James Apostolatos 12/11/18
Current Event 11 AP Biology
Citation:
Saey, Tina Hesman. “Biologists Are One Step Closer to Creating Snake Venom in the Lab.”
This article discusses how researchers have learned to grow organoids that mimic the venom glands of snakes. According to Harvard Stem Cell Institute, Organoids are “tiny, self-organized three-dimensional tissue cultures that are derived from stem cells.”. These researchers wanted to know if they could make organoids producing venom from snakes. A team of researchers produced venom-gland organoids from at least seven species of snakes. The organoids have survived in the lab for up to two years and have shown successful results. Harvesting venom from the organoids can provide a new way to receive venom samples in large quantities. The growth of organoids and experiments using snake venom can be the next step in using venom to create drugs and antibodies.
This topic is important because it is connected to stem cell research. Recent experiments using stem cells have the potential to become many different types of cells in the body. The connection to this article is that the use stem cells may allow researchers to make venom in the lab instead of extracting it from the actual snake. In this experiment, if scientists can extract venom from the lab-grown glands, that venom might be used to create new drugs and antidotes for bites. This is also connected to the use of snake farms. Learning about snake venom is important considering up to 2.7 million people worldwide are estimated to be bitten by venomous snakes each year according to the World Health Organization. The study of snake venom can lead to antivenoms and cures. According to the article “If scientists can extract venom from the lab-grown glands, that venom might be used to create new drugs and antidotes for bites including from snakes that aren’t currently raised on farms” (Saey,2018,1). Further research of these antibodies can help a bitten person recover.
I would have liked to see more details about the actual method, the researchers used to extract the venom. I would also have liked to learn more about the different types of snakes in the experiment. There also should have been more information about the scientist's background. I also wanted to learn how successful the data was and how they used the data for this specific experiment. It also would have been nice to show the future experiments that can take place.
Ella Stupart
ReplyDeleteMr. Ippolito
C Even
December 12, 2018
Citations
Saey, Tina Hesman. “Biologists Are One Step Closer to Creating Snake Venom in the Lab.”
Science News, 11 Dec. 2018, www.sciencenews.org/article/biologists-snake-venom-glands-organoids.
Apostolatos, James. Rev. of “Biologists Are One Step Closer to Creating Snake Venom in the Lab.”
Science News, 11 Dec. 2018,
https://bronxvilleapbiology.blogspot.com/2018/12/james-apostolatos-current-event-11-ap.html#comment-form
In his review of the article “Biologists Are One Step Closer to Creating Snake Venom in the Lab” by Tina Hesman Saey, James sites reliable sources, draws multiple important connections to society, and notes helpful suggestions to the author of the article. In his summary, James builds a strong basis for his argument by including a quote from the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, which is a reliable source. This lays the foundation for a persuasive argument. Secondly, in his connections paragraph, James identifies areas where this study on the creation of snake venom in labs could be beneficial to society in multiple ways. He talks about how it could help us understand and cure people who have been affected by snake bites and how it could help create vaccines in the future. A third strength in his review is that in his third paragraphs, he suggests multiple improvements for the author of the article instead of just one or two. He takes his analysis a step further by questioning the background of the scientists and the success of the experiment.
To improve his review, James could have given a clearer summary in his first paragraph and noted a few strengths in the article in his last paragraph. James’ summary paragraph briefly outlines the study, but after reading it, I was still confused on what exactly the scientists were doing. What made these scientists perform the study? What was the outcome? Is it still going on? This information would have been helpful to understand the experiment. In his last paragraph, James includes many suggestions which strengthened his review, but he did not include any places where the author was successful. It would have been helpful to the author if he included things that they did well so that they could repeat them in the future. It would also be helpful for the rest of the audience to know what James thinks worked well in the argument so that they could utilise those tactics in their own work.
I found this topic really interesting. I think it’s a very unique study and is a very smart way to come up with a vaccine to something as dangerous as snake bites. I think this experiment could spark more experiments similar to it and possibly help cure people who are affected by other types of poisons. These vaccines might even become as routine as the flu shot in places where snake bites may be common, such as Australia. I hope to see more studies like this one and I will keep an eye out for them in the future.