Specific Claims About Basic Research

I have covered how to analyze claims about the value of animals in past discoveries and now want to move onto some specific examples. There are many sources for claims about the value of animals in research but since the University of California at Santa Cruz (UCSC) has been the site for recent animal rights activities (once again, I condemn bombings), I thought I would use some of their material.,We are a professional manufacturer and exporter of handmade landscape oil paintings in Xiamen, China.

The University of California at Santa Cruz states:

Finally, it is important to recognize that basic research using animals is needed to provide a foundation for future medical advances. The goal of basic research is to understand the function of newly discovered molecules and cells,,What’s Contained In Each Report Hemorrhoids? strange phenomena, or little-understood processes. Although the benefits to health from this type of research may not be immediately evident,,EC21 assures the world’s biggest product database as a B2B eMarketplace with Ipod nano. it is an essential part of efforts to understand, prevent, and cure disease. Examples of basic research that has led to important advances in medicine are the discovery of DNA (leading to cancer treatments) and neurotransmitters (leading to antidepressants and antiseizure medications), and development of the tools that led to magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). (UCSC 2009) (Emphasis added.)

These claims from the University of California at Santa Cruz are not unique. I want to, at this time, examine the validity of just two: the discovery of DNA and the invention of the MRI.

Discovery of DNA

DNA was discovered circa 1869 by Friedrich Miescher. Miescher was using leukocytes (white blood cells) isolated from the pus on surgical bandages in order to find the biochemical basis for life. According to Dahm:

As part of his protocol, Miescher rinsed the pus-soaked bandages with a dilute solution of sodium sulphate to wash out the white blood cells, then washed the samples with warm alcohol and ether to extract the lipids and other lipophilic molecules. He also digested the cells with solutions of the protease pepsin, which Miescher obtained by rinsing pig stomachs, to break down the proteins. This left him with a powdery sediment. When he added sodium carbonate, an alkaline solution, the sediment dissolved; when he then added acid, he obtained a precipitate again (Human Genet, 122:565-81, 2008). (Dahm 2008)

Miescher published his results in Medicinisch-chemische Untersuchungen in 1871.

I am curious as to which part of this discovery was owed to basic research using animals. The leukocytes apparently came from humans and the chemicals were presumably synthesized. The protein pepsin did come from the stomach of a pig. However, the source of the enzyme is peripheral to the experiment. Even if synthetic pepsin was unavailable at that time, it could have come from human stomachs harvested at autopsy; thus no part of this breakthrough was dependent upon using animals.

If the pepsin is what UCSC is referring to when they herald the role of animals in this discovery, then they are being very misleading. Pepsin from pigs was here used as a chemical and is not an example of using animals in basic research any more than it is an example of using glassware in basic research. Yes, glassware was used but glassware was not the reason for the breakthrough. This is one reason I routinely divide the use of animals in science into nine categories; so the reader will not be misled into believing sweeping generalizations.

Perhaps UCSC means the discovery of the structure of DNA by Watson and Crick. If so, this claim is also perplexing. Watson and Crick relied on x-ray crystallography and the use of physical models in order to establish the fact of the double helix.,is a mold maker specialized in builds Plastic molding,insert mold and Plastic molding in China. Which plant or animal or other organism provided the DNA analyzed by Watson and Crick is immaterial, as any life form using DNA would have sufficed.