No really it is. Jon Hiller and I are both in Chicago and both work with imaging but that’s not the point. The point is, you might not ever get a chance to see an electron microscope in action or see an experiment live at a National Lab. So mark your calendar for another #SSHOw
Originally shared by ScienceSunday
Join us for another Science HOA, brought to you by ScienceSunday as we talk to Dr Jon Hiller about electron microscopy! Jon is a electron microscopist in the Nanoscience & Technology Division at Argonne National Laboratory. Jon’s research includes the development of state-of-the-art electron and ion beam instrumentation for materials and nanoscale research. He is most well known for his work in 3 dimensional Focused Ion Beam (FIB) tomography and complex sample fabrication for electron microscopy. His characterization of diamond thin films has lead to the development of the artificial retina.
We will be discussing all this, along with a live on air demonstration of scanning electron microscopy! Jon has also kindly offered to allow you, the audience to choose any objects that you would like to see under the electron microscope! So if you have any questions for Jon, or suggestions for samples for imaging, please leave them on the Event page as always.
Buddhini Samarasinghe and Scott Lewis will be hosting this event.
I’m posting this Richard Feynman video because my brain is overwhelmed with the kindness from my friends and people I don’t even know on G+ and I couldn’t think of something clever. So thank you all who participated in #HappyBirthdayMrMRI . Thank you for the good wishes.
There were so many clever and cute posts. I’ll respond more later. I have to walk my dog and get some work done. So I leave you with the scientific method from Richard Feynman. h/t Jennifer Ouellette
In general, we look for a new law by the following process: First we guess it; then we compute the consequences of the guess to see what would be implied if this law that we guessed is right; then we compare the result of the computation to nature, with experiment or experience, compare it directly with observation, to see if it works. If it disagrees with experiment, it is wrong. In that simple statement is the key to science. It does not make any difference how beautiful your guess is, it does not make any difference how smart you are, who made the guess, or what his name is — if it disagrees with experiment, it is wrong.
Dr. Amanda Ellison at Durham University wrote a book, Getting your Head around the Brain.
Disclaimer, I don’t have access to the book so I’m quoting the Telegraph (eeks!).
…fluke of nature sees alcohol closing down the section of the mind that stops us acting on impulse long before it deadens the ‘reptilian’ part responsible for our sexual urges.
The area of the brain that makes us want to mate is the oldest part – and located so far down that it keeps functioning however much we drink – until we are ready to pass out.
An article from Slate, Don’t Take Medical Advice From the New York Times Magazinehttp://goo.gl/EYaFh is being re-shared and discussed quite a bit on G+. So h/t to Gaythia Weis Jennifer Ouellette Mary Mangan and Google Plus Science Lab
It’s a great article about chemophobia and discusses a story about a mother who would rather give her child some Chinese medicine rather than what the “Western doctor” prescribed. It points out that supplements are not heavily regulated and so the dose and composition of the supplements can vary wildly. So you actually don’t know what you are getting.
When I come across people who display signs of chemophobia or who try to promote only “natural” products, I try my best to politely remind them that snake bites are natural too. Arsenic, cyanide, carbon monoxide can be deadly and are very much natural. You can get any of those three chemicals, naturally from the environment. In fact you probably have traces of arsenic in your blood.
Here’s an old post about rhubarb, natural and delicious.
Note that atropine is derived from belladonna and it can be used medicinally (Western medicine) for bradycardia (low heart rate) and ironically to counteract organophosphate poisoning (it’s not an antidote, it blocks the action of acetylcholine). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atropine
Which brings me to another one of my favorite comments when it comes to chemophobia.
Alle Ding’ sind Gift, und nichts ohn’ Gift; allein die Dosis macht, daß ein Ding kein Gift ist.
“All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; only the dose permits something not to be poisonous.” Paracelsus
The only real difference between medicine and poison is the dose….and intent. Oscar G. Hernandez, MD
Here’s another good article about chemophobia.
The best antidote for this irrational plague of fear is the same as it usually is: good science, clearly understood, and openly available to all. Seymour Garte, Ph.D.
Ultimately, this is a problem of psychology. In the age of high-investment parenting, threats to our children can overrun any rational defense a parent might be able to construct… As a chemist, I find chemophobia pretty ridiculous. As a parent, I’m in sympathy — we all fear unknown threats to our kids. I merely ask that parents step back from genuine fear-mongering that we get from Environmental Working Group and the like and try to gain a rational, risk-based perspective on chemicals in the home.
Finally, here is another article that made the rounds on G+.
Dr. Wafik S. El-Deiry and colleagues at Penn State University developed a new drug, TRAIL-inducing compound 10 (TIC10). What is TRAIL and what’s the big deal?
TRAIL is tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand. It’s a protein in our immune system that induces apoptosis (programmed cell death) in tumors. The problem with recombinant versions, i.e., man-made versions intended to be given as an anti-tumor drug, is that TRAIL has a short half-life in serum and it has poor biodistribution (it doesn’t readily cross the blood-brain barrier). So TIC10 induces TRAIL and because TIC10 can cross the blood-brain barrier, it appears to be more efficacious than trying to administer TRAIL directly. Since TRAIL is part of the immune system, boosting it with TIC10 is thought to be less toxic than traditional chemotherapy. It remains to be seen what side effects there are from TIC10 itself.
What is FOXO and what does it have to do with this story? The TRAIL gene is transcriptionally regulated by Foxo3a. The FOXO3, also called, Forkhead box 03, is characterized by a distinct fork head DNA-binding domain and is likely a trigger for apoptosis.
Before you get too excited, the paper notes that the TIC10 group only had a 6% increase in survival compared to a more traditional anti-vascular drug, in a mouse model.
News blurb from Nature.com
Small-molecule drug drives cancer cells to suicide
I ♥ science and debunking myths. OK, I’m not doing the actual debunking but I really enjoyed this article.
In a conversation on Linda Hedrick’s post (http://goo.gl/GLpKF) Kirk Teetzel had the right answer as to why the McDonalds burger doesn’t rot, i.e., why it is a myth. I had the same gut feeling so here is the link. http://goo.gl/9qyUj
From the article:
Now don’t get me wrong—I don’t have a dog in this fight either way. I really couldn’t care less whether or not the McDonald’s burger rotted or didn’t. I don’t often eat their burgers, and will continue to not often eat their burgers. My problem is not with McDonald’s. My problem is with bad science.
For all of you McDonald’s haters out there: Don’t worry. There are still plenty of reasons to dislike the company! But for now, I hope you’ll have it my way and put aside your beef with their beef.
Don’t take this the wrong way because I’m a scientist that does cancer research. I was driving home today and I was captivated by this story on NPR So crazy it might workhttp://goo.gl/cAGXf
Dr. John Brody (http://goo.gl/Djbb5), an expert in pancreatic cancer, goes home to give a speech at his alma mater about thinking outside the box. After his talk, his old music teacher, Anthony Holland, approaches him about an idea. Anthony had been working in his garage on an idea from Royal Rife to use electromagnetic waves to make cells burst like a wine glass when the resonant frequency is used. What really captivated me is when Dr. Brody tried to explain to his friend that his results were meaningless without proper controls. He also tried to explain that when Mr. Holland got support from other scientists, it was also tainted because he had not explained that the control experiments had failed so far.
mary Zeman via Melissa Bryan posted about an accident where a student nurse in training (3rd day on the job) administered a feeding bag of coffee and milk instead of a unit of blood. http://goo.gl/otI4e For starters, I don’t think coffee mixed with milk looks like a unit of blood. Nevertheless, in Mary’s post I explained what I think likely happened, e.g., COD.
Nutritional specialist Dr. Armando Carreir told the network that Ribeiro’s death “would have been as if [she] was suffocating.” from HuffPuff: http://goo.gl/euhoM
So how can the patient be suffocating? It was likely due to pulmonary edema (fluid in the lungs). So how did the patient get fluid in the lungs? Not knowing the exact mixture of coffee and milk, I’m guessing that the mixture was hypertonic. Let me back up and talk briefly about intravenous (IV) pharmaceuticals.
When you adminster a large volume of fluids IV, it has to be at physiologic pH (7.4), isotonic, and iso-oncotic. There are cases where you can give a fluid that is not one of these three properties to correct for the patients condition.
Tonicity
From the Wiki:
Tonicity is a measure of the osmotic pressure gradient (as defined by the water potential of the two solutions) of two solutions separated by a semipermeable membrane. It is commonly used when describing the response of cells immersed in an external solution. Like osmotic pressure, tonicity is influenced only by solutes that cannot cross the membrane, as only these exert an osmotic pressure. Solutes able to freely cross the membrane do not affect tonicity because they will always be in equal concentrations on both sides of the membrane.
There are three classifications of tonicity that one solution can have relative to another. The three are hypertonic, hypotonic, and isotonic. There’s a good figure in the Wiki that shows what happens to the blood cells in the three types of tonicity.
Colloid osmotic pressure (COP) or Oncotic pressure
COP is an osmotic pressure caused by protiens in the vasculature which opposes the hydrostatic pressure. The normal COP of plasma is between 20-25 tor. An increase in COP above normal levels will lead to water leaving the interstitium and entering the vascular space. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oncotic_pressure
