Thursday, 9 June 2022

The Mutant Genes in the Early Onset Familial Alzheimer's – Part 2 - Alzheimer's 6

You may read the previous postings (Part 1):

- The Rainbow Before Evening : The Mutant Genes in the Early Onset Familial Alzheimer's – Part 1 - Alzheimer's 6



Image 1- Meme from Google, just for fun

The mutant genes in another autosomal dominant forms of Alzheimer's disease were in:

- chromosome 1
- and chromosome 14.

This mutations lead to abnormal Presenilin 1 and Presenilin 2, which modified amyloid precursor protein so that increase amount of toxic form of Aß peptide.

Presenilins are kind of catalytic protease complexes that directly cleave the amyloid precursor protein.



Image 2- Handmade jar, illustration



Image 3- Here, my fav lady who always make me smile (credit to Google)

A person who carrying Presenilin mutation shown an alteration different of variant of amyloid beta peptides in the cerebrospinal fluid.

Mutation of presenil 1 and presenil 2 modify processing of amyloid precursor protein the increasingly of particular toxic form of Aß peptide.

This mutation suspects a heritable form of Alzheimer's disease.

So, the signs of mutant genes that lead to early onset Alzheimer's disease is prominent amyloid deposit in the brain.

The abnormal process of amyloid precursor protein lead to what is called as: extracellular deposit.

The amyloid deposit is characteristic fibrils of amyloid beta peptide.

# Previous postings:

Wednesday, 8 June 2022

Why Passion Flowers could Attract Butterfly? – Science 13

My neighbors call this flower “the last suffer,” and interestingly, its has many alternate names.



Image 1- Blooming of Passion flower.

Other common names, sure, depend very much on areas or regions, just few of them are:

- Holy-Trinity flower
- apricot vine
- maracock,
- white sarsaparilla
- molly-pop
- old field apricot
- granadilla



Image 2- Home décor, butterfly

Then, question: Why Passion Flowers could Attract Butterfly?



Image 3- Sunflower, just for illustration

The simple answer that it is because the plants could provide “specific” foods and fragrance to attract butterfly



Image 4- Walking path, illustration

In addition to butterflies, other critters that love to visit exotic purple passion flowers are:

- hummingbirds (the smallest bird in the USA)
- many other pollinators.



Image 5- Passion Flowers in the garden

Moreover, as reported by University of Florida (2012: Native Passionflower Vine Shares Special Relationship with Two Florida Butterfly Species) that at least two butterflies species depend on the flowers.

The butterfly are common, and easily observed in many places of the state of Florida, they are:

- the Zebra Longwing
- the Gulf Fritillary

Have you seen purple passion flowers?

Do you love it?

# Previous postings:

Monday, 6 June 2022

Why are We Getting Obese Nowadays? - Part 2 – Healthy Life 20

You may read the previous posting (Part 1):

- The Rainbow Before Evening : Why are We Getting Obese Nowadays? - Part 1 – Healthy Life 20



Image 1- Sweet cookies sold in the market

Some experts suggested the following possible reasons (needed to be studied furthermore):

1) Due to life style or behaviors or habits

- Life style such as infant with less or without breast-fed are obese more than infants with breast-fed more than 3 months

- Increasing of drug using especially prescription drugs which in fact relate to obesity.



Image 2- Walking path in neighborhood, illustration only



Image 3- A cute cat, illustration

2) Due to environmental changes

- Changing of our microorganisms in our intestines. It is believed the current type of gut microorganisms are relate to weight gain.

- We probably expose to more chemical environments such as food processing and pesticides. These lead to disturbing of hormonal work in the body, then to cause obesity.

Should we back to old days?

What do you think?

# Previous postings:

Saturday, 4 June 2022

Purple Bell Peppers in the Farmer Market – Food 14

We visit nearby farmer market couple days ago. It was quite surprisingly, we saw first time the purple bell peppers.

You may see the photos that we took.



Image 1- Purple Bell Peppers

These purple peppers have the same shapes compared to other color of bell peppers like:

- green
- red
- or yellow peppers

Actually, the bell peppers not really “solid” purple, but kind of “stripes” purple.



Image 2- Three Purple Bell Peppers

Searching through internet, we found many source, one of them reported by Goldy, R (2012: Green bell pepper showing purple striping due to cool temperatures in September).


Image 3- Cutting one half of peppers

Two possibility cause of purple bell peppers:

- if temperature too hot, immature bell pepper to be purple (stripes or half purple)
- if temperature too cold, green bell pepper will develop stripes purple.

We thought, in case in Louisiana, the temperature quite hot nowadays, about F 88* (C 31*) degree. Hence, the bell pepper tends to be stripes or half purple.

The difference with other bell pepper is that the white color dominates the inside part of the peppers and the texture of its flesh.

The purple is not covering all the fruit of peppers, it is just one half of the fruits (just stripes), so the peppers are look cute in this half purple.

# Previous postings:

Thursday, 2 June 2022

The Mutant Genes in the Early Onset Familial Alzheimer's – Part 1 - Alzheimer's 6

Previously, I posted about chromosomes related to the Alzheimer's disease and gene mutations as the genetic marker that believe to lead to this pathological disease.



Image 1- Simple talks of Alzheimer's patients


You may read previous postings (Part 1 and Part 2):

As we might know that the progressive declined in cognitive functions in Alzheimer's disease are associated with depositions of aggregated protein in form of extracellular plaques and neurofibrillary tangles in the brain.



Image 2- Plants, just for illustration



Image 3- Dialogs of normal and Alzheimer’s person.

Early-onset Alzheimer's disease appears about in the thirties and mid-sixties of the age which are characterized by the mutation of single gene in any chromosome in chromosome 1, chromosome 14 and chromosome 21.

Long investigations about the mutant gene that causes abundance of amyloid plaques were conducted.

Then the scientists found that this gene, the gene encoding amyloid precursor protein (APP), sits in chromosome 21.

It's an autosomal dominant.

# To be continued to Part 2

## Previous postings:

Wednesday, 1 June 2022

Have You Tried to Consume Any Forms of Coconut Products?

We talked about imported coconut in the USA market, please read at previous post:

- The Rainbow Before Evening : Countries which Export Coconut to America



Image 1- Coconut without shells, sold in the Mexican grocery

There are many products made of coconuts, include:

- oil
- milk
- milk beverages
- water (juicy)
- flakes
- flour
- butter
- sugar



Image 2- Coconut oil, sold in the Walmart groceries



Image 3- Coconut charcoal, sold in Amazon

Other well known coconut relate products are charcoal, vinegar, copra, cream, chips, candy and cakes.

I myself love to consume water (juicy) and meat of young coconuts, suitable during hot summer season.

Cans of juicy mixed with young coconut meats also available in many groceries, especially Asian shops.

I often use coconut oil and milk for cooking, especially for traditional foods. Smell good and tasty.

Have you tried to eat coconut? What products of coconut do you like most?

# Previous postings:

Tuesday, 31 May 2022

Tea Made of Hibiscus Flowers

We knew Hibiscus flowers could be processed to be tea, but we never seen its sold commercially in the market.



Image 1- A package of hibiscus tea

When we visit Mexican store a couple weeks ago, we saw the Hibiscus tea in the small plastic packages.

The waitress said that tea made of Jamaican flowers, flowers from a Caribbean country. So, it is mean the grocery imported those tea.

Price is quite cheap compare to other tea sold in other American groceries such as Walmart and Whole Foods Market.



Image 2- A pink Hibiscus flower in the garden



Image 3- Yellow flower at a yard



Image 4- Several packs of Hibiscus tea.

Just for comparison, price of teas per 8 oz (227 gram) in groceries of our city, Baton Rouge, Louisiana:

- Hibiscus tea is US$ 4.29 per 8 oz
- others tea is US$ 12.80 per 8 oz

We drink hot hibiscus tea, and love sweet cranberry flavor. Other flavors, just few are:

- spicy
- fruity
- and sour

# Previous postings:

The Beautiful Bright Green Luna Moth - Nature 148

We saw a beautiful bright green critter it is called the bright green Luna moth. The grub making its way through our yard. Image 01 - A Luna...