Cells

Friends thought Paul Silber had bet the farm when he ditched a secure job as a toxicologist with Dallas-based Mary Kay Cosmetics, packed everything into a U-Haul van and headed for Maryland to start a company based on an obscure, yet promising, field of biotechnology.Five years later, Mr. Silber relishes the memory as his Baltimore-based company, In Vitro Technologies, announced that in 1995 it turned a profit for the first time on revenues of almost $1 million. And he's expecting big growth in the next several years.

As a teenager in the mid-1990s, he moved with his parents to the United States from Pakistan. The family sought and received political asylum. They settled in Baltimore County and operated a gas station. The boy attended Owings Mills High School. His cricket skills helped him excel at baseball, the quintessential American game. "He always seemed like such a nice young man," said the chair of the English department. The nice young man graduated in 1999. He picked up a job as a data administrator with the Maryland Office of Planning.

Comparing their invention to a bar-code scanner at a grocery store, scientists at the Johns Hopkins Oncology Center have developed a new method to rapidly detect genes and measure their activity in cells.The technology -- which melds new computer software, new techniques and equipment already found in advanced laboratories -- can scan about 1,000 genes in a few hours, gathering information that might otherwise take years to collect.Dr. Kenneth W. Kinzler, an oncologist who co-directed the project, said the technology is a research tool that should give scientists a sophisticated view of how genes interact in cells to cause and fight disease -- or create specialized organs and tissues.

Strange as it may sound, only a few years ago Marylanders were heatedly debating whether to ban drivers from text-messaging on their cell phones while behind the wheel. The dangers of "distracted driving" were an illusion, opponents claimed, manufactured by a nanny-state government to justify unwarranted intrusions on personal liberty. Never mind that texting while driving was already known to cause thousands of traffic fatalities nationally every year, or that researchers had found that texting drivers' ability to concentrate on the road was about the same as if they had imbibed four or five drinks.

Much has been written and discussed recently about Henrietta Lacks, the African-American woman from Baltimore whose cancer cells, collected for research 60 years ago -- as she was being treated for the cervical cancer that took her life --inexplicably but astoundingly grew in the laboratory without end. The cells, named HeLa, have contributed to cancer therapies, the polio vaccine and a myriad of other biomedical advances. Sadly, in 1951, tissue from patients destined exclusively for biomedical research -- and not, for example, to diagnose or treat disease -- was commonly taken without their consent, stored and used by scientists.

Doctors and researchers involved in embryonic-stem-cell experiments in Maryland and nationwide fear that potentially life-saving discoveries are being jeopardized by a judge who has blocked federal funding for such research. Grants from a state fund for stem-cell research are not affected, but federal research funds that flow to institutions such as the University of Maryland and the Johns Hopkins University would be cut off. That could affect a $500,000 experiment conducted by researchers in labs at both universities.

Aging baby boomers are increasingly turning to testosterone prescriptions in a bid to stay healthy and boost their vitality. But the therapy has some health risks for men. Recently, scientists at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health have been exploring how stem cells can be used to regenerate testosterone in aging men, without their having to resort to testosterone injections. "We're trying to understand whether you can prevent [diminishing testosterone], whether you can reverse that," said Dr. Barry Zirkin, a Hopkins researchers who has co-developed a new way to activate stem cells in the testes that, in turn, form the cells that produce testosterone.

With the financial backing of the Vatican, University of Maryland researchers will lead an international group of scientists to study adult stem cells from the intestines with the hope of discovering treatments for diseases while bypassing the ethical debates that have embroiled such research for a decade. The partnership, known as the International Intestinal Stem Cell Consortium, brings together researchers from the Center for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine at the University of Maryland; the University of Salerno, Bambino Gesu — an Italian children's hospital; and the Istituto Superiore di Sanita — the Italian equivalent of the National Institutes of Health.

Scientists in the U.S. and Japan have converted human skin cells into stem cells like the ones found in embryos, a breakthrough that could yield regenerative therapies without igniting the ethical debates that have embroiled the field for nearly a decade. Yesterday's announcements raise the possibility that cells taken from sick patients could be reprogrammed and used to repair tissues damaged by heart disease, diabetes and other illnesses. The technique, achieved earlier this year in mice, holds two potential advantages.

What's all the excitement about biotechnology? It is about being able to manipulate the cellular machinery of life to create products of value: pharmaceuticals and diagnostics.Until the mid-1970s, this cellular machinery, which works the same way for all living things, was really a black box. It didn't lend itself to manipulation.If you think of the human being as a computer, the extremely long molecule called DNA that is contained in every one of our cells is like the software system. It works like a hard disk on a computer, and it contains all the information that your body will ever use in its lifetime.

Nicki Minaj wanted a cell phone case that matched her larger-than-life look - something cartoonish, with bright colors. So last year, the pop star turned to Tristan Herbert, a 23-year-old Parkville artist who makes custom covers for iPhones and Androids. Herbert spent 11 hours designing a case with a drawing of Minaj sporting long blonde hair, big hoop earrings, a belly shirt and blazer. The words "Pink Friday," the title of Minaj's first album, run alongside, and the background is, of course, pink.

Maryland's Fire Marshall has banned sky lanterns, the increasingly popular paper balloons that are sent aloft by the heat of a candle or fuel cell suspended from the bottom. "They're made with oiled rice paper and bamboo - it's almost kindling," said Deputy State Fire Marshal Bruce D. Bouch. "They have to land somewhere, and sometimes they're still partly on fire when they hit the ground. They've been known to ignite dry vegetation. " Bouch said the fire marshal's office frequently gets calls from people interested in using sky lanterns in weddings or other celebrations who want to know if they are legal in Maryland.

The chairman of the House subcommittee that oversees traffic laws will announce Tuesday that he will introduce legislation that would allow police to pull over a driver using a hand-held cell phone even if the motorist is not committing another offense. Del. James E. Malone Jr., a Baltimore County Democrat, said Monday that he plans to renew his effort to treat driving while talking on a hand-held phone the same as driving while texting. Texting while behind the wheel is considered a primary offense, allowing an officer to stop a motorist for that alone.

At Harford Friends School, an unusual field trip for middle school resulted from an equally unusual assignment for Cheryl Foley's science class: reading and discussing "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. " Eighth-graders from Harford Friends School recently toured the original lab at Johns Hopkins, where the HeLa cells were discovered. A HeLa cell is a cell type in an immortal cell line used in scientific research. Although many groups tour the facility every day, this group of middle schoolers was one of the youngest ever to be received by researchers.

Even as they celebrate clearing a legal hurdle, worries of stem cell research grant money evaporating constantly weigh on scientists like Dr. Ted Dawson, whose projects at Johns Hopkins Hospital have helped inform treatment of neurological diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. A three-year court battle by two researchers to stop stem cell research using human embryos ended Monday when the Supreme Court declined to review the case. Scientists like Dawson say that frees up grant opportunities and are relieved — for now. "It takes some of the uncertainty out," Dawson said.

Scientists who study sleep understand that light has a dark side, because it can interrupt natural rhythms, causing the mood and learning problems that go with lack of rest. Johns Hopkins University researchers have taken the understanding a step further and to a cellular level, finding that exposure to bright light at night appears to create these problems by itself, even apart from sleep patterns. Since the research was published online weeks ago in the journal Nature, biology professor Samer Hattar, who led the research team, has been much in demand as a speaker.

Scientists at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine have observed that abnormally high levels of aluminum produce toxic changes in animal brain cells -- changes that may suggest a link between the metal and human diseases of the brain, such as Alzheimer's.But Dr. Harvey Singer, a Hopkins neurologist, said yesterday that the experiment doesn't answer long-festering suspicions that aluminum causes Alzheimer's and a host of other brain disorders. Further research, he said, is needed before consumers should consider discarding their aluminum pots and pans.

Sunday night's WWE Hell in a Cell had been one of the most talked about pay-per-views in recent memory. Not all the talk was good, as many expected this show to completely bomb. I fell somewhere in the middle. I didn't expect an atrocity, but I didn't expect a show of the year contender. What WWE treated fans to was a pleasant surprise. A new World Heavyweight Champion was crowned, and a number of other stories were further developed through the night. Overall, this was more of a transition show than anything else, but it still delivered in the ring and came out of nowhere as a show that will certainly be talked about even more in the future.

Hell in a Cell is one of WWE's most prolific matches. In the past, it has been used as a capstone to end bitter rivalries. But, in recent years, it's become a standalone pay-per-view, an annual tradition. This year, the cell won't be used to settle a long-standing score, but rather to test an up-and-coming star against the WWE Champion clamoring for respect and a modern-day record title reign. Five of the six championships in WWE are scheduled to be defended, adding another layer of intrigue to Sunday's show, as it's rare that almost all the titles are defended on one pay-per-view.