Curry and Cancer

Posted on February 14, 2012 by Jeff

Indian food is my favorite cuisine. For me, nothing beats the lingering aromas, the complexity of the flavors, and a generous number of Scoville units. I am even having a Pavlovian response as I write this. And, now, there is even more reason to enjoy your curries: curcumin, a component of turmeric that is common in Indian food, appears to help slow the growth of prostate cancer cells (Shah et al, 2012).

curcumin

There has long been interest in curcumin and cancer, with potential beneficial effects seen for many types of cancer (see references here). Now, with the report from Karen Knudsen‘s lab, there are some clear indications of the underlying mechanism relevant to prostate cancer treatment.

Androgen deprivation therapy has limited success on prostate cancer due to resurgent activity of the androgen receptor. Curcumin has now been shown to “reduced the association of histone acetylation and pioneer factors, thereby suppressing androgen receptor residence and downstream target gene expression.” Thus, curcumin, or an appropriate derivative, could be effective in conjunction with androgen deprivation.

The bottom line: another potential benefit of curcumin in the fight against cancer. I just have to work on the proper dose now. Even if that means 3 curries a day, I’ll manage.

Happy Searching — Jeff Saffer

Top 10 Life & Biomedical Science Search Terms for 2011

Posted on January 20, 2012 by Jeff

Ever wonder what other people are searching for? Want to know what is hot in the field and what is not? Well, here it is: the top 10 search terms for 2011.

antagonism
cell cycle
stomach
H2-receptor
regulation
$Diseases
$Proteins
age
cancer
ethanol

This is based on the over 1.6 million searches done on the Quertle site in 2011. The searches were done by an equal mix of lab researchers and health care providers, covering almost every facet of life sciences.

Most searches were done in context of specific problems, rather than individual search terms. For example, there was a big interest in H2-receptor antagonists. Often, one of Quertle’s unique Power Terms was coupled with another term, such as the query $Proteins inflammation to find which proteins might be involved in the inflammation process.

The full 2011 report, covering the top diseases, proteins, chemicals, organisms, journals, and more is available for free to subscribers of the Quertle newsletter. Sign up here and you’ll have immediate access to insights on life and biomedical science trends.

Happy Searching — Jeff Saffer

Quertle – 2011

Posted on January 10, 2012 by Jeff

Happy New Year!

Been looking for something? Apparently so. You and your colleagues did 1,675,364 searches on Quertle in 2011. That is a 33% increase over 2010. We’d like to think that this growth means we are doing something right.

In 2011, we added MyQuertle for saving your favorite searches and getting automatic alerts. With that, we have expanded support for linking to institutional subscriptions and now connect to over 1100 organizations.

We also added Search Suggestions to help you find what matters. Those suggestions are also meant to help users recognize how verbs can help refine a search and how Power Terms™ can help answer questions. Based on your searches in 2011, that seems to be working. Speaking of the searches in 2011, Quertle’s Annual Report on Search Trends will be available soon. This report is free for subscribers to our Newsletter. Sign up now.

With the growth in 2011, Quertle now has a user base of almost 200,000 researchers, physicians, and other health professionals in 180 countries. In 2012, we look forward to expanding the user base and supporting even more searches. As far as the number of countries goes, we may have to create new ones to increase that number!

Happy Searching — Jeff Saffer

Publication Dilemma

Posted on December 20, 2011 by Jeff

Today, a US scientific advisory board asked Science and Nature to publish redacted versions of papers on engineered versions of H5N1 avian flu (bird flu) that could be more transmissible in humans (see article). It is a sad state that such important information that could be used to advance public health need be considered a means of empowering terrorists.

There are clear and unfortunately valid concerns in this case, but it is worrisome to think about any form of censorship in the scientific literature. It is a slippery slope that should be a concern to all of us.

The editors at Science and Nature have been burdened with a potentially no-win scenario. Are there valid ways to determine who should have access to the key data? Is it possible to stop a determined terrorist from, say, stealing lab notebooks?

Will there be a day when you have to have certain credentials to search the literature? Until then,

Happy Searching–Jeff Saffer

Skipping Vaccinations

Posted on November 29, 2011 by Jeff

I read another article today about parents skipping vaccinations for their children. In many places, 5% of the school children have not received required vaccines! What’s wrong with these parents?

Well, I’ll tell you what’s wrong – and it is not limited to vaccinations.

There is an unfortunate trend for people to react to unfounded beliefs. We are supposed to be an educated society, but actions such as shirking vaccinations belie that. Rather than give an issue careful consideration, many people are quick to consider unfounded beliefs as factual.

This reminds me of the concerns about EMF (something about which I am an expert). Not only is the data on EMF risks completely muddled, even if the supposed ill effects of EMF were true the actual risk is extremely low. But, because people do not understand EMF or the likelihood of a problem, they have been willing, for example, to drive or bus their child to a faraway school rather than go to a nearby school with slightly elevated EMF. And, they make this decision despite the fact that the risk of death from a transportation accident is much, much greater than the supposed EMF effects.

The same issue is happening with vaccines. Because people are too quick to react to an unfounded story about vaccines, they take the extremely greater risk of not vaccinating. They have clearly not given considered thought to the issue, yet will still argue vehemently about the “correctness” of their viewpoint.

In part, the issue is a need to blame. If a child becomes seriously ill, the parents have a natural tendency to want to place blame. “It must have been the vaccination.” Or, “it must have been the EMF.” (“Surely, it was not my actions or my genetics that had any part!”) Then, others hear this story and jump on the bandwagon.

Please urge parents you know to ensure their children are vaccinated. The literature on vaccines and safety is extensive and, while nothing including vaccines carries zero risk, the benefits far outweigh even the supposed, and unproven, risks. With the increased incidence of measles, for example, it is irresponsible not to get up-to-date on vaccinations.

Happy Searching–Jeff Saffer

Mental ILLNESS

Posted on November 17, 2011 by Jeff

We have just returned from the Society of Neuroscience meeting in DC. It was a great meeting, not only for getting the word out about Quertle (the ~1000 giveaways we had were gone in the 2nd day!) but also for some very interesting science.

One scientific topic that caught my attention was work being done on mental illness. There is much progress in that field and the understanding of mental illness and behavioral issues has come an incredibly long way over the past couple of decades.

But, there is still an unfortunate, and undeserved, social stigma associated with mental illness.

It is called an illness for a reason. It is not mental “problem I chose to have“. Like diabetes and other diseases, mental illness is blameless*. You don’t choose to have a mental illness. So why is it treated so differently? Insurance plans have gotten better, but they still have limits on treating mental illness, whereas traditional organic diseases do not.

There was a time when our understanding was definitely lacking. But, we know better now. For example, look at the vast literature on schizophrenia and genes or depression and genes. Why should treatment of this disease be limited? Why should society not give these patients the same support and acceptance of the patients with diabetes?

It’s that time of year when seasonal affective disorder will be more obvious. Be nice.

Happy Searching — Jeff

*Maybe some diseases, like lung cancer caused by the patient’s smoking, are not entirely blameless.

11/11/11: What’s in a Number?

Posted on November 11, 2011 by Jeff

Today is the 11th day of the 11th month of the 11th year in this century (and millennium). Many consider this an auspicious day. 11 is thought by some to be lucky, so three 11′s, it follows, would be even better.

But, the excitement seems unfounded, as the date is completely arbitrary. To borrow from Chicago, does anyone really know what time it is?

The calendar on which we base this supposedly special date has changed repeatedly over history. What year is it? And, what is that year relative to, and are we sure we have that date right? In many calendar systems, this isn’t the 11th year of anything.

Then there are months. Why are there 12 months? At one time, there were 10. Remember that September, October, November, and December got those names for a reason. Then Julius and Augustus Caesar, with big egos, wanted their own names added to the calendar, and just like that September no longer followed June. Based on egos, and maybe to some extent lunar cycles, we arbitrarily made it 12.

So, this could just as easily be 15/23/92, which, to another set of numerologists, might be very unlucky.

But, on the calendar most in use, it is 11/11/11. In our home town of Las Vegas, the wedding chapels are booked solid, with extra chaplains standing by for (I’m not making this up) drive-thru weddings. At least this makes sense (the date, not the drive-thru weddings, in terms of having an easy anniversary date to remember).

But, whatever year, date, or time zone, your literature searches will be better on Quertle.

Happy Searching — Jeff Saffer

PS: We have the Ancient Egyptians, who liked to count in base 12, to thank for there being 24 hours in a day.

Technology Challenges and the Economy

Posted on November 6, 2011 by Jeff

As we announced in our inaugural blog, Quertle was a WINNER in the first National Library of Medicine (NLM) software development challenge! Quertle was chosen for its innovations in searching the life science literature. Vicki and I had the distinct pleasure of attending the award ceremony at NLM on November 2nd.

In addition to touting both the winning technologies and the amazing resources of the NLM, the award ceremony highlighted the value of technology in supporting our economy. U.S. Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra and Health and Human Services Chief Technology Officer Todd Park (both of whom were dynamic and engaging) repeatedly touted the value emerging technologies have to our economy.

Better technology not only provides the ability to carry out critical tasks more efficiently, it also can serve as an engine to enable entrepreneurial ventures, thus creating jobs. Imagine how slow our economy would grow without the technology brought by computers, the web, even medical advances. Technology is clearly critical to advancing society and our economy.

We always expected that the Quertle search engine would enable each of you to advance your own technology. With the validation from the NLM, that expectation has proven to be a reality.

Happy Searching — Jeff Saffer

Searching the Literature & Slaying Dragons

Posted on October 21, 2011 by Jeff

OK, now that I have your attention, I’d like to introduce the Quertle Blog.

You know Quertle (or at least should know us) as one of the most exciting advances in searching the life science and biomedical literature. My Mother said so. More importantly, The National Library of Medicine said so as well. We are pleased to announce, in our inaugural blog, that Quertle was a winner in the Innovative Uses of NLM Information challenge.

Vicki Burnett and I started Quertle with a vision to make literature search results more relevant. In our own research careers, we have been frustrated by biomedical searches that produced overwhelming lists of results, many of which were not useful. Quertle uses “relationship-based searching”, which simply means we look for relationships among your search terms as asserted by the authors – not simply the occurrence of the terms anywhere in the document.

In some ways, traditional keyword searching has become like the dragons of myth – representative of the primal forces (in this case, of search engines). The keyword-based methods of all the major search engines were all we knew how to do well for so long. The result is the methods – and the sites – have become so ingrained, despite their “evil” ability to swamp us with irrelevant results.

In its short existence (coming up on two years), Quertle has gained users in 178 countries. We think that means the pains in traditional literature searches are felt everywhere. We also think that means Quertle is doing something right to address those pains.

In this new blog, we will, as time permits, we will discuss life science literature searching, life sciences in general, and on occasion rant about whatever is on our minds. Thanks for joining us.

Happy Searching — Jeff Saffer