The biologist: II. Human being: An individual or a society of cells.

Cells in our body as citizens in a country: Contrasts and similarities.    

Nature has been organised in units. As far as we know, each unit can be considered as a society of smaller units. So, a solar system can be seen as a society of a sun with its surrounding planets. But in turn the solar system itself can be seen as a unit in a star system (galaxy). On the other hand an atom closely resembles a solar system with its nucleus surrounded by electrons. However, as part of a molecule, it is as one of the many solar systems in a galaxy.

We are used to see our body as an entity, but it can also be seen as a society of cells. Each cell in turn can be seen as a society of molecules.
When we compare the cells in our body with citizens in a city or a country, remarkable similarities can be seen.
Cells are living among an infrastructure of collagen, reticulin fibres, bone, cartilage, blood and lymph vessels, intestinal tract, urinary system, nervous system and many other structures  prepared and populated by specialised colleagues of them. 
We live in a city with houses, buildings, road- and railway networks, sewer-systems, electricity-networks prepared and  manned by some of our specialised colleagues.
In both cases, the infrastructure has to be adapted regularly to a growing body or a growing city. Both the demolition and the rebuilding are performed by specialists. 
In our body e.g, bone is produced by osteoblasts, whereas osteoclasts are the cells involved in the demolition of bone. So we can grow up thanks to these hard working cells.
Medieval cities conserved for historical reasons, remind us to our continuously changing modern cities. Construction workers adapt our buildings, sewer-systems, road-networks and railways to the needs of modern times.
Cells are highly specialised with respect to their function. During transport of ingested food, a lot of  cells are successively involved in its digestion. Specialistic cells are taking care for the right degree of acidity, required for the optimal action of the enzymes produced by other cellular specialists. 
In earlier ages similar jobs in our cities were often performed by workers unified in guilds. Street names in the old cities remind often to the streets were specific people were performing their similar jobs.
Also cells in our body with a similar function are often living together in specific tissues or organs for reasons of efficacy.
Epithelial cells are produced close to the place where they will practise their function. This reminds me to my youth in a mining district, where male children of the miners, living close to their mines, were usually becoming miners too, like their fathers and grandfathers before them. In other organs such as the pancreas, both endocrine cells producing hormones such as insulin and exocrine cells producing enzymes for the digestion of food, are living, but both endocrine and exocrine cells live in their own district, comparable to "China towns" in western cities.
Other cells, e.g. monocytes produced in the bone marrow, emigrate from there to the blood circulation, where they remain for some time. Hereafter they enter one of the many tissues in our body and will maturate there to become a tissue macrophage, involved in host resistance and regulation of functions of non-phagocytic cells there. They may also become dendritic cells, involved in antigen presentation to cells of the lymphoid system. Their maturation on the place where they will  get their final job, might be considered a work-placement. However, in case of cells, a work-placement does not imply that other options remain open too. When the location has been chosen, a job there is obligatory. Stem cells form the only cell population for which all options remain open.
Just as different specialists in a city, working together to perform a complicated project, different cells can also cooperate. Especial in host-defence a lot of specialistic cells are working together. Dendritic cells, T-lymphocytes and B-lymphocytes, are closely collaborating to initiate an immune response to unwanted microbial intruders such as bacteria, yeasts or viruses. B-lymphocytes rapidly develop into plasma cells producing specific antibodies against such antigens. These gamma-globulin molecules with specific affinity for the antigen, subsequently stick to it, allowing the uptake and digestion by a macrophage. As in our human world, numerous specialised soldiers are subsequently trained in order to defeat their enemy if he will try a new attack.
In an earlier blog, I did already pay attention to macrophages, comparing them with  high-tech, self thinking, vacuum cleaners. 
The cells involved in host-defence reactions in our body remind to a military organisation, where infantrymen, artillery-men and scouts are working close together.
Unfortunately, a transplantation is seen by the government of the cells in our body as an unexpected and treacherous attack. It will subsequently mobilise all cells usually involved in host defence and will organise a coordinated resistance in order to beat off the enemy.  This causes problems for our human medical care.
As you would expect the government of the cells resides in our brain. Neurons and several other specialists there are keeping control over the complete city or country. They are not chosen by the cells during elections as our politicians, and can thus be considered as representing a dictatorial regime. On the other hand, contrary to some dictators that we - as men - have seen, these cellular rulers want to be the best for the citizens and are not completely crazy. Admitted, this does not apply to governments in the brains of all men. 
Also they are - evolutionary spoken - hardliners. As a consequence, euthanasia is not a question of willing or not-willing. A senescent erythrocyte (red blood cell) e.g, is not asked for his own will, but euthanasia is obligatory and immediately performed by a macrophage, based on changes in its surface molecules. These are recognised by the macrophage and judged as not efficacious for the cellular society as a whole. 
It reminds to fascist and communist practices in our human world. Of course euthanasia should never be obligatory for human beings. On the other hand, help for those with a long term wish for euthanasia as well as refusal of such help by physicians who have problems with euthanasia, should never be a reason for punishment in a civilised society as explained in an earlier blog (Euthanasia: A human right).
The government in our brain rules with the aid of the nervous and the neuroendocrine systems in our body. In turn these systems act partly via specialised hormone producing cells in several hormone producing centra. Other hormone producing cells are autonomous and respond directly to measurements on different locations in the city.
Whereas many cells in our body never leave their district or even their neighbourhood, other cells are regularly moving. Peripheral blood leukocytes e.g. move easily here and there between the various lymph nodes, spleen and other lymphoid structures distributed in our body. During their transport  in our body they use the blood circulation or the lymph flow as transport systems.
A final question to be answered is: Is there any information that cells in our body could become terrorists comparable to some human beings in a country? 
Yes, cancer cells in our body are comparable to radicalised men in human society. At the moment they are mostly Muslims. They do not have any problem with their own fate. They know that they will die themselves during their suicide attack, but they believe to be rewarded in their next life by a God. They do not understand that such a God would be the main enemy of all human beings, if he would really exist.
Though cancer cells try to establish their own state in our body and are rather successful in hiding themselves between normal cells, just as the terrorists of IS, they are not able to kill normal cells individually. Their ideal is to destroy the complete society of cells (our body).

Nico van Rooijen; Haarlem, June 26.

The biologist: I. Are we smart enough to know how smart animals are?  

This is the title of a book written by the famous biologist Frans de Waal, who studied behaviour and empathy of primates and other mammals. Biologists are strange men and I am one of them.
You can find biologists in nature, usually on muddy boots, collected around a tiny little plant, with a butterfly net,  as a bird-spotter carrying a too heavy tele-lens, but also in arctic areas being on the run from a polar bear or in a laboratory, wearing a white lab-coat and concentrated looking to complicated electronic equipment. Natural scientists and certainly also biologists, should be good observers.
Most biologists consider themselves as a temporal phenomenon in the long evolutionary line of life on earth, contrary to most other human beings, who see themselves as completely different from all other forms of life.
Our human brain is subject to various limitations and we are less rationally thinking than most of us will believe. One of these limitations is that we are inclined to ignore what we cannot see, even if there is a lot of evidence for it and/or rationally thinking would force us to accept the idea.
As earlier described, we believe that our environment may strongly influence our life, since anyone can see its effects. But many of us do not believe that our genes may influence it equally strong, since our genes are not an open book for us.
The fact that the difference between men and the other animals (especially mammals) is generally overrated by members of the first species, is based on the same principle.
We do not know the other animals and cannot communicate with them. As a consequence we believe they are stupid. We could have argued: That we know so little about them does not support the idea we have about our own astuteness.

If I look to our cat "Meneertje" (a Dutch name, to be translated as "Little Sir"), I sometimes wonder who of both knows more about the other. As an example, he often seems to know my next action if he observes my present action. In contrast many of his actions are a complete surprise for me.

Men who like dogs will tell you how smart they are but you will less frequently hear about an intelligent cat. The difference is that a dog will learn all tricks his boss wants to teach him. A cat teaches himself all the tricks he wants to learn himself.
My response to people considering dogs as intelligent animals and cats as stupid animals is usually: Indeed you can teach a dog all imaginable tricks except to shit on a permanent place. In contrast, you can teach a cat nothing, except to shit on a permanent place. The cat wants to learn it himself.  Frankly speaking, I prefer the last option.

"Meneertje" considers the attic floor of our house as his territory. He allows me to use it as my working place. He is knowing earlier than I do that anyone is going up the stairs. He also knows whether he likes the person who will appear shortly. Whereas he likes most persons coming up and takes position on the back of the  couch in order to welcome them, in a few cases his reaction is opposite and he flees immediately behind one of the radiators, where nobody can reach him and even see him. If a visitor asks me later: "Do you have a cat? I did not see him", the implication is that "Meneertje" did not like this visitor.
If anyone did forget to shut the door in front of the stairs to the attic, Meneertje knows, because he did not hear the second noise confirming that the door might be shut, but was not really closed. The door is a little oblique. As a consequence not only the handle should be drawn tighter, but also the additional handle at the upper side of the door.
He will going down the stairs and try to get the door open in order to be able to investigate the rest of the house. He is not interested in the third floor, but especially in the second floor of the house where "Tiger" the other cat in our house has his territory. Tiger in turn allows Alice (my wife) to work in his territory on the second floor.
Given that Meneertje is 6 years old, comparable to an adult man of ca. 40 years and Tiger is 18 years old, comparable to an old man of ca. 88 years, the result will be that Tiger becomes afraid and will hide himself in his own territory. We try to prevent that by carefully keeping all doors closed between their respective territories.

In his youth,  Tiger did also show both a remarkable memory and logic. At that time, he was the only cat in our house. As a consequence he did consider the entire house of 4 floors as his territory.
Before I was going to sleep, I used to drink a glass of port-wine and took some pieces of cheese.
Also, the door of the kitchen could be shut, but not be closed. So, Tiger could open it easily.
At first, I did open the cupboard in the kitchen in order to get the port-wine. The door made a little creaking noise. Subsequently, I opened the refrigerator to get the cheese. This produced a little rumble. Finally, I opened one of the drawers of the kitchen unit in order to get a knife to prepare the blocks of cheese. Also this action produced some creaking. All sounds were different.
The various actions were carefully performed as if I was a burglar who suddenly liked a delicacy.  I tried to prevent what appeared to be unavoidable.
After the last noise, the door of the kitchen was immediately opened by Tiger, who slowly entered as if I did call him. He took a seat next to me on the floor and turned his tail around him as you can see on old Egyptian sculptures made at a time a cat was still considered a holy animal.
Both Tiger and I were equally lazy. The consequence was that Tiger did not enter before he did hear all of the three different sounds.
He did wait patiently for a first piece of cheese. If I was lost in thought and forgot him completely, he did jump on the table and placed carefully one of his forepaws on my hand with the knife in order to remind me to his presence.
If I changed the sequence of actions and with it the sequence of the resulting sounds, there was no difference in his reaction. Only after the third sound he entered the kitchen.
I have seen many other examples of astuteness of Tiger and Meneertje, confirming their high level of understanding.

Nico van Rooijen, Haarlem; 2017, June 14

Euthanasia: A human right.

If we are born, it is at best the consequence of a desire of our parents. However in many cases it is no more than the result of a sexual assault, as it had been for millions of years during evolution. 

So, we may consider ourselves fortunate if our parents love us and take care of us.

Once alive, we appear to have a package of genes, that we are not able to change. We do not even know the details of our genetic programme.  A few details, mainly related to our external features, may become evident, but the rest, especially related to internal characteristics, remains largely hidden in darkness.

With this genetic programme, we are subsequently subject to numerous influences of our environment. The combination of our genetic programme and the influences of our environment may lead to a tremendous - nearly infinite - variation in the outcome. This outcome may be a lucky one, but it may as well be a bad one.

This can be easily demonstrated if we observe the lower forms of life. A dandelion in a Dutch pasture will grow up to another appearance than a similar dandelion in a pasture on a windy mountain slope in Switzerland. Contrary to a dandelion, a human being can move to another environment under the influence of his/her genetic programme.  A mind inclined to fanaticism can bring someone to become a fanatic Muslim, a fanatic Christian or a fanatic communist, depending on his place on our planet. But contrary to a dandelion, such a fanatic mind may e.g. travel to areas under control of IS (islamic state) and become the mind of a mass murderer there.
Anyone knows that lung cancer is usually caused by smoking. Nevertheless the earlier German federal chancellor Helmut Schmidt, who did smoke three packs of cigarettes a day, reached an age of 96, without getting lung cancer. Contrary to 40 years ago, then at the time I did hear a physician saying over the radio, that cancer had nothing to do with genes, it is now generally accepted that genes may have an important role in determining our susceptibility for various forms of cancer in spite of their final induction by environmental factors.

That most people do not believe in a strong influence of our genes can be explained easily. Our genes are not an open book, whereas the influence of our environment can be seen by anyone. Biologists, who are studying our predecessors in evolution, know that genetic factors are equally important.
There is an old proverb: "Where there's a will, there's a way." Unfortunately, willpower seems to be  determined by our genes earlier than by our environment. According to experimental psychologists, a free will has to be considered utopia.
But irrespective of the role of genes and environmental influence, both of these are together responsible for our own evaluation of our life.

As a consequence, under certain conditions, we should have the right to decide whether or not the balance of our life is overall positive or negative and to take the decision to end our life if we consider it as hopeless
Conditions should be defined e.g:
*Responsibilities with respect to other people, e.g. our children,
*A wish of euthanasia should be a long term wish. After a broken relationship e.g. the situation may gradually improve. A terminal disease on the other hand will only get worse, especially if it is painful.
*So each of us should get the right to decide to end his/her life and others should get the right to help us to fulfil this wish for reasons of charity, if we are not able to fulfil it ourselves. But for similar reasons, nobody (physicians inclusive) can be obliged to give this form of help if it goes against their own feelings and/or believing.
*Of course, in all cases there must be an independent check that help is not coming from those having other interests in the euthanasia than charity.

Politicians, jurists, physicians, psychiatrists, psychologists, priests, clergymen and all those, who believe that they are the specialists, who are able to judge whether euthanasia is justified in a particular case, should be aware that they are overrating their own capabilities. For each of us there is only one specialist, yourself, irrespective whether you are a plumber or a philosopher.

It is incredible that politicians belonging to political parties, said to be based on the bible, are strong opponents of those who are willing to help friends or relatives having a long term wish to end their life. Charity is an important Christian order. Help by those, who will strongly miss their friend or relative after the euthanasia, may be considered charity as well as self-sacrifice. The reference by Christian politicians to the commandment: "You shall not murder (kill)" can be considered an intentional deception of the meaning of it.

It is also incredible that some politicians pretend that no elderly people would wish to end their life, if
more attention would be paid to them. This might be true for those who have spent their lives mainly by consumption and entertainment, but will certainly not apply to most of those who were creative and productive.  For the latter, e.g. a writer or a painter going blind or a composer going deaf, age might gradually become a larger problem as a consequence of the difference with their previous life. Simple people may be easier to satisfy by arbitrary contacts than intellectual people.

An attendant effect of acknowledgement of euthanasia as a human right, would possibly be that less people, being at their wits' end as a consequence of a lack of attention for their long term wish, will jump before a train or from the roof of an apartment building. This may in turn reduce the number of train drivers and paramedics with psychical problems.

Nico van Rooijen, Haarlem, April 28, 2017

The macrophage: A high-tech micro vacuum cleaner.

Do you have a vacuum cleaner? Maybe you call it a Hoover, after the inventor? And do you use it?
If yes, you might be a woman. Anyway, being a man myself, my first vacuum cleaner entered my life after my marriage. Before that time, I did wait until the dust under my bed had produced a solid carpet there. Once a year, I rolled it up and threw it in the dust-bin.
As you understand, I am a lazy man, so the only suitable profession for me would be scientific research. There are few other possibilities to spend nearly all of your time on thinking. If doing would become an inevitable consequence, many nice students and/or technicians will help you to overcome this barrier.

I have several problems with a vacuum cleaner.
First of all, it produces a lot of noise, disturbing thinking.
Secondly, a vacuum cleaner is nowadays an old-fashioned apparatus. You have to control its activities and to check where it did remove dust and where not. This is especially tiring if you do not see any dust on places where others obviously see a lot of it.
A modern vacuum cleaner, adapted to our time, should have the following characteristics:
1. It should work without your own control. If your string of pearls is broken, the pearls should not be sucked together with the real dust by the apparatus. In other words, it should be able to discriminate. Contrary to a police officer, a vacuum cleaner would be praised for this capability.
2. Before the battery would be dead, the apparatus should be able to charge itself again.
3. The apparatus should be able to recycle the ingested dust in order to reuse it subsequently for a useful purpose.
4. The apparatus should be able to control and regulate several other functions in your house. If it becomes dark, the lights have to be turned on and the curtains have to be closed by the apparatus via remote control.
5. If more activity would be required somewhere, the apparatus should be able to replicate itself and the copies should be able to collaborate in the job.

As you will know, many human inventions are based on observations in nature. In the present case, we should focus on a micro vacuum cleaner, the macrophage, a cell present in nearly all tissues of our body.
From an evolutionary point of view, macrophages are ancient cells. They form the core of the natural immune system and did appear long before the cells forming together the complex immune system of the higher vertebrates to which we belong.
Macrophages are involved in "homeostasis" of the body by ingesting and digesting microorganisms or other non-self particles as well as products of inflammation or immune reactions, such as macromolecules or antibody-complexed antigens.
Intracellular digestion is mediated by their panels of lysosomal enzymes. As a consequence large concentrations of materials such as amino-acids for the building of new proteins are available.
During evolution, macrophages did acquire functions in the regulation of several other cells in the body. Differentiation, maturation, migration and/or functioning of these non-phagocytic cells could be stimulated or inhibited by soluble mediator molecules, such as cytokines and chemokines, produced and released by macrophages in the circulation and/or body fluids. They will act as a remote control system.

Their functions could be studied with the help of an approach to deplete macrophages selectively from tissues and/or organs in the body. By this approach, i.e. by creating an animal with macrophage-depleted tissues or organs - dependent on the administration route of the liposomes - functional aspects of macrophages could be studied "in vivo".
Liposomes - artificially prepared inert vesicles, consisting of concentric phospholipid bilayers, separated by aqueous compartments - will be eagerly swallowed by macrophages and will be subsequently digested with the help of their phospholipase enzymes.
Liposomes as structures were discovered by Alec Bangham (UK, died on March 9, 2010). He found that amphipathic phospholipid molecules, dispersed in water, became organised in vesicles, consisting of concentric phospholipid bilayers, separated by aqueous compartments. The hydrophobic fatty acid chains of each part of the bilayers were opposed to each other, whereas the hydrophilic head groups of the fatty acids were exposed to the water compartments separating the individual bilayers.
Hydrophilic molecules solved in the aqueous solution, used for preparation of the liposomes, could be entrapped into the aqueous compartments between the phospholipid bilayers and it was Gregory Gregoriadis (Greece/UK), who proposed and formulated liposomes as carriers of drugs in biology and medicine, i.e. the liposomal drug carrier concept.
Clodronate (dichloromethylene bisphosphonate) is a member of the family of bisphosphonate molecules developed for the treatment of osteolytic bone diseases. It shows high affinity for calcium and - as a consequence - adheres to bone if administered to vertebrates such as men. Osteoclasts play a role in the physiology of bone by breaking it down, opposed to osteoblasts who are involved in its reconstruction. It appeared that the activity of osteoclasts could be inhibited by bisphosphonate molecules sticked to bone.
Given that both osteoclasts and macrophages belong to the mononuclear phagocyte system (MPS), we decided to try clodronate as one of the first effector molecules in our planned "liposome mediated
macrophage suicide" approach.
Freely solved clodronate will not easily cross phospholipid bilayers such as liposome membranes and cell membranes. After injection, liposomes with encapsulated clodronate - used as Trojan horses - will be ingested and digested by macrophages. The encapsulated clodronate molecules are released within the cells and will accumulate there, since they are not able to leave the cell again. At a certain intracellular concentration, the clodronate molecules will induce apoptosis of the macrophage.
A lot of functional activities of macrophages have been discovered with the help of this approach since these activities were no longer performed or at least strongly reduced in macrophage-depleted animals.

The next step will be to produce a high-tech macro vacuum cleaner to make our own lives more pleasant!

Politics in the Netherlands: How to translate the results of the elections.

Compared to the situation in the rest of the world, elections in the Netherlands resemble a TV-show.

In some of the most influential countries of the world, the USA, Great-Britain and Germany, only few political parties determine the future. They are alternately winning the elections.  As a result, change of power - implicating undoing of many decisions of the previous government - did sometimes induce a repercussion in the economy of the country, since stability is a crucial factor.
In other countries, only one party has been admitted. Given that the name "party" does imply a "contradictio in terminis" in such countries, elections are a joke. Unfortunately, the population is not permitted to laugh at the joke and is actually suffering under a dictatorship of those saying to represent it.
Communist countries were typical examples, but communism has proven to be a plague for the prosperity in a country and communism became nearly extinct on our planet. Comparable to the dinosaurs but happily in a shorter period of time.
China is a good example. The rapid increase in its prosperity, since the country became a typical capitalist country, shows that clever people can speed up the economy of their country if they get the chance to do that. The condition is that people live in relative liberty, even if they stick to the name people's republic as in China. The Chinese are not only clever, but also practical people.
The difference between communist North-Korea and South-Korea as a typical capitalist country, also speaks volumes. The first country as the last communist country on earth, can be considered as a typical inefficacious communist museum with prisoners inside, but no visitors from abroad allowed to look at them. The last country taking advance of freedom and commercial activities all over the world is comparatively prosperous.

In the Netherlands, we have many political parties. From ultra left to ultra right, various parties based on religion and even a party for the animals, though animals were never invited to participate in the elections. Sooner or later we will also see a party for hooligans and criminals.
Also new political parties usually split up after a short time and it is no exception that individual members form a new party but nevertheless remain in the parliament.
This is a typical Dutch hobby, in earlier centuries mainly visible in the many religious schisms, but since God did emigrate out of the Netherlands, mainly practised by politicians.
Nevertheless, many votes end up somewhere in the middle, because Dutchmen are rationally thinking.

However, given that the ballot papers resemble newspapers as a result of the many political parties,
a majority allowing the rapid formation of a government is not always easily to find.
This is still more difficult, since several parties exclude collaboration with other parties.
The only solution might be to form a government by parties in the middle, no longer based on a majority but on a minority. Alternately, the government should seek support in the parliaments on the right or on the left side of the political spectrum, depending on the positions taken by these parties at earlier moments.
Parties changing their earlier position in a specific case, only as an attempt to bring the government down, should be forbidden and discontinued by law. This seems to be the only possibility to rule the Netherlands in the near future.
Nico van Rooijen, Haarlem, May 5, 2017

The philosopher & her admiring student:

The student is eager to learn the ideas of the philosopher

His admiration for the philosopher is obvious

After the lessons, they go for a ride in the Land Rover of the philosopher.

The student is still enthusiastic, but the philosopher seems to prefer a ride with a colleague.

Questions for Mr. Trump by an unreliable biologist.

Hi Donald, given your reactions on research of scientists with respect to the effects of global warming and their warnings regarding probable climate changes, I understand that you distrust scientists if their conclusions and resulting predictions do not agree with your own conviction.
You never gave us the impression that you are doubting your own words or their significance.
You might know that scientists in turn distrust politicians. To be fair, I think they have more reason to do so, than you have for the opposite.
If a scientist makes a statement, he will add his arguments and/or evidence and will always search to test his hypothesis.
I 'm afraid that, in spite of your name, you did not succeed in your attempts to trump your opponents, simply by blowing your own trumpet.
Trumpets remind me of elephants. In the Netherlands we have a proverb, literally translated: "He behaves as an elephant in a china cabinet". Given that - in this case - the china cabinet is our planet and the elephant was chosen to remain there for at least four years, I can only hope that the elephant will be tamed in the meantime.

Accidentally, you might have heard of a statement of one of the most important scientists of all times, Newton, about scientists: “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.”

Another interesting statement of Newton was as follows: “I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people.” 

Anyone of us, using a car or a plane to travel over the earth, meanwhile talking with others via a smart-phone or listening to the radio, has to trust on the achievements of countless scientists, standing on the shoulders of countless other scientists. So, if you are twittering on the back seat of your car after listening to the lies told about you via the radio or reading the lies written about you in the newspapers, while your driver looks at the route planner based on GPS, both of you are trusting on a lot of scientists at the same time.
With so many unreliable scientists standing on the shoulders of so may other unreliable scientists, the result would be extremely dangerous. It is like a "Tower of Babel" on wheels. Continuously, you should be afraid that it will collapse.
You must really fear that you will never survive the four years of your presidency with so many scientists on which you have to rely.

May, 8,  2017, Nico van Rooijen (un unreliable biologist)  Haarlem, The Netherlands.