Need some inspiration for spicing up your Valentine’s Day? Don’t just settle for the boring chocolate and roses. Ok, those are sweet and my myocardium will still give a sudden contraction to pump more blood from my left ventricle into my aorta if I get those on February 14th. But as Harvard scientists we can’t simply follow the stereotype; we have to make our distinguished mark in the endless and hopeless—oops, didn’t mean to let that slip–search for love. So think test tubes and indicator paper. Ask Steve Spangler for further advice. Also no pun intended on CrimsonSpark.
"Classic Portrait of a Barred Spiral Galaxy," Science Daily (Credit: NASA & ESA)
Sometimes to figure out ourselves, we often have to take a step back.
According to an article in the Science Daily, the distant barred spiral galaxy NGC 1073 may help us to better understand our own Milky Way galaxy as a similar galactic model.
I’m going to be starting a photo blog, ‘Snapshots in science.’ After all, aren’t pictures worth a thousand words?
Take a look a look at the efficiency of these ants!
According to an article in Science Daily, “Political and economic theorists could learn lessons from studying how an ant colony allocates food resources, according to the authors of a new paper.”
With new compelling hybrid fields continuously emerging, a look at biologically-inspired economics might provide nature’s hidden insightful lessons for society in today’s global crisis.
I did not know a leap second existed. Yes, I’ve heard about leap years and as a strict proponent of the lunar calendar, which is responsible for predicting the date of one of the most celebrated holidays, Spring Festival, I think it’s totally legitimate. But wait, we’re arguing not about leap years, leap months, leap days, leap hours, oh for heaven’s sake leap minutes even. We’re debating the triviality of the leap second.
According to the New York Times, these are “occasionally added to the world’s atomic clocks to keep them synchronized with Earth’s rotational cycles.”
Can there really be a wonder drug? Lately research has shown that almost so-called cure-all has its downsides. So before you pop that daily aspirin to help reduce your risk of heart attack, stroke, or cancer, please note this article
Aspirin may be deposed from its throne as the "wonder drug"
One of my favorite computer wallpapers is an eerie and beautiful turquoise and gold image of the Helix Nebula, famously known as the “Eye of God.” As a kid, I was always mind-boggled by the outer space and in those quintessentially curious and fickle years of my childhood, I often played fancifully with the idea of becoming an astronaut and exploring the celestial heavens to see for myself what Earth’s skies concealed. However, even the most powerful telescope images cannot always tell us everything about the universe. Indeed, some its larger mysteries are rather “dark” indeed, so to speak. In fact, what are known as darkmatter and darkenergy, though foreign to us in our own home planet, actually constitute the majority of our universe.
Take a look at a (rather fantastically stunning) clip from The History Channel segment on these dark mysteries:
With 2012 just in its early days and before the dawn of yet another term, a look back at the scientific journals of 2011 brings us articles from both the Journal of Molecular Biology (JMB) and Molecular Cell, respectively entitled The 50th Anniversary of the Publication of the Operon Theory in the Journal of Molecular Biology: Past, Present and Future and Integrated Gene Regulatory Circuits: Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Operon Model. While Watson and Crick grace many of the historic photos of molecular biology for their discovery of the iconic double-helix that revolutionized much of the thinking in the field today, we must pay great tribute to Jacob and Monod for explaining what Watson and Crick did not and for giving a new regulatory dimension to our view of life at the genetic molecular level in what JMB touts as “still a masterpiece to read.”
The “operon” is familiar term for ardent biology and chemistry concentrators and an increasingly familiar term for physics and engineering students on the interdisciplinary platform that constitutes science today. Rudimentarily defined, the operon is a unit of genes with select genes regulating the other protein-coding genes in the unit. The lactose operon is the premier model for gene regulation and initial characterization in the enteric bacteria E. coli has led to characterizations of more sophisticated gene regulation in higher organisms. It might further issue personal excitement for researchers—not excluding the budding young scientists among us—in the varied fields of epigenetics, stem cells, and systems biology. Moreover, the conception of regulatory circuits inspired by the operon underscores the sheer complexity of living phenomena as nature’s remarkable, robust information processors. Thus, the 50th anniversary reminds us that with greater breakthroughs in science come even greater questions.
For a short animated overview of the operon:
To briefly read up on the findings of Jacob and Monod and the scientific impacts, check out:
Moshe Yaniv, The 50th Anniversary of the Publication of the Operon Theory in the Journal of Molecular Biology: Past, Present and Future, Journal of Molecular Biology, Volume 409, Issue 1, 27 May 2011, Pages 1-6, ISSN 0022-2836, 10.1016/j.jmb.2011.03.041.
Shahragim Tajbakhsh, Giacomo Cavalli, Evelyne Richet, Integrated Gene Regulatory Circuits: Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Operon Model, Molecular Cell, Volume 43, Issue 4, 19 August 2011, Pages 505-514, ISSN 1097-2765, 10.1016/j.molcel.2011.08.003.
You can explore, search, and save any combination of virtual human body parts with BioDigital Human, a 3D interactive program developed by BioDigital Systems. BioDigital Human is available free in beta form at http://www.biodigitalhuman.com, and can also be downloaded as a Google Chrome App.
Since the dawn of HIV epidemic in 1981, the development of an HIV vaccine to protect people from infection has been a priority for many scientists. However, there have been many challenges to developing a vaccine. For example, HIV mutates rapidly to evade immunity, and there are no recovered HIV/AIDS patients, so an immune response induced by a vaccine cannot mimic that of a natural recovery.
Still, there is promising progress being made.
Recently, scientists tested different vaccine combinations on monkeys using a prime-boost approach, where one vaccine is given as a priming dose, and a booster shot is administered 6 months later. To mimic vaccines that would be used in humans, the SIV strain (SIV is the monkey analog to HIV in humans) used to make the vaccines was different from the strain used to infect the monkeys. The SIV strain used for infection was chosen to be particularly difficult to develop vaccines for, because it is resistant to developing neutralizing antibodies. Only neutralizing antibodies can protect against infections, like HIV, that attack the immune system.
This study was the first to show that vaccines that can protect against infection by a neutralization-resistant SIV, and the study showed that the Env surface protein on HIV is an important ingredient in developing a successful vaccine. Compared to sham controls, one vaccine combination in the study reduced the chance of becoming infected per viral exposure by 80%.
One of the successful vaccine combinations is now being developed for early-stage clinical trials in humans.
Reference:
D Barouch et al., Vaccine protection against acquisition of neutralization-resistant SIV challenges in rhesus monkeys. Nature DOI: 10.1038/nature10766 (2012).
