Friday, May 31, 2013

The Bacteriophages

The Bacteriophages

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This authoritative, timely, and comprehensively referenced compendium on the bacteriophages explores current views of how viruses infect bacteria. In combination with classical phage molecular genetics, new structural, genomic, and single-molecule technologies have rendered an explosion in our knowledge of phages. Bacteriophages, the most abundant and genetically diverse type of organism in the biosphere, were discovered at the beginning of the 20th century and enjoyed decades of used as anti-bacterial agents before being eclipsed by the antibiotic era. Since 1988, phages have come back into the spotlight as major factors in pathogenesis, bacterial evolution, and ecology. This book reveals their compelling elegence of function and their almost inconceivable diversity. Much of the founding work in molecular biology and structural biology was done on bacteriophages. These are widely used in molecular biology research and in biotechnology, as probes and markers, and in the popular method of assesing gene expression.

The Bacteriophages Review

I'm doing thesis work with phages, so I got in contact with a phage lab on campus who recommended this book. It's great for anyone first learning about phages, and continues to be a useful reference even after years of research (according to the lab I contacted). The reading is clear and and interesting, and it intersperses descriptions of the phage with the experiments used to obtain them.

The book is composed of three parts, with the first being an overview of phage history, phylogeny and biology. The second part is chapters on the specific 'families' of phages, including composition, genes, and mechanism of infection. The third part is chapters on application of phages, including phage display, phage contamination in fermentation plants, and phages as therapeutics.

You can find all of the figures form the book here, if you're interested in a preview: http://www.thebacteriophages.org/

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Thursday, May 30, 2013

Ball Lightning: An Unsolved Problem in Atmospheric Physics

Ball Lightning: An Unsolved Problem in Atmospheric Physics

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This is the only scientific review of ball lightning in print at the present time with an up-to-date coverage of theory. This book provides a critical review of eyewitness observations of ball lightning and of evidence of its interaction with the environment. Ball lightning is probably not hazardous, but may be a precursor of ordinary lightning. The conclusion is that ball lightning has lower energy than generally assumed and that some theories are thus redundant. After critically reviewing the current theory, recommendations are provided for future research. This specialist book draws new conclusions about the characteristics of ball lightning and relates these to current theories.

Ball Lightning: An Unsolved Problem in Atmospheric Physics Review

Ball lightning obviously is an extremely rare event. As in the case of other rare phenomena, the investigator is dependent on reports of casual witnesses, because systematic observing programs are not possible. The reports collected over many years include reliable as well as doubtful information. Stenhoff gives a good sample of reports, photos and descriptions. These clearly show the range of observed phenomena and the questions which remain open. The summary of sightings and the review of theories to explain the variety of observations makes the book very valuable, particularly as there is no comparable recent publication on this topic. I also appreciate the list of references (up to 1998 publications) which allows to look for details regarding reports as well as theoretical papers. All together: highly recommended.

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Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Bariatric Endoscopy

Bariatric Endoscopy

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To date, diet programs and medical therapies for the treatment of obesity have had limited success. Bariatric surgery, however, provides a means of effective weight loss for many of those with morbid obesity. Most of these weight loss procedures are performed with a variety of techniques that continue to evolve. Each technique is associated with unique challenges and complications and it is important for the clinician to be knowledgeable about the endoscopic management of these patients. Additionally, as endoscopic technology evolves it may offer more than just the diagnosis and treatment of complications. Endoscopic therapy may soon allow less invasive bariatric revision procedures as well as a variety of primary obesity therapies for various patient populations. Bariatric Endoscopy reviews the management of obesity, normal post-surgical anatomy, endoscopic and medical management of post-surgical complications, and future endoscopic therapies for obesity management. Organized into five sections, the volume covers an obesity overview, traditional therapy, endoscopy and the bariatric patient, medical management of post-surgical complications, and the future role of endoscopy in obesity management. Detailed illustrations are also provided for surgical procedures, complications and obesity management chapters. Authored by authorities in the field, Bariatric Endoscopy is an indispensible tool for the gastroenterologist or surgical endoscopist as they care for patients with complicated bariatric issues.

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Bariatric Endoscopy Review

This book is a must read for advanced endoscopists or any endoscopist that treats bariatric patients. It really is comprehensive. It is written by the the man who established the field and it sets the standard for the topic.

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Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Between Necessity and Probability: Searching for the Definition and Origin of Life (Advances in Astrobiology and Biogeophysics)

Between Necessity and Probability: Searching for the Definition and Origin of Life (Advances in Astrobiology and Biogeophysics)

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Systematically explores the early origins and basic definition of life.



Investigates the major theories of the origins of life in light of modern research with the aim of distinguishing between the necessary and the optional and between deterministic and random influences in the emergence of what we call �life.� �



Treats and views life as a cosmic phenomenon whose emergence and driving force should be viewed independently from its Earth-bound natural history.



Synthesizes all the fundamental life-related developments in a comprehensive scenario, and makes the argument that understanding life in its broadest context requires a material-independent perspective that identifies its essential fingerprints

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Between Necessity and Probability: Searching for the Definition and Origin of Life (Advances in Astrobiology and Biogeophysics) Review

How did life originate? Well, it's a wide open question. As Popa tells us, an explanation that is missing a critical step won't do. There are plenty of clues. But Popa shows us that there are still many approaches to putting the clues together.

There are plenty of approaches that are being pursued today. Popa tells us about many of them. Still, let's remind ourselves of some of them. One is to look for fossil evidence and DNA evidence of our earliest ancestors. Say that these turn out to be hyperthermophiles. Use that information, as well as the stability properties of RNA and DNA, to deduce the environment life originated in. A second idea is to look at the way we synthesize RNA (or DNA) today. Use that information to speculate about how the first RNA and DNA evolved. A third idea is to look at the self-assembly properties of entities for clues. A fourth idea is to note the similarity of ATP and the nucleic acid adenine. Assume this is no coincidence! A fifth idea is to do all sorts of experiments with collections of monomers and see if they arrange themselves into replicating strings. A sixth idea is to concentrate on computer simulations of all this. Computer simulations of the origin of replication show that there are some dangers, such as the "selfish RNA catastrophe," the "short-circuit catastrophe," the "population collapse catastrophe," and simply the risk of too many replication errors. Draw conclusions from the fact that these hazards were successfully avoided. A seventh idea is to at least answer the question of what came first, replication, metabolism, or cellularization. And so on. It seems that there is a great deal we aren't at all sure of.

Popa starts with the issue of the issue of the development of cellularization, metabolism, and replication. He asserts that since all are needed for life, they must have evolved together, not serially. He states that the ATP coincidence probably is unimportant, with ATP's use as an energy carrier being a late development. And he takes on the mathematical modelers by stating that they generally omit first order effects by not tracing the energy flow and the degradation of the evolving entities.

The issues Popa dwells on most are the energy sources, bioinformation, chirality, and the origin of specificity (as opposed to "metabolism" or "homeostasis"). Of these, the part on chirality was the most interesting to me. Popa discusses the implication that life's chirality implies the existence of some large-scale chiral driver, such as rotating vortices or asymmetries in right and left circularly polarized light.

There's also quite a bit of useful material about the definition of life. Popa is right to make the point that "life" and "living entities" are not at all synonymous.

Anyway, it is an interesting book about a tough problem: I'm glad I can just read about it and don't have to solve it!

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Monday, May 27, 2013

Beyond Flexner: Medical Education in the Twentieth Century (Contributions in Medical Studies)

Beyond Flexner: Medical Education in the Twentieth Century (Contributions in Medical Studies)

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For decades, educators, historians, and social commentators accorded major responsibility for the reform of medical education in the United States to the Flexner Report of 1910. More recently, historians have begun to challenge the impact of the Report and the desirability of the changes attributed to it. This volume takes the themes articulated in the Report and traces their development. With each theme being discussed by a specialist in the subject area, the book provides a comprehensive review of medical education in the twentieth century.

These themes, many of which have not been discussed in other books, include the basic sciences, the clinical curriculum, women in medicine, black medical education, and sectarian medical education. In addition, the volume includes chapters on the evolution of the health care delivery system, trends in financing medical education, the use of outpatient settings for clinical education, the current status of the medical curriculum and needed changes, and health manpower needs. The work concludes with a chapter discussing the current proposals for change and how they relate to the problems and reforms of the Flexner era. The work will be of interest to medical school administrators, policy makers, and faculty members as well as to practicing physicians.

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Beyond Flexner: Medical Education in the Twentieth Century (Contributions in Medical Studies) Review

This is an absolutely excellent specimen of academic-technical writing! Dense with objective facts, it easily remains a fascinating read. Simply as non-fiction literature, despite its specialized focus, this is one of the very best books written. At the same time, it is satisfying at a specialist level with 33 pages of notes & judiciously selected bibliography. I warmly recommend the book to any serous-minded person who mightbe interested in the history of the systems and the physicians we rely on for our helathcare. I consider it fundamental reading for anyone who hopes to understand the historical or current healthcare problems we face.

The topic of healthcare (and the sub-topic on the training of doctors) is highly politicized and divisive - it "made" a US President. But by some miracles of recruitment and editing, Barzansky and Gevitz have assembled a collection of "chapters" by strong scholars that manages to address all the difficult problems and competing interests without descending into contentious pleading for one "side" or the other. Not a single dud item!

As a political "conservative" working in Canada's hospital industry, I had several corrections made to my misperceptions and yet never felt that "my" views were dealt with unfairly. I suspect that a "liberal" reader will have both experiences similarly.

Introduction

Abraham Flexner (1866-1959) was a "high school" principal, who became interested in medical training and competence as an outsider. He was supported by the Carnegie Foundation to conduct a survey of Medical Schools in Canada and the USA; this "Flexner Report" was very frank and caught the attention of the schools: "Medical Education in the United States and Canada", appearing in 1910. In the years following, huge changes transformed medical education in both countries.

Flexner is credited or blamed with the trends in medical education since his 1910 "Report"; but the trends were already underway when he wrote and his Report was a catalyst that speeded them up. The collection discusses many dimensions of the change since and in relation to the Report.

1. Abraham Flexner in Historical Perspective (Hudson)

Flexner, sponsored by the Carnegie Fnd, with the support of the AMA & AAMC, articulated ideas in his "Report" from Europe/Germany and in NA medical circles accepted. Med deregulated 1830-1870-1890 many bad schools. Importance of knowledge & science became apparent - universities became centres. Flexner recc: 1.fewer 2.better med schools, 3.college pre-req, 4.scientific approach, 5.research MDs, 6.university hosp, 7.state licensure. Flexner did not say all MDs must research or that clinical skill not vital; nor did he say Johns Hopkins model shd be copied.

2. The Growth and Divergence of the Basic Sciences (Barzansky)

Pre-1900 curriculum was repetitional, not graded. Flexner's "basic" sciences: anatomy [hist & embryo], physi'y [physio-bio-chem], pharmac'y, path'y, bactri'y, from biology, chemistry, physics. MD shd develop a scientific "spirit" w experiential learning in labs. Over the 20thC med-ed lab work grew in time but became mere exercise unrelated to MD work. MD salaries and growth of special sciences led to non-MD (i.e. PhD) as med-ed teachers. Need to integrate basic sci learning with goal of clinical competence. Reaction to rote labs and PhDs brought organ-system and problem-solving curricula, w basic depts serving med-ed goals. Stat of hours devoted to basic science varied over 20thC.

3. Clinical Education since Flexner or Whatever Became of William Osler? (Atwater)

The role of the practioner in medical education has declined since 1910. Factors: 1_university control of hospitals and full-time teachers, 2_technology and specialism, 3_financial control by bureaus, 4_economic prosperity and public support. Changes in a_Hospital enormous and high-tech, b_Curriculum overload and selection c_Patients of all classes d_Clinical teachers specialist or non-practitioners and declining physician authority e_Students less responsibility and focus on post-grad specialties.

4. Women in Medicine Since Flexner (Walsh)

The "heyday" until 70s for women in medicine was mid-19thC. However, [as w all med schools] quality was poor. Flexner recommended fewer but high-quality schools. School numbers fell dramatically and women were invited to apply to the remaining ones; however open and covert attempts to exclude women from med sch kept the number of women MDs low [until in 2005 women>men].

In 1971 a medical text was published including girlie pictures and locker-room humour (Becker et al. Anatomical Basis of Medical Practice) withdrawn from publication after objections from a Dr Ramey objection [feminist or obscenity issue?]

5. Abraham Flexner and the Black Medical Schools (Savitt)

At least 15 "black" medical schools were founded by black MDs in the late 19thC; two have survived but the others closed after median 8 yrs (mean 12 yrs); unable to sustain the finances related to quality expectations [false that difficulties were black-specific; see Hudson and Gevitz next]

6. The Fate of Sectarian Medical Education (Gevitz)

Ordinary mainstream M.D. medicine is "allopathic" (allo- a different health state follows treatment [term invented mid19thC abusively by Hahnemann infra]). "Sectarian" is any non-allopathic: homeopathy (Samuel Hahnemann 1755-1843), eclectic (Wooster Beach 1794-1868), [chiropractic, naturopathic, Chinese CTM, etc.] and DO osteopathy (Andrew Taylor Still 1828-1917) of which the theory stresses a holistic approach esp musculo-skeletal manipulation. The trends after Flexner to upgrade medical training were sidestepped by DOs because they did not then use drugs or invasion. The other sects did use drugs but could not keep up to the increasing standards and schools disappeared. But DOs continued with low standards improving only so much and fast as survival allowed. Then during WW II, they de facto filled in for the MDs who went to the forces (which did not want DOs). And as DOs' techniques expanded after 1945, they accepted the challenges to improve training so that they are similarly trained and functioning; both MD&DO are now accepted in the USA but not in most other places. [DO is a not merely a fancy chiropractor; USA-level medical training is very similar to the MD (as some DOs lament)]

7. American Health Services Since the "Flexner Report" (Anderson)

The history of the organization of health services in the US falls into three periods. 1875-1930 Infrastructure development and patient-pays free markets, physician quality doubtful rapidly improved; 1930-1965 3rd party insurer or employer left some people without affordable care and the CCMC (Ctt Costs Med Care), physician and hosp accreditation, and professional hosp administration, system controls; costs now growing too rapidly; "group practice/HMOs; 1965-future Medicare/Medicaid legislation begins a rapid growth of government oversight and controls; cost-plus funding for services proves "irresponsible"; new structures put quality at risk; seeking a way to incentivize low-cost high-quality; DRGs tried; reaction against specialization in favour of generalists; physicians will lose control over payment and system.

8. Trends in the Financing of Undergraduate Medical Education (Perloff)

USA - Federal govt interest in Med Ed (want more quality and quantity of MDs) was expressed from the 1940s on by attempts to provide funding to Med Schools for Med Ed, but faculty resisted/refused, because they wanted to prevent erosion of their academic freedom to control the curriculum and to keep numbers of MDs low (higher incomes), and until then Med Sch funding was private and from tuitions; starting in the 1950s the Govt tried a compromise by funding biomedical research which provided indirect revenues to the Med Schs, but it filled Med Schs w research-oriented profs who did not give the best clinical training, and when research funds began to decline in the 70s, the MedSchs needed another source; in the 80s, clinical reimbursements (ultimately Fed) were still generous, so this led to "Practice Plans" (at LHSC = GFTs) in which MDs joined a pool so that their billings went to support the MedSch and research before they got paid, but this led to a focus on revenues and constant clinical activity away from education and also away from a social responsibility ethic that had been part of medicine, so grads were shaped wrong.

9. Trends in the Use of Outpatient Settings for Medical Education (Barzansky & Perloff)

The normal work of physicians was once in the place of their patients, in ambulatory settings. Before 1920, this was reflected in the educational methods of the schools. But as hospitals became internally more specialized w the dominance of departmentalized science, the ambulatory patient was less interesting to the learned faculty who favoured more acute cases of the diseases under study, and clinics too miscellaneous, busy, and superficial for teaching; teaching became focussed on the inpatient units with student in rounds; after 1920 this led to the narrowing concept of the outpatient and the care there provided became less of a focus and unsystematic so that it was of little use in educating MDs; MDs who did not have outpatient training were incompetent to practice everyday med, and by 1950 this led to a search for solutions: preceptorships (apprenticeships), comprehensive care programs, (HMO settings), opportunities or programs stressing rural or general exposure to med care.

10. The Medical Curriculum: Developments and Directions (Baldwin)

There are many motives to change curriculums: MDs want to improve their profession, changes in the kind or number needed as health delivery systems and team structures change, not to mention technology and the specialization reqd by knowledge growth leading to content selection and greater program length. Attempts have been through internal adjustments, integration of content, ambulatory setting. General trend is a distance between the medical teacher and students, with a need to teach ethics explicitly and concerns about how to evaluate "loner" students. While many of the curriculum changes are logical responses to the evolution already discussed, there is a concern that the students are not being helped to become healers.

11. Will the Supply and Distribution of Physicians be Appropriate for the National Needs in the Year 2000? (Kindig & Movassaghi)

[USA specific and dated numbers, avg 20 numbers per page not counting tables, but gives good feel for the degree of complexity] Some elaborate attempts have been made to forecast medical manpower (GME_NAC, and BHP) using "needs" or "supply" forecast models rather than demand; with a surplus predicted. Interim results are surprisingly accurate, though the negatives of the supposed surplus are being offset by other factors (oddly the article makes no mention of demographics). Gives a good idea of the complexity and limitations of forecasting medical manpower.

12. Abraham Flexner: Lessons from the Past with Applications for the Future (Barzansky)

Synthesizing review of the main points of the book; then an overview of "current" plans for Med Ed reform as in four actual proposals: AMA-CME, AAMC-GPEP, Ebert-Ginzberg, Macy Fnd. All agree that changes in healthcare delivery systems are affecting MedSchs: financing methods, delivery modes, new knowledge. Proposals: choose rounded students, avoid narrow curricular specialization, emphasize teaching, link med sch experience to pre and post education. Levers of change: licensure (the MedSch offers a degree, but the state [through Boards] authorizes practice) can use diff evaluation tools to support the perceived needs, financing (MedSch funding from research 20% and practice 40%) supplement to reward innovation in "model" institutions (like Johns Hopkins - Flexner); ambulatory (inpatients too acute for med ed) clinics in hospital construction, content overload (accelerating growth of knowledge) use computers to manage. Successful adaptation of the MedSch will require environmental support, acceptance of a problem, innovation in financing and program/logistic design.

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