sa smith

Technically, its the immune response to the HERVs that can control the HIVs, not the HERVs directly. :-D Ive written about the proposed connection between ERVs and HIV a couple times before-- Briefly, viruses do lots of things by accident.  Things just happen.  Sometimes viruses make us blind for…

Veterans Day parades. Thanksgiving parades.  Christmas parades.  Halloween parades.  St. Patricks Day parades.  MLK Day parades.  Gay Pride parades.  Fourth of July parades. Parades are a fantastic way for atheists to advertise, get positive exposure, and reach out to a wide variety of people…

One of the more amusing aspects of 'You are only criticizing Islam because you are RACIST AGAINST MIDDLE-EASTERNERS!!!!' is the fact that most Muslims do not live in the Middle-East. They live in Asia. Case in point: Indonesia, where about >87% of the population is Muslim.  12.7% of all Muslims…

Since the anti-science foo-foo hippies lost their bid to have all foods labeled 'CONTAINS GMO WARBLEGARBLE! TEACH THE CONTROVERSY!', a group of scientists at the Evil League of Evil have generated GMO corn for LSD. I guess as a gesture of good-will, or something. There. I hope everyones happy now…

Let me break down the overall scheme of vaccination, real quick. You get exposed to a dead/weakened/chunks of a pathogen (virus, bacterial toxin like tetanus, etc). Your body reacts to the vaccine 'invader' and triggers an adaptive immune response. Your adaptive immune system 'remembers' what it…

HIV diagnosis is The Root of most of the problems we have in HIV World. "How can we get more people antiretrovirals?"... How can you give someone antiretrovirals before they have been diagnosed with HIV? "How can we stop HIV transmission to sexual partners?"... Condoms work, but why would you…

YAY! Author Carl Zimmer: Our Viral Future from Singularity Institute on FORA.tv ONE QUIBBLE: Viruses are not 'bad news wrapped in protein'.  The vast vast vast majority of the viruses out there want nothing to do with humans at all. Even the ones that do infect humans, lots dont actually cause us…

NICE! Gene therapy of pancreatic cancer targeting the K-Ras oncogene Cancer sucks, but some kinds of cancers suck worse than others.  One that really sucks is pancreatic cancer.  From the intro of this paper: Pancreatic cancer (PC) is the fourth leading cause of cancer death among men and women,…

Wull... What the hell is the point in a whore vaccine that doesnt turn little girls into whores?? Boy, I hope some scientists are losing their membership in The Evil League of Evil over this: Sexual Activity–Related Outcomes After Human Papillomavirus Vaccination of 11- to 12-Year-Olds Risk of the…

Oh lawd oh lawd. Some folks at Emory investigated the differences in understanding vaccines between parents who got a lot of vaccine info from the internet, and parents who didnt. Oh lawd. Parents’ Source of Vaccine Information and Impact on Vaccine Attitudes, Beliefs, and Nonmedical Exemptions The…

An outcome some of you might expect, but for reasons you probably dont expect-- Let me tell you the punchline first: Effect of High-Dose vs Standard-Dose Multivitamin Supplementation at the Initiation of HAART on HIV Disease Progression and Mortality in Tanzania, A Randomized Controlled Trial…

Its like 'Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon', except with virophages!  And in my case, it seems to be closer to two or three degrees. Its happened again. Provirophages and transpovirons as the diverse mobilome of giant viruses Edited by James L. Van Etten, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE Dr.…

I get migraine headaches. They crack me up-- My mom and bro get them too-- but we all have different triggers, different warning signs, different migraine course/severity, different solutions, it doesnt make any sense. I think mine are pretty funny.  I start out by feeling warm.  Not 'hot', but…

Lets play a game. Think of a human disease.  Any disease.  Viral, bacterial, genetic, acquired, anything. Im pretty sure that no matter what disease you just thought of, there is a scientist, somewhere, trying to use a virus to cure/treat that disease. As I was doing my rounds on PubMed, looking…

There are some HIV-woo ideas that I cannot believe we are still dealing with in 2012. 1. 'Condoms dont stop HIV' - Actually, they do.  Really, really well.  Better than any 'prophylactic antiretroviral' (with no side-effects).  Virus cant evolve resistance to condoms.  Virus cant swim through the…

Orac wrote yesterday about the abominable union between anti-vaxers and anti-GMOers: “Genetically modified” vaccines and GMOs: Sapping and impurifying all our precious bodily fluids? My 'message' to these kinds of people?  Get over it.  Fast.  Because you look ridiculous. Skinner: Im telling you…

How to do things, from someone who actually does things: How to Protest a ‘Psychic’-- Dr. Caleb Lack There is a big difference between writing and talking about doing something, and actually doing something in the Real World.  Confuse the two at your own risk. For instance, while it is fine and…

Readers in the US/Europe probably havent heard a whole heck of a lot about alphaviruses. Mayaro, Chikungunya, Ross River virus-- Though these and other alphaviruses infect humans and our livestock (horses) they dont get much media time around here, because theyre more 'tropical'.  Africa, Australia…

Its like, instead of 'Put a bird on it!', scientists are like 'Put a virus on it!' Got cancer? Put a virus on it!  In constant pain? Put a virus on it! Addicted to cigarettes?  Put a virus on it!  Genetic disease?  Put a virus on it! Got acne? Put a virus on it! Propionibacterium acnes…

So what do you do after you use a genetically modified virus to treat-->functionally cure Hemophilia B? Why, use a genetically modified virus to treat-->hopefully functionally cure Hemophilia A, of course! Generation of an optimized lentiviral vector encoding a high-expression factor VIII…

Jerome Horwitz, the man who invented AZT, died-- Being in the basic virology realm of HIV Research World, I dont always pay as much attention to the clinical side of things as I should.  Thus I didnt know about the really interesting history of Jerome Horowitz and AZT.  Apparently he invented it as…

Science hath no insanity like the XMRV fiasco. *sigh* But there is a constant, bright spot in this ridiculous storm, and I dont want it to be overlooked-- The scientific leadership of Robert Silverman, and everyone associated/partnered with his laboratory*. As a young, hopeful, yet increasingly…

This is not overly helpful information for MS patients, but its still good news: No additional copies of HERV-Fc1 in the germ line of multiple sclerosis patients. Previous research has indicated that there are endogenous retroviruses that are disregulated and leading to detectable production of ERV…

What happens when the pain gets to be too much?  What happens when the drugs stop working?  The physicians are giving you as much as you can take without dying, and youre still living with 7, 8, 9 levels of pain, every waking moment?  Some of the talk behind physician assisted suicide is to let…

The story of 'How we know where HIV-1 came from' is really cool-- A group of researchers went into the jungles of Africa, collected lots of monkey poop, and figured out pretty much the exact colony of chimpanzees that transmitted their SIV into humans, which lead to the HIV epidemic we know today.…

I am, in no way, a 'fan' of using anti-retroviral drugs in uninfected individuals as a way to prevent HIV.  I think its a terrible idea that will result in more drug resistant HIV (already an issue before this idea was implemented) and ridiculous considering everyone who needs anti-retrovirals to…

Summer Arnie: Winter Arnie: I have to take video/pics of Arnie every time he sticks his tongue out like that when he sleeps.  I dont know whether its a pit thing or a goofy dog thing, but I just think its the CUTEST!

OKC Atheists have done many, many things right. On that list of right things (I encourage all atheist/skeptic groups to do this) is the way our groups support our 'local talent'.  Every month, we have a meet-up called 'Disbelief Discourse', dreamed up and executed by my adventures-in-anti-vaxers…

Last week I gave my departmental seminar.  Im pretty sure every school does this-- while you are getting your PhD, every so often you have to stand up in front of everyone and tell everyone what you are doing, and why, and what it means.  A lot of being a scientist is knowing how to present your…

A new* virus was recently discovered in my parents backyard, so to speak.  Pop-sci articles: Heartland Virus: New Phlebovirus Found in Missouri Mysterious New 'Heartland Virus' Discovered In Missouri Actual journal article: A New Phlebovirus Associated with Severe Febrile Illness in Missouri ...…