Pets Or No Pets?

Almost every person that I have met has owned or currently owns pets. You know what’s something else that I noticed about these people? They all seem to be living pretty happy lives. Yes they may be in school. And yes they also may be like me, and feel like they are drowning in all the work that they need to complete for school. But regardless, their pets are what keep them happy and upbeat.

An adorable Shiba Inu dog, ready to make your day as happy as his!

Owning pets has been scientifically proven to do a multitude of things that most people would assume has no correlation to health. For example, it has been studied that people who own pets have a much healthier heart than those who do not own pets. The effects of being with pets lowers your blood pressure compared to not having any time with animals. Heart attack survivors and people with serious heart conditions who own pets have been shown to live longer lives also. Another good example is the one where its been shown moods can be drastically affected by having or not having pets. People were reported to be generally happier overall, have more trust, and obviously be less lonely than those who don’t have pets. They were also shown to not visit the doctor as much as non pet people, and went for much more minor problems than your average person.  As pet researcher Allen r. McConnell, PhD. of Miami University stated, “[The pet owner] feels like you have greater control of your life when you have pets’.

A chubby cat ready to snuggle you to bed!

Moving away from the benefits of ones self by having a pet, the benefits for children in families that own pets are also positive and high. Studies conducted have shown that babies who are in pet owing households tend to not have allergies or asthma. One study found that babies with cats and/or dogs in the home tend to have fewer colds and ear infections than children with no animals in their immediate lives.

The next time the question comes up of whether or not to get a family companion, someone else that can be there for the family, for you the petowner, the kids, whoever it may be for, take a deeper thought into it. The benefits of having that adorable puppy or that snuggly cat clearly outweight the consequences, regardless of what they may be.

Going Nuts for Oral Immunotherapy

               Americans eat an estimated total of seven hundred million pounds of peanut butter every year.  However, about three million Americans are unable to consume peanut butter or any products containing peanuts due to peanut allergies.  Even though it seems impossible for these people to ever have peanut products, new research is experimenting with oral immunotherapy.  Said oral immunotherapy would slowly and increase these people’s tolerance to peanuts in a safe way.

               A trial to test the oral immunotherapy with peanut allergies was tested on ninety-nine children between the ages of seven and sixteen.  This trial took place for six months and had a placebo control.  The researchers first tested to see the patient’s threshold for the allergy.  The patients were then given a small dose, obviously lower than what their allergy reacts to and did this every day.  After two weeks of continuing this, they would increase the amount.  This trend would continue up until being increased nine times.  After twenty-six weeks, eighty-four percent of the patients were able to consume five peanuts a day while sixty-two percent could tolerate up to ten peanuts a day.

               Although results seem promising and beneficial in the patients’ allergies, the oral immunotherapy concept has yet to be approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.  Even though the thought of people being able to “grow out” of their peanut allergy, it is also a scary idea as well.  The doctors have urged parents not to do this at home but of course, I am sure there will be many cases of parents and children trying to do the oral immunotherapy at home and on their own without doctor’s orders or supervision.  The oral immunotherapy would be beneficial because the amount of peanuts consumed would be less than the needed to agitate the symptoms in the patient, therefore causing no harm.  However, if parents do this at home, they will not know the necessary limit for their child and have a high chance of accidently going over their child’s limit.

               Also, although this is under the supervision of doctors, the oral immunotherapy may not always work for all patients.  Some of the patients may still have side effects or reactions as they increase their daily peanut dosage, resulting in not fun side effects.  Also, in order to have a set amount for daily intake, the doctors must test the patients to see their threshold which in result would give them the stomach troubles, rashes, breathing irritations, etc. that they avoid by not eating peanuts.  It’s a hard concept to grasp: whether to possibly put your child in harms’ way in order to make their life a little easier in the long run or go along with the allergy and the pains of not being able to eat certain foods.

"Peanut Facts - Texas Peanut Producers Board." Texas Peanut Producers Board. Texas Peanut Producers, 2016. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

Sicherer, S. H. "Result Filters." National Center for Biotechnology Information. U.S. National Library of Medicine, Apr. 1999. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

Kwan, Nicole. "Oral Immunotherapy for Peanut Allergies Shows Promise, Study Finds | Fox News." Fox News. FOX News Network, 30 Jan. 2014. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

The Terminator of Prosthetics

If you are an avid Grey’s Anatomy fan (like myself), you probably know about the whole collaboration between Dr. Derek Shepherd and Dr. Callie Torres to create brain sensors that can functionally move a motorized prosthetic. The Shepherd-Torres sensors have come alive. Physicians and biomedical engineers from the John Hopkins University have reported what seems like a successful attempt to wiggle fingers using these sensors in an epilepsy patient. These brain sensors required little training on the patient’s part; the patient thought about moving his finger, the corresponding finger on the prosthetic moved as well.

“The patient’s neurosurgeon placed an array of 128 electrode sensors, all on a single rectangular sheet of film the size of a credit card, on the part of the brain that controls hand and arm movement.”

 

Illustration of the electrode array on the patient’s brain. Credit: Guy Hotson 

To get to this stage of prosthetic finger movement, a lot of preliminary analysis needed to be done. After the sensors were placed on the patient’s brain, scientists recorded and mapped what parts of the brain “lit up” with each movement, according to the sensor, then used this motor and sensory data to program the prosthetic arm. When the patient thought about moving his fingers, the electrical activity in the brain caused the fingers on the prosthetic to move, turning the electrode sensors into the ultimate mind-reading machines. This technology can eventually help people who have lost an arm or leg due to injury disease to have some increased mobility.

Even though the researchers at John Hopkins have made a huge advancement towards creating a mobilized prosthetic, they are still a long way from creating a device for clinical use. The sensors and prosthetic duo was used on a patient that is not missing any limbs, so the outcome of the same experiment may differ with an amputee. Hopefully, in a few years, researchers will have tested whether the sensors work efficiently with amputees and have developed a useable variation of the prosthetic. I am completely fascinated by this development in prosthetics, not only because a variation of this project was in one of my favorite shows, but also because there are many people in the world today that would be overcome with joy if the sensor-prosthetic duo becomes real. There are over 100,000 people in the United States alone with amputated hand or arms. Imagine how tremendous of an impact these sensors can cause in the lives of many who thought that nothing was to come after losing arm or hand.

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“We're just starting to learn the extent of the brain's connections. How far they reach, how deep they go. But we know that every connection matters. Every connection is crucial and when one is broken, it usually means some damage has been done. This system of connections compels us to act and choose and behave."  – Dr. Derek Shepherd, Grey's Anatomy

Sources:

Geggel, Laura. "Whoa! Mind-Controlled Arm Lets Man Move Prosthetic Fingers." LiveScience.

         TechMedia Network, 16 Feb. 2016. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

"Mind Controlled Prosthetic Arm Moves Individual Fingers." Neuroscience News. 16 Feb. 2016. 

          Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

Zika: A Silent Killer

            The hottest topic in the news right now is the Zika virus and its effects on pregnant women.  When a non-pregnant person is diagnosed with this virus it is called the “Zika fever” and can be treated through rest, but when a pregnant women gets the virus their unborn child can suffer brain damage and even death.  It’s very difficult to diagnose someone with Zika fever, however, because the illness only shows up in 20% of people (Zika Fever).

            The symptoms of the disease include rashes coupled with join pain, conjunctivitis, and aches throughout muscles and the head (Symptoms).  In a non-pregnant person the symptoms could show up within a week of exposure.  After symptoms have occurred the virus will stay in the blood for up to a week and then the person would be cured of the virus (Symptoms).  There have been very few, if any, deaths from this virus in non-pregnant people.

            When a pregnant woman contracts the virus the virus in the mother’s bloodstream reaches the baby through the umbilical cord and transfers the disease.  Because of the lack of an immune system the baby is unable to fight off the virus and can suffer brain damage and if the consequences are severe enough, death.  The main disease found in babies that have been born to mothers with Zika is congenital microcephaly (Zika Virus Infection).  This condition prevents the heads and the brains of the infants from growing to their normal size for their age and gender.  This poses serious health concerns for the baby including impaired mental development, motor skills, and communication difficulties.  In some cases babies have not made it to full term because the stress put on the brain while in utero is causes too much intracranial pressure resulting in brain damage and death.

            Upon further research it has also been found that if a man is infected with Zika the virus can stay in his semen longer than a week meaning that even if the mother does not have the virus after conception the baby still has a chance of developing the virus from its father (Zika Virus Infection).  Unfortunately, there is currently no way to vaccinate people for this virus which means that pregnant women will continue to be at risk for contracting the virus and transmitting it to their babies just as much as men are at risk for passing along the virus through conception.

"Symptoms, Diagnosis, & Treatment." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 03 Feb. 2016. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.

http://www.cdc.gov/zika/symptoms/index.html

“Zika Virus.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 16 Feb. 2016. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zika_virus

“Zika Virus Infection and Pregnancy." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 12 Feb. 2016. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.

http://www.cdc.gov/zika/pregnancy/question-answers.html

Anti-Flossers Unite

Just admit it. Whenever you go to the dentist, you always claim to floss at least once a day, but the reality is you seldom ever take the miniscule time out of your day to stick the annoying nylon string in between your teeth to watch your gums bleed. I know it, you know it, and the dentist who cleans your teeth and notices the buildup of plaque in between your pearly whites knows it: we all hate flossing.

Trying to use the mirror and figure out what angle to put our hands at in ordered to reach every nook and cranny with the floss seems to be too time consuming and arduous. Most of the time, it just does not seem worth enduring the pain and struggle. We would rather not floss and face the consequences of cavities, gum disease, and maybe even tooth loss. But do not worry. There is hope. A new study has brought us one step closer to human tooth regeneration, by shedding light on how sharks regrow their fleshing ripping incisors.

Sharks can have up to 3,000 teeth at one time, compared to the average human’s 32 (Whiteman 1). Scientists have long known that sharks have the unusual but advantageous ability to regrow their teeth indefinitely, although the genetics behind the underlying process have been uncertain. Recently, Dr. Gareth Fraser has identified a network of genes that are responsible for tooth development and lifelong tooth regeneration in sharks (Whiteman 1). Humans possess the same genes, and further study could help new treatments for tooth loss, maybe even the ability to fully regrow a tooth.

A team of scientists led by Dr. Fraser identified patterns from several genes of catsharks that led to the formation of dental lamina, which is found to drive tooth development and regeneration in the sharks (Whiteman 2). Luckily to our anti-flossing selves, humans also possess the same genes that spur the formation of dental lamina. The findings of these genes in sharks indicate that it could be possible to trigger tooth regeneration in humans.

Although these discoveries seem hopeful, I feel as though they may not be attainable. Making human tooth regeneration would involving editing the genome, which we have come close to, but have not fully been successful. If tooth regeneration does become possible, it more than likely will not be during a time when it could be helpful for us personally. It is time for us to conjure up the courage and start flossing.

 

Reference:

Whiteman, Honor. Medical News Today. MediLexicon International, 15 Feb. 2016. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.

 

Risk, Research, and Reward

          James Shreeve’s The Genome War examines the strained relationships between private and publicly funded scientific research and opposing ideologies involved in the race between Celera Genomics  and the Human Genome Project to be the first to map the human genome.  The Human Genome Project’s goal was to provide unrestricted public access to all 3 billion base pairs of the human genome with 99.99% accuracy. Their intent was to advance scientific knowledge and initiate further research and discovery.  Celera Genomics, in contrast, wished to patent specific sections of the genome deemed medically important and profitable to investors in order to fund their research.  By patenting a specific gene, Celera would restrict access to those parts of the human genome.  It is this fundamental concept of intellectual rights and the patenting of genes which have been “purified out of their natural state and shown the hand of man”, that resulted in the feverish rivalry between Celera and the Human Genome Project (Shreeve 106).

            This debate continues today over the ability of companies to patent genes.  Those who oppose the “patentability” of genes argue  it can make treatments based on the gene unaffordable to patients. They point out a  company’s ability to set a price for treatment without any competition.  However, companies like Celera counter, arguing profit is a necessity for the survival of the company and continued research.  They were “damned if they were going to pay ten million a year to someone and not get to file a patent” (Shreeve 105).  Companies like Celera must be able to recoup the tremendous expense involved in repeated research and testing to prove their treatments safe.  Profit provides the incentive needed for investors to commit millions of dollars and for researchers to devote years of study to the subject.

 It is the profit incentive which is the driving force behind competition and innovation.  Without possibility of financial gain, Celera, a company based entirely on the highly debated genome shotgun method, would not have been created.  Without Celera and the intense competition it produced in the field of genomic research, the Human Genome Project would not have had the need or incentive to generate new, faster, and more accurate methods to sequence DNA.   Without competition for the sake of the possibility of financial reward, exploration of the new field of genomic manipulation would have advanced at a much slower pace without  the exploration of unique and innovative  techniques including the whole genome shotgun method of sequencing.   The purpose of a patent is “to push originality out into the open where it can be used to produce more originality” (Shreeve 225).  The granting of a patent for a specific gene proved medically relevant and to which treatments can be applied, would incentive the use, innovation, and exploitation of the full potential of such technology. 
Certainly, a person cannot lay claim to a gene by simply naming it or describing it.  It is the productive use of the gene for the betterment of society for which a company should be rewarded with a patent to recoup its expense. 

Sources:

1. Shreeve, James. The Genome War: How Craig Venter Tried to Capture the Code of Life and save             the World. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004. Print.

The Desegregation of Science and Business

When most people think of the greatest names in the history and development of genetic research, their minds immediately jump to the likes of Gregor Mendel, Charles Darwin, and Watson and Crick.  One would think that playing a major role in such a significant event as sequencing the human genome would also guarantee that your name be placed among such illustrious figures.  In Craig Venter’s case, however, he may be remembered as an enemy of progress instead of one of its proponent. A quick google search of his name yields about 662,000 results, while his counterpart from the government funded Human Genome Project, Francis Collins, has about 80,700,000 results for his name in the search engine.  The official NIH site chronicling the efforts of the HGP makes little to no mention of Venter or Celera in its official timeline of events or general fact sheet.  From the very beginning of The Genome War, it is made quite clear to the reader that Venter was a sort of pariah in the scientific community, mainly due to his talent for coupling his research with extensive commercial success.

 My initial reaction to this general opinion of Venter was one of mild confusion.  Sure, I can understand the general concerns. Corporations, with their bottom lines and profit margins circling like sharks, could prove detrimental if involved in research, as results that could have lead to even more scientific discoveries could instead be hoarded and only relinquished to those with deep enough pockets.  While this is a legitimate worry, it fails to completely explain the extent to which Venter was maligned by his peers. He seems to share their zeal for uncovering the wonders of the human genome, yet this seems to hurt their opinions of him even more than if he had just been in it purely for the money.  In my opinion, the real source of their vitriol stems from a fear of lessening the exalted status that science has occupied for most of recent history.

If you ask the average scientist what drove them to put forth the sizable amounts of time, energy and possibly money required for them to pursue their chosen area of study, the answer you will receive in all likelihood will be somewhere along the lines of a passion for knowledge, the scientific process, and innovation. To be a scientist is to seek no other gain besides recognition for your work and the admiration of your peers. It would be incredibly unorthodox for a researcher to let the purity of scientific enquiry be tainted by something as base as monetary gain. James Watson, for example, believed that turning a profit was something any lesser man could accomplish, but only the greatest among us could fathom the depths of molecular biology (Shreeve 146).  The reading even references Francis Collin’s belief that he “had been given the gift of unusual intelligence in order to understand the basis of life, which was understanding God” (Shreeve 214).  For Venter to come and invade an arena of such transcendent ideals with his “vision of an enterprise that would break down the wall between business and academic science and rebuild it into a platform” challenged that exclusivity that was so carefully guarded by the scientific community (Shreeve 305). It had the potential to open up the gated community of research and science to those who had not run the gauntlet that traditionally led to a scientific career.  Venter represented the making of something that seemed celestial and infinite into something mundane and finite. 

But is that a bad thing? For many, getting involved in scientific research may seem like an incredibly draining experience, little reward for only the possibility of future success.  If Venter’s model of science as a business became commonplace, then those who aspired to join the scientific community but were previously intimidated by the often extensive costs of such an endeavor could be encouraged with the thought that, with enough ingenuity, they could possibly make a living off of their work, instead of being at the beck and call of research grants.  Awards and accolades are lovely and their receivers desire the recognition given to them, but they do not pay the bills.  Venter’s model is a much more practical approach to research that, while requiring a bit more oversight to prevent the misuse or misappropriation of data, could broad our scientific horizons exponentially more while also creating new economic sectors.

  

Sources

1.Shreeve, James. The Genome War: How Craig Venter Tried to Capture the Code of Life and Save the World. New York: Baltimore, 2005. Print.

2. "All About The Human Genome Project (HGP)." National Human Genome Research Institute. NIH, n.d. Web. 04 Feb. 2016.