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17 January 2011

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Science Timeline Part Thirteen

 

Gene therapy, stem cells, human consciousness,the Grand Unified Theory, and some, perhaps fanciful, glimpses into the future

 

Since the double helix of DNA was unravelled in 1953, more and more human ailments have been linked to specific genes. It is now apparent that there is a genetic component to virtually all diseases.

 

Some illnesses are actually caused by wonky genes; we may come down with others because our genes hand us a tendency towards them.

 

 

Decoding Genes for Therapies

In 1990, scientists began the awesome task of the mapping of the human genome. The decoding process was a joint effort, involving people from the United Kingdom, the United States, China, France, Germany, and Japan.

 

Its completion was treated as a great moment in the history of science. And, so it was, but, then the tough bit started. Using the knowledge they have about the genetic make-up of humans, scientists now are working on therapies for disease unlike any that have gone before.

 

Gene therapy is already in use for some disorders. The hope is that some day such terrors as cancer or schizophrenia will be defeated through genetic treatment.

 

At present, many cancer therapies are almost as bad as the disease; the body of a patient is bombarded by radiation or the poisonous chemicals of chemotherapy. In this all-out-attack process, healthy tissue is often destroyed along with the cancerous growth.

 

Genetic therapy will be much more finely targeted, so that only those cells that are causing the illness are destroyed. The patient may suffer no side effects and the disease defeated painlessly and completely.

 

The problem with gene therapy is that the treatment sounds promising theoretically, however, it is incredibly complex and involves multiple inter-relationships among tissue, proteins, and genes. It is slow in yielding up its secrets to science.

 

Stem Cell Research Expanding

Stem cells are capable of sprouting into all the various cells that go to make up a human. They contain all the genetic instructions needed to produce a liver, or an ear, or a litre of blood.

 

Wellcome Images

 

In 1998, researchers were able to derive stem cells from a human embryo (The electron micrograph image above is of a four-day old human embryo; the stem cells are red). But, the cells came from an aborted fetus and others from a laboratory-created embryo.

 

The sources raised concerns within the religious right and further research has been hampered, particularly in the United States, by opposition from this quarter.

 

In 2003, University of Toronto researcher Peter Dirks isolated the first cancer stem cell in a brain tumour. A year later, diabetic mice were treated with stem cells and, in 2005, human neural stem cells injected into mice appeared to repair damaged spinal cords.

 

In 2006, a breakthrough was announced that stem cells can be extracted from an embryo without harming it; stem cells can also be taken from the amniotic fluid that cushions babies in the womb.

 

The following year, researchers at Whitehead Institute in Massachusetts modified a skin cell to make it behave like a stem cell. These accomplishments combined to ease the ethical concerns about using embryonic stem cells, although not enough to please U.S. President George W. Bush who continued to block government funding into stem cell research.

 

However, Carolyn Abraham reported in The Globe and Mail (January 8, 2011) “Scientists speak of one day using them to conquer incurable diseases and grow new body parts when old ones wear out.”

 

What Makes us Human?

Other researchers are in the early stages of discovering how and where consciousness arises in the human brain. What happens when we die? What is the nature of the human mind? Do humans have a soul?

 

Tico

 

Some new techniques with long names are helping the search for answers to these age-old questions. Positron emission tomography (PET) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) enable scientists to examine the brain as it thinks, feels, and remembers. Researchers can now see the mind at work as it puzzles over the amazing discoveries yet to come.

 

The neuroscientist Sir John Eccles, felt there might be more to human brain activity than a bunch of complex electrochemical impulses firing off. He suggested consciousness might be a separate, undiscovered entity apart from the brain.

 

Working from that premise, the Human Consciousness Project is an international collaboration among many scientific disciplines to try to answer some of the most puzzling questions about what it means to be human.

 

The group says it “may not only revolutionize the medical care of critically ill patients and the scientific study of the mind and brain, but may also bear profound universal implications for our social understanding of death and the dying process.

 

Elsewhere, science fiction is turning into science fact at Switzerland’s École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). The Blue Brain Project was started in 2005 to “reverse-engineer the mammalian brain, in order to understand brain function and dysfunction through detailed simulations.”

 

Grand Unified Theory

Physicists are puzzling through complex equations trying to find a Grand Unified Theory.

 

This is an attempt to unite the four fundamental forces of the Universe - weak, strong, electromagnetic, and gravitational.

 

So far, explanations are theoretical only and well beyond the understanding of most mortals.

 

American physicists Howard Georgi and Sheldon Glashow proposed the first GUT in 1974 and other models have been devised and debated over the years.

 

One of the centres for GUT research is the Perimeter Institute in Waterloo, Ontario. Here, theoretical physicists from around the world “forge new, mind-bending ideas about the ultimate nature of our Universe, from space and time to matter and forces” as the Institute puts it.

 

Some of the research topics with titles such as loop quantum gravity, spin foam models, and superstring theory make the heads of non-physicists twirl.

 

However, unlocking the mystery of the GUT could lead eventually to a single explanation for all the laws of Nature. Should that happen the possibilities seem to be limitless and might make the output of science fiction writers look like the thoughts of people with little imagination.

 

Fearless Future Predictions

The futurist, Charles F. Kettering once said: “My interest is in the future because I am going to spend the rest of my life there.” With that in mind here are a few of the predictions made over recent years.

 

2011 – Discovery of the first Earth twin.

2011 - A supercomputer will operate at a speed of 10 petaflops; that’s 10 quadrillion floating-point operations per second.

2012 – Clothing will be able to sense body temperature and signal thermostats to increase or decrease heating or cooling.

2014 – People may not be able to tell which of their online friends are virtual and which are real; divorces will occur over affairs with avatars.

2015 – The genetic roots of all diseases will have been identified.

2016 – The holographic telephone projects a life-sized holographic image of callers.

2017 – Human beings land on Mars.

2020 – Flying-wing planes are capable of carrying 1,000 passengers up to a distance of 9,000 km at 900 km/h.

2022 – Fetuses, conceived in vitro, will mature to full term outside the uterus in an artificial incubator.

2025 – Computers will be wired directly into the brain and will be able to recognize and respond to thoughts.

2030 - Everything each person says or does will be recorded.

2030 – After developing artificial lungs, livers, and kidneys, doctors will create artificial limbs and fully functional artificial eyes.

2030 – Human hibernation is used for the first time in long space flights.

2040 – Nuclear fusion is harnessed to generate electricity.

2044 – A permanent colony is established on Mars.

 

But, before we get carried away with the wonderful world of the future, we should remember that many predictions in the past have proven to be spectacularly wrong.

 

“The abdomen, the chest, and the brain will forever be shut from the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon,” said the British doctor Sir John Eric Ericksen in 1873.

 

“... after a few more flashes in the pan, we shall hear very little more of Edison or his electric lamp. Every claim he makes has been tested and proved impracticable.”
New York Times, 1880

 

“We don’t like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out,” said the Decca Recording Company about a group called the Beatles in 1962.

 

Got Back to Part Eleven

 

© Canada and the World, January 2011

All rights reserved

1967

Syukuro Manabe and Richard Wetherald find that an increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is creating a greenhouse effect and global warming.

 

1974

The ozone layer in Earth’s atmosphere filters ultraviolet light from the Sun. UV-B light causes skin cancer and damages crops and too much has been getting through a depleted ozone layer. Chemists Frank Rowland and Mario Molina identify the villain that is destroying ozone as a chemical called chlorofluorocarbon, which is used in refrigerators and as an aerosol propellant. The discovery leads to the Montreal Protocol of 1987 that phases out various ozone-destroying chemicals. However, we still need to slather on the Sun block in summer.

 

1978

Clusters of galaxies would fly apart if not held together by gravity and a mysterious mass called dark matter. Astronomer Vera Rubin calculates that this invisible dark matter is ten times greater than the observable matter. (Princeton University would have been able to claim some credit for this fundamental research had Rubin been allowed to study there, but it did not accept women into its astronomy program until 1975).

 

1984

The American biochemist Kary Mullis finds a way of making multiple copies of a DNA sequence. The process is called polymerase chain reaction and it is a key step in molecular biology.

 

1985

A carbon compound with a cage-like structure is discovered by Robert Curl, Harold Kroto, and Richard Smalley. The compounds are called buckminsterfullerenes, fullerenes, or more popularly buckyballs. The name honours the architect Buckminster Fuller who famously created the geodesic dome that graced the Expo ’67 World’s Fair in Montreal. Buckyballs resist high temperatures and conduct electricity giving them numerous applications as lubricants, filters, semiconductors, and in many manufacturing processes.

 

1988

There are nine planets in the solar system; well, eight really, because poor little Pluto was downgraded to a dwarf planet in 2003. But are there others outside our little corner of the Universe? There certainly are. Canadian astronomers Bruce Campbell, G. A. H. Walker, and S. Yang discover the first extrasolar planet. They are reluctant to claim their finding and other astronomers are sceptical. Now, extrasolar planets are popping up all over the place; the count by January 2011 is 500+.

 

1990

The first person to be treated with gene therapy is a four-year-old girl (name unknown) whose weak immune system makes her susceptible to many severe diseases. The girl’s white blood cells are genetically tweaked at the National Institutes of Health’s Clinical Center, Bathesda, Maryland and an improvement is noted.

 

1997

The first mammal, Dolly the Sheep, is produced by cloning. Dolly dies at age six; a short life span for a sheep.

 

1998

The estimate is that the Big Bang happened 13.7 billion years ago. Now, astrophysicists Gerson Goldhaber and Saul Perlmutter say the Universe is not only still expanding but that the expansion is accelerating.

 

2002

The oldest hominid fossil is unearthed by a student in the team of French paleontologist Michel Brunet. The 6 to 7 million-year-old Toumai skull has human characteristics and is discovered in Chad. This suggests human evolution took place all over Africa rather than in just the eastern and southern parts of the continent as previously thought.

 

2003

The Human Genome Project is completed in April, mapping the location of all the genes that go to make up a human as well as decoding each gene’s instructions.

 

2008

By studying ice core samples, scientists in Antarctica are able to determine that carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are 28 percent higher than at any time in the last 800,000 years. Thomas Stocker of Switzerland’s Bern University says there is strong evidence that human activity is irreversibly warming the planet.

 

In September 1999

Herb Brody the Senior Editor of Technology Review picked the ten most significant technologies of the second millennium as:

 

The compass

The mechanical clock

The glass lens

The printing press

The steam engine

Electric power

The telegraph

Wireless communications

Antibiotics

The transistor

 

 

In October 1999, physicians Meyer Friedman and Gerald W. Friedland listed ten discoveries they believe fundamentally changed the way scientists and physicians were able to improve human health: they are listed in the Encarta Yearbook:

 

Understanding Human anatomy

Discovery of the circulation of blood

Identifying bacteria

Vaccination

Surgical anesthesia

Discovery of X-rays

Blood typing

Tissue culture

Development of antibiotics

Discovery of the structure of DNA

 

 

Who are the 10 greatest scientists throughout human history? Any list created to answer that question is going to be fiercely challenged by people whose favourites are not included.

Biography Online offers this selection:

 

Isaac Newton

Louis Pasteur

Galileo Galilei

Marie Curie

Albert Einstein

Charles Darwin

Emil Fischer

Nikola Tesla

Jagadish Chandra Bose

Aristotle

 

 

CANADA’S NOBELS

 

Canada can claim a connection to 13 Nobel science prizewinners. Some 1 were not born in Canada but did most of their research here; others 2 were born in Canada and did most of their scientific work elsewhere.

 

Frederick Banting – 1923 for Medicine

William Giauque2  – 1949 for Chemistry

Charles Huggins2 – 1966 for Medicine

Gerhard Herzberg1 – 1971 for Chemistry

David Hubel2 – 1981 for Medicine

Henry Taube2 – 1983 for Chemistry

John Polanyi1 – 1986 for Chemistry

Sid Altman2 – 1989 for Chemistry

Richard Taylor2 – 1990 for Physics

Rudolph Marcus2 – 1992 for Chemistry

Michael Smith1 – 1993 for Chemistry

 

Bert Brockhouse - 1994 for Physics

Willard Boyle2 – 2009 for Physics