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A.
A Little Known 'Morning After' Drug Treatment for
HIV Exposure
Narrator:
This is Science Today. The state of California may
become the first large state to issue guidelines
for doctors about prescribing a little-known 'morning
after' drug treatment for HIV exposure. Dr. Michelle
Roland of the University of California, San Francisco
has been studying the treatment called post-exposure
prophylaxis, or PEP, since 1997.
Roland:
So post-exposure prophylaxis generally refers to
a 28-day course of two to three anti-HIV drugs that
are taken within 72 hours of an exposure. This has
been used in the healthcare worker setting following
needle-sticks for many years.
Narrator:
Roland
says there's no guarantee that the treatment will
work, but results from animal and human studies point
in the direction that it should.
Roland:
We very first started thinking about the use
of PEP following non-occupational exposures when a
study was published in 1996 that demonstrated that
PEP was effective in health care workers and it reduced
their risk of getting HIV by about 80 percent.
Narrator:
For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
B.
Researchers Work to Detect Illness in Cows at a Cellular
Level
Narrator:
This is Science Today. Bioengineering researchers
at the University of California, Davis are working
on a concept of detecting illness in dairy cows at
the cellular level - even before the illness shows
up physically. Agriculture bioengineering professor,
Michael Delwiche, says to do this, they're attempting
to develop a somatic cell count monitor.
Delwiche:
Somatic cells are part of a cow's cellular immune
system and basically, they're white blood cells. If
there is some kind of trauma or bacterial challenge
to the udder of the cow, then the number of somatic
cells in the milk is going to go up, because these
are cells that sort of fight bacterial invasion.
Narrator:
To measure how many somatic cells are
in sample milk, UC engineers are also working on a
detection system using fluorescent sensors, which
could give dairy farmers fast, daily measurements
of a cow's health.
Delwiche:
None of these things are finished sensors that I could
give to dairy farmer X and he or she could use - they're
ideas, they're concepts.
Narrator:
For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
C.
A Report Warns Against the Use of Oxygenates as Gasoline
Additives
Narrator:This
is Science Today. In an effort to raise awareness
of groundwater contamination, environmental engineers
at the University of California, Berkeley, have published
a report warning against the use of oxygenates as
gasoline additives. Dr. Tad Patzek, lead author of
the study, explains.
Patzek:
Underground gasoline tanks in gas stations inevitably
leak. In fact, since 1990 there have been about 400,000
tank leaks in the country. And of course, only a fraction
of these tank leaks is ever detected, so the real
number is much larger.
Narrator:
Patzek says that when gasoline leaks, additives like
ethanol leak as well, increasing the threat to public
health.
Patzek:
When gasoline contains ethanol, the soil bacteria
would preferentially eat the ethanol, while other
gasoline components, which would be eaten otherwise
by the bacteria, propagate. So the presence of ethanol
causes the gasoline plume to propagate farther away
from the point of leak.
Narrator:
For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
D.
Mobile Emissions Lab Measures the Impact of Diesel
Exhaust
Narrator:
This is Science Today. Diesel exhaust has recently
been listed as one of the top five toxic pollutants
that affect children in California. At the University
of California, Riverside, researchers led by engineer
Joe Norbeck, are conducting studies to precisely measure
the impact of diesel exhaust.
Norbeck:
One of the big debates in California is the toxicity
and impact of heavy-duty diesel emissions and there
is a lot of effort to essentially ban diesels. But
one of the things is that there are a lot of technical
uncertainties.
Narrator:
Including
getting accurate measurements of diesel exhaust from
vehicles on the road, but Norbeck and his group built
a trailer containing an emissions lab that can take
measurements while being towed.
Norbeck:
We have
participation from the state of California agencies,
the U.S. EPA, the oil companies and the diesel engine
manufacturers and the trucking association. We're
trying to get everyone at the table that will then
agree that this is a research agenda that we need
to do.
Narrator:
For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
E.
Brassica Plants as Protective Agents for Breast and
Prostate Cancers
Narrator:
This is Science Today. Brassica plants are the richest
and most diverse source of vitamins of any vegetable.
These antioxidant-rich vegetables include broccoli,
bok choy, Brussels sprouts, kale and cauliflower.
Nutritional scientist Leonard Bjeldanes of the University
of California, Berkeley is studying this family of
vegetables as protective and potentially therapeutic
agents for certain cancers.
Bjeldanes:
We had been studying for some time the effects of
the vegetables on mammary and breast cancer and there's
a fair amount of information that says indeed, they
are in fact protective of mammary and breast cancer.
Epidemiology shows that, animal studies show that,
and so on.
Narrator:
Bjeldanes then discovered that Brassica plants have
a similar protective effect in the prostate, too.
Bjeldanes:
The thing
that is interesting about these food components that
intrigues me and others that's separate from the drug
aspect, is that these are naturally occurring substances
that people have been consuming for millennia and
we don't have any indications of toxicity.
Narrator:
For
Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
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