INTERESTING TIMES

Bring carbs
Eat protein.

Dr Paul brings ribs from a restaurant.  He's in his 90's and doesn't mind spending his money on food for others.  He's a retired physician, orthopedic surgeon to be specific.  His sons are all in medicine too, some clinical and some research.  He gave me the Mayo clinic book on Alternative Medicine.  They basically have a stoplight rating system for all things alternative, and the majority of treatments get the yellow light based on the science that they found.  I appreciate it pretty much.  They don't damn naturopathic medicine, it gets yellow also.  There are good and bad parts.  I wish they'd do the same approach for conventional medicines.  People might be shocked how weak the evidence is for some of them.  The degree to which pharmaceutical businesses drive the FDA and the delivery of medicine is apalling.  I love it every time I read of another review that shows reasonable conventional doctors understand that some of the uses of pharmaceuticals are unsubstantiated and may do more harm than good.

What does pituitary mean, from the Latin? (think onomatopoeia...)
to spit mucus
ptuo = to spit, pituita = mucus

What do you call a hormone that acts on neighboring cells?
paracrine

Are pituitary hormones steroid, steroid type, or peptide hormones?
peptide, all of them are

What do you call the loss of lateral visual fields?
bitemporal hemianopsia

Damage to what part of the pituitary causes diabetes insipidus, and which hormone is lacking?
( self quiz from SSL's notes )

How are ketogenic and glucogenic defined with reference to amino acids? Ketogenic aa's can be converted to acetyl CoA or acetoacetyl CoA. Glucogenic aa's produce pyruvate or Krebs cycle intermediates.
( on a few genetic errors that sicken and kill infants if undetected: MSUD, methymalonyl aciduria and PKU... )

One kind of food poisoning and anthrax are caused by bacterium in the genus Bacillus. They are gram positive rods that make spores and have exotoxins. In lecture there was mention of its marshmallowy capsule containing d-glutamate and that being unusual. The capsule and the exotoxin are plasmid encoded, and this organism is also unique in that it has two plamids.

Bacilli are facultative aerobes--meaning they use oxygen as the final electron acceptor in their electron transport chain, and have catalase and superoxide dismutase. But they can grow in the absence of oxygen by fermenting for energy. The two medically important species of Baccilus are cereus and anthrasis.

B. cereus is ubiquitous in the soil and commonly found in low levels in raw, dried and processed foods. It takes four or more hours in food held at the wrong temperature (warm) to grow enough to make you sick. Beware of steam trays! The food poisoning it causes is similar to that caused by Staphylococcus aureus---watery nonbloody diarrhea 6-18 hours after ingesting the poison, or a faster boot out the top end, or both. Bacillus cereus likes growing in cooked white rice.
( How are bacteria unlike eukaryotes? Answer behind cut: )

It's commonly known that scurvy is caused by vitamin C deficiency. The Latin name for the disease is scorbutus, and the name "ascorbic acid" (for vit C) is derived from this name of the disease. It was first described by Hippocrates about 300-400 BC, and was common among pirates and naval sailors until the 1900's.

( Learn all about it )

The next quiz in my class is on the 20 amino acids that are used in the human body. I have made my flash cards and begun to learn their structures and chemical characteristics.
( aa city )