Bullet shaped virus may be the future of new cancer and HIV treatments

By Liz Humes

An obscure virus that does not harm human cells has been generating a wave of excitement in the scientific community.  So what is the big deal?  A team of researchers from UCLA has reported the 3D structure of the vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) in a break-through study published in the February 5th edition of Science (full article).  Their findings may shed light on how VSV can be manipulated and used in the treatment of cancer and in the development of vaccines for HIV and other harmful viruses.

The researchers used advanced, cutting-edge imaging techniques to visualize the 3D structure of VSV, which appears to have a bullet shaped head and cylindrical trunk.  They also characterized how the virus comes to form this bullet shape.  With this additional level of understanding of the physical structure of the virus, scientists believe that they can find ways to modify the structure of the virus and use it to treat and prevent illnesses such as cancer and AIDS.

As author Z. Hong Zhou remarked, “This work moves our understanding of the biology of this large and medically important class of viruses ahead in a dramatic way.”

VSV is a model virus that scientists use in the laboratory to study dangerous viruses that cause illnesses such as the flu, measles, and rabies.  Previous studies have shown that VSV can detect and kill human cancer cells.  Other studies have addressed the question of how to manipulate the virus to deliver a vaccine against HIV to the human body.

3D animation of VSV trunk

(Video is a 3D animation of the lower trunk structure of VSV-source)

A closer look at vaccine technology

A current trend in vaccine development is to use harmless viruses as “vectors” that can carry a specific vaccine to human cells.  These viruses have been engineered in the laboratory to carry pieces of genetic material from other pathogens and when they attach to human cells, they inject this genetic material into the cells.  These actions mirror an infection by the pathogen itself, although the virus vector does not actually cause an infection, and stimulates an immune response.  The human body then remembers how to respond to this pathogen the next time it encounters the pathogen and the body is protected from infection.

Modified versions of the viruses that cause the common cold and small pox are being studied in addition to VSV for use as vaccine vectors.  Given the potential that this type of vaccination has to prevent deadly infections from viruses and bacteria, this is an area of research one should surely keep an eye on.

Want more information?

Press release

Vaccination information

HIV vaccination development

What Doesn’t kill Them Makes Them Stronger

By Nick Gubitosi         February 13, 2010

This past Thursday, a group of scientists from Boston University released a new study which revealed that treating bacteria with low levels of antibiotics produces mutations in the bacteria instead of killing them, allowing them to gain resistance to a wide range of antibiotics.  This newly gained understanding for the biomolecular processes that produce these “superbugs” can lead to the development of new antibiotics or even enhanced treatments that could prevent the creation of these extremely dangerous cross-resistant bacteria.

The team of scientists led by Professor James Collins, performed their tests on strains of E. coli and Staphylococcus.  They started by administering low levels of five different antibiotics to the bacteria, which caused the introduction of mutations into the bacterial DNA.  They followed this by then giving lethal doses of antibiotics to these mutated bacteria.  The results revealed that many of the bacteria initially exposed to low levels of antibiotics now exhibited cross-resistance to a variety of antibiotics.

In lethal levels, antibiotics cause bacterial DNA to be shredded.  However, when the antibiotic is not at a lethal level, mutations are entered into the bacterial DNA instead.  The bacteria not only survive with these mutations, but gain protection from antibiotics including ones that the bacteria weren’t even exposed to.

This study helps to show the serious dangers involved with taking low or incomplete doses of antibiotics, which is common practice in many areas today.  Farmers who include antibiotics in their livestock feed, doctors who prescribe antibiotics at random, and patients who don’t follow their full course of drugs are all promoting the creation of these bacterial “superbugs.”

With the information gained from these findings, enhanced antibiotic treatments can be developed that could prevent the emergence of multi-drug resistant bacteria and even increase their DNA killing ability so that low doses of antibiotics would be enough to kill mutated bacterial cells.

Click here for source

Screen Your Newborns

By: Nina Jean-Jacques

Production of white blood cells

Expecting parents are usually overwhelmed with concerns about the health of their unborn child. When the baby is born with ten fingers and toes and all is well, the parents breathe a sigh of relief and start to think about the future. However, sometimes there can be a major bump in the road that can be seen a few months after the birth of their child.

The blood disorder, T-cell lymphopenia, is characterized by have an abnormally low amount of white blood cells. T-cells are a type of white blood cell and are what the body uses to fight infection. The disease can appear in infants that seem healthy at birth after a short period of time. Symptoms of the disease do not appear until infections arise, putting the child in danger.

There is hope for parents. A study, led by John M. Routes, M.D., of the Medical College of Wisconsin and Children’s Research Institute in Milwakee, WI, shows that T-cell lymphopenia can be screened for at birth. There is a list of standard diseases that newborns are screened for. The yearlong study screened every infant born in Wisconsin in 2008 and took dried blood from the standard screening blood sample to test for the presence of a high amount of DNA circles that produce cells that a T cell can bind. In the time the study was conducted, 71,000 infants were screened for T-cell lymphopenia, eight of which displayed characteristics of the illness. The use of screening programs can prevent many health expenses for families and even prevent premature deaths. The cost for this type of screen is around $5.50 and could take a large burden off of a family, just by knowing the health status of their child. Most states already screen for at least 30 diseases for newborn infants and adding T-cell lymphopenia would not be a large problem.

Newborn screening is an essential part of preventing early deaths. Every parent should be aware of what is and what is not being screened for. Diseases can occur without having any history of them in the family. It’s always better to be safe than sorry, especially when it comes to children’s health.

Fore more information on newborn screening tests.

(source)

One Degree Makes All The Difference

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By: Kate Good

Among the laundry list of harmful “greenhouse gases” that are thought to be responsible for global warming, water vapor just does not seem to fit in. It is known that water vapor in the lower stratosphere dominates temperature as it is able to absorb and radiate heat, much like water vapor can on Earth’s surface. This ability to hold heat qualifies water vapor as a viable greenhouse gas. However, new research shows that water vapor has not only played a key role in global warming but now may be responsible for the recent plateau in global temperatures.

A team of researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Boulder, Colorado, reported a 10% drop in the amount of water vapor in the stratosphere (the atmospheric layer 10-50 km above Earth’s surface) since 2000. This decrease in stratospheric water vapor offset the previous predictions for greenhouse gas warming by approximately 25%.

Interestingly, water vapor projections from researchers at the University of Reading, UK, in 1999, found that an increase of stratospheric water vapor could have boosted present day warming by up to 40% compared to carbon dioxide on its own. Meaning, the current decrease of water vapor levels is a very good sign.

While the exact cause for this sudden decrease of stratospheric water vapor is unknown, scientists believe that the simultaneous drop of 1° Celsius in the temperature of the stratosphere is to blame. The colder temperature freezes out water vapor that would have otherwise entered the stratosphere and added to warming. However, like the fall in the amount of water vapor, the fall in temperature is too not yet completely understood.

Sources:

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100128/full/news.2010.42.html

Advances in Anesthesia: Being asleep while being awake

By Shelly Hwang

This past winter, I had the opportunity to work as what you would call, a nurse’s assistant. Basically, I cleaned hospital beds. But during this glamorous experience I was able to see nurses and doctors interact with patients before and after surgery. One of the key issues that repeatedly came up was anesthesia. Patients would be asked questions such as “are you allergic to any medications?” and “have you had any reactions to anesthesia before?” before entering surgery. Afterwards, their vitals would be closely monitored to ensure they return to their normal state after the anesthesia wore off.

Anesthesia is essential for its frequent use in otherwise painful surgical and medical procedures. However, anesthesia is not without its flaws. While anesthesia helps to achieve nerve blocks that can eliminate the feeling of pain, it often affects and impairs motor function. This is why patients are often unconscious, immobile, and sometimes unable to breathe on their own. A recent press release reports on a study conducted by a group of researches at the Children’s Hospital Boston. The researchers, led by Daniel Kohane, MD, PhD, of the Division of Critical Care Medicine at Children’s were originally studying surfactants, naturally-occurring agents that allow drugs to travel more easily through tissue, that would prolong the effects of anesthesia. However, to the surprise of the researchers, they discovered a potential new approach to anesthesia that would prolong the effects of anesthesia without causing a motor block.

While testing three types of surfactants along with anesthetics, the researchers found that sensory block in rats’ nerves were lengthened for up to 7 hours or more, but in many cases the rats did not experience motor impairment or experienced it for a very short duration. What’s next is figuring out the mechanism by which this approach works, and looking at the effects of other drugs and chemicals that may be used in anesthesia. If this approach proves to work on humans, it would have a monumental impact on the fields of anesthesia and medicine. From allowing women in labor to receive anesthesia while giving birth, to relieving individuals with musculoskeletal disorders from pain while allowing for the maintenance of  mobility, this anesthetic approach would bridge the gap between relief of pain and motor ability.

For more information.

Anesthesia at the Children’s Hospital Boston.

Running in Genes

By Abby Larson

Can someone really be born to be an athlete?  Science says so.  The idea of a genetic basis to exercise is a fairly new area of science, but it makes sense based on how the human body works. The expression of genes controls the function of human physiology: muscle development, capillary growth, hemoglobin concentration in red blood cells, etc.   After strenuous exercise, gene expression fires up to control muscle tissue repair due to increased forces on the body and tissue metabolic demand.  Capillaries feeding the muscles grow and become more efficient at delivering oxygen to tissues.  All of this is controlled by gene expression, the cellular switchboard of the human body.

Recent studies have identified over 200 genes that can determine the body’s ability to adapt quickly to exercise.  Based on this, training and conditioning could only take an athlete up to his or her genetically predetermined potential.  Does this mean that children can be genetically tested to see if they will be good at sports?  Is there a gene that makes a good football player versus a good runner? It’s more complicated than saying if a person has a specific gene, he or she can be a top athlete.  Like all processes in the human body, multiple genes are involved in adaptation to exercise and gene interactions play a large role.   Gene products don’t interact in a linear fashion, but in pathways and networks.  This makes genes harder to understand, and our knowledge of the interactions is in its infancy.  Once these pathways are discovered, scientists can begin to understand the extent to genetic determination of athletic ability.

These studies on the genetic basis of exercise are not going to benefit  just athletes—physical activity is one of the greatest preventative medicines for obesity, diabetes, and heart disease.  It is likely that genes correlated with exercise response could be mutated in people that have obesity or heart disease, which proposes new options of drug and gene therapy as preventative medicine.  The more we understand the benefits and mechanisms of exercise, the better we can understand how exercise can be used to improve public health.  So next time you go to the gym or run outside, think to yourself, “this is science.”

For more information

Old Chinese Medicine, New Cancer Treatment

Sara Braniecki

    Dr. Ahmed Chadli and fellow researchers at the Medical College of Georgia believe that they are on the right track to finding a new cancer treatment using celastrol, a plant derivative derived from trees and shrubs called celastracaea that the Chinese have used to treat symptoms such as fever, chills, and inflammation for centuries.

    Dr. Chadli and his colleagues think that they can devise a way for celastrol to be used for cancer treatment by using it to inactivate P23, a protein required for cancer growth.  Normally, P23 is a chaperone protein aiding the heat shock protein 90 (Hsp90).  Hsp90 has many chaperone proteins for its many different functions, and it is challenging for researchers to find a chaperone protein that will selectively target the Hsp90 implicated in a specific tumor.  The MCG researchers believe that celastrol has the specificity to control cancer cell growth by forcing the Hsp90 to cluster together, inactivating it.

    “Cancer cells need Hsp90 more than normal cells because cancer cells have thousands of mutations.  They need chaperones all the time to keep their mutated proteins active.  By taking heat shock proteins away from cells, the stabilization occurs and cell death occurs,” explains Dr. Chadli.

Dr. Chadli in the laboratory
Dr. Chadli researching in the laboratory.

 

Dr. Chadli is a researcher and professor at the Medical College of Georgia and an alumnus of the Mayo Clinic.  He has been researching Hsp90 for over 10 years and has several works published in The Journal of Biological Chemistry and other journals.  He conducts thorough research to understand the intricacies of all the molecules and pathways associated with Hsp90.  Cancer therapy can be greatly refined with ambitious research like his.  Dr. Chadli looks forward to future studies on cancer patients with greater dosage of celastrol, hopefully leading to greater results in the therapy.

Further information.

The Carbon Footprint of Disaster

By: Kate Good

Damaged Buildings in Petionville, Port-au-Prince

When a 7.0 magnitude earthquake hits, the first reaction of most people would not be to think of the environmental consequences of the natural disaster, but rather of the people who have been affected. While the devastation on the population of Haiti, as a result of the January twelfth earthquake is the first and foremost focus for relief, the future consequences on the distressed country’s environment could be as detrimental as the quake itself. No systems or equipment have yet been placed to dispose of hazardous medical waste, over 1,000,000 people have been displaced, and the possibility of landslides on the already eroding island’s shore demonstrate both short and long term problems that will plague the exhausted country.

Haiti’s General Hospital, the largest public hospital in Port-au-Prince sustained massive damage in the earthquake and as a result, many makeshift medical stations have been put in place. Described as a “war zone”, the first objective of aid workers is to treat those in need, meaning normal procedures taken to properly dispose of used medical equipment and wastes are not always followed.

While this is one of the short-term problems affecting the Haitian environment, the spread of medical wastes throughout waterways could lead to further contamination outside of the capital. Similarly, wastes from oil and chemical spills from a large number of badly damaged small industry and storage sites have become a concern as the impact of Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) have yet to be assessed.

It is estimated that in the epicenter of damage the percentage of destruction to buildings is 60-80%, not only does this mean tens of millions of tons of waste, but to make matters worse, cleared debris is deposited on roadsides because of the lack of other means of disposal. While efforts are being made to recycle as much material as possible, the waste generated by the reconstruction of these buildings will be equally significant in the future.

Approximately 1,000,000 people have been displaced into less affected rural and urban areas, however, the addition to the population of already stressed environments has put a serious threat on the area’s natural resources. With a dark history of deforestation and erosion, the addition of the earthquake makes the possibility of landslides much more likely. Due to the country’s natural dry conditions and coral sand geology, the already reported small landslides on hillsides in Port-au-Prince, will inevitably grow with the addition of heavy rains.

Sources:

  • http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=608&ArticleID=6454&l=en&t=long
  • http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/715270
  • http://news.discovery.com/history/why-is-haiti-so-poor.html
  • http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/01/earthquake_in_haiti.html

    • Livin’ Breezy

    Dan Conant

    With many countries setting goals for reductions in fossil fuel consumption after the recent Copenhagen climate conferences;  countries are trying to even produce 25% of their energy from clean or renewable sources.  But what about 100%?  For most 100% seems ludicrous; but on an island in Denmark it is very feasible and has been proven to be possible.  Located right off the North Sea, the wind never stops howling across this island, and the islanders are willing to everything on the line to be provided with clean power.  Also, the islanders are very motivated as they have large stakes and own many shares in the turbines.

    Turbines Off Of Samso. Photographer Unknown

    Samso island is home to roughly four-thousand people who are excited to move forward with their wind turbine expansion.  One main reason for the islanders willingness to put up these turbines is that typically people living on islands pay from two to four times as much for electricity compared to people on the mainland.  Although the turbines do make some noise as their blades whiz through the air and they take away from the serene look on the island; free power is more than enough to convince them to keep pushing forth with turbine expansion.  Not to mention that once the turbine building is complete, the people of Samso will have the potential to sell electricity back to the grid, helping them pay back their investments sooner and eventually making a profit.

    Many in the environmental fields are pushing Samso island as an example of how populations can be freed from fossil fuels and almost eliminate their carbon footprint, but there are still many skeptics.  Samso island is lucky enough to have a great location to be able to utilize the abundant winds off the north sea, and has plenty of space to erect turbines.  In comparison, Samso island is significantly larger than Manhattan, NY.  Additionally, the funding for such projects is very costly, but due to an enthusiastic local population the turbine expansion is becoming possible.  Furthermore Samso may not be able to be comparable to major cities due to population density and other factors, but it is an important representation of how a green-motivated economy can be successful in achieving its goals for renewable energy.

    Information for this article was gathered from this link.

    A Stuck Spirit

    A recent press release from NASA states that the Mars Rover Spirit will no longer be a mobile research platform. After driving into a sand trap in April 2009, the rover lost nearly all of its mobility and operators at NASA have periodically attempted to drive Spirit out of the trap with no success. Currently, the engineers are attempting to maneuver Spirit in such  a fashion so that its solar panels will face northward for the coming Martian winter. With a northern tilt, the rover can gain more power through its solar panels and remain operational.

    Spirit’s mission was originally supposed to be 90 days, but the little rover has been performing scientific research for the last six years, far beyond its original mission parameters. Two years into its mission, the right front wheel stopped operating, and the rover pushed forward with only five operable wheels. In late November of 2009, six months after the rover was rendered immobile by the sand trap, the right-rear wheel stopped working as well. With only four full functioning wheels, the rover is in a spot of trouble. However, there is an upside to the rover’s immobility.

    Steve Squyres, a researcher at Cornell University and principal investigator for Spirit and Opportunity, said “There’s a class of science we can do only with a stationary vehicle that we had put off during the years of driving…Degraded mobility does not mean the mission ends abruptly. Instead, it lets us transition to stationary science.” Possibly the most tantalizing opportunity presented to the researchers at NASA is the ability to study the planet’s core, and determine if the core is solid or liquid. “If the final scientific feather in Spirit’s cap is determining whether the core of Mars is liquid or solid, that would be wonderful — it’s so different from the other knowledge we’ve gained from Spirit,” said Squyres.

    Sources:

    • http://marsrover.nasa.gov/mission/status_spiritAll.html#sol2151
    • http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/mer/news/mer20100126.html
    • http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/mer/freespirit.html