MALE PATTERN BALDNESS!!!

Androgenic alopecia may have evolved to protect men from prostate cancer by increasing skin exposure to ultraviolet radiation.

Kabai P.

Abstract

Androgenic alopecia affects populations adapted to colder climate, and individuals at an age and hormonal status susceptible to prostate cancer. Male pattern baldness enhances absorption of UV radiation on the top of the head, an area directly exposed to sunlight during everyday activities. Ultraviolet radiation is reported to reduce the risk of advanced prostate cancer. Here I propose that progression of androgenic alopecia rather than being a risk factor is a finely tuned mechanism evolved to protect against prostate cancer.

Med Hypotheses. 2008;70(5):1038-40. Epub 2007 Oct 1.

Why is this cool?

 I am bald. Seriously bald. My head shines in the sun and blinds bikers as they speed by. I have cried myself to sleep many times and it took many years and dating services before I found a woman short enough not to notice my hair loss. Often, I find myself staring into stars, clouds, and assorted celestial bodies cursing and spiting them for letting this happen. Today's paper suggests that I should have been staring my prostate and cursing it for sucking.

 You may not know this, but in science there are normal papers which give data and explanations of that data, but there are also hypothesis papers or theoretical papers that propose an explanation that needs data. Today's paper is one of the latter. It takes two facts in science and says "hey, what if they are connected?" The author thinks that going bald at some late stage in life may be an evolved response to prevent prostate cancer. This is because there was some paper published that showed UV radiation decreases the risks of prostate cancer. I haven't read that paper either.

 I have my own idea about the reason behind androgenic alopecia (male pattern baldness). So, it is obvious that baldness is a genetically coded attribute and genes occur in genomes which are under Darwinian selection. Most people go bald in their thirties and late twenties, but I remember hearing somewhere that the life expectancy of a human way back was very low, like late twenties being the norm. Ok, I think that baldness is a byproduct of some other genetic change that manifests earlier in life. What is that earlier manifestation? I don't know. What do you think?

Octopus personality!!

Video playback demonstrates episodic personality in the gloomy octopus.

 Pronk R, Wilson DR, Harcourt R.
  Coleoid cephalopods, including octopuses, cuttlefish and squid, rely mainly on visual signals when interacting with conspecifics, predators and prey. Presenting visual stimuli, such as models, photographs, mirrors and live conspecifics, can thus provide insight into cephalopod behaviour. These methods, however, have limitations - mirrors and live animals lack experimental control, whereas models and photographs sacrifice motion-based information. Video playback addresses these issues by presenting controlled, moving and realistic stimuli but, to date, video playback has not been used successfully with any cephalopod. Here, we developed a video playback technique for the gloomy octopus (Octopus tetricus) that incorporated recent advances in video technology. We then used this technique to test for personality, which we defined as behavioural differences between individuals that are consistent over time and across ecologically important contexts. We captured wild octopuses and tested them on 3 separate days over a 10 day period. On each test day, subjects were presented with videos of a food item, a novel object and a conspecific. These represented a foraging, novel and threatening context, respectively. A fourth video without a moving stimulus controlled for the playback monitor itself and potential artifacts associated with video playback. Experimental stimuli evoked unambiguous and biologically appropriate responses from the subjects. Furthermore, individuals' responses to the three experimental contexts were highly correlated within a given test day. However, within a given context, individuals behaved inconsistently across the 3 test days. The reordering of ranks suggests that rather than fulfilling the criteria for personality, gloomy octopus show temporal discontinuities, and hence display episodic personality.

J Exp Biol. 2010 Apr;213(Pt 7):1035-41.

Why is this cool?

 Ever since I saw THE FUTURE IS WILD, I have been obsessed with helping our future overlords get a leg up on up humans. I sometimes pour known mutagens into the ocean or I leave tools on the beach. Sadly, my efforts have gone unnoticed and I feel like Appollyon.

I need to re-read this, because I didn't even notice that this is might be  FANTOMEX!!!

 From the abstract, they tell us that they tested 3 octopi (is that the correct plural form?) for behavioral responses that would suggest personality. Personality being "behavioural differences between individuals that are consistent over time and across ecologically important contexts." What they found was that the octopi had episodic behavior. I took a quick look at the paper and episodic personality is when the octopus does not display consistent behavior to the supplied response. I really want to read the paper, but on first pass I see a lot.
 They showed the octopus a TV with some stuff and over three days time the response from each octopus differed. They called this episodic behavior, but maybe the octopus just figured out that the stimulus was simulated. Maybe, more amazingly, the octopus has a truly different personality structure!! Humans have distinct individual personalities and those personalities persist through the different experiences. What if the octopus personality is one where they are constantly in flux and can never be consistent? Imagine a personality that is genetically programmed to explore personality space all the time!! EPIC CRAZINESS!!

 Human exploration of personality space is best seen through the filmography of NICOLAS CAGE!! Seriously, can he more fully capture the human condition? His emotions and actions are writ large across my genome! I think the last movie he makes will be a year long and will be him staring into a camera as he dies in front of us! 

ONE BILLION SERVED!!!!

Contributions of conventional plant breeding to food production.

Borlaug NE.

Abstract

Within a relatively short geological time frame, Neolithic man, or more probably woman, domesticated all the major cereal grains, legumes, and root crops that the world's people depend on for most of their calories and protein. Until very recently, crop improvement was in the hands of farmers. The cornerstones of modern plant breeding were laid by Darwin and Mendel in the late 19th century. As the knowledge of genetics, plant pathology, and entomology have grown during the 20th century, plant breeders have made enormous contributions to increased food production throughout the world. There have been major plant breeding break-throughs for maize and wheat, and promising research activities to raise yields in marginal production environments are ongoing. Since it is doubtful that significant production benefits will soon be forthcoming from the use of genetic engineering techniques with higher plants, especially polyploid species, most research funds for crop improvement should continue to be allocated for conventional plant breeding research.

Science. 1983 Feb 11;219(4585):689-93.

Why is this AMAZING??!

 Let me paint you a picture, billions starving around the world. Dust and tumbleweeds everywhere. Then a lone gunman pushes the saloon doors apart and casts his gaze on everything before him. He walks to the bar and orders a triple jack and pounds it down. He turns around and again surveys the saloon. He sees many a hollowed, hungry face. His large, vein covered hands have callouses on them right where you expect to see callouses on a gunfighter. One of those hands reaches underneath the poncho that the stranger wears and when it comes out it is now a fist. That hulking fist is watched with desperation and anticipation, by all before him. When the hand finally opens, there is a collective sigh to find that it is not more danger than implied by the stranger's presence. In fact, it is something innocuous. Seemingly innocuous. There in a pile is grain. Glorious food! The stranger throws more here and there and he speaks. Finally, those parched lips speak. People halfway across the room can smell the jack on his breath. He raises a fist and yells:

"I bring REVOLUTION!"

 Ok, so that is not the exact story of how Norman Borlaug changed the world, but I think it speaks to the truly epic contribution that he made to our society. He did not publish many scientific articles that I could find (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/), but he worked to feed the world. Eventually, he did. His research feeds Pakistan, India, and China. People say he has saved one billion lives! That is probably not counting the number of people alive because those previous people lived!

REVIEW: Untreated Syphilis in the Male Negro

 Today's review is on the TUSKEGEE EXPERIMENT, specifically the first paper published and the paper published in 1964, which I think is the last one. So, let's start with some history.

 Africans were sold to the colonies as slaves and became the backbone of labor in much of the country especially the South.

After many years, the slaves were no longer Africans, but were now known as the blacks (I don't know when African-American came into vogue, but it would be interesting to know) or more derogatory names. The Civil War freed the slaves and later legislation made them equals in the eyes of the law. Well, when the slaves were freed, they were still poor and had no choice, but to stay in the areas they were formerly enslaved. Since poverty is not something easily escaped, even in the land of Horatio Alger, the children and children's children of former slaves remained poor. Most poor people don't have access to the best or even adequate medical treatments, so they go their lives with debilitating diseases, one of which was syphilis. Some surveys of rural communities in Alabama found that blacks had high levels of untreated syphilis.

 Here is where the researchers come in, in their own words they wanted to "study the untreated syphilitic patient from the beginning of the disease to the death of the infected person." Their study started by doing the following serological tests on 1,782 black men:

Treponema pallidum, bad ass.

Kolmer complete fixation- Serum from possibly syphilitic individuals is mixed with sheep blood cells and extracts or emulsions of Treponema pallidum. If the sheep blood cells lyse, then there must not be antibodies in the possibly syphilitic serum, meaning not syphilis. If there is no lysis, then the person has antibodies against syphilis and has syphilis. I think I got this right, so be aware that this could be incorrect.

Kahn flocculation- Serum from possibly syphilitic individuals was added to extracts of T. pallidum prepared from beef hearts. The extract and the serum are mixed and a precipitate should form is the individual is syphilitic. If no precipitate, then no syphilis. Remember, I could be wrong on this because I am not an expert in this field.

Run DMC never had syphilis.

 Of the 1,782 black dudes tested, 472 gave two positive tests for syphilis and of those, only 399 were used in the study, I will call them the UNTREATED. Of the 1,258 black guys who did not test positive for syphilis, 201 were used as non-syphilitic controls, I will call them the FREE AND CLEAR. The researchers also included a group of 275 black men who had syphilis, but received treatment early on and no longer had the disease, I will call them the TREATED. 

 You may already have a big question on your mind and I think we need to address it now: why did they only use black dudes? Was it racism? A lot of people answer yes, but from the paper alone you could not guess it. I think the researchers took advantage of a situation that emerged from racism, but if they were racist in choosing their subjects is a different matter. Does this research offer any scientific merit? Charles McDonald M.D. says it best "...this study has contributed and can continue to contribute a great deal to our knowledge of syphilology." He also says that this experiment contributed most by forcing us to "...rethink and redefine our present day positions and practices as they relate to human experimentation."

 So, the patients were identified in 1932 and the first paper came out in 1936. By 1964,  the researchers provided strong evidence for some features of the disease that were previously suggested such as cardiovascular problems in UNTREATED. They were also able to show syphilis in the central nervous system in UNTREATED, which was not believed to occur in blacks at that time. Their work showed that any amount of treatment was better than nothing as many UNTREATED received injections of arsenic or mercuric outside of the study. These injections lead to longer life and, in some case, negative results from serological tests. Curiously, nothing is mentioned about the TREATED.

Isaiah Bradley, the black Captain America.

  A similar incident of the government doing experimental testing on black men, occurred in the then controversial Captain America: Red, White, and Black. In it, Isaiah Bradley was tested using a concoction that attempted to reproduce the Super-Soldier Serum that went into Captain America. Later on, his grandson, Elijah, would receive a blood transfusion and become the black super soldier. This comes after being shot while protecting his half Skrull/half Kree friend.

Elijah Bradley, Patriot.

FIRST GENOME SEQUENCED!!!!

Nucleotide sequence of bacteriophage phi X174 DNA. 
Sanger F, Air GM, Barrell BG, Brown NL, Coulson AR, Fiddes CA, Hutchison CA, Slocombe PM, Smith M.

Abstract

A DNA sequence for the genome of bacteriophage phi X174 of approximately 5,375 nucleotides has been determined using the rapid and simple 'plus and minus' method. The sequence identifies many of the features responsible for the production of the proteins of the nine known genes of the organism, including initiation and termination sites for the proteins and RNAs. Two pairs of genes are coded by the same region of DNA using different reading frames.

Nature. 1977 Feb 24;265(5596):687-95.

Why is this cool?

 Remember that revolution that I mentioned? Well, here is one of the big starting points. Fred Sanger and co-workers sequence the very first genome: Bacteriophage phi X174!! Just as a reminder, bacteriophages are viruses that kill bacteria and not so much anything else (I might be wrong about this last part). To put this in perspective, that first genome was published in 1977 years before home computing, AIDS (some debate here), the public use internet, and the Gulf War. To reveal more of the timeline, the first free living organism genome sequenced was 18 years later in 1995!! The size of the bacteriophage phi X174 genome is 5000 base pairs and only codes for 11 genes!! I'm not sure when the function for all those genes was determined, but that might be interesting. 
 Speaking of interesting viruses, one of the crazy ones has to be THE TRANSMODE VIRUS!!

Magus, Warlock's father and an old school Technarch.

The transmode (or techno-organic) virus seems to convert organic matter to techno-organic matter. The Technarchy are carriers of the virus and when organic matter is infected, the Technarchy can steal the life force of the infected. 

Cameron Hodge was a phalanx.

The infected organic matter becomes the phalanx, a hive mind geared towards creating more infection. After a certain amount of time, the phalanx can form a tower to call the Technarchy to have them steal the life force of the infected. The first Technarchy character to appear in a comic was Warlock!! He used to be my favorite character.

Warlock!!

 Cable was infected with a techno-organic virus, but I don't know if it was the Transmode virus.

ESSENTIAL GENES!!!!

Essential Bacillus subtilis genes.

Kobayashi K, Ehrlich SD, Albertini A, Amati G, Andersen KK, Arnaud M, Asai K, Ashikaga S, Aymerich S, Bessieres P, Boland F, Brignell SC, Bron S, Bunai K, Chapuis J, Christiansen LC, Danchin A, Débarbouille M, Dervyn E, Deuerling E, Devine K, Devine SK, Dreesen O, Errington J, Fillinger S, Foster SJ, Fujita Y, Galizzi A, Gardan R, Eschevins C, Fukushima T, Haga K, Harwood CR, Hecker M, Hosoya D, Hullo MF, Kakeshita H, Karamata D, Kasahara Y, Kawamura F, Koga K, Koski P, Kuwana R, Imamura D, Ishimaru M, Ishikawa S, Ishio I, Le Coq D, Masson A, Mauël C, Meima R, Mellado RP, Moir A, Moriya S, Nagakawa E, Nanamiya H, Nakai S, Nygaard P, Ogura M, Ohanan T, O'Reilly M, O'Rourke M, Pragai Z, Pooley HM, Rapoport G, Rawlins JP, Rivas LA, Rivolta C, Sadaie A, Sadaie Y, Sarvas M, Sato T, Saxild HH, Scanlan E, Schumann W, Seegers JF, Sekiguchi J, Sekowska A, Séror SJ, Simon M, Stragier P, Studer R, Takamatsu H, Tanaka T, Takeuchi M, Thomaides HB, Vagner V, van Dijl JM, Watabe K, Wipat A, Yamamoto H, Yamamoto M, Yamamoto Y, Yamane K, Yata K, Yoshida K, Yoshikawa H, Zuber U, Ogasawara N. 

Abstract

To estimate the minimal gene set required to sustain bacterial life in nutritious conditions, we carried out a systematic inactivation of Bacillus subtilis genes. Among approximately 4,100 genes of the organism, only 192 were shown to be indispensable by this or previous work. Another 79 genes were predicted to be essential. The vast majority of essential genes were categorized in relatively few domains of cell metabolism, with about half involved in information processing, one-fifth involved in the synthesis of cell envelope and the determination of cell shape and division, and one-tenth related to cell energetics. Only 4% of essential genes encode unknown functions. Most essential genes are present throughout a wide range of Bacteria, and almost 70% can also be found in Archaea and Eucarya. However, essential genes related to cell envelope, shape, division, and respiration tend to be lost from bacteria with small genomes. Unexpectedly, most genes involved in the Embden-Meyerhof-Parnas pathway are essential. Identification of unknown and unexpected essential genes opens research avenues to better understanding of processes that sustain bacterial life.

Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2003 Apr 15;100(8):4678-83. Epub 2003 Apr 7.

Why is this cool?

Leezle Pon is not a bacterium, but a small pox virus.

 The human genome is 3.3 billion base pairs and there are approximately 20,000 genes coded in it. Rats has a genome size of 2.75 billion base pairs that also code about 20,000 genes. This is amazing because it doesn't intuitively make sense about how an organism much smaller than humans can have a genome that codes for just about the same number of genes! Consider rice and corn. The rice genome has 340 million base pairs in it coding for about 30,000 genes. Corn has about 2.3 billion base pairs that code for about 30,000 genes. These are very different plants and their genome sizes reflect that, but the number of genes coded for does not reflect that. Both genomes code for close to the same number of genes! This inevitably leads to the question: HOW MANY GENES ARE NECESSARY FOR LIFE?!?
 That is exactly the question that these researchers set out to answer. There are some problems though. You can not mutate humans for research. You can do mice, but that is EXTREMELY EXPENSIVE. You could do plants, but that can take forever. Bacteria are inexpensive to use and easy to work with, so this research uses Bacillus subtilis to address the question. So, how did they do it?

 You would think that they would knockout one gene and tested if the organism still lived and if it did they would then knockout another and so on and so forth until they had the minimum number of genes required to maintain life in a nutrient rich environment. As it turns out, that approach is just not as easy as it sounds, so that went about a different way. They made a knockout for every gene in B. subtilis for a total of 4,100 different knockouts! Of those knockouts, only 192 genes were completely essential to maintain life.

BABY TEETH RADIATION!!!!

Strontium-90 absorption by deciduous teeth. 

REISS LZ.

Science. 1961 Nov 24;134:1669-73.

Why is this cool?

 So, in the 1950s and 1960s, the US was testing tons of nuclear weapons and people were getting nervous about mutually assured destruction and environmental consequences of nuclear fallout. A lone researcher took it upon himself to find out if nuclear weapon testing was leading to accumulation of radioactive material in humans. So, the researcher gathered baby teeth from around St. Louis and then tested then for radioactivity. What they found rocked many a parents' world: the teeth had RADIOACTIVE STRONTIUM-90 (kind of redundant because strontium-90 probably doesn't exist in a non-radioactive form)!!!!! They present data that the later a child was born, until 1954, the more radioactive strontium was found in his teeth!
 Was this radioactivity correlated with higher incidences of cancer later in life? I don't know, but I would bet so. It is very interesting, because both my parents were born in the early fifties and they probably still have strontium-90 in their teeth!! This paper was published in 1961 and that precedes an IMPORTANT MILESTONE IN AMERICAN HISTORY: STAN LEE'S RE-INVENTION OF MARVEL!!!

Made of Uranium-238

 Is it a coincidence that Stan Lee (born in 1922) had developed the greatest comics ever written shortly after widespread nuclear weapon testing? I think not. In fact, I believe Stan Lee to be made of radiation!!From 1961 to 1963, Stan created society defining characters such as:

THE AVENGERS!!

THE HULK!!

THE FANTASTIC FOUR!!

SPIDER-MAN!!

THE X-MEN!!!