Stay to The Left

Why do people in England drive on the left side of the road? Well, funny you should ask! The reason why people in England drive on the left is because most people are left handed and in centuries past, people were in the best position to protect themselves with their sword when passing someone. Around 1300 AD, Pope Benefice passed a Papal Edict formalizing this practice. Later on, when there was an increase in horse traffic, The General Highways Act of 1773 recommended that people keep left. It became law in part of the Highways Bill in 1835.


So now you know!

Just Thought You Should Know

The reason why people in the army solute is because knights lifted up their helmet visors so that their friends could identify them. This is actually just one theory. There are many different theories to the origin of the salute. This one is my favorite. Just thought you should know.

DNA Follow-up

Here's a little more detail of what makes up DNA. DNA is made up of repeating subunits called nucleotides. These nucleotides have three parts to them, a sugar molecule called dioxiribose, a phosphate group, and a nitrogen-containing base. The four nitrogen-containing bases are adenine, cytosine, guanine, and thymine (ACGT). Adenine pairs with thymine and guanine pairs with cytosine. They are bonded together with hydrogen bonds. If you think of DNA as a ladder, the base pairs would be the rungs. I could go further. Maybe I will in another post.

Now, I'll talk about DNA replication. First, DNA is separated into two strands. They are split apart by enzymes called helicases. The reason that the base pairs are bonded together by hydrogen bonds is for this very process. Hydrogen bonds are easy to break. Now, enzymes called DNA polymerases move down along the two strands of DNA. As they move along the chains, new chains are assembled using the nucleotides in the surrounding area. The bases must pair with the right bases. Take this imaginary strand: ACCGTATCG. The new strand that would be formed along that would be TGGCATAGC. Replication results in two new copies of the original DNA. Each copy has one old strand and one new strand.

So there you have it. A little insight into the world of DNA.

Deoxyribonucleic Acid

Hi guys!

I haven't posted in a while so I thought I'd post something new! Some of you might find this boring because you probably know about this topic already. SO, turn away if you must!

DNA or deoxyribonucleic acid is in every living thing. The DNA in our bodies has been passed down over a billion years. DNA is considered the “secret of life”. It contains genetic instructions that make us who we are. It is in almost every cell in your body. A gene is a specific part of a cell’s DNA. We have twice as many genes as fruit flies but we only have 30,000 genes, which is less than what was originally thought. You pass your genes on to your children.

There are some diseases that are caused by malfunctions or mutations in your genes. Even one base pair* can mess up everything. Tay-sachs disease is one of these. It basically kills your brain. It is very uncommon because even if one parent is a carrier the disease isn’t passed on. In one case, there were two brothers who were identical twins. After having children with their spouses, they found out that one family’s son had tay-sachs and the other family’s daughter had it too. As it turned out, all four of them were carriers.

And before I lose you I'll stop!

* Base pairs make up DNA. If you have ever seen a picture of DNA, you will have seen the ladder-like bars connecting the sides together. Those are base pairs. The letters that make base pairs are Adenine, Guanine, Cytosine, and Thymine.

Crown-of-Thorn Starfish

I studied these starfish briefly when I was studying coral reefs. These starfish eat coral. in the 1960s there was a population boom of these starfish and there has been a spike in population about every 15 years since. Scientists blame nutrient run-off from farms. A team of scientists studied the levels of chlorophyll in the water. Run-off leads to high levels of chlorophyll. Chlorophyll shows the amount of food (phytoplankton) the starfish have to eat. A doubling of this chlorophyl makes it so ten times the starfish larvae survive. Scientists found that the run-off alone is able to cause the population spikes of crown-of-thorn starfish.

Wooly Mammoth Carcass Was Found in Siberia

I found this article on this 42,000 year old baby mammmoth that was found frozen in Siberia. The mammoth was found in 2007, almost perfectly preserved in Sberian river muck with only her hair and toenals missing. Her internal organs, and the contents of her stomach are still in her tiny little body. Scientists have learned a lot about these ancient creatures through this baby mammoth they named Lyuba. They learned that mammoth babies eat their mother's excriments because it gives them bacteria they need for proper digestion. The Russians preserved Lyuba in ethanol and an antifungal agent called methylparaben. She can now be seen at the Field Museum in a traveling exhibit called "Mammoths and Mastodons: Titans of the Ice Age".

See the full article at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/08/AR2010030803850.html

See my story about the baby mammoth
http://artandwritings.blogspot.com/2010/12/wooly-mammoth.html

Telomerase Reverses Aging Process

By Ewen Callaway

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/aug/04/medical-experiments-on-mice

   "Premature aging can be reversed by reactivating an enzyme that protects the tips of chromosomes, a study in mice suggests."

   "Mice engineered to lack the enzyme, called telomerase, become prematurely decrepit. But they bounced back to health when the enzyme was replaced. The finding, published online November 28 in Nature, hints that some disorders characterized by early aging could be treated by boosting telomerase activity. (Scientific American is part of Nature Publishing Group.)"

   "It also offers the possibility that normal human aging could be slowed by reawakening the enzyme in cells where it has stopped working, says Ronald DePinho, a cancer geneticist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts, who led the new study. "This has implications for thinking about telomerase as a serious anti-aging intervention."

  "Other scientists, however, point out that mice lacking telomerase are a poor stand-in for the normal aging process. Moreover, ramping up telomerase in humans could potentially encourage the growth of tumors."

http://www.mcgill.ca/hostres/enu/