Forty principal investigators from Harvard and California gathered at Massachusetts General Hospital last week for a casual, annual symposium focused on discussing unpublished work, receiving critical feedback, and forming cross-country collaborations. Fernando Camargo, PhD, and David Langenau, PhD, co-organized this year's meeting. Read more. 

• Chad Cowan, PhD, and Derrick Rossi, PhD, for the first time have used the CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing technique to create what could prove to be an effective technique for blocking HIV from invading and destroying patients' immune systems. (Read the paper in Cell Stem Cell.)
• David Scadden, MD, and postdoctoral fellow Borja Saez, PhD, have discovered that blocking the production of heparan sulfate can force blood stem cells from their home in the bone marrow into the bloodstream. From there, the stem cells can be easily extracted for transplantation. (Read the paper in Blood.)