Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Nibblet

I've been doing so much reading this semester, like seriously, stacks. I impress myself. But the best line so far? I think it's definitely from a 1987 paper titled Influenza Virus Resistance of Wild Mice: Wild-Type and Mutant Mx Alleles Occur at Comparable Frequencies*.

"The other inbred Mx+ strain, A2G, originated at Glaxo Laboratories between 1942 and 1950 from an illegitimate mating between strain A and an unknown mouse"

Up until fairly recently, animal research was incredibly disorganized. Researchers keeping mice helter-skelter and every which way. This of course led to some problems with reproduceability.

So it's not entirely surprising that some unintended crosses occurred along the way but it's funny to me, to think of a mouse sneaking into the Glaxo laboratories some fifty odd years ago to consummate an illicit mousey romance.

*Don't try finding this baby on-line, oh no I had to go to an honest to god library to get my hands on this paper. Next I'll be churning butter or some such shit.

13 comments:

Demirep said...

when you say you had get your hands on that "paper" what do you mean exactly? does that mean it's not a pdf file? I don't quite follow.

auritus said...

Yeah, the university does have articles from this journal on-line but only since 1999 and this paper was published in 1987.

So instead of accessing a .pdf on-line and printing it out, I had to go into the stacks and find the archived version to make photocopies.

Adam said...

What is this "photocopies" you speak of? Some ancient art?

auritus said...

Yeah, I'm told our ancestors used to "fax" each other these "photocopies".

Faith said...

Just found you thru Shakes - I'm in the research mines at UCLA. I'll be catching up with your archives...
F.

auritus said...

Welcome Faith.

I have to say that the blog is going on four years and I am not the same person I was when I started it. But in the interest of honesty I've left it all up. Enjoy!

timidvenus said...

wow.i had to stop reading for a bit after the first paragraph. the alleles and all got me excited.

auritus said...

It's okay, I too become sexually aroused by alleles.

Just ask Adam about all the times I made him dress up as an allele. With six inch clear plastic stripper heels.

timidvenus said...

i wondered why he had those...

Adam said...

It's all true.

auritus said...

For stripping.

Under the name D. Lightful.

timidvenus said...

well, i expect a show the next time im in town.

Adam said...

Well, I still have the heels but I gave the allele costume to a homeless dude.

I have a mildly sexy uracil costume though.