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/

Why do wintergreen mint lifesavers spark in your mouth?

Have you ever eaten a wintergreen lifesaver in the dark when someone else was watching? If so, they saw a green spark while you were chewing it. this is why you see it:


http://www.candyfavorites.com/blog/tag/spark/

"Triboluminescence

Wintergreen mints of all types emit light when the candy is bitten into. The light may be very faint, but it can occasionally be spectacular. The effect, called triboluminescence, is due to the electrical charge that builds up within the crystalline structure of the sugar within the candy. The triboluminescence occurs when the electrical charge is violently released as the structure of the crystals is broken. Of course, it isn't just sugary candies that produce this light; when anything is torn or broken, the same thing can occur. When atoms are forced violently apart, they lose a larger portion of their electrons far more quickly than normal. As the electrons search for balance, they bounce around until they find somewhere to rest.

Wintergreen Oil

When the atoms are crushed, the electrons are forced out of their atomic orbits. These electrons collide with air molecules and the electrons transfer a portion of their energy in the collision. Because there is an excess of energy, a portion of that energy is emitted as visible light. With wintergreen mints, this visible light is bright blue, and while there isn't very much of it, it is extremely bright. The more pieces of candy that are crushed at one time, the greater the amount of atomic damage, and the more spectacular the light show. Wintergreen mints will emit a greater than normal amount of visible light because the wintergreen oil is fluorescent. The oil within the candy emits the light that is of a longer wavelength, and more easily seen by the human eye. The interesting thing about the wintergreen oil is that it absorbs the shorter wavelength light that is typically emitted and emits the longer wavelengths in its place. That's why the wintergreen candies will emit a much stronger "spark" than other candies."

Read more: Why Do Wintergreen Mints Spark in Your Mouth? | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/how-does_5164047_do-wintergreen-mints-spark-mouth.html#ixzz15gXk9ZV9



http://myweb.lmu.edu/jphillips/201_F02/week1/fri1.html

"What do you see" experiment results

None of the answers were the same! everyone who participated in the experiment saw different things for each photo. Do you see what they saw? Thanks to all the people who participated!

1. Cracked metal http://www.vrperformance.com/mt/2008/11/cracking_up_e46_subframe_issue.html

2. Ivy leaves www.gardeninggonewild.com

3. Bacteria art http://star.tau.ac.il/~eshel/index.html

4. Sunspot http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap051106.html

5. Bacteria http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2007/11/hold-antibiotics-infections-critical-healthy-life

RESULTS:

#1: cracked metal

Petrified wood
Part of a car, or a prosthetic leg
a picture of a sunken ship in water upside down
a turtles head


#2: ivy leaves

Ivy leaves
Ivy leaves
underwater planty stuff


#3: Bacteria art

ferns
plant roots
an old button with feathers coming off
something too small to see without a microscope


#4: sunspot

sea urchin
part of a flower, or a UFO
a bunch of seeds
the inside of a flower


#5: bacteria

worms
scary aliens
oil stuff in water
some sort of very small worm

The science behind brushing 2-3 times a day

Have you ever wondered why your parents tell you to brush every day, twice a day? I mean, apart from the obviou. I found some sights in which I took a few quotes from to help explain why doctors and parents tell you to brush 2-3 times a day.

"The study published Friday in the British Medical Journal found that individuals with poor oral hygiene have a 70 percent increased risk of heart disease compared with people who brush twice daily." http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2010/05/28/brush-your-teeth-save-your-heart/?hpt=Sbin

read research here

"7 Reasons to Brush Your Teeth Twice a Day

1.Fluoride

2.Bacteria

3.Saliva production

4.prevent tartar build up

5.protect gums

6.fresh breath

7.improved overal health
"When you brush before going to bed it’s a first line of defense against the formation of cavities while you sleep."

Read more: http://www.sanedentist.com/7-reasons-to-brush-your-teeth-twice-a-day.html#ixzz14kC6dt5t

"Failure to brush your teeth twice a day increases risk of heart disease"

http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=failure-to-brush-your-teeth-twice-a-2010-05-27