Rice Catalyst Discoveries

Aryabhata, born in 476 CE in India, was an eminent mathematician and astronomer. Given that he lived roughly 1500 years ago, not too much is known about the specifics of his life. In fact, even though he is responsible for a few astronomy and mathematics texts, only one text of his survives to this day: the Aryabhatiya. From that work alone, we can appreciate what Aryabhata has contributed to science. The Aryabhatiya is written in verses of Sanskrit, which makes the text beautiful in terms of wording as well the content that he addresses.

The numeral system used today (the Indian/Arabic numeral system) had not yet been developed in his time, so Aryabhata used letters in place of numbers. Although the concept of zero had not yet been formalized yet, Aryabhata was aware of its existence and had a placeholder for it, which was impressive for the time. Notably, he also devised what was, at the time, the most accurate approximation of π, 62832/20000, which resulted in a value of 3.1416. This practical approximation proved very close to the true value of 3.1415926. Aryabhata provided his own solutions to equations of certain forms, accompanied by general instruction in algebra and trigonometry. In his Aryabhatiya, he also gave a chart of sine values, the earliest surviving instance of its kind.

On the astronomy front, Aryabhata realized that the Earth was spherical in shape and calculated that the Earth had a circumference of 24,835 miles, an approximation that is remarkably close to the true value of 24,902 miles! Aryabhata had devised this nearly 1000 years before Columbus, who was expecting to see Asia, set sail west from Europe, owing to his much poorer understanding of the Earth’s circumference and overall size. He also correctly deduced how solar and lunar eclipses occurred, despite subscribing to an Earth-centric model of the universe. When Aryabhata died in 550 CE, he had greatly enriched the scientific world with his discoveries, although his work may not have been appreciated until centuries later when Arab scholars translated his work. His work eventually made its way into Latin and reached a European and Arab audience. Aryabhata’s Aryabhatiya represents a fruitful synthesis of art and science that is not often seen in today’s world, and that unique feature makes the Aryabhatiya stand out from other scientific works in history.

Vijay Venkatesan is a freshman at Baker College at Rice University.

Dr. Mark Post is a professor of vascular physiology at the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands, a professor of tissue engineering at the Technical University Eindhoven, and one of the leading scientists involved in researching artificial meat production techniques.

Dr. Post is not the first person to ever attempt to produce artificial meat. Rather, he is following in the footsteps of Dr. Willem van Eelen, the true pioneer of artificial meat production.

One of the most recent projects undertaken by Dr. Post—discussed shortly in the last installment of this blog—is to create a full and edible burger within a year. A recent article in BBC discusses this project, and in it Dr. Post speaks of the challenges behind the project, as well as the reasons for the effort.

The biggest challenge is producing meat that has the right feel and taste, something that has been eluding scientists such as Dr. van Eelen since 1999. An issue stated by Dr. Post is that it is difficult to control the embryonic stem cells of cows and pigs—much more than those of rats, mice, or even humans. “For some reason, we can’t do it and we don’t know why,” says Post. To deal with this problem, Post suggests using myosatellite cells that can be taken from grown animals without killing them. The benefit of these cells is that they are “one way” cells, and can only turn into muscle cells. Also, these cells have an “innate tendency to organize into muscle fibers.”

The second issue is exercising the meat to achieve proper texture and tenderness. For this, Dr. Post plans to also rely on the traits of myosatellite cells—in this case their innate tendency to exercise themselves and contract when given rough surfaces (such as Velcro) in the Petri dish to grab onto.

Finally, the current problem to address is getting oxygen and nutrients to the cells in the center of the meat. For this, Dr. Post plans to develop an intricate meshwork in order to transport nutrients and oxygen to all parts of the meat.

Dr. Post has many reasons for putting so much effort into this project, but his main reasoning is the issue of the carbon footprint of current meat farming methods. Contemporary meat farming methods produce 18% of all man-made greenhouse gas emissions—even “greater than emissions due to transports.” Further, the UN predicts that the problem will only get worse, with the demand for meat projected to double by 2050. In contrast to these issues, artificial meat production would focus more energy on cell growth, rather than other mammalian functions. This would result in more efficient cell growth, and therefore a lower carbon footprint. Along with this practical reason for producing more sustainably grown meat, Dr. Post cites a more moral reason for producing meat artificially. In a recent interview, Post expressed that: “I think everybody knows subconsciously that the way we produce meat is not sustainable and isn’t friendly to animals.” With his most recent project, perhaps he will get closer to achieving his goal, and lead the world towards a more moral and sustainable form of meat production.

Andrew Stout is a freshman at Baker College at Rice University.

Memories are the epitome of our everyday life. No one could even imagine what life would be like without our memory. Even imagination requires some use of our memories. Since we rely on memory so greatly, the main question is how our memory actually forms. Is it a chemical reaction between proteins, or some occult process yet to be determined?

At the National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan, researchers have determined two genes that allow for memories to form in the brains of fruit flies. Fruit flies are not humans, but knowing their method of memory formation gives valuable clues as to how the human brain functions. It is quite surprising that such simple organisms like a tiny fruit fly can have such complex processes occurring in its teeny tiny brain. The lead researcher, Ann-Shyn Chiang, and his colleagues have located two neurons that allow for the formation of memories and two genes that allow the memories to be sealed forever. Researchers experimented with the fruit flies by shocking the flies when they were attracted or exposed to one kind of odor, and left them alone when another odor was introduced. Even after a day of training, the fruit flies could distinguish which odor was dangerous or safe and would be attracted to the safe one. However if there were some protein inhibitor given to them, they lost this memory forming ability. In order to figure out which proteins and neurons are aiding in memory formation, researchers used a protein inhibitor that was sensitive to temperature. Using this toxin, they tried to determine which neurons were the centers for memories. They found that the neurons discovered were not the ones that they had expected for a long time to be memory formation centers: mushroom body neurons. Instead, when the toxin inhibited the Dorsal Anterior Lateral Neurons, the flies could not form memories.

This finding is important in the field of neurobiology because eventually, this can help to determine the complex memory formation processes that occur in human brains. This may also be of help in future research about diseases that affect memories, such as Alzheimer’s disease. As Josh Dubnau, fruit fly memory formation researcher, has said, “We first need a model, to know how we go about understanding human memory.”

Mariam Junaid is a freshman at Baker College at Rice University.

Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, born August 26, 1743, was the son of a French lawyer. Lavoisier, like Robert Hooke, had a love for science and the status and wealth necessary to pursue the subject. Although he attained his law degree at age twenty-one, Lavoisier elected to not practice law; instead, he began studying under Parisian scientists for several years. After performing some independent research, Lavoisier was admitted to the Academy of Sciences in Paris. To financially support his scientific pursuits, Lavoisier became affiliated with a French private tax-collecting organization called the Ferme Générale. This group was notorious for abusing the peasants from whom it collected taxes, but Lavoisier performed his duties legally. Unfortunately, his involvement in the Ferme Générale would be his downfall.

In 1771, Lavoiser married Marie-Anne Paulze, who would go on to greatly assist Lavoisier by translating works between English and French and helping him illustrate his experiments. Lavoisier’s breakthrough came in 1775 when he acquired a government position  that allowed him a greatly improved laboratory facility in Paris. He began performing important work, attracting many people who wished to be involved with his experiments and ideas. While studying in Paris, Lavoisier established that combustion was caused by a gas in the air that he termed oxygen. His work led him to also name the other element of water, hydrogen. Lavoisier’s combustion theory of oxygen was a dramatic departure from contemporary theory.  Previously, chemists believed that a substance known as ‘phlogiston’ existed inside all combustible materials and was released upon burning. Lavoisier was able to prove the phlogiston theory as false using another of his own concepts, the theory of conservation of mass. To increase his scientific impact, he published a 1789 chemistry textbook, naming twenty-five elements in the process. Outside Lavoisier’s contributions to chemistry, he also contributed to the development of the metric system.

Despite advancing science greatly and trying to effect positive political change, Antoine Lavoisier faced a gruesome fate not befitting such a learned person. Lavoisier’s life ended prematurely due to his involvement with the Ferme Générale; he was guillotined in 1794 during the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror for his participation in the taxation of peasants. Nonetheless, Antoine Lavoisier contributed greatly to the field of chemistry by changing its focus to quantitative observations and elements. The impact of his work is felt by any student of chemistry today.

Vijay Venkatesan is a freshman at Baker College at Rice University.

New studies have found that infants as young as two months old already have some grasp of physics knowledge. This fact may sadden students who struggle in Physics class right now, but they have actually known the basic laws of physics since childhood. The study showed that infants can understand that unsupported objects will fall down, meaning they have an intuitive sense of gravity.

Additionally, infants were able to understand that objects will move if the container they are in moves. They even have some math knowledge; infants were able to demonstrate knowledge of which jar has more liquid (if one is four times the other). By two months of age, infants are able to track a moving ball with their eyes, which was recorded via eye tracking technology. At around five months, they can understand that solids and liquids have different properties. Kristy vanMarle, an assistant professor of Psychology and researcher at the University of Missouri, says it is believed “that infants are born with expectations about the objects around them, even though that knowledge is a skill that’s never been taught.”

Now, this doesn’t mean that we are born with all the knowledge we need. As we get older, we learn more about our natural environment, and that experience adds to the store of knowledge that we had as an infant. As an example, when infants get older, they ask for bigger portions of food. Parents can further help infants learn about the world around them by engaging with them and playing with them. Even simple exercises such as peek-a-boo and allowing babies to examine safe objects by themselves can add to the child’s understanding and create rapid growth. Interaction with adults at this young stage is extremely important for the child to develop and learn beyond his or her instincts. As vanMarle said, “natural interaction with the parent and objects in the world gives the child all the input that evolution has prepared the child to seek, accept and use to develop intuitive physics.”

Mariam Junaid is a freshman at Baker College at Rice University.

Dr. Mark Post—of Maastricht University int he Netherlands—is one of the leading scientists involved in the production of in-vitro meat. He has led many important studies dedicated towards producing commercially viable meat in a lab setting, and according to a recent interview, sees “a hamburger” in the near future, albeit an expensive one—estimated to cost around 300,000 Euro.

One of the biggest hurdles that scientists like Dr. Post have had to overcome is the issue of what cells to use, and how to grow them in order to produce the right texture for the meat. In a 2010 study, Dr. Post and other scientists attempted to find a good way of exercising the muscle cells in order to more appropriately mimic in vivo tissue (as muscle tissue requires regular exercise to avoid cell atrophy). In this study, Dr. Post and his colleagues used myoblast skeletal muscle tissue cells, because embryonic myoblasts are the simplest muscular tissue cells to grow in vitro, and proliferate quickly (Edelman, 2005). Muscle cells were obviously needed to produce the texture of natural meat. Post used a number of instruments design for cell manipulation to physically flex cells in order to “stretch” them about 10% and therefore mimic real life muscle flexion and relaxation. The goals of the study were to observe whether these methods were effective in avoiding cell atrophy and creating legitimate cell “exercise.”

The results of this study showed less than ideal muscle cell proliferation and response to the manipulation, due to the fact that the process inhibited maturation into functional muscle cells. Dr. Post claims that a possible reason for this was that cells eventually adapted to the constant manipulation. To overcome this problem, Dr. Post suggests allowing periods of rest for the cells (much like our muscle cells get when we sleep). While this study might seem as though it had an underwhelming conclusion, it is a valuable step towards tasting that first  burger—something that Post believes to be of the utmost importance. In a recent interview, Post said that “everybody knows subconsciously that the way we produce meat is not sustainable and isn’t friendly to animals.” For this reason, Post has continued working to “turn meat production from a farming process to a factory process”, and hopefully make it much more sustainable (and cheaper) in the process.

Andrew Stout is a freshman at Baker College at Rice University.