Monthly Archives: April 2017

Human Behavior

Professor researches effects of human behavior – Indiana Daily Student

People are taking actions to combat behaviors they see as harmful to the environment.As the climate changes and natural resources deplete, its necessary for people to take responsibility for,and action against, harmful human behaviors.James Farmer is one of those people.

Farmer,a professor in the School of Public Health, is one of five recipients of IUs Outstanding Junior Faculty for 2016-2017 award. The award is given to tenure track faculty members,who are working on nationally recognized research.

Farmerresearches sustainable behavior and decision-making at the Human Dimensions Lab. The lab researchers concentrate on food and farming systems as well as natural resource sustainability.

Farmer said the research is a collaborative effort between undergraduate, graduateand post-doctoralstudents as well as many colleagues.

This isnt just James Farmer, he said. This is a total group effort by really dedicated, brilliant people.

He and other researchersat the lab work to understand human behavior and how it affects the environment, he said,as this understanding is necessary to develop management and policy tactics to protect the environment.

The researchers are also interested in understanding the perceptions of municipal park professionals pertaining to climate change and how these perceptions affect the general population.

Municipal parks manage about 50 percent of the urban tree canopy, he said. We need to better understand their role in making cities habitable in the future with climate change issues.

Farmer said if parks arent implementing adaptation strategies, individual citizens will be less likely to change their behavior as well. However, if people adopt eco-friendly behavior to diminish the effects of climate change, it is typically a result of them experiencing climate change themselves, he said.

If one is experiencing what he or sheperceives to be acts of climate change, theymore apt to accept it on an individual level, he said.

Farmer received his bachelors, mastersand doctoral degrees from IU, but said his passion for nature developed much earlier in his life.

I grew up playing in the woods, he said. I lived in the same house in the woods with a creek in my front yard, until I moved into Willkie my freshman year.

Farmer said he played outdoors often, if not every day, as a child and was involved in Boy Scouts and Future Farmers of America, so studying natural resources has always made sense for him.

However, he said he had never thought about studying food systems until ten years ago when he listened to Omnivores Dilemma by Michael Pollan. Farmer said he had recently started considering what he and his family were eating and found the social factors behind food consumption interesting.

He and his wife began attending Community Supported Agriculture events, where people buy food from farmers. Here he met a graduate student who was studying food systems, which made him realize it was a possibility.

If she can study this, I can study this, he said. So, she and I collaborated on a grant to study famers markets and CSAs.

One aspect of food systems Farmer is studying is the barriers that exist for people to attain local food. He said there are two main barriers: cultural and economic.

Farmer said a common critique he and other researchers make of farmers markets is that the primary demographic is white, upper-middle class because they typically have more privilege, thus dont have the limitations lower class minorities have.

You can improve a system by critically reflecting on a system, he said. Thats what we try to do. Local foods not just panacea. Its part of a movement to improve food sovereignty, to improve ecological systems.

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Professor researches effects of human behavior - Indiana Daily Student

Human Behavior

Column: ‘Profiling’ is a normal part of human behavior – Burlington Times News

By Walter Williams / Creators News Service

Profiling is needlessly a misunderstood concept. What's called profiling is part of the optimal stock of human behavior and something we all do. Let's begin by describing behavior that might come under the heading of profiling.

Prior to making decisions, people seek to gain information. To obtain information is costly, requiring the expenditure of time and/or money. Therefore, people seek to find ways to economize on information costs. Let's try simple examples.

You are a manager of a furniture moving company and seek to hire 10 people to load and unload furniture onto and off trucks. Twenty people show up for the job, and they all appear to be equal except by sex. Ten are men, and 10 are women. Whom would you hire? You might give them all tests to determine how much weight they could carry under various conditions, such as inclines and declines, and the speed at which they could carry. To conduct such tests might be costly. Such costs could be avoided through profiling that is, using an easily observable physical attribute, such as a person's sex, as a proxy for unobserved attributes, such as endurance and strength. Though sex is not a perfect predictor of strength and endurance, it's pretty reliable.

Imagine that you're a chief of police. There has been a rash of auto break-ins by which electronic equipment has been stolen. You're trying to capture the culprits. Would you have your officers stake out and investigate residents of senior citizen homes? What about spending resources investigating men and women 50 years of age or older? I'm guessing there would be greater success capturing the culprits by focusing police resources on younger people and particularly young men. The reason is that breaking in to autos is mostly a young man's game. Should charges be brought against you because, as police chief, you used the physical attributes of age and sex as a crime tool? Would it be fair for people to accuse you of playing favorites by not using investigative resources on seniors and middle-aged adults of either sex even though there is a non-zero chance that they are among the culprits?

Physicians routinely screen women for breast cancer and do not routinely screen men. The American Cancer Society says that the lifetime risk of men getting breast cancer is about 0.1 percent. Should doctors and medical insurance companies be prosecuted for the discriminatory practice of prescribing routine breast cancer screening for women but not for men?

Some racial and ethnic groups have higher incidence and mortality from various diseases than the national average. The rates of death from cardiovascular diseases are about 30 percent higher among black adults than among white adults. Cervical cancer rates are five times greater among Vietnamese women in the U.S. than among white women. Pima Indians of Arizona have the world's highest known diabetes rates. Prostate cancer is nearly twice as common among black men as it is among white men. Using a cheap-to-observe attribute, such as race, as a proxy for a costly-to-observe attribute, such as the probability of some disease, can assist medical providers in the delivery of more effective medical services. For example, just knowing that a patient is a black man causes a physician to be alert to the prospect of prostate cancer. The unintelligent might call this racial profiling, but it's really prostate cancer profiling.

In the real world, there are many attributes correlated with race and sex. Jews are 3 percent of the U.S. population but 35 percent of our Nobel Prize winners. Blacks are 13 percent of our population but about 74 percent of professional basketball players and about 69 percent of professional football players. Male geniuses outnumber female geniuses 7-to-1. Women have wider peripheral vision than men. Men have better distance vision than women.

The bottom line is that people differ significantly by race and sex. Just knowing the race or sex of an individual may on occasion allow us to guess about something not readily observed.

Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University. To find out more about Williams, see http://www.creators.com.

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Column: 'Profiling' is a normal part of human behavior - Burlington Times News

Human Behavior

Surprised? Studies Linking Violent Video Games To Real-World Human Behavior Have Been Retracted – Hot Hardware

We'll give you a moment to pick your jaw up off the floor. Now brace yourself before reading further. Ready for this? Not one, but TWO studies linking violent video games to real-life violent tendencies have been retracted. Granted, that still leaves about a trillion more, but it's a start, right?

The first of those studies is titled "Boom, Headshot!" It was published in the Journal of Communication Research five years ago and it looked at the "effect of video game play and controller type on firing aim and accuracy." Not without controversy, the study concluded that first person shooters were essentially training gamers to become skilled gunmen in real life. Because you know, mashing a mouse or gamepad button while aiming with an analog stick is exactly like the real thing. Or not.

"He wants to discredit my research and ruin my reputation," Bushman said.

The Journal of Communication Research ultimately retracted the study this past January.

"A Committee of Initial Inquiry at Ohio State University recommended retracting this article after being alerted to irregularities in some variables of the data set by Drs. Markey and Elson in January 2015," the retraction notice read. "Unfortunately, the values of the questioned variables could not be confirmed because the original research records were unavailable."

While that might have been tough luck for Bushman, it wasn't the only controversial study of his to be scrutinized and eventually retracted. In another paper published in Gifted Child Quarterly in 2016, Bushman and three other researchers studied the "effects of violent media on verbal task performance in gifted and general cohort children." They noted a substantial (and temporary) drop in verbal skills in children after subjecting them to 12 minutes of a violent cartoon.

Joseph Hilgard, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania, had doubts about the study. When looking into the matter, he noted that Bushman and his colleagues were forthcoming but couldn't provide details on the study's data collection process. The person who collected the data lived in Turkey and has been out of contact with the group. As a result, it too was retracted.

"As the integrity of the data could not be confirmed, the journal has determined, and the co-authors have agreed, to retract the study," the retraction notice said.

It's a tough break for Bushman, but a good day for gamers.

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Surprised? Studies Linking Violent Video Games To Real-World Human Behavior Have Been Retracted - Hot Hardware

Human Behavior

How many calories is that human? A nutritional guide for prehistoric … – The Verge

If you were to eat, say, another human being, how many calories would you be taking in? Thats a valid question not only for health-conscious people, but for anthropologists, too. You see, our human ancestors were cannibals but we dont really know why. Did they kill and eat each other like they would a mammoth or a wholly rhino for the meat? Or were they practicing some sort of religious ritual?

To answer that question, James Cole, a senior lecturer in archaeology at the University of Brighton, looked into the nutritional value of a human being and then compared it to that of other animals our ancestors dined on. He found that eating a man provides fewer calories than gobbling down a mammoth, bison, or red deer. And that suggests that our ancestors ate each other not for nutrition but for some other purpose maybe as a form of funerary or cultural ritual. The findings were published today in the journal Scientific Reports.

Was it some sort of religious ritual?

Today, cannibalism is a taboo (although its still practiced by some remote tribes). But we have evidence that our prehistoric ancestors including Neanderthals dined on human flesh. All over Europe, bones of early humans, collectively called hominins, show butchering marks similar to those found on animal remains. Some hominin bones are clearly chewed, or broken to extract the marrow; sometimes the base of the skull is missing, meaning someone was trying to get to the brain. Researchers mostly believe that early humans were eating the dead because they provided easy access to tasty steaks, Cole says. But there are still questions about how often we practiced cannibalism and why.

In modern humans, cannibalism happens for a variety of reasons: some people have resorted to eating human flesh after surviving plane crashes; in some cultures, the dead were eaten as part of ritualistic process; other times, dining on humans is a sign of sociopathic behavior (think Hannibal Lecter). So how do we know that cannibalism in early humans doesnt have some meaning other than pure nutrition? Cole wanted to know, and thought of answering the question by calculating the nutritional value of humans vs. animals.

Hes bringing a different perspective to the question, says Hlne Rougier, an associate professor of anthropology at California State University, Northridge, who did not work on the study. Its an interesting approach.

A man is 125,822 calories

To calculate the calories of a human being, Cole looked at several studies done in the 1940s and 50s that analyzed the protein and fat content of different parts of the human body. From that information, he could calculate how many calories you get from a one-pound heart (650), a four-pound liver (2,569), and three pounds of nerve tissue (2,001). After combining all organs together, you can basically slap a nutritional label on a human corpse that reads: 125,822 calories. At least, within the constraints of those 1940s and 50s studies. (They analyzed a total of four men, ranging from 35 to 60 years old, and weighing an average of 145 pounds, so Coles caloric count only applies to male Homo sapiens with those parameters.)

Cole then wanted to compare our nutritional value to that of other animals known to be eaten by early humans. Again, he pulled from the published literature, and calculated how many calories you could get from the muscle mass of 20 ancient animals. (No information for internal organs exists, Cole says.) He found that the muscles of a mammoth would provide 3,600,000 calories, woolly rhinos 1,260,000 calories, and red deer 163,680 calories. In comparison, a mans muscles can get you only 32,376 calories. We just arent that nutritionally viable, Cole says.

So if eating a man isnt that nutritious, why in the world would our ancestors spend time and resources to hunt other hominins that are just as smart just to get dinner? Cannibalism must have had another purpose, Cole says, possibly one connected to warfare or religion. Other researchers think those are valid conclusions. There can be a cultural explanation for all of these episodes of cannibalism, Rougier says. But thats not a completely new conclusion, she says. For years now, weve gotten more and more evidence that early humans like the Neanderthals were actually quite complex. So its totally plausible that they ate human flesh for more than just gobbling down some juicy meat.

The problem, however, is that we might never know and we certainly dont know now. Im not sure the evidence can really help to pick one or the other, says Silvia Bello of Londons Natural History Museum, who researches the evolution of human behavior. In fact, we cant even say whether some of the early humans that were eaten were hunted, or died of natural causes and were then turned into meals. And every instance of cannibalism would have happened under different circumstances, Cole says. But the new data should be taken into account when analyzing cases of prehistoric cannibalism, Rougier says.

After all, understanding why early humans sometimes ate one another will help us better understand their behavior, beliefs, and social interactions. Plus, theres something morbidly engrossing about Neanderthals butchering hominin bones in a cave thousands of years ago and that perverse fascination is what drew Cole into studying this in the first place. Its like a car crash, he says, you cant stop looking.

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How many calories is that human? A nutritional guide for prehistoric ... - The Verge

Human Behavior

Wine Tasting Engages Your Brain More Than Any Other Behavior … – Food & Wine

Any good wine snob knows that, despite the terms intended negative connotation, the label should really be worn like a badge of honor. Sure, some beer lovers or, even worse, casual wine drinkers might find that snobbery worthy of derision, but they clearly dont understand the difficulty, dexterity and dedication necessary to reach that level. Thankfully, however, a scientist has finally tossed us wine snobs a life preservera Yale neuroscientist nonetheless. In his recently published book, Neuroenology: How the Brain Creates the Taste of Wine, Gordon Shepherd argues that wine tasting actually stimulates your brain more than allegedly highfalutin activities like listening to music or even tackling a complicated math problem. Remember that time you did trigonometry while sipping wine with Beethoven playing the background? Thats basically the closest youve ever come to being Albert Einstein.

According to Shepherd, tasting wine engages more of our brain than any other human behavior. His book essentially an oenologic extension of his previous publication, Neurogastronomy: How the Brain Creates Flavor and Why It Matters delves into this process with extreme detail, from the fluid dynamics of how wine is manipulated in our mouths; to the effect of its appearance, smell and mouthfeel; to the way our brains process and share all that information. He suggests that unlike something like math that utilizes a specific source of knowledge, wine tasting engages us more completely. Speaking to NPR, he explained how even basic steps of wine tasting can be more complicated than they seem. You don't just put wine in your mouth and leave it there, Shepherd said. You move it about and then swallow it, which is a very complex motor act.

However, possibly the most complex part of wine tastingone of Shepherds central points and the subtitle of his bookis his argument than when we drink wine, our brains are actually need to create the flavors for us to enjoy. The analogy one can use is color, he explained to NPR. The objects we see don't have color themselves, light hits them and bounces off. It's when light strikes our eyes that it activates systems in the brain that create color from those different wavelengths. Similarly, the molecules in wine don't have taste or flavor, but when they stimulate our brains, the brain creates flavor the same way it creates color.

Its a pretty intense philosophy to wrap your head around. However, I will tell you, one time I drank so much wine that all the sights, smells and flavors of wine completely disappeared. So maybe hes on to something.

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Wine Tasting Engages Your Brain More Than Any Other Behavior ... - Food & Wine

Genetics

FDA approval for 23andMe’s direct-to-consumer genetics test – pharmaphorum

In a landmark decision from the FDA, genomics firm 23andMes direct-to-consumer genetics test has been approved in 10 conditions.

Originally given FDA marketing authorisation in February 2015 as a personal genetics test for Bloom syndrome, US patients can now bypass their doctors and perform at-home genetic tests using 23andMes Personal Genome Service to determine their risk of developing specific diseases.

However the FDA has approved the tests as a guide to potential risks, and has said they should not be used as a diagnostic tool.

The 10 conditions the Personal Genome Service now has marketing approval in are:

Thetest itself involves analysing DNA taken from a saliva swab. The sample is sent via post to a 23andMe lab which returns results in around six weeks.

Similar tests are already available to patients but only through their doctors. The most notable example is Myriad Genetics myRisk a 28-gene panel for determining predisposition to a number of cancer types. The test raked in $632 million in sales last year for the company.

This is an important moment for people who want to know their genetic health risks and be more proactive about their health, said Anne Wojcicki, 23andMe CEO and co-founder. The FDA has embraced innovation and has empowered individuals by authorising direct access to this information. It is a significant step forward for 23andMe and for the adoption of personal genetics.

The approval contrasts with the FDAs 2013 decision to prevent 23andMe from selling its genetic tests on the basis that inaccurate results could misinform patients.

As a work-around, 23andMe marketed its test as an ancestry kit to determine whether patients were carriers of genetic mutations associated with particular diseases. It did not however offer genetic health reports.

Regardless of its high-profile backing from entitieslike Google Ventures, the jury is still out as to whether genetic tests will in fact be beneficial and not simply overload doctors with patients demanding specific therapies based on their genetic health reports.

Chief medical officer for England, Dame Sally Davies, remains on the fence about the products,as evidenced by her recent interview with the Financial Times:We are going to have to explain to the public that there are cowboys out there giving you data that they dont understand and we wont be able to explain, said Davies. I think theres an element of that with 23andMe, although they do report back quite effectively.

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FDA approval for 23andMe's direct-to-consumer genetics test - pharmaphorum

Genetics

NewLink Genetics Unfairly Punished – Seeking Alpha – Seeking Alpha

The market punished NewLink Genetics (NASDAQ:NLNK) after presenting data on their indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO) combination with Keytruda in advanced melanoma. The stock initially lost over 20% of its market value only to recover half of its losses and end the day down 10% after a number of analysts came to the company's defense. This article will explore whether the market overreacted to the data or if the data truly as bad as the market made it out to be.

IDO Inhibitor

IDO is a intracellular enzyme that regulates the immune response by degrading tryptophan to kynurenine. IDO pathway activity allows tumors to hijack the pathway to avoid the immune response.

The IDO pathway has gained a tremendous amount of hype in response to initial data released from Incyte (NASDAQ:INCY) at EMSO in 2016 as well as recently expanded trials in combination with PD-1 inhibitors with both Merck (NYSE:MRK) and Bristol-Myers Squibb (NYSE:BMY) across a variety of tumor types. Immuno-oncology companies are looking to find the right combinations to provide synergistic benefits in areas where currently approved therapies are inadequate. While there is still limited available data, IDO inhibitors appear to be the front-runner to be one the first approved I-O combination with PD-1 across multiple tumor types.

NewLink Genetics

NewLink has wholly owned IDO inhibitor, Indoximod, as well as a partnered IDO inhibitor, GDC-0919, with Genentech/Roche. The company has two distinct strategies to target the IDO pathway. Indoximod acts directly on immune cells to reverse IDO pathway-mediated response. GDC-0919, like Incyte's epacadostat, is an enzymatic inhibitor, which blocks tryptophan metabolism.

NewLink's AACR presentation released data on Indoximod in combination with Keytruda to treat advanced melanoma. The interim data shows 60 patients treated, with 52 (87%) having stage IV melanoma. Importantly, NewLink included patients with difficult to treat Ocular Melanoma. In Merck's Keytruda phase 3 trial for melanoma, patients with ocular melanoma were excluded.

Source: AACR 2017

Across all 60 patients, there was a 52% objective response rate (12% complete response; 42% partial response), 22% stable disease, which resulted in a 73% disease control rate. Removing patients with ocular melanoma the ORR and DCR increase to 59% and 80%, respectively.

Source: AACR 2017

Source: AACR 2017

Good Results, Negative Reaction

Considering Keytruda's Phase 3 trial in advanced melanoma had a 33% ORR, it's clear adding an IDO inhibitor provides tremendous benefit. To understand why the market punished NewLink, we need to examine Incyte's IDO data with Keytruda in melanoma released at EMSO in 2016.

Source: EMSO 2016

Incyte presented a smaller data set comprising only 19 patients with advanced melanoma, none of which had ocular melanoma. Across all 19 patients, there was a 58% ORR (26% CR; 32% PR) and 74% DCR. Removing ocular melanoma patients from NewLink's data and you get strikingly similar data with one exception. Incyte's limited trial saw 26% of patients experience a complete response compared to just 12% in NewLink's trial.

Incyte's safety data presented at ESMO isn't apples to apples because the company included multiple tumor types, but Incyte's combination did include a higher number of grade 3/4 treatment related adverse events with 19% compared to NewLink's 6%. Importantly, no grade 4 or 5 events were reported in NewLink's data. This is an important distinction for the IDO combination, because the Opdivo/Yervoy combo saw a marked increase in adverse treatment related events. In Opdivo/Yervoy phase 3 trial in advanced melanoma the ORR was 59%, but grade 3/4 treatment related adverse events was 58%. This puts the IDO/PD-L1 at an advantage over Opdivo/Yervoy combo due to its comparably clean safety profile.

Balance Sheet

NewLink ended 2016 with $131.5 million in cash. The company expects a quarterly cash burn around $14 million, which would put the 2017 ending cash balance around $75 million. This excludes any possible milestone payments from Genentech, if they are able to advance their IDO partnership, GDC-0919, into Phase 2 during 2017. The bottom line remains NewLink has an acceptable cash balance to fund current studies well into 2018. Having said that, small cap biotechs are notorious for surprising investors by issuing new shares to raise capital. Investors should expect NewLink to raise funds sometime in the next 12-18 months.

Speculative Biotech Risks

As with all small cap biotech companies in the development stage, NewLink remains a high risk/high reward investment and should only be viewed as a speculative investment. While the company is targeting one of the hottest immuno-oncology pathways, there's no guarantee either of NewLink's IDO therapies will prove superior to Incyte's IDO program. A classic example of the risks in biotech is exemplified by NewLink's AACR presentation. The company reported encouraging data that was comparable to data released by Incyte, but the market did not give the company the benefit of the doubt and pushed shares down 20%. Investors who can't stomach volatility should probably look elsewhere.

Conclusion

IDO inhibitors are a huge step forward in combination with PD-L1 and paves the way for additional advancements in checkpoint inhibitors. It's too early to write off NewLink's proprietary IDO inhibitor, Indoximod. The data presented showed encouraging results in a broader patient population than has thus far been available. I believe the market has overreacted to what should be viewed as at the very least comparable data. Incyte may have shown a higher complete response rate, but in a far smaller data set. If it turns out Incyte's IDO enzymatic approach to block tryptophan metabolism is indeed superior to Indoximod mechanism of action, remember NewLink has a partnership with Genentech/Roche (OTCQX:RHHBY) utilizing the exact same approach. IDO inhibitors will remain a focal point for any company pursuing immuno-oncology and NewLink has distinguished itself as a major player with proven results in this area.

I'd recommend NewLink as a speculative buy on any continued weakness below $20/share. Data on IDO/PD-1 combinations should continue to be released throughout 2017 with ASCO in June as a likely event for Merck, Bristol-Myers or Roche to present data in areas outside of melanoma.

Disclosure: I am/we are long NLNK.

I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.

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NewLink Genetics Unfairly Punished - Seeking Alpha - Seeking Alpha

Genetics

How octopuses, squid, and cuttlefish defy genetics’ ‘central dogma’ – Phys.Org

April 6, 2017 This visual abstract depcits the findings of Liscovitch-Brauer et al., who show behaviorally complex cephalopods use extensive RNA editing to diversify their neural proteome at the cost of limiting genomic sequence flexibility and evolution. Credit: Liscovitch-Brauer et al./Cell 2017

Octopuses, squid, and cuttlefish often do not follow the genetic instructions in their DNA to the letter. Instead, they use enzymes to pluck out specific adenosine RNA bases (some of As, out of the As, Ts, Gs, and Us of RNA) that codes for proteins and replace them with a different base, called Inosine. This processcalled "RNA editing"is rarely used to recode proteins in most animals, but octopuses and their kin edit RNA base pairs in over half of their transcribed genes. When researchers did experiments to quantify and characterize the extent of this RNA editing across cephalopod species, they found evidence that this genetic strategy has profoundly constrained evolution of the cephalopod genome. The study appears in Cell on April 6.

Researchers have found that octopuses use RNA editing to rapidly adapt to temperature changes (DOI: 10.1126/science.1212795) and that the majority of RNA transcripts in squid neurons contain these edits (DOI: 10.7554/eLife.05198). In the new study, researchers hoped to find out how commonplace these edits are, how they evolved along the cephalopod lineage, and how such extraordinary editing capabilities affect the evolution of the cephalopod genome.

Vertebrate cells are capable of RNA editing, but we use it very rarely. Humans have 20,000 genes but only a few dozen conserved RNA editing sites that are likely encoding functional proteins. Squids also have about 20,000 genes but have at least 11,000 active RNA editing sites affecting the proteome, many of which are conserved, according to this study's estimates. "Basically, this is a mechanism to make proteins that are not encoded in the DNA. They are not present in the genomic sequence," says study co-author Eli Eisenberg, a biophysicist at Tel Aviv University in Israel. "With these cephalopods, this is not the exception. This is the rule. The rule is that most of the proteins are being edited."

In fact, RNA editing is so rare that it's not considered part of genetics' "Central Dogma." "Ever since Watson and Crick figured out that genetic information is stored in DNA, we've had this view that all the information is stored in DNA, and it's faithfully copied to another molecule when it's usedthat's RNA, and from there, it's translated into the proteins that do all the work. "And it's generally assumed that that's a pretty faithful process," explains study co-author Joshua Rosenthal, a cephalopod neurobiologist at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA. "What the squid RNA is showing is that that's not always the casethat, in fact, organisms have developed a potent means to manipulate information in RNA."

Analysis across different cephalopod species revealed that this pattern held true in two species of octopus, the common cuttlefish, and one species of squid, all of which belong to the "coleoid" subclass within cephalopods, which are-known for their complex hunting and social behaviors. However, when the researchers checked for signs of RNA editing in one of the octopus's more distant relatives, the chambered nautilus, they found much lower levels of RNA editing. RNA-editing levels were also low in the California Sea Hare, a non-cephalopod mollusk that the researchers used for comparison.

Extensive RNA editing turned out to have robust evolutionary consequences. RNA editing enzymes can only happen to base pairs that are surrounded by a large RNA superstructure. If the bases on either side of the editing target mutate, then the organism may lose the ability to edit that target. Avid RNA recoders, like octopuses and squid, cannot afford DNA mutations in their RNA-editable genes, so they've surrendered the benefits of a frequently mutating DNA genome in favor of RNA editing, the researchers found.

Most organisms extensively use splicing, the process of cutting or adding whole sections of RNA transcripts before they leave the nucleus, to diversify their proteomes, but prioritize DNA flexibility over RNA editing. "We usually think of evolution using whatever it can to answer some challengesso why was RNA recoding not used?" says Eisenberg. "Now, we have an example of what happens when we do use RNA editing abundantly. We know there's a price. The price is slowing down genome evolution...Cephalopods probably chose to take this RNA bargain over genome evolution, and maybe vertebrates made the other choicethey preferred genome evolution over editing."

Since many of the most heavily edited RNAs coded for key neural proteins, the researchers wonder whether RNA editing might contribute to the remarkable intelligence of octopuses and their kin. Not only are they smart enough to hunt, octopuses are clever enough to escape from jars, use coconut husks to hide themselves, signal to others by changing their skin color, and learn through observation.

"They're the only taxon out there that approaches vertebrates in terms of behavioral complexity," says Rosenthal. "These behaviorally complex coeloids all have this tremendous RNA editing, particularly in their nervous system, where they're recoding the messenger RNAs that encode for the very things that are important for electrical excitability."

Researchers are working on an octopus animal model to find out whether RNA editing plays a pivotal role in cephalopod behavior. Experiments that deal with the role of RNA editing in behavior will require an octopus that grows well in laboratories and can be genetically manipulated.

"RNA editing is an elegant system to add flexibility to your genetic information," says Rosenthal, "but it's a real challenge to figure out when it's being used and how it's being used."

Explore further: Squid enrich their DNA 'blueprint' through prolific RNA editing

More information: Cell, Liscovitch-Brauer et al.: "Trade-off between Transcriptome Plasticity and Genome Evolution in Cephalopods" http://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(17)30344-6 , DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2017.03.025

Journal reference: Cell

Provided by: Cell Press

One of the surprising discoveries to emerge from the young field of comparative genomics is that drastically different organismshumans, sea urchins, worms, flies are endowed with a more or less common set of genes. ...

The principle of adaptationthe gradual modification of a species' structures and featuresis one of the pillars of evolution. While there exists ample evidence to support the slow, ongoing process that alters the genetic ...

New techniques in molecular biology that enable targeted interventions in the genome are opening up promising new possibilities for research and application. The ethical and legal ramifications of these methods, known as ...

A new study provides insight on the potential role played by RNA (ribonucleic acid) editing in cancer.

Gene editingone of the newest and most promising tools of biotechnologyenables animal breeders to make beneficial genetic changes, without bringing along unwanted genetic changes.

(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers have discovered that when it comes to the survival of an octopus living in frigid waters, the reasoning is not a difference in the gene DNA but rather a difference in the RNA editing.

Researchers from the CNRS have discovered that mandrills use their sense of smell to avoid contamination by intestinal protozoans through contact with infected members of their group. Their work, published in Science Advances, ...

Birds show an amazing diversity in plumage colour and patterning. But what are the genetic mechanisms creating such patterns? In a new study published today in PLOS Genetics, Swedish and French researchers report that two ...

Walking through a grassy field or forest take a moment to consider what lies beneath the surface. A web of plant roots interacts symbiotically with arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi that extend their hyphae from the root ...

A new study of Peruvian frogs living at a wide variety of elevationsfrom the Amazon floodplain to high Andes peakslends support to the idea that lowland amphibians are at higher risk from future climate warming.

Humans are able to interpret the behaviour of others by attributing mental states to them (and to themselves). By adopting the perspectives of other persons, they can assume their emotions, needs and intentions and react ...

(Phys.org)A pair of biology professors, one with the University of Illinois, the other with Macquarie University in Australia has proposed in a Perspective piece in the journal Science that the traits we see as instinctual ...

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Did Octopuses become "brains" in a hospitable environment which gave them more flexibility to form themselves whereas land creatures had to "build" complex systems to support their "brains" in a hostile environment ( air)?

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How octopuses, squid, and cuttlefish defy genetics' 'central dogma' - Phys.Org

Embryology

A day of insanity that typifies Toronto’s housing market – Macleans.ca

(Meagan Campbell)

If real estate were a religion, Elijah Joseph would be a believer. He is 24-years-old, and he has devoted his future to erecting properties trimmed with 24-carat gold. Im looking to build a great big empire, he says. There is no doubt. I have a plan. I have a course of action, and right now, Im kind of looking for a mentor.

READ MORE:How Canada completely lost its mind over real estate

In mid-March, Joseph attended the Toronto Real Estate Wealth Expo, a jungle of real estate gurus and their 15,000 disciples who paid up to $500 per ticket, only to be told to invest in what is actually one of the worst buyers markets in Canada. While life coach Tony Robbins and singer Pitbull fired up the crowd into impulsive mode, a line-up of personalities preached that,despite record-highToronto house prices, now is actually an ideal time to buy. The presenters all had personal stakes in the market, but attendees ignored the conflict of interest, and the event, disguised as a conference and concert, became a full-daysermon on buying real estateas the greatest good.

Fear will kill you. Fear will drown you, said Daryl King, who is selling properties upwards of $8.8 million throughout the Greater Toronto Area and Ontario. Just jump in! chanted Inez Kurdrik, a downtown realtor. On the same panel, Brad Lamb, nicknamed the condo king, who has built eight high-rises in Toronto, declared, Toronto has become one of the last safe havens in the world.

In reality, a consensus is emerging that Toronto is a in fact a buyers hell. The average house price in theGreater Toronto Area sold for $916,000 last month, up more than 30 per cent from the year before.

The Expo strategically tours cities in need of buyers. Sponsored by real estate agencies, developers and banks, the event will visit Miami, a sellers market in which housing prices rose 10 per cent last year, and Chicago, which was almost an equally strong sellers market last year when the Expo was planned.

This event is a blood-sucking event, said Clark Lord, a musician and artist who bought tickets solely to see Tony Robbins. Theyre telling everyone [that they can] be a millionaire when we cant even pay for food. Lords friend, Ivan Rendalic, a lawyer, only went because Lord bought him a ticket. All this is is a stimulus package, says Rendalic. Theyre getting high on the hype. Theyre refusing the logic. Once people hit a small barrier, theyre f**ked.

The event itself was misleading. Gold ticket seating meant a foldable chair at the nosebleed-back, and while attendees like Joseph paid $250 for VIP passes, expecting they would get to meet Robbins, such access was reserved for people who paid $500 for Ultimate VIP passes. Robbins showed up an hour and a half late, at which point he fist-pumped around the room while telling people to search within their heartsa bizarre hybrid of busker and Buddha. Our hearts start beating before our brains start working, he said, though his embryology lesson was incorrect. Robbins wasnt the only presenter who needed fact-checking; at the Expo in 2009, a headliner was Donald Trump.

This is the very hugest, the very hugest of all, said Raymond Aaron, a personal finance guru, who was supposed to present on automatic prosperity but instead spent his stage time selling his two-day course. Youre gunna go buzzurk. Im going to do something unbelievably special . Another giant, giant bonus This is the very, very, very, very hugest Its not $5,000. Its $697! No HST!

The most aggressive salesman was realtor Tim Payne, a presenter who was expected to spill secrets on flipping houses but spent nearly two hours advertising his $995 three-day course, charging an extra $6,000 for access to contacts. I wanna kick your legs out and choke you until youre wealthy, he said. As the father of six boys, he boasted to the crowd, I feed them money. They just crap out money.

READ MORE:Canadas housing bubble looks disturbingly familiar

That burden of proof was enough to convince Joseph, who stood up and headed for a registration table to pay for the course. I just know I want to be around mansions, he said. I look at them. Im in love with them. I study them. His future house: Marble floor. 30-foot ceilings. Maybe a tennis court, maybe not a tennis court (Im not really a tennis guy.) And a big, big, big hangar for a variety of cars.

Joseph currently lives with roommates in an apartment in East York for $800 per month. He works going door-to-door selling solar panels on commission. He was formerly a college basketball player and lived in Windsor with his mother, a personal support worker, but he says, I left my family to find wealth.

Exiting the Expo, Joseph planned to convert others to join the real estate market. He is nicknamed The Rev, he says, because he talks to his friends with reverend-like pedagogy. When I ingest this, I literally spew it all out to everyone I speak with, he says. Maybe Ill get into motivational speaking of my own.

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A day of insanity that typifies Toronto's housing market - Macleans.ca

Embryology

New pecking order in kindergarten – HeraldandChronicle.com

Barbie Thomas is hatching chickens for the first time. And she can't help but be excited that one of those in her flock is a Delaware Blue Hen. Thomas graduated from University of Delaware and having her college's mascot in her classroom is a perfect fit.

Once again, the peep show is alive and well in kindergarten classes throughout the county. "I taught Pre-K and now I'm teaching kindergarten so this is my first time (hatching chickens). It has been amazing. I was really scared yesterday but it was so cool. We saw cracks (in the incubated egg) and in 25 minutes we had a chick. I am as excited as the kids. It's really cool," said Kenmore Elementary kindergarten teacher Barbie Thomas. Through Maryland Extension and grant funds, Cecil County 4-H is providing an incubation and embryology project at all the local elementary schools and at a few community sites. For chickens, the incubation period takes about three weeks until they hatch. Each classroom has received or will receive the pre-incubated eggs two weeks into the incubation period. Students and teachers care for and monitor the eggs. After hatching, the newborn chicks remain in classrooms for observation for up to three weeks. Extension staffer 4-H program assistant Victoria Stone was in all three kindergarten classes at Kenmore last week teaching the second lesson in the embryology unit. These were the practical lessons of feeding, bedding, and warming the peeps. Stone explained that about 60 classrooms are receiving these lessons. Teacher Amanda Hobson said the snow impacted the hatching process. The students watched for signs of hatching all during the school day. She then set up a time lapse camera to capture any action that happened after school. That's when one decided to hatch. "This is a really good learning experience for the kids. This teaches them to be caregivers. This is amazing and one of my favorite things in kindergarten. We began talking about it in October," said Hobson. Once the lesson is over, Hobson will give the chickens a permanent home at her house. She can then provide students with updates.

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New pecking order in kindergarten - HeraldandChronicle.com