Justice, Texas Style

 
Reuters is reporting that the State of Texas has just executed it's 400th convicted criminal since 1982 [Texas executes 400th person since 1982].

The Governor's office issued a statement in response to criticism of the large number of executions in Texas.

Texans long ago decided that the death penalty is a just and appropriate punishment for the most horrible crimes committed against our citizens.

I suspect this is true. Texans probably do support the death penalty. That's not the point. The point is why are there are so many more executions in Texas compared to other states with the death penalty and why is the USA one of the few "civilized" nations to permit executions of their own citizens?

I don't know the answers to these questions. Does anyone else?

"KINGSTON LACY RELICS OFFER INSIGHT INTO ANCIENT EGYPT"

The ostraca mentioned in the articles below are being prepared for publication by Klaas Worp (Greek ostraca), Brian Muhs (Demotic), Jacques van der Vliet (Coptic), Rob Demaree (Hieratic), and Tasha Vorderstrasse (Arabic).

A crate of ancient Egyptian relics discovered at a National Trust property has turned out to be a large collection of inscribed pottery sherds known as 'ostraka', used by scribes to write a variety of notes and messages.

Among the pieces, found during work in the cellars of Kingston Lacy in Dorset are over one hundred tax receipts given by officials for poll tax, mortgages and income tax, providing a fascinating glimpse into everyday life in ancient Egypt.

The ancient sherds form part of a considerable collection of Egyptian artefacts brought to Kingston Lacy in the 19th century by its owner, pioneer Egyptologist William John Bankes. more at 24 hour museum.org



Same news item from the Guardian

Egyptians' ancient tax burden revealed

A dusty crate of broken bits of pottery discovered at a stately home in Dorset has given a fresh insight into the life of the ancient Egyptians - and it turns out that concerns over mortgages, taxes and simply making ends meet were as important then as they are now.
More than 200 "ostraka" - potsherds inscribed with notes - were found in the cellar of the National Trust property Kingston Lacy, near Wimborne Minster
Revealing the find yesterday, experts said some of the ostraka featured lists of temple priests who "stood before the god", but most were concerned with the minutiae of everyday life.
Among the messages translated are receipts for a poll tax bill paid by a farmer, tax paid on handicrafts, income tax from a crop of dates and tax for the maintenance of public utilities.

At least 16 of the tax receipts were issued to the same taxpayer, Patsibtis, son of Petorzmethis. He is also a taxpayer on more than 20 ostraka in the British Museum and other collections.

Brian Muhs, who oversaw the translations, said: "Because there are a lot of ostraka, and many relate to the same people, we are able to build up a picture of what life was like. It is possible to build up a picture of income, jobs, family makeup.

"Some show that the lives of farmers were very hard and they ended each year in debt and had to sell their harvest of dates to pay their taxes," added Mr Muhs. "It was a perpetual cycle of hardship.: more at the Guardian

Source: Chuck Jones and Brian Muhs (thanks).

Nobel Laureate: Earl W. Sutherland, Jr.

 

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1971.

"for his discoveries concerning the mechanisms of the action of hormones"

Earl W. Sutherland, Jr. (1915-1974) received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work on the mechanism of action of hormones, particularly epinephrine. Sutherland was very much influenced by Carl Cori [Nobel Laureates: Carl Ferdinand Cori and Gerty Theresa Cori] who worked on the pathways of glycogen breakdown and glucose synthesis in mammalian liver cells. Sutherland is responsible for discovering how the hormone epinephrine regulates glycogen synthesis [Regulating Glycogen Metabolism]. Along the way, Sutherland discovered the second messenger cyclic AMP (cAMP), which was Monday's Molecule #39.

The presentation speech was delivered by Peter Reichard of the Karolinska Medico-Chirurgical Institute. Note the opening line that refers to Monod's famous quote"What is true of E. coli is also true of the elephant." It was 1971 and Chance and Necessity had just come out. For years scientists had thought that the action of hormones demonstrated that so-called "higher" organisms used higher-level processes to regulate metabolism. Hormones needed whole tissues and organs to show an effect. What Sutherland proved was that hormones work at the cellular and molecular level just like the molecules that regulated activity in bacteria.

Your Majesty, Your Royal Highnesses, Ladies and Gentlemen,

What applies to bacteria also applies to elephants. This free quotation after the French Nobel prize winner, Jacques Monod, illustrates with some exaggeration one important principle of biology: that of the identity of the fundamental life processes.

Yet one need not be a Nobel prize winner to know the difference between bacteria and an elephant. The latter is not only much larger. The decisive difference lies in the fact that bacteria are unicellular organisms and that all the functions of life are contained in a single cell. In higher organisms on the other hand, there occurs a division of labor between different types of highly specialized cells. Nevertheless, the elephant must function as an integrated unity. The cells in the different organs must be coordinated in such a way that they rapidly adapt to the changing requirements of the environment.

The hormones form part of such a coordinating system. Among other things, the difference between a bacterium and an elephant lies in the fact that the latter - as well as all of us here - for the sustainment of his life is completely dependent of the proper function of hormones, while bacteria can do without them.

What then is the function of hormones? Ever since the first hormone was discovered about 70 years ago this has been a central theme of research for many scientists. This question is also of considerable medical importance. Many diseases are hormone diseases, amongst them diabetes. In spite of this the mechanism of hormone action remained a complete mystery until recently. The answer did not come until Earl Sutherland started his investigations on the function of the hormone epinephrine.

This hormone is produced in the adrenal glands and is transported to different organs of the body by the blood. It is formed in increased amounts during stress and adapts the individual to new situations. One of its important functions lies in the liberation of glucose inside the cells for the production of energy. Epinephrine serves as a chemical signal, as a messenger, which is sent out from the adrenals to activate different organs essential for the defense of the individual.

Sutherland investigated the effect of epinephrine on the formation of glucose in liver and muscle cells. He discovered a new chemical substance which serves as an intermediate during the function of the hormone. This substance is called cyclic AMP. It transmits the signal from epinephrine to the machinery of the cell, and Sutherland therefore called it a "second messenger". Furthermore, Sutherland made the important discovery that cyclic AMP is formed in the cell membrane. This means that epinephrine never enters the cell. We may visualize the hormone as a messenger which arrives at the door of the house and there rings the bell. The messenger is not allowed to enter the house. Instead the message is given to a servant, cyclic AMP, which then carries it to the interior of the house.

Sutherland suggested already around 1960 that cyclic AMP participates as a second messenger in many hormone mediated reactions, and that its effect thus is not limited to the action of epinephrine. First this generalization was not willingly accepted by the scientific community, since it was difficult to visualize how a single chemical substance could give rise to all the diverse effects mediated by various hormones. By now Sutherland and many other scientists have provided convincing evidence, however, that many hormones exert their effects by giving rise to the formation of cyclic AMP in the cell membrane. Sutherland had discovered a new biological principle, a general mechanism for the action of many hormones.

How can one then explain the specificity of different hormones? A good part of the explanation lies in the fact that different cells in their membranes possess specific receptors for various hormones. The different messengers thus must find their way to the right door in order to deliver their messages.

Cyclic AMP was discovered in connection with investigations concerning the function of hormones. It came therefore as a big surprise when Sutherland in 1965 reported that cyclic AMP also occurred in bacteria which apparently had no use for hormones. It was soon found that cyclic AMP was produced by other unicellular organisms, too. In all these cases cyclic AMP was shown to have important regulatory functions which aid the cells in their adaptation to the environment. Maybe we can look upon cyclic AMP as the first primitive hormone, regulating the behaviour of unicellular organisms. We then may look upon the true hormones of higher organisms as components of an overriding principle which was added during the course of evolution. Thus the difference between uni- and multicellular organisms does not, after all, appear to be so great, and with respect to cyclic AMP we can turn around Monod's dictum and say that what applies to elephants also applies to bacteria.

Dr. Sutherland,

Hormones were known in biology and medicine for a long time. The mechanism for hormone action remained a mystery, however, until you discovered cyclic AMP and its function as a second messenger. In recent years it has become apparent that cyclic AMP also serves as an important regulatory signal in microorganisms, and that its action thus is not limited to the function of hormones. When you discovered cyclic AMP you discovered one of the fundamental principles involved in the regulation of essentially all life processes. For this you have been awarded this year's Nobel prize in physiology or medicine. On behalf of the Karolinska Institute I wish to convey to you our warmest congratulations, and I now ask you to receive the prize from the hands of his Majesty the King.

Google Sky

 
If you haven't updated your copy of Google Earth then you should do so right now. A new feature called "Sky" has been added [Celestial add-on points Google Earth at the stars.

The image on the right shows us what the sky will look like tomorrow night when Mercury, Saturn, and Venus are close together in Leo. Saturn is going to be very close to Regulus. Unfortunately, the program won't tell me if I can see this from where I live. I don't know if this feature is missing or if I just can't find it.

You can click on the galaxy icons to get more information and you can click on each star to find out it's name, distance, spectral type etc.

Pretty cool. I wonder if Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy will comment? I'd like to know what he thinks of the program.

Identity of the Product of Mendel's Green Cotyledon Gene

 
This posting has been replaced by Identity of the Product of Mendel's Green Cotyledon Gene (Update).


Another of Mendel's seven genes has been identified. This one is described in his 1865 paper Experiments in Plant Hybridization [MendelWeb] as character number 2.

2. To the difference in the color of the seed albumen (endosperm). The albumen of the ripe seeds is either pale yellow, bright yellow and orange colored, or it possesses a more or less intense green tint. This difference of color is easily seen in the seeds as their coats are transparent.

Mendel's reference to the color of albumin, or endosperm, is inaccurate. He was actually observing the color of the cotyledons—the "seed leaves" that surround the embryo in the pea seed. These tiny leaves are covered by a seed coat that is partially transparent.

In wild-type peas the seeds turn yellow as they mature (i) but certain mutants exhibit a "stay-green" phenotype where the peas retain their green color (I). The figure shows seeds from a plant with the II genotype (top) and the ii genotype (bottom). The seed coat has been removed from the lower pair of each group of four peas.

In a paper just published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA) a group in Japan has identified the "stay green" gene that Mendel worked with (Sato et al., 2007). It turns out that the gene, called SGR (stay-green), encodes an enzyme that is localized to chloroplasts and plays a role in the degradation of chlorophyll during senescence and maturation of seeds. When the enzyme is defective chlorophyll isn't broken down and the tissue stays green.

This brings to three the number of Mendel's genes that have a known function. The wrinkled pea phenotype is caused by a defect in the gene for starch branching enzyme (Bhattacharya et al., 1990) [Biochemist Gregor Mendel Studied Starch Synthesis]. The tall/short phenotypes are caused by defects in the gene for gibberellin 3β-hydroxylase (Martin et al., 1997). Gibberellins are plant growth hormones.

---

[Photo Credit: The photograph of mutant and wild-type pea seeds is taken from Figure 1 of Sato et al. (2007)]

Bhattacharyya, M. K., Smith, A. M., Ellis, T. H., Hedley, C., and Martin, C. (1990) The wrinkled-seed character of a pea described by Mendel is caused by a transposon-like insertion in a gene encoding starch-branching enzyme. Cell 60:115-122.

Martin D.N., Proebsting W.M., Hedden P. (1997) Mendel's dwarfing gene: cDNAs from the Le alleles and function of the expressed proteins. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. (USA) 94:8907–8911.

Sato Y., Morita R., Nishimura M., Yamaguchi H., and Kusaba M. (2007) Mendel’s green cotyledon gene encodes a positive regulator of the chlorophyll-degrading pathway. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. (USA) (early publication, [August 20, 2007]).

Monday's Molecule #39

 
Today's molecule is complex but it has a very simple common name. The common name is not sufficient—you must supply the formal IUPAC name to win the prize. There's a direct connection between this Monday's Molecule and Wednesday's Nobel Laureate.

The reward (free lunch) goes to the person who correctly identifies the molecule and the Nobel Laureate(s). Previous free lunch winners are ineligible for one month from the time they first collected the prize. There's only one (Marc) ineligible candidate for this Wednesday's reward since many recent winners haven't collected their prize. The prize is a free lunch at the Faculty Club.

In preparation for the beginning of classes in three weeks I'm going to start requesting email responses. Send your guess to Sandwalk (sandwalk(at)bioinfo.med.utoronto.ca) and I'll pick the first email message that correctly identifies the molecule and the Nobel Laureate. All responses will be posted tomorrow along with the time that their message was received on my server. This way I may select multiple winners if several people get it right.

Comments will be blocked for 24 hours. Comments are now open.

Like a Broken Record ...

 
Matt Nisbet is at it again. His particular spin frame on the rationalism vs. superstition debate is that the rationalists are making too much noise. According to Nisbet, we atheists are hurting the "cause" (what cause?) by speaking out loudly against superstition in the form of religion. Apparently it would be better to tone down the rhetoric in order to avoid offending those who believe in superstition. This is the strategy that has been followed by Americans for the last 100 years or so. No matter how stupid the religious extremists are, whether from the pulpit or on talk radio, we mustn't say that they are stupid because that would hurt their feelings. Or rather, it would hurt the feelings of the moderate believers who tolerate and support the religious extremists.

Of course Matt doesn't recognize that this is just his personal opinion. Oh no, that wouldn't be right, would it? If you are going to attack Dawkins, Hitchins, and Harris then you'd better frame it make it sound like an attack based on solid scientific reasoning. Here's what Matt Nisbet says in his latest posting [Why the New Atheist Noise Machine Fails].

Everything we know from social science research on attitude formation and beliefs predicts that the communication strategy of the New Atheist noise machine will only further alienate moderately religious Americans, the very same publics who might otherwise agree with secularists on many social issues.

Everything we know from history predicts that social change is often stimulated and led by vocal "extremists" who dare to speak out even if it offends those who prefer the status quo. This was true of the women's movement, the civil rights movement, and the gay rights movement. In those cases it was the moderate male chauvinists, the moderate racists, and the moderate homophobes who were initially offended. They didn't like being told that their long-held beliefs were wrong. In all those cases I suspect there were Matt Nisbets who tried to silence the outspoken leaders because they were offending the average moderate citizen.

If social science "research" says that the cause of outspoken individuals always fails then that says a lot more about the so-called "research" of social scientists than it does about reality.

The Dawkins/Hitchens PR campaign provides emotional sustenance and talking points for many atheists, but when it comes to selling the public on either non-belief or science, the campaign is likely to boomerang in disastrous ways.

The experiment is under way. Up until 2005, atheism was pretty much hidden under a bushel and religious superstition was rarely confronted in public. The result is that America is the most religious country in the industrialized world and evolution isn't taught in schools. Let's see if there's any change in the status quo over the next decade as the Dawkins/Hitchens framing PR campaign continues. According the Nisbet, the country will become even more religious because of the backlash. I'm betting that religion will become less important to Americans when they realize that there are other options.

There are times when I wonder which side Nisbet is on. It sounds to me like he's perfectly happy with the way things have been for the past several decades.