I wanted to update some past topics I covered.
Biofuels
Nature journal voted a paper on biofuels as one of their top papers of 2007. This paper pointed out the drawbacks to alcohol as a biofuel i.e. low energy density, high volatility, and contamination by the absorption of water from the atmosphere. It suggests an alternative called dimethylfuran (DMF) that can address these issues and can be derived from fructose, a sugar available from biomass. In my opinion, the days of alcohol as a biofuel are numbered and we should watch alternative biofuel research very closely for domain opportunities.
Nature 447, 982–985 (21 June).
Artificial or engineered food
Food from cloned animals is on the mind of the FDA these days. They are expected to approve the sale of food from cloned animals as early as next week. The influence of biotechnology and molecular biology on our food supply is becoming greater. The public are still uneasy about the food supply and controversy may erupt at any time.
Disease testing
Nature editors also voted a major study looking at the British population for genes associated with bipolar disorder, coronary artery disease, Crohn’s disease, hypertension, rheumatoid arthritis, and type I and type II diabetes. Many novel disease associations were found. Disease testing, diagnostics and biomarkers deserve close watching.
Nature 447, 661–678 (7 June).
Genomics
Science journal voted personalized genomics and human individual variation as breakthroughs of the year for 2007. There are also some hints as to what might be next for genomics and I will talk about those soon.
Environment and global warming
Science journal editors voted global warming as a breakthrough of the year. While it has been among the top ranked for several years, a lot more was understood about the consequences and causes. This is an area where there has been heavy speculation by domainers but I think there are still opportunities especially looking at secondary effects. I will talk about how to look downstream, upstream and laterally to find good domain names around popular topics another time.
The end of the year and beginning of the new year is a time when the media loves to vote top 10 lists and speculate about the future. It can be interesting to browse these lists to see how you are doing and maybe even spawn some new ideas.
Comments on this entry are closed.