Physiological adaptations

The Giant Squids the unknown phantom of the sea.  It's a very elusive animal that has been scarcely seen throughout history.  Recently, new dissections and computer models have offered a lead in the mystery as to why the squid's eyeballs are soccer ball-sized and are three times wider than any other animals.  Scientists believe that the squid's eyeballs size is a evolutionary trait that stemmed from their need to avoid capture by the Sperm Whale.  The Sperm Whale is the Giant Squid's greatest predator.  It's believed that the eyes evolved to see bioluminescent trails of light left by sperm whales. Additionally, the colossal squid would be able to recognize a sperm whale from 120 meters away.

The study of a squid's physiology can offer insight into other adaptive sight measures taken by other animals.  Maybe our eyes evolved to help us protect against predators.  It's also interesting to note that the energy need to run the neurons for their eyes was a significant amount.  More research will have to be done in order to fully understand the physiological structures of the giant squid.

Mapping the Brain

From a glance, the brain may seem like an extremely complex structure with nerve endings strung out everywhere.  However, a recent study that included mapping the white matter of the brain shows that the connections in the brain are actually highly organized.  White matter is the bundle of nerve fibers that allow different brain regions to communicate and coordinate with one another.  The fibers form a grid-like structure which neatly blended together and are not a jumbled mess.  Scientists believe the reason for the way of growth is due to chemical signals that guide axon growth during brain development.  Additionally, it appeared that the grids were most regular in deep brain structures including neural pathways that were involved in emotion and memory.  Although scientists speculate that the grid-like structure exists, they are not a hundred percent certain and more testing needs to be completed.

The mapping of the human brain is a monumental achievement.  The development of the white-matter network in children could eventually one day help to provide insight into neurological conditions such as autism and other mental complications.

Speed Up Your Metabolism and Clean Up Your Body..Through Exercise?

According to recent research, it has been discovered that exercise is the quickest way to purge the insides of your cells of all the unwanted debris that accumulates there over time. “Broken or misshapen proteins, shreds of cellular membranes, invasive viruses or bacteria, and worn-out, broken-down cellular components, like aged mitochondria, the tiny organelles within cells that produce energy”, all add up over time and end up producing this “trash heap” that needs to be removed. Cells clear away this debris and even use it to give them energy through a “self-eating” process called autophagy. The cell creates special membranes that collect all the matter in the cytoplasm and then carry it to the cells lysosome which breaks apart this matter and uses it for energy. Scientists have found that malfunctions in this system of autophagy can lead to many diseases and may even be a great contributing factor in aging. Autophagy increases in situations of physiological stress such as exercise. So an experiment was run in order to see the connection between autophagy and exercise and how these two activities benefit the body as a whole. The first strain of mice had normal levels of autophagy but when they were forced to run, within 30 min, their levels of autophagy level increases greatly. The second strain of mice was altered to ensure that their level of autophagy would not increase in stressful situations but is otherwise normal. When both mice were set up to run the altered mice who couldn't increase their levels of autophagy quickly became tired and weak. The scientists also discovered that when put on a fatty diet the normal mice were able to alter their diabetic effects through exercise whereas the altered mice were not able to do so. This finding shows that exercise can increase levels of autophagy which can in turn clean your cell faster, making you healthier and stronger!

Link to the Article

Building a Melanoma Vaccine

Researches have recently trained mouse immune systems to eradicate skin cancer from within. They use genetic combination of human DNA from melanoma cells and a cousin of the rabies virus. The strategy used is called cancer immunotherapy. It uses a genetically engineered version of the virus to deliver a lot of genes derived from melanoma cancer cells directly into tumors. In the mice studies 60 percent of tumor-burdened mice were cured in less than three months! Building caner vaccines from tumor DNA is beneficial because tumors can adapt to the repeated attacks of a healthy immune system and display fewer antigens. While cancers can learn to hide from a normal immune system, it appears unable to escape an immune system trained by the DNA. I found this interesting because if scientists continue to work with this hopefully they can improve it and come up with a sure cure for melanoma cancer. This would help thousands of people, especially now a days since the sun is getting stronger.

Key to immune system could lie in the cheek!

A team led by Professor Phil Stephens in the School of Dentistry have performed an experiment and found out a group of new cells that "suppress the immune systems" function. The cardiff scientists have believed that the new cells that are created will help with the disorders of the immune system. They initially took cheek cells of the patients and cloned them. Then looking at the lab results they figured even a small amount could inhibit the lymphocytes in the immune system. The overall breakthrough of the experiment shows that cheeks cells have the potential for future immune system therapies.


I was intrigued by the results of this particular experiment because its quite amazing how cheeks cells can have such a potential to function in other parts of our body. I mean now cheeks cells are helping fight off diseases? How amazing is that? Maybe this might spark a new light in finding the cure for cancer as well. 

Global Warming Effect On Transpiration

New research shows the global warming potential of carbon dioxide (CO2), which is the main greenhouse gas is underestimated as a climate change affect with plants. It was researched that plants "sweat" less when surrounded by more CO2. This means that plants lose less water when exposed to higher levels of CO2, which makes the surrounding air warmer. A team from The Indian Institute of Science showed that Higher CO2 levels make stomata, tiny pores on plant leaves open less widely and lose less water through transpiration that cools the surrounding air. Less transpiration means less cooling and this impacts global climate change. This also shows how plants have a big part in global warming because it reduces plant transpiration. I find the piece interesting how too much CO2 can cause a drastic effect on the environment in many different ways.

Drug may be near for cancer's companion condition cachexia

      This article was about the disorder that often is linked with cancer called cachexia. Cachexia is the muscle wasting and weight lost that often accompanies cancer patients. people with Cachexia lose about 5% of their weight in the period of 6 months. 90% of oncologists deny cachexia patients because there is no known treatment. Cachexia is especially prevelent advanced cancer patients, but also affects HIV, liver failure, and heart failure patients. But now two treatments that  boost muscle strength are in phase three clinical trials. This medication would boost the muscle strength of patients which would help them not lose weight due to cachexia. Scientists don't know for sure but they believe that this treatment will prolong cancer patients' lives.
      I liked this article because I had never even heard of Cachexia before. It's terrible to think about becaue fighting cancer must be hard enough, I never knew that people also had to worry about drastic weight loss. I hope that this treatment eventually hits shelves, and is safe. I think this medication might be useful for an array of things, and maybe not only cachexia. hopefully the drug would help terminally ill people live longer.