The Iron Ring

Appearing this week on Slate :

“An Italian court rejected a law that restricts in vitro fertilization and genetic testing of embryos. The law bans such testing, prohibits creation of more than three embryos per cycle, and requires all created embryos to be implanted. Ruling: 1) The test ban is an "abuse of power." 2) The three-embryo limit violates the woman's rights if multiple pregnancies (which might be required because the limit lowers the odds of an embryo surviving to term) pose a risk to her health. Liberal reactions: 1) It's a victory for women's rights. 2) It's good for embryos, since they'll be tested for health. 3) Now couples can try for kids instead of holding back in fear of genetic disease. 4) Now couples can do IVF and testing in Italy instead of circumventing the law by leaving the country. Conservative reactions: 1) The test doesn't protect embryos with disease genes; it marks them for killing. 2) The ruling legitimizes eugenics. “

The genesis (no pun intended) of the law is actually really interesting. Essentially, Italian law was trying to make IVF as similar to natural birth as possible. For starters, the three embryo limit. Three is just about the most that nature will put in there at once, right? As for banning the testing of embryos—that can’t be done with regular conception, can it? Yet it seems cruel to deny couples the chance to check the health of those embryos before implanting them, especially those couples with inheritable disease or known genetic risks. And while the Italians claim that such testing ‘marks them for killing’ perhaps nature does this on her own— miscarriages naturally occur in approximately 15-20% of pregnancies.

In light of something that came up in class yesterday, I thought I would mention ski
helmets.

I found some statistics from the 2007 International Symposium on Skiing Trauma and Safety

"Helmet use been estimated to be about 40 percent of users and has been increasing about
5 percent annually over the past several years....the use of helmets reduces the
number of head injuries by 30 percent to 50 percent, ......non-helmet users were
greater than two times more likely to have died of head injuries among accidents in which
helmet use was known."

And in case anyone was wondering if wearing ski helmets is 'cool' I assure you that the
percentage is much higher than 40% on Aspen Mountain (perhaps the pinnacle of 'cool' as
far as skiing is concerned, no pun intended). I will allow the celebs I witnessed in
helmets to remain nameless.

In other news, my plant is coming along nicely although it still has no company in the
long silver pot ......

I found three lengthy and impressive articles on the health effects of bisphenol A (BPA) pictured here on the left. I decided to narrow my focus a bit. For example, it may take much less BPA to cause those sad alligators to have smaller penises than it does to cause breast cancer in people. Further, as the cellular mechanisms that cause these effects are WIDELY varying, I decided to focus on the BPA-carcinogenic (particularly breast cancer) question. I narrowed my questions to three main issues:

1) Is BPA carcinogenic?

2) If so, at what levels is it dangerous?

3) What levels are present nowadays anyway?

I found the answer to 1 and 2 in the same article (R.A. Keri et al. / Reproductive Toxicology 24 (2007) 240–252) and the answer to 3 in a different article (W. Dekant, W. Völkel / Toxicology and Applied Pharmacology 2008).

Basically, naturally occurring estrogens (at least estradiol 17β) are carcinogenic, which is why women whose have early onset of menstruation or late menopause have a greater risk for breast cancer (news to me!). In any case, as we establish this link between estrogen and cancer (see how I carefully word my sentences), the question of ‘is BPA carcinogenic?’ really becomes, ‘does BPA function as an estrogenic endocrine disruptor?’ which, translated, means ‘can BPA trick your body into thinking it is estrogen’?

This question, in turn, becomes ‘does the receptor that recognizes estrogen also recognize BPA’ (whew! Still with me?). The answer (at least what I can glean from here as I did not read the entire article) is that yes, BPA can be an agonist for the estrogen receptor, at high (100 mg/kg/day) doses. Again, to translate, that means at an exposure of 100 mg per kg of your body weight per day. A quick google search tells me that for women, weight is around 65 kg, which means you would need to be exposed to 6500 mg/ day for BPA to act as an agonist to the estrogen receptor. Of course, this is not the end of the story, but it is a place to begin to think about which levels of exposure might be dangerous.

The authors conclude that there is too little literature to indicate that BPA is definitely carcinogenic (this is a healthy skepticism on the part of scientists). This brings me to my final question, just how much BPA is hanging around anyway?

Apparently, scientists are not in agreement on how best to measure BPA. I will spare you all the details and say that a group in Germany measured BPA in urine and determined an approximate daily exposure of <>

Should we be worried? Probably not

Will I continue to research this as I am not satisfied with these few papers? Yes

Will I post what I find even though I have few readers and it seems I am the only person interested? Of course.

Do we need more research into this subject? YES

Interested in how BPA gets in us anyway? Look here and here and also here. Can’t vouch for verity in all three but it’s a starting point.

A new show this fall on HBO mentioned something in passing that caught my attention. A doctor of one of the characters blamed claimed his health issues were due to increased environmental estrogens. This doctor blamed a host of problems on this increased estrogen; early menstruation in young women, decreased mobility of sperm, even breast cancer. I got curious and hit google.

I found this and this . According to these sources plastics are responsible for causing estrogen-like effects not only in people, but in animals too; causing male alligators to have small penises, and causing infertility in male panthers.

Odd? Yes definitely. But true? I’m not convinced. So I went straight to the source I trust most when it comes to science; Pubmed. I determined the culprit is a compound called bisphenol-A. I intend to research this further but I have trouble accessing fulltext articles from home. More tomorrow……..

What are scientific women supposed to wear to work, interviews, conferences?

I went to a lunch discussion today on this very topic and I have to say, I heard some pretty ridiculous comments. Some of these women scientists have spent too much time in the minority. They think they are gods gift to nerdy lab men, perhaps?

I think the answer is sort of obvious. Look nice. Not too nice (no crazy jewelry). Wear something from a store that sells regular clothing (Banana Republic) and not from a store known for lingerie (V.S). I can't honestly see myself spending too much time wondering what to wear when it comes time for me to interview. We all wear black pantsuits. One time I wore pink shoes to a conference (it was a very casual conference and I was not presenting) and now everytime I speak in front of an audience my advisor tells me not to wear them. I threw them away years ago (my husband hated those shoes).

I digress. The one item from today's discussion that got me thinking was not about what you wear to interviews, but what to wear to work. I see so many female scientists with bad fashion sense (I will not name names). I have always figured that the smarts came with a little fashion ineptitude, but now I am starting to wonder if it is deliberate. Perhaps these women have decided it is better to be nondescript. It does seem as though looking too nice or too sexual may cause you to work twice as hard to be taken seriously. The thing is, I think this is true in almost all fields; medicine, law, education. Name a career where it is ok to dress like Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blonde?

Here it is--

Can you see my tiny green sprouts??? I will try to contain my excitement and not post new pictures each day (although if another type of spice planted here begins to sprout as well I may not be able to contain myself)---

To change topic for a minute, I wanted to share something from class today. I'm not taking a class, I'm actually a TA this semester (extra points to students who find this blog??) and today I was able to take part in, or at least observe, a class discussion. The professor posed a question; what is more important for medicine, to help people survive or to make life more comfortable? It seems as if the answer should be survival, but then, how much of our health care system exists to make our lives more comfortable? It got me thinking about my own research, which happens to fall into the 'make life more comfortable' arena. I study something debilitating (pain) but not life-threatening. I intend to change my field of study after I graduate, so perhaps this is the fundamental change I am seeking. Maybe in my next research life I would like to study something more closely connected to survival. In any case, in the spirit of survival, I must go, as I am hoping to revive my freelance writing career and this involves some reading and research in my precious 'spare' time.

Goodnight!

I have some very exciting news.

About ten days ago I planted seeds and this morning, something finally grew!

I planted basil, oregano and cilantro all in one pot (I planted different seeds in different sections) and I have been putting my pot by the window and lifting the shades for it every morning. After a week I wondered if it was just too cold so I started moving my pot to a warmer spot when the sun went down. Its a lot of work, actually. In any case, this morning I saw my first evidence of plant growth and I will record it and post pictures in the next few days. I tried to google image a picture of basil to post here but lets be honest, basil looks a bit like weed. Besides, these asparagus people are priceless.

The next step will be to identify which spice grew. I used a long skinny pot and planted the oregano in the middle. The budding plant is definitely on one end which means it is either basil or cilantro. I'm hoping for basil but I'll take whatever grows.

In the meantime, lets all wonder why anyone would hate cilantro so much?

Yes, it has been 7 months since my last post. They have been hectic months! I have been on two vacations and I got married (no, I will not be posting those pictures here). Yet I still have no excuse for abandoning this blog, and the ~3 regular readers I have (had?). I will only say this; I have seen a rat come back to life after about twenty minutes (I have witnesses to this) and it gave me faith in the ability of anything to be revived, including this blog.

Before I post a few pictures of my latest trip, I have some science to comment on.

The Scientist, a publication near and dear to my heart, has published a series of articles once again considering the gender inequity in academic science. In one article Phoebe Leboy, a biochemistry professor at the University of Pennsylvania and president of the Association for Women in Science, speculates on how to fix the ‘leaky pipeline’. She postulates that women in academic positions in the sciences have a harder time because they are less likely to have a spouse at home.

“For starters 36% of men, compared to only 8% of women, have spouses who stay at home, giving men - as a group - an advantage in the workplace.”

And suppose my supportive husband wished to stay at home full time so I could pursue my teaching/research career on the tenure track? How exactly would my meager (at best) salary support not only both of us but our growing family? The problem is not the lack of stay at home spouses, the problem is that teaching is simply not lucrative. Yet Dr Leboy agrees that other factors are involved.

“Rearing children during the most demanding times in a scientist's career is just one of the issues women face. Many academic women don't have children. According to a UC, Berkeley-based survey of nearly 9,000 tenure track scientists across UC campuses, 48% of tenure track women did not have children. Clearly there are factors other than feelings of familial obligation that keep women from advancing in science.”

But perhaps these women would like to have children? I see this statistic as proof of how difficult it is to have children in a tenure-track position.

I have several novel ideas for those interested in ways to keep us women in the sciences.

1) Pay us more money (I don’t mean more than men, I just mean generally ‘more’). This is not an easy career path. Not only did my education cost me almost seven years of my life beyond college but at what cost? While it is true that other careers are also intensive and difficult (law, medicine), these careers are also much more lucrative. Is it any wonder so many doctoral students are choosing consulting over research when they complete their degree?

2) Stop valuing tenure. Many statistics show only the number of women who are in tenure-track positions or who have tenure, etc. What about the number of women in solely teaching roles? Or those who work in a Research professor capacity? Do they not contribute to the scientific arena? Why should we bemoan their fall from the pipeline when they are gainfully employed, performing research and obtaining grants at our Universities?

3) Reward mentors. I know that women in the sciences in academia are VERY busy. They have to teach, publish, write grants, serve on committees, and do just about whatever their department asks of them. And this on top of perhaps raising small children. Why on earth would these women mentor someone like me? For my own advisor, it makes sense for her to encourage me to be successful in a science career. Not only was I a huge investment for her, but with any luck, we will become colleagues and professional contacts. Not to mention that after working together for so long, I like to think she would like to see me succeed. But what about a professor I only marginally know? Other than meeting with me once to give some advice, what incentive is there for her (or him) to help me? What if mentoring a graduate student could be substituted for serving on a committee?

If you couldn’t tell from this post, I am reconsidering a career in academia. In fact, during the 7 month hiatus from this blog I have decided to seek a postdoc position when I finish my doctorate (and btw- I feel good about 2008.....). I am not sure if this postdoc will be in academia or in industry, but I do think that after spending all this time learning how to be a careful researcher, I may as well become one.