# 4398
There was a sardonic one-liner back in the 1970s, after a decade of media `scare stories’ about the dangers of everything from butter, to coffee, to artificial sweeteners, that said; `Face it . . everything gives lab rats cancer’.
While probably not true, it sprang to mind this morning when I saw this little tidbit that appears into a recent edition of PNAS.
- Bronwen Martin, Sunggoan Ji, Stuart Maudsley, and Mark P. Mattson
Abstract
Failure to recognize that many standard control rats and mice used in biomedical research are sedentary, obese, glucose intolerant, and on a trajectory to premature death may confound data interpretation and outcomes of human studies. Fundamental aspects of cellular physiology, vulnerability to oxidative stress, inflammation, and associated diseases are among the many biological processes affected by dietary energy intake and exercise.
Although overfed sedentary rodents may be reasonable models for the study of obesity in humans, treatments shown to be efficacious in these animal models may prove ineffective or exhibit novel side effects in active, normal-weight subjects.
I suppose the good news here is that with the proliferation of fast food, Playstations, a ubiquitous Internet, and 500 cable channels streaming into every home – soon mankind’s metabolism will match that of lab rats and it will all balance out.
Scientific experimentation with lab rats isn’t wrong, you see. It is just a little ahead of its time.
I am, admittedly, always a little bit skeptical when I read the conclusions of the latest whiz-bang scientific study or a press release announcing an exciting new advance in medicine. Even the ones that don’t employ rodents.
Not because I harbor conspiratorial beliefs, or a deep suspicion of the motives of scientists . . . but because I view scientific discovery as a journey . . . not a destination.
Advances in science are anything but linear, and very often we find ourselves sidetracked or detoured down some flawed alley of investigation along the way.
What was conventional scientific wisdom five years ago may be debunked today, and what we replace that old knowledge with now may be obsoleted in short order as well.
Absolutes in science are hard to find. And the process of determining scientific `fact’ can be messy and prolonged.
Which is why you’ll often see cautions in my blogs about the latest research, and an avoidance of self-serving `medical miracle’ press releases about innovations that may never get out of the laboratory.
Over the past year, I’ve highlighted some of the conflicting studies on the efficacy of face masks vs. respirators for infection control, on the usefulness of hand washing as a flu preventative, and numerous studies on exactly how influenza is transmitted.
If you are looking for a consensus among scientists on these matters, I’m afraid you’ll have to keep looking.
What you probably can find, however, is a study that will support practically any scientific, personal, religious or economic bias or agenda you might happen to favor.
And barring that, you can most certainly find a study that conveniently questions the methods of any study you might oppose.
It’s a contrarian’s delight.
Scientific research can be a bit of a minefield through which one must tread carefully. But rather than being distressed by the confusion or ambiguity that conflicting research sometimes promotes, I’m intrigued by it.
Which is why I try to put links to the original study (or abstract) whenever I write about a journal article, so that the reader can look beyond the press release or the media hype and hopefully weigh the merits of the research themselves.
As a non-scientist, I also rely heavily on the opinions and reviews of reputable scientists and (science) journalists whom I trust for guidance, particularly in those areas where I have little or no expertise.
Although it usually comes at a great price, pandemics . . . like wars, often result in a significant surge in scientific and medical knowledge.
Our understanding of how influenza mutates, evolves, and spreads will no doubt grow tremendously over the next couple of years as the data gathered during this pandemic is examined and analyzed.
While I try to highlight only reputable studies, the admonition of Caveat Lector remains for anything you read here (or anyplace else for that matter).
Novel H1N1 has already re-written much of what we thought we knew about influenza virology. And some of the things we will think we learned from this virus may be overturned by the next pathogen to come down the pike.
That’s simply the nature of science. Our knowledge, like the influenza virus, is constantly evolving.
Which is why, after more than 4400 essays in this space, there will always be something new to write about tomorrow.
News Editor