New Rearch for Breast Cancer Promising

Kudos to McGill University!!!!! Advancement is what is needed for a better quality of life.



In many cases, cancer cancer can only be detected in the advanced stages and mammography is costly, subjects patient to radiation, and remains the subject of scrutiny as it's purpose is often questioned. No cure for cancer exists today, and early detection seems to have no bearing on the final outcome--as there is no cure.

However, a research team at McGill University has developed new technology that can accurately measure protein biomarkers. Scientists have worked feverishly for years trying to develop a blood test for cancer based on the presence of Carcinoembryonic Antigen, a protein biomarker for cancer identified 40 years ago. The problem is this biomarker is found in healthy individuals as well as those with cancer.

Recently a biomedical engineering group from McGill's Goodman Cancer Research Centre measured the profile of 32 proteins in the blood of 11 healthy controls and 17 individuals that had a particular subset of cancer with astonishing results.

Researchers found that a subset of six of the 32 proteins could be used to establish a fingerprint for this cancer and classify each of these patients and healthy controls as having or not having breast cancer.The end result is to develop a simple test to be given in a doctor's office with a droplet of blood.

This is positive research for many women as 1 in 8 will be diagnosed with cancer. What makes a female and male anatomically different defines what and who we are. Breast cancer is often very difficult to accept or overcome.  Kudos to McGill University for working diligently towards a better quality of life for women. Cancer is a dirty word and we are no closer now than 100 years ago to a solution. This kind of research is the kind we need! When people hear about the positive results of this type of research, comfort is found.



Turning Biology into an Engineering Discipline

Imagine a Tree that grows in the shape of a Chair

What will be the role of our future and Biology?

Five Questions: Turning Microbes Into Micro Refineries

According to the above online article synthetic biologist Reshma Shetty predicts that we will eventually engineer organisms to grow everything that we manufacture today. This may be a huge jump, but as we move forward we all realize that life must change if we are to continue to coexist on this planet or any other planet for that matter.

If you google the company website run by Reshma Shetty and her agents this is the initial caption: 

The organism is the product.

Ginkgo BioWorks sells engineered organisms that make the world better. Ginkgo BioWorks was founded in 2008 by five MIT PhDs. The mission is to make biology easy to engineer. Only when biological engineering is fast and predictable will we fulfill the potential of biological technologies to revolutionize the provision of food, medicine, energy, and materials.

You treat biology like an engineer’s tool kit. how does that work? There’s all this genome sequencing data from different organisms all over the world. Think of that as a parts list. These organisms each have cool things that they do. If I want to build a system for biofuel, I can pull out enzymes that produce the fuel and put the parts together in different ways until I get yields high enough to compete with oil.

My suggestion concerning this odd article is to go to their website and read the information they provide:http://ginkgobioworks.com/tech.html

The introduction of modified organisms is a realitively new field and merits serious concerns. Do not be fooled into thinkg all is well. Ethical guidlines must be put into place in order to insure public safety. Some of the new organisms they claim to be perfecting are:

Electrofuels
Ginkgo BioWorks is engineering an organism for the energy industry in partnership with the DOE that converts electricity and CO2 to liquid transportation fuels.

Sulferisms
Petroleum refining generates 163 million tons of Hydrogen Sulfide annually. Ginkgo BioWorks is engineering an organism in partnership with the DOE to capture the energy in this waste product and convert it to usable fuels and valuable organic compounds.

Six Month Turnaround 
Ginkgo engineers deliver scale-up-ready organisms in six months for the production of renewable fine and specialty chemicals. Our customers include sugar refiners, flavor and fragrance companies, and other producers of fine chemicals.

All this information sounds impressive, but how will it protect the general public, how will it help the general public. These are the questions I have on the subject. It appears the interest of the company is to solely generate large sums of money. What a shallow existence to simply seek large sums of money. No good thing has ever come from the company that seeks only money. Along with the increase in technology many are forgetful of the increase in humaninology---a term I just coined. It means people must realize that people are not animals. We can no longer shove problems under the rug. The attitude of "get while the getting is good" only produces an atmosphere conducive to defeat and a future that is void of expression, love, and all the ingredients that make this world unique.

Do we live in a world that no longer cherishes humanity? Will we progress to a station in which people are of zero importance? To strive for money is hollow. In a parting comment Reshma says, "We want to democratize access so anyone can engineer biology."

Is this their idea of a joke? Do they feel as if they as the sole controlers of this industry? I think not and that God my life isn't so empty.  

The Cost of Experimentation

 Styling Spring Dandelions Discovered Wearing Mesh Metal Hats?

What Does the Word Nano Really Mean? And What is Nanomesh?

      The first step to understanding dandelions wearing mesh hats is to define the word nano. According to the essay by Sacha Loeve titled "About a Definition of Nano: How to Articulate Nano and Technology" nano holds several meanings, but in each and every case the word 'nano' is associated with something very, very, very, small. Such is the case with the new metal mesh designed by researchers at the University of California, Irvine, HRL laboratories and the California Institute of Technology, which can rest on the bloom of a dandelion without damaging it.

Typical of a scientist trying to explain the nano mesh is found in this diagram below. The long and the short of the explanation is as follows according to the online article I found in Daily Tech: "To build the incredible nanomesh, the researchers first made a polymer mesh using a self-propagating photopolymer waveguide technique.  Thiol-ene was the selected class of photopolymers (thiol-enes are four-branched hyrocarbon molecules with a central junction of silicon and a sulfur connector midway on each branch).

An electroless nickel plating technique was then applied.  When you want to coat a solid object in metal, one common way is to use electricity to force metal atoms to stick to the surface.  Another method relies on a chemical reaction to plate.  In this case the reaction is between hydrated phosphates and nickel, which is auto-catalyzing.

The end result is a 100 nm thick layer of NiP, that's 7% phosphorous and 93% nickel by weight.  The layer is solid, and is a (supersaturated) solution of phosphorous.

The photo plastic is then eaten away using etching techniques.  What is left behind is essential tubes made out of smaller tube "beams".  This tubes out of tubes approach yields a substance that's surprisingly strong, but is also 99.99 percent air."



I consider all the possibilities for the use of this new nanomesh, but currently the cost is very expensive and not available for commercial use. So what is it good you may ask? I think we can not afford not to experiment and must press forward in the world of science. Imagine using this mesh for a webbing to keep birds from flying into the turbines of jets. Imagine wearing clothes made from mesh that never had to be washed in the conventional method---using millions of gallons of water---but instead simple shaking off the residue. As we forge into the future with nanotechnology which is applied to biology and all the sciences, we must keep in mind that in order to find answers we must try new things---some of the new ideas will be functional and some will not. 

Scientists Make a Huge Mistake

Will it cost you your own Life? 

Each day we unknowingly place the safety of lives in the hands of doctors, scientists, and alleged professionals. Should we or should we not?

     

     Scientists, doctors, judges and lawyers are essentially no different than the average human being in that they can make mistakes. Consider this example as evidence to support this claim. This is a Leopard frog or so most scientists thought for the last century or so, but infact recent DNA testing proved to have incredible results. According to the story in a recent on-line article from Rutgers University "Lead author and evolutionary biologist Cathy Newman was completing her master’s at The University of Alabama while working with Leslie Rissler, associate professor of biological sciences at Alabama, on an unrelated study of the southern leopard frog species when Newman first contacted doctoral candidate and co-author Jeremy Feinberg at Rutgers in New Jersey. Newman asked for help on her project, and in return, Feinberg, an ecologist, asked the geneticists if they could help him investigate some "unusual frogs" whose weird-sounding calls were different from other leopard frogs."

      The unusual croak of the frog alerted the Feinberg to test the frog, but how long would this mistaken identity have gone on and are their other circumstances?

 

Stumbling Over Data: Mistakes Fuel Climate-Warming Skeptics is the title of an online article listing several recent mistakes made by supposed experts and suggests that mistakes can be made so everyone should fact check information. Granted these mistakes are not life threatening, but what if they were?

     The point of this blog is to simply suggest that even experts can make mistakes so do not be surprised when it happens and always take the time to find out for yourself before it is too late

What is the truth with Algae Fuel. Is it possible?
This blog settles the current idea or notions the common Joe may have about the possible use of algae as a form of gasoline.
Research for this blog was taken from different sources to be listed at the end of the blog.


The short answer is no! Algae will not be turned into buy-able gasoline anytime in the near future. The main reason fuel will not come from algae is because it would cost a great deal per gallon and it would take a great deal of energy to produce the fuel which makes it of no value at this point.

What circumstances have given rise to even consider algae as a fuel source?

High oil prices and the idea of competing for oil on the global market make it necessary to consider other options for fuel. According to Wikipedia "High oil prices, competing demands between foods and other biofuel sources, and the world food crisis, have ignited interest in algaculture (farming algae) for making vegetable oil, biodiesel, bioethanol, biogasoline, biomethanol, biobutanol and other biofuels, using land that is not suitable for agriculture. Among algal fuels' attractive characteristics: they do not affect fresh water resources, can be produced using ocean and wastewater, and are biodegradable and relatively harmless to the environment if spilled. Algae cost more per unit mass (as of 2010, food grade algae costs ~$5000/tonne), due to high capital and operating costs, yet are claimed to yield between 10 and 100 times more energy per unit area than other second-generation biofuel crops. One biofuels company has claimed that algae can produce more oil in an area the size of a two car garage than a football field of soybeans, because almost the entire algal organism can use sunlight to produce lipids, or oil. The United States Department of Energy estimates that if algae fuel replaced all the petroleum fuel in the United States, it would require 15,000 square miles (39,000 km²) which is only 0.42% of the U.S. map or about half of the land area of Maine. This is less than ¹⁄₇ the area of corn harvested in the United States in 2000. However, these claims remain unrealized, commercially. According to the head of the Algal Biomass Organization algae fuel can reach price parity with oil in 2018 if granted production tax credits.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algae_fuel)

What other credible opinions exist regarding fundamental questions about algae as a fuel source?


According to this article in National Geographic: Facts on Algae Biofuel by Lexa W. Lee (http://greenliving.nationalgeographic.com/algae-biofuel-2814.html)
"Algae consume large amounts of carbon dioxide, a major greenhouse gas and contributor to global warming. When harvested and dried, algae can also be burned directly like wood, coal or peat to generate heat and energy. However, critics of genetic engineering warn of harmful effects should modified algae escape from confinement into the natural environment, where they could potentially compete against wild species. Proponents, however, argue that such a crisis would be unlikely, since the modified algae must be cultivated under carefully controlled conditions and would likely not survive outside.

Are there current companies that specialize if fact finding experiments on Algae?

Yes. The most well known company in the US is called Sapphire Energy in California. Operating form a government grant for research and donations from the likes of Bill Gates the company boasts operating funds exceeding 100 million.---which will be used to complete a 300 acre demonstration pond in New Mexico.

The message I am getting from reading tons of information is simply: Genetically modified algae can be dangerous if not contained properly. Characteristics of algae, such as its ability to consume carbon dioxide make it perfect for our needs. However, currently it is in no way possible or ready for the gas tank. I suggest keeping an eye on Sapphire and other companies testing algae. Certainly our country must have a different source of fuel than fossil fuels. No longer can we expect to have low gasoline prices. Our country has no mass public transit system therefore we are in a tough situation at best.
 

A Varanus bitatawa lizard ? Wow!

According to the catch line of the National Geographic article: "It has a double penis, is as long as a tall human, and lives in a heavily populated area of the Philippines. Yet somehow the giant lizard Varanus bitatawa has gone undetected by science until now."

My question is how could such a giant, cool lizard exist without scientist knowing they were alive? Well, they lived in trees  According to study team member and biologist Daniel Bennett of Mampam Conservatio "They spend all their time high up in trees, more than 20 meters [66 feet] above the ground." 
Long known to Filipino tribal hunters, the monitor lizard was identified as a new species in 2009 via its DNA, scale pattern, size, and peculiar penis, a new study says.
So all the locals knew about this cool lizard, but we did not?  It seems it is related to the Komodo Dragon; the one we've all viewed before and thought Wow what a big lizard.

So they are both huge lizards, so what  else is similar or different?
"Capturing both types of lizards was crucial, Bennett said, because it allowed the team to inspect the two monitor lizards side-by-side and detect subtle differences that can help determine whether the animals represent different species.
One particularly revealing trait was the double-ended penis common to monitor lizards. The shape of this reptilian feature is unique to each species."
 According to Benett the reason for not finding them sooner is"few reptile surveys of the mountain forests where V. bitatawa lives" have been taken. So in other words no scientist have had reason to study in this area of the rain forest do far.
What good consequences are the result of this finding? I think the best result is the simple knowledge that new species exist on this planet. Mush study remains available on this planet especially in the oceans that exist. This discovery opens up still remaining prospects of new adventure. And according to this text:     

"The process of science is a way of building knowledge about the universe" to "constructing new ideas that illuminate the world around us." New scientific knowledge may lead to new applications. For example, the discovery of the structure of DNA was a fundamental breakthrough in biology. It formed the underpinnings of research that would ultimately lead to a wide variety of practical applications, including DNA fingerprinting, genetically engineered crops, and tests for genetic diseases. Potential applications may motivate scientific investigations. For example, the possibility of genetically engineering bacteria to cheaply produce cutting-edge malaria drugs has motivated one researcher to continue his studies of synthetic biology.  New technological advances may lead to new scientific discoveries. For example, developing DNA copying and sequencing technologies has led to important breakthroughs in many areas of biology, especially in the reconstruction of the evolutionary relationships among organisms.

An Introduction to blogging!

"Some things I have to say aren't getting said
in this snowy, blonde, blue-eyed, gum chewing English"~Julia Alvarez 

For some time now I have been posting scientific items, as news worthy items, for a Biology in the News class presented by the distinguished Dr.R. Hardwick of Clemson University. Thus far, Dr. Hardwick and interested parties, I have failed to find a persona. Let me explain; I have now had adequate time to consider how best for me to present information and to whom that might be the audience.
Rather than trying to form myself into the rules of others; I have decided to make the rules myself. A) blogs must have credibility B) Blogs must contain information of interest C) Blogs must be concise and well written---keeping these ideas in mind I have now decided to aim my attention toward an audience that wants to know science stuff that is good stuff and includes progress that makes all of us whole and happy well informed people, and focus totally on credibility of the source and evidential support.
In short, why should I waste my time reading a blog? Certainly it must be because we find something in common with the writer of the blog or the persona of the writer, or the opinion of the blogger. His/her style or slant or down home folksy charm or something about the blogger we enjoy otherwise information generic.