A slim chance: Insulin’s role in obesity

Because obesity has become a huge epidemic in our world today, scientific researchers are always looking for reasons to explain such a huge phenomenon and help those many people in need. After gaining such a huge amount of weight, many people find it impossible to loose the pounds once they put them on. It is well known that part of the struggle to lose weight is will power; however, some research has shown late on-set diabetes, one of the symptoms of obesity could be perpetuating it. Late on-set diabetes is the resistance in the hormone cells to insulin even though it is available. Although this diabetes is not deadly, insulin regulates the absorption and release of sugar, and without it blood sugar can get out of control. Dr. Bruning from Max Planck Institute for Neurological Research in Cologne decided to research if the insulin controlled brain cells also resisted insulin and might effect an obese person's ability to consume so much food. By looking at the midbrain cells, which are responsible for producing the feeling of pleasure, in mice, Dr. Bruning found vital information. The male mice that had been genetically altered to not have insuline-receptor genes, ate 3.2 grams of rodent chow and the average amount of food a male mouse eats a day is 2.8 grams. In female mice the average amount per day to eat should have been 2.7 grams; however, without the insuline receptors the female mice ate 3.1 grams a day. Obviously there was a difference without the insuline receptors; however, Dr. Bruning cannot conclude that humans are effected the same way because knocking out a gene is different than acquiring late on-set diabetes and mice are not men! This research is still important though, because it raises the question as to why the absence of something can produce a reaction of pleasure for food.

http://www.economist.com/node/18833493

Taking a Stand: my opinion on water shortage vs. water pollution

OR

In my opinion, i strongly believe that water shortage is a much bigger problem than water pollution. Although water pollution is harmful and sometimes expensive to take care of, it is not as bad as the absence of water. Without water all sources of life would die and there is no way of creating water out of nothing. Polluted water can easily be purified to the best of our ability with great technology we have today. As we learned from the FLOW video UV lights and other processes can be used to purify water. To say polluted water is hard to deal with is true; however, water shortage is impossible to deal with. Sometimes trucking in water from other parts of the world can help in these situations, but then other parts of the world may start to have water shortages. If the water supply dwindles so will population. Clearly water shortage is a much worse problem than water pollution.

WATER!

Things you need to know about water:

Water is...
a polar molecule
V-shaped
the most common solvent
made of 2 Hydrogen Atoms and 1 Oxygen Atom
constantly in a cycle
present on 70% of the earth
boiled at 100 degrees Celsius and is vapor above
liquid from 99 degrees Celsius to 1 degrees Celsius
solid from 0 degrees Celsius and below
(has) high surface tension
always in a 2hydrogen:1oxygen ratio


-When things are dissolved in water their positive ions will attract towards Oxygen and their negative ions will attract to the hydrogens

1SDS #1-9, 18-22

1. See Drawing

2. In natural water purification when water vapor rises, condenses into tiny droplets in clouds, and-- depending on the temperature-- eventually falls as rain or snow as pure water just like distillation. The second step of the filtration is bacterial action converts dissolved organic contaminants into a few simple compounds. Also when raindrops strike soil and seeps far into the ground it passes through gravel, sand, and even rock which filters out bacteria and suspended matter.

3. Aluminum Hydroxide is a sticky, jellylike material that traps and removes the suspended particles that the process of flocculation uses.

4. Even after the filtration process water may be acidic enough to dissolve metallic water pipes. Shortening pipe life and causing copper and cadmium to appear in homewater supply is harmful to humans. Therefore, calcium oxide is added to the water to neutralize the acidic water by being basic.

5. About 1 ppm of fluoride ion is added to the teated water to reduce tooth decay.

6. Adding chlorine to drinking water kills desease-producing microorganisms whereas untreated water may have harmful organisms for humans.

7. The disadvantages to using chlorination in water is the reaction with organic compounds produced by decomposing animal and plant matter to form substance that, if in sufficiently high concentrations, can be harmful to human health. TGN us a carcinogen found in over chlorinated water and can be cancer causing.

8. The water from a stream of a mountain may need chlorination because the water could have a disease that an animal carried and brought to the water by drinking from it or walking through it. The water could also have metals and bacteria from its surrounding soil that can be harmful.

9. Two other methods to prevent bacteria as chlorine does without the harm could be to use the UV lights that the man from FLOW invented.

Another method could be distillation; however, this method is much too expensive and time consuming to perform.

18. The Hydrological Cycle would either completely stop or just continue only underground and within streams. The absence of evaporation would mean that the water always stayed on the ground and that it would never leave without the wind or some type of force pulling it. That could be advantageous or could be harmful. The evaporation also purifies that water, so i would assume our water supply would be more foul.

19. If water was not a multi form element than the evaporation could not occur and neither could the precipitation of the hydrological cycle.

20. The risks of THM have to be balanced with the positive effects of chlorination for water cleanliness. The small amount of THM should not be harmful.

21. In the natural purification there is essentially 3 of the same steps. The evaporation and condensation mocks the distillation apparatus. The sand and gravel filtration mocks the way water goes through gravel and soil under ground causing filtration.

22. a) 2 ppm b) 14 ppm c) 780 ppm

Balancing Chemical Equations

A chemical equation is made up of three things. The original reactants, a catalyst, and the product. The reactants are two molecules or molecular compounds which when added together create the product(s). A molecule is made of atoms and there can be more than one atom of each molecule in a chemical equation. A molecular compound is a substance formed by two or more molecules or elements joined together by a chemical bond (the glue). Sometimes the reactants need the help of a catalyst to jump start the chemical reaction to get your product. A catalyst should not be accounted for within the chemical equation and can be ignored when doing the final balancing.

Steps to Balancing an Equation:

1. Count the amount of atoms within each element for each side of the equation
ex.

H-2 | H-2
O-2 | O-3

2. Point out which molecules are uneven

3. Multiply each side by a number to end up with the same amount of atoms

4. Do a recount of the atoms

H-4 | H-4
O-4 | O-4


5. If everything is equal, you have balanced your equation!

1SCS #20-27, 33, 35

20. a) A Soft drink is more acidic than a tomato because it is lower on the pH scale. b) Black coffee is more acidic because it has a lower pH than pure water, which is neutral at 7. c) Milk of Magnesia is more acidic than ammonia even though they are both basic on the pH scale.

21. Because of the ten-fold difference, 20 times.

22. Acidic pH water can impaire the fish-egg development thus hampering the ability of fish to reproduce and can also leach into the soil surrounding and cause those metal ions to cause harm to the fish. Basic pH water can dissolve skin and scales of fish as well.

23. Polar molecules are molecules that have an uneven distribution of electrical charge while nonpolar molecules have no separation of charge. Polar molecules dissolve in polar molecules while nonpolar molecules dissolve in nonpolar molecules.

24. I would select Lamp oil to dissolve a nonpolar molecular substance because it is made up of nonpolar molecules and will therefore be able to dissolve this substance.

25. Water is a Polar molecule just like NaCl unlike cooking oil which is a nonpolar molecule and can only dissolve other nonpolar molecules.

26. "Like dissolves like" refers to the way polar and nonpolar molecules tend to stay within their own groups and can only dissolve each other. For example a polar molecule such as water will dissolve ethanol because ethanol is also a polar molecule.

27. Plain water is made up of a polar molecule while greasy dishes have nonpolar molecules so they need a base or a nonpolar to wash them.

33. Many mechanics prefer to use waterless hand cleaners to clean their greasy hands because water is polar and cannot get rid of the grease while a nonpolar molecule probably within their cleaner could help their hands become clean.

35. Hydrogen would have the partial positive charge because it is a positively charged ion while Flourine in a negatively charged ion.

ISCS #9-19 p. 82-83

9. Out of the 55 grams of Sugar water solution, there is 11 grams of sugar and 44 grams of water.

10. 15,000 ppm

11. Having an uneven distribution of electrical charge which means that each molecule has a partial positive region at one end and a partial negative region at the other end.

12. See Drawing

13. a) The negative end, which is oxygen. b) The postive ends, the Hydrogens.

14. Heavy metals are called "heavy" because their atoms have greater masses than those of essential metallic elements.

15. Heavy-metal poisoning symptoms include nervous system, brain kidneys, and liver damage which can lead to death.

16. a) A person may be exposed to Lead by being in a house built before 1978 and painted with Lead paint. They may also be exposed to Lead by automobile electrical storage batteries. b) A person may be exposed to Mercury from eating fish that have been exposed to mercury in the water. They also may be exposed to mercury from a broken flourescent light bulbs.

17. Hydroxide

18. Hydrogen

19. a) basic b) basic c) acidic d) neutral