My my, we've come a long way. I'm actually pretty surprised we've made it this far, and I want to thank my readership for sticking with me and checking in now and again. Unfortunately, with finals season upon us, I'm going to have to take a little bit of a hiatus to help my significant other with her studies. When I have free time, I'll continue to work on the blog, and we'll be resuming regularly scheduled content by 5/16/14, so be sure to check back in by then. As I head into the break, I'd like to take this opportunity to step outside of my typical bounds and share some thoughts; no evidence, no citations.
Working as a Paramedic, I, along with my co-workers, see people living at the very extremes of life. A common day for us involves several worst days of other people's entire lives, be it simply due to back pain, or due to a stroke permanently disabling a loved one in one swift, unpredictable moment of terror. I'm getting very near to my four year anniversary working in this field, and I feel that's long enough to be able to share some thoughts and observations on the field.
The list of observations could, if allowed, occupy several posts, elaborating on various phenomena such as the observation that it's only ever the bad guys that want a hug after something goes down. I could speak about all the people that imagine our jobs as being as bloody and violent as a frontline deployment (really, it's best described as hours or boredom peppered with moments of sheer, unadultered terror), the people who ask me if I've ever seen people die, or simply assume that I see it on a daily basis. Today, we're only going to focus on one, the one that I, personally, find the scariest- silence.
A lot of people imagine our scariest scenes being those that are filled with flames, screaming, and blood. The truth is that, in general terms, if you're healthy enough to be screaming and writhing in pain, you'll live to see the hospital. Really, there's a profound terror that can be found in walking into a scene that should be loud, people should be screaming at you, but they're silent. Imagine, if you will, a little old lady gasping for air, and making no sound; a child hit by a truck, not screaming, but moaning; a middle aged man, complaining of chest pain earlier, now silent and slumped forward on the couch; approaching a middle aged woman involved in a car crash who's silent and not moving. These are all just tastes of the kind of terror that silence can bring in the prehospital field.
Sometimes, it's not the presence of something that serves to terrify, sometimes it's the absence. On that note, we'll see you back here on 5/16. Feel free to leave questions, comments, and concerns here, I'll be happy to read them.
Friday, April 25, 2014
Friday, April 18, 2014
Don't fear the NEIDL
The National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratory (NEIDL) is a $200 million dollar public health laboratory in Boston, Mass, operated by Boston University. They preform research on multiple pathogens of significant concern to public health, including Tuberculosis, which is a mounting problem in the face of the HIV and antibiotic resistance epidemics. The only problem with their laboratory is that a whole section of it- the Biohazard Safety Level 4 (BSL 4) lab- has never operated in its designed capacity due to multiple legal hurdles the NEIDL had to clear in order to prove that it was safe. First, they were required to prove that their operation was safe, and their security and biosafety measures were deemed effective by an outside company. After that, the NEIDL won a legal suit, in which a judge deemed that their biosafety measures were adequate for safe operation in south Boston. For a better idea of their security and biosafety measures, you can watch a video tour of the BSL-4 facilities at link [1]. At a glance, however, this should give you some idea of their security- if there's a fire, the fire department doesn't get in without being stopped at the gates and individually ID'd and cross-referenced to their list of Boston city firemen. If the power goes out and the negative pressure system fails, all air from the lab is drawn through multiple custom HEPA filters to remove any particulate. On top of the security and engineering controls, the facility operates under the direct supervision of the Boston Public Health, and the CDC.
Now, having cleared all other hurdles, the NEIDL is coming under fire from Boston city council member Charles Yancey, who wants to pass a city ordinance banning BSL-4 research. After all, who wants that sort of research going on in their back yard? What if there's a release? Of course, this sort of NIMBYism (Not In My Back Yard) fails to account for other sites, such as the CDC campus in downtown Atlanta, that have successfully operated BSL-4 facilities for years without a single problem. In fact, there are six BSL-4 labs in operation across the country right now, with seven more planned or under construction, with no reportable incidents yet. In fact, with about 3,000 Americans dying every year from foodborne illness, you're roughly 3,000 times more likely (more than that, since the number of BSL4 releases in the US is actually zero, not one) to be killed by a pathogen from your local fast food operation than you are to be killed by some exotic disease that somehow managed to slip through the NEIDL's biosafety measures. [3][4]
What's more is that Mr. Yancey is calling for this ban without accepting multiple offers on the NEIDL's part to give him a tour. So, the next question is, could Mr. Yancey actually succeed here? Unfortunately, the answer is yes. In 2002, shortly after the 9/11 attacks and Anthrax bioterrorism incidents, UC Davis attempted to get permission to build a BSL-4 laboratory. This attempt was subsequently rejected by the community, and the attempt was shut down for little more reason than unfounded fear, much like the situation in Boston. [5]
So what do we lose if the NEIDL is shut down? We lose out on another BSL-4 facility that could preform vital, life-saving research on emerging and clinically important pathogens in a safe setting. If we already had two dozen of these labs, it wouldn't be too big of a deal, but the fact is that we've only got six in operation now, so a seventh lab could actually mean a significant increase in clinical progress in treating globally important infections. Tired of big government waste? You're looking at it right here- a multimillion dollar public health lab being threatened because some politicians think these viruses are scary, not for any reason that's evidence based. So, what can you do? You can share this article with your friends (PLEASE share, if you ever share one of my articles, let it be this one), spread the word about what's going on in Boston, and sign this petition. http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/let-the-bsl-4-lab-open
Together, we can save the NEIDL. Together, we can save SCIENCE!
[5]http://daviswiki.org/Biosafety_Level_4_Laboratory
[4]http://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/cdc-and-food-safety.html
[3]http://www.fas.org/programs/bio/research.html
[2]http://www.bu.edu/today/2014/researchers-cite-experts-findings-of-neidl-safety/
[1]http://www.twiv.tv/threading-the-neidl/
Now, having cleared all other hurdles, the NEIDL is coming under fire from Boston city council member Charles Yancey, who wants to pass a city ordinance banning BSL-4 research. After all, who wants that sort of research going on in their back yard? What if there's a release? Of course, this sort of NIMBYism (Not In My Back Yard) fails to account for other sites, such as the CDC campus in downtown Atlanta, that have successfully operated BSL-4 facilities for years without a single problem. In fact, there are six BSL-4 labs in operation across the country right now, with seven more planned or under construction, with no reportable incidents yet. In fact, with about 3,000 Americans dying every year from foodborne illness, you're roughly 3,000 times more likely (more than that, since the number of BSL4 releases in the US is actually zero, not one) to be killed by a pathogen from your local fast food operation than you are to be killed by some exotic disease that somehow managed to slip through the NEIDL's biosafety measures. [3][4]
What's more is that Mr. Yancey is calling for this ban without accepting multiple offers on the NEIDL's part to give him a tour. So, the next question is, could Mr. Yancey actually succeed here? Unfortunately, the answer is yes. In 2002, shortly after the 9/11 attacks and Anthrax bioterrorism incidents, UC Davis attempted to get permission to build a BSL-4 laboratory. This attempt was subsequently rejected by the community, and the attempt was shut down for little more reason than unfounded fear, much like the situation in Boston. [5]
So what do we lose if the NEIDL is shut down? We lose out on another BSL-4 facility that could preform vital, life-saving research on emerging and clinically important pathogens in a safe setting. If we already had two dozen of these labs, it wouldn't be too big of a deal, but the fact is that we've only got six in operation now, so a seventh lab could actually mean a significant increase in clinical progress in treating globally important infections. Tired of big government waste? You're looking at it right here- a multimillion dollar public health lab being threatened because some politicians think these viruses are scary, not for any reason that's evidence based. So, what can you do? You can share this article with your friends (PLEASE share, if you ever share one of my articles, let it be this one), spread the word about what's going on in Boston, and sign this petition. http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/let-the-bsl-4-lab-open
Together, we can save the NEIDL. Together, we can save SCIENCE!
[5]http://daviswiki.org/Biosafety_Level_4_Laboratory
[4]http://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/cdc-and-food-safety.html
[3]http://www.fas.org/programs/bio/research.html
[2]http://www.bu.edu/today/2014/researchers-cite-experts-findings-of-neidl-safety/
[1]http://www.twiv.tv/threading-the-neidl/
Friday, April 11, 2014
Tapeworms
Right now, you're probably picturing a long, white, segmented, flat worm burrowing into the side of someone's intestines. Some of you probably picture hapless campers eating undercooked fish, or yuppies who don't know any better eating Sushi. Others among you may, perhaps, think that the worms are obtained from eating undercooked beef or pork. Some of you probably even imagine these worms burrowing into someone's brain. None of you are wrong- but then, you're not exactly right, either.
You see, there's not just one tapeworm that can get into people, each with their own special life cycle and possible pathogenic effects. Some of the most common tapeworms found in people are: Bovine tapeworm, Porcine Tapeworm, Fish tapeworm, and Dog tapeworm. The Bovine tapeworm is actually benign in Humans (though quite pathogenic for cattle), except in rare cases where bowel obstruction may occur- the worm, "knowing" that it's in a human, sits in your upper small intestine and simply takes a very small portion of your meals to sustain itself. You won't lose weight, contrary to popular myth, and you will likely never know if you are infested. Occasionally, a worm segment will detach and be shed from your body, ideally shedding the egg-filled segment in a grassy area where the eggs will subsequently be consumed by a cow. Once in the cow, conformational changes in the eggs occur as they pass through each of the cow's four stomachs (which is what prevents them hatching in a human) which cause them to hatch. The juvenile worms then proceed out through the intestinal wall and burrow into the cow's various bodily tissues, including muscle, organ, and brain. Once there, the worms remain dormant until the cow is slaughtered and consumed- in this case, by a human who failed to cook the meat thoroughly enough to kill the juvenile worm- completing the life cycle.[1]
As creepy as Bovine tapeworms are, they're the most benign of the various tapeworms. The next worm we'll look at is the fish tapeworm. As with the cow tapeworm, the fish tapeworm infests its host through ingestion of the juvenile stage in undercooked meat. Disease from the fish tapeworm is rare, but it can cause bowel obstruction and, in very rare cases, liver and gall bladder disease. Also, this is the largest among the tapeworms that can infest humans, growing up to thirty feet in length. Sushi lovers need not despair! The fish tapeworm has only ever been found in freshwater fish, and can be readily killed by freezing the meat. Just cook your freshwater fish, and you'll be fine. [2]
The dog tapeworm is a special cycle, where infestation of humans is a complete accident, as far as we can tell. Taenia Hydatigena, which sheds an infectious stage in canine stool, can be ingested by various mammals- typically sheep- and people. Once consumed, the worm leaves the intestine, and forms a large cyst in the abdominal cavity, where it produces more larvae and hides from the intermediate host's immune system while it's waiting for the host- and therefor, the cyst- to be eaten by a dog. If the cyst is ruptured prematurely, such as by abdominal trauma, many thousands of larvae can be released into the abdominal cavity. In Humans, the immune system can recognize the worm from the initial, infectious encounter, which can lead to the sudden onset of anaphylaxis and death subsequent to the worms' release into the abdominal cavity. Failing the rupture of the cyst, you could live a full and healthy life with this worm and be none the wiser. [3]
The Piece de Resistance here is the porcine tapeworm- Taenia Solium. The intent of the porcine tapeworm's life cycle is suspected to be much like that of the bovine worm's, in that the worm exists as a cyst-encased juvenile stage in the various tissues of a pig's body, waiting for consumption by a human. Once consumed, the juvenile develops into a fully fledged worm in the intestines of a human, and sheds eggs to be consumed by pigs. The really scary part about this worm is one of the few things that we'll go over here that's genuinely terrifying- the worm's eggs cannot tell the difference between a human gut tract and a porcine gut tract. If you were to eat bovine tapeworm eggs, no disease would develop. If, however, you were to consume porcine tapeworm eggs because, say, a restaurant chef who is infested didn't wash their hands after they had a stool, the eggs would hatch, and you would develop Cysticercosis (the juvenile stage of the worm in your various tissues). One famous form of this is Neurocysticercosis, where you actually develop juvenile stage worm cysts in your brain, potentially with pathogenic effects, including seizures, headaches, confusion, excess fluid on the brain, difficulty maintaining balance, and death (severity dependent on the number of cysts). What makes it scary is that its epidemiology is subtle and hard to avoid- it's not somebody sneezing, pouring blood out of every pore, or eating undercooked meat; it's as easy as someone else not washing their hands.[4][5][6]
So what can you do? WASH YOUR FILTHY MEAT HOOKS. Washing your hands regularly and after you use the bathroom is how you can help prevent the spread of almost every transmissible disease. There are medications you can take that will treat tapeworm infestation, so see your practitioner if you suspect that you're infected. Make sure that you cook all your meat thoroughly before consumption. As always, you can help by sharing what you've learned here (and sharing the facebook post it rode in on), doing your own research, and supporting those who support science! If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, feel free to leave them on the blog here, or ask me on the facebook post.
[1]http://bioweb.uwlax.edu/bio203/s2009/temanson_caro/Life%20Cycle.htm
[2]http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/diphyllobothrium/
[3]http://www.vetsonline.com/publications/veterinary-times/archives/n-43-46/cysticercosisa-a-controlling-tapeworm-in-dogs-and-sheep.html
[4]http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/taeniasis/biology.html
[5]http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/cysticercosis/disease.html
[6]http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/cysticercosis/
You see, there's not just one tapeworm that can get into people, each with their own special life cycle and possible pathogenic effects. Some of the most common tapeworms found in people are: Bovine tapeworm, Porcine Tapeworm, Fish tapeworm, and Dog tapeworm. The Bovine tapeworm is actually benign in Humans (though quite pathogenic for cattle), except in rare cases where bowel obstruction may occur- the worm, "knowing" that it's in a human, sits in your upper small intestine and simply takes a very small portion of your meals to sustain itself. You won't lose weight, contrary to popular myth, and you will likely never know if you are infested. Occasionally, a worm segment will detach and be shed from your body, ideally shedding the egg-filled segment in a grassy area where the eggs will subsequently be consumed by a cow. Once in the cow, conformational changes in the eggs occur as they pass through each of the cow's four stomachs (which is what prevents them hatching in a human) which cause them to hatch. The juvenile worms then proceed out through the intestinal wall and burrow into the cow's various bodily tissues, including muscle, organ, and brain. Once there, the worms remain dormant until the cow is slaughtered and consumed- in this case, by a human who failed to cook the meat thoroughly enough to kill the juvenile worm- completing the life cycle.[1]
As creepy as Bovine tapeworms are, they're the most benign of the various tapeworms. The next worm we'll look at is the fish tapeworm. As with the cow tapeworm, the fish tapeworm infests its host through ingestion of the juvenile stage in undercooked meat. Disease from the fish tapeworm is rare, but it can cause bowel obstruction and, in very rare cases, liver and gall bladder disease. Also, this is the largest among the tapeworms that can infest humans, growing up to thirty feet in length. Sushi lovers need not despair! The fish tapeworm has only ever been found in freshwater fish, and can be readily killed by freezing the meat. Just cook your freshwater fish, and you'll be fine. [2]
The dog tapeworm is a special cycle, where infestation of humans is a complete accident, as far as we can tell. Taenia Hydatigena, which sheds an infectious stage in canine stool, can be ingested by various mammals- typically sheep- and people. Once consumed, the worm leaves the intestine, and forms a large cyst in the abdominal cavity, where it produces more larvae and hides from the intermediate host's immune system while it's waiting for the host- and therefor, the cyst- to be eaten by a dog. If the cyst is ruptured prematurely, such as by abdominal trauma, many thousands of larvae can be released into the abdominal cavity. In Humans, the immune system can recognize the worm from the initial, infectious encounter, which can lead to the sudden onset of anaphylaxis and death subsequent to the worms' release into the abdominal cavity. Failing the rupture of the cyst, you could live a full and healthy life with this worm and be none the wiser. [3]
The Piece de Resistance here is the porcine tapeworm- Taenia Solium. The intent of the porcine tapeworm's life cycle is suspected to be much like that of the bovine worm's, in that the worm exists as a cyst-encased juvenile stage in the various tissues of a pig's body, waiting for consumption by a human. Once consumed, the juvenile develops into a fully fledged worm in the intestines of a human, and sheds eggs to be consumed by pigs. The really scary part about this worm is one of the few things that we'll go over here that's genuinely terrifying- the worm's eggs cannot tell the difference between a human gut tract and a porcine gut tract. If you were to eat bovine tapeworm eggs, no disease would develop. If, however, you were to consume porcine tapeworm eggs because, say, a restaurant chef who is infested didn't wash their hands after they had a stool, the eggs would hatch, and you would develop Cysticercosis (the juvenile stage of the worm in your various tissues). One famous form of this is Neurocysticercosis, where you actually develop juvenile stage worm cysts in your brain, potentially with pathogenic effects, including seizures, headaches, confusion, excess fluid on the brain, difficulty maintaining balance, and death (severity dependent on the number of cysts). What makes it scary is that its epidemiology is subtle and hard to avoid- it's not somebody sneezing, pouring blood out of every pore, or eating undercooked meat; it's as easy as someone else not washing their hands.[4][5][6]
So what can you do? WASH YOUR FILTHY MEAT HOOKS. Washing your hands regularly and after you use the bathroom is how you can help prevent the spread of almost every transmissible disease. There are medications you can take that will treat tapeworm infestation, so see your practitioner if you suspect that you're infected. Make sure that you cook all your meat thoroughly before consumption. As always, you can help by sharing what you've learned here (and sharing the facebook post it rode in on), doing your own research, and supporting those who support science! If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, feel free to leave them on the blog here, or ask me on the facebook post.
[1]http://bioweb.uwlax.edu/bio203/s2009/temanson_caro/Life%20Cycle.htm
[2]http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/diphyllobothrium/
[3]http://www.vetsonline.com/publications/veterinary-times/archives/n-43-46/cysticercosisa-a-controlling-tapeworm-in-dogs-and-sheep.html
[4]http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/taeniasis/biology.html
[5]http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/cysticercosis/disease.html
[6]http://www.cdc.gov/parasites/cysticercosis/
Friday, April 4, 2014
Humanity
The tides of real life have kept me pretty occupied lately, so instead of completely compromising on the quality of an article, I'm going to share something that I think everyone needs to watch in order to be a citizen of the world. At the time, Charlie Chaplain was trying to urge the US government to abandon its policy of appeasement towards Nazi Germany with his movie "The Great Dictator", but his words remain just as applicable today. Enjoy the video, please share it with a friend, we'll see you next week.
Friday, March 28, 2014
YOUR SOUL
No, seriously. For the most part, science tends to skirt around questions of the metaphysical for a plethora of reasons. No small cause of this is the likelihood that people really won't like the answer science would arrive at, no matter what that answer may be. See the science denialism post for more on that. Another large factor in the lack of scientific research on the metaphysical is a guiding principle that science cannot ever definitively prove a negative result. No matter how much money you spend, zoologists and hunters you employ, aerial thermal sweeps your preform, and woodland cameras you set up, you cannot prove that Bigfoot doesn't exist- you can only say that there's an overwhelming lack of evidence in the face of volumes of research to support bigfoot's existence, therefor, it is highly plausible that bigfoot does not, at the time of this research, exist in the regions surveyed. Shorthand: in all likelihood, Bigfoot doesn't exist. There's an inherent trap in the science's negative result principle, in that someone could argue that Bigfoot sensed the hunters and Zoologists coming and evaded them; Bigfoot's fur insulates its heat signature from thermal scans; Bigfoot's keen sense of smell alerted it to the presence of the cameras, which were contaminated with the odor of humans, thus leading Bigfoot to avoid photographic detection. Science, stretched for resources in manpower and money, must then ask which is more likely: that an eight foot tall manbeast with senses far keener than any other North American mammal is continuing to evade scientific detection in the face of thinning woodlands, or given that the only evidence present after years of searching is purely anecdotal, bigfoot doesn't exist? The simplest, and most likely, explanation is that Bigfoot doesn't exist, and as such, science dismisses arguments to the contrary, which plead for valuable resources that could be put to other, more fruitful causes.
So, when I say that little research has been done regarding the human soul, you should have some grasp of the background behind that statement. There is a unique exception, however, that you may have heard of in popular culture- the story of the soul weighing 21 grams. In 1901, one Duncan MacDougall had a hypothesis that the human soul had measurable mass, and that one might measure this mass by detecting its departure when the body died, as conventional wisdom holds that the soul doesn't stick around once the party's over in the body. To preform the measurements, MacDougall obtained an industrial scale allegedly sensitive to 2/10ths of an ounce, or about 5.7 grams, on which to weigh terminally ill patients and their beds before, during, and after the moment of death. His sample size was pretty small- only six patients, only four of whom produced a result. Now, according to the Wikipedia page (so take it for what it's worth), the average weight loss at the time of death was about 15 grams, or roughly three times the scale's sensitivity.
To date, to my knowledge, the experiment has not been repeated, and there is no peer-reviewed data regarding weight loss at time of death in any other literature anywhere, though there were some experiments where sheep tended to increase in mass immediately post-mortem. Some initial reactions to the data include that the patients may have lost fluid due to the relaxation of various sphincters at the time of death, to which one must acknowledge that the scale was weighing the patient and bed in totality, and that the transfer of various fluids from the patient to the bed would not have affected the total weight. The next counter-argument is that the loss of weight is due to the final exhalation at time of death. Assuming complete collapse of the lungs and complete ejection of total lung capacity (very unlikely), that would be, at best, a loss of about 7 liters of air. At 0 degrees Celsius and sea level altitude, one liter of air has a mass of 1.29 grams, so that should only account for about 9 grams- not that the expulsion of air would show up on the scale, but if it did, it wouldn't account for a range up to 21 grams. More scientific attacks on the experiment tend to come from the angle that the experiment wasn't methodologically sound- and they're right. The scale wasn't as sensitive as I would've personally (and as I'm sure others) liked it to be, and the sample size was horribly small, but that doesn't mean that Dougall didn't hit on something, it just means that data could be easily anomalous or skewed. I, personally, would like to see perhaps a meta-analysis a patient weights immediately pre-and-post mortem- that doesn't seem like something that would be too difficult to preform, given that most hospital beds have scales built into them these days.
So what was being lost? Well, it's hard to say for certain, but there's been some studies that suggest that data, in the form of information stored on discs, has weight.[1] When researchers measured data storage devices, like USB drives, CDs, and DVDs loaded with white noise recordings, the devices lost weight during the deletion of the media, and retained that weight loss for a period that generally seems to be about 30 minutes. In one case, the deletion of 2 GB of data from a flash drive, the loss of weight was measured at a milligram. According to the researchers, the weight is greater than expected due to loss of water, thermal excitement, and various other physical phenomena. So, was the weight loss memory loss from a dying brain? According to a Scientific American article I found, the brain is estimated to hold around 2.5 Petabytes of data, or 2,621,440 Gigabytes. Assuming the weight ratio of weight loss of roughly 1 milligram per every two gigabytes is both constant and conserved in the human brain, and that complete memory erasure occurred at the time of death, then the total weight loss should be 1,310,720 mg- that's 1.3 Kg, or just about 3 pounds, which is considerably more than MacDougall measured. Brain cell death is not immediately total, however, and goes on for give or take ten minutes after death- at least, that's the point at which irreversible brain death and damage occurs. So the weight loss may not have manifested immediately, but some part of it may, indeed, have been memory loss due to the death of brain cells post-mortem.
Unfortunately, this is pretty much where I've hit a dead end. I've rode the conjecture train as far as it can take us without leading us over a cliff to the land of make-believe and raw, unadultered speculation. Some will probably say that I've already run too far with this, but I found it too tantalizing not to explore. One has to wonder, supposing MacDougall's results were more than just artifact, what did he actually pick up on? Could science, some day, empirically measure a soul? We'll never know unless science gets more funding! So, support those who support science in the public arena! Donate to science organizations and projects. Grow your own knowledge, do your own research, draw your own conclusions, and share what you've learned here. As always, feel free to leave me any questions, comments, or suggestions.
[1]http://www.ece.tamu.edu/~noise/research_files/Memory_weight_FNL.pdf
[2]http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-is-the-memory-capacity/
So, when I say that little research has been done regarding the human soul, you should have some grasp of the background behind that statement. There is a unique exception, however, that you may have heard of in popular culture- the story of the soul weighing 21 grams. In 1901, one Duncan MacDougall had a hypothesis that the human soul had measurable mass, and that one might measure this mass by detecting its departure when the body died, as conventional wisdom holds that the soul doesn't stick around once the party's over in the body. To preform the measurements, MacDougall obtained an industrial scale allegedly sensitive to 2/10ths of an ounce, or about 5.7 grams, on which to weigh terminally ill patients and their beds before, during, and after the moment of death. His sample size was pretty small- only six patients, only four of whom produced a result. Now, according to the Wikipedia page (so take it for what it's worth), the average weight loss at the time of death was about 15 grams, or roughly three times the scale's sensitivity.
To date, to my knowledge, the experiment has not been repeated, and there is no peer-reviewed data regarding weight loss at time of death in any other literature anywhere, though there were some experiments where sheep tended to increase in mass immediately post-mortem. Some initial reactions to the data include that the patients may have lost fluid due to the relaxation of various sphincters at the time of death, to which one must acknowledge that the scale was weighing the patient and bed in totality, and that the transfer of various fluids from the patient to the bed would not have affected the total weight. The next counter-argument is that the loss of weight is due to the final exhalation at time of death. Assuming complete collapse of the lungs and complete ejection of total lung capacity (very unlikely), that would be, at best, a loss of about 7 liters of air. At 0 degrees Celsius and sea level altitude, one liter of air has a mass of 1.29 grams, so that should only account for about 9 grams- not that the expulsion of air would show up on the scale, but if it did, it wouldn't account for a range up to 21 grams. More scientific attacks on the experiment tend to come from the angle that the experiment wasn't methodologically sound- and they're right. The scale wasn't as sensitive as I would've personally (and as I'm sure others) liked it to be, and the sample size was horribly small, but that doesn't mean that Dougall didn't hit on something, it just means that data could be easily anomalous or skewed. I, personally, would like to see perhaps a meta-analysis a patient weights immediately pre-and-post mortem- that doesn't seem like something that would be too difficult to preform, given that most hospital beds have scales built into them these days.
So what was being lost? Well, it's hard to say for certain, but there's been some studies that suggest that data, in the form of information stored on discs, has weight.[1] When researchers measured data storage devices, like USB drives, CDs, and DVDs loaded with white noise recordings, the devices lost weight during the deletion of the media, and retained that weight loss for a period that generally seems to be about 30 minutes. In one case, the deletion of 2 GB of data from a flash drive, the loss of weight was measured at a milligram. According to the researchers, the weight is greater than expected due to loss of water, thermal excitement, and various other physical phenomena. So, was the weight loss memory loss from a dying brain? According to a Scientific American article I found, the brain is estimated to hold around 2.5 Petabytes of data, or 2,621,440 Gigabytes. Assuming the weight ratio of weight loss of roughly 1 milligram per every two gigabytes is both constant and conserved in the human brain, and that complete memory erasure occurred at the time of death, then the total weight loss should be 1,310,720 mg- that's 1.3 Kg, or just about 3 pounds, which is considerably more than MacDougall measured. Brain cell death is not immediately total, however, and goes on for give or take ten minutes after death- at least, that's the point at which irreversible brain death and damage occurs. So the weight loss may not have manifested immediately, but some part of it may, indeed, have been memory loss due to the death of brain cells post-mortem.
Unfortunately, this is pretty much where I've hit a dead end. I've rode the conjecture train as far as it can take us without leading us over a cliff to the land of make-believe and raw, unadultered speculation. Some will probably say that I've already run too far with this, but I found it too tantalizing not to explore. One has to wonder, supposing MacDougall's results were more than just artifact, what did he actually pick up on? Could science, some day, empirically measure a soul? We'll never know unless science gets more funding! So, support those who support science in the public arena! Donate to science organizations and projects. Grow your own knowledge, do your own research, draw your own conclusions, and share what you've learned here. As always, feel free to leave me any questions, comments, or suggestions.
[1]http://www.ece.tamu.edu/~noise/research_files/Memory_weight_FNL.pdf
[2]http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-is-the-memory-capacity/
Friday, March 21, 2014
Science Denialism
Often, people contest the ideas put forth by science- and not entirely without historical merit. Once upon a time, we thought bad air caused respiratory sickness (thus, the source for Influenza- Spanish for 'influence'), we thought XMRV (Xenotropic Murine leukemia virus Related Virus) caused chronic fatigue syndrome, and we classified Homosexuality as a psychological disorder. Dissenters and critics claim that their criticism is harmless if they are incorrect, though this is contingent on the notion that mainstream science is already operating on what it believes is right. The motives are different- some people feel that some lines ought not to be crossed, while others whisper of conspiracy and profit gouging. The simple truth of science denialism, though, is that it isn't harmless.
HIV denialism, for example, is the notion that HIV is either not the causal agent for AIDS, or that HIV does not exist outright. From what I can tell, this movement seems to be the mutant husk of an honest scientific debate from the late 1980's to the early 1990's, where some scientists were not wholly convinced by the evidence presented at the time that HIV was the causal agent for AIDS. A similar skepticism- a healthy skepticism that was backed up by peer reviewed studies and not conjecture- successfully disproved XMRV as the causal agent for chronic fatigue syndrome, however, with HIV, the evidence is overwhelming. Not only does HIV fulfill Koch's Postulates to be the causal pathogen[1] (an epidemiological correlation, the ability to isolate the pathogen from a host and propagate said pathogen outside the host, and transmission from an infected organism to an uninfected susceptible organism produces the disease), but we have very strong, well-defined correlations between the use of Highly Active AntiRetroviral Therapy (HAART) and extended life expectancies of HIV infected individuals.[2] Antiviral drugs often target specific sites in specific viruses, and aren't broadly neutralizing in the same manner as antibiotics.
Yet, whispers of conspiracy, profit-gouging, and medical hubris echo across the internet, riding on the waves of an honest skepticism in science from years past. HIV denialists make wild claims, including the notions that vitamins may outright cure HIV where drugs would not[3], that the very antivirals intended to help reduce viral loads (AZT, namely) cause the disease. One may ask what the harm is, and who might believe such claims and act on them. I've heard various anecdotes of lives needlessly cut short because someone took what they read on the internet at face value, but the most egregious case happened in South Africa. In the year 2000, the president of South Africa invited several AIDS denialists to a closed government conference on AIDS. Shortly afterwards, the government and some of its ministers adopted denialist views and policies, causing a campaign of misinformation to the people of South Africa, and a refusal of the government to accept free antivirals. After legal suit and significant outcry from the non-industry scientific community, the South African government eventually reversed its position, but the damage had already been done. The loss of life resulting from the government's denialist policies is presently estimated at 330,000 people- or just under the entire population of Wyoming, or 180 people a day for five years. [4]
Denialism of the safety and efficacy of vaccinations has led to the resurgence of preventable diseases once eradicated from countries- such as Measles in the US and the UK. See my post on Vaccines for more information. Denialism of climate change- and the climate is changing, the only debate is whether we're influencing it or not- continues to bog down efforts to modulate weather trends back towards more favorable conditions. Denialism and fear of the safety of nuclear energy applications keeps electricity prices high, and prevents us from extending the shelf life of ripe fruits and vegetables by the closure of irradiation plants. The thing about science is that it isn't a belief system- it's a collection of observations from which conclusions are drawn. The existence of the sun and its radiation of light is not contingent on your faith in it, but basic science demonstrates that we have regular cycles of day and night thanks to the earth's rotation through observation. Ignoring facts does not cause them to cease to be, and denialism of science without sound evidence or reason to back up that denialism can be, and is harmful.
If you like this post, please share it with your friends. As always, I encourage you to do your own research, draw your own conclusions from the facts presented here. Please, increase your knowledge, and share it with those around you. Feel free to leave questions, comments, and concerns here on the blog. I'd love to hear your feedback. Until next time, stay spooked.
[4]http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19186354
[3]http://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/may/14/southafrica.internationalaidanddevelopment
[2]http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/53/10/1024.full
[1]http://www.niaid.nih.gov/topics/HIVAIDS/Understanding/howHIVCausesAIDS/Pages/HIVcausesAIDS.aspx
HIV denialism, for example, is the notion that HIV is either not the causal agent for AIDS, or that HIV does not exist outright. From what I can tell, this movement seems to be the mutant husk of an honest scientific debate from the late 1980's to the early 1990's, where some scientists were not wholly convinced by the evidence presented at the time that HIV was the causal agent for AIDS. A similar skepticism- a healthy skepticism that was backed up by peer reviewed studies and not conjecture- successfully disproved XMRV as the causal agent for chronic fatigue syndrome, however, with HIV, the evidence is overwhelming. Not only does HIV fulfill Koch's Postulates to be the causal pathogen[1] (an epidemiological correlation, the ability to isolate the pathogen from a host and propagate said pathogen outside the host, and transmission from an infected organism to an uninfected susceptible organism produces the disease), but we have very strong, well-defined correlations between the use of Highly Active AntiRetroviral Therapy (HAART) and extended life expectancies of HIV infected individuals.[2] Antiviral drugs often target specific sites in specific viruses, and aren't broadly neutralizing in the same manner as antibiotics.
Yet, whispers of conspiracy, profit-gouging, and medical hubris echo across the internet, riding on the waves of an honest skepticism in science from years past. HIV denialists make wild claims, including the notions that vitamins may outright cure HIV where drugs would not[3], that the very antivirals intended to help reduce viral loads (AZT, namely) cause the disease. One may ask what the harm is, and who might believe such claims and act on them. I've heard various anecdotes of lives needlessly cut short because someone took what they read on the internet at face value, but the most egregious case happened in South Africa. In the year 2000, the president of South Africa invited several AIDS denialists to a closed government conference on AIDS. Shortly afterwards, the government and some of its ministers adopted denialist views and policies, causing a campaign of misinformation to the people of South Africa, and a refusal of the government to accept free antivirals. After legal suit and significant outcry from the non-industry scientific community, the South African government eventually reversed its position, but the damage had already been done. The loss of life resulting from the government's denialist policies is presently estimated at 330,000 people- or just under the entire population of Wyoming, or 180 people a day for five years. [4]
Denialism of the safety and efficacy of vaccinations has led to the resurgence of preventable diseases once eradicated from countries- such as Measles in the US and the UK. See my post on Vaccines for more information. Denialism of climate change- and the climate is changing, the only debate is whether we're influencing it or not- continues to bog down efforts to modulate weather trends back towards more favorable conditions. Denialism and fear of the safety of nuclear energy applications keeps electricity prices high, and prevents us from extending the shelf life of ripe fruits and vegetables by the closure of irradiation plants. The thing about science is that it isn't a belief system- it's a collection of observations from which conclusions are drawn. The existence of the sun and its radiation of light is not contingent on your faith in it, but basic science demonstrates that we have regular cycles of day and night thanks to the earth's rotation through observation. Ignoring facts does not cause them to cease to be, and denialism of science without sound evidence or reason to back up that denialism can be, and is harmful.
If you like this post, please share it with your friends. As always, I encourage you to do your own research, draw your own conclusions from the facts presented here. Please, increase your knowledge, and share it with those around you. Feel free to leave questions, comments, and concerns here on the blog. I'd love to hear your feedback. Until next time, stay spooked.
[4]http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19186354
[3]http://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/may/14/southafrica.internationalaidanddevelopment
[2]http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/53/10/1024.full
[1]http://www.niaid.nih.gov/topics/HIVAIDS/Understanding/howHIVCausesAIDS/Pages/HIVcausesAIDS.aspx
Friday, March 7, 2014
Protein
 |
| Credit to primehealthchannel.com |
How do TSEs cause disease? It all starts with a mutation in a gene that codes for a protein, which creates a slightly altered version of the naturally occurring prion. This one altered prion then goes forward, finds other proteins, and re-folds them into more prions like it through a yet undescribed autocatalytic process. Those proteins then go find more proteins, and on, and on. This isn't a very fast process at first- the incubation period of TSEs is somewhere on the order of years, varying a little for each particular prion- but once initial symptoms manifest, the patient presents with a rapidly deteriorating neurological status, going from a functional human being to dead in a matter of about four months for classic Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease. The protein eventually chews your brain into what actually looks like swiss cheese (see the photo on top). The body mounts no detectable immune response- if I had to venture a guess, it's a combination of the fact that they're very similar to your cellular proteins, and that prion diseases generally don't demonstrate aggressive pathologies outside of the central nervous system (which is devoid of immune cells for good reason). There is no known therapy for prion diseases, and they are capable of crossing species barriers (feline TSEs are believed to be Mad Cow, for example).[3] The only real good news here is that TSEs aren't very easy to transmit, short of a medically transmitted (nosocomial) infection or consuming infected flesh. According to the WHO, the only tissues that demonstrate infectivity are the brain, spinal cord, and eye (these are the most infectious, with corneal transplants causing up to three recognized cases of CJD); As well as the CSF, kidneys, liver, lung, lymph nodes, spleen, and placenta. It's worth noting there are no documented cases of transmission from mother to fetus. [2]
The horror of prions is multifaceted. On one front, they have a higher mortality rate than any other known human pathogen- even Rabies isn't 100% fatal, we're learning. On another, while TSEs aren't readily transmissible, they are extremely hard to destroy. How difficult is it to kill a prion, exactly? The WHO's resource on Prion infection control measures states that Prions are completely unaffected by ionizing and UV radiation, boiling, dry heat less than 300 degrees Celsius (572 F), Formaldehyde, Alcohol, Ammonia, Hydrogen Peroxide, and Hydrochloric Acid. In fact, allowing infected substances to dry or be exposed to alcohol will increase the infectivity of a Prion-exposed material. Even autoclaving at 121 degrees Celsius for 15 minutes is only partially effective. The chemical of choice for cleaning seems to be Sodium Hydroxide. The WHO also recommends the disposal of non-disposable equipment after it is exposed to high and moderate infectious materials of a patient with Prion disease.[2]
Before you let this information really scare you, it's important to realize that you don't have to catch a TSE to develop one. According to the CDC, CJD arises spontaneously in the world population at a rate of about one case per million. In older people, the rate is about 4.6 cases per million. It's believed that the cause is a mutation in the prion genome.[4] Next time you get a headache, it might be worth wondering about.
As always, if you want to do something about Prions and TSEs, support science, and support those in power who support science. Share what you've learned here, do your own research, and feel free to share any questions, comments, or concerns with me.
[1]http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvrd/prions/index.htm
[2]http://www.who.int/csr/resources/publications/bse/whocdscsraph2003.pdf?ua=1 (section 6)
[3]http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvrd/prions/resources/BelayE_Annu_Rev_Microbio.pdf (page 284)
[4]http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvrd/cjd/
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