Decoded Dog by Dianne Janczewski

Author:Dianne Janczewski
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780578417653
Publisher: Quo Vadis Publishing
Published: 2019-02-28T22:00:00+00:00

A COLD DAY IN HELL

I HAD everything ready. All the background research done, a schedule, assignments, and documents for signatures. Assembly line organized, the students returned and Anna delivered the samples in person. Behind closed doors we told the story and I asked everyone for their commitment and silence. Joining us were Drs. Martenson and Pierce who would run the toxicology and endocrinology assays. Participation was unanimous.

We explored the ethics of sharing only those samples from the CRFS dogs. Everyone had an opinion. While Jamie didn’t think there was any use in sending non-CRFS samples to CDC, even if they were from dogs that eventually got CRFS, Anna felt that there was value in looking at these in the context of looking for differences in the same dogs pre- and post-infection. It was critical that we eventually share these samples. Martenson and Pierce saw legitimacy in her argument, but pointed out that since the CDC was not collecting these from other vets, there wasn’t an established pool of like samples and ours would not make up a statistically valid population in the context of the thousands of other samples in their bank. Megan and I both felt that we should submit the samples eventually, but Anna’s team—our team—should at least get first crack at them since she made the initial observation. We came to a consensus that we would conduct our research and if we didn’t find anything in our initial analysis, we would contact the CDC and see if they were interested in taking these samples. Anna would at least make a note in the files of submitted samples from Addison’s dogs with CRFS that they seemed to die more slowly than dogs that didn’t have Addison’s.

We were not alone in this. If we found something we would follow it closely, but we had to let others contribute their expertise. The thought that Regnum and thus Kendal would likely gain access to our work made me sick to my stomach, but I had to just deal with, or better, just ignore it. Even if we were inclined to keep the samples initially to ourselves, considering the endless possibilities and seeing the vision of all those dead dogs, there is no way we could expect to do this on our own. We needed to do the initial work and prepare for scientific collaboration beyond our team.

Messenger RNA (mRNA) extraction had to be done first since it is very unstable. When a gene is activated, short pieces of mRNA are created from the gene’s template, which is then read by the ribosomes to make proteins. Changes in the amount of mRNA for a particular gene suggests that the organism has a reason to make more or less of that specific protein.

Proteins were next. They are fragile and degrade quickly if samples are not kept cold. There’s always a fear that an elusive protein wasn’t found not because it wasn’t there, but because the sample had degraded. Again, changes in levels or structure of a protein can point to how the dogs’ bodies are reacting to CRFS.

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