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THE BIOCHEMIST - June 2002 Issue; Theme: A morbid fascination - Deadly serious

June 06, 2002

Introduction - The answer to a shortage of organs?
It is a transplant surgeon's dream to find an endless supply of organs and tissues that match their recipient. The prospect of transplanting animal organs into humans (xenotransplantation) is increasingly promising, but there are still obstacles to be overcome. Not least are the weighty ethical issues that need to be resolved. (p.8)
Contact: Dr Ismail Al-Khatib, Chairman, Cambridge and Oxford Heart Transplant Foundation, PO Box 224, Cambridge CB4 2FR, UK; tel: +44 (0)1223 366653; fax: +44 (0)1223 367831; e-mail: ismail@heart-transplant.org)

Suicide: a way of life - Programmed cell death
An introduction to the topic of apoptosis (or programmed cell death). If you've been bamboozled in the past, then this article is just right for you. The article describes the molecular controls that allow cells to autodestruct and also how some cells are targetted for murder. (p.9)
Contact: Dr Bernard Corfe, School of Biological Sciences, G38 Stopford Building, University of Manchester, Oxord Road, Manchester M13 9PT, UK)

Biomolecules in fossil remains - Multidisciplinary approach to endurance
Svante P'¤'¤bo, a leading pioneer in the study of ancient DNA, eloquently described the recovery of genetic information from the fossil record as a 21st Century form of genetic time travel. The advent of PCR made possible the amplification of small amounts of DNA from fossil samples and allowed the direct study of phylogenetics from extinct organisms. In this article, we discover that ancient biomolecules allow us to answer some age-old questions, but only if we know how molecules are preserved over thousands of years. (p. 12)
Contact: Dr Christina Nielson-Marsh, 206 Natural Sciences Building, Dept. of Geological Sciences, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824-1115, USA; tel: +1 (517) 355 8307; fax: +1 (517) 353 8787; e-mail: nielse42@msu.edu)

Dead and buried - soil and the biochemical afterlife
Plants, animals and micro-organisms are the beating heart of our world. But what happens when they die? Is there life after death? The answer could very well be beneath your feet, in the soil. Soil is a part of our world that we tend to take for granted; it's the 'gloop' on your boots after a bracing country walk or the mud that makes your garden grow. What we don't necessarily realize is that soil is a living and breathing component of the terrestrial biochemical system, with a voracious appetite to boot. (p. 15)
Contact: Dr Nick Ostle, Dr Nick Ostle, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Merlewood Research Station, Grange-Over-Sands, Cumbria LA11 6JU, UK; tel : + 44 (0) 15395 322 64; fax: + 44 (0) 15395 347 05; e-mail: no@ceh.ac.uk

Plastic fantastic! - Body Worlds
Love him or loathe him, Professor Günther von Hagens has set the scientific and art worlds alight with his controversial exhibition of plastinated humans stripped of their skins. The exhibition has made it to the unglamorous Old Truman Brewery in London's East End, and was sending shockwaves through the media, and even Parliament, before it even opened. Set in thought-provoking positions, are the pieces there for education or are they an abomination? (p. 18)
Contact: Gary Burd, 59 Portland Place, London W1B 1 QW, UK; tel: +44 (0)20 7580 5530; fax: +44 (0)20 7323 1136; e-mail: gary.burd@biochemistry.org

Product focus
Adding function to characterization - Combining mass spectrometry with surface plasmon resonance
Since Sir J.J. Thomson of the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge constructed the first mass spectrometer (then called a parabola spectrograph) at the turn of the last century, mass spectrometry (MS) has become the most ubiquitous analytical technique in use today. It represents a powerful tool in the study of all substances because it provides more information about the composition and structure of a substance from a smaller amount of sample than any other analytical technique. It is also a powerful quantitative tool. Femtograms (10-15g) of carcinogenic pesticide residues can be quantitated and identified in foodstuffs, whereas a genetic abnormality can be characterized from mere femtomole (10-15mol) quantities of a protein. (p. 21)
Contact: Sarah Perceval, HCC DeFacto Group, No.1 London Wall Buildings, London Wall, London EC2M 5PG, UK; tel: +44(0)20 7496 3300; fax: +44(0)20 7496 3355; e-mail: s.perceval@hccdefacto.com

Other articles
~ Meeting reports - Biochemical Society Meeting 676, University of Heriot-Watt, Edinburgh (colloquia on tetrapyrroles, neurodegeneration, 14-3-3 proteins, antibody function and antibody evolution); Research colloquium for young researchers on Neurodegeneration. (p. 25)
~ Policy matters - Biochemical Society lobbies government on research careers; Recent triumphs of the UK Life Sciences Committee. (p. 33)
~ Learning curve - Science is fun! Response to the inquiry into Science Education for 14-19-year-olds. (p. 36)
~ Cyberbiochemist - Dead computers. What can you do with your conked-out computer? (p. 42)
~ Member Profile - Sir Paul Nurse, Joint winner of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine interviewed. (p.45)
~ Past times - Early days of biochemical spectroscopy at Liverpool. (p. 47)
~ News - Cardiff Meeting preview. (p. 54)

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