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A.
The DNA Sequencing of Infectious Bacteria
Narrator:
This is Science Today. The U.S. Department of Energy
has enlisted the services of the California-based
Joint Genome Institute to sequence the entire genomes
of a variety of infectious bacteria. Susan Lucas
oversees the production sequencing of seventeen
different pathogens.
Lucas:
What's important about sequencing the entire genomes
is that if you do several, you can actually compare
each genome to figure out why some genomes are more
lethal than other genomes. And right now, that's of
importance to scientists to help protect the U.S.
from bio-threat.
Narrator:
While there are no actual pathogens on site, Lucas
says twenty-one state-of-the-art sequencing machines
are working round-the-clock, six days a week to
sequence and assemble the fragmentary DNA of infectious
bacteria.
Lucas:
Right now this facility can output anywhere from
45 to 50 million base pairs a day - totaling to
one billion base pairs a month, which is a third
of the human genome.
Narrator:
The facility is staffed by researchers from
three national laboratories, which are managed by
the University of California. For Science Today,
I'm Larissa Branin.
B.
The Electrical Challenge of Martian Dust Devils
Narrator:This
is Science Today. If you've driven through the desert,
you've probably seen dust devils-but you might not
have known that scientists study these swirling winds
in places like Arizona to learn more about the same
phenomena on Mars. UC Berkeley physicist Greg DeLory
is looking at the effects dust devils might have on
robotic and human exploration of the Red Planet.
DeLory:
Not only does dust obscure vision and block out the
sky, it turns out that all this dust moving around
generates frictional charging just like rubbing your
feet up against the carpet.
Narrator:
And while the electrical charges of earth's
dust devils don't amount to much, Martian dust devils
can be 100 times wider and ten times higher, and therefore
more electrically dangerous.
DeLory:
You
can imagine dust getting inside a spacesuit seal or
an airlock seal and it causing a problem. If it's
electrically charged it tends to stick to things,
and then the discharges might affect communications,
damage computers, damage connectors, all the things
that have happened to consumer-level products on earth
from shaggy carpets and other things like that.
Narrator:
For Science Today,
I'm Larissa Branin.
C.
A Breakthrough in Research into Huntington's Disease
Narrator:
This is Science Today. Huntington's Disease, which
afflicts 30 thousand people nationwide, is the most
common inherited neurological disorder. It's estimated
that an additional 150 thousand people have the gene,
but not the symptoms. Dr. Steven Finkbeiner, a researcher
at the University of California, San Francisco, says
symptoms of Huntington's disease usually begin in
midlife
Finkbeiner:
The most common symptom is abnormal movements of people's
arms and legs. They lose the ability to control those
movements. But the disorder can also cause cognitive
decline, so it's difficult for people to think and
can cause emotional and psychiatric disturbances as
well.
Narrator:
Scientists know which protein is responsible for the
disease, but they don't know how the mutation causes
individual neurons to die. But Finkbeiner developed
a robotic microscope and computer program that are
breakthroughs for research into Huntington's disease.
Finkbeiner:
One of the main things this microscope does is help
us look at early events, while the neuron is still
alive that might still be disturbed by the expression
of this abnormal protein.
Narrator:
For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
D.
Do Patients Prefer Doctors of a Certain Gender or
Ethnicity?
Narrator:Do
you care whether your doctor is a certain race or
gender? This is Science Today. Barbara Gerbert of
the University of California, San Francisco, led a
team of researchers who studied whether patients prefer
to have a doctor of the same gender or ethnicity.
She explains the motivation behind the study of ethnic
preferences.
Gerbert:
We were concerned because we were working in settings
in which there were people of various ethnicities
and people speaking a number of languages and we wanted
to know if patients had a preference for the race
of their doctor.
Narrator:
The results
of the study showed a surprising difference between
gender and ethnic preferences.
Gerbert:
Almost 80%
preferred a woman doctor-but regarding race people
were very willing to choose people, doctors, of varying
ethnicities, varying races, if they found someone
with good communication skills, a warm, kind doctor.
Narrator:
For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
E.
Mankind's Oldest Biotechnology . . .
Narrator:
This is Science Today. Brewing is pretty much mankind's
oldest biotechnology. In fact, beer has been brewed
for some eight thousand years and according to brewing
scientist Charles Bamforth of the University of California,
Davis, the first brewing happened by accident.
Bamforth:
Somebody in those dim and distant days got some barely
wet and it started to sprout and they found that they
could stop it sprouting if hey dried it and when they
did that and they tasted it, they thought - well,
it tastes better. And again, they got the malt wet
and then stray organisms came in, some yeast and they
turned some of it alcohol and they tasted that and
they thought - well, that's even better and it makes
us feel nice and cozy and warm as well.
Narrator:
Ale was the standard beverage of choice in Northern
Europe for centuries until lager was developed.
Bamforth:
Lager
developed because an edict was brought in so they
had to brew beer earlier in the year and need to store
it, so that it would be O.K. when the time came around
to drink it. And so they realized that if you chilled
it down, you could store it and hence, the product
was born.
Narrator:
For
Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
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