Studying Dangerous Viruses

The book I have chose to read for this blog assignment is a research book about the development and history of dangerous viruses and ailments ranging from HIV/AIDS to various types of cancer.
The book is taken from the view points, experiments, and breakthroughs contributed to the study of these sicknesses by various well known immunologists, oncologists, and clinical doctors.
I chose this book mainly to learn more about the progression of studies done on HIV/AIDS, and to learn more about the virus's peculiar characteristics (example: How the virus is able to adapt to withstand the varieties of medications administered to the host).
I also chose this book to learn more about cancer studies of some of the more aggressive cancers. My developing passion for medicine (more specifically Pediatric Oncology) also fueled this choice.
In reading the book, I will also be looking for similarities between the cancers discussed the the HIV/AIDS virus. Though they are two very different diseases, I would not be surprised if I found similarities between them.
As I make new discoveries from the text, I will post that which I find the most intriguing and important.

A Tear for Baiji

"I consider myself a strong man," he said. "But when I saw that footage I cried for several minutes. It's just so terribly sad."

That was August Pfluger's response to watching a video of Qi Qi (pronounced "chee-chee"), the last known member of the now apparently extinct Chinese River Dolphin, or baiji. Qi Qi died in 2002 after over 20 years living in captivity. She was rescued after being caught in fish hooks and brought to the aquarium.

Pfluger lead a team along China's Yangtze river (the dolphin's only habitat) in a 6-week search for any remaining dolphins that might still be alive but their quest was fruitless and they have essentially declared the species extinct. Official recognition of the extinct status takes a lot longer to reach.

There are now only 5 remaining species of freshwater dolphins, and 4 of them are "critically endangered."

As usual, the culprit is human exploitation of the rivers. In the case of the baiji, industrial needs led to the dredging and deepening of the river, boats propellers may confuse the dolphin's sonar, and pollution reduces the dolphin's food supply, which consists of smaller fishes in the river.

Baiji is the first large species of (aquatic) mammal to become extinct since the Caribbean monk seal was driven to extinction by over hunting in the 1950s.

National Geographic Article

The Beak of the Finch - Final Entry

By Jonathan Weiner

Reading Level - Advanced High School, College

Judgement - Loved it.

This is a book that other biology teachers have raved about for years but I kept thinking, how interesting could an entire book be that is devoted to such a seemingly narrow topic - a bunch of little birds who are distinguished by little more than the size of their beaks?

But I was wrong. I was interested in finding out more about the beaks of finches since we have a required state lab on natural selection that is inspired by these creatures that Darwin frankly paid little attention to at the time. So I ordered the book from Amazon a few months ago and started reading it on my subway commute to work and back. It is a fascinating story of the struggle for survival on a single Galapagos Island called Daphne Major - a desolate island not habitable by humans and small enough that Peter and Rosemary Grant, along with their research teams, were able to literally count and measure every bird and generation of birds on the island every year from the early 1970s to present (published 1994). Along the way we get insights into Darwin's theory, the nature of scientific study, and excursions to related stories of other researchers conducting similar investigations into natural selection at work in other species around the world.

One of the most important discoveries of the Grant teams was the unexpected speed at which natural selection can work on a population when environmental conditions change. For most of the history of biology since Darwin, scientists had assumed that evolution occurs at a really slow pace and few scientists, until the Grants' study came along, even attempted to make actual measurement in natural settings (a nice example of a type of "bias"). The Grants' study of the Galapagos Finches demonstrated that the pressures of natural selection can be measured and observed over a time frame of years - as opposed to centuries or millenia. Many other studies, a few of which are discussed in the book, confirm this conclusion.

Quote:

"Evolution happens the whole time," Peter Grant tells his classes at Princeton. "You look up in surprise. But Evolution is always happening. Completely contrary to Darwin's view that very, very, slowly, very intermittently, life evolves."

Science Reading Log Assignment

Revised 1/1/07

Read one medium length non-fiction science book. That’s approximately one book at around 50-100 pages. Alternatively read 10 newspaper or magazine articles on science.

• At least one completion of this assignment is due by February 26th, 2007. Additional completions of this assignment (a second 50-100 page book with log entries for example) will be awarded extra credit points. This assignment counts as a project.
  For books – write three or more log entries per book as described below.
• For articles, one log entry per article as described below.
• Post at least one comment in response to someone else’s entry.

Log entries may be posted on the class reading blog or in a composition book.

Books

Pre-Reading Entry

• Pre-reading heading
• Title, author, short description of the book (from the book sleeve or other source), A short explanation of why you chose this particular book, and your expectations – what do you expect to get from the book, do you expect it to be interesting, dull, difficult, etc.

Midpoint Entry

• Midpoint heading.
• Review the following from your pre-reading post:
• Title, author, short description of the book (from the book sleeve or other source).
• Reflect on what you have learned so far – include at least one SHORT quote from the book and explain why you chose it. Remember – we read non-fiction to learn more or less factual information about the world Your reflection should describe some of that information.

Final Entry

• Final entry heading
• Your final book review in which you summarize the main ideas in the book, what you think were the most important ideas, and how you judge the quality of the work in terms of readability, clarity, appropriateness for your reading level, etc.

Newspaper or Magazine Reports

• Title of article, author, name of magazine or newspaper, main topic.
• Discuss any new vocabulary words you learned from the article.
• Describe 1 or more facts you learned from the article (NOT vocabulary words).
• Discuss any experiments that were conducted to support the ideas presented.

These are guidelines especially for students who “don’t know what to write about” in a log. If you are a proficient reader and writer, feel free to diverge somewhat from these guidelines – as long as you express yourself clearly and give the essence of the book or article and bring your own style into the writing your entries will be acceptable.

Welcome Post

Welcome students. Please remember to use your nicknames and not real names in this blog. Do not post photos of your self or your classmates. Refer to your classmates with nicknames only.

I have posted the official assignment guidelines above. You may, however, also post on other items of interest to you as they arise, including but not limited to comments you wanted to make in class but didn't have the opportunity, things you saw on TV or at a movie that are related to science, observatons you made outside of school -at a park, for example or in your back yard. You may also post appropriate photographs as long as they do not include you or your classmates - at least for now.

There are also rules of etiquette that I will strictly enforce regarding how you respond to other people's ideas. We will discuss these first in class and I will post them here as well.

Otherwise, have some fun but consider this semi-formal writing. Do not use instant messaging abbreviations or (mis)spellings. Mistakes are unavoidable, just don't intentionally mangle the English language, please!