KoAP Biology Summer Assignment: Survival of the Sickest Questions
1. Life is more abundant in the North Atlantic than in the Pacific because the ocean area of the North Atlantic is directly in the path of iron-rich dust from the Sahara Desert, which leads to the development of bigger communities of phytoplankton, and in turn plankton, and so on. This fact is related to global warming because someone thought of an idea to fight global warming by putting huge amounts of iron solution into the ocean so that extreme plant growth would occur and these plants would remove enough carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere to counter the negative effects of humans.
2. During Passover, Jews rid their homes of all traces of leavened bread and other grains. This decreased their exposure to rats searching for food, and since rats were carriers of the plague, the Jews’ observance of Passover may have helped protect them from the bubonic plague.
3. Phlebotomy may assist in conquering an infection because bleeding induces the release of a specific hormone in humans that reduces their fevers and causes the immune system to increase its level of activity. Since the immune system is responsible for fighting infections, kicking the immune system into high gear would help rid the body of infection.
4. Although iron is a critical nutrient, and can be beneficial to your body, too much iron can allow infections to develop quicker. When Dr. Weinberg tested tetracycline by adding a bit of it to Petri dishes with bacteria and various other nutrients, Dr. Weinberg concluded that the dish that contained iron, even though the antibiotic was present, fostered an extreme amount of development of bacteria. The control variable in this experiment would be just the ...
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...ct that humans do not have fur, unlike other primates, as the fur would have made underwater motion highly inconvenient.
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30. One idea that I have came away with after reading Survival of the Sickest is that evolutionary adaptations are not always perfect for the species; in fact, many times an evolutionary adaptation is a compromise. Furthermore, I have realized that every aspect of humans today is a product of evolution. Hence, every detail of why something in the human body is the way it is can be explained by its value to the species at some point – whether past or present – for survival or increased ability to reproduce. Lastly, the wide, extensive discussion presented in the novel demonstrates to me how important evolution is to biology. In every single idea, theory, or hypothesis explained, evolution connected the concepts together.
One of the largest epidemic events in history, the Bubonic Plague had a devastating effect on European society. It is believed to have begun in China, and it reached European soil in 1347, when it struck Constantinople (Document 1). It was carried by infected fleas that spread the disease between humans and rats. A symptom of the plague was the development of large, dark swellings called “buboes” on the victim’s lymph nodes. By the time the plague left, Europe’s population had been reduced by almost half. The devastation as a result of the plague may seem shocking, but there were several important factors that contributed to its deadliness.
A law was made, saying that once someone was ill with the plague they were to stay in their house. Anyone who happened to live in the same house as the unfortunate soul was also locked in, with fear that they could spread the disease. Beggars were not allowed to wonder the streets at anytime, and were executed immediately for doing so without a given reason. All of these, although sensible ideas (apart from the execution..) would not contribute towards public health, as the disease was not contagious in the human community. It was in fact passed on from fleas living on black rats, but this knowledge had not yet been developed.
At this time however, cold weather and rains wiped out many crops creating a shortage of food for humans. Rats also went through this shortage in food. This made them “crowd in cities, providing an optimal environment for disease”(Karin Lehnardt in 41 Catastrophic Facts about the Black Death). Before the black death spread through Europe, sanitation wasn’t very good. Living conditions were bad so when the black death came to Europe, it spread more rapidly because people were not clean and healthy. Another reason the plague spread so fast was because the dead “bodies were piled up inside and outside city walls where they lay until mass graves could be dug”(Karin Lehnardt in 41 Catastrophic Facts about the Black Death). This made the air very polluted and contributed the spread of the epidemic. In total, the black death killed about thirty million people. This was about one-third the population of Europe. Some towns were completely wiped out. Because of this, medieval people thought everyone would eventually die, although we now know that some populations did survive. Also, because people were not being saved by the church, their beliefs were questioned. Less people dedicated their lives to the church because of this. Both the poor and the rich died but more than one-half the people dead were poor. This was also a result of poor sanitation and living conditions. The Black Death initiated in China in the early 1340’s
Hamilton, V. P. (2015). Plagues, Passover, and the Exodus. In Handbook on the Pentateuch (2nd ed., pp. 157-176). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic.
Red crosses were often painted on doors to let anybody who may pass by to be wary of the plague for those with the crosses had been stricken by the plague. Each night, people would collect the bodies that had fallen to Black Death and disposed of the bodies in mass graves. They would often burn and do as much as they possibly could to prevent further outbreak of the disease.
From 1347 to 1350, the Black Death hit Northern Europe. Although, this was not the first time this type of disease was record. The plague was documented to have affected North Africa and the Middle East during the Classical Time. There are several speculations that this certain type of virus had been the cause of other epidemics, such “the pestilence described as striking the Philistines in the biblical book of 1 Samuel” (plague 9) although this is not verified. When it hit Europe in the 14th century, the main cause was black rats and fleas that carried the virus, as well as the disease being spread by poor sanitary. During this time period, about “one-fourth to one-third of the total population of Europe, or 25 million persons” (plague 10) died. The infected black rats were believed to have been carried over by Central Asian trade routes, fleas are believed to have become infected by biting an already infected rat. How a person would get infected was in two ways; either, normally one was bitten by a tainted flea or rat and unfortunately, the virus could live in the host indefinitely. Once a person became infected, it wouldn’t take too long for those around them to also become infected. Not only was the plague spread by rats and fleas, but the disease was insa...
Even with the grueling pain that the dark swells and the large tumors brought with them, to the Jews, this pain was the not the worst. The Black Plague was a killer disease from 1348-1351 that spread all throughout Europe. At this time, the Jews were despised in their communities because most of them took the occupation of money-lending. This job was considered unholy and the people of Europe looked down upon the Jews because of it. The Black Plague created a more hostile environment for the Jewry of Europe because of the newly founded flagellants, the Jewish ghettos, and the increased attacks on Jews.
Disease is considered an horrid word; by definition it is a disorder within an organism which implies it is unwanted and needs to be fixed. However in, Dr. Sharon Moalem and Jonathan Prince’s book, Survival of the Sickest the authors discuss a topic one does not often hear, the benefits of sickness. Diabetes, hemochromatosis, and sickle cell anemia are just a few problems that in the past helped us survive long enough to reproduce.
Darwin has two theories on the key principles of theory of evolution. One is the natural selection, a species that attains characteristics that are adapted to their environments (Darwin, Charles). The other one is survival of the fittest, which is when an individual best adapts to their environment survive to reproduce, and their genes are passed to later generat...
Anyone with even a moderate background in science has heard of Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution. Since the publishing of his book On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection in 1859, Darwin’s ideas have been debated by everyone from scientists to theologians to ordinary lay-people. Today, though there is still severe opposition, evolution is regarded as fact by most of the scientific community and Darwin’s book remains one of the most influential ever written.
The plague was spread by fleas, which were not effected by the disease. Fleas first infected the rats, which lived off garbage and sewage. The rats then spread the infection to the humans. Rats were a common sight in the cities, due to the poor sanitary conditions, so no one suspected them (www.tartans.com). In the winter the plague seemed to disappear, but only because fleas were dormant then. Each spring, the plague attacked again, killing new victims (www.byu.edu). The effects of the plague were devastating. After just five years, twenty-five million people were dead - one third of Europe's population. Once people were infected they infected others very rapidly. As a result, in order to avoid the disease, many fled to the countryside where the lower population density helped to decrease the speed at which the disease spread (www.tartans.com). From a person's time of infection to his or her death was less than one week (www.home.nycap.rr.com). The plague became known as "The Black Death" because of the discoloration of the skin and black enlarged lymph nodes that appeared on the second day of contracting the disease. The term "The Black Death" was not invented until after 1800. Contemporaries called it "the pestilence" (Cantor 7).
analysis on how the Atlantic became known as the Atlantic because of the presence of
The. The “Challenging Darwin”. Bioscience. 2(2005). The 'Secondary' of the 'S 101, eLibrary.
...f infections acquired during the hospital. Many of these studies have indicated that these infection control interventions will decrease the number of sick or dying patients related to hospital acquired infections and lower the medical cost by decreasing the stay of each patient in the hospital.
The white blood cells destroy any unfamiliar pathogens in the bloodstream and can cause inflammation. Therefore, the inflammation causes a surplus of white blood cells to clot the wound for healing.