PLoS Blog

In a new PLoS Biology article, “The Challenge of Conserving Amphibian Megadiversity in Madagascar,” Franco Andreone et al. argue that governments and conservation organizations should invest in proactive efforts to protect amphibians in Madagascar, which harbors some of the richest groups of amphibian fauna in the world, before the populations go into decline. We asked Kevin Zippel, program director of the Amphibian Ark, created to keep “threatened amphibian species afloat” through captive management programs, to explain the value of the authors’ approach.

PLoS Computational Biology regional perspective series new article: Bioinformatics in China.

Dr Harold Varmus, Chairman of the PLoS Board, is being interviewed on NPR's Science Friday this week about his PLoS Biology Editorial in which he applauds the newly enacted NH Public Access Policy as a positive step toward ensuring greater access to and better use of the scientific literature. Tune in and feel free to ask questions on the show.

This week, we were delighted to discover that PLoS ONE had appeared in the New York Times for the sixth week in a row, with an article and part of a podcast on a paper by Iriki and colleagues who trained degus (a type of rodent) to manipulate a rake (“as smoothly and efficiently as croupiers in any Las Vegas casino,” according to the NYT), in their paper, Tool-Use Training in a Species of Rodent: The Emergence of an Optimal Motor Strategy and Functional Understanding.

Pete Binfield joined PLoS this week as the Managing Editor for PLoS ONE.