Tara C. Smith
Associate Professor, lab rat (microbiologist/infectious disease epidemiologist) and occasional blogger, full-time nerd.
tsmith
Posts by this author
August 16, 2006
Ran across this interesting article in New Scientist on natural resistance to HIV.
Researchers are launching a project to discover how certain people, dubbed "elite controllers", are successfully able to fend off the HIV virus without using drugs.
More and more cases of such people - also known as…
August 16, 2006
This month's edition of Animalcules will go live tomorrow, so this is your last chance to get your submissions in. Details ca be found at Snail's Tails, where it will be hosted. I know I've seen several new microbiology blogs in the past month or so, so please, use this as a chance to introduce…
August 16, 2006
DarkSyde over at DailyKos has his own post up today on the anthrax letters. He asks for "Thoughts, plots, conspiracies?", and gets quite a few in the comments, so be sure to check those out as well.
August 16, 2006
In the United States, approximately a third of those who are HIV-positive don't even realize it. Worldwide, that number can be much higher. Because of this, and because those who don't know their HIV status can play a large role in continuing to spread the virus, in recent years, there has been…
August 15, 2006
The grandaddy of the state science groups, Kansas Citizens for Science, celebrated its 7th birthday. Congrats to everyone involved, and much thanks for your leadership--not only in the state, but in the national fight for better science education. Happy birthday, and keep up the excellent work!
August 15, 2006
I've blogged previously about the massive effect vaccines against the human papilloma virus (HPV) could have. HPV is a common sexually-transmitted virus. Though most strains are harmless, a few have the potential to cause cervical cancer. Therefore, the HPV vaccine will be the first one ever…
August 15, 2006
There's been quite a bit of discussion in the news lately about how safe we are (or aren't) in the light of the recent terror arrests in the UK. As we approach the 5-year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, many changes have been made in the name of protecting us from terrorism. Some of them,…
August 15, 2006
Check it out, in the form of a letter to his 2-month-old son over at Hospital Impact.
August 14, 2006
To use my earlier post on stigma as a jumping-off point, there was a session today titled Religion and New Leadership: the Challenge to Deliver (video available at the link). Speakers included religious leaders from a variety of religious and cultural backgrounds, discussing the role they play…
August 14, 2006
Don't forget to send along your entries--this month's Animalcules, the microbiology carnival, will be hosted this Thursday, August 17th at Snail's Tales. You can send submissions to snailstales AT earthlink DOT net--earlier is always appreciated!
August 14, 2006
While Lindsay give the quote of the night to Bill Gates and much of the coverage in the press this morning focuses on his talk of microbicides, his wife Melinda spent much of her time discussing the stigma that comes with being diagnosed with HIV. She discussed how political figures won't…
August 14, 2006
The control and eventual eradication of the smallpox virus from the wild is one of the most heralded success stories in all of public health. Indeed, smallpox has played a central role in the history of vaccination. Even prior to Edward Jenner's use of the related cowpox virus to protect…
August 13, 2006
If I could have been at this week's conference for one session, it would have been this morning's symposium on AIDS denial and responsible journalism. Hannah has already mentioned it and given her impressions and thoughts. The session itself was moderated by HIV researcher Daniel Kuritzkes and…
August 13, 2006
Read the best posts of the past two weeks and test your pediatrics knowledge over at Unintelligent Design.
August 11, 2006
As y'all may or may not be aware, the XVI International AIDS Conference begins this weekend in Toronto. For those of you who read Seed magazine, you've seen that the current issue focuses on "AIDS at 25," and they also have an online summary here. As a matter of fact, myself, a Seed journalist,…
August 11, 2006
Paleontologists X-ray fossil embryos
The article describes the cover story in this weeks' Nature, that PZ has already blogged about here. As the headline to the story suggests:
Paleontologists have created detailed three-dimensional images of evolution's first multicellular creatures in their…
August 11, 2006
Missed this while I was out last weekend, but John Hawks has a link to a story noting that a new analysis shows that Holy Roman Emperor Charles V suffered from gout, thought to play a key role in his abdication of the throne.
(More below...)
A 450-year-old piece of Charles V's pinkie lends…
August 11, 2006
Via Stranger Fruit, Panda's Thumb, and elsewhere in the blogosphere comes this Science paper discussing attitudes regarding evolution in a number of countries, including the United States. As noted in John's title, the U.S. comes in second....from the bottom. Only Turkey has a greater proprtion…
August 10, 2006
So it would seem.
West Nile is spreading beyond birds, horses and humans. A squirrel has tested positive for the virus and hundreds more are showing the same symptoms
People are finding squirrels in their yards or parks that look like they've been injured because they aren't able to walk. In some…
August 10, 2006
James A. Van Allen, Discoverer of Earth-Circling Radiation Belts, Is Dead at 91
James A. Van Allen, the physicist who made the first major scientific discovery of the early space age, the Earth-circling radiation belts that bear his name, and sent spacecraft instruments to observe the outer reaches…
August 10, 2006
I wrote several posts on mumps outbreak here in Iowa this past spring. However, we aren't the only I-state to have dealt recently with an outbreak of vaccine-preventable disease. An editorial in yesterday's New York Times highlights the dangers of withholding vaccincations.
(Continued below…
August 9, 2006
And the winner of today's bad headline award goes to:
Sexual lyrics prompt teens to have sex
Teens whose iPods are full of music with raunchy, sexual lyrics start having sex sooner than those who prefer other songs, a study found.
Whether it's hip-hop, rap, pop or rock, much of popular music…
August 9, 2006
The name "dengue" means "breakbone fever" due to the extreme bone pain it causes. The virus is a member of the flavivirus family, which includes the virus that causes yellow fever. Both viruses are arboviruses--viruses that are transmitted by arthropods. In the case of dengue and YF, the…
August 8, 2006
I'm still catching up on everything I missed over the weekend, so in the interim, check out this week's Grand Rounds hosted by Mexico Medical Student.
August 7, 2006
Sure, the midwest could become a tropical paradise. But then there's this:
Bathing was banned along 15 kilometres of the Italian Riviera yesterday when more than a hundred holidaymakers were taken to hospital after being infected by toxic tropical algae.
Doctors at Genoa, where most of the…
August 4, 2006
Though I won't be around this weekend to attend, y'all might be interested in checking this out:
The Iowa Academy of Science will present "Iowa Skies" at the Saylorville Visitors Center this Saturday evening, August 5th, at 7:00 p.m. The program is free and open to the public.
The program by…
August 4, 2006
...or, really, another swing to Ohio to drop off the kids. Their school-based daycare ended today, so I'm currently somewhere in a little place on Lake Huron to camp for two days, then I'll be in Ohio for a few hours to drop them off with relatives, and then back to Iowa on Monday. I have a few…
August 3, 2006
(The title should, of course, be hummed to the tune of "Strokin'...")
I'm out playing with cows again this afternoon. In the meantime, a few good posts from elsewhere:
Ed talks about the excuses Dembski's given for why research into intelligent design isn't being done.
Revere notes a cull of…
August 3, 2006
This week's "Ask a scienceblogger" is more pop culture than actual science:
What movie do you think does something admirable (though not necessarily accurate) regarding science? Bonus points for answering whether the chosen movie is any good generally.
Thoughts after the jump...
I'm one of…
August 3, 2006
People probably don't generally think of Iowa as their first destination for bone and fossil-hunting. And sloth bones don't exactly get the press coverage that a giant T. rex or a novel dinosaur species often receive. But this is still a fascinating story:
After three years of digging up bones…