Welcome to Our Blog
Thank you for visiting our website. We are a relatively small lab with big ideas. We are part of a much larger group of investigators known collectively as the LLUMC Molecular Radiation Biology Laboratories. It is our hope that this website will educate, communicate, and incite scientific debate. As the PI of our little group, I hope to post our data and discuss potential mechanisms, consequences, and countermeasures. With a bit of luck we'll all learn something. The links to the left include our merry band as well as collaborating investigators and laboratories. The links to the right include our archive and blogroll. The banner above will always bring you back to the main page page. Take a look around and please feel free to leave a comment on our blog (try to keep it civil and constructive) or shoot us an e-mail. - Michael " Ubertramp " Pecaut
February 2010 Lab Update
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2010.02.09
Categories & Tags: Loma Linda University
Comments: None
Well, for this Lab Update, I have some some really bad news. Dr. Lora Green passed away a couple of weeks ago. I worked with her on several papers and grant proposals and found myself in her office asking questions on a regular basis. She will very definitely be missed. Since I’m not very good at this sort of thing, here is the obit that ran in the local papers:
“LORA M. GREEN PhD Untouched Serenity Offsetting the intense sorrow of her loss on January 11, 2010, as colleagues, friends and family we have had the joy of working, relaxing and living with Lora–husband of 35 years, Timothy Green and son, Keigm Green; daughter of Marlene and Everett (deceased) Murray. In her Redlands, CA home, Lora was diverse in her interests in people, ideas and actions — a researcher, artist, mentor, comedian, teacher, gambler, and “five-star scientist.” But above the science, her humble way, enthusiasm, humor and goodness depicts Lora’s unique and beautiful being.”
Write up of the 12th Annual Basic Sciences Research Symposium
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2009.12.15
Categories & Tags: Props
Comments: None
The research symposium I chaired a couple of months ago was written up in the school newspaper, “Today.” This year, the focus was on Radiation Medicine and Radiobiology. A copy of the article can be found here. We’re on page 2 under the heading “Musical Milestone.” I’m not sure why. Maybe we were considered a musical comedy act.
Novemeber 2009 Lab Update
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2009.11.16
Categories & Tags: Props, Recognition
Comments: None
It’s been three months since my last update and I guess it’s about time. Believe it or not, we’ve had another publication show up in PubMed in the interim. It’s another manuscript about the STS-118 flight (our 4th from this flight, I think), but this time it’s geared more toward immunohistology than our usual cell count stuff. Jack Tian did all of the work. Here is the abstract.
Tian J, Pecaut MJ, Slater JM, Gridley DS.
NASA has reported pulmonary abnormalities in astronauts on space missions, but the molecular changes in lung tissue remain unknown. The goal of the present study was to explore the effects of spaceflight on expression of extracellular matrix (ECM), cell adhesion and pro-fibrotic molecules in lungs of mice flown on Space Shuttle Endeavour (STS-118). C57BL/6Ntac mice housed in animal enclosure modules during a 13-day mission in space (FLT) were euthanized within hours after return; ground controls were treated similarly for comparison (GRD). Analysis of genes associated with ECM and adhesion molecules was performed according to quantitative RT-PCR. The data revealed that FLT lung samples had statistically significant transcriptional changes, i.e., at least 1.5-fold, in 25 out of 84 examined genes (P < 0.05); 15 genes were up-regulated and 10 were down-regulated. The genes that were up-regulated by more than 2-fold were Ctgf, Mmp2, Ncam1, Sparc, Spock1, and Timp3, whereas the most down-regulated genes were Lama1, Mmp3, Mmp7, vcam-1, and Sele. Histology showed profibrosis-like changes occurred in FLT mice, more abundant collagen accumulation around blood vessels, and thicker walls compared with lung samples form GRD mice. Immunohistochemistry was used to compare expression of six selected proteins associated with fibrosis. Immunoreactivity of four proteins (MMP-2, CTGF, TGF-beta1, and NCAM) was enhanced by spaceflight, whereas, no difference was detected in expression of MMP-7 and MMP-9 proteins between the FLT and GRD groups. Taken together, the data demonstrate that significant changes can be readily detected shortly after return from spaceflight in the expression of factors that can adversely influence lung function. Key words: space shuttle, respiratory tract, gene expression, histopathology. Read More..
Summer Student Research
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2009.08.14
Categories & Tags: Gamma Radiation, Macrophage, New Results, Oxidative Burst, Radiation
Comments: None
Cory Pan is a student from Chaparral High School who spent the summer working in our lab as part of the Apprentice Bridge to College (ABC) minority research program. We only had about seven weeks to train him and get through a series of experiments. Due to the limitations in time, we decided that he should do some in vitro work characterizing one of our macrophage cell lines after exposure to radiation. Although he wasn’t allowed to irradiate the cells themselves, he did all of the other cell culture work on his own (with Erben looking over his shoulder). By working his butt off, he managed to run the experiment at least eight separate times. In the end, five of the experiments were good enough to include in the final analysis. He ended up with some pretty interesting results. During his last week, he had to present a poster describing his work to the public. Read More..
Lab Update
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2009.07.06
Categories & Tags: Brookhaven National Laboratory, Gamma Radiation, Grant, Grant Proposal, Microgravity, New Publication
Comments: None
I seem to have a distinct lack of content, don’t I? Which is sad because quite a few things have been going on lately.
Most importantly, Farnaz graduated. Yeah, team! Her oral defense went well, despite her butterflies and the committee was impressed. She’s off studying for her MCAT over the summer, but she promises me that she’ll come back in the fall and convert two chapters of her dissertation into two manuscripts. She better because she put a ton of work into those studies and dataz must be published! Heh. She was also awarded a travel grant for the upcoming Radiation Research Meeting in Savannah, Georgia. In fact, they selected her abstract for an oral presentation so they must have thought she did something worth hearing. Read More..
Lab Update
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2009.04.12
Categories & Tags: Gamma Radiation, Grant, Low Dose Radiation, Microgravity, NASA, New Publication, Protons, Radiation, Space Shuttle, T cell
Comments: None
It’s been a couple of months since the last update, so it’s about time. We have some good news and some bad news. The bad news first. My NASA grant was turned down for funding. I haven’t seen the review yet, so I’m not sure why. Nor do I know who or what actually DID get funded. Guess we’ll have to see.
Ironically (or coincidentally, I haven’t decided which), we received the acceptance letter from JAP for our third immune publication from the last shuttle flight on the same day. The reviewers were pretty rough on us, though. It bounced back and forth three times before they finally accepted it. Farnaz was pretty excited as this was her first publication. Woot! Now all she has to do is finish her dissertation and graduate. Hahaha. It’s still an Epub ahead of print, so I don’t have a reprint. Give it a few weeks. Read More..
Lab Update
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2009.02.10
Categories & Tags: Department of Energy, Grant Proposal, High-Energy Iron Radiation, Immunity, Microgravity, Mouse, NASA, NIH, New Publication, Radiation, Space Shuttle
Comments: None
Well, I’ve been on and off vacation for the last month or so. But a lot has been going on since my last update.
First, the bad news. Both NIH and DOE have turned down my grant proposals. I will probably try to resubmit the NIH grant this summer once I figure out how to address some of the reviewer concerns. I gotta keep remembering that being a scientist requires a thick skin and a short memory when it comes to rejection. Good thing I’m showing signs of early onset Alzheimer’s. Hah!
I still haven’t heard back from NASA regarding my Mice In Space proposal. I’m not sure what is holding it up. My guess is the recent economic issues have made spaceflight an even more difficult prospect than usual. Plus, they may be trying to work out a way to blend two or more proposals together. Given the lack of funds for science in general, this is probably harder than it sounds.
We also haven’t heard from LLU regarding our NMTB grant proposal. Seems LLU got a lot more proposals than they expected and they are having a harder time deciding who gets what. They may also be debating cutting the funding cap in order to fund more individual projects. I have no idea.
On to the good news. Read More..
NASA and Innovation
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2009.02.09
Categories & Tags: Current Events, NASA
Comments: None
Some of you may have heard this story on NPR this morning.
“A short, satirical video produced by an astronaut and posted on YouTube is generating a lot of discussion within NASA and the space community. The video focuses on making sure the agency’s bureaucracy doesn’t crush innovative ideas and dissenting opinions.”
It’s been a running joke in some circles that once you start to work for NASA, you move away from doing actual science and start slipping into a management black hole. A lot of the research NASA depends on is actually done outside of the organization and in the University setting. Much like the work in our lab. As I’ve seen both the science and the engineering sides of NASA, some of this sounds all too real. I’m glad to hear that NASA is taking this criticism seriously.
Update on NIH and NASA grant proposals
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2008.10.27
Categories & Tags: Grant Proposal, Low Dose Radiation, Mouse, NASA, NIH, Radiation, Russian Space Agency, Space Shuttle
Comments: None
You may recall that we submitted a grant proposal to NASA a few months ago to fly an immune experiment on board the Russian Bion M1 rocket. We proposed to fly mice for about a month and then challenge the mice with live E. coli about three days after landing. We also had a second aim that included using a transgenic mouse model (NOX2 or gp91phox knockout). Unfortunately, NASA and the Russian Space Agency could not come to an aggreement on the flight and the project was changed. Now, the flight will likely occur on the space shuttle in February 2010. We were fortunate enough to be one of five proposals invited into the scientific defnition phase. Basically, we were asked to rewrite our proposals to meet the new requirements (e.g. smaller sample size, shorter flight time, different launch/landing site, etc.) and we’re thrilled to get this far. The new due date is Nov 19th.
The news for our NIH proposal is less good. In this proposal we were focusing on the low dose radiation patients receive for bone marrow transplants and the long term immune and behavioral consequences. Unfortunately, the proposal was returned without a score. We’re still waiting on the review.
Space in the news
Posted by: Ubertramp on
Categories & Tags: Current Events, NASA, Radiation
Comments: None
It looks like spaceflight has been in the news a lot over the last week or two. First, the son of an astronaut became an astronaut. Must be nice to have a spare $30M sitting around to give to the Russians for this…
“Richard Garriott, a 47-year-old computer games designer who created the Ultima game series, paid US$30 million for trip to the International Space Station. When he lifted off Oct. 12, he became the first American to follow his father into space.”
Next, one of the guys who walked around on the moon (OK, it was THE Buzz Aldrin) a few decades ago had this to say about a future Mars mission,
“The first astronauts sent to Mars should be prepared to spend the rest of their lives there, in the same way that European pioneers headed to America knowing they would not return home, says moonwalker Buzz Aldrin.”
Sign me up!!! Seriously. I’d go in a heartbeat. And no one can never claim I didn’t know what I was getting into, now could they? Heh.
NASA announced a new NSBRI for more space radiation research. Dr. Ann Kennedy is out there and she knows her stuff. This should be good.
“The University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine has been awarded $10 million over a five-year period from the National Space Biomedical Research Institute (NSBRI). The grant establishes an NSBRI Center of Acute Radiation Research (CARR) studying the acute effects of space radiation.”
And finally, there’s another player in the space race. I hope congress and the next president of the United States is paying attention…
“Chandrayaan-1 – which means “Moon Craft” in ancient Sanskrit – is scheduled to launch from the Sriharikota space center in southern India at 8:20 p.m. EDT Tuesday in a two-year mission aimed at laying the groundwork for further Indian space expeditions.”
