BIOSBIOS NewsIssue 11 • Winter 2009

In this issue

Editorial

Controversies and scandals by Ayo Wahlberg 2

Neuroethics in Washington by Caitlin Connors 4

Postgraduate pages: Cancer Stories – A story about a (re)presentation by John Macartney 5

MSc pages: The MSc students speak by Grégoire Hervouet-Zeiber and Nishant Bagadia 6

Postcards to BIOS 8

Research updates 10

Publications, lectures and conference presentations by BIOS staff, associates and students 10

Upcoming BIOS events 12

BIOS News Issue 11 • Winter 2009 1

Social brains and neurosocieties

What happens when society or ‘the social’ is brought into the lab through experiments that aim to mimic or model social behaviour or interaction? And conversely, what happens when neuroscience diffuses its way out of the lab and into popular literature, art, court cases, therapeutic practices or military applications? Members of BIOS explored these and many other questions through hosting and participating in a series of events in the Michaelmas Term.

In early October, about 20 participants gathered just outside Rome for the first Interdisciplinary NeuroSchool of the European Neuroscience and Society Network which was organised by Giovanni Frazzetto at the Mouse Biology Unit of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory around the topic of ‘Genetics of behaviour and psychiatric disorders: from society to the lab and back’. A month later, a few members of BIOS attended the inaugural Neuroethics Society Meeting held in Washington DC. And in December, a group of 20 junior researchers presented papers

at ENSN’s workshop on ‘Our Brains, Our Selves – Historical and Ethnographic Approaches to the New Brain Sciences’ hosted by Andreas Roepstorff and his team at Aarhus University in Denmark. BIOS also hosted a roundtable with Suzanne Anker of the New York School of Visual Arts who spoke of her work around ‘neurocultures’. Each of these events addressed emergent social and ethical implications of the new brain sciences and related practices.

In this issue of BIOS News, you will find a reflection on the place of controversies and scandals in biological research by Ayo Wahlberg. Caitlin Connors looks back at the inaugural Neuroethics Society meeting held this November in Washington DC. In the postgraduate pages, John Macartney reports on a Cancer Stories Symposium at which he presented in Indianapolis. In the MSc pages, this year’s MSc group tell of how they ended up coming to the LSE to do an MSc in Biomedicine, Bioscience and Society. We wish all a happy new year! n

Controversies and scandalsby Ayo Wahlberg

2 BIOS News Issue 11 • Winter 2009

The BIONET project is heading into its final stages. Since its launch in November 2006 (see BIOS News 5, Winter 2007), this Chinese-European collaboration on issues around the ethical governance of biological and biomedical research in a context of global science practice has held a total of three workshops (in Beijing, Shanghai and Xi’an) and one conference (in Changsha) on the topics of reproductive medicine, stem cell research and clinical trials.

The objective of the project, which is funded by the European Commission’s Sixth Framework Programme as well as the Medical Research Council in the UK, is to empirically map out practices of ethical governance in China and Europe in these fields, and on this basis, to propose a set of recommendations for best practice in the ethical governance of research collaborations in biological and biomedical research between Chinese and European scientists. This latter task has been given to the BIONET expert group which is chaired by Prof. Christoph Rehmann-Sutter (University of Basel) and co-chaired by Prof. Qiu Renzong (Chinese Academy of Social

Sciences). My own work as Research Fellow for BIONET contributes to the former objective, ie, mapping out practices of ethical governance.

Reflecting on BIONET’s hitherto workshops and conferences, as well as my spell as Visiting Fellow at the Peking University Health Science Centre in the fall of 2007, it strikes me how prominent a place controversies and scandals have had in our deliberations and discussions. Speakers at BIONET events have highlighted the ‘Hwang scandal’, disagreements about the moral status of embryos, the Harvard-Anhui blood sample scandal, controversies around human-animal hybrids and more. Each of these scandals and controversies has been global in form spanning many countries, yet played out in different ways in local contexts.

Controversy and contestation are of course familiar to most of us, as the fields we study in the bio-realm (from genetics to neuroscience and regenerative medicine) are almost always controversial in some way. Indeed, some might say that this is the very reason that social science has a role to play in bioscience

and biotechnology, through its empirical engagement with how new technologies and therapies are taken up, transformed and/or resisted by individuals, biosocial communities, publics or nation states. In sociology, ‘controversy studies’ have especially been prevalent in sociology of science and sociology of knowledge approaches, often in a Kuhnian context of a struggle of knowledge paradigms where actors engage in truth games. The notion of controversy has also been central to public understanding of science approaches as well as studies around public engagement in science. Reflecting on BIONET’s work so far, I have found it useful to distinguish between controversies and scandals. Let me explain.

Tampering controversies

It is a common feature of bioethical debates to hear that scientists are tampering with the fundamentals of human life/nature, that they are ‘playing god’. When Cohen et al. published ‘Construction of Biologically Functional Bacterial Plasmids in vitro’ in 1973, Wilmut et al. published ‘Viable offspring derived

BIOS News Issue 11 • Winter 2009 3

from fetal and adult mammalian cells’ in 1997 and Chen et al. published ‘Embryonic stem cells generated by nuclear transfer of human somatic nuclei into rabbit oocytes’ in 2003, not only did they demonstrate ‘proof of principle’ for genetic modification, somatic cell nuclear transfer and human-animal cybrid creation respectively, they also set the stage for very vocal controversies and campaigns. Banners proclaiming ‘GMO free zone’, ‘Stop cloning’ and ‘No Animal Human Hybrids’ carried by protestors have become a part of the ‘public understanding’ of these new technologies in many countries.

One of the discussions we have had at our BIONET workshops has concerned national differences in the ways in which such controversies play out. For example, some countries are considered to have very ‘restrictive’ stem cell research policies because of the moral status accorded embryos (eg, Germany, Austria, Poland, Italy). Some suggest that those countries which have ‘influential’ religious groups tend to be more protective of embryos than more secularised countries. And although such generalisations are rarely full proof, they do make a point about how policy making processes differ from country to country. In China, some speakers suggested, there is ‘no public debate’ about such an issue as the moral status of embryos because ‘life begins at birth’ and also, China’s one-child policy brings an entirely new dynamic to the notion of ‘spare embryos’. On the other hand, there has been some resistance to human-animal hybrids.

Among the lessons learned from our exchanges has been that when it comes to bioscience policy making, scientists, government officials, non-governmental organisations (churches, disease advocacy groups, consumer groups, etc), media and the ‘public’ input the process in different ways. For example, whereas, the media, church and NGOs are seen to make significant inputs in Europe, in China, government officials draft policy by soliciting inputs from a wide range of experts, including scientists, lawyers and bioethicists. And such differences can to some extent determine how certain issues become controversial and others don’t. In both regions, an ongoing institutionalisation of bioethics has meant that national ethics commissions are also feeding into policy making processes.

Tainted scandals

So how are scandals different from controversies? For me, in the realm of biological and biomedical research, scandals do not so much pertain fears about ‘tampering with human life’ as they do fraudulent and/or unethical practice on the part of scientists. So if controversies pertain science, scandals concern the actions and practices of particular scientists (or institutions). The ‘Hwang scandal’ is probably the paradigmatic case here. Many of our speakers from Europe and China pointed to the lessons to be learned from this scandal, and indeed the passing of a Regulation on Scientific Misconduct by the Ministry of Science and Technology in China in 2007 has been interpreted by some as a direct response to the Hwang scandal as well as a series of national scandals where Chinese scientists have been caught out for fraud.

A key distinction made by Herbert Gottweis at our Shanghai workshop on stem cell research was between peer review and ethical review. On the one hand, scientific data can be fraudulent when manipulated, and thereby tainted. This is so to speak ‘fake data’ that has been manipulated in order to enhance the reputation of scientists. But in a post WWII world where the Nuremburg code and Helsinki declaration have come to be central for all human subjects research, data can also become tainted if it has been unethically procured (eg, by ignoring informed consent requirements or through coercion and exploitation of vulnerable subjects). This aspect of the ‘ethical taintedness’

of data was central to both the Hwang-scandal (which of course also turned out to be fake!) and the Harvard-Anhui blood sample scandal where Harvard scientists were accused of procuring large quantities of blood samples from farmers in China’s Anhui province without proper informed consent. Moreover, data generated through the global outsourcing of clinical trials to developing countries has also come to be seen as ‘ethically tainted’ by many.

As science has become global with biological samples easily flown from one country to another and therapies invented in one country tested in another, so too have scandals. Ethical review boards, mandatory informed consent procedures and ethical codes of conduct for scientists are among the tools that have been developed/are being developed to combat ethical fraud. However, as many of the cases discussed at our workshops showed, there continue to be plenty of instances throughout the world where ethically questionable practices continue, a situation complicated when global research collaborations across different regulatory frameworks take place.

Perhaps it is only a question of time before the next big scandal breaks (first human clone?) or the next big controversy emerges (synthetic biology?). What is clear is that controversies and scandals in the field of biological and biomedical research will continue to signpost efforts to ethically govern this form of activity. n

Controversies and scandals continued…

Photo by mtoz (www.flickr.com/people/mtoz/)

In the words of its founders, ‘neuroethics’ encompasses ‘a wide array of ethical issues emerging from different branches of clinical neuroscience (neurology, psychiatry, psychopharmacology) and basic neuroscience (cognitive neuroscience, affective neuroscience)’ (http://neuroethics.upenn.edu/). In practice, the largely neuroscientist-member society has tended to focus largely on issues arising out of psychopharmacology and functional neuroimaging – on issues such as cognitive enhancement and the ethical or legal implications of neuroscientific investigations of personality, consciousness, morality, etc.

Conference participants and society members at large tend to split into two main academic camps: 1) working clinicians or scientist-practitioners such as neuroscientists and psychologists and 2) bio-ethicists and philosophers. Amid sessions on decision-making and free will, neuroscience policy, paediatric bipolar disorder, cognitive enhancement, forensic and military neuroscience, the conference content perhaps unsurprisingly split accordingly, focusing on two general types of emergent ethical issues. First, much discussion centred on practical ethical problems faced by working neuroscientist researchers, as society members aired concerns and questions not typically discussed (or

necessarily sympathetically received) in the scientific research environment. Thus, a discussion of the ethics of deep brain stimulation conducted between neurologist Helen Mayberg, ethicists Jonathan Moreno and Joseph Fins, and Nature editor Philip Campbell focused on the difficulties of fielding public requests for neurological treatments at the early stages of development – on the lack of resources available for scientists suddenly forced into discussion with families and patients desperate for cures, and on the researcher consequences of the frequent disconnect between media reports about scientific developments and their actual stage of progress.

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Neuroethics in Washingtonby Caitlin Connors

In mid-November, several members of the BIOS family made the trek to chilly Washington DC for the First Annual Meeting of the Neuroethics Society, the group’s first large-scale event since an inaugural ‘field-mapping’ conference in 2002.

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Neuroethics in Washington continued…The second stream of discussion had less to do with the day-to-day practice of neuroscientific research and more to do with the potentially larger ethical issues raised by its discoveries – such as concerns about privacy issues in neuroimaging-based ‘lie detection’ and its potential use or misuse in the courtroom, or the should and shouldn’ts of individual cognitive enhancement through pharmaceuticals or brain-machine interfaces. These sessions (which seemed to have garnished the bulk of the media attention post-conference) often tended towards the ‘what if’ scenario, as panellists and discussants acknowledged that many of the ethical issues under exploration were not present and pressing concerns but suggested that the field must interrogate potential problems before they arise.

Perhaps unsurprising for a BIOS affiliate, I found the conference most engaging when it focused on more grounded discussion about the practical consequences of current neuroscientific and psychiatric ways of seeing. One of the most productive sessions, The Neuroethics of Pediatric Bipolar Disorder, brought together former NIMH director Steven Hyman, NIMH science program director Ben Vitiello and bioethicist Josephine Johnston to wrestle with the causes and consequences of the explosion of diagnosed pediatric bipolar disorder

– a childhood diagnosis that, like controversy-riddled ADHD, generally involves the prescription of childhood psycho-pharmaceuticals. Here I felt

the meeting shone, as the experience and expertise of the panellists were brought to bear on real-world tensions situated at the heart of this relatively new disorder: the personal and professional imperative to keep a critical eye on the consequences of pediatric labelling and medication even as you try to meet the pressing clinical need of a family in crises; an appreciation for sometimes necessary pharmaceuticals balanced with concerns about long-term side effects in vulnerable child patients.

This session also encouragingly expanded the kinds of ethical issues under discussion, as Josephine Johnston reminded the group that the ways in which we understand the causes and potential treatments of psychological problems have real ethical consequences for patients. She urged self-reflexivity on the part of the clinical and psychiatric communities necessarily embedded in controversies about pediatric bipolar disorder and other psychological disorders, calling attention to the ways in which pharmaceutical understandings of problems and people might limit the range of thinkable solutions. Reminding the assembled body that ‘When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail’, Johnston suggested that modern tendencies to characterize psychological disorders in biological terms sometimes neglects ways of thinking about environmental and

social or family influences on childhood distress and disorder. She then cautioned that more holistic understandings of children and their problems, particularly an awareness of family constellations that might either help or hamper their development, often get left out of clinical discourse – to the potential deficit of the child.

If the impressive North American and international turnout of the conference is any indication – the event organisers hoped for around sixty or eighty participants and were near-overloaded with over two-hundred professionals and students – neuroethics is gaining steady strength as a discipline. Plan to see this group in the headlines and journals. And, for the sake of your cold-phobic colleagues, cross your fingers that the next conference gets scheduled somewhere slightly less wintry… n

I’m going to tell you a story. A story about my presentation at a conference. So, as they say, ‘Are you sitting comfortably? Good. Then I’ll begin’. But as Arthur Frank warned us at the opening plenary, the beginning of someone’s story is not always the start of his or her narrative. And this is as good a time as any to remind ourselves of this.

Why, you might ask, would BIOS News feature a story? BIOS, surely, is the research centre that conducts

interdisciplinary research with hard-nosed scientists on such things as reproductive technologies, regenerative medicine, stem cell therapies, neurotechnologies and all things that are prefixed with ‘bio’. But this is my ‘in’. Yes, in this slapdash straw man that I paint there is a space for those who are interested in ‘biopolitics and the transformation of ideas of citizenship and identity’. (It has not quite been relegated to the small print, yet.) So

with that attention seeking piece of reflexive controversy behind me, surely the next paragraph contains my ‘real’ story.

So let me tell you about my presentation at the ‘Cancer Stories Symposium’ at Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI). But what is it that I am telling you? Can stories be purely a work of non-fiction? A non-fictitious story, Frank told us, is an unlikely representation. And so is the fictitious.

Postgraduate pagesConference Report: Cancer Stories – A story about a (re)presentationby John Macartney

Cancer Stories – A story about a (re)presentation continued…However, what this account can do is draw upon the narratives told and the events witnessed. It can be taken, in its own moment, when it is suitable to you, as its own ‘narrative resource’ for your own story.

For instance I can tell, and you can retell, my story about the delightful and welcoming atmosphere that the organisers provided. The myriad of departments that were represented: anthropology, history, medicine, English literature, law,

social psychology, medical humanity, performing art, and sociology. Or my own presentation, ‘Ethical intuition: Listening to the subjectivised voice of cancer narratives’; which seemed to go down very nicely, thank you. But in this telling (and retelling) there are questions about the relationship between the indexical nature of narrative resources and the potential for novelty within them – a problem many in BIOS have to deal with, one way or the other.

I am going to stop writing now; so this must be the end of my story. And at the end of a story there is often an ethic to point to. Here it is that stories are an important part of what BIOS does. The stories we listen to and the ones we tell. I hope we can all learn from that. n

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This year, the MSc program at BIOS draws students from various cultural and professional backgrounds to form one of the more interactive and engaging groups since the program’s inception. We have asked some of the students to describe their ambitions for the BIOS program and experiences in London.

I) Academic and cultural Backgrounds

This year’s students come from very diverse cultural and academic backgrounds. They received their undergraduate education in varied regions where many social issues are pertinent to the current dialogue in biomedicine and society. These regions include North America, South and South East Asia and the European Union.

‘I am a polish law graduate. My professional legal experience varies from investment banking, international law, IP law, health and pharmaceutical regulations. I started my education at Silesian University in Poland, and since have trained at the University of Paris Pantheon Assas and The University of La Sapienza. I am currently considering moving into another field, which is why

I am here at BIOS’.

Kasia Kaminska, Poland

‘Prior to joining the MSc program at BIOS, I worked in a hospital’s neurophysiology lab performing EEGs. I have a Bachelors Degree in cognitive psychology from the University of Rochester in New York’.

Katelyn Thomas, USA

‘I have completed an MSc in Natural and Applied Sciences from Oklahoma State University (USA) and an MSc in Botany (Biochemistry and Molecular Biology) from the University of Calcutta (India)’.

Kasturi Ghatak, India

‘I have completed a BSc in Biochemistry at the University of Montreal and then worked in a laboratory trying to identify and characterise the genes induced by retinoic acid in human cells. Later, I completed an MA in Political Science at the University of Quebec in Montreal. My thesis was on the links established between the Chechen Wars and foreign policy in Russian Political Discourse’.

Grégoire Hervouet-Zeiber, Canada

‘I received my undergraduate degree in biochemistry and English from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Thereafter, I worked in science journalism, business development for a start-up and consultant for Deloitte Consulting, LLP before coming to BIOS.’

Nishant Bagadia, USA

II) Why BIOS?

Many of the students hope to build upon their background in natural science, practical medicine, and business to incorporate social science dimensions into their future work. These future ambitions for the MSc students have wide ranging applications in diverse settings. Some hope to improve health care systems in their host country, while others aim to tackle ethical questions around science and medicine. A fair number of students are driven to continue their education with a doctorate degree, while others still would like to apply their degrees in the private or public sectors of various markets.

‘For me, BIOS was the perfect mixture of interesting and relevant subject matter, an interdisciplinary approach that allows for more free thinking than usual in graduate studies’.

Katelyn Thomas

MSc pagesThe MSc students speakby Grégoire Hervouet-Zeiber and Nishant Bagadia, MSc students in BIOS

BioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocieties BioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocieties BioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocieties BioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocieties BioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocieties BioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocieties BioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocieties BioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocieties BioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocietiesBioSocieties

Vol 3, issue 4

Featuring articles by Alastair Matheson on the role of the pharmaceutical industry in constructing scientific and medical knowledge, Jane Calvert on commodification in systems biology and synthetic biology, Mette Svendsen and Lene Koch on recruitment of patients to pharmacogenomics research, as well as an excerpt from Tom Shakespeare’s forthcoming account of his own life with achondroplasia and a lecture by Nikolas Rose on race, risk and medicine in the age of ‘your own personal genome’.

www.journals.cambridge.org/jid_BIO

Out now!The Master’s speak continued…

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‘I wanted to move towards Social Sciences from Biological Sciences as I wanted to work with people rather than working alone in a lab with no human interaction. On the other hand, I also wanted to use the scientific skills I had gained in my future projects. BIOS seemed to be a perfect combination and LSE was one of the few, as well as the best, institution offering such a course. I would like to join a PhD programme eventually, as I want to be a part of the academia’.

Kasturi Ghatak

‘This programme allows me to think critically and in new ways about the Biosciences, to think of science as a cultural enterprise. It also helps me make conceptual links in my own multidisciplinary background’.

Grégoire Hervouet-Zeiber

‘I truly believe that the MSc in Biomedicine, Bioscience and Society will help me to establish my career path in the world of ‘bioscience, biomedicine and pharmaceutical markets’ since its ensures very close links with the industry which I would like to dedicate my future endeavors’.

Kasia Kaminska

III) What are your thoughts on London?

For the new MSc group, it is not all about studying. The city of London is an active and stimulating backdrop for any student to expand their lifestyle interests. As such, the students have not only chosen BIOS, they have specifically chosen London!

‘London is a refreshing change after spending three years in a small Midwestern

one’s education, this city can expand your mind if you let it’.

Katelyn Thomas

‘And if the education, history and intellectual stimulation are not enough in London, I can always take time to relax over a few pints at one of thousands of local pubs’.

Nishant Bagadia

As apparent, the 2008-09 BIOS MSc program proves to be a fun and exciting experience for all parties involved. n

town within the USA. It feels like being at home, as the city is very much like my hometown Kolkata. I love this city for its culture and heritage and also its diversity. In a nutshell, I am enjoying London and also the atmosphere at LSE’.

Kasturi Ghatak

‘A fantastic location! London offers so many unique opportunities to supplement

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Postcards to BIOS

Hi from Sydney!

Niamh Stephenson

After three fantastic months with all at BIOS I just slipped through the turmoil at Bangkok airport and arrived back to Sydney (yes, its summer here but before you get too envious, summer can involve sunny blue skies but its likely as not to consist of non-stop, torrential, muggy rain, and the past few days have seen both). Already I’m missing that productive clicking of multiple BIOS keyboards interrupted by kitchen conversations and Wednesday afternoon cake.

Well, I feel like I had to leave exactly at the point it would have been good to stay at least another few months

– when new conversations and connections were beginning. I hope that there’ll be chances in the future

to continue those conversations – including in person. So, please get in contact if you’re coming to Sydney, or thinking of it. I’m based at the University of New South Wales and as well as working with colleagues in public health I’m involved in an interdisciplinary research program on Technology Bioscience and Innovation Culture (www.arts.unsw.edu.au/research/strengths/res_tech_biosci_innovation). If you’re thinking of giving a talk, this group of researchers would be a good audience for much of the research that’s being undertaken at BIOS – it’s a mix of social scientists together with cultural studies and humanities types. Although I’m back, I haven’t finished sabbatical and now I’m based at Sydney University’s Centre for Values, Ethics and Law in Medicine (www.cvelim.org/index.html).

The name doesn’t really give much away, but this research centre is as close to the set up and ethos of BIOS as anything you’ll find in Australia. It would also be a good place to visit and give a talk. So if you’re heading this way, get in touch and I’d be glad to link you up with people here.

But really, there’s no place like BIOS and now I’ll just have to get used to working without first passing by the heart of the BIOS machine (aka David Reuben’s continuous presence in front of the screen, David, I know you’re dying to finish but you realise a lot of people will have to do some serious readjustment when you do…) and without the welcome interruptions of talk planned and unplanned with everyone on the 11th floor, and the reading group Kathrin’s organising. I hope we can keep in touch. n

NYC

Sarah Franklin

I’m very fortunate to be enjoying six months of my ESRC research fellowship at NYU’s Institute for the History of the Production of Knowledge on the 10th floor of 285 Mercer Street. The book I am completing is entitled Biological Relatives: substance, interiority and the genealogical frontier, and it is something of a sequel to Dolly Mixtures – focussing instead on embryo transfer. It’s great to be back in the States but I do feel a bit British at about 3pm every Wednesday and am missing you all!

The man from Gulu

Christine Sweed, BIOS Centre Manager

I had never met anyone from Uganda before meeting David. About a week before my trip I was chatting to Kerstin, a PhD student in the BIOS kitchen about my impending journey. David from Estates was looking at a floor problem we had, and mentioned he was from Uganda. When I asked where he was from I was amazed to find it was Gulu, Northern Uganda – the very town I was heading for.

David gave me the contact information of some of his family and in Gulu I met Patrick, his nephew as well as two of his sisters. Patrick was instrumental in arranging transport and a driver for us while we were in Northern Uganda, something we would have struggled to do without David’s assistance.

My purpose in Gulu was joining my good friend Sarah to work for a charity called Motivation, who assist people with spinal cord injuries in various countries worldwide. In alliance with Gulu Disabled Persons Union (GDPU), a week of ‘Peer Group Training’ was organised which consisted of teaching local people (with existing spinal cord injuries) wheelchair skills, ways of maintaining good health etc. There was also time for games, conversations and lots of smiling and handshaking

– Ugandan people are incredibly friendly and welcoming! I found this humbling at times considering this was a post-conflict area and some of our participants were former child soldiers. Almost everyone we met had horrific stories to tell of the 20 year civil war with the LRA; their strength and spirit were unlike any I have ever seen.

My Masters degree in Human Rights provided me with scepticism of NGO’s in general, but this was challenged when I saw the enthusiasm and enjoyment of the

participants. The idea that valuable information and support could be passed on at a grassroots level through local networks is sustainable as well being common sense.

Contracting Malaria while at the training camp was made easier by the support and kindness of those around me; without Alfred (pictured with me – a staff member of GDPU) I would have spent a lot more time in the hospital negotiating local procedures! Malaria also gave me a better understanding of one of the most ubiquitous and dangerous diseases in East Africa, which raised questions such as why this treatable disease kills millions in Africa each year, is Malaria one of the ‘neglected’ diseases etc.

A truly rewarding and fascinating experience, I can’t wait to go back! Thank you to everyone in BIOS for your support in my recovery, and to be honest, returning to work was a real tonic…unlike the cold English weather! n

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Postcards to BIOS continued…

10 BIOS News Issue 11 • Winter 2009

Des FitzgeraldPhD Candidate

I begin my graduate work (not at BIOS) with the idea that I would conduct an ethnographic study of major psychosis – thereby, I told myself, validating ‘the real’ within the content of psychotic experience, and also delivering a stern rebuke to an anthropological literature that I found, too often, quiescent in the face of biomedical power. Needless to say, this programme – though admirable – ran into something of a brick wall: the problem is that once such positions are asserted (and I certainly asserted them) there really isn’t a great deal more to be said.

Relief arrived via a colleague who questioned my ideas about mental disorder, telling me that there was such a thing as schizophrenia, and that there was no shortage of lesion studies that attested to it. Desperate to ‘disprove’ this fact (Oh God, I thought at the time, really?), I encountered literature from biomedical psychiatry, and from the neurosciences, that did indeed seek pathology within the brain. Of course, I soon realised that my friend put her case rather too strongly. But I also realised that it didn’t matter anyway – because it was now apparent that I had been asking the wrong question,

and I had been asking it of the wrong object. Here, at the level of the brain, and within the very pages of the neuro/psychiatric journals, I had found an infinitely more productive way to think through (and with) those ideas (and entities) that had long interested me; here, it seemed, the very disorders that I was looking for were being openly performed, photographed, mapped and processed – while, all the time, coyly slipping in and out of view, in guises that were at once material, ideal, and somewhere in between.

Now, as a PhD student at BIOS, under the supervision of Nikolas Rose, I’ve been given the luxury to keep reading this material, and also the secondary literature that attends to it, as my thoughts about the brain, about mental disorder, and about imaging technology coalesce. Full coalescence is estimated to take place some time around October 2012, but my goal for the immediate future is simply to read, to take some crash-courses in psychopathology and brain imaging, and, finally, to feel my way towards a coherent articulation of my thoughts. Loosely, I hope to soon settle upon a particular disorder, and then to begin to consider its existence as a disorder, as it emerges in – and between – the clinical encounter and the imaging laboratory. n

Research updates

PublicationsAbi-Rached, JM (2008) ‘The implications of the new brain sciences’ in EMBO reports 9(12): 1-5

Abi-Rached, JM (2008) ‘The ethical dimensions of post-war mental health’ in The dissertations of the PJD Wiles Scholars, Abraaj Capital, in press

Franklin, S and Mason, C (2008) ‘From Lab to Studio: the Arts of the Life Sciences’ in Albano, C (ed.) Crossing Over: Exchanges in Art and Biotechnologies [Exhibition Catalogue], London: Royal Institution, pp.9-16

Franklin, S and Kaufman, SR (2009) ‘Ethical and Consent Issues in the Reproductive Setting: The Case of Egg, Sperm and Embryo Donation’ in Warwick, RM, Fehily, D, Brubaker, SA and Eastlund, T (eds.) Tissue and Cell Donation: An Essential Guide, Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, pp. 221-241

Franklin, S and Kaftantzi, L (2008) ‘Industry in the Middle: An Interview with Intercytex Founder and CSO, Dr Paul Kemp’, in Prainsack, B, Geesink, I and Franklin, S. (eds.) Cell Technologies 1998-2008: Controversies and Silences, Special Issue of Science as Culture, 17(4)

Franklin, S (2008) ‘Reimagining the Facts of Life’ Soundings 40

Gottweis, H, Braun, K, Haila, Y, Hajer, M, Loeber, A, Metzler, I, Reynolds, L, Schultz, S, Szerszynski, B (2008) ‘Participation and the New Governance of Life’, Biosocieties, 3(3): 265-86

Jackson, E (2008) ‘Seroxat and the suppression of clinical trial data: regulatory failure and the convenience of legal ambiguity’ Journal of Medical Ethics, in press (with Linsey McGoey)

Jackson, E (2008) ‘Degendering Reproduction’ Medical Law Review (2008) 346-368

Jackson, E (2008) ‘The donation of eggs for research and the rise of neopaternalism’ in Freeman, M (ed.) Law and Bioethics (Oxford UP) 499-527

Publications, lectures and conference presentations by BIOS staff, associates and students

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Publications, lectures and conference presentations by BIOS staff, associates and students continued…

Jackson, E (2008) ‘The Right to Die’ Nature 284-5

Lentzos, F and Rose, N (2009) ‘Governing insecurity: Contingency planning, protection, resilience’ Economy & Society 38(2): in press

Lentzos, F (2008) ‘Preparing for the CBM Content Debate: A study on the information exchange that builds confidence between States Parties to the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention’, End of project report

Rose, N (2008) ‘Was ist Leben? – Versuch einer Wiederbelebung’ (What is life – revitalized, in German Translation), in Weiss, M (ed.), Die menschliche Natur im Zeitalter ihrer technischen Reproduzierbarkeit (Human Nature in the Age of Biotechnology), Suhrkamp

Rose, N (2008) ‘The somatic ethic and the spirit of biocapital’ in Daedalus Winter 2008, 36-48

Rose, N (2008) ‘Psychology as a social science’ in Subjectivity, 23(1): 1-17

Rose, N (2008) ‘Psicologia como uma Ciência Social’ in Psicologia et Sociodade, 20 (2) (Argentina)

Osborne, T and Rose, N (2008) ‘Populating Sociology: Carr-Saunders and the problem of population, Sociological Review, 56(4): 552-78

Osborne, T, Rose, N and Savage, M. (2008) ‘Inscribing the history of British Sociology’ in Sociological Review, 56(4): 519-34

Singh, I (2008) ‘Beyond Polemics: Science and ethics of ADHD’ Nature Rev Neuroscience, 9(12): 957-64

Singh, I (2008) Culture, education, and ADHD. Early Child Development and Care. 178 (4), 347-61

Singh, I, Keenan, S, and Mears, A (2008). ‘Service users’ experiences of stimulant drug medication’ in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: Full Guideline for Consultation, pp 94-8. National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence: London

Wahlberg, A (2008) ‘Reproductive medicine and the concept of ‘quality’’ in Clinical Ethics, 3(4): 189-93

PresentationsAbi-Rached, JM (2008) ‘Beyond the origin: Mapping the birth(s) of modern neurosciences’, Our Brains, Our Selves – Aarhus Mirror Workshop Historical and Ethnographic Approaches to the New Brain Sciences, Aarhus, Denmark, 1-2 December 2008

Cockerton, C (2008) ‘Synthetic Biology: social and ethical debate in the UK’ Synthetic Biology 4.0, Hong Kong, 10-12 October 2008

Franklin, S (2008) ‘Five Million Miracle Babies Later’ Centre for Gender and Women’s Studies, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, 28 October (also presented to the Department of Anthropology, New York University, New York City, 6 November 2008

Franklin, S (2008) ‘Future Mix’ paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, San Francisco, CA, 20 November 2008

Kim, L (2008) ‘Neo-liberal challenges and the logic of survival in South Korea: unique approach to stem cell research?’, University of Sussex, 15 December 2008

Kim, L (2008) ‘The response of Korean scientists to the Hwang scandal: a network analysis’ at Wellcome Trust Mechanism of Fraud in Biomedical Research Workshop, London, 17-18 October

Kim, L (2008) ‘Network analysis on mapping communication: re-analysis of UK data’ at Mapping the Societal Conversation of Science Workshop, Sofia, 15-17 October

Lentzos, F (2008) ‘Global trends in the content of information exchanged’ Invited presentation to a seminar on the Confidence Building Measures of the Biological Weapons Convention jointly organised by UNIDIR and France, Geneva, 4 December 2008

Lentzos, F (2008) ‘What information builds confidence?’ Invited presentation to a seminar on the Confidence Building Measures of the Biological Weapons Convention organised by the Geneva Forum, Geneva, 2 December 2008

Lentzos, F and Sims, N (2008) Statement to the Biological Weapons Convention meeting on behalf of the LSE, Palais des Nations, Geneva, 1 December 2008

Lentzos, F (2008) ‘Managing Dual Use Research of Concern in Norway.’ Invited presentation to the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) international roundtable on ‘Sustaining Progress in the Life Sciences: Strategies for Managing Dual Use Research of Concern’ cosponsored by the US Government and the World Health Organization, Washington, 5-6 November 2008

MacArtney, J (2008) ‘Ethical intuition: Listening to the subjectivised voice of cancer narratives’. At Cancer Stories Symposium: The impact of narrative upon a modern malady. Indiana University-Purdue University-Indianapolis (IUPUI), USA, 6-8 November 2008

Rose, N (2008) Society and Neuroscience: A European Perspective, 21st Congress of the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology, Barcelona, September 2008

Rose, N (2008) Technology assessment – for the people?, European Parliamentary technology Assessment Conference, The Hague, October 2008

Rose, N (2008) Being human today and tomorrow – what news from genomics and neuroscience?, Institute of Advanced Studies, University of Durham, October 2008

Rose, N (2008) The ‘social brain’?, Global Minds Conference, University of Aarhus, November 2008

Rose, N (2008) ‘The politics of health in the 21st century?’, Nordic Conference on Knowledge, Politics and Health, Aarhus, December 2008

Schmid, S (2008) ‘Reproductive medicine in Switzerland: Between normalisation and merographic connections’. Paper presented at the 3rd and final international workshop of the project ‘New Reproductive Technologies and the Making of Bodies, Persons and Families in Russia and Switzerland’, Zürich, 2-5 June 2008

Schmid, S (2008) ‘Tracing the Transnational Scapes of Reproductive Technologies I: Emergent Forms and Domains of Regulation’, discussant at ‘IVF as global form. Ethnographic knowledge and the transnationalisation of reproductive technologies, Berlin, 12-14 June 2008

Schmid, S (2008) ‘Thinking with Bourdieu about Reproductive Medicine’, paper presented at EASST/SSSS, Acting with Science and Technology’, Rotterdam, 20-23 August 2008

Singh, I (2008) ‘Born Criminals? Social and ethical implications of research into genetics, development, and criminality’, London Medical Sociology Society, London, UK, December 2008

Singh, I (2008) Presenter, NeuroSchool, ENSN, Rome, Italy, October 2008

Singh, I (2008) ‘Biomarkers: the new frontier?’ Oxford University Centre for Neuroethics, Oxford, UK, October 2008

Vrecko, S (2008) ‘Pharmaceuticals, history, and culture: the power of ‘magic bullet’ thinking. Invited presentation, Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, November 2008

Vrecko, S (2008) ‘Knowledge politics in neuroscience and society’. Invited presentation, Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, December 2008

Wahlberg, A (2008) ‘Mice, scales and traits – situating tensions between neural substrates and patient experiences’ presented at Our Brains, Our Selves, European Neuroscience and Society Network workshop, Aarhus, Denmark, 30 November – 1 December 2008

Wahlberg, A (2008) ‘The flock and the citizen – permissiveness and vulnerability in international biological research collaboration’, invited presentation PLACEB-O

‘in conversation’ seminar series, Cambridge University, 14 November 2008

Wahlberg, A (2008) ‘Herbs, crystals and needles – how ‘quackery’ became complementary’, invited presentation for final year students at North London Collegiate School, 6 November 2008

Wahlberg, A (2008) ‘A mystical West and a rational East – biopolitics and the optimisation of life in Vietnam’, invited presentation, Biopolitics in Asia, University of Vienna, 10 October 2008

Wahlberg, A (2008) ‘Family secrets and the industrialisation of herbal medicine in Vietnam’, invited presentation Medical Anthropology seminar series, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, 7 October 2008

Zhang, JY (2008) ‘Chinese Scientists’ Role in Shaping Contemporary National Research Policies presented at the International Forum for Contemporary Chinese Studies Inaugural Conference ’Post-Olympic China: Globalisation and Sustainable Development after Three Decades of Reform’, University of Nottingham, 19-21 November 2008

Zhang, JY (2008) ‘The Cosmopolitanisation of Science: a case study of China stem cell research’, invited seminar at Department of Philosophy, Durham University. Durham, 27 November 2008

Zhang, JY (2008) ‘The Organization of Scientists and Its Relation to Scientific Productivity: a case study of Chinese stem cell research’, presented at The Social Regulation of Stem Cell Research: Looking beyond regulatory exteriors in Asia, University of Sussex, Brighton, 15 December 2008

Upcoming BIOS events

BIOS • The London School

of Economics and Political

Science • Houghton Street

London WC2A 2AE

Tel: +44 (0)20 7955 6998

Fax: +44 (0)20 7955 6565

www.lse.ac.uk/collections/BIOS/

During term time, the BIOS research seminar series and BIOS reading group sessions are held regularly on Thursdays and Wednesdays respectively. The Thursday seminar series feature invited speakers to discuss their research on various social and ethical aspects of the life sciences and biomedicine, while the reading group facilitates discussion around a series of topics that are of interest to persons associated with BIOS or who have an interest in the life sciences throughout the LSE and beyond.

12 BIOS News Issue 11 • Winter 2009

Dates for your calendar January – April 2009

22 January 2009 ‘ Security and Liberty’

Didier Bigo

BIOS Research Seminar

5-7pm, H216 (Connaught House)

5 March 2009 ‘ Medicine, health and health care. Public goods or

commodities?’

Uffe Juul Jensen

BIOS Research Seminar

5-7pm, NABLG03 (New Academic Building)

BIOS Reading Group

The Reading Group will be meeting on 28 January, 18 February and 11

March from 1-3pm. Check the BIOS website for an updated Lent Term

programme, room details and reading list.

MSc

SO455 Key Issues in Bioscience, Biomedicine and Society will meet on

Thursdays in NAB119 from 11am-1pm.

BIOS Roundtables

BIOS roundtables will continue in the Lent Term aiming at exploring shared

interests in the BIOS community, and to address problems, issues, and

concerns encountered. See the bulletin board for dates and to sign up!