Molecular biology of the gene

What Hacker News says

1. MajimasEyepatchApr 2024
   Absolutely right. These basic concepts like the central dogma aren't especially hard to learn, but it's important to really understand them deeply if you want anything to make sense.

   Among textbooks, Molecular Biology of the Gene by James Watson et al. is a good starting point to understand the central dogma: DNA -> RNA -> Protein. Likewise Molecular Biology of the Cell by Alberts et al. for cell biology.

   An Introduction to Systems Biology by Uri Alon is good for the more mathematically inclined once you're ready to get more advanced, though you should really have a solid grasp on the fundamentals of molecular and cellular biology first.

   None of this is for the faint of heart, but it's not especially difficult either. It's unfortunate that it's hard to get hands-on experience with biology once you've graduated from college, which helps a lot to connect the dots, but there are still plenty of great resources out there.

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2. sansnommeJan 2020
   (Assuming a CS background) To do anything useful/fun/interesting in bio you should have a strong understanding of the Central Dogma, once you understand that you can move on to the rest. Many here recommend building gene analytics and other similar software/SaaS. I don't recommend it because you learn absolutely nothing from those low hanging fruits. Genetics and its relation to CS, at a sufficiently low level, is mostly string manipulation and search. There is a market if you are willing to build and do sales but it's hardly exciting. Better to get some actual wet lab experience and understanding, than become yet another "data science" biotech startup. We have had enough of those in healthcare already, tons of so-called "health tech" companies that were merely performing analytics on wearables. Profitable? Maybe. Exciting and innovative? No.

   Some reading material:

   Synthetic biology: A Primer

   An introduction to systems biology (get the 2020 edition)

   O'Reilly: Biobuilder

   Molecular biology of the Gene

   Campbell's Biology

   YouTube Channels:

   The Thought Emporium

   Josiah Zayner

   Khan Academy Biology

   Biology Professor

   Shomus Biology

   (The first two deal exclusively with bioengineering)

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3. dekhnJul 2019
   To the computer hackers who read these things: biology is a complex system. So complex that the most complicated system you have ever worked on seems very simple compared to it. WHen you read articles like this, be aware the scientists have extensive training in working with complex systems, and publish exciting sounding coherent narratives that are, at best, incorrect but useful working models (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong).

   It's fun to speculate but to prove your case and make a real dent in human health problems is a lot harder than coming in late and saying "But wait, why don't you just..."

   I heartily recommend going back to the great textbooks of these fields and reading them, rather than trying to understand things by dropping into the state of the art research (which is usually wrong, and hard to understand in detail).

   Some books I recommend: The Biology of Cancer (Weinberg). After you read this book you'll have a better understanding of why doctors and scientists cringe when people say "cure cancer".

   Molecular Biology the Cell (Alberts, etc). After you read this book you'll have a much better understanding of the full complexity that scientists have to deal with in complex cellular systems.

   Molecular Biology of the Gene (watson, etc). Can't say much about this book except that's it's a classic reference.

   What makes these three books exception is that they support all their factual claims with direct links to the papers that established the facts. And they provide you with the skills to evaluate modern research. But nothing compares to actually going to grad school and participating in the research- once you see how the grants are made, the experiments are, and the papers are written, you'll understand why trying to understand biology by press release is like trying to understand assembly language by watching a Steve Jobs product announcement.

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4. dekhnSep 2018
   Campbell Biology followed by Molecular Biology of the Cell and Molecular Biology of the Gene
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5. dekhnApr 2016
   "Does the machinery in the cell just randomly bind to plasmids and do what they say?"

   Sort of. Please read Molecular Biology of the Cell, Molecular Biology of the Gene, and Biochemistry. It's explained in detail (what people have observed). TL;DR: yeah, machinery in the cell binds to plasmids. No, it's not random- it's a highly biased process.

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6. dekhnFeb 2016
   Molecular Biology of the Cell, Molecular Biology of the Gene, Cancer (all textbooks)

   The Eighth Day of Creation

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