Author Archives: sj397

About sj397

https://courses2.cit.cornell.edu/GERSTChecklists/Portfolio1Result.php/?id=sj397

Harnessing the Body’s Potential

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Last week I attended the table talk about immunotherapy. During this talk I was able to learn about this interesting type of treatment that seeks to induce, enhance, or suppress or the body’s own immune response to fight diseases it sometimes gets tricked by. One very popular disease researchers want to implement this form of treatment is for cancer. Because there are numerous types of cancers, which also vary person to person, creating a common treatment for all cancers is not likely, but it has been implemented for the treatment of some cancers, including lung cancer, leukemia, and melanoma.

Immunotherapy, or biologic therapy, uses substances made by the body or in a lab to reinforce the patients own immune response. Immunotherapy can help the body slow or stop the growth of tumors, and even make it better at getting rid of cancerous cells.

Cancer affects a great many people, and it is always interesting to see how the treatment for this disease is changing due to all innovations in the field. Immunotherapy is a growing solution for treatment, because it utilizes the body’s own immune system in fighting disease, which causes fewer negative consequences, unlike with most of the popular treatments, especially chemotherapy. I look forward to watching this treatment increase in effectiveness.

What stays with you

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The Friday Film was Citizen Kane, a discovery of Charles Foster Kane’s life by a reporter determined to find the meaning behind the rich newspaperman’s last word: “rosebud”. Following many leads, he uncovers elements of Kane’s private life, but nothing about the word, “rosebud”. Unfortunately, the reporter never discovers the meaning, the last link was destroyed eventually unnoticed. At the end, the viewers learn that the words implied that despite his success, he still thought about the moment he was taken away from his home as a young child.

This film was set up in an interesting way. It starts with his death, and the viewer is able to learn about Kane’s life as the reporter also learns about his life. This is interesting because the impression that we are left with is similar to the reporter’s, who asks the questions the audience is also wondering about.

Overall, I thought this was an interesting film that, while it built up slowly, went into Kane’s life so throughly. While in the beginning, we see some rosy exterior about some aspect of his life, as the reporters asks questions and follows recommendations to others who know more, he, and the audience, discover that Kane’s life is not at all perfect as it seems. Rather, it contains extra worries people not in Kane’s position would have to consider.

Mistaken Identity

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The film North by Northwest was directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Before Stan Lee was doing cameos in the Marvel Universe films, Alfred Hitchcock was making background appearances in his films. As someone who really enjoys films from this era, I was looking forward to watching this film. I had seen many Hitchcock films, such as Psycho and Dial M for Murder, and I also liked films with the actor Cary Grant, who has also acted in His Girl Friday and Charade(with Audrey Hepburn!!!). I enjoyed watching this film because it had numerous unexpected plot twists that made it super entertaining. Every time you thought the path had smoothened for the main character, another twist would occur. I would definitely recommend this film to other people.

Walking on Sunshine

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When I chose to come to Cornell, I was excited about the prospect of being able to discover a new hiking trail every weekend. Needless to say this did not happen as I was quickly caught up in the stress of college life. This weekend I decided to go for the Cascadilla Gorge Hike. I thought this would be a great opportunity to discover and learn about at least one hiking trail. This was a particularly nice one to learn about because it had so much history intertwined with Cornell’s history. For example, Cascadilla Hall was one of the first buildings to make up Cornell’s Campus. Additionally, the stone that makes up the now-dorm came from the gorge itself. We also learned about some of the geology of the gorge. It is made up many layers of sedimentary, which compressed over hundreds of thousands of years, and now makes up the walls of the gorge. This was a nice change in pace from my usual Saturday morning, which is just doing homework.

Join the Club

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When the leaves began to turn from greens to the oranges and reds, and the weather gets chilly, I know the Apple Harvest Festival is upon us. Although I went last year, I anxiously awaited the weekend where you could go down to Ithaca Commons and be greeted by the large crowds of people lugging around their bags of apples and enjoying the surprising varieties of food that could be made with apple, such as the apple pizza, apple mac n’ cheese and numerous baked goods. If you would prefer to stick to apples in their initial form, there were countless vendors selling many types of apples from the well-known Honeycrisp to those newer club varieties. Cornell’s Society of Horticulture were even offering samples of these club varieties, some lacking names and only having identifiers. Of course with the cold weather, first I started with Hot Spiced Apple Cider. This is one of the main reasons I looked forward to this weekend.

But this year before we went down, Professor Blalock told us about the apple business. As with most things, us humans have found a way to engineer apples so they can have our desired texture and flavor. For example, Honeycrisp, which is now over 20 years old, is adored due to its crunch and sweetness. But for this apple, the procedure was slightly different. One the patent ended, everyone was able to grow Honeycrisps. But nowadays, if there is a patented apple, you have to be part of a specific group of farmers to go it. If you are not part of that group, you will not be able to grow it. I personally disliked this way of managing the patent. While I understand that engineering these apples takes much time and effort, I think it is unfair to exclude the farmers who could benefit by growing this crop. Especially, when the clubs are limited to a certain region. Wouldn’t it be nice for people in regions different than those from the club apple to still be able to also get local fresh club apples?

To Make Us Better

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On Tuesday, I attended the Table Talk about Genetic Engineering. The conversation mostly centered around the idea of Three Parent Babies and Pig Organ Donors. This is a commonly discussed topic lately, due to the rise in the use of these technologies with human applications. Most of the criticism around using this technology leads to ethical questions about how this relatively expensive technology can adversely affect our societal structure and how much should we be able to change the DNA of humans or any animals in general. For example, if people were able to fix the DNA of their children for a fee to prevent any diseases, most people would to ensure their child doesn’t have any unnecessary problems. But because it is a potentially expensive procedure, the lower income families may not be able to afford it and it could lead to a positive feedback loop, where employers would prefer those who went through the procedure because they would be unlikely to get sick or they could have a higher IQ, or whatever else they can change. Then those without the procedure may be forced into the lower paying jobs and that cycle can continue on. The other main ethical concern is with the concept of how much should we be changing our DNA or those of the plants and animals around us? Currently, they have been altering the DNA of pigs to remove genes to make them less susceptible to the animal diseases, allowing for future applications of growing them with human compatible organs for transplants.

Before this talk, I already knew about some Genetic Engineering applications like the ones discussed were happening. I had also read some interesting books, such as “Brave New World” that introduced concepts of how these technologies could affect society. The way I felt about these applications of genetic engineering mirrored what I had felt before. I think it is a great resource to help people and cure terminal illnesses, but it depends on the guidelines they have to adhere and who controls the technology. If guidelines remain lax, there is a lot that could potentially go wrong with who they test this on or how far they take it. Such as, potentially making clones for humans, whose organs they can harvest, should the ‘original’ human need it. Additionally, those who control it have a lot of say in how it affects our society. If it were a not-for-profit group then I hope that they would standardize it so everyone can gain access to it. But a for-profit group may be more interested in income and may make it an elite thing. This could lead to a large gap in the low income and the higher income citizens. Additionally, genetic engineering could also be very helpful to humans. Not only in the way of removing diseases, but it could give us the ability to adapt to different climates or maybe even other planets within a far shorter timeline. Of course, this is far off, as we would first have to determine how different genes interact with others before we could go in and change DNA and we would have to have the technology to aid us in this feat.  Genetic engineering is a fascinating field and it will be interesting to see where it takes us in the future.

16 Years Later…

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I attended the War on Terror Table Talk. Because it was on the 16th anniversary of this tragic event, we started with talking about what we remembered about this day. It was interesting because most of us were 3 or 4 years old, and had no memory of the actual day it occurred, but rather remembered learning about it or noticing something off about the day. For me, I didn’t remember 9/11 nor the first time I heard about it, but I can remember having moments of silence every year in elementary school to remember the event and having conversations in my classes, talking about the Twin Towers and the additional planes that went down.

But 9/11 was not the end, rather it was the beginning of a U.S. policy declaring ‘War on Terror’. This event lead to a sharp increase in military operations, and a month later the first of countless many US troops were sent into Afghanistan to remove the Taliban regime and capture al-Qaeda forces. This also means that the US has been fighting a war in Afghanistan for almost 16 years. Naturally, the discussion shifted to what the US can do to bring back troops from the Middle East. The method I agreed with was training the Afghan troops, so they could be self-sufficient with the US maybe supplying weapons.

This was an interesting conversation that allowed us to explore a important but uncommon topic. Even though we are still fighting a war in Afghanistan, the coverage about it has decreased. So this table talk gave us the opportunity to share our views about this.

A Sweet Adventure

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Around for almost 45 years, Ithaca’s Farmers Market has made for a wonderful place to have brunch, or just stop by and discover local treats. A fairly busy place, it was easy to see why so many people came to experience it. There were many places with fresh food cooked in front of you. Such as the oven baked pizzas – yes, they brought a stone oven – and the crepes, which I had and they were amazing. There were vendors selling breads, cheeses, soaps, and maple and honey products. The honey vendor that I went to had multiple types of honey you could try; I tried Wildflower and Strawberry, both of which were delicious. I could even make out the undertones, the flavors matching the type of the honey. I also saw a vendor selling colorful yellow and pink mushrooms. With all the vendors, it was easy to get caught up in all the wonderful products; I ended up buying maple candy and a loaf of focaccia bread, which was so good I finished in about 2 hours. Not only was this a fun event, but I got to try a lot of yummy foods and buy a few items to take back and share with friends. I would definitely recommend that you go to the farmers market at least once… although it may not be your last time. I have a pretty good idea where I will be spending my Saturday mornings from now on.