A Microbiologist Evaluates Dr. Greer’s Messages

Evaluating Dr. Greer’s Messages

By Guest Blogger,

Tyler A. Kokjohn, Ph.D.

Anencephalic Human Fetus (courtesy Dr. Ed Uthman, MD)

Getting too far ahead of the data may be risky and few situations illustrate that better than the Atacama humanoid story presented by Dr. Steven Greer.  Despite the obviously strange appearance of the remains, recently released laboratory test results do not support an extraterrestrial origin for the entity (1, 2).  A preliminary analysis of mitochondrial (mt) DNA sequences has revealed although the entity is not a New World primate, it shares genetic kinship with people indigenous to the area in which the tiny body was recovered (2, 3).Notwithstanding the awkward discord between his initial assertions regarding the origins of the remains and the actual lab results, Dr. Greer continues to hatch still more factually unsupported speculations regarding extraterrestrial connections (3).

Judging ‘Preliminary’ Results

The report issued by Dr. Garry Nolan of Stanford University (2) makes clear his assessments are ‘preliminary,’ meaning conclusions based on the DNA sequences and other evidence should not be considered definitive.  Before the Atacama humanoid research can be published in a peer reviewed scientific journal a great deal more work will be required.  Dr. Nolan is clearly a competent researcher who has been able to complete investigations and publish quality data in respected journals.  However, no primary sequence data from the Atacama entity have been provided for inspection.  Until that happens, I will afford Dr, Nolan exactly the same latitude I give all my colleagues; unless the full data appear in a peer-reviewed journal, the information and interpretations, although interesting, cannot be deemed to represent reliable scientific fact.

Although the preliminary evidence argues against an extraterrestrial origin, discovery of a 6-inch tall human would still be extraordinary.  However, at this stage the notion that the data reveal the entity is not the vanguard of a new race of humans, but a stillborn fetus is also equally valid.  In that case, finding that the entity did not possess any mutations for dwarfism or skeletal abnormalities would be the predicted outcome.  The entity is tiny not as a consequence of unusual mutations, but because it never completed prenatal development.  Unfortunately, the sequence analyses are incomplete and interpretative statements regarding this point flatly contradictory with independent expert Dr. Ralph Lachman estimating on the basis of bone growth patterns the entity was 6-8 years old at the time of death (1, 2, 3).  Reaching any firm, scientifically justified conclusions will clearly take more time and additional work.

Alternative Investigatory Approaches

DNA sequence analysis is powerful, but the information it can reveal does have some limitations.  Fortunately, there may be alternative ways to establish the age of the entity at death.  The investigators have been provided a huge windfall in that the entity also seems to possess substantial amounts of preserved soft tissues.  That potentially provides an internal check of the DNA sequences as well as the chance to have a glimpse at some of the genes that were actually active when the entity died.  The type of hemoglobin present in human blood cells changes predictably with development before and after birth.  Two forms of hemoglobin, HbE (embryonic) and HbF (fetal) are found during development in utero.  These immature forms of hemoglobin have higher affinity for oxygen than the adult form, enabling the baby to ensure adequate levels of perfusion during development.  A stillborn human fetus with skeletal development comparable to the entity would harbor hemoglobin F (fetal) proteins and that hypothesis could be subjected to a direct test.  Finding a high level of HbF would strongly suggest the entity did not leave the uterus alive, or, if it was living at birth, did not survive long.  Examination of the genome alone would not reveal this situation as all forms of the hemoglobin gene (E, F, A, A₂) will be present in the nuclear DNA whether or not they were expressed at the moment of death.

If the entity lived 6-8 years, it is also possible careful forensic examination of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract contents might reveal what, if any, food stuffs were in the gut at the moment of death.  If the entity was still born, the GI tract would have contained little external matter.  In addition, a forensic examiner might be able to note putrefaction of the gut tissues suggesting a decomposition process beginning from within and indicative of a GI tract heavily colonized by microbes as expected for an entity that had lived independently outside its mother.

Questions Concerning Provenance

The details concerning where, when and who discovered the Atacama entity (4) will probably need to be clarified explicitly if the data are to be published in a peer reviewed journal.  Not only will they provide scientifically important evidence regarding the nature of the entity, the preliminary data strongly suggest the remains are human.  That means the investigators may need to certify they have followed all rules and regulations regarding the acquisition, import and disposition of human remains.

Larger Issues

Dr. Greer has now demonstrated that he can establish productive liaisons with respected mainstream academic scientists.  To push a slow moving effort forward perhaps he will now emulate the outreach effort he made to get expert help with his investigation of Ata.  Recruiting recognized authorities to vet the concepts for the clean ET energy technologies he says will free us from fossil fuel and nuclear power dependence would quickly bolster his credibility.

A search of the US Patent and Trademark Office database failed to reveal any clean energy patents held by Dr. Greer.  If he had the foresight to apply for patent protection for the information he possesses and awards have been granted, that would constitute both documentation and validation of the ideas as an independent patent examiner agreed the invention disclosures passed criteria of novelty and utility.  If his applications were rejected on a grounds of infringement of existing patents, that might help expose an alleged conspiracy by revealing the specific technologies, their disposition and entities controlling their application or suppressing their use.  If no applications have been submitted, that would present a literally golden opportunity to seek motivated collaborators by offering to share a portion of the potentially lucrative future royalties.  If Dr. Greer’s clean energy claims are factual he should have no trouble getting expert help getting them documented and reduced to practice quickly.

Dr. Greer has a most unusual problem for a ufologist, all his hypotheses regarding the origin of Ata can be tested directly in a properly controlled fashion.  The remains have yielded high quality DNA meaning a complete, high coverage genomic sequence will be available and many unadulterated complete human genomes are now available for direct comparisons.

If the investigators ultimately claim discovery of a novel Lilliputian race of humans, the burden of proof will be a heavy one demanding meticulous documentation, unimpeachable data and publication in the peer reviewed scientific literature.  And there is more.  The famous Carl Sagan quip about the evidence necessary to prove extraordinary claims has an important corollary; paradigm-busting pronouncements will generate intense, perhaps hostile, scrutiny.  As the recent announcement of faster-than-light neutrinos and a swift flurry of responses discrediting the finding revealed (5), such inspection may expose even the most subtle experimental artifacts and interpretation errors.  Granted wide latitude for a preliminary report, a scientist’s reputation is at stake with a submission to a peer reviewed journal.  It will be interesting to see the nature of the final conclusions regarding the Atacama entity, how they are presented to the scientific community and whether all parties to the collaboration ultimately endorse them.

The scientific evidence may only be preliminary, but considered in the context of prior accomplishments and the complete lack of substantiation provided in his latest efforts, I suggest it possible to reach a reasonable conclusion regarding the astonishing serial claims of Dr. Greer.  Caveat emptor.

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1. Lee Speigel, ‘Sirius’ Documentary Reveals DNA Test Results on Ata, the ‘6-inch Alien, 23 April 2013 (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/23/sirius-documentary-dna-re_n_3135628.html)

2. Dr. Garry Nolan, Chile Specimen Report and Summary, (http://siriusdisclosure.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Chile-Specimen_GPN-Summary.pdf).

3. Steven M. Greer, Stanford University Research: Atacama Humanoid Still a Mystery, 22 April 2013 (http://siriusdisclosure.com/evidence/atacama-humanoid/).

4. Lee Speigel, Steven Greer ‘Sirius’ Documentary to Unveil Pictures of Alleged Tiny Space Alien (PHOTOS), 16 April 2013 (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/16/tiny-chile-alien-backgrou_n_3071767.html?utm_hp_ref=weird-  news)

5. Adrian Cho, Once Again, Physicists Debunk Faster-Than-Light Neutrinos, 8 June 2012 (http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2012/06/once-again-physicists-debunk.html)

Winning the war against new age crystal hugging hippies

Winning the war against new age crystal hugging hippies.

Alzheimer’s Disease: Eat More Reality

There’s been a lot of talk around the health food store lately about coconuts being a miracle cure for Alzheimer’s disease and tofu causing it. Being that I have the good fortune of friendship with one of the few doctors who is actually working to cure the disease, I asked him to write an article for JayVay.com that would put the rumors to rest and tell us where the science is in terms of prevention. He answered the call and here it is. Thanks again, Tyler.  – Jeremy Vaeni

Alzheimer’s Disease:

Eat More Reality

by,

Tyler A. Kokjohn

There is no cure for Alzheimer’s disease (AD).  Worse, we have no reason to expect one to be forthcoming any time soon.  Why is it so hard to do anything about this terrible condition?  One problem is that we still cannot identify a specific cause for AD dementia.  The brains of AD patients are often loaded with amyloid deposits, aggregates of small, toxic proteins and other molecules.  The ‘amyloid hypothesis’ posits that the neurodegeneration and dementia of AD are due to these deposits and a lot of effort has been expended trying to eliminate them.  However, AD dementia may represent the culmination of a long process involving far more than just simple amyloid accumulation.  Controlling dementia may require something more than the typical ‘one target, one pill’ mentality that dominates pharmaceutical research at the moment.  All this tells us is that we should be quite concerned about preventing AD in the first place.

Most neuroscientists agree that AD development risk depends on genetics, environment and behavior; in other words, literally everything.  The most significant AD risk factor by far is advanced age.  Simply live long enough and the odds for getting demented increase dramatically.  The emerging epidemic of AD is thought to reflect the fact that more people now survive to old age coupled with complicating factors like diets rich in saturated fats and sedentary lifestyles.  In principle, these facts suggest that lifestyle modifications might help delay the onset of dementia or allow some individuals to avoid it altogether.

The really bad news is that the underlying complexity of AD frustrates prevention efforts as well.  Another way to put this is that it is difficult or impossible to correct a problem when you are uncertain about precisely what it is that has gone wrong in the first place.  A number of dietary supplements such as curcumin have been suggested on the basis of convincing laboratory tests which revealed they might decrease production of amyloid.  That is a great idea, but what if amyloid is not the primary culprit in dementia?  Or what if amyloid IS the sole problem?  The evidence suggests that amyloid deposits accumulate slowly over time, how early does one have to begin dietary supplementation and at what levels to prevent problems?  Disappointing AD immunotherapy clinical trials have led many scientists to hypothesize that beginning treatments in patients who show signs of even early dementia are doomed to failure; the pathology is irreversible at that point.  Simple, just get people before they show AD signs.  OK, when?  Five years before, ten years before?  And how do you time something that hasn’t happened yet?  If you start with young people the problem becomes one of waiting for the endpoints of dementia and death which might be decades away.  All you have to do as a scientist is wait and hope that (a), your subjects adhere to the diet and (b), you don’t die before they do.    Now let’s complicate the picture even more; AD dementia might be a bit different in each of us and reflect our personal activity levels, occupations, dietary preferences, education and life history such as head injuries, participation in sports or military service.  Those additional factors make testing nutritional supplements (nutra-ceuticals) for beneficial cognitive effects, a tricky enterprise in itself, a literal nightmare.

Tabulated below are some supplements with alleged utility for coping with or preventing AD dementia.  The bottom line is that a number of compounds and supplements do have a clear biochemical potential to impact processes that might conceivably influence AD dementia.  However, when subjected to rigorous clinical trials, results have often been disappointing and many so-called alternative treatments have not been tested in scientific studies at all.  In addition, the precise purity of many concoctions is uncertain and the producer is allowed to set standards for purity and safety.  Remember, anything you ingest might induce undesirable side effects or interact with other medications in unpredictable ways.  I do not endorse their use nor recommend anyone use them without first consulting with a physician.

Clearly, people will persist in seeking a simple cure for an extremely complex and heterogeneous disease process.  Instead of waiting for a miracle, can anything helpful be done to decrease the chance you will become an AD victim?  One thing that has been noted is that having a healthy heart and vascular system improves the odds of avoiding AD dementia.  Have a look at these arteries from the circle of Willis which feed the brain.

On the left are examples of arteries from a healthy, non-demented patient.  One the right are vessels typical of a person with advanced vascular disease (atherosclerosis) who was demented.  Our work and the work of other labs confirm that the presence of vascular disease is often associated with AD.

This means that until the day when a cure is discovered, personal actions and some standard medical interventions to keep your heart and blood vessels in peak condition – maintaining a healthy weight, controlling diabetes, cholesterol levels and hypertension, not smoking or stopping smoking, eating an anti-oxidant rich diet featuring fresh fruits, vegetables, whole grains and legumes – will greatly improve your odds of avoiding AD dementia.  And do not forget to exercise.  The now all-too-common sedentary lifestyle may be a hugely underappreciated killer.  Save your life – turn off the TV or computer and move. If you just sit there, AD might find you.

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A reliable source of information regarding current Alzheimer’s disease news, research and therapy is the Alzheimer’s Research Forum web site (http://www.alzforum.org/).

Linda Cortile Harbors Immortal Blood Cells? – by Special Guest Blogger Dr. Tyler Kokjohn, Ph.D.

Linda Cortile Harbors Immortal Blood Cells?
Simple Questions With Big Implications

by,
Dr. Tyler Kokjohn, Ph.D.
Professor of Microbiology
Midwestern University

If you could potentially save thousands of human lives with virtually no risk to yourself, would you do it?  Probably most of us would feel a compelling moral duty to act under such circumstances.  If the assertion that Linda Cortile harbors immortal blood cells is true, it is no mere medical curiosity.  This would represent an unparalleled opportunity to improve global human health profoundly.

In humans and other mammals, red blood cells (erythrocytes) lack nuclei and other organelles like mitochondria.  With limited biochemical capacities, human red cells normally have a finite lifetime of around 3-4 months in circulation.  Worn out cells are removed and replaced constantly. If Linda Cortile possesses immortal cells, she would represent something totally new to medicine.

                                         

Sedimented human red blood cells (MDougM)            Frog red blood cells (Luis Fernandez Garcia)

Whether her condition was the result of alien genetic tinkering or completely natural, the implications to medical practice would be immense.  Looking at the proteins and other structures, scientists could determine the specific alterations conferring such amazing resilience to her cells.  In turn, that might make it possible to engineer the production of immortal blood cells on an unlimited basis.

A supply of immortal blood cells could decrease the presently heavy demand for transfusions.  Although life-saving, transfusions carry significant risks and have been integral in spreading infections like hepatitis B and human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) across the globe.  In addition, a major problem of blood banking – the limited lifetime of blood cells in storage – would be solved.  The high costs and efforts associated with the need for constant collection of fresh supplies from donors would be decreased dramatically.

    U. S. Navy Photo by Mass Communications Spec. Don Bray

But would cells tough enough to be immortal also resist other threats like malaria in which parasites invade and multiply within erythrocytes?  The Centers for Disease Control estimates that over 300 million cases of malaria occur each year resulting in more than one million deaths.  Perhaps other infectious disease agents that attack red cells to access their iron stores and other nutrients would be inhibited as well. If pathogen resistant, immortal blood cell supplies could be developed, the direct benefits to human health would be hard to quantify.

    Malaria falciparum inside red cells (Michael Zahniser) 

Have immortal cells been seen before?  Some cell lines with alterations associated with cancer seem to have an apparently unlimited capacity to divide and grow.  One of the more famous cell lines utilized in research is designated ‘HeLa’ denoting its original source as a cervical cancer explant taken from patient Henrietta Lacks over sixty years ago.  Ms. Lacks is deceased, but the HeLa cell line lives on.  Another interesting case is the ‘Mo’ cell line derived from samples obtained from a patient (the late John Moore) with hairy cell leukemia.  The Mo cell line turned out to be quite valuable and launched a legal battle with far-reaching implications.

Does Ms. Cortile harbor immortal blood cells?  In one sense, that is impossible to prove definitively because such things would outlive any of us.  But, if she has cells that are analogous to the HeLa line, for all practical purposes we could consider them immortal.  Blood testing is safe and routine, and it would seem a straightforward matter to determine if her cells can be stored for long periods without degradation or possess other biophysical deviations compared to the normal red cells of humans.  Whether or not one feels a demonstration of quasi-immortal cells supports her alien abduction claims, the implications for human health and well-being seem to warrant the effort.  It is hard to imagine that someone has not already attempted to verify this remarkable and long-standing assertion.  Perhaps an attendee at a future seminar featuring Ms. Cortile will be kind enough to ask a question or two for me regarding where the matter stands.