I am fascinated by all the ways that scientists are taking sensitive techniques and using them to look into our past. For example, scientists constructed the entire genome of Yersinia pestis, the caustive agent of the Black Death, from teeth and bone samples of plague victims from the 14th century. Without methods like polymerase chain reaction (PCR), such an analysis could not be performed. My fellow blogger Terri discussed how a postmortem autopsy of Ozti, a mummy found in the Alps, used modern techniques to learn not only what color his eyes were but that he suffered from Lyme disease. In a recent PLOS ONE article, Corthals et al. took this analysis of preserved human remains further to determine if a mummy from the Andes in Argentina may have suffered from an active lung infection, testing for an immune response by protein profiling. Continue reading “Protein Profiling of a Lung Infection in a 500-Year-Old Mummy”
Author: Sara Klink
Curcumin Moderates the Health Effects of Diesel Exhaust
The majority of the ground transporation in the United States runs on diesel fuel. It powers most of the fleet of large vehicles that travel around Wisconsin and across country moving products and people. My family uses diesel fuel in all the large tractors that plant and harvest the 1,200+ acres of crops on the farm as well in the semitrailer that hauls the final product to market. Diesel also fuels a small portion of the passenger vehicles that people drive every day in the United States, including the car that is my main mode of transport. However, exposure to diesel exhaust can have negative effects on human health, and recent reports have found an increased risk of lung cancer. While these studies documented heavy exposure levels (miners underground with diesel generators), people still wonder about the effect of exposure when behind a truck spewing dark exhaust. A recent PLoS ONE article examined the effect of diesel exhaust particles on mouse cardiovascular systems and how treating with curcumin attenuated the negative effects. Continue reading “Curcumin Moderates the Health Effects of Diesel Exhaust”
Methylation of Your Genome Decreases as You Age
If asked what are the differences between a grandfather and his newborn granddaughter, I would reply with the obvious ones: size (the grandfather is larger than his granddaughter), condition of the skin (babies have soft, smooth skin and elders have age spots and wrinkles) and life expectancy. Other visual cues may seem more similar than different. For example, grandfather and granddaughter may both lack hair on their heads or need assistance to move from one place to another. However, both baby and elder are a product of the genes expressed from their genome even if the exact sequence is not identical between them. Because genes are expressed differently over a human’s lifetime, Heyn et al. decided to examine the methylation profile in the genomes of newborns and individuals 89 years old or older. Continue reading “Methylation of Your Genome Decreases as You Age”
Tracking the Progression of Plague Using Bioluminescence
Sequencing Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that caused the Black Plague in Europe during 1348–50, is an amazing accomplishment. Y. pestis infection still occurs sporatically and causes fatalities despite the Age of Antibiotics. Even with animal models, there are questions remaining about the progression of infection. Nham et al. used in vivo imaging to examine the course of infection in a mouse animal model using a bioluminescent clone of Y. pestis. Continue reading “Tracking the Progression of Plague Using Bioluminescence”
Could the Next Chemotherapy be Derived from a Weed?
As much as I may complain about weeds, one that I enjoy (in moderation and not among my vegetables) is dandelions. The bright yellow flowers herald spring, and the seed puffballs, while not as visually interesting, offer entertainment as I watch birds landing on the shaft, bending it and eating the seeds. When I am pulling out the taproots with my dandelion weeding tool, I like to leave them on my lawn to break down because the roots are known to draw up nutrients. As it turns out, dandelion root is more than a nutrient source for other plants; it has been used for medicinal purposes. And now Ovadje, Hamm and Pandey have published research showing that dandelion root extract is able to induce apoptosis of leukemia cell lines while leaving normal blood cells untouched. Continue reading “Could the Next Chemotherapy be Derived from a Weed?”
A Little Science Humor for Lunch
At ScienceOnline 2012, Brian Malow also known as @sciencecomedian performed a short routine during the Saturday lunch. He complained that several jokes floating around the web were not attributed to him so I thought I would share a few I remembered complete with attribution. His sense of humor appealed to me as I was raised in a home rife with puns. Yes, my family can carry on an entire conversation dedicated to a single theme, no music necessary.
Fans of the television show “The Big Bang Theory” are likely to understand this reference: Schrödinger’s cat walked into a bar…or did it?
For chemistry buffs: Helium drifted into a bar. The bartender says “We don’t serve noble gases in this bar.” Helium doesn’t react.
If you enjoy reading about the Large Hadron Collider and the search for a certain particle: A Higgs Boson entered a church. The priest said “We don’t allow your kind in here.” The Higgs Boson replied “Without me, you have no mass.”
Microbiologists may appreciate this one: An infectious disease enters a bar. The bartender says “We don’t serve your kind. You’re Staph.”
More wordplay with particles: A neutron enters a bar. The bartender says “For you, no charge.”
Fungi, a Tool for Weed Control?
While I enjoy growing a variety of produce from tomatoes, basil and garlic to blueberries, one thing remains the bane of my existence: weeds. My least favorite: quackgrass. I even dug up an entire garden bed to rid myself of the weed and its long rhizomes. How well do you think that worked? I found that the quackgrass happily grew around the popcorn I planted in that same location. What is a gardener to do? Well, recent research by Veiga et al. demonstrates that fungus can lend a helping hand and suppress growth of some weed species. Continue reading “Fungi, a Tool for Weed Control?”
Finding Life on Mars May Be Complicated by Microbes Hitching a Ride from Earth
“The Andromeda Strain”, a novel written by Michael Crichton, remains one of my favorite science fiction novels for two reasons (spoiler alert for the plot): The US government deliberately sent objects into space to scoop up extraterrestrial microorganisms and examine their potential to be used as a weapon (with the expected consequences of contaminated space probes falling near human habitats and causing trouble), and the deadly organism infecting humans is stopped in its tracks by the inescapable bounds of its pH requirements exemplified by two survivors in an afflicted town: a crying baby and a Sterno-drinking man. Reality may be a bit different from the novel but the principle is the same: We are launching probes from our planet and sending them to other planetary bodies, sometimes to stay on another planet, sometimes to return to Earth. In both cases, worries about terrestrial organisms contaminating other planets and extraterrestrial organisms contaminating Earth are valid. Because we are sending more and more probes to examine the possibility of life on other planetary bodies, Curiosity being the most recent example, the question remains: How do you adequately test for organisms that may be hitching a ride from Earth into space? Continue reading “Finding Life on Mars May Be Complicated by Microbes Hitching a Ride from Earth”
Black Raspberry Extract May Lead to Tomorrow’s Cancer Preventative
When deciding which varieties of fruit to cultivate, I chose to plant black raspberries on my small suburban lot. They grow wild in Wisconsin, but fighting through swarms of mosquitos, brush and thorns to pick berries was not my idea of fun. For the last two years, I have received a large crop of juicy black berries that I enjoy eating fresh or process into black raspberry jam to spread on toast. Therefore, I was interested to learn that black raspberries have demonstrated cancer preventative properties in animal models of chemically induced oral and colon cancers as well as cultured oral cancer cells. Due to similarities between oral and cervical cancers, researchers recently tested if the beneficial effects of this berry could extend to human cervical cancer cells. Continue reading “Black Raspberry Extract May Lead to Tomorrow’s Cancer Preventative”
Sequencing the Black Death is a Window to the Past
After writing my review of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA article “Targeted enrichment of ancient pathogens yielding the pPCP1 plasmid of Yersinia pestis from victims of the Black Death”, I vaguely wondered if the authors could have sequenced more than a single 10kb plasmid. If the single-copy chromosomal DNA was too scarce, maybe one of the other Yersina pestis plasmids that may exist at a higher copy number (e.g., pMT1) might be sequenced. Continue reading “Sequencing the Black Death is a Window to the Past”
