It is a joy to browse the information on drugs here, ranging from chemical structures to illustrated clinical applications. RxList was initiated by a group of pharmacists in 1995 to collate pharmaceutical information about brand-name and generic drugs. They claim (with justification) to be the premier internet drug resource. Articles are written by pharmacists and physicians, supplemented by data obtained from other sources such as the FDA. Medications can be found using the A–Z drug list (an alphabetical listing of both brand and generic drug names), or by entering the generic or brand drug name in the search box at the top of the page. I came to this site during a search for information on the drug Nexium® (esomeprazole magnesium) and found that the active ingredient in Nexium is bis(5-methoxy-2-[(S)-[(4-methoxy-3,5-dimethyl-2-pyridinyl)methyl]sulfinyl]-1H-benzimidazole-1-yl) magnesium trihydrate, a compound that inhibits gastric acid secretion. Fortunately, the Nexium chemical structure was also given as a clear structural drawing. More chemical and clinical detail followed. Above the entry I located an invitation to view a slide show on digestive disease myths, an appropriate offering to link to a drug that inhibits gastric acid secretion. I took the slide show and then proceeded through several more slide shows illuminating common medical conditions and their treatment. I particularly commend the slide show on adult skin problems. The services here are multilayered and comprehensive, so allow some browsing time to take it all in. If you want some teaching material then you may find the series of articles on drug families will provide useful information on the actions and side effects of commonly prescribed medications. The drug families described are ACE inhibitors (high blood pressure medications), angiotensin receptor blockers, antacids, antidepressants, benzodiazepines, beta blockers, calcium channel blockers, COX-2 inhibitors, diuretics, medications used in dentistry, nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drugs, sleep disorder drugs, statins (cholesterol lowering drugs), and tricyclic antidepressants. PLoS Computational Biology is a peer-reviewed journal published monthly by the Public Library of Science (PLoS) as the journal of the International Society for Computational Biology. I was introduced to the journal and its rigorous editorial standards when invited to refer a paper. The current impact factor for PLoS Computational Biology is 6.2, which places it highest in the category of mathematical and computational biology. Although this is a niche journal, it has a wide appeal in content, because of many intersections of computing with everything from ecology to genomics. For example, the current issue when reviewed included the article “Evolutionary Sequence Modeling for Discovery of Peptide Hormones” contributed by eight US authors from major laboratories. The abstract for this article introduces the circumstance that there are a large number of orphan G-protein-coupled receptors whose endogenous ligands (peptide hormones) are unknown. Identification of these peptide hormones for understanding disease and treatment opportunities is an important, but a difficult problem. The article describes a computational approach that models structure along the genomic sequence linked with a model of temporal evolutionary path structures across species. Such cross-genomic sequence comparisons can be used to discover new functional molecules, in particular the peptide hormones. Returning to the nature of the journal, the policy is stated as the publication of works of exceptional significance that further the understanding of living systems from molecules to patient populations and ecosystems, through the application of computational methods. Research articles for publication are required to demonstrate both scientific novelty and new biological insights. Extending the research content are reviews and tutorials (including multimedia presentations) that teach concepts in the field of computational biology. You can go to the archive of issues and easily step through the content of each. The cover artwork for each issue is excellent (see Fig. 1). The creative commons attribution license of the journal allows authors to retain copyright for their articles, and anyone can use the articles for teaching or other purposes as long as the original authors and source are cited (no permission is required from the authors or the publishers). PLoS Computational Biology has an author publication fee of US$2,200, with a waiver for authors who do not have funds. The International Society for Computational Biology (www.iscb.org), the professional parent society of the journal, also provides additional publications, meetings, training, education, employment, and information relating to computer applications in life sciences. Cover artwork from PLoS Computational Biology, November 2007, titled “Trinucleotide disease as a genetic time bomb.” Trinucleotide diseases such as Huntington's occur when a subject inherits a DNA region consisting of a three-letter code abnormally repeated many times. The age at which the disease strikes the patient is encoded by the number of repeats. A universal mechanism by which this molecular time bomb operates in this family of hereditary diseases has been suggested. Image credit: Genia Brodsky, Weizmann Institute of Science. The primary resources for teaching in this website are under Training and Publications. The Department of Health Promotion and Education (DHPE) was found in 1946 in the United States by the state directors of health education and the deans of health education. The objectives of DHPE are to share program efforts, ideas, and materials between the state authorities. In the 1980s the US Centers for Disease Control began to cooperate in running national conferences and expanding DHPE activities. There is a section of fact sheets that relate comprehensively to infectious diseases and it was the sheet on cytomegalovirus that led me to this site. I discovered here that cytomegalovirus is a member of the herpes virus family that includes the causative agents of chickenpox, infectious mononucleosis, fever blisters, and genital herpes. These viruses share the ability to remain alive, but dormant, in the body lifelong. A first infection with cytomegalovirus usually causes no symptoms and the virus persists without causing obvious damage or illness. It rarely becomes active when the immune system weakens and is no longer able to hold the virus in check. An estimated 80% of adults in the United States are infected with cytomegalovirus. These facts and more are summarized in the DHPE fact sheet. You can work through an alphabetic list of numerous infectious diseases. I was previously unaware of cat-scratch disease, but in the United States about 24,000 people suffer from this bacterial disease each year. Under Training and Publications you can find a folio of papers on health policy and human–environment case studies, many relating to smoking and diet. Each year I print an updated version of my identities and passwords that I use to get access to publications, professional society sites, and financial services. I paste the list into my hard-copy diary that travels around with me at most times. I include some (although not enough) cryptic codes and it is possible that my identities could be stolen if my diary was lost. My local newspaper alerted me to Access Manager, a genre of software that would save me from my inability to remember every password. Encrypted password data can be stored on a desktop computer or mobile device, or in a net-accessible location. A single password used to enter the Access Manager will divulge all the others. The article about Access Managers that I read reviewed four products and rated eWallet from Iliumsoft as the best, relative to Password Plus, KeePass, and My Password Manager. A food industry journal alerted me to a new zero-calorie sweetener that is being marketed as Reb-A or PureVia™. Although it is a new commercial product, it has been used for centuries by South American natives as a sweetener. The product is Rebaudioside A, which is extracted from the leaves of the Stevia plant, a member of the chrysanthemum family that is native to Paraguay. It is rated as up to 450 times sweeter than sucrose. Reb-A joins a list of other low-energy sweeteners and has the “organic” advantage of being a completely natural product, unlike aspartame that has its origins in the synthetic laboratories of G.D. Searle when Jim Schlatter accidentally made it in 1965. Rebaudioside A is a triglycoside of steviol, a diterpene. The isoprenoid pathway leading to the terpenes has long held me in awe of the power of biochemical pathways to give rise to such diverse products as rubber and Reb-A. The isoprenoid pathways also illustrate how biochemically rich plants are relative to animals. Plants cannot flee from their predators or court a mate and so they produce a range of chemicals that achieve all of the functions that movement achieves for animals. It may seem odd that a product that makes Stevia leaves sweet to taste, and therefore attractive to be eaten by animals, would confer a selective Darwinian advantage. There are now large plantations of Stevia and so Darwin is vindicated yet again. The website given here introduces a lot of the ecofriendly aspects of growing and using the Stevia plant. Other information is needed to get the full picture, e.g., initial toxicity tests suggested that Reb-A was carcinogenic, but these tests were flawed and now Reb-A is considered safe for human consumption (this background can be found using Wikipedia). For a biotechnology course setting a project on this diterpene could bring together a lot of biochemistry and health issues while providing a case study for the commercialization of a natural product. The data base currently includes 5,374 proteins exhibiting 26,052 reactive sites, thereby making an average of 4.8 phosphorylation sites per protein in the data base. Of the 26,052 sites included in the data, serine phosphorylation sites represent 59.1%, tyrosine phosphorylation sites 25.1%, and threonine phosphorylation sites 15.8%. PhosphoNET can be searched for proteins using the Uniprot ID or a common name. A list of possible options for proteins is generated by entering at least three letters of the name and waiting for a list to appear. I chose to search for aquaporins and found that two were in the data base. For aquaporin zero (Uniprot ID P30301) the data base reveals that it is a channel protein having a mass of 28,122 Da, with 263 amino acids. Four sequences around separate serine phosphorylation sites were given and clicking on the reference button for each site led to the primary literature reference via PubMed. This data base is being actively expanded. CNET Networks Incorporated is a media company based in San Francisco. The company was founded in 1993 and was acquired by CBS in 2008 for US$1.8 billion. Initially the core business was providing television news and features. As the internet became central to communication technologies, the company added web-based functions. What is available now at CNET is a web supermarket with many departments and choices which makes possible to spend days sampling all the useful and interesting features. There are numerous subeditors for CNET who specialize in niche reports, often with a video of the subeditor making a presentation. The first recommended choice is to look at the selections available under the News banner. CNET news proclaims itself to be filtered by humans, not bots, and the quality of the summaries validates this claim. At the time of review, President Obama's energy policies were a leading feature. There is a Green Tech choice within the news categories, and this has excellent coverage of issues related to science and the environment, particularly new consumer technologies such as electric cars. Feature articles on medical science are not so conveniently clustered, but the search facility allows rapid location of targeted subjects. While browsing articles on cancer I located the information that the researchers at the Children's Hospital in Boston could directly view the internal organs of a new colony of zebrafish. Embryos of normal zebrafish have naturally transparent bodies but turn opaque when they get older. The new breed stays transparent throughout its lifetime, thus allowing the visualization of tumor development. In general, CNET is divided into seven major sections. These sections are 1) Reviews—product and service reviews, largely conducted in-house by CNET staff; 2) News—articles that are mostly dedicated to technology; 3) Tips and Tricks—a range of tutorials, guides, and tips for technology users; 4) TV—a selection of video content including reviews, first looks, and special features; 5) Shopper—a tool that aims to find the lowest prices on items from online retailers; 6) Blogs—comments from CNET personalities and external responses; 7) Download—provides Windows, Macintosh, and mobile software for download. CNET can be added as a Rich Site Summary (RSS) to your browser (see entry below). RSS has three interpretations in web terminology; Really Simple Syndication, Rich Site Summary or RDF (Resource Description Framework) Site Summary. These variant names describe the forms of web syndication used by news websites and blogs. An RSS provider, such as CNET above, downloads content to subscribers who choose filters to suit their needs. The downside is generally unsolicited advertising, but this is necessary to subsidize the service. The sites provided by RSS usually display an icon with the acronyms RSS, XML, or RDF to indicate that a feed is available. A user saves time, relative to individual visits, by obtaining filtered up-to-date content from multiple sites automatically. Hundreds of providers are listed at this RSS explained website. Under Health there are multiple providers within the subcategories of cancer, cardiovascular disorders, digestive disorders, endocrine disorders, immune disorders, infectious diseases, musculoskeletal disorders, neurological disorders, respiratory disorders, and sleep disorders. If you use Microsoft Outlook for email, this program can also serve to provide RSS feeds, and to make it easy, Outlook has a list of sites that you can choose from to get started. For complex integration of multiple sources, feed reader (news aggregator) software allows collection of RSS feeds. Popular readers are Amphetadesk, FeedReader, NewsGator, and Google Reader. The utility FeedReader was commended in the Websites of Note in the BAMBED issue of November/December 2008. If you want to use feeds, the RSS-explained site will provide the information needed.