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
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.
Update from the Lab
Posted by: Ubertramp on 2008.09.06
Categories & Tags: BioServe Space Technologies,Brookhaven National Laboratory,Grant,International Space Station,NASA,New Publication,Politics,Russian Space Agency,Space Shuttle
Comments: 1
We’ve been pretty busy in the lab lately. We had yet another publication appear in PubMed, sent off multiple publications to journals for review, and ran a couple of big experiments. On top of that, I moved to a new house, so I’ve been less than useful in the lab for the last couple of months.
The publication in PubMed is from one of our earlier studies investigating the effects of radiation on the ability to respond to an immune challenge. In this case, it was a secondary challenge – meaning, we challenged the mice twice. Once immediately after irradiation. And once several weeks later. In essence, we were checking to see if radiation altered the development of basic immune memory. Here’s the abstract:
