Recent Posts

Hey Doc Ireland, I was just wondering what my actual final exam grade was since i only had to get a 75 or higher for a 3.5 in the class.  I thought for sure I did better than a 75 on my final, but I guess not    It's bugging me since I was .8 % away from a 3.5!! Can u email it to me at bamsudd07@yahoo.com? Thank you- Samantha Budd

Doc. Ireland,

Willl you please please please post the grades!!!!! 
Or atleast tell me what I got on the last assignment sometime soon.... haha

James Secord  

Kinda waited til yesterday and then my internet went down... so I'll post it anyways and see if I get credit.
I looked up a biotechnology regarding post-transcriptional control mechanisms and using small molecule drugs to modify them in order to avoid nonsense mutations and treat diseases like cystic fibrosis. The article specifically speaks of one drug that targets the non-sense mutations, overrides it so that the translation continues past the false stop signal and produces functional, full length proteins. The benefits include a new area of biology that hasn't been explored, but it also hasn't been rigorously tested so far, which is the only drawback I can think of.

http://www.genengnews.com/articles/chitem.aspx?aid=2869&chid=0&pn=2

  Crystan Mercer

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30372740/

According to Dictionary.com, biotechnology is the use of living organisms or other biological systems in the manufacture of drugs or other products or for environmental management. In Miles City, Montana researchers are confident they have found a way to utilize the genetic sequence of one of their cows to produce better quality and safety beef and dairy products, as well as improving upon the techniques used to treat and prevent the illnesses affecting cattle. The problem being addressed in this article is the decrease in the number of a specific population of cattle existing today as well as the fact that the quality of beef and dairy can be improved upon. Benefits would be that the cattle would be healtheir when it came to processing and would contain less illnesses and diseases that could potentially be passed onto who ever eats the meat or reduce the amount of livestock farmers have to work with. By doing this research scientists came across other valuable information that could help them out in the future, facts about the similarities between the number of chromosomes in cattle and the number found in humans. There were no drawbacks stated in the article but with all experimentation there has to be a negative, a counter action that could make the experiment unnecessary.

Doc,
According to Alison L. Vanennaam and Paul G. Olin, genetically engineered atlantic salmon may end up in a grocery store near you.  One strain of transgenic (genetically engineered) atlantic salmon, with a growth hormone from larger chinook salmon, and a promoter from a very cold tollerant ocean pout, is currently being reviewed by the FDA.  Although these transgenic fish wiegh the same at maturity as native atlantic salmon, the advantages of these fish are growth rates four to six times that of "natural" fish while using twenty-five percent less feed to gain this mass. A major concern with transgenic fish is the risk of escape or release into the wild.  Interbreeding with native strains and outcompeting native strains are both dangers associated with genetically engineered fish. One way to combat the interbreeding problem is to make triploid fish, fish with 3 sets of chromosomes.  These fish are all female, and sterile as the third chromosome set interferes with miosis.  The first drawback is that the process is inefficient, a one percent success rate.  The second is that it is costly to determine for certain that the procedure was successful and all of the fry are triploid.  At present, no international rules exist to govern the growing or transporting of transgenic fish.  As with most issues, customers willingness to buy genetically engineered fish will determine their future.
Jason Smith
www.calag.ucop.edu/0603JAS/pdfs/BiotechFish.pdf

Swine Influenza (swine flu) is a respiratory disease of pigs caused by type A influenza that regularly cause outbreaks of influenza among pigs. Swine flu viruses do not normally infect humans, however, human infections with swine flu do occur, and cases of human-to-human spread of swine flu viruses has been documented.

From December 2005 through February 2009, a total of 12 human infections with swine influenza were reported from 10 states in the United States. Since March 2009, a number of confirmed human cases of a new strain of swine influenza A (H1N1) virus infection in California, Texas, and Mexico have been identified.

http://www.cdc.gov/flu/swine/
Bobby Howard

Brittany Homoki

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090423132922.htm

This article is referencing medical regeneration.  It uses DNA methylatio as a type of chemical modification of DNA that can be inherited gentically, and then removed without changing the original DNA sequenece.  These scientists are trying to reprogram DNA to go from Adult cells to stem cells, and then reprogram them to become whatever type of cell they want them to be.  This is a down fall there are rooms for errors.  If the cell is taken to far back it can not be moved forward into the other cell types.  It is also an extremely costly procedure.  The main point of this research is to see if artifical stem cells can "mimic" a natural cell a full one hundred percent.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090410/hl_afp/healthchinadiseaseoutbreak
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hand,_foot_and_mouth_disease

As of April 7th this year, 50 people from China have died from hand, foot and mouth disease.  The number of people infected is expected to rise, with the peak number of cases between May and July.  This year, there have been more than 115,000 reported cases of hand, foot and mouth disease in China. Hand, foot and mouth disease is especially fatal to children due to their immature immune systems.  Enterovirus is the cause of hand, foot and mouth disease.  Hand, foot and mouth disease is spread through the mucus, saliva, or feces of the infected individual.  The incubation period is usually 3-7 days. Some symptoms include sores, fever, headache, rash, sore throat and fatigue.  Hand, foot and mouth disease is a virus, so medications usually aren't prescribed.  There are some treatments for the infected person's symptoms, but that is usually just over the counter pain relievers and fever reducers.  Avoiding infected people is the best way to stop the spread of hand, foot and mouth disease.

Chelsea Seymore

Kyle Brousseau

the diseaseoutbreaking in Mexico right now is the pig flu that is associated with the infuenza virus and it has killed 60 people in mexico the organism that is causing the spread is pigs. the diseas is spread through out the air because its part of influenza which is respiratory diseases, and people with the disease had no direct contact with pigs. the diseas is being controlled by the CDC trying to find more cases of this disease because in the article it said there is like 45 different cases of the new influenza virus. there also is a respiratory alert for mexico right now that the public health agency of canada has issued.

 http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/04/24/swine.flu/index.html?section=cnn_latest