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Chasing his dream

Check out my brothers latest project! Please pass it a long.

Help make his dream a reality!

http://igg.me/at/myfirstbook/x/6155587

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Wise words from a very wise man.

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“The focus of the Bridging Hearts and Minds Conference is to create connections between the classroom, laboratory, therapy room and living room to foster the study and practice of mindfulness for the good of the next generation,” said Steven D. Hickman, PsyD, executive director of the UC San Diego Center for Mindfulness. “The mindfulness movement is impacting the psychological, physical and the social well-being of young people globally by helping to reduce stress, increase focus and positively impact school performance. This conference will help attendees learn how to achieve these results in their own communities.”

More here

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Edward Snowden managed to put whistleblowers on the map in 2013, but  - as this list of popular updates shows - whistleblowing is by no means limited to former government employees saving us from the surveillance state. To whit…

Thirteen well-read in 2013 - On Whistleblowers

Criminal Antitrust Update - April 2013

SEC Charges Allianz with FCPA Violations

Dodd-Frank News: January 2013: Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform And Consumer Protection Act Monthly Update

Ringing in the New Year: A Summary of New California Employment Laws for 2014

Is Edward Snowden a Whistleblower?

In Case You Missed It - Interesting Items for Corporate Counsel (Cumulative)

Skadden’s 2013 Insights: Global Litigation

UK Employment Law – A Year In Perspective – Changes Past and on the Horizon

Dodd-Frank Retaliation Cases Continue To Be a Mixed Bag For Companies

The Allianz FCPA Enforcement Action – What the Compliance Practitioner Needs to Know

SEC Enforcement in the Second Term of the Obama Administration

OSHA Now Accepting Whistleblower Complaints Online

The Miami Dolphins-A Code Red For Compliance

Stay in touch»

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Love science!

How Cells Remodel After UV Radiation Researchers map cell’s complex genetic interactions to fix damaged DNA

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, with colleagues in The Netherlands and United Kingdom, have produced the first map detailing the network of genetic interactions underlying the cellular response to ultraviolet (UV) radiation.

The researchers say their study establishes a new method and resource for exploring in greater detail how cells are damaged by UV radiation and how they repair themselves. UV damage is one route to malignancy, especially in skin cancer, and understanding the underlying repair pathways will better help scientists to understand what goes wrong in such cancers.

The findings will be published in the December 26, 2013 issue of Cell Reports.

Principal investigator Trey Ideker, PhD, division chief of genetics in the UC San Diego School of Medicine and a professor in the UC San Diego Departments of Medicine and Bioengineering, and colleagues mapped 89 UV-induced functional interactions among 62 protein complexes. The interactions were culled from a larger measurement of more than 45,000 double mutants, the deletion of two separate genes, before and after different doses of UV radiation.

Specifically, they identified interactive links to the cell’s chromatin structure remodeling (RSC) complex, a grouping of protein subunits that remodel chromatin – the combination of DNA and proteins that make up a cell’s nucleus – during cell mitosis or division. “We show that RSC is recruited to places on genes or DNA sequences where UV damage has occurred and that it helps facilitate efficient repair by promoting nucleosome remodeling,” said Ideker.

The process of repairing DNA damage caused by UV radiation and other sources, such as chemicals and other mutagens, is both simple and complicated. DNA-distorting lesions are detected by a cellular mechanism called the nucleotide excision repair (NER) pathway. The lesion is excised; the gap filled with new genetic material copied from an intact DNA strand by special enzymes; and the remaining nick sealed by another specialized enzyme.

However, NER does not work in isolation; rather it coordinates with other biological mechanisms, including RSC.

“DNA isn’t free-floating in the cell, but is packaged into a tight structure called chromatin, which is DNA wound around proteins,” said Rohith Srivas, PhD, a former research scientist in Ideker’s lab and the study’s first author. “In order for repair factors to fix DNA damage, they need access to naked DNA. This is where chromatin remodelers come in: In theory, they can be recruited to the DNA, open it up and allow repair factors to do their job.”

Rohith said that other scientists have previously identified complexes that perform this role following UV damage. “Our results are novel because they show RSC is connected to both UV damage pathways: transcription coupled repair – which acts on parts of DNA being expressed – and global genome repair, which acts everywhere. All previous remodelers were linked only to global genome repair.”

The scientists noted that the degree of genetic rewiring correlates with the dose of UV. Reparative interactions were observed at distinct low or high doses of UV, but not both.  While genetic interactions at higher doses is not surprising, the authors said, the findings suggest low-dose UV radiation prompts specific interactions as well.

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To many, Down syndrome (DS) is a childhood condition. But improved health care means that individuals with DS now routinely reach age 50 or 60 years of age, sometimes beyond.  However, if they live long enough, people with Down syndrome are almost certain to develop Alzheimer’s disease (AD).

Risk estimates vary, but the National Down Syndrome Society says that nearly 25 percent of individuals with DS over the age of 35 show signs of Alzheimer’s-type dementia, a percentage that dramatically increases with age. Almost all develop dementia by the age of 60.

“The more we learn about Down syndrome and Alzheimer’s disease, the more we realize these conditions – one seen at birth, the other quite late in life – are two sides of the same coin,” said William C. Mobley, MD, PhD, professor and chair of the Department of Neurosciences at UC San Diego School of Medicine. “Autopsies of DS and AD brains reveal virtually identical pathologies – the same telltale amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles.”

Under the auspices of the Alzheimer’s Disease Cooperative Study (ADCS), based at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, a new clinical study called the Down Syndrome Biomarker Initiative (DSBI) was launched in March 2013. According to the study’s director, Michael Rafii, MD, PhD – medical director of the ADCS – its aim is to discover indicators of Alzheimer’s and study progression of the disease, with the ultimate goal of better understanding brain aging and AD in adults with Down syndrome.

The three-year pilot study has enrolled 12 participants, aged 30 to 60 years of age. Study participants will be screened for various biomarkers of AD, using tests that include three types of brain scans, retinal amyloid imaging and blood tests, among others.

“Findings to date using MRI and amyloid PET scans indicate that individuals with Down syndrome show the same brain patterns as those in the general population with the earliest stages of the memory-robbing disease, called prodromal AD,” said Rafii.  He added that indications of increased brain amyloid deposition – the insoluble protein aggregates found in the brains of patients with AD that are thought to be an underlying cause of the disease – is similar in individuals with DS and those in the general population with AD.

People with amyloid deposition in the brain experience progressive cognitive deterioration. Brain atrophy – shrinking of the brain’s hippocampus – caused by the amyloid buildup, affects routine functional abilities, ultimately leading to complete physical disability.

“By understanding the progression of the disease in people with Down syndrome and those in the general population, we hope discoveries can be made in each group that can be shared between both populations,” said Rafii. 

The design of the DSBI pilot study is patterned after the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI), which began in 2004 to establish neuroimaging and biomarker measures of AD.  ADNI tracked the changes taking place in the brains of 800 older people, either free of symptoms or diagnosed with late-stage mild cognitive disorder and early Alzheimer’s disease. 

“Our aim is for the Down Syndrome Biomarker Initiative to mirror ADNI’s successes,” Rafii said.  “ADNI has helped the international Alzheimer’s research community learn significant lessons about the pathology and biomarkers of AD, which in turn has driven new ways of looking at the disease and new studies that we hope will lead to viable treatments. We are confident we can do the same thing for Down syndrome.” 

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It is finals time!

Basically the only thing I'm capable of saying when finals time comes around

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Poor Buddy! lol

What law school does to my Christmas spirit

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When exams start next week and you just can't

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A colored scanning electron micrograph of a human T lymphocyte. Image courtesy of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease

Using microRNA Fit to a T (cell) Researchers show B cells can deliver potentially therapeutic bits of modified RNA

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have successfully targeted T lymphocytes – which play a central role in the body’s immune response – with another type of white blood cell engineered to synthesize and deliver bits of non-coding RNA or microRNA (miRNA).

The achievement in mice studies, published in this week’s online early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, may be the first step toward using genetically modified miRNA for therapeutic purposes, perhaps most notably in vaccines and cancer treatments, said principal investigator Maurizio Zanetti, MD, professor in the Department of Medicine and director of the Laboratory of Immunology at UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center.

“From a practical standpoint, short non-coding RNA can be used for replacement therapy to introduce miRNA or miRNA mimetics into tissues to restore normal levels that have been reduced by a disease process or to inhibit other miRNA to increase levels of therapeutic proteins,” said Zanetti.

“However, the explosive rate at which science has discovered miRNAs to be involved in regulating biological processes has not been matched by progress in the translational arena,” Zanetti added. “Very few clinical trials have been launched to date.  Part of the problem is that we have not yet identified practical and effective methods to deliver chemically synthesized short non-coding RNA in safe and economically feasible ways.”

Zanetti and colleagues transfected primary B lymphocytes, a notably abundant type of white blood cell (about 15 percent of circulating blood) with engineered plasmid DNA (a kind of replicating but non-viral DNA), then showed that the altered B cells targeted T cells in mice when activated by an antigen – a substance that provokes an immune system response.

“This is a level-one demonstration for this new system,” said Zanetti. “The next goal will be to address more complex questions, such as regulation of the class of T cells that can be induced during vaccination to maximize their protective value against pathogens or cancer. 

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such a hot car!

The wide-eyed thrill of racing. Now in 1080p.

Forza Motorsport 5 arrives 11/22 on Xbox One.

ESRB Rating: EVERYONE

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When you prevent opposing counsel from committing malpractice by alerting him to the fact that he had his client sign the wrong draft of a settlement after she asked for a provision to be removed, that is inconsequential to your client and his position.

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Lawyered!

When the only way I can get the cable guy to leave my house is by saying, "Sir under SC Code Section 16-11-620, if you refuse to leave this property after my warnings, you will be guilty of criminal trespass, and our next meeting will be in court".

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When your professor tells you that the format of your final exam is being changed to multiple choice

This is bad, people. Really bad

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Hahaha Patrick

After realizing that I hit snooze on my alarm 7 times

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June 11: Protecting Basic Rights

On the same day as the standoff in Alabama, JFK delivers an address asking Congress to enact legislation protecting the right of all Americans to be served in facilities that are open to the public. “This seems to me to be an elementary right,” he says. The Civil Rights Act became law in 1964.