We are not alone

Science News Magazine has been published since 1922, over ninety years. The news arm of the non-profit Society for Science and the Public educates and informs the public about current happenings in science and technology. It has covered such seminal events as the first man-made nuclear reaction, the first electronic computers, man’s first walk on the Moon, and the first jet aircraft. For some time, the editors have selected the top science story of each year.

For 2013, there were plenty of candidates. The amazing rise of miniature unmanned aerial vehicles (drones). Gene therapy advances in managing blood cancers. The ability to grow replacement organs from scratch. The Nobel prize in physics for the discovery of the Higgs boson.

But what was the top science story of 2013? Bugs.

Or more precisely, bacteria and other organisms which make up the microbiota living on and within the human body.

In a steady stream of studies and reports throughout the year, we learned more and more about our remarkable little cousins. For instance, the fact that only 10 percent of your cells are human; the other 90 percent are a mixture of bacteria, fungi, and viruses. (That microbes are so tiny and human cells relatively huge accounts for the fact that, by mass, our microbiota only amounts to a few pounds).

Scientists are even beginning to argue that we should view the human body as a superorganism defined by this mixture of human and microorganism DNA (microbiome). The advantage in doing so is that it might help us better understand the effects of diet, chemical exposure, and other factors on our health.

It is important to note that our community of microorganisms is for the most part beneficial. They help us digest food and convert it more efficiently to energy. They influence the immune system, training it to identify and fight true pathogens. They produce hormones instructing our body to store fats, and create necessary vitamins. To understand the workings of the human body without considering our microbiome is, we are finding, impossible.

Michael Pollan, in an in-depth New York Times Magazine article (“Some of My Best Friends are Germs”, May 15, 2013), details his research into this new frontier. Starting with a submission of swabs to the BioFrontiers Institute at the University of Colorado, he received a detailed report of his personal microbiome. Pollan interviews the scientists involved in the project and describes how our microbiome, unique as a fingerprint, is developed. Soon after birth, a community of microbes takes hold in the infant gut. Its composition from there is influenced by environment and, mostly, diet. In fact, the BioFrontiers scientists can identify from a person’s swab samples both where they live in the world and what is the makeup of their diet.

Researchers have observed that obesity may be encouraged by a certain mix of gut flora. And that mix of flora is a result of diet. Meat eaters have a distinct pattern of gut flora from vegetarians. Diets high in sugars and fats are quickly absorbed, denying nutrition to our little minions. They prefer diets high in fiber and complex carbohydrates; these take much longer to digest. What a surprise, then, to see that independent research into low glycemic index (GI) diets have concluded that diets high in fiber and complex carbohydrates are highly preferable for health. The microbes are the key, and they live or die by our dietary choices.

So what might this flood of human microbiome research mean? Perhaps we’ll find that our war on bacteria, with a plethora of antibiotic soaps and cleaning products, might be taking a toll on our little helpers. Certainly we need to be concerned with pathogens, but perhaps we are overdoing it.

We might find that diet books of the future will focus on cooking for our whole selves. Lightly cooked vegetables, whole grains, al dente pasta, for instance, all take longer to digest and provide the fiber that our gut bacteria thrive on. Feed them well and they will serve us well. It would be a complete change in perspective and provide a grand new toolset for managing obesity and optimizing health.

There is much research yet to do and understanding to be gained. But it is exciting that we are beginning to comprehend the owner’s guide to the whole human being.

War and Secrets

Allied freighter attacked and sunk by German U-Boat

From the German point of view, it was the Second Happy Time. During 1942, the Axis sank 609 Allied ships totaling over 3 million tons at a cost of only 22 U-boats. It was, indeed, a happy time for the Germans as they focused their attention on the east coast of North America. Lack of preparation, no blackout of American cities, and an underequipped Atlantic U.S. Navy led to enormous German success.

(The First Happy Time was in 1940 and 1941, as Germany took on the unprepared British Royal Navy and the convoys they protected).

There was one other key to German dominance of the shipping lanes: Engima. Enigma was a German cipher machine used to encrypt messages. Enemy military commanders were able to gather intelligence and send orders with little chance of eavesdropping by the Allies. Convoys were discovered and submarines ordered to intercept in complete secrecy. The toll on Allied shipping was appalling.

The British established a top-secret effort at Bletchley Park to take on the challenge of breaking Enigma. To complicate matters, there were several variations of the machine in varying degree of sophistication. With the able assistance of Polish mathematicians, the British began to gain some success in decoding Luftwaffe and German Army messages. But the German Naval Enigma was a substantially different machine and defied cryptanalysis. Our convoys were sitting ducks.

And then fortune smiled. On October 30, 1942, the British Air Force spotted the German submarine U-559 on the surface off the coast of Egypt.  The airplane summoned the destroyer HMS Hero which closed on the submarine and forced it to submerge. Other destroyers joined the hunt and U-559 was severely damaged by depth charges. Losing trim, she came to the surface and was boarded by British sailors who retrieved her Enigma machine and code books.

Meanwhile, brilliant mathematician Alan Turing, who had been working on code breaking at Bletchley Park, turned his attention to the Naval Enigma. (Alan Turing is the father of our digital computer – thank him as you use your laptop computer or iPhone). Turing was finally able to break the Naval Enigma code using his deep experience at Bletchley and the newly obtained U-559 materials. The Second Happy Time came to an abrupt end for the Germans, and the sealift of men and materiel accelerated as we prepared for the invasion of the continent.

The Bletchley Park operation was very complex. It involved spies in the field, the best mathematical minds, radio listening stations, and science-fiction room-sized calculating machines like Colossus. And all of this was top secret and continued to be so long after the war had ended. All who were involved were required to sign the Official Secrets Act and vow to remain silent. And this secrecy was vital to ensure that the Germans did not know that their codes had been broken. The lives of millions and the very outcome of the war were at stake.

In thanks, the British recognized Turing by awarding him the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1945, then convicted him in 1952 of the criminal act of homosexuality. Turing kept his silence and committed suicide two years later. (Last month, over 60 years too late, the Queen issued a Royal Pardon “in fitting tribute to an exceptional man”.)

Which is why it is so incongruous that Edward Snowden has hundreds of thousands if not millions of fans.

Snowden revealed far more than the NSA collection of telephone metadata. A Pentagon report just sent to Congress asserts that most of the documents Snowden took relate to military operations. According to House Intelligence Chairman Mike Rogers, "The vast majority of the material was related to the Defense Department, and our military services," not NSA operations.

You might think, “So what? We’re not in a real war.” And you would be wrong. Our struggle against the virus of radical Islamic jihad is no less grave than those earlier anti-submarine patrols on the dark, storm-tossed Atlantic.

The lives of our citizens and the lives of our troops are now less secure thanks to Mr. Snowden. You can be a fan if you like. But Alan Turing, who sacrificed much and contributed even more, would most likely disagree.