AIDS, Michael Jackson, Gandalf, and Cloning
Once again we return to our scheduled blog programming with another epic installment of life during the HHRF with your host, Julian Genkins! This past Thursday marked the beginning of a new era, an era that will surely change our world forever. What happened? Well, put simply, Michael Jackson died of cardiac arrest. Simultaneously one of the most lauded and mocked celebrities of our time, none can deny the impact of his seraphic falsetto crooning whether as a cute young boy while part of the Jackson 5, or as the bizarrely transformed plastic man of the past couple decades. No matter what, his life was a Thriller, and his death reminds us that nobody could Beat It like Mike. His heart must have stopped because it had had enough, and whatever the case, I know that his will be missed by Billie Jean and the rest of the world. Now, whenever I look at the Man in the Mirror, I will forever think of Michael Jackson and the bizarre, yet world-changing legacy he left behind.
Speaking of bizarre, who would have thought that Gandalf could die to AIDS? I mean, the guy is a pretty skilled wizard; one would think that he could save himself or at least prevent immediate immune system collapse. I always figured that Tolkien create the Balrog as a symbol for something, what I never deduced was that it represented AIDS. And considering he wrote the Lord of the Rings during the 30’s and 40’s, it is incredible that he already had knowledge of the disease. But if you consider the two, one a retrovirus that invades and compromises your immune system leaving your body open to all sorts of nasty opportunistic infections, and the other a big fiery monster, I get the feeling that Tolkien was grasping at straws and didn’t yet have a complete understanding of the disease. Or maybe Ian McKellen is only an actor and not really Gandalf. I think the latter is more likely though. I guess we will have to wait for the sequel to “And the Band Played On” to find out if he returns as Gandalf the White or not. The anticipation is really killing me, especially since there has been no evidence of a sequel nor would it make logical sense with the storyline. But hey, if band plays on, who says it has to stop with just one movie.
Despite the incredibly intriguing nature of discovering Gandalf’s true sexual preferences as well as hearing him speak gibberish (more than likely it was just an arcane language which we fail to recognize as aliens to the land of Middle Earth), I guess that the true purpose of watching this film was not to explore the viability of Tolkien characters on true Earth. Instead the motive behind the movie was to expose the unethical methods used by Dr. Robert Gallo to gain renown for the discovery and identification of the HIV virus, which others such as the CDC and the Pasteur Institute had truly identified and described. His bending of trust and falsification of information exemplifies unscrupulous scientific research, an omnipresent problem in the scientific world. The dispute between Gallo and the head of the Pasteur Institute team, Dr. Luc Montagnier, although settled comfortably in the late 80’s and 90’s, was truly put right by the awarding of the Nobel Prize to Montagnier last year. Although it took 3 decades, this result is evidence that trying to falsify science, to gain credit for discoveries that you have not actually made does not pay and is easy enough to see through. This is also seen in the number of retracted “scholarly” papers presenting fabricated data or stolen information.
But bad research is no fun. Good research is where all the excitement is, therefore it will be much more interesting if I discuss my own. So finally, after 3 weeks, I have completed the preparation for my true investigation of drosophila Embryos and will begin it next week. I have established an extensive portfolio of GFP and RFP marked embryos, showing that their rate of closure is unaffected by the combination of markers. And now the fun begins. Ginger, my mentor if you forgot, has established 3 lines of flies with RNAi genes that, when expressed, effectively knockdown or knockout three proteins responsible in some way for mechanosensation in Drosophila. These three genes, RPK, TRPA1, and nompC, are all thought to be pivotal in the tension detecting processes that mediate dorsal closure. Whether they are actually the gated channel mechanosensors themselves, or involved in the transduction of the mechanical signal beyond the cell membranes is uncertain, and that is where I come in. Well, at least that is the ULTIMATE goal of this experiment, to identify and categorized the major role of the proteins coded by these 3 genes in the process of mechanosensation. Thus, next week I will begin imaging RNAi expressing, GFP/RFP marked embryos and analyze their rate of Dorsal Closure. Although the phenotypes have been varied (at best) in the RNAi flies, and it is difficult to identify the mutant phenotypes because of how irregular they look, I have high hopes for the stock currently being crossed and cannot wait to report on the results of the imaging.
Additionally, besides embarking on a more intriguing voyage into mechanosensation, I have also been charged to finish a cloning project begun by Ginger a couple months ago. It, once again, involves the creation of a new drosophila capable of being imaged live while marked with GFP at the sites of phosphoylated tyrosine (phosphotyrosine). But just to keep you on the edge of your seats I will leave it to my next entry to discuss this project. Until Then!
Stay classy, San Diego
