Life Science Disciplines Research Articles

Principles and Applications of Luminescence Spectroscopy

Advances in instrumentation during the last decade as well as the ease with which the technology could be adapted to a wide variety of assay platforms has truly made luminescence spectroscopy the analytical method of choice in several diverse disciplines of life sciences. The primary reasons for its growing popularity are twofold: the use of nonisotopic labels and its exquisite sensitivity. Analyte concentrations as low as 10−10 to 10−12 M can be easily detected, while luminometry can detect biological events at concentrations as low as 10−18 M. This is in contrast to absorption and NMR spectroscopic techniques, which require, respectively, 10−8 M and 10−5 M concentrations of the compound of interest. Furthermore, in several variations of this technology, the measurement itself can be nondestructive and noninvasive. Despite the fact that luminescence spectroscopic techniques provide some of the most sensitive and selective analytical methods, they have not yet been widely used in both basic and applied food research. The only exception to this is the growing popularity of the commercially available ATP bioluminescence kits used routinely for monitoring the cleanliness of work surfaces in the food industry. This review describes some of the relevant basic aspects of luminescence, several popular variations of this technology, and their potential uses in food research.

The Pharmaceutical Industry in the 21st Century: Surviving in the E-Business Environment

e-... the electronically enabled exchange and management of information to execute (...), is at the core of the most impactful societal change in history, the so called “Information Age.” The pharmaceutical industry likes to think of itself as an innovator, and rightly so in its life science disciplines (so we do not address these areas in this article). However, the story is a little different in the core competency of information management (IM). In IM, the pharmaceutical industry has been conservative at best, if not recalcitrant in adapting to the changes that have already reshaped other industries such as finance, automobile, and aerospace, all of which share with pharmaceuticals some key IM characteristics. Hence the challenge: How does the pharmaceutical industry survive the exhilarating pace of change that is bringing about the e-business imperatives of the Information Age marking the beginning of this new century? This paper introduces seven trends which are major drivers in determining the way that global markets are taking shape in the Information Age, and outlines some CEO strategic imperatives to address those drivers in various industries, including some of those mentioned above. It then attempts to suggest what could be pharmaceuticals CEOs’ concerns in terms of their organizations’ core competencies, to bring the industry into the new century, given its very historically conservative approach to information management. Finally, it concludes with an account of how the industry’s highly regulated environment has reflected the coming of the Information Age, exemplified by the Food and Drug Administration Modernization Act of 1997, and how the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America has positioned itself to partner in this transition. A model outlining the various phases to be undertaken is offered in closing.

Membrane dynamics in endocytosis: structure--function relationship.

A number of years ago a small group of investigators was torn apart by a debate over the existence or fate of somewhat obscure endosomal vesicles not even represented in text books. During the last decade, however, interest has shifted with the fireworks of newly discovered molecules involved in the regulation of protein transport. We are now entering the post-genomic era, where individual components can be re-assembled into functional, multiprotein cellular machines. Borders between disciplines in Life Sciences are fading away as our molecular understanding approaches atomic resolution. It is these exciting developments that were captured by the latest edition of the ESF conference series on endocytosis.

International conference on basic and clinical aspects of cell-cycle control.

Scientists of numerous medical and life science disciplines met in Siena, Italy to discuss the latest proceedings in basic and clinical research. General models of interconnected linear and back-feeding cell-cycle control pathways provide a basis for applied molecular research. Cell-cycle determining factors essential for the control of cellular homeostasis either become markers to determine characteristics of a disease and/or become therapeutic targets. Apart from animal and tissue culture models, molecular theories finally have to stand proof in clinical application and evaluation. Therefore, the clinical feedback to the basic scientist's bench is essential for necessary adjustments of their models to improve future approaches to research challenges. A select group of speakers provided the audience with such an interdisciplinary dialogue at the first International Conference on Basic and Clinical Aspects of Cell-Cycle Control from May 29 to 31, 2000 in Siena, Italy.

Intensity breeds effectivity

The 1990–1996 publication activity of 10 medium-sized European countries in the leading journals of 37 life science disciplines and in the seven top general life science journals was investigated. For each country the number of leading disciplinary journal articles per 100000 inhabitants (intensity) was compared to the percentage of top journal articles (effectivity). A high and significant correlation, i.e. quality heightening was found.

Correspondence factor analysis of the publication patterns of 48 countries over the period 1981–1992

This study illustrates the application of a descriptive multivariate statistical method, Correspondence Factorial Analysis (CFA), to the analysis of a dataset of over 6 million bibliometric entries (data from ISI). CFA is used to show how the 48 most prolific nations stand in relation to each with regard to their publication interests in 17 specific disciplinary areas and one multidisciplinary field over the period 1981–1992. The output of a CFA is a map displaying proximity among variables (countries and disciplines) and constitutes an impartial working document for experts interested in the evaluation of science. The present study focuses on three aspects of a CFA: (1) The normalized “publication patterns” of countries with a common feature (e.g., that belong to the same geopolitical zone, economic union, etc.) can be pooled in order to highlight the position of the union with respect to individual countries; (2) complex CFA maps can be simplified by selecting reference countries or disciplines and observing how the remaining countries and disciplines relate to these references; (3) data on additional countries (new publication profiles) or on additional variables (e.g., socio-economic data on all the countries under study) can be introduced into the CFA maps used as mathematical models. Our CFA of the ISI dataset reveals the scientific interests of nations in relative terms. The main cleavage (the first factorial axis) is between countries that still concentrate on the disciplines of the industrial revolution such as physics and chemistry (or that have turned toward their offspring, materials sciences) and those that have veered toward more “modern” disciplines such as the life sciences (e.g., clinical medicine), the environment, and computer sciences. The second cleavage, along the second factorial axis, is between countries that focus on the agricultural sciences (the land surface) and those interested in the geosciences (the sea, earth's mantle, and mining). The third and fourth axes discriminate even further between earth, life, and abstract sciences highlighting the ostensible relationship between (organic) chemistry and all life science disciplines and between physics and disciplines related to engineering, materials sciences, etc. The CFA maps disclose the specific behavior of each country with respect to these cleavages. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Correspondence factor analysis of the publication patterns of 48 countries over the period 1981-1992

This study illustrates the application of a descriptive multivariate statistical method, Correspondence Factorial Analysis (CFA), to the analysis of a dataset of over 6 million bibliometric entries (data from ISI). CFA is used to show how the 48 most prolific nations stand in relation to each with regard to their publication interests in 17 specific disciplinary areas and one multidisciplinary field over the period 1981–1992. The output of a CFA is a map displaying proximity among variables (countries and disciplines) and constitutes an impartial working document for experts interested in the evaluation of science. The present study focuses on three aspects of a CFA: (1) The normalized “publication patterns” of countries with a common feature (e.g., that belong to the same geopolitical zone, economic union, etc.) can be pooled in order to highlight the position of the union with respect to individual countries; (2) complex CFA maps can be simplified by selecting reference countries or disciplines and observing how the remaining countries and disciplines relate to these references; (3) data on additional countries (new publication profiles) or on additional variables (e.g., socio-economic data on all the countries under study) can be introduced into the CFA maps used as mathematical models. Our CFA of the ISI dataset reveals the scientific interests of nations in relative terms. The main cleavage (the first factorial axis) is between countries that still concentrate on the disciplines of the industrial revolution such as physics and chemistry (or that have turned toward their offspring, materials sciences) and those that have veered toward more “modern” disciplines such as the life sciences (e.g., clinical medicine), the environment, and computer sciences. The second cleavage, along the second factorial axis, is between countries that focus on the agricultural sciences (the land surface) and those interested in the geosciences (the sea, earth's mantle, and mining). The third and fourth axes discriminate even further between earth, life, and abstract sciences highlighting the ostensible relationship between (organic) chemistry and all life science disciplines and between physics and disciplines related to engineering, materials sciences, etc. The CFA maps disclose the specific behavior of each country with respect to these cleavages. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Spanish performance in life sciences. A comparative appraisal of the scientific production of Spain and five other European countries in 1989

The output in life science disciplines from Spain and five other European countries has been measured in a datafile derived from theCurrent Contents-Life Sciences on diskette (1989). The results of this flash evaluation were contrasted with data retrieved from a survey covering the yearly output during the 1973–83 period and thee 1981–85 aggregated value from Schubert, Glanzel, Braun datafiles. The results of these studies showed an increasing share of Spain in the six countries' output, especially in the subfields of organic chemistry and phytochemistry. However, the quality of the Spanish articles—as deduced from the journal impact factors (JRC-1989)—is below the six countries average. The usefulness of the Current Contents on diskette for handy and reliable flash evaluations has been ascertained through a comparative analysis with more comprehensive surveys.

Payload proposals for Space Station

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is calling for proposals for investigations that will use the space station's attached payloads. Experiments from the disciplines of Solar System exploration, space physics, astrophysics, communications, and life sciences will be considered, according to Announcement of Opportunity OSSA 3—88. Letters of intent are due by August 19.Right now, NASA expects to begin construction of the space station in orbit in 1995 and finish in 1997. The research announcement states that NASA plans to fund four to six investigations, which will be launched aboard the space shuttle and attached to the frame of the station during assembly.

Towards An Islamic Critique of Anthropological Evolutionism

I. THE BIOLOGY-CULTURE CONNECTION IN THE HISTORYOF ANTHROPOLOGICAL THOUGHTThe story of modem anthropology is a story of the Euro-American attemptto discover the other than Euro-American human being. Within thatstory is the story of the intellectual self-discovery of the Euro-American;within that is the story of the discovery of racism; within that is the storyof political and ideological pressures on the processes of such discoveries;within that the amazing and wonderful story of the scientific discovery ofthe worldly nature of the human being - conceptualized generally: acrossall space and time, all colors and languages; and within that story is a storyof the social and natural sciences: of their methods, results, potentialities,and pitfalls.If there is a central theme that runs through all these stories within thestory, it is the story of the impact of Darwinian and post-Darwinian biologyon the social and human sciences. Modem anthropology is not much morethan an evolutionist form of humanism. Evolutionism is to be found in mosttypes of contemporary anthropological studies, as a central position or animplicit assumption. It is clearly axiomatic to thought, analysis, and interpretationin the discipline. As such it is a fundamental issue in the considerationof modem anthropology for inclusion in, and recasting for, Islamic educationalpurposes. The aim of this presentation is to consider briefly how theimpact of Darwin, and of biology after Darwin, on recent anthropologicalthought may be measured as a step toward developing an Islamic methodologyfor anthropological research and teaching.Since its publication in 1859 by Charles Darwin (and Alfred Russell),evolutionary theory has been refined and developed by virturally all life sciencedisciplines and a few other disciplines such as anthropology. Anthropdogyis rooted partly in the life sciences and partly in the social sciences. Humanevolutionary theory developed by anthropologists has gained wide acceptancein all sectors of the Western scientific establishment. Adherence to, and propagationof, an evolutionist world-view has become a symbol of the liberalistmission of Western science in the face of periodic opposition to it comingfrom conservative, evangelist, Christian fundamentalists, and politicians whorepresent them. A few of the anti-evolutionists are also scientists (Williams,1983). They have given leadership to the most recent form of antievolutionism,called scientific creationism. Within the scientific and educationalcommunity their view is at present a minority view; the dominant viewbeing the pro-evolutionary one. Among the Judeo-Christian population atlarge, in the United States, surveys indicate that about half of the people givecredence to the evolutionary view. The others either do not or do not care.An effect of post-Darwinian natural science on social science was to bringhuman evolution into focus as incorporating psychological, social, and culturalaspects in addition to the biological (see e.g. in Eiseley, 1958; Freeman, 1974;Harris, 1968; Opler, 1964; Reed, 1961; Stocking, 1968). The historical relationshipof bio-evolutionary theory to the social sciences in general andspecifically to anthropology, is complex. Nowadays it is one of the dependenceof the latter on the former. It has been argued, however, that in its formativeyears, Darwinian evolutionary theory was in fact an application of socialscience concepts to biology. Darwin himself acknowledged that the Malthusianstatement of the principle that human population, when unchecked, increasesin geometrical ratio while subsistence increases only in arithmeticalratio, influenced his idea of natural selection. The subsequent acceptance ofMendelian genetics, on which the modem form of evolutionism rests, quicklytransformed even the fundamental social science principles of the study ofhuman races and variation. The continuing success of the biological sciences ...

Obsolescence or immediacy? Evidence supporting Price's hypothesis

The time distributions of references given by five leading journals in each of seven life science disciplines revealed that the decrease in the frequency of references is faster in the early years (5–10 years) than later. The rate of decrease is in good correlation with the 3 and 4 year-old references per article values, with the discipline impact factor sums and with the ratio of the 3-year-old references to the 4-year-old ones. The results are discussed as evidence supportingPrice's immediacy factor, i.e. the fall of citations in time does not mean obsolescence.

Precious Metals and Living Organisms

In principle, the biosphere contains the essential minerals necessary for growth, survival and multiplication of the diverse spectra of living organisms, as well as all of the remaining naturally occurring elements of the Periodic Table. Here we emphasize the concept of selective element accumulation characteristically displayed by individual species from all of the major taxonomic groups. In particular, we describe the range of organisms and tissues known to contain relatively large concentrations of precious metals, including gold, silver, platinum and iridium. These accumulator species may indeed be detected in various natural habitats as well as on contaminated and polluted sites. Specific examples, drawn from a variety of life science disciplines, are presented to illustrate the possible involvement of organisms in precious metal cycling and biogeochemical deposition over geologic time. The prospects for metal recovery from fresh and ocean water utilizing specific organisms is also assessed. The metabolism of precious-metal-containing drugs is outlined with reference to the mechanisms of action of compounds at the cellular level that give these compounds considerable potential in therapeutic applications. It is concluded that the accumulation of precious metals by organisms is little understood and merits further research.