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WORK TITLE: Systematic
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://www.jamesvalcourt.com/
CITY: Cambridge
STATE: MA
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:
http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/15215213.James_R_Valcourt * https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesvalcourt/
RESEARCHER NOTES:
LC control no.: n 2016062668
LCCN Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/n2016062668
HEADING: Valcourt, James R.
000 00343nz a2200109n 450
001 10310496
005 20161116124202.0
008 161116n| azannaabn |n aaa
010 __ |a n 2016062668
040 __ |a DLC |b eng |e rda |c DLC
100 1_ |a Valcourt, James R.
670 __ |a Systematic, 2017: |b ECIP t.p. (James R. Valcourt) data view (working on Ph.D., biology, at Harvard)
PERSONAL
Male.
EDUCATION:Princeton University, A.B. (magna cum laude); Harvard University, Ph.D. candidate.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Systems biologist. D.E. Shaw Research, New York, NY, former researcher.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
James R. Valcourt graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University with his bachelor’s degree in molecular biology. He also received the Pyne Prize as a student. Valcourt then went on to work as a researcher at D.E. Shaw Research in New York City. At D.E. Shaw, Valcourt studied pharmaceutical drugs with a system-based approach. From there, Valcourt returned to academia, and as of 2017, he was a doctoral candidate at Harvard University. As a doctoral student, Valcourt works under a $250,000 Hertz Foundation Graduate Fellowship, and he works on systematic biology. Specifically, Valcourt studies early germ layer cell fate choices and the regulatory logic informing those choices.
Valcourt explains his work for the lay reader in his 2017 volume, Systematic: How Systems Biology Is Transforming Modern Medicine. In it, the author explains that the human body functions according to a systemic operation of single cells, much like an ant colony functions as a systemic operation of single ants. Yet, the whole is more than the sum of its parts, resulting in remarkable processes when individual cells work together. Valcourt additionally provides an overview of systems biology and its potential, noting that the field emerged in the early 2000s following the discover of the human genome. Since then, systemic biology has evolved to combine biology, engineering, and mathematics, and the field relies on supercomputers to explore how every element in the human body works systemically. Without computers, researchers would be unable to quantify the ways in which eighty-six billion brain cells interact in a single human. Thus, Valcourt’s book explores complex biological functions from a cellular level, and this exploration can be applied to treat aging, cancer, and even allergies.
Reviews of the book were largely positive, and critics noted that Valcourt offers an exciting look into an emerging field and that fields’s many possible applications. For instance, a Kirkus Reviews columnist found that “readers will notice that, except for a few dramatic anecdotes, none of Valcourt’s marvels is currently happening, but he makes a convincing case that they are viable and just around the corner.” A Publishers Weekly reviewer was equally laudatory, asserting that “Valcourt delivers a lucid introduction to this ingenious combination of the hard sciences and advanced technology that adopts a holistic view of natural phenomena.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Kirkus Reviews, January 1, 2017, review of Systematic: How Systems Biology Is Transforming Modern Medicine.
Publishers Weekly, December 12, 2016, review of Systematic.
ONLINE
James Valcourt Website, http://www.jamesvalcourt.com/ (October 24, 2017).
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James R. Valcourt
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James R. Valcourt is pursuing a Ph.D. in systems biology at Harvard University. As a former researcher at D. E. Shaw Research in New York City, he used supercomputer simulations to study pharmaceutical drugs. He is a recipient of the quarter-million-dollar Hertz Foundation Graduate Fellowship, and graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University with an A.B. in molecular biology, receiving the Pyne Prize. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
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Systematic: How Systems Bio... Systematic: How Systems Biology Is Transforming Modern Medicine
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James Valcourt
Ph.D. student. Sometimes I write books.
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I’m a Ph.D. candidate in the Harvard Systems Biology program. I study the regulatory logic underlying early germ layer cell fate choices in Sharad Ramanathan’s lab. Outside of work, I enjoy backpacking, listening to comedy podcasts, and telling stories about the microbiome at cocktail parties.
I recently wrote a book about systems biology for non-scientists. It’s called Systematic: How Systems Biology is Transforming Modern Medicine, and you can pick up a copy at your favorite bookstore.
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Valcourt, James R.: SYSTEMATIC
Kirkus Reviews.
(Jan. 1, 2017):
COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Valcourt, James R. SYSTEMATIC Bloomsbury Sigma (Adult Nonfiction) $27.00 2, 7 ISBN: 978-1-63286-029-3
Exploration of "how understanding neural systems is helping us unravel some of the biggest mysteries in science."One
cannot fully comprehend the workings of an ant colony by studying a single ant, and a human is far more than a
collection of cells and chemical reactions. This is old news to scientists, but new ways of thinking, combined with vast
computing power, have given them a powerful tool, systems biology, to analyze these complex relationships.
Enthusiastic and young--he is currently pursuing a doctorate in biology at Harvard--Valcourt delivers an expert
overview of a spectacularly burgeoning field where, for example, a team of scientists spent 12 years and $3 billion
sequencing the human genome in 2003. By 2016, a single scientist could do the same in a day for roughly $1,000.
Philosophers and nonscientists routinely proclaim the superiority of the "big picture," and Valcourt agrees without
downplaying the difficulties. Isolated phenomena, he writes, "don't fit together quite as easily as Lego blocks, but we
are starting to realize that we can use them to construct biological systems that have the potential to produce
medicines, sense environmental toxins, and improve manufacturing processes." Mixing interviews, anecdotes, and
lucid explanations, the author describes how dividing fertilized cells, at first identical, learn how to become a complete
organism. He shares the universal amazement at how organs such as the brain develop seemingly magical (i.e.,
"emergent") properties absent from their individual components, and he concludes that researchers and their
supercomputers will transform lives, cure diseases, design drugs and perhaps living things from scratch, and efficiently
correct a defective genome in an adult. Readers will notice that, except for a few dramatic anecdotes, none of
Valcourt's marvels is currently happening, but he makes a convincing case that they are viable and just around the
corner.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Valcourt, James R.: SYSTEMATIC." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Jan. 2017. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA475357302&it=r&asid=129c5cebcecc37c7c7952ebd26e367fc.
Accessed 2 Oct. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A475357302
---
10/2/2017 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1506990239530 2/2
Systematic: How Systems Biology Is
Transforming Modern Medicine
Publishers Weekly.
263.51 (Dec. 12, 2016): p139.
COPYRIGHT 2016 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Systematic: How Systems Biology Is Transforming Modern Medicine
James R. Valcourt. Sigma, $27 (288p)
ISBN 978-1-63286-029-3
Amazing phenomena occur when cells work together, writes Valcourt in this accessible introduction to systems
biology, a field with a distinguished history that took off at the beginning of the 21st century. Combining engineering,
mathematics, and advances in computing technology, scientists are learning how the innumerable elements in a
complex organism work in concert. Valcourt offers as an example the seemingly miraculous workings of the human
brain. A single brain cell simply fires an electric pulse, but 86 billion connected brain cells enable a person to think,
feel, imagine, and wonder. Systems biologists are studying that kind of leap from simple action to complex behavior.
Valcourt visits laboratories where researchers are examining the mechanism of aging, the specific genetic errors that
make a cell malignant, why useful drugs produce nasty side-effects, and why the immune system overreacts
(provoking allergies) or underreacts (ignoring cancers). Understanding these processes will transform human lives, but
despite the book's title, at present the field's triumphs are largely confined to the laboratory; as Valcourt admits, many
ongoing attempts to unlock these secrets will fizzle. Still, systems biologists seem on the verge of achieving great
things, and Valcourt delivers a lucid introduction to this ingenious combination of the hard sciences and advanced
technology that adopts a holistic view of natural phenomena. (Feb.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Systematic: How Systems Biology Is Transforming Modern Medicine." Publishers Weekly, 12 Dec. 2016, p. 139.
General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA475225102&it=r&asid=5a227c7b383f9fc9099ca03a541cb0e7.
Accessed 2 Oct. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A475225102