The Innocence Project

The innocence project is "national litigation and public policy dedicated to exonerating wrongfully convicted individuals through DNA testing..." On February 15th, 2008, a wrongly accused man named Kennedy Brewer was exonerated making history as the first person to be exonerated based on post-conviction DNA evidence.  Accused of capital murder and sexual battery of his three year-old daughter, Brewer was held in jail for fifteen years, seven of which were spent on death row.  Now, the Innocence Project has exonerated 305 wrongfully convicted men and women, showing our country the faults in our system.
After his biological daughter was found dead in a creek near his house, Brewer was accused, arrested, and sent to jail.  Three years after he was arrested, Brewer's trial began and he was put on death row.  His conviction was based off of invalid evidence that nineteen bite marks along the victim's body mathed Brewer's teeth marks.  In 2001, the analysis of semen collected from the body in 1992 proved Brewer innocent, but he was not immediately released.  The prosecution intended to re-try Brewer for a single charge of capital murder, resulting in brewer being moved from death row to pre-trial detention. With a new prosecutor on the case, Brewer was released in 2007 with a new trial pending.  Before he could be tried, it was discovered that the DNA sample matched a man named Justin Johnson.  Johnson confessed to the crime as well as to a nearly identical crime.  Both of these cases shared the same prosecutor and sheriff.  In both cases, they overlooked the obvious suspect, a registered sex offender who resided nearby and instead convicted an innocent man.  On February 15th 2008, Brewer was exonerated, proven innocent.
I truly believe and strongly support the concept of the Innocence Project and after reading many stories about wrongly convicted men and women, I am shocked to hear about the faults in our system.  It is shocking to learn about the lies that are told in the courtroom and it's hard to understand how a jury can base their verdict off untruthful evidence.  Overall, I am very grateful that our country has an organization like the Innocence Project and that it works so effectively to exonerate innocent people.

A Test For Parkinson's With A Phone Call

Affecting about 6.3 million people worldwide, Parkinson's disease causes tremors, incurable weakness, and muscular rigidity.  With no simple, quick, or objective strategy to detect Parkinson's disease early on, Parkinson's is truly incurable.  Max Little believes that the answer to this problem has been in front of us the whole time; he believes Parkinson's disease can be tracked through your voice patterns.

Currently, in order to get a check-up for Parkinson's a patient must go to the doctor's office to receive a lengthy neurological exam.  Max Little offers an alternative option.  Max Little's project researches the possibility that personal progress with Parkinson's disease can be monitored through voice patterns.  Currently, Max Little's cooperation is building a database of voice samples.  When a person calls, they are asked whether or not they have Parkinson's disease, then are asked to say a few sentences. Eventually, when the database of voice recording have been completely built up, patients with Parkinson's desease can call, record their voice, and receive an update on their progress with Parkinson's.  Then, this information can be sent to their doctor's office to analyze the patient's progress and adjust treatment from there.

At first, I had a very hard difficult time understanding this idea.  Event though I understand how this process is supposed to work, I found it somewhat difficult to believe.  I think that because I'm not extremely familiar with the symptoms of Parkinson's disease I had a hard time understanding how voice patterns can indicate the stage of Parkinson's disease.  After I figured out and accepted this concept, I was very impressed with this concept and experiment.  This concept can possibly hold the key to an effective and easy way to track Parkinson's disease and may eventually help doctors cure this awful disease.

"Forks Over Knives"

            We recently watched a documentary called “Forks Over Knives”, which presented views about  obesity and the downward spiral of diets in America. Living in Colorado, one of the skinniest states in America, I’m somewhat blind to the presence of obesity in America.  In America, one person dies every minute of heart disease and one in three Americans will be diagnosed with diabetes at some point in their life.  One in five four year olds today are considered obese and the average American now carries 23 extra pounds.

            This documentary approached the issue of obesity by proposing a plant-based diet that eliminates meat and dairy products.  Through studies, this diet theoretically helped to drop peoples weight, cholesterol levels, and other significant medical measurements.  It proposed that the protein from animal products is harmful and can stimulate the growth of cancer cells.  A few doctors in this film went as far as to say that eating a plant-based diet can reverse the growth of cancer cells without the assistance of any medicine.

            Although this documentary looked and felt reliable, I am having a difficult time believing all of the information that was presented to me.  I found it very difficult to believe that eating a plant-based diet could “reverse” cancer or even the symptoms of cancer.  Cancer is a complex and problematic disease that has been taking over our world.  It has sent our doctors into a never-ending race to find the cure to this hostile disease.  Could the answer have been in front of them the whole time?  I think that although a plant-based diet may help cancer patients feel better and maybe numb their symptoms, it can’t cure the actual disease.  This is just one example of how this movie manipulated words to persuade people to agree with their views.  I think that when watching a movie like this, it is very important to think about the validity of the information they are giving you.

Lucy The Chimpanzee

     In 1964, a chimpanzee named Lucy was born.  With her birth came a remarkable study of chimpanzees' brain capacity, behavior, and language capabilities.
     Two days after Lucy was born, Maurice and Jane Temerlin took Lucy from her parents.  For the next ten years, Lucy was raised as a human being.  She used the toilet, slept in a bed, wore clothes, and even served tea for guests. When she was four, Lucy began taking lessons to learn sign language.  Through sign language, she learned to communicate with her parents and other people who would come to visit her.  Lucy also developed emotions. She comforted her mother when she was sad and helped her when she was sick.
     The fantasy could not last forever.  Lucy began to get very aggressive, virtually tearing the Temerlin's house to shreds.  In result of Lucy's violent actions, Maurice and Jane were forced to make a very difficult decision: what should they do with Lucy?  Eventually, Lucy was taken to a nature reserve in Gambia.  Lucy's emotional attachment to the Temerlins was evident when she began to lose hair and get skin infections after the Temerlins left her at the nature reserve.  Janis Carter, a psychology graduate student, grew close with Lucy and eventually took Lucy and other emotionally damaged chimpanzees to a deserted island to live their lives independently.  Janis stayed on the island with the chimpanzees for a long period of time, attempting to free Lucy into the wild.  After Lucy successfully released Lucy to the wild, Janis returned to her life.  Year later, when Janis went to check of Lucy, Lucy was missing.  It is thought that Lucy was killed by poachers.
      The story of Lucy the chimpanzee is very touching.  She was a gifted chimpanzee and led the modern world of science to impressive new studies involving chimpanzees and language.  Personally, it is very touching to hear such an emotional story.  The idea of someone having a chimpanzee in their household that they interact with everyday is very abstract.

Bio-Technology!

     This is my first post on my new Biology Blog!  My name is Sarah and I am a Sophomore at Animas High School in Durango, Colorado. The website for my school animashighschool.org I love to play volleyball, do gymnastics, play the piano, and do photography.
     This blog is for my Biology class.  My teacher is Colleen Dunning. Her Digital Portfolio is http://cdunning.wix.com/biology#! This blog will be used all year for posting about what we learn in class! This blog will also be used at exhibitions in order to assist us in showing off our work!
     I will be blogging about many things this year.  Not only will I be blogging about what I have learned, but I will also be blogging some of the assignments that I have completed and upcoming events!