Can It Get Worse Than Hurricane Sandy?

A recent study has shown that tropical storms which make their way up the Atlantic coast are likely to become more intense during the remainder of the twenty-first century.  The most recent tropical storm, Hurricane Sandy, was nicknamed “the storm of the century.”  This was the largest hurricane in history in terms of land mass that it covered.  Hypothetically, you could have put three Hurricane Irenes inside of the land mass that Hurricane Sandy covered.

Hurricane Sandy compared to Hurricane Irene

The study showed that tropical storms of the 21^st century are likely to intensify because of both increased greenhouse gases and reductions in particulate pollution over the Atlantic Coast.  They also showed that as more carbon dioxide is emitted, storms will continue to become stronger.  

Even though flooding was far worse when it came to Hurricane Katrina in 2005, Hurricane Sandy could possibly have more overall damage because if the very densely populated region that it hit.

This again shows that our decisions as individuals affect others on a much larger scale.  Joining the green movement can have a much greater effect on our future than I originally thought.

Researchers have recently found that pesticides which contain dichlorophenol can potentially be linked to food allergies.  Dichlorophenol is a chemical used in pesticides and to chlorinate water.  The research showed that pesticides that contain high levels of dichlorophenol can possibly weaken food tolerance for some people.  When an individual’s food tolerance is lowered, that person is much more susceptible to having an allergic reaction.

The actual study contained over 10,000 participants and occurred between 2005 and 2006.  About 2,500 participants had dichlorophenol measured in their urine.  These 2,500 participants were then part of another study that showed 411 of these individuals were found to have a food allergy and 1.016 had an environmental allergy.  Dr. Jerschow agreed that increased use of pesticides and other chemicals is associated with an increased rate of food allergies.  

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, there has been an 18% increase in food allergies between 1997 and 2007.  As of right now, the most common food allergens are peanuts, milk, wheat, eggs, soy, tree nuts, and shell fish. 

As I have previously mentioned, I have a food allergy to peanuts which can be life threatening if underestimated.  I am absolutely fascinated by almost anything that has to do with allergies because they have been such a large part of my life.

This article in particular was very interesting. It really made me think about how something as random as a pesticide, commonly found in water that I drink, can greatly affect my allergies.  It also made me think about the other things that can affect allergies.  If something as random as dichlorophenol can be a factor, it seems like almost anything can be

According to researchers, the 4.9 million barrels of oil which spilled into the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 was not nearly as bad as the two million gallons of dispersant used to try and clean it up.  The Deep Water Horizon Spill is considered to be by far the biggest ecological disaster when it comes to oil spills.

This specific study found that when the oil and dispersant were mixed, its toxicity increased by 52 times.   The test done to fins this was done on rotifers, an animal which is at the bottom of the food chain in the Gulf.  It was completed on five different strains of rotifers.  This animal is often used to assess toxicity in waters because of their sensitivity to toxins and their ability to respond quickly to environmental stimuli.  The mixture caused many adult rotifers to die and affected 50 percent of their eggs from hatching.  It is very important that their eggs hatch because the next generation is needed to feed the animals higher on the food chain, such as fish, shrimp, and crabs.

Researchers are now thinking that it may be better to let oil spills disperse on their own because of the toxic chemicals used often before we know that they are safe.

The area which was affected from the 2010 oil spill

I can remember being in high school when the oil spill occurred and no one could believe thus was happening.  The spill lasted for 70 days before it was capped and the effects of this oil spill were felt immediately.  The largest industry near the Gulf of Mexico is fishing. Many fisherman own small businesses and were hardly keeping their head above water before the spill.  Afterward, many had to close down completely because the industry collapsed.

This really made me think about how my decisions can affect other people on a very large scale.  Using the dispersant was a good thought and researchers had valid reasoning behind it, but they did not know all of the effects that it was going to have in the long run.  For this reason, they should have thought more about their decision before acting. The effects of this spill will unfortunately are going to be felt for several decades.  We do not yet know when the Gulf will fully recover because of the damage done to the food web.

For the full article on this topic, go to sciencedaily.com.

 

Bacteria are single celled microscopic organisms which consume nutrients from the environment.  They consume enough nutrients for them to grow to twice their original size and then cut themselves down the middle to become two bacteria cells, and so on. Their entire life is focused around them growing and dividing.  As humans we are made up of over a trillion cells, but at any time in our life, there are also 10 trillion bacterial cells either in or on us.  So in a way, we are10% human and 90 % bacteria.

 

            Most of the time they are not as much of a problem as people think they are.  Bacteria cover us in an invisible body armor which keeps environmental harms out and help us stay healthy.  They digest our food, make our vitamins and tell our immune system to keep bad microbes out.  But on the other hand, if the wrong bacterium gets into your body they can cause a person to be very sick with illnesses such as food poisoning, toxic shock and Lyme disease.  Bacteria can do really good things or really bad things but the question that Bassler proposed to her team was “How can such a small organism do anything at all?”

            They learned that Bacteria are too small to act on the environment if they act as individuals.  Bassler’s team discovered this by studying a marine bacterium called Vibrio-Fisheri, harmless bacteria which live in the ocean.  They had a flask of Vibrio-Fisheri in a very concentrated solution, and when the lights turned off the bacterium produced light.  Her team was then assigned to figure out not why the bacterium made light, but when they made light.  When they were alone or in a dilute suspension, they produced no light, but when they grew to a certain cell number, all of the bacteria simultaneously turned on light. 

            The next question proposed was, how can bacterium tell the difference between times when they are alone and when they are together? Bacteria talk to each other through a chemical language.  They make and secrete small hormone like molecules and when the bacterium is alone, these molecules float away and do not produce any light, but when the bacterium grow and multiply, they all make these molecules and they increase in proportion to the overall cell number.  When the molecules reach a certain number, they tell the bacterium and they turn on light together. 

            All bacteria have systems like this where they can talk to each other.  They make chemical words; recognize the words and they turn on group behaviors that are only successful when all of the cells participate in unison.  This is a process called Quorum Sensing which is almost like voting.   The bacterium vote with chemical votes, the votes gets counted and everyone responds to the vote.  This then relates back to how humans get sick.  A bacteria gets inside of you and they sit and wait and while waiting, they begin to rapidly multiply.  They then count themselves with the hormone like molecules and when they reach the correct cell number, the launch their attack on an organism which cannot even compare in relationship to their sizes. 

         

         For the full video on how bacteria communicate, go to ted.com

A recent study has shown that children and even adults can suffer from asthma like symptoms when participating in brief periods of very intense exercise, even though they are perfectly healthy. For the most part when this happens, there is usually no history of asthma at all. Normal symptoms include wheezing and trouble breathing. Each child which was involved in the research was tested for two types of exercise. First they were tested at a consistent work rate, which would normally be used to evaluate for exercise induced asthma. The second was an exercise test which is normally used to measure someone aerobic capacity.
 

In all, researchers tested fifty six children who didn’t have asthma or allergies. Results showed that short amounts of very heavy exercise caused a decrease in lung function when tested in children who didn’t have asthma. Also, almost half of the kids who were tested had at least on abnormal test result. Mainly, the asthma symptoms occurred in the bronchial tubes when they became tight when they were involved in intense exercise.

Researchers were not expecting to have such a large portion of the children with these problems after short periods of exercise. Scientists think that this could be an effect from the surface of the airway being dehydrated.

This topic is very near and dear to my heart as many of my family members have been diagnosed with asthma.  I also know first-hand that asthma can be a very scary condition.  When having an asthma attack your lungs feel like they are burning because they are working so hard to try and get oxygen to your lungs. It almost feels like your throat is closing up because depending on how bad the attack is, you physically cannot breathe.

I thought this was a great article which explained how people who have no history of asthma or allergies can still have very similar symptoms. I also think that more research should be done in this area because of how common asthma and allergies have become. Finding out if you have asthma or not, even if you have the symptoms could be very important, even life changing.

You can find the full article on this topic at sciencedaily.com.