science news

[BillT]

I've read a couple of Richard Preston books I've liked: The Hot Zone and some novel about germ warfare/terrorism.

I think Kuru was the only one known before Mad Cow was understood.
Now, many years later, several others have been found because they knew what to look for.

[BillT]

The Hot Zone: the scariest thing Steven King ever read!

[LizStreithorst]

The Hot Zone was a work of art.  Preston made a mistake with Ebola when he said that internal organs turned to much.  He lost a lot of respect due to that error.

I think that prions are the coolest things discovered in my lifetime.  An entire world of scientific research has opened up.  If I had been better at school and remembering thing of no interest to me, and vomiting them out on tests, I might have been a scientist.  Alas, I'm no good at jumping through hoops.  And the days are long gone when you could become an apprentice. 

I wonder if these other weird brain problems are caused by prions.  Could be.  If so, how do they get into the body?  We don't know.  So many questions.  No answers.  Do you not wish that you could be working on this, Bill?

[BillT]

Prions are pretty cool, but not my real interests. There are a lot of very interesting things in science.
Working on Prions would require a big emphasis on biochemistry. Not my favorite. My better abilities lie elsewhere.

Currently, as a kind of retired person, my interests are multi-media, optics, cosmology, genetics, information and life processes (cell processes as an informationally driven bunch of nano-machines).

If I were working in a lab I would want to be working on something like how neurons make their proper connections in the developing nervous system. Neural connections in turn determine behavior, to some extent. On the other hand, I could be happy doing a lot of stuff.

I especially liked The Hot Zone because I grew up in the DC area and had actually been to Reston, VA a few times. It was kind of an unknown local story to me.

[Mugwump]

The Hot Zone was a work of art.  Preston made a mistake with Ebola when he said that internal organs turned to much.  He lost a lot of respect due to that error.

I think that prions are the coolest things discovered in my lifetime.  An entire world of scientific research has opened up.  If I had been better at school and remembering thing of no interest to me, and vomiting them out on tests, I might have been a scientist.  Alas, I'm no good at jumping through hoops.  And the days are long gone when you could become an apprentice. 

I wonder if these other weird brain problems are caused by prions.  Could be.  If so, how do they get into the body?  We don't know.  So many questions.  No answers.  Do you not wish that you could be working on this, Bill?

It's said that basically two folks took him to task over it....and they could have been being picky...??....semantics???...publicity hunters??

""The Hot Zone has received criticism for sensationalizing the effects of Ebola virus. In their memoir Level 4: Virus Hunters of the CDC,[6] former CDC scientists Joseph B. McCormick and Susan Fisher-Hoch lambaste Preston for claiming that Ebola dissolves organs, stating that although it cause great blood loss in tissues the organs remain structurally intact. McCormick and Fisher-Hoch also dispute Preston's version of the CDC's actions in the Reston virus incident.""

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hot_Zone