Comments on bionet.molbio.rapd

[Brook Milligan]

   RAPD is one of many new techniques based on PCR.  Since PCR has become
   such a large part of molecular biology, I would propose a new USENET
   group "bionet.molbio.pcr".  The RAPD-L ( and any other PCR ) lists
   could be merged into a new bionet PCR group.

I would be against the merging of all pcr-related topics into a single
group.  The biological questions being addressed are in many ways
quite distinct, and the group would be in danger of becoming swamped
with "how do you run this type of pcr reaction?" questions rather than
a forum for discussing the role of markers and their analysis in
natural populations.  I perceive the role of the methods/reagents
group as addressins the former questions and the role of the proposed
rapd group as addressing at least a portion of the latter.  If a
broader charter is to be considered, I would suggest a biologically
motivated broadening to include other types of markers, as opposed to
a technically motivated broadening to include all of pcr.

Brook G. Milligan               Internet:  brook at trillium.botany.utexas.edu
Department of Botany            Bitnet:    bohk313 at utaivc
University of Texas at Austin   UUCP:      ...!ut-emx!brook
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