Monthly Archives: August 2010

Who do you trust with your health?

Posted on by
Reply

Who do you trust with your health?

It seems like a very simple question but there are a lot of different answers, it’s also quite difficult to critique any answer to it, especially if you take personal liberty into account. “The Government” is often the contentious member in your personal healthcare team – some see it as meddling, telling us what to eat or maybe blaming it because your Uncle can’t get Avastin on the NHS – almost everyone has an opinion on the Government’s role in their healthcare requirements.

Funnily though, even if you don’t trust the Government’s suggestion that you should limit your salt intake to 6g a day, you probably trust it to deem who’s trustworthy to look after you.  Pharmacists, Doctors, Clinical Scientists, Physiotherapists etc… I could go on. All are certificated by the Government, which confirms that they meet the strict requirements to practice their medical specialty.

But soon there may be a new set of “professionals” for you to ponder the Government’s recommendation of trustworthiness. The Department of Health (DH) is proposing a registration scheme for practitioners of traditional medicine (acupuncture, herbal medicine, Chinese medicine and so on) which will make them appear endorsed by the Government.

These practitioners do not have training in evidence-based medicine and the proposed regulations will not demand that they have a full knowledge of the body or of the implications of various treatments on that body.  Traditional medicine is by it’s very nature not modern, not advanced, dare I say, not complicated?  A great degree of intelligence and training is required to be a Pharmacist or a Clinical Scientist, and even after the minimum four years these professionals are still limited in what they are allowed to advise upon. I therefore question Government endorsement of people who could not possibly have the in-depth knowledge of physiology to truly appreciate all aspects of the patient’s health.

And yet the practitioners feel qualified to diagnose almost every health problem, most often defying long established medical facts. This is incredibly dangerous as missed opportunities to diagnose cancers or bleeding disorders for example can mean the difference between life and death. Many people will see state regulation of these methods as an endorsement of their validity, which though it may not be strictly true, will see these “professions” gain trust amongst a public not trained to spot spurious claims and practices.

Health is far too important to tolerate far-fetched ideas of spiritual energy centres or herbal cures for serious conditions. There may be some truth to some of the claims made by these specialities, if so, lets test them and if they’re successful they can be integrated into modern medicine, rather than being part of that oxymoron category “alternative medicine”. Furthermore, these regulations should demand medical training from practitioners – three years minimum seems reasonable – after all, then the “professionals” can charge more for their services, everyone’s happy! The DH should go a lot further to ensure that people claiming to be able to treat people’s real medical conditions are highly qualified and capable, not just anyone who can buy some pills off the internet, light an incense stick and set up shop.

The Voice of Young Science (VOYS) are staging a protest outside the Department of Health on Whitehall from 11.30am on 8th September, demanding that practitioners of traditional medicine are not endorsed and validated by the Government. They will be handing out diplomas in old wives’ medicine as a stunt to highlight the ease with which anyone is able to qualify themselves under the proposed regulations.  Please, if you can, go down and support them. Email Julia (jwilson@senseaboutscience.org), the VOYS co-ordinator, for more information or to tell her you’re coming along.

Secrets of cross-species transmission revealed

Posted on by

Arran Roberts


Scientists have come up with a new theory on how viruses can cross the species divide. Humans are susceptible to a number of viruses which originate from non-human hosts, for example, the recent swine flu epidemic originated in pigs.  A collaboration of researchers from the University of Georgia, the U.S Centre for Disease Control, the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and Western Michigan University has made a groundbreaking discovery which may explain how viruses are able to jump from host to host.


Viruses pass between species via a phenomenon known as ‘cross-species transmission’ or CST. It was previously thought that viruses were able to cross species due to high rates of genetic mutation, allowing the virus to adapt to whichever species it came into contact with.


This latest piece of research, led by Daniel Streiker of the University of Georgia, suggests that transmission depends on a different factor entirely; evolution. The team investigated the transmission of the rabies virus between different species of bat. It was concluded that the rabies virus was only able to infect a subset of bat species, which were closely related to the original carrier. This implies that this kind of jump depends on the hosts being evolutionarily related. “Although CST events are the source of infectious diseases that kill millions of people each year, the natural reservoirs of viruses in wild animals and how they cross species barriers are poorly known and difficult to observe” said Professor Gary McCracken in the initial press release. This result has finally brought clarity to what it is that determines virus transmission between species.


The research also carries wider implications for our health. At the moment, the World Health Organization which are hard pressed to predict the next human epidemic as a result of a CST event. However, with this new knowledge, it will be significantly easier to follow the pattern of infection and deduce which viruses may eventually jump to a human host.


The full research paper appears in the August 6th edition of Science Magazine.

DNA Extraction from Strawberries by Michaela

Posted on by
2

Another experiment we did in Einstein’s Kitchen was extracting the DNA from strawberries, and wowed kids and adults alike!

Please do not eat anything (apart from the strawberries) in this experiment and if you’re doing this with small children please be extra vigilant to make sure they don’t put anything in their mouths.

DNA. It’s the blueprint for life. DNA spells out the instructions to all living things to tell them how to become what they are, and how their cells should work. Discovered back in 1869 as a part of the cell’s nucleus, it wasn’t until the 1950s that some very clever people realised that DNA was in fact the genetic material – the thing that carried genes and was responsible for heredity – the passage of characteristics from one generation to the next – why you look like your parents!  Since then there’s been a surge in research studying how traits are passed on and how the message in genes leads to a cell working the way it does.

DNA stands for deoxyribonucleic acid – quite a boring name that just describes the chemical structure (shown below). It’s basically a big string of units, where each unit has a different letter, A, T, G or C that the cell reads. These strands form the infamous double helix structure.

As scientists we’re interested in extracting, or getting at, DNA for a number of reasons, for example, to read the sequence of it to compare it from organism to organism, diagnosing genetic diseases, and to use it as a tool to study processes in the cell. DNA can be used from blood and other samples found at crime scenes to identify who could have been there, and the same principle is behind paternity tests.

 

To get at the DNA we scientists carry out a technique not too dissimilar to what we carried out at the festival, and that you can try yourself at home!

So here’s what you’ll need:

  • ·         A cup and a squashing instrument (like a fork)
  • ·         One strawberry
  • ·         10mL of DNA extraction buffer (add 2 tsp of salt to 50mL washing up liquid and then make that up to one litre with water).
  • ·         Cheesecloth
  • ·         A funnel
  • ·         A shot glass
  • ·         A thin stick
  • ·         10mL ice cold alcohol (we used 100% ethanol, but white rum works!). Just stick it in the freezer for a couple hours to cool it.

What you need to do is actually really easy but I’ve included an explanation for each step, so don’t be put off by the length of this:

1.          DNA as mentioned before is found inside the cell’s nucleus, so the first thing you’ll need to do is break open the cells. Simply place your strawberry in the cup and start mushing!

2.          Cells are actually really tiny things, so though after a minute or two of mushing your strawberry won’t be looking much like a strawberry, chances are that a lot of the cells are still intact! So to really help break it up add 10mL of the extraction buffer (about 2 teaspoons) and carry on stirring. Cells are held together in a sack of fatty acids called the membrane. Washing up liquid is a detergent, and in the same way as it cleans off grease it will dissolve the membrane meaning that the cell bursts open to release everything.

 

3.          This mix will contain everything inside the cell including the DNA dissolved in the liquid, as well as a lot of big bits that you’ll want to get rid of, so the next thing to do is filter the liquid away from all the big bits. To do this simply place your cheesecloth inside the funnel and pour your mushin. Give it a bit of a stir so that the liquid passes through to be collected in the shot glass.

4.          Now the next step is almost like magic, but it’s not actually. We can make the DNA appear out of the liquid! That’s because the DNA is dissolved in the liquid but we can make it so it no longer ‘likes’ water and so will turn to a solid – this is called precipitation. Slowly add 10mL ice-cold ethanol and be careful not to disturb the mush (or spray strawberry all over your kitchen). You should see a fluffy white solid forming at the junction between mush and alcohol. This is a little tricky, but bear with me: remember in your extraction buffer you added salt – salts sticks to the negative charges on DNA and neutralises them. Now in chemistry there’s a bit of a rule where things that are the same will dissolve each other but things that aren’t the same won’t dissolve in each other. Alcohol has a charge so by making the DNA unlike the alcohol by neutralising its chargesit means that it won’t dissolve any longer – it will come out of solution as a solid.

 

5.         Get your stick and fish out the white stuff – that is DNA!

 

Every living thing uses this very same chemical, and if you extracted DNA from yourself or a worm it would look exactly the same as strawberry DNA. Strawberries are great for using in this experiment because they contain so much DNA! We have two copies of each of our chromosomes, but strawberries have 8! This has mostly come about through selective breeding by farmers to get bigger strawberries! You might be wondering why it’s just a big white lump and doesn’t at all look stringy. This is because actually DNA itself is very, very small and so you’d need see a single molecule without the help of an extremely powerful microscope that uses electrons instead of light to look at very tiny things. DNA has to be very small to fit inside the cell. In Humans there’s 6ft of DNA in every single cell, and if you were to lay every strand end to end it’d reach to sun which is over 93 million miles away. Then it’d come back again… 600 times!!! That’s a lot of DNA! There are special proteins that wind up the DNA and package it all up so it fits.

Had fun making a mess? Why not send us your comments and pictures! And of course, any questions then drop us a line or comment on the blog.

More Exeriments by Beki

Posted on by
Reply

Yeast, friction, pH and goo – all in a day’s work at Einstein’s Kitchen!

 

Despite the torrential rain, the weekend at Green Man was fantastic. Einstein’s Kitchen was a true success, and I’m looking forward to the next time we get to cook up some science!

I had four smaller experiments on the go in the kitchen – blowing up balloons with yeast, lifting up a jar of rice with only a pencil, testing for acids and alkalis using cabbages, and of course the now infamous Oobleck.

So how do you do all of this?  Let’s start at the very beginning…

Can yeast blow up a balloon?

Yeast is a type of micro-organism, so you can only see it under a microscope, but it is a living fungus and commonly used in baking and brewing. In both of these processes the yeast doesn’t breathe like humans do, but survives using fermentation. It uses sugar as a food, and produces CO2 and alcohol. This means that, unlike respiration – where oxygen is taken in and carbon dioxide given out – the yeast produces more and more gas. So, if you trap the yeast in a confined area (like a cola bottle) the extra gas can blow up a balloon!

How do you pick up a jar of rice with only a pencil?

When you first get your jar full of rice all the grains will have lots of gaps between them, full of air. As you push the pencil into the rice, the grains are forced out of the way and will begin to form more ordered arrangements, which reduces the air spaces in the jar. Eventually, the level of rice will drop, as the grains become more and more compacted and closer together – that’s when you top up your jar. As you continue to force the pencil to the bottom of the jar, the friction between the grains of rice, the jar and the pencil increase even more – so much so that eventually (after some perseverance) the force of friction will equal the weight of the jar and the rice. And, hey presto! You’ve lifted the jar!

Using cabbage as a pH indicator.

pH is a measurement of how acidic a solution is – an acid is something with a sour taste, and it has an excess of hydrogen ions (H+). An alkali (also known as a base) has an excess of hydroxide ions (OH-). To learn more about the reactions that happen when you combine the two check out Kay’s blog! Red cabbage has a pigment, or colouring, in it called Flavin. This gives it its purpley-red colour, and is also what can tell you whether something is an acid or alkali. Flavin reacts differently to the amount of H+ ions in a solution, and will turn pink in acids and blue/blue-green in alkalis. You can use it to test out anything you might have at home and even produce a pH scale of your own – showing the range from strong acid, though neutral (the colour doesn’t change), all the way to strong alkali!

 

Oobleck

If you visited us at Green Man Festival I’m sure you won’t have missed the gloopy mixture we had outside… that was Oobleck. Technically speaking Oobleck is a non-Newtonian fluid. This means it doesn’t act like a ‘normal’ fluid, and doesn’t obey the laws that Newton said all fluids should. These are that they would only respond to temperature (freezing water makes a solid; heating up honey makes it more runny) and pressure (squeezing water out of a water pistol moves it faster). Oobleck also responds to shear forces – when you apply sudden and hard force it behaves like a solid, but when you are gentle with it, it acts like a liquid.

So what is going on – how is it that you can punch it, yet your hand will sink into it if you do it slowly? It’s all about the mixture of molecules in the Oobleck – cornflour and water (twice as much cornflour as water). When you are gentle, and use less force (pouring the Oobleck, or sinking your hand into it)  the water molecules can move freely between the cornflour molecules, and they act as a lubricant so it flows like a liquid.  When you apply hard, quick force (by hitting or rolling it) the water molecules can’t fill the gaps, meaning the cornflour molecules are pushed together and friction increases – the Oobleck gets stiffer and acts more like a solid.

What else acts like this? Quicksand for one – that’s why the advice is never to struggle if you’re waist-deep in it – you’ll end up causing it to act like a solid and get even more stuck! Oobleck and quicksand are actually thickening non-Newtonian fluids. Thinning ones are those that become more liquid-y when force is applied – a few examples are paint, toothpaste and ketchup (that’s why tapping the neck of the bottle will release the ketchup!).

It’s not just for fun either – thickening non-Newtonian fluids are also useful. A special kind is being tested in body armour – the way it reacts to sudden force makes it perfect for absorbing the impact of a bullet better than standard vests! It’s also used in the transmissions of some 4×4 vehicles, like Land Rovers, to transfer power between the front and rear wheels when the primary driving wheels start to slip.

And, if you were wondering, the name has been taken from the Dr. Seuss book ‘Bartholomew and the Oobleck’, where King Didd tells his servants he is bored of the same rain, snow, sun and fog and tells them to add some variety to the weather. The result is that sticky green Oobleck falls from the sky and buries everything. It is only when Bartholomew tells him to say “Sorry” that the Oobleck stops falling!

Einstein’s Kitchen was an amazing experience, but it would have been nothing without the budding scientists – both the adults and the kids – who came to our stall and participated in all of our activities. I hope we’ve encouraged everyone to think about how much science there is all around them, and to give some of it a try again at home!

Sweetie Chromatography by Jenna

Posted on by
Reply

The Science Brainwaves crew ventured to the Brecon Beacons last week, to take SCIENCE to the unknowing festival goers of Green Man 2010.

Communicating science through the tasty medium of food, the Science Brainwaves team worked up a scientific feast of dry-ice ice cream, DNA extraction, chromatography, fermentation of yeast, non-Newtonian fluids, acid-base reactions, LEDs lit by lemons and our favourite pH indicator red cabbage.

Experiments available in Einstein’s Kitchen at Green Man Festival were:-

  • Dry-ice Ice cream
  • Extraction of DNA from Strawberries
  • Sweetie Chromatography
  • Oobleck (non-Newtonian fluids)
  • A pot of Baking Soda Volcano
  • Coke and Mentos Balloons
  • Acid-Base Indicator (Red Cabbage)
  • Lemon powered lights
  • Picking up a jar of rice with a pencil
  • Yeast Balloons

My main experiment was Sweetie Chromatography, where we separated out the colours of sweets and felt-tips using a technique known as Chromatography.

Chromatography is a method for separating mixtures. The name chromatography comes from the greek chroma- meaning “colour” and graphein- meaning “to write”. Sweetie chromatography used the paper chromatography form of chromatography. The experiment involved the separation of the sweetie colour mixtures by the mobile phase, which in our case was acetone (but other liquids could be used as a solvent such as water, ethanol, nail-varnish remover). The mobile phase was taken up the stationary phase (Whatman filter paper, alternatively coffee filter paper could be used) which separates out the different pigments of colour which make up the sweetie colour.

Visually the aspiring scientists in Einstein’s Kitchen could see the acetone being pulled up the filter paper, bringing with it the colours of the sweets and felt tips.

The take home scientific principle from this experiment is the term molecular solubility. The more soluble [which refers to the how much a substance (in this case the different colours) are capable of being dissolved in a solvent (in this case acetone)] the colour is in the solvent (acetone) the higher up the filter paper it will be deposited. The least soluble colours were deposited at the lowest level on the filter paper.

There were lots of things I enjoyed about the sweetie chromatography but my favourite thing has to be the look on every persons face when they returned to pick up their chromatogram (name given to filter paper once chromatography complete) that look of amazement, surprise and happiness all rolled into one. Proof again that when presented in the right way Science really can be fun.

Stay tuned for further blogs on Einstein’s Kitchen experiments.

Einstein’s Kitchen – Food for Thought!

Posted on by
Reply

The Brecon Beacons were the beautiful setting for a music festival called Green Man which happened the weekend of the 20-23rd of August 2010, and the unlikely place to find scientists brewing up fun!

Science Brainwaves, not ones to turn down the chance to get science out to everyone they could, packed up a Transit van and drove the 186 miles to set up a stall called Einstein’s Kitchen in the area of the Green Man festival called Einstien’s Garden (…can you see the link?). Einstein’s Kitchen had a number of different experiments running at various times to get across the basic principles of biology, chemistry and physics to the sodden festival-goers (it may have rained just a wee bit…). All of these experiments were based on things easily found in the kitchen cupboard. Things included using lemons as batteries, Strawberry DNA extractions, sweetie chromatography, dry-ice ice cream, using a cabbage to detect pH, Oobleck, bicarbonate of soda and vinegar volcanos, and more!

If you were lucky enough to attend the festival and had a go at some experiments at our stall then this blog will, for now, be the place to find all the info you need to recreate the experiments in your own kitchen! If you couldn’t get to the festival, then don’t worry! Hopefully you’ll be able to get a feel for the event from our photos and reports. We’ll be sticking up all the information sheets and posters we had there so you can give it all a go yourself! You never know, we may well be taking a new and improved Einstein’s Kitchen to other places… keep your eyes peeled! In the mean time, enjoy!

If you have any comments at all then please, do email/comment/go on our forums!

Lots of science love!

The Science Brainwaves Team

Einstein’s Kitchen

Posted on by
Reply

Wow… what a weekend!

It may have rained solidly, but I for one really enjoyed taking science to the revellers at the Green Man festival in Wales!

It was messy, it was informative but most of all it was fun! We even spread the science love (by sticking ‘I heart science’ stickers on to just about everything and everyone)!

 

I’ve just set up a blog to feature all of the Einstein’s Kitchen info – how to carry out the experiments yourself, pictures and reports about the event that all the other Brainwaves team will be contributing to, so go have a look – it will be growing with info as time goes on, but we’re working on giving it it’s own entire section on the website, so keep your eyes peeled.

As it turns out, this may well be the first of many outings that Einstein’s Kitchen makes, and I for one and very excited about it!

 

See you next year, Green Man!

Disease threatens regional extinction of little brown bats

Posted on by

Claire Tree-Booker

 

White-nose syndrome, a fungal disease affecting hibernating bats, has caused the death of around one million little brown bats in North America, describe scientists in the journal Science.

The disease-causing fungus, known as Geomyces destructans, causes early arousal from hibernation in these bats, which results in them using up their crucial fat reserves. The fungus is thought to thrive in the damp, dark conditions in the caves where little brown bats hibernate.

Many bats hibernate in groups of up to half a million, meaning that the fungus, which grows on the bats’ exposed wings and noses, can spread very easily.

The researchers think that the disease was carried to North America by humans travelling from Europe; Dr Kunz, leading the team, said that the disease was first discovered in a New York cave that was frequently visited by tourists.

Following analysis of data collected from bat colonies over 17 years, the scientists calculated that the fungus kills approximately 73% of bats in a colony once infection has occurred.

They conclude that little brown bats in North America could be extinct within the next 16 years.

This study only investigated the effects of white-nose syndrome in little brown bats, but at least seven species, including the northern long-eared bat and the tri-coloured bat, are affected by the disease.

Dr Kunz said “this is only the tip of the iceberg in terms of what we’re likely to see in the next several years”.

If little brown bats become extinct, it could have a huge impact on ecosystems, as many of these insects are agricultural pests, bats are essential to keep their numbers down. Dr Kunz said “a single bat can eat half its bodyweight in insects in one night”.

The researchers say that this decline of a common bat species highlights the need for increased research and monitoring of wildlife diseases.

 

Original article: An Emerging Disease Causes Regional Population Collapse of a Common North American Bat Species. Winifred F. Frick, Jacob F. Pollock, Alan C. Hicks, Kate E. Langwig, D. Scott Reynolds, Gregory G. Turner, Calvin M. Butchkoski, and Thomas H. Kunz. Science 6 August 2010: 679-682. 

 

Analysing Brainwaves

Posted on by
1

 

Everything we see, hear and touch is processed by our brains. Every time we experience something the neurons in our brains start to fire and emit little pulses of electrical activity. All of these millions of tiny neurons fire in a systematic way in big chains of networks. Different parts of networks communicate with each other so that we can interpret all of the complex stimuli that are entering our senses every second.

Of course, everyone’s brain interprets the world in a slightly different way but there are also many similarities. Understanding the processes that go on in the brain and how the networks of neurons work can help us to understand and predict behaviour.




One way of working out how all of these processes work is to measure brain activity by recording the electrical signals produced when neurons fire – when we are thinking. This can be done using electroencephalography (EEG) equipment. This technique involves wearing a big net of recording devices that measure the electrical activity that is going on in your brain. In Sheffield, we have state of the art equipment which contains 128 extremely sensitive recording channels. This technique is absolutely fantastic for working out the exact timing of the processes that go on in the brain. Recordings are typically taken 250 times each second. Now, just imagine how much data you get from 128 recording sites taking readings 250 times each second – phew! Thankfully, we have computer programs to process this data but even with our really powerful computers, some types of analyses may need to be run overnight.


Here are some examples of what electrical activity in the brain can look like. Certain things we do produce very distinctive signals. A big peak is usually produced by blinking. We can also usually see swallows or other small movements in the EEG signal.

 

We can also tell how alert someone is. If someone is nearly falling asleep they start producing a lot of alpha frequency signal (about 10Hz) which produces a very distinctive signal. If this happens, we know we’ve produced a very boring experiment!


The EEG studies that we are running at the moment mainly investigate different aspects of attention. We are looking at the brain’s very early response to seeing a new stimulus. We can see changes in brainwaves as soon as 0.1 seconds after things appear, if not before. We are also trying to understand how the brain puts together information about different features, such as colour and shape.


Here is an example of some data we recorded from one of our volunteers.

This is the average waveform produced from hundreds of trials recorded from site 62.

Below are scalp maps showing different time points in the trials

 


We are always looking for volunteers to participate in our studies to try to understand more about how the brain works. If you are interested in finding out more, get in touch and we’ll let you know if we have any studies suitable for you to participate in right now. The EEG lab at Sheffield is run by Dr Elizabeth Milne who also runs the Autism Research Lab. Other researchers in the lab are Dr Megan Freeth, Tom Bullock, Cigir Kalfaoglu and Mandeep Jabbal.

If you would like to participate in one of our studies, get in touch with us at the Sheffield Autism Research Lab.