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b_b  ·  3216 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Pubski: February 10, 2016

    Now I'm entering the realm of staining with antibodies and I'm learning just how few good antibodies there are compared to how many proteins I find interesting.

Too true. I can't tell you how many papers I've reviewed whose main conclusions relied on staining that was shitty. It's hard to just say "I don't believe you" in a review, so you have to come up with something nicer, such as, "The images seem overexposed, and the morphology of cell X seems peculiar. Perhaps some negative and positive controls would be instructive." Seems like biology 101, but the frequency with which it happens is astounding. And I assume that a lot of these papers get through, because the reviewers aren't experienced microscopists. Although I'm sure I miss a bunch of basic shit that other scientists would look at and say, "are you stupid?" If I only knew what those things were...