Revolutionary micro-rocket medicine to stop bleeding

Posted on April 9, 2014 by | Leave a comment

Imagine medicine that can actively move. Medicine that are like fighter-jets transporting soldiers to a disaster zone. Clearly, this way of thinking challenges the traditional view of medicine where drugs are designed to absorb into the blood stream and flow with the direction of blood to reach sites all over the body. However, Dr. Christian Kastrup and his research team at the University of British Columbia are boldly challenging this traditional view. In collaboration with the Department of Emergency Medicine at Harvard Medical school, these researchers have developed a revolutionary micro-particle system that actively moves to sites of injury in the body. The system is a cream that can be applied on the surface of the skin. The hope is that these systems can be used to transport medicine deep inside wounds that are bleeding uncontrollably.

Medicine that can self-propel may be the next big breakthrough in pharmacological research. Image courtesy of Dr. Christian Kastrup

This new technology has exciting implications for saving lives in developing countries. In Africa, 1 in 10 mothers will die from severe bleeding during childbirth. In modern cities, this technology could reduce bleeding after a traumatic injury, buying the victim more time before reaching the hospital and having access to doctors and surgeons. In Canada alone, 15,000 people die each year from such traumatic injuries. Moreover, this technology could make life more convenient by substituting endless rolls of bandages and dressing with a thin film of cream coated on top of a simple band-aid. The next time you get your wisdom teeth pulled out by the dentist, you may not need to suck on uncomfortable pads of cotton! Rather, a cotton liner swabbed with cream may suffice to control the bleeding.

Layer upon layers of bandages may be a thing of the past! Image via Wikipedia

The system developed by Dr. Kastrup and colleagues works by immediately reacting with blood to fizz and foam up. To help you visualize this, the way it works is similar to Vitamin C tablets bought from pharmacies. When you drop the tablet into water, it bubbles and creates foaming (see youtube video below). This foaming reaction generates force which can be used to move medicine against outward flowing blood in situations where severe bleeding occurs.

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This research by Dr. Kastrup is the first to demonstrate effectiveness in reducing bleeding in living organisms. In two mice models, the micro-particle systems were shown to significant reduce the amount of bleeding. While these results are promising, further study will be needed to investigate proper dosages in humans and how to develop more selectivity in the pathway to which the micro-particle systems move. The latter is an important point as blood clotting in unintended regions may led to serious adverse effects (such as stroke).

We had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Kastrup and graduate student James Baylis to learn more about this exciting line of research. Please see below for our podcast and video.

Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4s89poehvmw&feature=youtu.be

Podcast:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXf0g_KFmVk

Written by: Group 2 (Vivian Kwan, Baltej Sekhon, William Yang)

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Moss and their Relationships

Posted on April 9, 2014 by | Leave a comment

The purpose of mosses is unknown to many people despite the fact that they are one of the oldest land species on Earth. However, the importance of the species has a much greater impact on the ecosystem than just aesthetic values. Mosses are classified in the phylum Bryophyta, and consist of approximately 12 000 unique species. Relationships among the major branches of this phylogeny are greatly understudied compared to many other major land-plant groups.

Mosses are able to survive and grow on many surfaces such as on trees, rocks, and dirt. (Image via mountainmoss.com)

Through the many years of evolution, phylogenetic inference has linked and displayed relationships among different species. Dr. Ying Chang, a Post-Doc researcher from the Department of Botany at the University of British Columbia, investigates these relationships through surveying 14-17 genes from taxa representing major branches, using different phylogenetic methods such as parsimony and likelihood. The following video provides a more detailed description of the experiment and explains the impact of the research.

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Dr. Chang’s research found a sister-group relationship between Bryidae, Dicranidae, Timiidae, and Funariidae. She also found sister-group relationships between Tetraphidopsida and arthrodontous mosses, and Takakiopsida and Sphagnopsida. These connections help better understand how species have evolved, what enabled the evolution, and the ancestral root of the species. This research provides a better insight on relationships between several species and how their evolution diverged, such as how first land plants adjusted to terrestrial life.

Although Dr. Chang’s research provided a better understanding of this phylogeny, the general public still understands very little of the importance of moss to the ecosystem. Moss has many purposes and it is almost impossible to step out into nature without seeing moss. The following podcast shows several interviews with students at UBC and their perception of moss, as well as several industrial and ecological uses.

Click for Podcast.

A better understanding of mosses will further allow for an increased amount of industrial uses as well as an improved knowledge of people’s impact on environment.

By: Andrew Hefford, Joanne Shih, Peter Zhao, Tien Vu

SCIE 300 – Section 211 (Group 3)

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Paradox of Social Evolution

Posted on April 9, 2014 by | Leave a comment

Why would an individual survive and reproduce if it displays behaviour that has disadvantages or incurs costs itself?  For example, a vampire bat donates a blood meal to another vampire bat even though there is no benefit to the donor.  The donor has no guarantee that it would find food to sustain itself in the near future.  This type of social behaviour is called altruism, when the donor is at a disadvantage or has a cost while the receiver benefits.    In fact, it seems that there is a paradox over the evolution of this type of social behaviour since the helper experiences a cost to itself.

A vampire bat (courtesy of Wikimedia user Ltshears)

The idea of survival and selection of an individual was originally based on the theory of evolution put forth in the 19th century by Charles Darwin.  After reading Darwin’s theory, an English scientist called Herbert Spencer developed the idea of survival of the fittest (Wee, Alvin 2013).  This concept means that an individual that was better able to survive in their environment was the one that lived and passed on characteristics to his or her offspring (babies).  With regard to altruism, it would then appear that if an altruist experienced costs, these disadvantages would make the altruist less likely to survive and reproduce.  In fact, altruism is present in the world, and is important to the survival of groups, as explained in the following video (credits are given in the video).

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In the video, there was an explanation of how shared genes are passed on by the group at the expense of the individual (Freeman, Scott 2008).  This process is called kin selection.  In order to investigate how kin selection and other variables affect the evolution of social behaviour, evolutionary biologist Dr. Florence Débarre and her research team developed a mathematical model (a representation based on mathematics) in this area.  Recently, in March 2014, Joseph Burant, host of UBC Science Talk, interviewed Dr. Débarre.

Dr. Florence Débarre (courtesy of Florence Débarre via http://biosciences.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Florence_Debarre).

Dr. Florence Débarre (courtesy of Florence Débarre via http://biosciences.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Florence_Debarre).

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Dr. Débarre’s research paper agreed with findings from other researchers that altruism evolves if altruists interact more often with other altruists.  Through this interaction and kin selection, social behaviours such as altruism evolve if the overall benefit is greater for the group than the cost of competing against this group.  Although altruism seems to be a paradox to the survival and reproduction of an individual, altruism helps groups survive and thrive.

Reference:

Débarre, F. (2014). In Burant J. (Ed.), Personal interview via skype. Vancouver, B.C.:

Freeman, S. (2008). Kin selection. In B. Wilbur, A. Gilfillan, S. Winslow & B. Ruden (Eds.), Biological science:  volume 2 (evolution, diversity, and ecology) (3rd ed., pp. 1168). San Francisco: Pearson Benjamin Cummings.

Wee, A. (2013). Herbert spencer (1820-1903). Retrieved 04/06, 2014, from http://www.victorianweb.org/philosophy/spencer/spencer.html

by Joseph Burant, Simeng Alexandra Cai, & Jason Leung

SCIE 300 – 211 (Group 1)

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Relationships between Stress and Ulcers

Posted on March 24, 2014 by | Leave a comment

How many time have you heard such phrases as, “I’m so stressed that I’m going to develop an ulcer” or “Don’t stress so much or you’re going to get an ulcer!” Do we really know what this means or accept that stress causes ulcers? As the semester winds down to exam period, stress is a huge factor that piles onto many students. I’m interested in this topic because the past 4 days have been the most stressful days of the year so far and exams haven’t even started yet!

Ulcers are sores on the skin or mucous membrane that is followed by the tissue breaking. The most common type of ulcer we see is peptic ulcers otherwise known as stomach ulcers. Stomach ulcers are located usually on the duodenum, which is the first part of the small intestine and are usually very painful.

Diagram of location of stomach ulcers. (Image via. physio-pedia.com)

It’s a common misconception since 1980’s that stress was the direct cause of ulcers.  Other causes in belief were it was genetic, excessive alcohol, smoking, and tobacco, and poor lifestyle choices in diet. After the 80’s, we quickly saw research conclude ulcers were a result of bacterial infections, most commonly the bacteria, Helicobacter pylori. H.pylori damages the mucous coating that protects our stomach and intestines. It is spread by contaminated food that has not been fully cooked or unclean water.

Today our knowledge of causes of ulcers is much more indepth than 30 years ago. Overuse of painkillers is an addition to promoting ulcers which in the past has been prescribed as a solution to ulcers. We still see excessive alcohol, smoking, tobacco, and poor lifestyle choices as a factor in allowing for the bacteria, Helicobacter pylori to be more prone to infect a host.

The belief of stress causing ulcers is not completely untrue though. Stress can increase the risk of ulcers if other factors are present. You are more prone to ulcers if you already have poor lifestyle habits on top of the stress.

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Educating yourself on facts and relationship allows you to have a better understanding than general public when it comes to these topics that the majority of people believe.

Guan Qun Zhao

 

 

 

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Innovative Recycling is the Future

Posted on March 24, 2014 by | Leave a comment

Do you have an overflowing cupboard at home full of flimsy plastic shopping bags which you’ll never use? There has been a push for using reusable canvas shopping bags, which are environmentally friendly and cut store costs but sometimes using the plastic disposable ones are the only option.  There have been  numerous news stories outlining how detrimental these plastic bags can be in the environment. A recent study shows that there may be a use for those hundreds of plastic bags, which would keep them out of the natural environment and out of your cupboard! YouTube Preview Image

Diesel Pump via Google Images

This study shows how it’s possible to convert plastic shopping bags into diesel fuel. The study collected plastic shopping bags from local retailers and, through chemical processes, produced diesel fuel as well as what they believe are other oil based lubricants. The end diesel product is nearly identical to natural diesel fuels and has a substantially higher potential energy output then the energy consumed in its production. 

In an interview with Science Daily, Dr. Brajendra Sharma stated, “You can get only 50 to 55 percent fuel from the distillation of petroleum crude oil… But since this plastic is made from petroleum in the first place, we can recover almost 80 percent fuel from it through distillation.” The researchers were able to blend up to 30 percent of their plastic-derived diesel into regular diesel and “found no compatibility problems with biodiesel,” Sharma said.

It was discovered that only 13% of the approximately one trillion shopping bags used in 2009 were recycled, showing that we need to continue to push our communities to recycle. Discoveries and innovations in the fields of recycling and renewable energy, like the study discussed, are extremely exciting when we think about the future of our planet. In order for our modern society to survive at the same level of comfort we currently enjoy, we must continue to think of innovative ways to recycle and reduce our garbage.

Written by Andrew Hefford

 

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Hey, Nice Smile

Posted on March 24, 2014 by | Leave a comment
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A scene from the movie Mean Girls provides some interesting insight on the way we interact with each other. With a smile, Regina George compliments a fellow classmate and brightens her day. Seconds later, she rolls her eyes and says, “That is the ugliest effing skirt I’ve ever seen.” How was she able to pull off her lie so convincingly?

Through her smile.

Smiling has a long evolution history and is considered an inborn trait, meaning that we’ve developed the ability to smile from the time we were born. There are many reasons we smile and an important one is that it fosters communication between people. Moreover, we tend to smile when we are talking to people because we don’t want to give off the impression that we are unlikeable and hostile. Even though we know it’s impossible to like everyone and for everyone to like us,  we generally still try to appear friendly and polite, if not neutral, to avoid getting into any unnecessary confrontations.

Back in the 1800s, French physician Duchenne de Boulogne identified two distinct types of smiles. The first type of smile, called a Duchenne smile, refers to a smile linked to genuine positive emotion and involves contraction of the muscles around the eyes and the muscles that raise the corners of the lips. The other, the Pan Am smile, is a fake smile that involves contraction of only the muscles around the corner of the lips. Sounds relatively straightforward, right?

(Copyright Paul Ekman 2003, “Emotions Revealed,” Owl Books, 2007.)

Current research using neuroimaging techniques have indicated otherwise. A study by Calvo and colleagues (2013) measured the neuronal activity of participants using electroencephalograms (EEG) as they judged whether or not an assortment of faces were genuinely happy. The researchers found that there were no differences in brain activity upon seeing happy faces compared to seeing faces that combined a smile with fearful or neutral eyes. In other words, the brain was unable to differentiate genuine smiles from fake smiles.

In a different study, researchers tracked the eye movements of participants as they viewed images of faces with genuine and fake smiles and found that the majority of viewers fixated their gazes the earliest on the smiling mouth first, regardless of the type of eyes. Participants were also more likely to judge faces with fake smiles as genuine when they fixated on the smiling mouth first before looking at the eyes. The results suggested that the primary fixation on the mouth causes viewers to misinterpret the true emotion behind a face.

So, in conclusion, it is quite difficult to detect the sincerity behind a smiling face. This is how Regina George was able to deceive the poor girl. On the bright side, this means that no one really knows our real thoughts, either.

This really casts a new light on the saying, “Smile at your enemies, it confuses them”, doesn’t it?

 

By Joanne Shih

 

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Posted in Biological sciences, Science in the news, Uncategorized

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My experience with presenting scientific research

Posted on March 24, 2014 by | Leave a comment
File:Embarrassed woman.jpg

I am so embarrassed! (Image via Wikipedia)

I can’t believe this is actually happening… I rummaged in my backpack frantically looking for my script. Finally, I found it crumpled in the corner and shakily read out the rest of my presentation. How can this happen? I was utterly humiliated.

This was my first experience presenting research at a lab in front of the principal investigator, several graduate students, and other undergraduate research assistants. I froze mid-way during the presentation even though I had carefully memorized my entire speech the night before.

After this incident, I never wanted to present again. I had the idea that public speaking is for the gifted few who are able to magically deliver beautiful sentences with what seemed like no effort at all. Yet there was something in me that wasn’t ready to give up. For some very strange reason, I signed myself up to give an oral presentation at the UBC Multidisciplinary Undergraduate Research Conference (MURC) later that same year in 2012.

I remember the day of MURC very clearly. I was a nervous wreck waiting to present. “Why, why would you do this to yourself, why, why, why!?” was going through my head in an endless loop. The presenter before me finished, the audience clapped, and then my name was called. I was 100% sure that I would slur my words and stutter because I was just too nervous. But then an amazing thing happened. I placed my notes down on the beautiful wooden podium and looked out at an audience that seemed genuinely interested to hear what I had to say. I felt a new sense of empowerment and from there, delivered a very smooth talk.

Maybe what I have to say is worthwhile after all (Image via Flickr by Joe Hardy)

This was a defining moment for me because I realized that when you confront your fears, you take back the power it has over you. Communicating science in the form of a verbal presentation is a very powerful experience. You can inspire an audience, tell a compelling story about your research, and share knowledge with others that are eager to have you answer their questions. After presenting at MURC, it gave me the courage to pursue many other opportunities that I never had the confidence to go after before. I learned that being courageous isn’t not being afraid, it’s being scared to death but doing it anyways.

This past weekend, I presented another research project at MURC 2014. To my horror, a key slide in my powerpoint was missing during my presentation, causing me to stumble. But you can bet this won’t stop me from presenting again in the future! If you have been involved in some cool research and have thought about presenting, I encourage you to go for it! I bet you’ll be surprised at how well you’ll do! Here’s a fun resource with tips on public speaking by Zach Holman.

Written by Vivian Kwan

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Elepants Have Learnt to “Understand” Human

Posted on March 17, 2014 by | 2 comments

 

Whether we realize it, African elephants (Loxodonta africana) are listening to us. It is recently found that African elephants are able to differentiate between ethnicities and genders, and can tell an adult from a child just by listening to the sound of a human voice. This is a very beneficial skill for the elephants that are often threatened by humans because they can protect themselves from human actions.

African elephants (Loxodonta africana)

A recently published study in PNAs (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America) last month by Drs. Karen McCombs and Graeme Shannon from University of Sussex provides evidence that African elephants (Loxodonta africana) can recognize human voices. By listening to our voices, elepants can determine our relative age and gender, tell different human languages apart and determine whether the people approaching them are a threat.

Their study was conducted in Kenya’s Amboseli National Park, and Elepants there are killed periodically by Maasi pastoralists (a semi-nomadic group that sometimes kill elephants). McComb and her colleagues wondered if the elephants are able to tell the voice of the Maasai men apart from Kamba people (crop farmers who rarely have violent contact with elephants). The researchers recorded voices of both Maasai and Kamba speaking in their native language “Look, look over there, a group of elephants is coming.” The researchers then played back the voice recordings to 47 elephant groups while observing the animals’ reactions. McComb and her colleagues discovered that Massai voices caused the elephants to smell the air or  huddle together twice as tightly than when they heard the Kamba voices.

Image of Maasai Men

Image of Kamba People

The elephants not only are able to tell the diffenrent ethnic groups apart, they are also able to recognize the gender and relative age of the voices. McComb found that elephants were less likely to run away when they heard Massai women or boys speaking as compared to Massai men. And this is because the Massai men is a much more serious threat for the elephants compared to Massai women or boys. Their research shows that elephants and other animals might be studying us more carefully than we are studying them as they have learnt to “understand” human in order to protect themselves from danger.

“Humans are undoubtedly the most dangerous and versatile predators the elephants are faced with these days,” said Prof McComb, and their research showed that elephants were “trying to adapt to human threats” by recognizing human languages.

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Reference:

McComb K, Shannon G, Sayialel KN, Moss C. Elephants can determine ethnicity, gender, and age from acoustic cues in human voices. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1321543111

By Simeng Alexandra Cai

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Posted in Biological sciences, Issues in science, Science in the news, Uncategorized

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You Who Came From The Stars

Posted on March 17, 2014 by | 2 comments

You may know that your body is made of 65% oxygen, 19% hydrogen, and other heavier elements. But do you know where did all these elements come from and how they were generated?

An artist drawing of Big Bang. (via Google)

We know that the current theory states that the universe began with the Big Bang, an event that initially started at an extremely hot and dense point and that point expanded over nearly 14 billion to form the current universe. Right after the Big Bang, the universe contained only free floating subatomic particles such as protons, neutrons, and electrons. When the universe continued to expand, its temperature cooled off. Once the temperature was cool enough for the protons to catch the running electrons in this colder than before, yet still boiling universe, the first hydrogen atom formed. Similarly, helium and lithium were generated by the collision of protons and neutron. By that time the universe was made of mostly hydrogen, helium and trace amount of lithium.

After another long period of time, the region of the universe that was slightly higher in density started to attract any mass to form gas cloud by the force of gravity. As this cloud of mass got denser, it attracted even more mass. Eventually, the core became dense and hot enough for hydrogen atoms fusing together to form helium atoms and generating enormous amount of energy. Nowadays, we call this cloud of gas a star. As a star grows, more fusion reaction happened and more helium were generated. When there was enough helium accumulated in the core, all these helium started to fuse together and form carbon. After that, when there was enough carbon, oxygen started to form. This process continued until iron was formed.

An Image of Our Sun ( via Wikipedia)

An image of our Sun ( via Wikipedia)

Unfortunately, the stars can’t generate any heavier element than iron. This is because the nature of iron fusion does not produce energy  but consume energy. Hence, when a star started to fuse iron, its core lost the pressure-gradient force against its gravity and the core collapsed. The result was a supernova: a stellar explosion.

An Image of Our Sun ( via Wikipedia)

Kepler’s Supernova ( via Wikipedia)

That was the moment the rest of the period table elements were filled!

During supernova, atoms were exposed in more extreme temperature and pressure, allowing the formation of elements beyond iron in just a few second. Then, the star exploded into a cloud of gas: nebula.

 

Eagle Nebula (via Wikipedia)

This newly formed nebula can now give the raise of another star or stars and the debris that rotate around the newly formed star would become a planet and elements that you find on a planet, including yourself.

Now you can tell your friends that your body was once the core of stars.

By William Yang

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