Philadelphia, day 3

Hey everyone,

Day one "cool things that i learned" recap:

So the format of this conference is pretty nice. Everyday, there are talks about various topics of stem cells (ie. somatic stem cells, cancer stem cells, therapeutic applications, etc) and you basically choose to go to which ever talks you want based on interested or watever.

If anything, I've learned the most about hematopoetic stem cells which are stem cells that blood is derived from. A lot of the topics that the scientists speak about are just so encrypted because I just don't know enough about stem cells. I specialize in cancer stem cells and I still was confused during the cancer stem cell talks.

As far as haematopoetic stem cells (HSC) work, they are formed in the bone marrow and differentiate into RBCs, granulocytes, monocytes, platelets, and lymphocytes. The cool thing is what factors tell HSCs to differentiate into watever is needed and basically everyones trying to figure out how to program the HSC to do what they want it to do.

So related to HSCs and blood, another big topic is leukemia or "blood" cancer. By figuring out how HSCs work we can learn more about leukemia, and vice versa. In leukemia, its suggested that there are also leukemia stem cells (cancer stem cells).

A major factor that affects differentiation is the stem cell niche or the "neighborhood" of the stem cell. Much like how where we are from makes a difference in how we are, the neighborhood of the stem cell affect its outcome. i hope that makes it understandable. Also, different things will affect the niche, which will affect the stem cell "fate". Say all of a sudden, you are short on RBCs...then something will affect the niche, which will tell the HSCs to make more RBCs. This guy i met at the conference who also is from UCSD explained all this stuff to me about HSCs. He has been able to alter the Jak pathway for putative HSCs and form RBCs and this is FUCKING AWESOME.

This morning, I was supposed to get up at 9, but got up at 1 instead. The night before, i got trashed off free beer at the junior investigator panel (where we ask people about their careers and stuff) and two margaritas at chilis and i was done. I passed out at around 9 and woke up at like, all rejuvinated from a 3 hour nap. I stayed up till 5 and then fell asleep. I woke up at 1 instead.

Today, after the poster presentations, I went with Vikram to look for alcohol. Philadelphia is dry. No beer anywhere. There are wine and spirit shops, but no beer. Finally we found beer, after asking like 5 different people at 5 different places. I chugged two guineesses + 2 shots of baileys all at once and i was done. I was watcihng the laker game and passed out. They were up at 20 at that time. I woke up and they were down by 2. WTF. Lakers lost and that sucked. 1-3 is tough to make up for anything but I believe in Kobe and co. AND germany lost to croatia. Terrible day for teams that Andrew likes. :(

Anyways: pictures.





just my thoughts. Oh dreamgirl i miss you so.