Genomics Blog
Ah the elusive Prion. The folded protein behind BSE, CJD, Chronic Wasting disease, and playing a role in Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and ALS.
And there you have it. My entire knowledge base (well almost), though when I was the Marketing and Communications Manager for Alberta Beef Producers I was a litte more up on the latest developments. I'm a bit rusty these days, which is eactly why I'm in the Prion 101 workshop at the Prion Research Conference in Ottawa. Time to brush up.
The session is being run by Dr. Scott Napper, is an Associate Profesor at the University of Saskatchewan as well as the Program Manager of Emerging Diseases at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization. Prions lead to a novel form of infectious disease that results from the misfolding of a normal cellular protein. Dr. Napper likened it to a kind of molecular peer pressure because the proteins cause other proteins to do the same thing resulting in a cascading effect to the disease. One of the challenges is that what we do know about prions does not account for all the complexities we see and it would appear that there is a LOT that we don't know about prions and related disease.
This conference while it may have answers, will likely raise a lot of questions with the 300 attendees from around the world.
So what's the Communications Director from Genome Alberta doing hanging out with a bunch of Prion researchers?
New media, what else.
I'll be leading a workshop on New Media and joining me on the panel are Colin Anderson and Stéphane McLachlan from the University of Manitoba, and Valerie Sim from the University of Alberta. I talked to them on a conference call once but until last night had never met them and there is no queston they are part of a new wave of researchers who want to talk about their work and bring it to the world to discuss, debate, and hopefully so the public can understand the science.
Colin is a PhD student at the University of Manitoba and has an excellent blog called Farm to Fork Research that can be found at http://www.farmtoforkresearch.com/
Stéphane is an Associate Professor at the University of Manitoba and the driving force behind Shaking the Tree Radio at http://www.environmentalconservationlab.ca/?cat=7 produced by the Environmental Conservation Lab at the University of Manitoba.
Valerie Sim is an Associate Professor at the University of Alberta and writes a blog a http://priongirl.blogspot.com/ which is all about what is is like to be a new reearcher. She is also active on Twitter as Prion Girl. Rumour has it she is also one heck of a violin player.
These 3 are not your typical researchers when it comes to the new online tools available to reach out to the world. They embrace them. I'm lookng forward to our session this afternoon.
And if you want some insight into what exactly a prion is, here is a YouTube video that will help, It features Michael Geschwind from the University of California, San Francisco, Memory and Aging Center. He is one of the plenary speakers at the PrP Canada 2010 Conference.
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Comments
Colin Anderson - www.farmtoforkresearch.com
I enjoyed the workshop new media and science workshop today. New media is certainly changing the way I think about communication and I am excited to continue to experiment. Although 'new' media is arguably revolutionizing communication in larger society, there is far less uptake in academe. Do publicly funded scientists/academics have a responsibility to communicate their research to the public in an accessible way? I think so, and it seems that New Media could play a role in enabling this.
One of the bottlenecks seems to stem from the reward structure in science which tends to discourage informal collaboration/sharing during the idea/science development phase (with exceptions amongst small numbers of collaborating researchers). Only when a scientist completes a study and polishes off a paper/report does it enter into the 'public realm' (are academic journals a public space?) where scientists, citizens, politicians then interact and use the ideas. Because of the way academics are rewarded (i.e. for publishing new ideas/science in journal articles/books) they are afraid that if they communicate in less formal forums (e.g. through new media), they will get scooped - i.e. someone will either: a) maliciously steal and publish part of or the whole idea / data / technique or b) build on the idea by publishing expanded/extended research in a sanctioned forum and by doing so make the original-borrowed contribution less important. But couldn't sharing ideas earlier/throughout the research process, allow 'science' to move faster, create better research? Does the competitive nature of the reward system stifle 'progress' because it discourages collaboration/sharing? What would a more collaborative environment for academics/scientists look like and, one step further, collaboration and dialogue with citizens (a responsibility?)? What do you think?
Elaine -
Yes, I believe research should be shared around - maybe then, more answers would be found. I've been posting my research and findings for years, but no-one seems to think it of any significance.
Prions are supposed to misshappen or misfold to cause brain wasting diseases. I believe from research, that prions are NOT the initial cause of brain wasting, but lack of oxygen to the brain due to injury and/or toxin, could be. I believe prions may be an anaerobic, (living without oxygen), part anaerobic, have an anaerobic cell, or need a host which is one of these.
From the Encyclopaedia Britannica - In Sickle-cell aneamia, the cell changes shape when exposed to oxygen and reverts somewhat to the Sickle-cell when deprived of oxygen. This is a reasonable explanation as to why prions change shape.
In several CJD case studies, family have mentioned the person had an injury or fall, hitting their head, before symptoms were displayed. Research has found, that if the carotid body in the neck is damaged, it can cause an imbalance of carbon dioxide and oxygen to the brain, which can cause neurological symptoms and even a quick death.
I've read even healthy brains have prions - so if injury caused lack of oxygen to the brain - this would allow the prions to change shape to cause brain wasting.
Does anyone have any views on my research and findings?