"Immune Protein Fends Off Exotic Virus"

Key Purpose: To show the recent discovery of a protein that will protect people from a certain virus.

Key Ideas:

• Antiviral proteins fend off viruses
• The main virus that it will eradicate is the Chikungunya virus
• This virus has caused an epidemic in Southeast Asia
• The virus causes joint pain and high fever
• The effectiveness of the proteins produced from the immune cells can be used to control the outbreak of the Chikugunya virus

Key Conclusion:

After reading this story, I am really interested what might be in our body that we have no idea about. It is possible that inside our cells we have the power of curing our own diseases. This could be the common cold or something large like A.I.D.S. I think that more research into our body and what we are made of might be fantastic for finding cures and creating medicine. We wouldn't have to look at outside resources to find cures; every person might have it inside them. If we can find this out, many people in countries that do not have proper medical attention for their citizens could save many lives. I think we have just started t see these things and experiment with them. I am really interested in viruses and bacteria. When I was ten, I wanted to be an infectious disease doctor. Now that we are discussing this in biology, I am enjoying the class even more. To me it is very interesting to study something that might be the end to all humans, or something that might be able to help the world.

"Immune Protein Fends off Exotic Virus." Science Daily: News & Articles in Science, Health, Environment & Technology. Web. 19 May 2010. .

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"How Malaria Dupes Immune System"

Purpose: This article shows and explains how and why malaria is such a deadly virus.

Key Ideas:

• The insects that inject malaria "turn on" a gene in a humans body that creates proteins that will camouflage the infected cells that enter the body.
• If the body recognize these camouflage protein, the disease can make different kinds.
• Malaria kills about 2 million people each year.
• The disease is good for sneaking into the immune system.
• The disease also has many different forms of camouflage proteins that are dormant until they are needed.
• Because the disease can keep changing, so the immune system does not have time to counter the attack.
• Many scientists are trying to figure out the key for being able to see past the camouflage proteins

Key Conclusion: I think that this is very interesting and quite scary. It is interesting because it is fascinating how a virus can disguise itself with created proteins, but on the other hand, it is scary because of the deadly effect of the disease's abilities. If any other virus were to mutate and be able to have the same attributes as malaria, it would become so much more deadly. Also, this may be something that will be able to help in the medical world. With the problems of autoimmunity diseases, many patients may be able to disguise transplanted cells that would normally be destroyed by the immune system. For example, scientists could insert insulin producing cells in a person with diabetes, and because it is disguised by proteins, diabetes could be cured. All in all, I thought that this article was: scary, interesting, and something that could help many people.

"BBC NEWS | Health | How Malaria Dupes Immune System." BBC NEWS | News Front Page. Web. 19 Apr. 2010. .

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"Fatty Foods Can Weaken the Immune System"

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to show the dangers about many people's diet that can lead to more serious problems, like the slow down or destruction for the immune system.

Key Information:

• After several lab tests with mice eating a high diet of lard, the mice became more susceptible to bacteria and viruses.
• The result of the fatty food is the slow down of white blood cells.
• The white blood cells help the body break down the outside bacteria and viruses that come into the body.
• Eating a very fatty diet is the main cause of the slow down of white blood cell response, but a contributing factor is also a person's genes.

Key Conclusions: After the lab tests with mice, scientists have seen how potentially dangerous this problem is. Many more people are now susceptible to having this problem because of the millions of fast food restaurants. Also, more people are able to get this food because of the trans-fat and saturated fats that are more common in food today. If this problem becomes more serious, average disease like the common flu will become more hazardous and many diseases will diminish the human population.

"Fatty Food Can Weaken the Immune System." Science Daily: News & Articles in Science, Health, Environment & Technology. Web. 19 Apr. 2010. .

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