BOOKENDS September 2019, Volume 3, Issue 1

New E-resources for KU Libraries users.

KU Libraries are happy to announce that we have added several medical databases to our e-resources list, including:

Access Medicine: an online collection of key medical reference texts that provide authoritative and current medical data. Medical news, updates, patient education information, a diagnostic tool, and an integrated drug database with information about dosages, trade names, and pricing are also part of this resource. Searching is available across the entire suite of basic sciences and clinical texts.

Bates Visual Guide to Physical Examination: includes more than eight hours of video content that provides head-to-toe and systems-based physical examination techniques. Note: OSCE Clinical Skills Videos not included in this subscription.

Clinical Key: gives you full text access at the point of care to selected medical texts, journals, practice guidelines, drug information, patient handouts, videos, images and more. The database gives access to daily updated information within more than 30 medical and surgical specialties.

Lecturio: a medical learning management tool provides education material in the field of Medical Science, Clinical Science and Pre-Med. Lecturio also provides approximately 1500 USMLE like questions.

Primal Pictures (Anatomy TV): interactive 3D graphics of the human body, including features such as a 3D Atlas, a 3D Real Time rotating anatomy study tool, Functional Anatomy, Imaging, Therapy, introductions to Clinical Specialties with case studies and much more. A study guide, student quizzes, saving/sharing and notes functions are in addition available for best possible learning support. NML's Primal Pictures subscription also includes apps for mobile access to study tools for all parts of the human anatomy.

To see the full list please visit the library e-resources HERE

Nonpareil science writer David Quammen explains how recent discoveries in molecular biology can change our understanding of evolution and life’s history, with powerful implications for human health and even our own human nature. In the mid-1970s, scientists began using DNA sequences to reexamine the history of all life. Perhaps the most startling discovery to come out of this new field—the study of life’s diversity and relatedness at the molecular level—is horizontal gene transfer (HGT), or the movement of genes across species lines. It turns out that HGT has been widespread and important. For instance, we now know that roughly eight percent of the human genome arrived not through traditional inheritance from directly ancestral forms, but sideways by viral infection—a type of HGT. In The Tangled Tree David Quammen, “one of that rare breed of science journalists who blends exploration with a talent for synthesis and storytelling” (Nature), chronicles these discoveries through the lives of the researchers who made them—such as Carl Woese, the most important little-known biologist of the twentieth century; Lynn Margulis, the notorious maverick whose wild ideas about “mosaic” creatures proved to be true; and Tsutomu Wantanabe, who discovered that the scourge of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is a direct result of horizontal gene transfer, bringing the deep study of genome histories to bear on a global crisis in public health. 

“Quammen is no ordinary writer. He is simply astonishing, one of that rare class of writer gifted with verve, ingenuity, humor, guts, and great heart” (Elle). Now, in The Tangled Tree, he explains how molecular studies of evolution have brought startling recognition about the tangled tree of life—including where we humans fit upon it. Thanks to new technologies such as CRISPR, we now have the ability to alter even our genetic composition—through sideways insertions, as nature has long been doing. The Tangled Tree is a brilliant guide to our transformed understanding of evolution, of life’s history, and of our own human nature.
https://www.goodreads.com/ar/book/show/36373639-the-tangled-tree

Managing Cyber risk with smart cyber

In the digital age, artificial intelligence technologies are starting to have the same kind of game-changing impact that factories and assembly lines had on manufacturing at the dawn of the industrial age—dramatically improving efficiency and enabling new products, services, and business models that simply weren’t possible before. Driven by internal and external pressures to continuously evolve and mature their capabilities for mitigating and minimizing cyber risk, organizations are actively exploring new technologies and improvement opportunities wherever possible. Artificial intelligence (AI) is a hot topic in the boardroom and at the water cooler, pushing innovation to new heights in many business areas. Advancements in AI technologies, processing capabilities, and data availability are enabling computer systems to perform tasks that once required human intelligence to execute. Examples of these include machine learning, natural language processing, speech recognition, computer vision, image comprehension, and robotics. In cyber, AI technologies can improve threat intelligence, prediction, and protection. It can also enable faster attack detection and response, while reducing the need for human cyber security experts— specialists who are in critically short supply these days.1 AI can learn from security analysts and improve its performance over time, leading to time savings and better decisions. These "smart cyber" capabilities are urgently needed as cyber attacks continue to grow in volume and sophistication. 1 The changing faces of cyber security: closing the cyber risk gap, Deloitte, 2018 Analytics and big data are a key enabler for AI, making it possible to process and analyze vast quantities of data—with parsing, filtering, and visualization done in near real-time.

To read the full article click here