My Blog

On several occasions, I had the chance to watch a very popular HBO series called "Big Love."  Basically, it’s describing a simple yet not so simple Mormon household.  The story is simple in a sense that each member of the family is very much in par with the rest of the world.  They go about with their daily activities, troubles, and emotional challenges. 

The not so simple portion is the relationship between the husband and his wives.  Yes, wives.  Boy… would all men love to hear this statement~  The realistic portion of this series lies in its ability to depict the complex emotional , monetary, and positional struggles among the wives and the husband.  But then again, how would *I* know if it’s realistic or not?  In any case, it looks plausible.

I am often curious and wonder whether such love (from the husband) is unequivocally the same across each of his beloved wives? Is it even possible to do something like this?  Equally, would the wives all share the same vision as the husband and act as ONE?  To me, LOVE, whether big or small is a singular term, seldom generally applied, and never shared.  Did this family(and like many other fundamentalist Mormon families), just created a new level of equilibrium, where all forces of nature are balanced and harmonious even with multiple loved ones?  or I am just a small love person who, like the frog sitting at the bottom of the well, thinking the sky(love) is just that small??

I get up every other Friday morning at 4:30am to catch the earliest train to San Jose airport and then fly down to orange county, follow by a 1.5 hour drive down to La Jolla, SD. 

As I was doing my "routine" this morning, I gazed up in the early dawn of the eastern sky.  It was BEAUTIFUL!!  A waxing crescent hung near mid level at about 45 degrees with Venus shining brightly off to its side.  There were some traces of early morning clouds hanging loosely.  Pale blue began to light up near the horizon, and I knew this was the moon’s last call for tonight’s crescent special~ :)  If I am bipolar, I was certainly to have one of these "manic" episode, during which I would’ve practically reinvented the wheel, calculus, and newtonian physics (I dont know about Einstein’s general theory of relativty, that maybe difficult even during manic episodes). 

I suddenly realized (most of us are just insensitive about this) that if 1,000 years from now,  someone else happens to gaze up at the same direction at the same time, he/she would still appreciate and equally in awed by the pure beauty of that very same sky!  I wonder if my ancestors have gazed up and look at it generations agao? 

Now that the technology that enables us to trace back more than 30 generations into the past is available (Affymetrix human mapping 500K array, Ilumina Infinium/sentrix array)  why is there a lack of interest?  do people just don’t know yet? I think the society isn’t really ready to accept such challenge.  Any policy makers reading on anything about human diversity and variation would just frawn on the idea of identifying population-specific DNA variants.  What’s to affraid of?  bearing our heads and ignoring the challenge of new technology will only make matters worst.

Have you ever hear about people using the words "gold digger?"  In dictionary it is defined as "A woman who seeks money and expensive gifts from men."  In general, it often refers to individuals who sought after only the monetary value of a meaningless relationship. 

Well~ what does all this have to do with bacteria? Nothing until in this weeks Science, Frank Reith and colleagues reported the fascinating "alchemist" bacterium (Ralstonia metallidurans) that concentrates gold grains from liquid gold(3)tetracholoride.  So far its (and relatives) presence has been found in all gold grains but not the surrounding soil! The mechanistic proteins involved in gold production has not been identified and the relationship between gold and Ralstonia is still a mystery.  However, Reith et al speculate that the accumulation of gold actually may help the bacterium gain a competitive advantage living in the presence of heavy metal and the presence of AuCl4- maybe helping the bacterium to detoxify its immediate environment.

Ralstonia(and its ancestors) has been collecting gold for millennium and I think it’s the true gold digger. :)  Some of the gold that we’re using/in bank are indeed bacterioform!

reference: Reith, F, Rogers, S, McPhail, DC, and Webb, D. Biomineralization of Gold: Biofilms on Bacterioform Gold. Science(2006) V313: 233-236.

The phrase "Extraordinary claims require
      extraordinary evidence" was popularized by Carl Sagan (1934 - 1996),
      a well-known astronomer and author who hosted a TV series called
      "Cosmos," published hundreds of scientific articles, and was
      professor of astronomy at Cornell University in New York.  Most people have seen this line from individuals who believe that our complex societal structure and advance medicine have somehow freed ourselves from natural selection and Darwinian evolution.  justifiably, it certainly make sense that individuals who traditionally would not have survived bacterial infection are living happily with their family, producing and reproducing.  As time progressed, some guy in the 50s and 70s have published a whole line of theoretical arguments proposing the human genome is neutral and all the differences can be explained by "neutral drift," a random process that creates and diminishes diversity in the human genome. 
Along came the 21st century and our technology have evolved to the point where we can investigate over 60-70% of the genome all at once.  We looked again and the genoe is not neutral at all!!  so where should we use this phrase? Which one is the more extraordinary claims? Neutral Drift? or Natural Selection?  Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence! now I said just look at any other nonhuman species and people are perfectly happy with the observed signatures of natural selection (explained by the fact that they lack a complex society and antibiotics).  Why do we just frown upon claiming evidence of natural selection in humans?  I said … the extraordinary claim is that there is NO selection in humans~ and the neutralist better have some extraordinary evidence to proove that!

I knew this day would come… The handicapped would stand one day and the quadraplegics would have hands!! It’s only in science fictions when we can peice the broken tissues of an accident victims together using bionics!! now it’s actually real~  A group of scientists led by Dr. John Donoghue from Brown Univ reported the amazing research on a device that allow a quadraplegic car accident victim actually move things again.  Simple tasks like opening email, write something, or turn the tv on or off just for starters…  I believe, within the next 5 years, we would have prothetics for the brain!!

reference is at Leigh et al. Nature 2006 V442(13)164