Did Neanderthals Self-Medicate Long before Pills?

Allison Barker

Current Event Review

AP Biology

April 21, 2017

Karimi, Faith, and Ashley Strickland. "Did Neanderthals Self-medicate Long before Pills?"

CNN. Cable News Network, 09 Mar. 2017. Web. 20 Apr. 2017.

The article that I read, “Did Neanderthals Self-Medicate Long Before Pills?” discusses the idea that Neanderthals may have turned to plants to relieve pain. A recent study focusing on the dental plaque of two Neanderthals from Spain and two from Belgium revealed to researchers new information about Neanderthal eating and medicinal habits. While Spanish Neanderthals appear to have been vegetarians, those from Belgium ate meat. However, this was most likely a product of environment, as the Spanish Neanderthals lived in dense forests with no animals, and not a matter of choice. Further, one young Spanish Neanderthal appears to have treated a dental abscess, as well as other symptoms, such as bad diarrhea, by consuming plants such as poplar, which contains the active ingredient of aspirin, and a natural form of the antibiotic penicillin. Alan Cooper, co-author of the study, states that, “Apparently, Neanderthals possessed a good knowledge of medicinal plants and their various anti-inflammatory and pain-relieving properties… The use of antibiotics would be very surprising”(Faith 2017). These findings show that Neanderthals, who have always been known for living simple lives, might have been more complex than previously thought. This new technique of using plaque on the Neanderthals’ teeth to study what Neanderthals ate and how they lived opens up many new areas of research for scientists. One scientist describes, “We figured out that we could obtain bacterial DNA from dental plaque that was calcified on ancient skeletons. This is the first time it has been applied on an extinct species”(Faith 2017). These improvements will allow us to see into the Neanderthal lifestyle.

This development is important because it allows us to gain information about our ancestors, which could be helpful both for historians and for scientists. Many microorganisms found in modern humans are actually shared with Neanderthals, and so learning about the lives of Neanderthals could lead to further insight into the health of people today. These techniques of studying plaque, which were further perfected during this study, can also be extended for other uses, making them extremely helpful to humans.

This article was very informative and easy to understand. If I had to change one thing about it, though, I would format the information a bit differently. I felt that, at times, it was hard to follow the order in which the information was given, and I believe that changing this would make the article even more accessible to readers who may not be interested in science under different circumstances.

"Trillions of Plastic Bits, Swept Up by Current, Are Littering Arctic Waters"

Schlossberg, Tatiana. "Trillions of Plastic Bits, Swept Up by Current, Are Littering Arctic Waters." The New York Times 19 Apr. 2017.

In “Trillions of Plastic Bits, Swept Up by Current, Are Littering Arctic Waters,” Tatiana Schlossberg describes how a recent study published by a group of researchers from the University of Cadiz in Spain and other institutions shows that a major ocean current is carrying pieces of plastic from the North Atlantic to the Greenland and Barents seas and leaving them there. The plastic is left in surface waters, in sea ice, and on the ocean floor. The study’s lead author, Andres Cozar Cobanas, explains that, “We don’t fully understand the consequences the plastic is having or will have in our oceans,” he said. “What we do know is that this consequences will be felt at greater scale in an ecosystem like this” because it is unlike any other on Earth. This specific section of the ocean is crucial to the thermohaline circulation, which is the global current of the deep water that is controlled by differences in temperature and salinity. When the current brings warm water to the surface, it brings the plastic waste from more densely populated coastlines where they can get trapped by landmasses or by the polar ice cap in the Arctic.

Schlossberg’s article is extremely important to society because it presents the findings of a study that reveals that trillions of plastic items dumped into the oceans every year are adding up quickly and travelling throughout all the oceans. The author included the fact that around 8 million tons of plastic end up in the ocean and that there may be as much as 110 million tons of plastic garbage in the ocean. These substantial figures are definitely a source of concern for environmental scientists, and this concern should be shared by all people who wish to continue living in a relatively clean environment. Cabanas stated that, “This plastic is coming from us in the North Atlantic,” he said. “And the more we know about what happens in the Arctic, the better chance we have” of solving the problem. Hopefully, the researchers will be able to develop a solution quickly and encourage average people to contribute to diminishing the problem of plastic waste pollution in the oceans.

“Trillions of Plastic Bits, Swept Up by Current, Are Littering Arctic Waters” is a well-written article that provides a succinct summary of the study and a thorough overview of the issue. Schlossberg did an excellent job of providing the reader with the most relevant information and including expert quotes and statistics to support her article. I really appreciate how she attached pictures of the researchers collecting plastic waste and pictures of certain fragments because they really help the reader to understand the scientists’ processes as well as what types of garbage were being discovered. The biggest weakness of the article was a lack of context and details surrounding the actual study. The author definitely could have improved the article if she had included more background information on the study, what scientists plan to do with the information, and how this discovery is significant. These details would have provided the reader with a more well-rounded unders

For Evelyn: Gorman, James. "No Oxygen? The Naked Mole Rat Might Not Care."

Evelyn Kluemper

AP Biology

4/21/17

Gorman, James. "No Oxygen? The Naked Mole Rat Might Not Care." The New York Times. The New York Times, 20 Apr. 2017. Web. 20 Apr. 2017.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/20/science/naked-mole-rats-metabolism-video.html?_r=0

The naked mole rat is the only known cold-blooded mammal.  The creature lives with hundreds of others in a system of underground tunnels.  A queen mole rat leads her colony, which consists of workers, soldiers, and male consorts.  Until two recent cases, it was widely believed in the scientific community that mole rats are unable to develop cancer.  The latest discovery about these remarkable creatures is that mole rats have the ability to survive without oxygen for eighteen minutes.  The normal level of oxygen in our atmosphere is about twenty percent.  It was found that mole rats “can live for at least five hours in an atmosphere that is only 5 percent oxygen” (Gorman).  Scientists from Berlin, Europe, Africa and the United States have determined that mole rats are able to convert forms of energy metabolism.  In an ideal setting with an abundance of oxygen, these animals typically run on glucose, as does any other mammal on Earth.  However, when there is an absence of oxygen, mole rats can metabolize using fructose, which is a sugar that can be found in fruits.  Most mammals can metabolize fructose anaerobically, but only in particular organs, while the mole rat can use fructose in their brain and heart. Although their pulse lowers and breathing slows, the mole rat is the only known mammal that metabolizes fructose in all organs.  Scientists speculate that this ability evolved in these animals because mole rats live in tunnels that may lack oxygen.

According to Dr. Thomas Park from the University of Illinois, “there’s no immediate use for this knowledge, but it is one of many aspects of mole rat biology that seem worth learning more about” (Gorman).  Dr. Park is likely correct that this information is not critical to current society.  Even if people lived in conditions with low oxygen levels, it would take millions of years for humans to naturally evolve to develop this ability.  However, this knowledge could potentially be used by the medical community, such as to treat or prevent strokes.

This article was interesting to read, as I had little knowledge about how fascinating mole rats are.  An informative video was included, allowing me to see naked mole rats and help me understand the information presented in the article.  I would have liked it if the article was longer and had more facts.  Additional background information about naked mole rats would help readers understand the significance of the discovery.

Cephalopods May Have Traded Evolution Gains for Extra Smarts

Saey, Tina Hesman. "Cephalopods May Have Traded Evolution Gains for Extra

Smarts."Science News. N.p., 17 Apr. 2017. Web. 18 Apr. 2017.

Dolphins are well-regarded as the most intelligent creatures in the ocean. However, the odd-looking cephalopods such as octopus, squid, and cuttlefish are giving the Einsteins of the sea a run (swim) for their money. More interestingly a recent study dictates that these creatures “don’t always follow the rules laid out in their DNA. Straying from prescribed genetic instructions may have increased the cephalopods’ thinking prowess, but comes at an evolutionary cost.”  Researchers from The Cell report that “once genes have been copied from DNA into RNA, these cephalopods heavily edit the genes’ protein-making directions” which in turn results in different forms and functions than would be predicted. Although it sounds like a broad claim to state “all cephalopods” it should be noted researchers took care to involve one squid, two octopus, and one cuttlefish species in their study. Thus, their conclusions are applicable to a wide variety of cephalopods and their related species. The study found that between 80,000 to 130,000 RNA sites had been edited, a very large number when contrasted with the minuscule 1,159 RNA edited sites and 933 edited sites in a nautilus and mollusk, respectively. On a molecular level researchers discovered “RNA editing changes one of the information-carrying subunits of RNA from the nucleotide adenosine to one called inosine. That substitution can change how a cell reads the genetic instructions to build proteins, exchanging one amino acid for another not specified by the DNA instructions.” Although such tweaks to proteins usually produce  harmful effects, and evolution tends toward the occam's razor principle of simplicity, cephalopods seem to not follow the trend.  As juxtaposition “in the brains of humans and other mammals, fewer than 1 percent of RNA editing sites change protein-coding instructions.” However, computational biologists Noa Liscovitch-Brauer and Eli Eisenberg of Tel Aviv University in Israel and colleagues have discovered that “squid, octopus and cuttlefish edit about 11 to 13 percent of the protein-building RNAs in their brains...cephalopods edit RNA in other tissues, too, but not as much as in the brain.” The findings are complex and much remains unknown. Eisenberg has stated “adding up all the edited and unedited combinations could produce hundreds to thousands of different versions of a protein within a cell. It introduces immense complexity and diversity.”  Speculation still flourishes as scientists try to discover why the species edit RNA in the same place, but the commonality among species proposes such edits to be an important facet in cephalopod evolution.

This article and its premise of the discovery of the cephalopod tendency to edit their RNA at first seem unimportant and perhaps random to the unenlightened human. However, when looking more deeply at what evolutionary factors caused the cephalopod brain to develop while their bodies did not can tell us more about evolution and its application to humans. Science is a constantly evolving field, changing and growing at every angle. New discoveries about these cephalopods may encourage or inspire other scientists to look more into human RNA editing. We may discover more about our evolutionary history and how we wound up with such a vastly more developed brain than most creatures here on earth. Evolution of any species, including the unassuming cuttlefish, is integral to our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.

Overall the author of this article, Tina Hesman Saey, did an excellent job. I particularly enjoyed her inclusion of relevant graphs and images. These more qualitative touches made the article more accessible and understandable for the average reader. Additionally, I commend her for her use of quotes as well as her evident in-depth research about the topic. By including the ideas and point of views of many leading researchers on the topic Saey asserts a sense of authority and intellectual exploration of the complex issue. However, there was one aspect upon which Saey could improve. Primarily, I would have appreciated greater in-depth commentary and relevance on her part. The article felt more like a reiteration of the facts rather than a piece of science journalism with new ideas and points of view. Her article demonstrates the balance between research and your own thoughts. It is a small tightrope to walk between infusing your piece with your ideas as well as staying true to the facts. In the future I would recommend Saey fix her problem by dedicating a specific paragraph somewhere in her article where she uses no quotes, only her own commentary, to assert why her article is relevant and should be discussed.

Ebola Vaccine Proves Effective, Final Trial Results Show

Grace Randall

CE 22

Rosen, Meghan. "Ebola Vaccine Proves Effective, Final Trial Results Show." Science News. N.p., 22 Dec. 2016. Web. 05 Apr. 2017.

https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/science-ticker/ebola-vaccine-proves-effective-final-trial-results-show?mode=topic&context=69

In the article, “Ebola vaccine proves effective, final trial results show”, the recetn triumph of a recent Ebola vaccine is discussed.  Researchers found “Of 5,837 people in Guinea who received a single shot of the vaccine, rVSV-ZEBOV, in the shoulder, none became infected with the virus 10 to 84 days after vaccination. ” They discuss how the World Health Organization used a “ring vaccination”  approach, in which they vaccinate people in close proximity to those already infected. This is an effort to prevent the virus from spreading any further. Supposedly, these results resemble those of similar studies in 2015. The article also discusses the history of the outbreaks.

This study is greatly applicable to society, as the creation of this vaccine could save thousands of lives. Considering the number of deaths that came as a result of the outbreak in 2013, a vaccine that could put a stop to this horrible virus would be incredible. The next step is to ensure all people have access to this vaccine, as to ensure it is really effective.

I thought the author of this article did a pretty decent job, but there were still some areas she could have improved upon. For the most part, I felt her writing was very clear and concise. I was able to really understand this material and get a good overview of the newest advancements with the Ebola virus. Still, I felt the author could have gone into some more depth. It was a much shorter article, and I felt as though he just skimmed the surface. I am still really curious about how researchers discovered this vaccine and what the future of it may look like.

We Might Soon Resurrect Extinct Species. Is It Worth the Cost?

Yin, Steph. "We Might Soon Resurrect Extinct Species. Is It Worth the Cost?" The New York

Times. The New York Times, 20 Mar. 2017. Web. 05 Apr. 2017. <https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/20/science/revive-restore-extinct-species-dna-mammoth-passenger-pigeon.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2fearth Action=click&contentCollection=earth®ion=rank module=package_version=highlights contentPlacement=2&pgtype=section front>.

For my current event, I read an article called “We Might Soon Resurrect Extinct Species” by Stephanie Lin. This article was about how and why we should or should not resurrect extinct species. The article first starts off by discussing the woolly mammoth, a creature that went extinct thousands of years ago. To recreate this extinct animal would mean splicing woolly mammoth DNA into the DNA of an African Elephant, a process that would cost tens of millions of dollars. Scientists argue that a species should not be resurrected if it puts a current species preservation efforts at stake or if its niche is already being filled by another species. One particular species that would be good to revive is the Passenger Pigeon; a bird that breaks down dead trees and helps them to disintegrate into the soil much more quickly. This job is not being done be any other bird at the moment.

This article is important because it will help us to determine whether or not to resurrect species if it buts at stake the survival of another species. This is a great ethical question of ecology and this article helps to answer that question. The article also pulls into the question of whether or not we should be allowed to interfere with nature's “extinctions” and since they happened naturally, it is for the best.

Overall the article was well written and coherent. It included many diagrams of the extinct animals and many different points of views which allowed the author to give an unbiased point of view on the issue.

A Dolphin's Recipe for Octopus

Klein, Joanna. “A Dolphin’s Recipe for Octopus.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 5 Apr. 2017, Accessed 5 Apr. 2017. <www.nytimes.com/2017/04/05/science/dolphins-toss-shake-eat-octopus.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fscience&action=click&contentCollection=science®ion=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=2&pgtype=sectionfront.>    

I choose to read Joanna Klein’s article, “A Dolphin’s Recipe for Octopus.” Overall, I thought the article was extremely well written. The article began by discussing the difficult dolphins go through to eat an octopus. If dolphins fail to do this correctly, they will be killed. However, bottlenose dolphins in Australia still have managed to do so. The article includes photos showing how dolphins kill the octopus they eat. To kill them, dolphins bit off their head, shake their body, and toss the octopus and slam it against the water until it is broken into bite size pieces. Before these photos were taken, scientists knew that dolphins all over the world ate octopus but did not know how. Many dolphins have been killed and/or suffocated while trying to eat the octopus. So scientists question why they would go through this risk for a meal. Scientists hypothesize that dolphins consume nutrients from octopus that they fail to find other places. Dolphins strategically plan when to eat octopus. For example, octopus are most commonly consumed by dolphins during the winter and spring when water is choppy so that their attack has the highest rate of success.

This article is important because it can help us to learn about the habits of both dolphins and octopus. This helps us expand upon our knowledge of the intelligence of dolphins. We have know they are one of the most intelligent creatures, but this article helps us learn how intuitive they are. We are also able to learn what their common methods for attacking prey are. We also are able to learn about the defense mechanisms of octopus. This expands our knowledge of the world around us which is helpful to scientists in the future.

Overall, I enjoyed the article. I liked how it included the pictures the article was discussing. I also liked how the article discussed both the negatives and positives dolphins experienced from consuming octopus. One thing I disliked about the article was how it failed to mention what the importance of the findings were. Therefore, I had to infer what this information could be used for. I found this article interesting because it was fascinating the extreme effort and risk dolphins experience when consuming an octopus. I would be interested to learn more about the risks and benefits dolphins have with consuming and killing octopus.