Life & Health Sciences

Biomedical research

Biomedical research in the United States runs largely on NIH money and NIH rules. NIH has 27 institutes and centers and sends most of its budget to extramural researchers through grants such as the R01. Since January 25, 2023 the NIH Data Management and Sharing Policy has required a Data Management and Sharing Plan with every application that will generate scientific data, with data shared by publication or the end of the award, whichever comes first. A new mandatory plan template applies from May 25, 2026. The updated NIH Public Access Policy, in force for publications from July 1, 2025, removed the 12-month embargo: papers go to PubMed Central for release on the official publication date. Literature work starts in PubMed, maintained by NCBI at the National Library of Medicine, which holds more than 40 million citations, with its MEDLINE records indexed by MeSH. Europe PMC plays the same role for Wellcome and its partner funders. Preprints go to bioRxiv for the life sciences and medRxiv for health research; both screen submissions but do not peer review them. Animal work needs IACUC approval under the PHS Policy that OLAW administers and should be reported against ARRIVE 2.0. Recombinant or synthetic nucleic acid work needs Institutional Biosafety Committee review under the NIH Guidelines. RRIDs make antibodies, cell lines, organisms, software and core facilities citable in methods sections.

Reviewed 5 November 2026 by CASRAI Editorial Board

Sources

Wikipedia: National Institutes of Health(read 5 November 2026)
TMC Library: NIH Data Sharing Policy Overview(read 5 November 2026)
WVU Libraries: NIH Data Management and Sharing Policy (2023) and NIH Public Access Policy effective 2025(read 5 November 2026)
Wikipedia: NIH Public Access Policy(read 5 November 2026)
PubMed: About(read 5 November 2026)
PMC: Introduction(read 5 November 2026)
Wikipedia: Europe PMC(read 5 November 2026)
bioRxiv: About(read 5 November 2026)
medRxiv: About(read 5 November 2026)
ARRIVE guidelines(read 5 November 2026)
PLOS Biology: The ARRIVE guidelines 2.0(read 5 November 2026)
Wikipedia: Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare(read 5 November 2026)
Wikipedia: Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee(read 5 November 2026)
UNC Environment, Health and Safety: Institutional Biosafety Committee(read 5 November 2026)
RRIDs.org(read 5 November 2026)
dbGaP home(read 5 November 2026)
NC3Rs: Who we are(read 5 November 2026)
Wikipedia: Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology(read 5 November 2026)

Field at a glance

Funders and programmes

National Institutes of Health (NIH): The main US biomedical funder: 27 institutes and centers, with most funding going to extramural researchers through research grants such as the R01.Website ↗ · Our guide →
NIH Data Management and Sharing Policy: Effective January 25, 2023: applications that will generate scientific data need a DMS Plan, and data must be shared by publication or the end of the award.Website ↗ · Our guide →
NIH Public Access Policy: Peer-reviewed papers from NIH funding go to PubMed Central; the updated policy removed the 12-month embargo, so papers are public on the publication date.Website ↗ · Our guide →
NC3Rs: UK organisation that funds research and works with funders, industry and regulators to replace, refine and reduce the use of animals in research.Website ↗

Preprints and indexes

PubMed: NCBI's free index of more than 40 million biomedical citations and abstracts; MEDLINE records are indexed with MeSH.Website ↗ · Our guide →
Europe PMC: Repository run by EMBL-EBI for a funder alliance led by Wellcome; supporting funders require their articles to be free there within 6 months.Website ↗
bioRxiv: Life-sciences preprint server founded by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in 2013, now run by openRxiv; screened but not peer reviewed.Website ↗ · Our guide →
medRxiv: Preprint server for medical, clinical and health research, run by openRxiv; screens for dual-use and health-risk content and excludes case reports.Website ↗ · Our guide →

Archives, facilities and data

PubMed Central (PMC): NLM's free full-text archive of biomedical and life-sciences journal literature, public since 2000; holds author manuscripts deposited through NIHMS.Website ↗ · Our guide →
dbGaP: NCBI archive for studies of genotype and phenotype in humans; public data download directly, controlled data need an Authorized Access request.Website ↗ · Our guide →

Standards and formats

ARRIVE 2.0: NC3Rs reporting checklist for animal research, updated in PLOS Biology in 2020 with an Essential 10 minimum and a Recommended Set.Website ↗ · Our guide →
Research Resource Identifiers (RRIDs): Persistent IDs for antibodies, cell lines, organisms, plasmids, software and core facilities, so readers can check exactly what a study used.Website ↗ · Our guide →
PHS Policy and OLAW: OLAW implements the PHS Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals and monitors compliance by Assured institutions.Website ↗ · Our guide →
IACUC: The institutional committee that oversees animal research, with a veterinarian and an unaffiliated member and facility inspections every six months.Website ↗ · Our guide →
NIH Guidelines and the IBC: Institutions with NIH support for recombinant or synthetic nucleic acid research must set up an IBC and register it with NIH OSP.Website ↗ · Our guide →

Societies

FASEB: Federation of 22 US biological and biomedical societies, founded 1912; publishes The FASEB Journal and FASEB BioAdvances.Website ↗

114 pages across 13 topic areas

Laboratory Operations & Safety

Biobank Software: What It Does, Key Features, and How to Choose
What biobank software does, how it differs from a general LIMS, and the ISO 20387/GDPR compliance features and selection criteria to check before choo…
C Elegans CGC: Strain Ordering & Lab Guide
The Caenorhabditis Genetics Center (CGC) distributes C. elegans strains. Learn account registration, fee schedules, strain naming, and culture revival…
CCK-8 Assay: How It Works, What It Measures and Where It Misleads
The CCK-8 assay uses WST-8 to report dehydrogenase activity in living cells. Learn the stated parameters, vendor differences and common pitfalls.…
Choosing a Chemical Inventory Management System for Your Lab
A buying guide to chemical inventory management software: what it does, why spreadsheets fail at audit, the regulatory drivers, how it differs from a…
Data Acquisition System (DAQ): Components, Types and Lab Use
A data acquisition system (DAQ) links sensors, hardware and software. Learn its parts, architectures, and the sampling and resolution settings to reco…
Germ-Free Mice: Definition, Derivation, and Procurement Guide
What "germ-free" means, how germ-free mice are derived and housed, why they are used in microbiome research, and how research institutions source and…
Geroscience: Definition, the Geroscience Hypothesis and the Seven Pillars of Aging
Geroscience explained: how aging biology links to chronic disease, the 2014 seven pillars of aging, and how the framing changes lab study design.…
Human Microbiome Project (HMP): Aims, Phases and Findings
What the Human Microbiome Project was, how its two phases differ, what the 2012 and 2019 papers established, and what to check before reusing its data…
Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells: iPSC Lab Guide
A laboratory guide to induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs): derivation factors, feeder-free culture, ISSCR quality benchmarks, and clinical trial st…
Mouse Husbandry: Housing, Care, and Compliance Standards
A practical guide to mouse husbandry for research facilities: housing and environmental standards, feeding, breeding colony management, health monitor…
Mouse Metabolic Phenotyping Centers (MMPC): NIDDK Consortium Explained
The NIDDK-funded Mouse Metabolic Phenotyping Centers (MMPC): who runs them, what live-mouse tests they offer, and how data ownership works.…
Protein Purification: Strategy, Affinity Tags, and Chromatography Sequence
The general strategy for purifying a protein of interest: cell lysis, clarification, affinity-tag capture (His-tag/Ni-NTA, GST, FLAG), the affinity-io…
Sentinel Mice: How Rodent Colony Health Monitoring Works
Sentinel mice are exposed to used bedding from a research colony and tested on a fixed schedule so facility staff can detect rodent pathogens before a…
Undiagnosed Diseases Network (UDN): What It Is and How It Works
How the NIH-funded Undiagnosed Diseases Network is organised: clinical sites, sequencing cores, biorepository, and the application timeline.…
Western Blot Blocking Buffer: Choosing BSA or Milk by Target
Milk casein is a phosphoprotein that competes with phospho-specific antibodies, and milk biotin saturates streptavidin. BSA avoids both but costs more…
Western Blot Imaging: Film vs CCD vs Laser ScannerComparison
Detection chemistry decides which imager is possible; linearity decides which is quantifiable. Film, cooled camera and laser scanner compared on dynam…
Western Blot Loading Controls: Housekeeping Protein vs. Total-Protein Normalization
A loading control is only interpretable inside its linear range. How to choose between housekeeping-protein and total-protein normalization, how to ru…
Western Blot Transfer Buffer: Towbin, Methanol and SDS Decisions
Transfer buffer composition is four decisions - buffering system, methanol, SDS, and the transfer apparatus - made against protein size and membrane.…
What Is Ficoll? Ficoll-Paque, PM400 and Percoll Explained
Ficoll is a Cytiva trademark. Learn how Ficoll PM400, Ficoll-Paque PLUS and Percoll differ, with vendor-stated specifications and a sourcing checklist…
X-Ray Crystallography: How It Works, From Crystal to PDB Deposit
A researcher-facing guide to X-ray crystallography: Bragg's law and the phase problem, the crystal-to-structure workflow, how to read data-quality met…
Zebrafish Husbandry: Water Quality, Housing, Breeding, and Health Surveillance
A practical guide to zebrafish (Danio rerio) husbandry for research facilities: water quality management, housing and stocking density, feeding, breed…

Scholarly Publishing

Addgene: Nonprofit Plasmid Repository Guide
How researchers use Addgene: plasmid searching, deposit workflows, quality control sequencing, electronic MTAs, and material shipping logistics.…
ARRIVE Guidelines for Animal Research Reporting: The Full 2.0 Checklist
The complete ARRIVE 2.0 checklist for reporting animal research: all 21 items across the Essential 10 and Recommended Set, journal requirements, and h…
ASBMB: American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
What ASBMB is, what its four journals cover, and how to submit an abstract to the 2027 annual meeting, with dates and fees.…
ATCC: American Type Culture Collection Guide
A guide to ATCC: American Type Culture Collection history, cell lines, microbial reference strains like ATCC 25923, ordering workflows, and MTAs.…
bioRxiv vs. medRxiv: Preprint Server ComparisonComparison
bioRxiv and medRxiv are sibling preprint servers -- one for basic life-sciences research, one for clinical and health research with extra ICMJE-aligne…
CiteAb: Antibody and Reagent Search Engine Guide
CiteAb ranks research antibodies and reagents by academic citations. Learn how to search, verify experimental citations, and find life science alterna…
FASEB: Biomedical Coalition and Journal Guide
An overview of FASEB: coalition governance, 21 member societies, The FASEB Journal, Capitol Hill advocacy, and data management resources for researche…
ImageTwin: Scientific Image Integrity Guide
Explore how Imagetwin detects figure duplication, manipulation, and AI generation in scientific papers using a 150M+ image database and forensic tools…
Is Scientific Reports Peer Reviewed?
Is Scientific Reports peer reviewed? Discover how Nature Portfolio evaluates technical validity, indexing status across Scopus and DOAJ, and article c…
Proofig: Scientific Image Integrity Guide
An explainer of Proofig AI: features, image duplication and manipulation screening, technical limits, verification workflows, and journal standards.…
The EQUATOR Network: Which Reporting Guideline Does Your Study Need?
A study-design routing table for the EQUATOR Network's reporting guideline library — CONSORT, PRISMA, STROBE, SPIRIT, STARD, TRIPOD, ARRIVE, SQUIRE, C…
The NIH Public Access Policy Explained: 2024 Rules, Deadlines, and Compliance
The NIH Public Access Policy requires NIH-funded peer-reviewed manuscripts to be deposited in PubMed Central. This guide covers the 2024 policy's zero…
What Is bioRxiv? The Life Sciences Preprint Server Explained
bioRxiv is a free, open-access preprint server for the life sciences, founded at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in 2013 and operated by the independent…
What Is medRxiv? The Clinical and Health Sciences Preprint Server Explained
medRxiv is a free, open-access preprint server for clinical and health research, launched in June 2019 by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Yale School o…

Research Methods & Statistics

Nephrology vs Urology: Differences, Overlap and Research FocusComparison
Nephrology is the medical specialty of the kidneys; urology is the medical and surgical specialty of the urinary tract and male reproductive organs. H…
What Is Biochemistry? Research Areas, Funding, and Career Paths
What biochemistry studies, its major subfields, who funds the research (NIH, NSF), core lab methods, and typical career and PhD training paths.…
What Is Biophysics?
Biophysics uses the concepts and instruments of physics to explain how biological molecules, cells and organisms work. Subfields, methods, funders, so…
What Is Cardiology? A Guide to the Discipline
Cardiology is the branch of medicine and biomedical science that studies the heart and blood vessels. This guide covers its subfields, methods, funder…
What Is Endocrinology? Research Areas, Funding, and Career Paths
A thorough guide to endocrinology: what it studies, its major subfields, the federal and private funders behind endocrine research, common research me…
What Is Epidemiology? Research Areas, Funding, and Career Paths
A complete guide to epidemiology: its core definition and methods, major subfields, the real funding landscape (NIH institutes, CDC, NSF, private foun…
What Is Gerontology? Research Areas, Funding, and Career Paths
Gerontology is the interdisciplinary science of aging — biological, psychological, and social. This guide covers its subfields, research methods, the…
What Is Hematology? Research Areas, Funding, and Career Paths
A thorough guide to hematology: what it studies, its major subfields from red cell disorders to hemostasis, transfusion and blood cancers, the funders…
What Is Nephrology? Research Areas, Funding, and Career Paths
A thorough guide to nephrology: what it studies, its major subfields, the federal and private funders behind kidney research, how kidney trials measur…
What Is Pulmonology? Research Areas, Funding, and Career Paths
A thorough guide to pulmonology: what it studies, its subspecialties, how respiratory research is funded (including NHLBI), common methods and trial e…
What Is Systems Biology? Research Areas, Funding, and Career Paths
Systems biology studies biological organisms as integrated networks of interacting components, combining measurement, mathematical modelling and compu…
What Is Toxicology? Research Areas, Funding, and Career Paths
Toxicology is the study of how chemical, physical, and biological agents cause harm to living organisms, and of the dose and mechanism that determine…

Laboratory Compliance & Quality

21 CFR Part 58: GLP Requirements for Nonclinical Studies
How 21 CFR Part 58 governs nonclinical safety studies: the study director's single-point authority, quality assurance unit independence, protocol and…
Biosafety Levels BSL-1 to BSL-4: Containment Requirements Compared
A cross-level comparison of BSL-1 through BSL-4 on the four elements BMBL 6th edition actually uses — standard practices, special practices, primary b…
Bloodborne Pathogens Standard (29 CFR 1910.1030) in Research Laboratories: Paragraph (e) and the Cell Line Question
Clinical bloodborne pathogens guidance stops at Universal Precautions. Paragraph (e) of 29 CFR 1910.1030 adds containment, a separate biosafety manual…
CLIA Certification: Certificate Types, Complexity Categories, and Whether Your Lab Needs One
A guide to CLIA certification under 42 CFR Part 493: the five certificate types, waived/moderate/high complexity categories, and the research-lab exem…
Exposure Control Plan for Bloodborne Pathogens: The Five Elements 29 CFR 1910.1030(c) Requires
What has to be in a written Exposure Control Plan under 29 CFR 1910.1030(c): exposure determination, methods-of-compliance scheduling, Hepatitis B vac…
Eyewash Station and Safety Shower Requirements: ANSI Z358.1 and OSHA
ANSI/ISEA Z358.1 and OSHA 1910.151(c) requirements for eyewash stations and safety showers: 10-second/55-foot travel distance, 15-minute flush, tepid…
Lab Waste Disposal: RCRA Streams, Generator Status, and Disposal Routes
A research lab generates several legally distinct waste streams — RCRA hazardous chemicals, medical/biohazardous waste, sharps, radiological waste, an…
Laboratory Design for Compliance and Safety
A practical guide to the compliance and safety dimension of laboratory design: containment zoning, ventilation and pressure relationships, fume hood a…
OSHA-Reportable Laboratory Injuries: The 8-Hour and 24-Hour Clocks, and What Recordable Means Instead
Reporting a laboratory injury to OSHA and recording it on the 300 Log are two different duties with two different triggers. This guide separates 29 CF…
Type I, II and III Laboratory Water: Grades, Standards and Uses Compared
ASTM D1193, ISO 3696 and CLSI GP40 define laboratory water grades (Type I/II/III, Grade 1/2/3, CLRW) with overlapping but non-identical resistivity, T…
What Is Good Laboratory Practice (GLP)?
A plain-language guide to Good Laboratory Practice (GLP): what it is, why FDA created it, what 21 CFR Part 58 requires, and how GLP differs from GMP a…

Research Data Management

EMPIAR: The Electron Microscopy Public Image Archive for Raw Cryo-EM Data
EMPIAR is EMBL-EBI's public archive for raw 2D cryo-EM image data. Learn how it differs from EMDB (derived maps) and the PDB (atomic models), and how…
H3Africa's Data and Biospecimen Access Committee (DBAC): A Governance Model for African Genomic Research
How H3Africa's Data and Biospecimen Access Committee (DBAC) governs access to African genomic data and biospecimens collected under broad consent, inc…
NIH Data Management and Sharing (DMS) Policy: Requirements, Timeline, and Compliance
What the NIH Data Management and Sharing Policy actually requires: who it applies to, what a compliant DMS Plan must contain, how it differs from the…
NIH Data Management and Sharing Plan Template: How to Fill It Out
A section-by-section walkthrough of NIH's Data Management and Sharing Plan template, covering both the original 2023 narrative format and the shorter…
NIH Data Management and Sharing Plan: What It Requires
The six required elements of an NIH Data Management and Sharing Plan, who must submit one, how it is reviewed, and the 2026 simplified pilot format.…
NIH Resource Sharing Plan vs. Data Management and Sharing Plan
The NIH Resource Sharing Plan and the 2023 Data Management and Sharing (DMS) Plan are separate, differently-scoped requirements filed under the same a…
PhysioNet Credentialed Access: How to Get MIMIC and Other Restricted Data
How PhysioNet's open, restricted, and credentialed access tiers work, and what the credentialing process (CITI training, identity review, and a per-da…
Protein Data Bank (PDB): Archiving and Reusing Macromolecular Structure Data
How the Protein Data Bank archives experimentally determined 3D macromolecular structures, wwPDB governance, deposition mandates, formats, and reuse i…
UK Biobank Data Access: Tiers, Cost, and How to Apply
UK Biobank's 500,000-participant cohort is one of the most heavily used population-health resources in research -- but access requires a scoped applic…
UniProt: The Protein Sequence and Functional Annotation Knowledgebase
UniProt is the primary knowledgebase for protein sequence and functional annotation data, curated by a consortium of EMBL-EBI, SIB, and PIR. This guid…
WormBase vs. FlyBase vs. MGI vs. ZFIN: Model Organism Databases ComparedComparison
A side-by-side comparison of the four major model organism databases -- WormBase (C. elegans), FlyBase (Drosophila), MGI (mouse), and ZFIN (zebrafish)…

Grants Management & Research Funding

American Heart Association Research Grants and How Disease-Focused Charities Fund Research (vs. NIH)
How disease-focused charities like the American Heart Association fund research differently from NIH: smaller awards, capped F&A/indirect costs, lay-s…
FNIH Guide: Foundation for the National Institutes of Health
Learn how the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health (FNIH) funds biomedical consortia, connects researchers with NIH and industry, and shar…
Gerontological Society of America (GSA): Membership, Journals and Fellows
What the Gerontological Society of America is, who can join, and where its five journals take submissions, as described on its pages on 2026-11-08.…
Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator
Comprehensive guide to the HHMI Investigator Program: 7-year appointment rules, dual-employment mechanics, eligibility criteria, and compliance standa…
NHLBI Payline: What It Is and How It Works
The NHLBI payline is the percentile-rank cutoff the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute uses to guide which peer-reviewed applications it funds…
NIDDK Explained: Mission, Funding, Council, Payline
NIDDK orientation for applicants: its mission, funding mechanism families, advisory council role, why a payline is policy guidance, and who to contact…
NIH Intramural Research Program: Guide to the IRP
Explore the NIH Intramural Research Program (IRP): governance, 4-year BSC review cycles, eligibility, facilities, and internal investigator funding mo…
NIHR Biomedical Research Centres (BRC): What They Fund
What NIHR Biomedical Research Centres (BRCs) are, the 20 NHS-university sites that hold them, what the nearly £800m in sustained funding actually pays…
The Pew Charitable Trusts: Biomedical Scholars and Policy-Research Grant Programs
How The Pew Charitable Trusts funds research: the nomination-only Pew Biomedical Scholars program, its in-house policy research model, and how it diff…
Whitehall, Klingenstein, Dreyfus, and Pew Biomedical Scholars: Niche Discipline-Specific Research Foundations
A comparison of four discipline-specific early-career research foundations — Whitehall (neurobiology), Klingenstein (neuroscience), Dreyfus (chemical…

Research Integrity & Compliance

45 CFR 46 and the Common Rule: What Each Subpart Covers
45 CFR 46 is the HHS human-subjects regulation with five subparts (A-E). The Common Rule is specifically Subpart A. This guide maps every subpart to i…
AAALAC vs. IACUC: Voluntary Accreditation vs. Mandatory CommitteeComparison
IACUC is the legally mandated committee that approves individual animal-use protocols; AAALAC International is the voluntary, external body that accre…
AAHRPP vs. AAALAC: Human vs. Animal Research AccreditationComparison
AAHRPP and AAALAC are both voluntary peer-review accreditors, but AAHRPP accredits human research protection programs (IRBs) while AAALAC accredits an…
CONBIOÉTICA Committee Registration in Mexico: CEI, Research and Biosafety Committees Under NOM-012-SSA3-2012
Registering a Comité de Ética en Investigación and its companion research and biosafety committees with CONBIOÉTICA, clause by clause under NOM-012-SS…
Ethics of Embryonic Stem Cell Research: Dickey-Wicker, NIH Guidelines, and ISSCR Standards
A practical guide to the ethics and regulation of embryonic stem cell research: what the Dickey-Wicker Amendment actually restricts, how the 2009 NIH…
FDA Modernization Act 2.0: What It Actually Changed About Animal Testing
The FDA Modernization Act 2.0 (Pub. L. 117-328, Sec. 3209) struck the words requiring animal tests from the FD&C Act and the biosimilar pathway. It di…
Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals: What It Covers and Who Must Follow It
The Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (8th edition, National Academies Press, 2011) is the reference standard PHS Policy and AAALAC acc…
Ley 20.120 (Chile): Research on Human Beings, the Genome, and Accredited Ethics Committee Requirements
Ley 20.120 and its reglamento, Decreto 114, are the statute behind Chilean ethics review — not the ISP/ANAMED product pathway. This guide sets out the…
Organ-on-a-Chip as a Replacement Method Under the 3Rs
Organ-on-a-chip microphysiological systems as a 3Rs Replacement method: current regulatory acceptance status, validation limits versus in vivo models,…
Secondary Use of Identifiable Data and Biospecimens: The Regulatory Pathways
How researchers can lawfully reuse identifiable data and biospecimens collected for an earlier study: the Common Rule's secondary-research exemption,…

Laboratory Equipment & Instrumentation

Biosafety Cabinet vs. Fume Hood vs. Laminar Flow Hood: Which Do You Need?Comparison
A biosafety cabinet protects worker, sample, and room. A chemical fume hood protects only the worker. A laminar flow hood protects only the sample. Th…
Cell Sorting by Flow Cytometry: Nozzle, Sheath Pressure, Sort Mode, Purity and Post-Sort Viability
How nozzle diameter and sheath pressure are chosen from cell size, why sort mode is a droplet-conflict rule rather than a quality dial, what purity mo…
Mass Spectrometry Proteomics: Choosing DDA or DIA, Sample Prep, and Run QC
A decision guide to bottom-up mass spectrometry proteomics: choosing between DDA and DIA acquisition, the digestion, cleanup and fractionation choices…
Mycoplasma Testing Methods Compared: PCR, Culture, Indicator Cell Culture and Luminescence
A method-selection guide to mycoplasma detection: direct culture, indicator cell culture with DNA staining, NAT/PCR and enzymatic luminescence compare…
Pipette Tips: Selection Guide by Application
How to choose pipette tips by application: filter/barrier vs. standard, low-retention vs. standard, sterile vs. autoclavable, and rack vs. bulk format…
qPCR Melt Curve Analysis: Reading Peaks, Primer Dimers and the Confirmatory Check
A diagnostic reading of the qPCR dissociation curve: which peak shapes mean primer dimer, which mean non-specific amplicon, why there is no universal…
RNA Integrity Number (RIN): How It Is Computed and How to Read a Trace
What the RIN algorithm actually computes (nine electropherogram regions and a neural network trained on 1,208 samples, not the 28S:18S ratio it replac…
Spinning-Disk vs Point-Scanning Confocal: Choosing by Speed, Photodamage and Optical Sectioning
A selection procedure for spinning-disk versus point-scanning confocal microscopy, built on the three constraints that actually decide it: frame rate,…
Types of Laboratory Glassware: Volumetric vs. General-Purpose, Explained
A selection-and-accuracy reference for laboratory glassware: the volumetric vs. general-purpose distinction, TC/TD markings, Class A vs. Class B toler…

Research Tools & Software

CryoSPARC: What It Is, How to Install It, First Workflow
CryoSPARC explained: what it does for cryo-EM, academic licence access, install commands and a job-by-job first workflow with outputs.…
HUMAnN: Metagenomic Functional Profiling Pipeline
An operational guide to the HUMAnN pipeline, detailing tiered metagenomic profiling, ChocoPhlAn and UniRef databases, output tables, and CLI workflows…
MeSH Terms in PubMed: Explosion, Major Topic, Subheadings — and What MeSH Alone Misses
Explosion, [majr] and subheadings are the three mechanics that change what a MeSH search returns — each documented against NLM’s PubMed User Guide and…
PubMed vs. PubMed Central (PMC): What’s Actually in EachComparison
PubMed is a citation/abstract search index; PubMed Central (PMC) is a full-text archive. What each actually contains, why a PMCID differs from a PMID,…
REDCap Research Database: Setup, Export, and Use
Configure a REDCap research database, build instruments, manage user permissions, export analytical data, and resolve project validation errors.…
The PubMed Advanced Search Builder: Numbered History, Field Tags, and Reading Search Details
The Advanced Search page gives you a Builder, a numbered History and a Search Details expander. The third is the one that matters: PubMed routinely ru…
Using the PubMed E-utilities API: ESearch, EFetch, ELink and the 9,999-Record Ceiling
A measured, end-to-end walkthrough of pulling a department or author publication set from PubMed over HTTP: ESearch, EFetch, ELink, EPost and the Hist…

Clinical Research Administration

21 CFR: What Title 21 of the Code of Federal Regulations Covers
A routing guide to Title 21 of the Code of Federal Regulations: how CFR citations are structured, and which Part governs electronic records, informed…
Biobank Specimen Consent Models: Broad, Tiered, and Dynamic Consent Compared
A comparison of the three main biobank consent architectures — broad, tiered, and dynamic consent — and how each aligns with ISO 20387 biobank accredi…
FDA Rare Disease Evidence Principles (RDEP): What It Is and What It Means for Sponsors
FDA's Rare Disease Evidence Principles (RDEP), announced September 2025, clarifies how sponsors of ultra-rare genetic disease drugs can meet the subst…
NOAEL and First-in-Human Starting Dose
How the No Observed Adverse Effect Level from nonclinical toxicology studies is converted to a Human Equivalent Dose by allometric scaling, then to th…
Orphan Drug Designation: FDA Criteria, Process, and Incentives
A practical explainer on FDA orphan drug designation: the prevalence and scientific-rationale criteria, how sponsors apply through the Office of Orpha…
Toxicokinetics in Nonclinical Safety Studies
Toxicokinetics characterizes systemic exposure achieved within a nonclinical toxicity study, not therapeutic dosing, and is the basis for the exposure…

Research Information & Identifiers

PubMed-to-Embase Search Strategy Translation for Systematic Reviews
How to translate a PubMed search strategy into Embase syntax for a PRISMA-compliant systematic review: MeSH-to-Emtree vocabulary mapping, field-code a…

Scholarly Writing

How to Describe T0-T4 Translational Research Stages in Proposals and Manuscripts
How to correctly signal which T0-T4 translational research stage a grant proposal or manuscript addresses, with primary-source stage definitions, prop…

Technology Transfer & Innovation

BIRAC BIG (Biotechnology Ignition Grant): Eligibility, Milestones and Application
How BIRAC's Biotechnology Ignition Grant actually works: eligibility criteria, the BIG Partner incubator mechanism that gates fundability, milestone-l…

Key terms

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