Moon

Ken asked me to give him the moon. I told him that is impossible, but he did not agree with me. "You can pick it by a rail, dad." he said.

I am unable to pick the moon for him. Alternatively, I give him my moonlike head.

Resurrect extinct animals

"Production of healthy cloned mice from bodies frozen at -20 degrees C for 16 years"
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18981419

Dr Wakayama and colleagues, Japanese scientists at RIKEN research institute, produced cloned mice from frozen carcasses. These dead mice had been kept frozen at -20 degrees C for 16 years without any cryoprotective treatment. Freezing inevitably causes cell burst and DNA damage inside. Using a modified cloning method by nucleus transfer, the team succeeded in producing healthy mice from the cloned embryos.

Recently, several studies have reported regarding reproductive cloning of endangered species.
Scientists at Advanced Cell Technology, a biotechnology company in Massachusetts, first reported the cloning of an endangered animal in 2001. They cloned a gaur, an Indian wild cattle, using nuclei of skin cells frozen for eight years. However, the cloned gaur, named noah, died from an infection two days after its birth. After Noah, a number of endangered animals have cloned by same nucleus transfer techniques. These studies used cryoprotected cells for the cloning, whereas Wakayama's team enabled using nuclei from dead and degraded cells. Their study will open the way to "resurrect" extinct animals, such as mammoths.

In Australia, scientists at the Australian Museum attempted to resurrect Tasmanian tiger (thylacine), a wolf-like marsupial, from the specimens. However, since the DNA retains too less quality, they forced to give up the attractive project. In a recent report, researchers from the Australia and USA isolated a transcriptional enhancer element from the specimens and resurrected the functions in transgenic mice (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18493600). A professor in the team says that their work proved possible to study the functions of genes from extinct species, although cloning of a thylacine is still a long way off.

In Japan, Japanese toki (Japanese crested ibis) has become extinction in 2003. Since the tissues and cells from the last one were frozen for preservation, it appears to be easier to resurrect this extinct bird than other extinct animals.

Theoretically, the techniques are applicable to reproductive cloning of humans. In 1991, a frozen 5,300-year-old Neolithic man was discovered in the Austrian Alps. On the other hand, bodies of some presidents of Communist governments, such as Vladimir Lenin, Kim Il-sung and Mao Zedong, were embalmed after their death. Although it would be difficult to obtain intact DNA from these preserved corpses, the study by Wakayama's team might stimulate some scientists of resurrecting them.

Chrysanthemum flowers

Photo is chrysanthemum flowers.

Japan has two national flowers: spring sakura (Japanese cherry) and autumn kiku (chrysanthemums). The former represents transient beauty and later implicates modesty and patience.

Recently, one of the most successful music producers in Japan arrested for alleged fraud. A decade ago, he had around 10 billions yen (100 millions dollar), but he is now on a charge of defrauding an investor of 500 million yen regarding copyrights transfer.

He might be cherry blossoms. I looked the chrysanthemum flowers in a new light.

Newly formed University

The newly formed University that I got hired had been waited its approval by the Council for University Establishment.
On Oct 31, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) officially approved the establishment. Therefore, my next position seems to be guaranteed.

On the other hand, my laboratory will move in early December. I am only one who will stay in a lab at Wako city. But it is difficult to continue my research there. I feel isolated from my lab, and I failed to isolate some genes that I have tried cloning. I have little time to accomplish it.

Ken's birthday

Ken became four on Oct 27.

One year ago, he was too young to recognize his birthday. Now that is a special day for him and he looked forward the day.
At the night, he saw a whole cake for his birthday. He delighted and danced with joy. But he had only a little and went to his bed.



He wanted a bike for his birthday present. So the next day we went to buy it, but that was too heavy for him to ride. Alternatively we gave him a scooter, but he was afraid to ride it too.

He is using a diaper at night yet. I told him that four-years-old boy usually do not pee in the diaper. That may have pressured him; he wetted his bed for a fourth straight day in the daycare.

He had a cake at Mari's parent's house too. The birthday of Chi-baa, his grandmother, had come on Oct 30. But he had no thought for someone else's birthday but himself.

Sticky tape and X rays

In the Oct 23 issue of Nature, the cover picture shows the X-ray image of a human finger taken with peeling tape as the X-ray source. Researchers at UCLA reported that peeling sticky tape (i.e. Scotch tape) in a vacuum generated X-rays.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v455/n7216/abs/nature07378.html

The amazing streaming video is here.
http://www.nature.com/nature/videoarchive/x-rays

The sticky tape emits X rays only in a vacuum. But you can get a flash of light (namely, triboluminescence) when you peeled it in a dark room.

This report is very interesting. The research needs to be nominated for an Ig Nobel Prize!

Sunset

The sunset view from my laboratory.

Grant

I submitted a grant proposal to Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (KAKENHI) of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS). I wrote the proposal for a small grant-in-aid for young scientists regarding my research on functions of a novel gene family.
The research is included in basic science, but I wrote it like an applied research. I heard that research in basic science is difficult to get a grant than that in applied science. Budget allocations tend to concentrate on applied research than on basic research in Japan.

Of course, I want to achieve breakthrough in basic research. But I have to get a grant anyway.

One missing vote

Today, Nov 4, is the general election day in the USA in 2008.
I found an interesting video to promote voting for Barack Obama.

"Obama's Loss Traced To Non-Voter"



In this video, single nonvoter tipped election to McCain-Palin ticket.
You can make your personalized version of the video with your name in it. I made it by the name of "Hillary Clinton".

I am not a voter in the USA and do not know well which candidate is better for Japan. But I question Sarah Palin's qualifications to be Vice-President in the USA.

In her first policy speech in Pittsburgh, Palin pledged to fully fund the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). She said that the specific projects designated by Congress spend earmarks more than the shortfall to fully fund the IDEA.
"And where does a lot of that earmark money end up ?" she said. "You've heard about some of these pet projects they really don't make a whole lot of sense and sometimes these dollars go to projects that have little or nothing to do with the public good. Things like fruit fly research in Paris, France. I kid you not."

In the speech, Palin also claimed early identification of a cognitive or other disorder, especially autism.
Here, human neurexins have been identified as a genetic risk factor for autism. A recent study reported that Drosophila neurexin is required for synapse formation in the adult central nerves system.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17498701
Furthermore, Drosophila researchers at the University of North Carolina demonstrated that neurexin has crucial roles in regulating the formation of synapses and in the proper development of active zones and regulating synaptic function in vivo.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17785181

Palin mocked Drosophila research, and is ridiculed by many Drosophilists.