, real-time measurement of activity, surface body temperature, and respiratory rate applied to hibernating mouse models

Publishing date: 2019-09-05 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: If you’re trying to measure animal activity without disturbing a hibernating animal your options were previously limited and expensive but the growing utility and shrinking price of sensors, cameras and single-board computers has enabled this device for monitoring mice nesting boxes using a Raspberry Pi and an infrared camera for under $400.

Harnessing robotic automation and web-based technologies to modernize scientific outreach

Publishing date: 2019-07-29 Published on: PLOS Biology summary: Technological breakthroughs in the past two decades have ushered in a new era of biomedical research, turning it into an information-rich and technology-driven science.