BioQuakes

AP Biology class blog for discussing current research in Biology

Author: sgagocytosis

Regular Exercise Can Change Our DNA

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Most people (hopefully) know that exercise and physical activity are beneficial to almost everyones physical and mental health. Exercising improves one’s mood, boosts energy, controls weight, helps the body fight against diseases, reduces stress, and many more life benefits. A new study  by a group of scientists in Sweden discovered how the influence of physical exercise actually has that beneficial effect on the human body.

The scientists focused their work on 23 young, healthy men and women at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. The participants were asked to exercise on stationary bikes for 45 minutes, four times per week, for three months. The scientists understood that it would be difficult to study the full changes on each person because they can’t isolate the other aspects of someone’s life like diet or other behaviors. Because of this issue, each person only exercised one leg so they essentially became their own control group.

After the three months had passed, the scientists clearly saw that the exercised leg was stronger. They also studied the DNA of the muscle cells and compared them between each leg. The genome of muscle cells on the exercised leg had new methylation patterns. DNA Methylation is the process of methyl groups attaching to the outside of a gene and making the gene more or less able to respond to biochemical signals. This entire study is also known as epigenetis. Epigenetics is the study of modifications of DNA influenced by the environment. The scientists found that exercise has a huge effect on human epigenetics based on methylation patterns.

The experiment showed that many of the methylation changes were on the enhancer part of the genome. Enhancers “bind to activator proteins which help connect transcription factors to RNA polymerase and the promotor region to turn on transcription of a gene” (from Mrs. Newitt notes packet). The enhancers amplified the expression of proteins by genes that effect energy, insulin, muscle inflammation and muscle pain.

Exercising is good for you and now we know why. It affects how healthy and fit our muscles become. The results of this study will now help lead other scientists into methylation pattern and gene expression research.

 

Main article:

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/12/17/how-exercise-changes-our-dna/?_r=0

Other articles of interest:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25484259

http://learningenglish.voanews.com/content/study-regular-exercise-can-change-our-dna/2580467.html

http://www.cell.com/cell-metabolism/abstract/S1550-4131(12)00005-8?_returnURL=http%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS1550413112000058%3Fshowall%3Dtrue

http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-living/fitness/in-depth/exercise/art-20048389?pg=1

White-Nose Syndrome Threatening Brown Bat Species

In 2006, hibernating bats in upstate New York were identified with white-nose syndrome , a disease that produces a white fungal growth around the wings, mouth and nose of bats. The disease is a huge problem for North American bats, with it killing at least 6 million brown bats and the disease now spreading from New York to Mississippi and Canada. The disease may even threaten the entire bat species and disrupt the ecosystem. Scientific researchers have been studying WNS for over a decade and only recently have they developed a reason for its lethal effect on the North American bat population.

Researchers from the US Geological Survey and the University of Wisconsin learned that the fungus Pseudogymnoascus destructans kills brown bats by “increasing the amount of energy they use during hibernation”. When bats are hibernating during the winter, they must carefully save up their energy to survive without eating until the winter ends. The fungus drains bats of their energy and forces them to wake early and either starve or freeze to death. The study done by USGS measured how much fat was burned and at what rate during hibernation between non-infected and infected bats. Dr. Michelle Verant, a USGS National Wildlife Health Center scientist, found that bats infected with WNS used twice as much energy as the healthy bats during hibernation and had “potentially life-threatening physiologic imbalances that could inhibit normal body functions”.

The immune system of bats is very tolerant of pathogens and diseases that can be lethal to humans, like ebola and even some cancer cells. Bats are immune to many viruses and rarely show signs of disease so the visible white growth on the bats poses a huge threat to the ecosystem. Dr. David Blehert worked with Dr. Verant at the USGS National Wildlife Health Center and the WNS is scary because “here we have an animal that can survive some of the scariest viruses we know, and it’s undone by a common soil fungus.”

Brown Long-eared Bat

Brown Long-eared Bat

 

Main Article:

http://www.science20.com/news_articles/winter_hibernation_energy_drain_how_whitenose_syndrome_kills_bats-151997

Other Articles of Interest:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-01/usgs-hdw010215.php

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/13/science/no-time-for-bats-to-rest-easy.html?ref=science&_r=0

http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6793/14/10

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_nose_syndrome

 

Vegan diet found to have the best health benefits

 

Vegetables

Many people have recently been trying a gluten-free diet in an attempt to be healthier, or for other personal reasons. Gluten is the basic protein found in wheat, rye, barley, and triticale so those on that diet must avoid foods like bread, pasta, cereal, cake, essentially any carb. Carbohydrates seem to have a bad rep in our society and people often try very hard to keep them out of their diet. Some researchers even say that: “We’ve gotten somewhat carb-phobic here in the U.S. when it comes to weight loss”. 

A recent study led by researchers at the University of Southern California have found that a vegan diet even while consuming carbohydrates is best for “weight loss, decreased levels of saturated and unsaturated fat, lower BMI’s and improved macro nutrients.” This study showed that maybe people should be avoiding meat instead of carbs to improve their diet. While a vegan diet is not healthy for everyone, the study still introduced a new look on dieting and healthy eating.

The study randomly assigned one of five diets to several participants that were then followed for six months throughout the study. The five diets included vegan which bans all animal products, vegetarian which bans meat and seafood but allows animal products such as cheese and eggs, pesco-vegetarian which excludes all meat except seafood, semi-vegetarian with some meat intake, and omnivorous which excludes no foods. The participants were invited to weekly support groups throughout the study to make sure they followed their diet and also remained healthy.  At the end of the six months, the participants on the vegan diet lost more weight than the other groups by an average of 4.3%, or 16.5 lb. 

The leader of the study, Gabrielle Turner-McGrievy, was surprised by the outcome of the research. She thought the outcome of the pesco-diet would have been significantly higher than that of the meat-diet but it was not. The vegan diet was also high in carbohydrates. Turner-McGrievy was proud to say that “This study might help alleviate the fears of people who enjoy pasta, rice, and other grains but want to lose weight.”

I found this article to be very interesting because I have been following a pescetarian diet for about 11 months. I exclude meat in my diet but I still eat seafood and other animal products. My diet is also very high in carbohydrates because carbs are easy snacks. I am surprised yet pleased to see how little the effect of carb consumption had on the vegan diet.

 

Original Article:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141106101732.htm

 

Related Articles & Additional Information

http://www.thestate.com/2014/11/09/3802103/usc-study-finds-vegan-diet-most.html

http://www.medicaldaily.com/vegans-eat-carbs-and-still-lose-weight-why-you-should-give-diet-shot-310106

http://www.meatlessmonday.com/

http://celiac.org/live-gluten-free/glutenfreediet/what-is-gluten/

http://www.veganhealth.org/

Violent Chimpanzees

Chimpanzee

Scientists had wondered whether chimpanzees were naturally violent to one another or if human influence made the animals more aggressive. A recent study disproved the theory that chimpanzee violence was caused by human impact. Researchers analyzed chimpanzees and bonobos (pygmy chimpanzee) in Africa and noticed that the mammals killed other members of their species to provide themselves with more resources and territory, ultimately becoming a more dominant primate.

The argument was supported by Dr. Michael L. Wilson, an anthropologist at the University of Minnesota and the study organizer for the research. Wilson led the 54-year study with 29 other authors and collected data on 18 chimpanzee groups in Africa. According to the researchers, there were 152 chimpanzee killings, the scientists observed 58, they inferred 41, and suspected 53 killings in 15 communities. Wilson contributed data from the Ngogo group of chimpanzees in Uganda and found that they were “the most violent group of chimpanzees there is,” even though their habitat is little disturbed by humans. The chimps just “go around and kill their neighbors.”

Other anthropologists from different universities wanted more data on the subject. Robert Sussman at Washington University continues to support the idea that humans pressure chimpanzees to act in violent ways because the statistics from Wilson’s paper did not tell him enough. “They haven’t established lack of human interference.” Humans are too involved in chimpanzee societies and the animals then reflect that human behavior. Brian Fergusan at Rutgers University held a similar view to Sussman and claimed that the impact humans have on the chimps “can’t be assessed by simple factors” organized by Wilson.

The new data changed this solid theory that human interference in chimpanzee society made the primates more violent. While some scientists remain dismissive on the paper, the data offers a new view on the argument.

 

 

 

 

Original Article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/18/science/lethal-violence-in-chimps-occurs-naturally-study-suggests.html

Related Articles

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/09/140917131816.htm

http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/museums/chi-chimpanzee-aggression-not-linked-to-mans-presence-study-20140917-column.html

http://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/chimps-are-naturally-violent-study-suggests-n205651

http://www.livescience.com/47885-chimpanzee-aggression-evolution.html

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