While an undergrad I developed a low-guilt qualification to my avoiding 'real work'. It had to be useful somehow. This led to a pretty dcent running regimin and randomly clean house (on occasion)to forgo running stats on SAS or grinding soil samples or something.
Now that I've moved on to graduate work, I've had to step up my procrasitination as well. I still work out to avoid the billionth virology text, but I've also taken up gardening and sewing. It's funny how you eventually become what 17 year old you would absolutely hate. Feminism be damned, I'm sewing a damn dress and not reading those big 'ol words.
Farming is an exciting venture as well. As I live in an apartment, I've found an awesome community supported agriculture group ( Beardsley Farms href="http://beardsleyfarm.org/">) whic is a mile away from my house. If I run or bike there instead of writing that's double the procrasitination- working out and organic farming. Probably the best use of my time, right? I suppose I could always just write blog posts....oh wait.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Woolly mammoth hemaglobin is awesome
I have been researching methods for killing nematodes. The details are a little messy- I should probably throw my current version of my proposal up here. One issue I need to focus on remedying is killing nematodes and not the bacteria found in a given soil. Therefore, I've been looking at heating thresh holds and cooling thresholds, which has led me to read a lot about various cold weather adaptations, and a cute little study in which woolly mammoth blood was RESURRECTED. You don't get to say that word a lot in science. RESURRECTED. Sounds so intense. Anyways. Here's a little write up of the article I did. enjoy. RESURRECTED.
When we think of cold weather adaptation in animals, we think of fat gain in harbor seals, hibernation in polar bears, and increased fur thickness in musk-ox. While many survival traits of arctic animals are apparent, some are harder to see. Researchers, however, are finding that adaptations may go below the skin – and run through it. The secret is in the blood.
To study cold adaptations in hemoglobin, the oxygen-carrying protein found in blood, a group of researchers looked at blood from Asian and African elephants and their now extinct cold-adapted pachyderm brethren, the woolly mammoths. By extracting DNA from a Siberian woolly mammoth preserved in ice for 43,000 years, researchers resurrected hemoglobin.
Scientists observed that amino acids used to create the hemoglobin molecule in woolly mammoths differed from those of modern Asian and African elephants. Mammoth hemoglobin required less energy to transfer oxygen to tissues in the body due to its weaker hold on the oxygen molecules it carried.
In elephants and other mammals adapted to a warmer climate, hemoglobin is more likely to transfer oxygen to warm tissues, such as a working muscle. Cold tissues have less energy to sever the oxygen molecule from the hemoglobin.
In warmer climates, where a working muscle needs more oxygen than a muscle at rest, this trait is beneficial. However, this trait is dangerous in cold climates where animal extremities are often cold even when working. If the woolly mammoths did not have an adaptation to release oxygen in colder tissues, their legs and tails would not have received enough oxygen to survive.
The mammoth’s lower-energy hemoglobin allowed its large body to receive oxygen throughout its limbs even when cold.
The production of cold-adapted proteins is not novel to the woolly mammoth. Arctic fishes create proteins to bind to the surfaces of ice particles to stop their expansion in the fish’s blood as they swim the below-freezing waters of the Arctic Ocean.
Many plants in the arctic have also adapted. They flush compounds into their cells to lower their freezing point, thereby avoiding cell death due to freezing.
However, the mechanism used by woolly mammoths has not been found in any other animal. This rare discovery occurred thanks to recent developments in genetic techniques, allowing researchers to find the secrets the ice holds.
When we think of cold weather adaptation in animals, we think of fat gain in harbor seals, hibernation in polar bears, and increased fur thickness in musk-ox. While many survival traits of arctic animals are apparent, some are harder to see. Researchers, however, are finding that adaptations may go below the skin – and run through it. The secret is in the blood.
To study cold adaptations in hemoglobin, the oxygen-carrying protein found in blood, a group of researchers looked at blood from Asian and African elephants and their now extinct cold-adapted pachyderm brethren, the woolly mammoths. By extracting DNA from a Siberian woolly mammoth preserved in ice for 43,000 years, researchers resurrected hemoglobin.
Scientists observed that amino acids used to create the hemoglobin molecule in woolly mammoths differed from those of modern Asian and African elephants. Mammoth hemoglobin required less energy to transfer oxygen to tissues in the body due to its weaker hold on the oxygen molecules it carried.
In elephants and other mammals adapted to a warmer climate, hemoglobin is more likely to transfer oxygen to warm tissues, such as a working muscle. Cold tissues have less energy to sever the oxygen molecule from the hemoglobin.
In warmer climates, where a working muscle needs more oxygen than a muscle at rest, this trait is beneficial. However, this trait is dangerous in cold climates where animal extremities are often cold even when working. If the woolly mammoths did not have an adaptation to release oxygen in colder tissues, their legs and tails would not have received enough oxygen to survive.
The mammoth’s lower-energy hemoglobin allowed its large body to receive oxygen throughout its limbs even when cold.
The production of cold-adapted proteins is not novel to the woolly mammoth. Arctic fishes create proteins to bind to the surfaces of ice particles to stop their expansion in the fish’s blood as they swim the below-freezing waters of the Arctic Ocean.
Many plants in the arctic have also adapted. They flush compounds into their cells to lower their freezing point, thereby avoiding cell death due to freezing.
However, the mechanism used by woolly mammoths has not been found in any other animal. This rare discovery occurred thanks to recent developments in genetic techniques, allowing researchers to find the secrets the ice holds.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
