scicop

Igneous: The Magma Cooling Company

Sedimentary Crust Lickers

Metamorphic Slates

As a Ham Radio Operator, I have always fancied the idea of a "repeater" being placed on the surface of the moon. The advantage, the way I think about it, is that you would have a "satellite" in the sky with a long "window" duration for communications with nearly half the globe "visible" at any given time.

Sure, it won't always be in the sky, but the moon would sure be a good base for relay stations that would facilitate communications around the world. You wouldn't need to relay between LEO satelites (limited by their altitidute and duration of window exposure..we usually only have a 10 to 15 minute window with these things every hour or so).

Radio communications is relatively rapid, Hams do moon-bounce communications (they bounce their signals off the moon) and the delay is only about a second. And they've done it with rather simplistic antennas and power (although most use massive arrays).

What do you all think about this?? We can put probes on Mars...why not put "repeaters" on the moon??

(this is just for discussion purposes..fantasy if you will).

A trip to Mars?

I think another big one for success is : ENJOY WHAT YOU DO!

Being a team-player, a leader, learning. all comes easier when you enjoy what you do, i.e. you are emotionally satisfied with the job you do that allows you to pay the bills.

you may want to try some from of immuno-supressive therapy, if your RA is moderate to severe and you have failed to respond to other therapies, such as NSAIDS. These therapies are usually anti-cytokines (antibodies or recominbant proteins that attenuate pro-inflammatory cytokine action). This include Enbrel (indicated for RA), and imfliximab or the trade name..Remicade (an anti-TNFalpha mAb). Remember that RA can be an autoimmune disease.

Although effective, the consequence of these therapies is that they are immuno-suppressive, so the frequency of opportunistic infections may increase. Talk to your physician.

These therapies are also expensive, they are not generic as of yet (least to my knowledge) so you may want to investigate how your MCO tier these drugs in their formularies, and what percentage you would be responsible for. Also depending on where the tier the drug, you may also need to demonstrate to them that you have failed to respond to conventional therapy options, this your physcian and prior prescribing history can help demonstrate this if this is true. These therapies are not curative just like NSAIDs and glucocorticoids, but help maintain a semi-non pathological state, and relapse may and do occur.

But since you're on this board, I imagine you have some form of science-accumen, so go to pub-med, and look up some of the trials for the drugs I mentioned.....and most importantly....TALK to your physician!!!! a professional in the field!

Hmm..what makes a crackpot? This is not an evidenced-based assertion, but here is my two cents..keep the change.

I figure a crackpot is one who subconscienciously knows that they are inadequet to perform in a proper research environment (i.e. peer-review, collaboration, exchange of ideas with established/reputable/independantly funded scientist). Therefore the come up with wacked out ideas in an attempt to gain either a following of like-minded crackpots or a small amount of fame from others in the crackpot community. They're trying to make up for their personal failures.

Thank you.

As refered to above, as the human brain ages it does become damaged. In fact as we age, we ALL get plaques similar to those found in Alzheimer's disease. These, in-part, contribute to the poor memory that can plaugue our senior citizens. Sure old folks can (and are) very alert and some (over the age of 80) are still scientist that run their own lab! But, obviously they don't function as they did when they were in their 40's or 50's.

As time goes on, dementia and/or memory loss would set in.

i think we've past the time to panic..its time to act. However we have "live for the moment" money hungry businessman in control of our government, so we're all doomed.

so what's the point?

Dear Scicop' date='

Thank you very much for the fast reply.

You are absolutely right re the polyclonal population.

As I have mentioned before, my problem is that I have a very small quantity of the mAb so I am not capable to produce it's CDR1.

I have done the screening (by ELISA) with whole mAb in addition to the screening against normal human IgG as a control group. I hoped that may be control group will provide a weaker signal. But unfortunately I get a higher signal even than mab that I have immunized with.

Regarding your question:

I have this mAb which is human and bearing common 16/6 idiotype.

I need to develop an ELISA method for screening of human antibodies in serum for presence or absence of antibodies bearing this common 16/6 Id.

Therefore I need pAb or mAb that can recognize this idiotype.

I would use an anti-idiotyping network but it works only than the antibodies injected within the same species, so it is not particle in my case (we are talking about humans).

I appreciate a lot your professional opinion and will glad to here if you have any ideas regarding my problem.

Thanks in advance,

Pery.[/quote']

 

Ok, well, I'd stop where you are. I think you need to go with trying to produce a monoclonal antibody, I feel you're wasting your time going down the pAb route. That being said you need a new batch of your bait mAb and ALOT of it. You will use alot of it in screening, because when you screen for monoclonals, you will screen ALOT of spleenocyte colonies. Each well you screen will represent a specific colony, and usually it is done in triplecate.

 

Before you start any monoclonal ab production you need to contact an expert. I have done it before, but I am limited with my ability to help you on-line. You basically need some to hold your hand (NOT KIDDING) when you start in. There are tricky parts to mAb production including immunizing, fusion, spleen cell selection, colony selection and growth, and screening. There is also a level of organization skills that will be necessary to develop and/or possess. Usually you can find such expertise in your institutions tissue culture facility. They will have the resources and equipment to help you.

 

Also, monoclonal Ab production is very time consuming and very expensive (consider your salary as well as the cost for tissue culture material and screening reageants..you will use LOTS of the stuff). You may wish to consider asking your PI to outsource the job. It may not be cheaper in the long run, but it will save time and you'll have an endless supply once you have the cell line. Also, you can use your time more wisely with other projects. Also, the risks will be higher if you have a novice try to make a mAB and you're in a rush for data. I failed on my first attempt, set me back a couple months. Got it with my second, but with alot of HAND HOLDING. mAB production takes a few times to master and even then, you always learn new tricks.

 

If you want and you have the time to learn mAB production, it can be a very vaualbe skill to have, pharmaceutical and biotech companies will compete for you. So, its basically how much time and energy you're willing to invest.

 

Good luck!!

kid wants attention. Some good parenting would work, i.e. a swift kick in the arse. however, if that fails, pyschosocial intervention would be the next step, i.e. psychologist. If that fails or is not working effectively, then last step would be psychiatry, or rather, pharmacothearapeutic intervention.

My social security number is my "life" number. Couldn't do anything without it. And if you "mess"-up in life, it can certainly stop you from doing the things you want to do.

Platoon for me "you're an anxious foot soldier on the battlefield of life, seeking to avoid danger and preserve your security"

hmm..and as a leader i'm "Hilter". Where is my regime??!! I can rule the world!

Hitler for me..."you're paranoid and killing all your enemies helps to relieve your anxiety!"

would rather be Bill Clinton, I'd tell the world to "suck on it".

I think the books would be of great value to any one who wishes to fully understand Cuban life /history.

Its easy for us to look in and say yeah," it must suck to live and grow up in Cuban", and of course that would be a totally outside view.

One thing that is remarkable about us humans, is how we can adapt to pretty much any situation. I'm sure the Cuban people had (and still) suffered countless atrosities living under fidels rule, however, people do continue to live their lives and there comes a point when such environment becomes a norm for them, they learn how to live in the environment and in some cases may even find some good and happiness (although very different from how us westerners would perceive good and happiness) Especially parents of kids who grew up in that time and with the newer generations that only know of Fidels rule and current way of life.

Wouldn't you as a parent try to bring your kids up to be happy no matter what environment you were in?

Another point is, under fidels rule, as time passed, people became isolated from the outside word. Thus, they had to way to compare their situation to an outside reference point. But they continue living.

So of course there will be stories, told by those who lived in Cuba of good times and happiness.

This is kind of analogous to China under Maos rule, where the chinese people though that under Mao, they were superior to us "capitalist-roaders" in the western world. Again, this is because they had no point of reference to the outside world. Although the chinese suffered, they didn't realize that the were in a bad situation, and in fact many books have been writen that account for how the chinese viewed themselves and their lives during Maos reign. You'll find that they didn't view their lives as horrible at all, in fact, most were HONORED to be serving Mao, especially during the Great Leap (this changed during the cultural revolution)

But because we have books that tell of what it really was like to live in China, written by chinese authors who lived during that time, we can appreciate the fully history Maos china from the peoples point of view and not only have the Westerner (outsider) perspective.

So, i think those books would be beneficial to the children of "exiles" (as well as the 'exiles" themselves) to have a different and augmented understanding of life in Cuba. There is an education value to those books, to bad others can't see it.

You're using a big protein in an attempt to get a fragment specific antibody. The nature of polyclonals is that they will recognize multiple sites of your antigen. If you're using an entire mAB to create pAB specific to a region of the mAB, you're bound to get alot of not specific pABs!!

You would need to produce that CDR1 region (recombinantly) and inject that into the rabbit to get a specific pAB (or mAB) I think you're wasting your time injecting the entire mAB, you're just gonna get pAB that recognize the entire multiple sites on your mAB fragment.

Also, how are you screening for CDR1 selective binding, I assume you're have some form of CDR1 protein to do the screen right? Remember, your antibody is only as good as the screen you develop for it! If you are using a CDR1 fragment in your screen that maybe you can use that as an antigen. REALLY think about your screen if you have to alternative but to use your mAB as an antigen. If you're using the entire mAB in your screen then you're fighting a losing battle. I did my screens using ELISA, although i've know others that use western blot, I found ELISA more quantative. Whatever you use for screen, just make sure it will give you specific results.

There are other tips I can give..but I think you're wasting you're time if you're not using CDR1 fragment an antigen or a screening tool.

I've personally made monoclonal antibodies (using a subtractive hybridization method), and I can say its VERY labor intensive (it took amost 8 months to produce), so I would avoid that route (this is why your screen is essential!!)

The other question I have is why do you need an antibody to the variable region, in other words what is the nature of the experiment you intend to do? They can be other ways to get at the same question.

"i've executed this experiment flawlessly, it will work and I'll get great results!"

"I have one more year until graduation"

"i'm gonna publish in nature!"

"my work will be heavily cited by others"

"A 175 priority score and 9% on my RO1??!!!! I'm getting funded!!"

"After my post-doc i'm gonna be a senior scienist at Pfizer"

"my PhD will be worth something".

There..some science related "famous" last words for you...most of them spoken by me at somepoint in my career.

Well, I would rather see the space experiments funded anyday rather that some of the questionable research being funded here on earth!

It doesn't matter if nothing may come out of the research, its still data! I've done alot of experiments where I did not obtained ground-breaking results, but it was still data! So even if I found that Beta-arrestin can associate with one receptor subtype and that it could associate no-differently with another "related" subtype, its still data that no one else has published or reported! I may not have been able to publish it, but at I did get the word out through conferences and word of mouth with fellow colleagues in the field (who were grateful for the knowledge, because they were going down the same path!).

Back to space, the fact that astronauts who have been in space for prolong periods show symptoms muscle/nervous system atrophy as well as vestibular dysfunction that can persists for weeks after their return to earth does suggest changes in physiology in response to weightlessness (lack of gravational stimuli or microgravity stimuli I guess). These are all mediated by molecular changes that mediate neurotransmission or neuroplasticity or muscle degeneration. I see nothing wrong in trying to elucidate the "space mediated" mechanism of these pathologies (yes..pathologies...albeit repairable) Whereas I don't argue your fluid dynamics/forces statement at all, its never good to assume things will be the same from place to place!

As for radiation, yeah of course, you can't control for that in space, but perhaps we can control for it on earth by mimicing radiation exposure on earth for similar experiments? Maybe that's what they'll be looking for in the Drosophila flies?? Maybe they are looking at P-element (or transposon) jumping as it relates to the expression of immune-system genes???? We don't know the full details of the experiments do we? Do for now, I'm just assuming.

(by they way...that's how we trigger P-element jumping here on earth, we expose fruit-flys to doses of X-ray radiation..i did it to "knock-out" or rather inactivate a nearby gene...lot of crosses after-wards ....lots of crosses to get one!!"

Of course I'm not thinking safety issues here, but just a thought.

The one thing all experiments have in common here on earth is gravity! Can't assume that things will work the same in a gravity less environment. While your idea of "diffusion" in small spaces would be conserve may be true on earth, and some developmental processes require "gravitational forces" to set-up gradients and organizers. You can't assume that develomental or even maintanance of certain "molecular" states will be the same in space!!!! would be REAL DUMB!! That is why we do experiments, to test assumptions and hypothesises!

Furthermore, those experiments are of complete relevance, not only to help us understand the biological limitations of space travel, but also uderstand what goes on here on earth.

My graduate school has a relationship with NASA, they are involved in neuroscience related projects (they are still processing data from the neurolab mission), and as a result I had the pleasure of attending a lecture (and having lunch) by one of the specialist on aboard the neurolab mission (STS-90), a Jay Buckley MD. From his lecture and our conversation, we were exposed to some really neat data that showed in impact of gravity on a number of nervous system functions, including development and ability to maintain a variety of physiological homeostatic states.

But don't take my word for, a simple pub-med such of gravity and development will give you alot of hits..expecially in topics that are of a "molecular" nature!

So, I think it really dumb to assume the biological functions, even at the molecular level, would be the same in space, as so many publications out there suggest that the lack of (or too much) can have some big (as well as subtle) effects that can be impacting to prolonged human existance in space.

I don't know what it will be in the US, they so far as I know, they just have an approvable letter (not full approval). Given that its fourth-line in the UK, i'm sure it will be indicated in a similiar fashion here in the US. Depending on the price, i'm sure it will be tiered in the formularies in a similar manner as well.

Sanofi-Adventis's new CB1 antagonist, SR141716A or rimonbant, has been shown to have appitite suppressing effects and has been shown to promote weightloss. The results from their randomized, multi-center placebo controlled Phase III study gave them the FDA approval earlier this year as a weight-loss drug.

so am I a fan of chilis, I'm not a fan of the feelings I get 5-8 hours later when nature bids its calling. Yaw-sers.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/07/17/shuttle.flies/index.html

With the goal of understanding the contribution of gravity to the developing/matured immune system, NASA scientist sent up some drosophila eggs on the recent Discovery mission. Hatched in space, they will now be studied at NASA.

I should note the Drosophilia shares an immune system similar to our own innate-immune system. Innate immunity in mammals is hallmarked by the presence of antigen sensing receptors called Toll-like Receptors (TLRs), humans have 10 of them with differing antigen molecule selectivity. TLRs namesake is derived from the Drosophila TLR ortholog "Toll" which has been shown to participate in both development and antigen sensing with respect to fungal infection.

So anyway, I guess one day NASA will have an opening for a drosophila geneticist/mission specialist to go up in space! Fly-folks..get your applications in!

So anyway..anyone have some good ideas regarding biological based experiments to be done in space?

I have one...how about assessing long-term impact (over 1 month) of low/absent gravity on the rate of CNS neurogensis OR rate of new blood derived stem-cell formation in adult rats/mice as a means to study say....lack of gravity induced muscle atrophy?

YT look up a company called "Corgentec". You can grow up their pipeline drug!

A sample of Na2S2O3 (aq) is titrated with acidified KMnO4 (aq) to a pink endpoint. One product of this redox reaction is SO4 2- (aq).

 

A product of the reduction half-reaction is

 

a. H +

b. Mn 2+

c. SO4 2-

d. S2O3 2-

 

Please note that the numbers behind the letters are supposed to be subscript.

 

I have no idea where to start. I know I should write some sort of half reaction' date=' but with the info given, I don't know what the products would be!!!![/quote']

 

yeah..you've been given the starting products, and you've been given an end product..now...write it out!!! complete with charges. See what you have on the "product" side and see what's missing on the other side. Its like algebra sort of. you know you have SO4 2- on the other side..whats missing?

(something is off..check answer C its your given...I dont think that belongs) Have you accounted for all your S, how about your O, how about your Mn?

Hmm..how about that H?

I've given you clues..now go figure it out.