Monthly Archives: October 2013

“The Center for Postnatural History”

Posted on by
3

We’ve always known that scientists have created some pretty strange things. Popular culture agrees, giving us ideas like Frankenstein and Soylent Green and the Hulk. But now, you can actually see all of these creations under one roof. The “Center for Postnatural History” in Pittsburgh was opened last year by Richard Pell, an electronic media professor at Carnegie Melon University. Pell is very aware how controversial some of the creatures might be, so he keeps the language and labels very neutral to try to create an environment where “activists and scientists can run into each other, feel comfortable and maybe even blow each others’ minds.”

Three notable displays are Freckles the goat, GloFish®, and some leaves from a genetically modified African chestnut tree. Freckles was genetically engineered to produce in her milk the same material that makes spider silk, by Utah genetics professor Randy Lewis (who also happens to enjoy farming). This silk, which is stronger than Kevlar, could be used for everything from bulletproof vests to ligament repair. After her death, Freckles was stuffed and displayed in Richard Pell’s museum.

GloFish® are regular aquarium fish that have been engineered to produce the proteins that make jellyfish fluorescent. And the African chestnut tree has a wheat gene that makes it immune to a fungal disease that almost wiped out normal types of the tree.

This museum features many, many other post-natural species. Personally, I think the museum awesome and I might look into visiting it sometime because I’m interested in this stuff. There are many natural history museums where we can learn a lot about dinosaurs and evolution, but it would be harder to apply it to research that’s going on right now. “Center for Postnatural History” would not only generate much discussion, but it might also inspire people to come up with brilliant new ideas.

Sources:

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/humans’-living-creations-put-display

http://www.postnatural.org/

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/jan/14/synthetic-biology-spider-goat-genetics

Will Research For $

Posted on by
4

third_world_867475

Let’s talk about the government. Again? You say. But this blog’s about science! What cures got discovered this week?

Well, the answer is, profitable ones. When people hear the word “science,” what comes to mind are test tubes, fruit flies, spaceships, and cancer treatments. But the thing is, the government is actually behind all of it— not in a creepy way, but their funding is needed for any type of research.  Every scientist has to apply for grants to get enough money to keep their lab and their job.

The problem is that the government has limited funds and mostly gives grants to research about diseases whose treatment could eventually benefit the government economically. They’re basically making an investment. As a result, many serious diseases that affect poor countries (but not developed ones) are being neglected; out of 336 new drugs and vaccines developed in 2010-2011, only 1% were for diseases that are mostly common in developing countries (like tuberculosis, malaria, diarrheal and tropical diseases, etc.), even though those diseases account for 11% of the global health burden.

These diseases have become known as “neglected diseases.” Dr. Bernard Pécoul, the director of the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative (DNDi), says that “We must keep pushing to keep these diseases on the international policy agenda and move quickly to deliver truly transformative, life-saving treatments.”

Dr. Nathalie Wourgaft, medical director of DNDi, points out that “[There are] deadly gaps in new medicines for some of the world’s least visible patients.” And this is definitely true; research is ridiculously expensive and it often takes years and years of developing a cure, and then doing animal experiments and clinical trials, before a drug is approved. People in non-visible countries just can’t afford to pay enough money in order for all the research behind the cure to be profitable. So the government’s probably not interested.

This is obviously a pretty bad situation. But what changes in the international policy agenda could be made to fix it? Should the government set aside funding for neglected diseases? Or would it be better to provide science education in poor countries in hopes that someone will grow up to discover a cure?

Sources:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/10/131024121923.htm

http://www.dndi.org/

100% Certified Lab-Grown

Posted on by
3

As the population continues to increase exponentially, world hunger is becoming a much more widespread and serious issue, and more extreme measures are being taken to solve it. One of those ways is growing meat in petri dishes.

This August, a completely lab-grown burger was fried and eaten in London after having been grown from cow stem cells in a lab. This burger is all muscle– because there were no fat or skin or cartilage cells to begin with, there was no such tissue in the meat. This development could have some interesting implications for world hunger– if meat can be mass-produced in places with climates that can’t support large numbers of animals, everyone can get their protein.

Widespread use of this discovery could also help environment in some major ways. Right now, it’s estimated that confined animals produce three times as much waste as humans in the US, and account for a huge percentage of carbon and methane emissions. Runoff from factory farms ends up in groundwater and ecosystems, causing diseases to develop in places that they shouldn’t be developing in.

So how much value do lab-grown burgers have? Are they the next “pink slime”? Or are they the solution to world hunger and the destructive consequences of factory farming?

Or do you think hunger can be fixed in a much less creepy and “scientific” way? After all, meat is being produced so fast, and there is so much of it, that it has already become less expensive than vegetables. Things like Epic Meal Time, a Youtube series that features recipes for 60-pound 6 piece chicken nuggets, among other food items, show that getting enough animal protein in your diet is clearly not an issue in some places. Should we focus first on the politics and socioeconomic barriers that contribute to world hunger, instead of trying to fix everything with science?

 

Sources:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/06/science/a-lab-grown-burger-gets-a-taste-test.html

http://www.dosomething.org/tipsandtools/11-facts-about-factory-farms-and-environment

Stemming of A Controversy

Posted on by
3

So by now, everyone has heard about how controversial stem cell research is. It has been a major issue in elections and scientific research for years, if not decades. Words like “murder” and “life-saving cures” have been thrown around, and everyone is just plain mad.

Some people claim:

former-embryo-copy

 

while other people argue:

embryoswelcom

 

and others just try to lighten the mood.

not guilty

I’ve always been really hesitant to take a side because I don’t completely understand how stem cell research actually works. So I’ve decided to find out. What are stem cells? Who is affected? Why is it so controversial?

Basically, stem cells are cells that can change into many different kinds of specialized tissue. There are four types of stem cells: adult, umbilical (from umbilical cords), fetal (from aborted human fetuses), and embryonic (from human embryos) stem cells. As far as we know, adult cells can only turn into several different types of tissue. Fetal and embryonic cells are the most flexible, but they’re also the most controversial because the process of obtaining them requires scientists to destroy the embryo.

This embryo can either be conceived, or made by cloning a cell from the patient’s body and a donated egg. Either way, some groups argue that an embryo is still a life, and taking it apart in the name of science is not ethical. Others say that the embryo was created through artificial means anyways, and stem cells could save many other lives by turning into functional organs.

It would seem that this ethical debate will continue regardless of how successful the research is; if scientists can grow organs from embryonic stem cells but not from adult stem cells, embryonic cells would have to be used to create any other organs in the future.

So how do you think this should be regulated? One idea could be that researchers first have to show promising results with mouse or other lab animal stem cells before getting funding to work with human stem cells. Or should only adult and umbilical stem cells be used at all?

 

Sources:

http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/life/cellular-microscopic/question621.htm

http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/cellular-microscopic/stem-cell6.htm

[Th]e [S]hutdown: Why It Matters

Posted on by
2

Everyone knows about the really obvious effects of the government shutdown on science— the Smithsonian museums are closed, national parks are closed, NASA is pretty much closed, and this thing pops up whenever you try to do research for a science class:

Screen Shot 2013-10-10 at 6.30.01 PM

However, there are two other slightly more serious consequences that haven’t been publicized as much: many patients with serious illness are being kept from possible treatments, and our food is no longer being inspected.

Even though people are still being enrolled in clinical trials at the National Institutes of Health, the process has become much slower. Only 12 patients have been enrolled since October 1st, when the shutdown began. Normally, about 200 patients, many with cancer, are enrolled each week and more than 1,400 trials run at any given time. But because of the lapse in funding, only people who are in immediate danger of dying are being added to the list.

It’s important to note that clinical trials are often a last hope for patients—they’ve gone through other known treatments but the disease hasn’t improved, so they decide to try new, experimental treatments that are still being studied. So while lawmakers and politicians are arguing about how health care should work, other people are trying to decide which 12 patients (out of 200) with long-term, life-threatening illnesses need treatment the most, since 75% of the NIH staff has been furloughed and the agency just doesn’t have enough funding to treat everyone.

I guess this won’t be happening anytime soon:

Screen Shot 2013-10-10 at 7.46.07 PM

The CDC and FDA have also suffered cuts, losing 68% and 45% of their staff, respectively. Among this staff are epidemiologists who had been tracing a salmonella outbreak that started in California and spread through 18 states, before they were furloughed. There have been no inspections of domestically produced food this week because inspectors, lab technicians, and many other staff members have also been sent home.

Food inspections have led to a lot of important information being made public in the past, most recently the fact that arsenic was used in chicken, turkey, and pig feed. If the government shutdown lasts for many more weeks, it would be almost impossible for anyone to know what new things are added to the food that our meal plans pay for.

These issues are frustrating because even though they are so severe, they are so easily fixed; if funding is resumed, the NIH could continue to perform clinical trials, and the CDC and FDA could go back to working on public health.

Hopefully our government will pause their health care debate long enough for that to happen.

 

Sources:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/10/us/politics/risk-to-food-safety-seen-in-furloughs.html?src=recg

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/10/health/in-shutdown-clinical-trial-enrollment-slows-but-doesnt-halt.html?ref=science

(Special Health Issue) A Dose of Arsenic

Posted on by
3

This Tuesday, the FDA announced a ban on three arsenic-containing compounds that have been used in over 100 drugs that are fed to pigs, chicken, and turkey. This was because of a recent discovery that chicken sold in grocery stores (and probably at Redifer and Pollock buffet) contained more than four times the arsenic it is allowed to. These chemicals are used to “prevent disease, increase feed efficiency, and promote growth.” I had no idea what “feed efficiency” meant, so I Googled it and found out that it’s “a ratio describing the amount of feed consumed per unit of production (e.g. milk, eggs, gain).”

Screen Shot 2013-10-04 at 2.02.26 AM

This is an important issue because arsenic can cause lung and skin cancer, hard black scab-like growths on skin, liver lesions, and a whole host of problems with almost every organ system.

So why didn’t the FDA ban these chemicals in the first place? Doesn’t every chemical that could possibly end up in our food have to go through FDA approval first?

It’s important to realize that in low amounts, dangerous chemicals often don’t have major health effects. Mercury levels in shrimp are so low that even the cholesterol is probably more harmful. We’ve been eating a little bit of arsenic in our meat for years before the FDA banned it several days ago. And on a molecular level, all proteins are just really fancy ammonia molecules, which sounds a lot more horrifying than it really is.

Screen Shot 2013-10-04 at 2.25.24 AM<– really fancy ammonia molecule

It’s often easy to demand that all unpalatable chemicals be banned, but there are few other practical options for raising animals on such a large scale. If we don’t want the cost of meat to skyrocket and entire forests to be shaved to clear land for pastures, lab-produced (and possibly dangerous) chemicals would need to be used. In fact, a fourth arsenic-containing compound that many people would like banned, is the only known treatment for histomoniasis, a liver parasite that can kill many young turkeys.

With these three drugs withdrawn, factory farms will have to replace them with others. Diseases still have to be prevented, and growth (both animal growth and economic growth) still has to be promoted, arsenic or no arsenic.

Should the FDA start specifying what companies should do, instead of what they shouldn’t do? Or will they just be playing Whack-a-Mole with dangerous chemicals in food, no matter what? Should we demand a list of the ingredients in animal feed as well as the ingredients in our food?

This issue is much more complex than it first seems, but could there be a solution?