FGF's

This picture was taken from the following website:
http://unachivablelover.files.wordpress.com/2009/
01/daddy-girl-brunette.jpg?w=325&h=325

This Wednesday, my dad was taking me to school and we were chatting in the car. We started out talking about medical school, but somehow, the conversation trailed off into physical disabilities. There is a pediatric cardiologist who is a friend of the family. He, apparently, has an arm that is shorter than the other. While discussing his difficulties of trying to get into surgery, this also served as a learning experience for my dad. I told him all about the FGF family, from when we were studying cell signaling pathways. I also told him the handicap was probably due to a mutation in this pathway, which causes shortness of limbs (something I remembered from a test). More than anything, it was fun for me to be able to share knowledge with my dad. (Usually, it goes the other way around.) In turn, I think he was proud of how much I had learned (and I'm actually applying) from this class. Also, the social implications of diseases were once again brought to my attention, making me realize how lucky I should be to be considered "normal."

Stem Cells for the Brain



This picture was taken from the following website:
http://www.clipartguide.com/_named_clipart_images/
0511-0811-1701-0815_Cartoon_of_a_Man_Listening_to_
the_Radio_While_Driving_clipart_image.jpg

Yesterday, I was listening to the radio, 103.5 FM, with my dad in the car and I heard a news story on stem cells acting on the brain. Scientists (at one university I can't recall the name of) injected embryonic stem cells into a human with brain cancer. The hES cells were injected with medication needed to target the brain cells. These injected cells were attracted to the mutated cells in the brain, being the cancerous cells, and changed the fate of the cells. They became specialized as fully functioning neurons, and because the medication was targeted specifically to that area, the hopes are that the tumor will diminish greatly, if not disappear completely. This was really interesting to me because hES cells are powerful in that they are totipotent. They can become anything, relating to autonomous specification that we learned about previously in class. The really unique feature of these cells, however, is that they also exhibit conditional specification because they become the cells they are around. For example, hES cells in the brain become neurons. It will be interesting to see if this experiment works, and if so, how much cancer will be treated in the future.

Lifelong Effects

This picture was taken from the following website:
http://www.lucinafoundation.org/assets/hydrocephalus.jpg

This past Sunday, October 10th, 2010, I watched a movie with my mom and sister at home on the Hallmark Channel called "Follow the Stars Home." It was produced in 2001 and starred Kimberly Williams-Paisley. It was aired from 4:45 - 7:00 pm. Essentially, the movie started out with a romantic love story between a couple who got together after meeting when the lady did some work for her future groom's brother. Before they knew it, they found out the wife (played by Williams-Paisley) was pregnant. After one of the sonograms, they received some bad news from the doctor. The baby was discovered to have genetic defects. The bad news was, unfortunately, only confirmed when the couple got a second opinion. Upon the wife's decision to keep the baby, her husband promptly left her, claiming he didn't want to have anything less than a perfect child. He wanted her to get an abortion as soon as they found out, but she decided to continue with the pregnancy. Before the child was born, the wife's brother-in-law (who introduced the couple and was also a doctor) did a further examination on the baby still in utero. He found the baby girl, if carried to full-term, would have fluid on the brain, also known as hydrocephalus (and pictured above), in addition to spinal cord and central nervous system damage, as well as poor development of the heart and lungs. Several surgeries would be needed to induce the development necessary for the baby's correct growth. She would not be able to walk, talk, and she would have a hard time breathing. Worst of all, though, her predicted life span was a mere six years. The movie went on to show the baby and her struggle throughout her life, as well as the constant and tedious way her mother and grandmother cared for her. Eventually, the drama re-entered the movie to add to the storyline, but a synopsis of the scientific part of the movie is given above.

I learned a lot from watching this movie. First, life is never easy. My eyes were opened to the role of parents when children are at such a young age. Even working with newborn babies at the hospital has not revealed this to me. It really made me think because, as a girl, I may be in that position one day, and it caused me to ponder about what I would do if this situation occurred later in my life. The last decision is ultimately left up to me because the baby would be growing in my body, but should my opinion on this sort of issue interfere with my marriage? If so, what is the cut-off point where things should only get my opinion as compared to my husband's? If not, where do you draw the line as to what really should be considered fairly in a marriage, concerning the birth of the first child? This relates to our class, of course, because it is a genetic disease, although it was never named specifically, that affected the physical and mental development of the child. A mutation somewhere in the process of fertilization and cleavage caused a child's life to end significantly earlier than her peers. Previously in class, we also discussed some of the ethical issues that come with certain diseases -- an issue that was brought up by the viewing of this movie. I'm really glad I watched this movie, and it was nice for me to see that the things we are learning in class really do relate to life outside the classroom.

Cleft Palate

This picture was taken from the following website:
http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/20173.aspx

This past Sunday, September 12, I had the unfortunate task of attending the funeral of a close family friend. While it was slightly expected, death always seems to come at an unfortunate time, and it proved very hard for all the close family members. One of the people who spoke had an especially hard time. This was partly due to the fact that he had been given the task of speaking at his friend's funeral, however, the tears shed did not help. As he continued to speak, however, it was noticeable why he had such a hard time speaking, as well as why it was so hard to understand him. He had a cleft palate. This led to his slight speech impediment, as well as resulting in the slight difficulty others had when understanding him. After some research, I found the following information.

"We all start out life with a cleft lip and palate. During normal fetal development between the 6th and 11th weeks of pregnancy, the clefts in the lip and palate fuse together. In babies born with cleft lip or cleft palate, one or both of these splits failed to fuse." A cleft palate is a split or separation in the oral cavity. This is one of the most common birth defects, and affects about one in 1,000 babies. Children born with this disorder have struggles with eating, breathing and speaking. The cause of this anomaly is unknown, although genes and environment are suspected precursors. Surgeries provide the best results for treating clefts, however complications may be lifelong, such as they were in my encounter.

More than anything else, my eyes were opened to the social detriments birth defects can cause, even at the mature adult stage. At the funeral, even after this person had become an adult, it was apparent to the audience that something was wrong. It is hard to comprehend how such a small abnormality, that doesn't even have a known cause yet, can cause so much potential damage. Birth defects, in particular, are hard for me to understand because babies have done nothing to deserve them. We should be in constant appreciation of the fact that God has truly created our bodies more intricately than we will ever know.

The information in the second paragraph was taken from the following website: http://www.entnet.org/HealthInformation/cleftLipPalate.cfm.