This book provides a current analysis of the legal and ethical challenges in preparing for and responding to chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and explosive crises. From past events like the Chernobyl nuclear incident in Russia or the Bhopal chemical calamity in India, to the more recent tsunami and nuclear accident in Japan or the Ebola crisis in Africa, and with the on-going threat of bioterrorism, the need to be ready to respond to CBRNE crises is uncontroversial. What is (...) controversial is whether we are on a path that adequately prepares us for the next event. The ethical and legal scholars in this volume hold that much work remains to be done and offer this book to stimulate further reflection and dialogue around CBRNE crises. This is an indispensable book for both students and scholars of bioethics, international law, public health, as well as for regulators and administrators developing policy and legislation related to public health planning and emergency responses. (shrink)

First responders to chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear (CBRN) events face decisions having significant human consequences. Some operational decisions are supported by standard operating procedures, yet these may not suffice for ethical decisions. Responders will be forced to weigh their options, factoring-in contextual peculiarities; they will require guidance on how they can approach novel (indeed unique) ethical problems: they need strategies for “on the spot” ethical decision making. The primary aim of this paper is to examine how first responders (...) should approach on the spot ethical decision-making amid the stress and uncertainty of a CBRN event. Drawing on the long-term professional CBRN experience of one of the authors, this paper sets out a series of practical ethical dilemmas potentially arising in the context of a large-scale chemical incident. We propose a broadly consequentialist approach to on the spot ethical decision-making, but one which incorporates ethical values and rights as “side-constraints”. (shrink)

The strategic use of disease and poison in warfare has been subject to a longstanding and cross-cultural taboo that condemns the hostile exploitation of poisons and disease as the act of a pariah. In short, biological and chemical weapons are simply not fair game. The normative opprobrium is, however, not fixed, but context dependent and, as a social phenomenon, remains subject to erosion by social (or more specifically, antisocial) actors. The cross cultural understanding that fighting with poisons and disease (...) is reprehensible, that they are taboo, is codified through a web of interconnected measures, principal amongst these are the 1925 Geneva Protocol; the Biological Weapons Convention; and the Chemical Weapons Convention. Whilst these treaties have weathered the storm of international events reasonably well, their continued health is premised on their being ‘tended to’ in the face of contextual changes, particularly facing changes in science and technology, as well as the changed nature and character of conflict. This article looks at the potential for normative erosion of the norm against chemical and biological weapons in the face of these contextual changes and the creeping legitimization of chemical and biological weapons. (shrink)

The theory of chemical symbiosis suggests that biological systems started with the collaboration of two polymeric molecules existing in early Earth: nucleic acids and peptides. Chemical symbiosis emerged when RNA-like nucleic acid polymers happened to fold into 3D structures capable to bind amino acids together, forming a proto peptidyl-transferase center. This folding catalyzed the formation of quasi-random small peptides, some of them capable to bind this ribozyme structure back and starting to form an initial layer that would produce (...) the larger subunit of the ribosome by accretion. TCS suggests that there is no chicken-and-egg problem into the emergence of biological systems as RNAs and peptides were of equal importance to the origin of life. Life has initially emerged when these two macromolecules started to interact in molecular symbiosis. Further, we suggest that life evolved into progenotes and cells due to the emergence of new layers of symbiosis. Mutualism is the strongest force in biology, capable to create novelties by emergent principles; on which the whole is bigger than the sum of the parts. TCS aims to apply the Margulian view of biology into the origins of life field. (shrink)

Starting from the conceptual premises of Garrod, who as long ago as 1902 spoke of chemical individuality, and of Burnet (1949), who recognized as self one's own molecular antigenic structures (as opposed to the antigenic alien: the non- self), the discovery and understanding of HLA antigens and of their extraordinarily individual and differentiated polymorphisms have gained universal recognition. Transplant medicine has now dramatically stressed, within man's knowledge of himself, the characteristic of his biological uniqueness. Today man, having become aware (...) of being a biological antigenic-molecular individuality which is unique and different from that of all of his fellow men (except for monozygotic twins), can therefore easily consider himself a true biological Ego. (shrink)

When Hippocrates wrote these words, some time after 430 BC, he and his colleagues could do little for either good or harm to sufferers from infectious disease. Indeed, they themselves were at particular risk. Thucydides, describing the so-called plague of Athens of 430 BC in his History of the Peloponnesian War, writes that “mortality among the doctors was the highest of all, since they came more frequently in contact with the sick.”.

This article explores the influence of textual structures on the acquisition of knowledge in popularization discourses related to biopesticides. Following a terminological insight into the linguistic and cognitive complexities of the notion, we proceed to a semantic analysis of press articles in major Anglo-Saxon newspapers, focusing on the explanation strategies used by the media to simplify their presentation. We show that in the mediation process, biopesticides are systematically described as being environmentally friendly, and opposed to chemical pesticides, consistently shown (...) to be detrimental to the environment. We hypothesize that this simplistic binary framing is exploited by journalists as it is easy to understand in a context of agroecological transition and commonly shared distrust for chemical pesticides. In that respect, it proves to be adequate for purposes of explanation and simplification. However, by outlining this discursive process based on duality, we aim to draw attention to the potential misconceptions of plant protection issues in general, and biopesticides in particular. We ultimately demonstrate that when adopting other perspectives, this dual framing proves to be inadequate for the construction of knowledge by any non-expert press reader. (shrink)

Since the introduction and widespread adoption of chemical herbicides, “weed management” has become almost synonymous with “herbicide management.” Over-reliance on herbicides and herbicide-resistant crops has given rise to herbicide resistant weeds. Integrated weed management (IWM) identifies three strategies for weed management— biological-cultural, chemical-technological, mechanical-physical—and recommends combining all three to mitigate herbicide resistance. However, adoption of IWM has stalled, and research to understand the adoption of IWM practices has focused on single stakeholder groups, especially farmers. In contrast, decisions about (...) weed management often occur within a social ecosystem where multiple stakeholder groups co-create knowledge and practices. To more holistically investigate perceptions and decision-making related to herbicide resistant weed management, we conducted 23 in-depth interviews in combination with Q methodology with farmers and public-/private-sector agricultural professionals in the state of Georgia (U.S.). Our investigation focused on the management of an increasingly herbicide resistant weed, Palmer amaranth, which enabled broader conversations about agricultural systems, farmer livelihoods, and sustainability. Factor and thematic analyses allowed us to identify and characterize two distinct typologies: one primarily valued agronomic efficiency and relied upon chemical-technological management practices, while the other valued diversifying weed management strategies as the pathway to agronomic and economic success. Typologies diverged substantially in attitudes toward the three weed management strategies, the role of technology, and systems management generally. These two viewpoints have implications for how we understand underlying stakeholder motivations and choices around weed management strategies, both of which are crucial in promoting and supporting farmer use of diverse, ecologically-sound, weed management strategies. (shrink)

In situations with limited medical resources, be they personnel, equipment, or time, clinicians use “triage” to determine which patients receive treatment. What type of treatment a patient receives depends on the triage “lottery” rules in place. Although these rules for sorting patients and distributing resources are standardized for most situations, they must be somewhat altered after overwhelming, nonstandard disasters.

ion and Ideation - The Semantics of chemical and biological fundamental concepts. The methods of abstraction and ideation are indispensable tools to introduce new concepts in a scientific terminology. The latter is paradigmatically introduced within the 'protophysical program' whereas abstraction is commonly applied in logics and mathematics. The application within the reconstruction of chemistry and biology causes several problems. Ideation appears to be inadequate whereas the application of abstraction necessitates a critical and minute examination of the corresponding equivalence (...) relations. These problems are solved by the introduction of the method of materially-synthetic abstraction which is exemplified by the introduction of the chemical concept of 'substance' and the biological concept of 'hereditary factor'. (shrink)

Following Kripke and Putnam, the received view of chemical kinds has been a microstructuralist one. To be a microstructuralist about chemical kinds is to think that membership in said kinds is conferred by microstructural properties. Recently, the received microstructuralist view has been elaborated and defended, but it has also been attacked on the basis of complexities, both chemical and ontological. Here, I look at which complexities really challenge the microstructuralist view; at how the view itself might be (...) made more complicated in order to accommodate such challenges; and finally, at what this increasingly complicated picture implies for our standard assessment of chemical kindhood—primarily, for the widespread assumption that chemical kinds in general are more neat and tidy than those messy biological ones. _1_ The Received View _2_ A Taxonomy of Chemical Kinds _3_ Atomic Number _4_ H2O, H3O+, OH−, and More _5_ Complicating the Microstructuralist Picture _6_ Concrete and Other Mixtures _7_ Macromolecules, Especially Proteins _8_ Abandoning Sameness of Elemental Composition _9_ Not So Different after All. (shrink)

The chemical characterization of the substance responsible for the phenomenon of “transformation” of pneumococci was presented in the now famous 1944 paper by Avery, MacLeod, and McCarty. Reception of this work was mixed. Although interpreting their results as evidence that deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) is the molecule responsible for genetic changes was, at the time, controversial, this paper has been retrospectively celebrated as providing such evidence. The mixed and changing assessment of the evidence presented in the paper was due to (...) the work’s interpretive flexibility – the evidence was interpreted in various ways, and such interpretations were justified given the neophytic state of molecular biology and methodological limitations of Avery’s transformation studies. I argue that the changing context in which the evidence presented by Avery’s group was interpreted partly explains the vicissitudes of the assessments of the evidence. Two less compelling explanations of the reception are a myth-making account and an appeal to the wartime historical context of its publication. (shrink)

The theory of numbers, the theory of computation and well-known biological and neurological studies on cognition and consciousness all indicate the concept of recursion as their common denominator. Mathematical recursion owes its meaning and properties to a dual relationship between its results, which always constitute a sequence, and the operator that generated them, which is instead invariant. This article proposes that this duality in recursion originates from the duality between the biological homeostatic equilibrium in living systems and the adaptive physico- (...) class='Hi'>chemical changes required to sustain such equilibria. Such duality gives order and meaning to the experiences of a living system. One of the many implications of this innovative perspective is that this duality can decouple computational results from our intuitive order relations, and that this can cause a rarefaction of the capacity of digital systems to convey communication and favour adaptation to the environment. (shrink)

We have synthesized a 582,970-base pair Mycoplasma genitalium genome. This synthetic genome, named M. genitalium JCVI-1.0, contains all the genes of wild-type M. genitalium G37 except MG408, which was disrupted by an antibiotic marker to block pathogenicity and to allow for selection. To identify the genome as synthetic, we inserted "watermarks" at intergenic sites known to tolerate transposon insertions. Overlapping "cassettes" of 5 to 7 kilobases (kb), assembled from chemically synthesized oligonucleotides, were joined by in vitro recombination to produce intermediate (...) assemblies of approximately 24 kb, 72 kb ("1/8 genome"), and 144 kb ("1/4 genome"), which were all cloned as bacterial artificial chromosomes in Escherichia coli. Most of these intermediate clones were sequenced, and clones of all four 1/4 genomes with the correct sequence were identified. The complete synthetic genome was assembled by transformation-associated recombination cloning in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, then isolated and sequenced. A clone with the correct sequence was identified. The methods described here will be generally useful for constructing large DNA molecules from chemically synthesized pieces and also from combinations of natural and synthetic DNA segments. 10.1126/science.1151721. (shrink)

This paper provides a short accountof the South African Defence Force's chemical and biologicalwarfare programme during apartheid, specifically during the period 1980 to 1994. It examines the circumstances ofrecruitment of the scientists and physiciansand their retention in the programme; detailsthe `scientific efforts' of the programme andits aberrations; and explores ethical issues inrelation to the involvement of scientists inthe programme.

The belief in the Darwinian theory of evolution appeared to be shaken when one tried to interpret statements of molecular biology in it. As a consequence there arose a theory of non-Darwinian neutral evolution. The supporters of this theory believe that under natural conditions no factors exist which can distinguish and select organisms on their internal (molecular) structure. In the opinion of these neutralists natural selection cannot in principle control the molecular constitution of organisms. Contrary to the viewpoint of (...) the critics of neutralism it is impossible to admit that nucleic acids, proteins and other biomolecules can evolve without the participation of natural selection. This controversy in contemporary theoretical biology can be solved by integrating the conceptions of molecular ecology with Darwinian theory. Molecular ecology acknowledges the interactions of organisms by means of chemical substances synthesized by them. Such chemical ecological factors play a leading part in the selective stages of biomolecular evolution. These diverse chemical ecological interrelations take place intensively when living beings interact with parasitic microbes. (shrink)

Jacques Monod (1971) argued that certain molecular processes rely critically on the property of chemical arbitrariness, which he claimed allows those processes to “transcend the laws of chemistry”. It seems natural, as some philosophers have done, to interpret this in modal terms: a biological relationship is chemically arbitrary if it is possible, within the constraints of chemical “law”, for that relationship to have been otherwise than it is. But while modality is certainly important for understanding chemical arbitrariness, (...) understanding its biological role also requires an account of the concrete causal-functional features that distinguish arbitrary from non-arbitrary phenomena. In this paper I elaborate on this under-emphasised aspect by offering a general account of these features: arbitrary relations are instantiated by mechanisms that involve molecular adapters, which causally couple two properties or processes which would otherwise be uncorrelated. Additionally, adapters work by acting as intermediate rather than cooperating causes. (shrink)

Explores the development of the ideas of evolutionary biology, particularly as affected by the increasing understanding of genetics and of the chemical basis of inheritance.

This article examines to what extent a particular case of cross-disciplinary research in the 1930s was structured by mechanistic reasoning. For this purpose, it identifies the interfield theories that allowed biologists and chemists to use each other’s techniques and findings, and that provided the basis for the experiments performed to identify plant growth hormones and to learn more about their role in the mechanism of plant growth. In 1930, chemists and biologists in Utrecht and Pasadena began to cooperatively study plant (...) growth. I will argue that these researchers decided to join forces because they believed to rely on each other’s findings and methods to solve their research problems adequately. In the course of the cooperation, organic chemists arrived at isolating plant growth hormones by using a test method developed in plant physiology. This achievement, in turn, facilitated biologists’ investigation of the mechanism of plant growth. Researchers eventually believed to have the means to study the relation between a substance’s molecular structure and its physiological activity. The way they conceptualized the problem of identifying hormones and unraveling the mechanism of plant growth, as well as their actual research actions are compatible with the new mechanists’ account of mechanism research. The study illustrates that focusing on researchers’ mechanistic reasoning can contribute considerably to explaining the structure of cross-disciplinary research projects. (shrink)

The process of condensation of an amorphous solid into a rigid matrix can often trap molecules in reversible binding sites. Exchange of the same molecular species with such sites is known to be sensitive to small chemical differences and to distinguish between enantiomers. In addition to their usefulness in chromatographic processes, such materials can separate, by solid phase extraction, specific compounds from complex mixtures. Furthermore, the trapped molecules can have their reactions guided and catalytically changed. The combination of this (...) spontaneously formed system of templates and catalytic sites may support a type of replication cycle, and suggests some pathways from simple chemistry toward the complexities of biology. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Complexity 11: 30–35, 2005 -/- . (shrink)

Patterns resulting from the sole interplay between reaction and diffusion are probably involved in certain stages of morphogenesis in biological systems, as initially proposed by Alan Turing. Self-organization phenomena of this type can only develop in nonlinear systems (i.e. involving positive and negative feedback loops) maintained far from equilibrium. We present Turing patterns experimentally observed in a chemical system. An oscillating chemical reaction, the CIMA reaction, is operated in an open spatial reactor designed in order to obtain a (...) pure reaction-diffusion system. The two types of Turing patterns observed, hexagonal arrays of spots and parallel stripes, are characterized by an intrinsic wavelength. We identify the origin of the necessary difference of diffusivity between activator and inhibitor. We also describe a pattern growth mechanism by spot splitting that recalls cell division. (shrink)

The concept of living has changed in time along the history of biology and its specificity has been associated or to a particular matter, active such as the chemical one, or was considered as a product of the spatial organization of a passive matter. Today, these two paths can be merged in the chemical perspective that takes account of the general reflections on the complexity and on the systemic, in the “systemic complexity” approach.

By the end of the Second World War the advancing allied forces discovered a new nerve gas in Germany. It was called Tabun. Codenamed GA, it was found to be extremely toxic. British experts were immediately dispatched to examine the agent. On arrival, they discovered that German scientists had also developed even more toxic nerve agents, including Sarin, known as GB. The first organized testing of Sarin on humans began in October 1951 at Porton Down in Wiltshire, Britain's biochemical warfare (...) establishment since the First World War. In February 1953, volunteer number 562 experienced the first recorded serious adverse reaction. Testing continued. Two months later, on April 27, six subjects were given 300 milligrams of Sarin. One of the volunteers, a man named Kelly, suffered serious ill effects, fell into a coma, but then recovered. Although asked by their superiors to reduce the amount tested to the “lowest range of dosage”—which would have been somewhere in the region of 10–15 milligrams—Porton's scientists continued their tests with a “lower” dosage, reducing it from 300 to 200 milligrams. (shrink)

To construct a synthetic cell we need to understand the rules that permit life. A central idea in modern biology is that in addition to the four entities making reality, matter, energy, space and time, a fifth one, information, plays a central role. As a consequence of this central importance of the management of information, the bacterial cell is organised as a Turing machine, where the machine, with its compartments defining an inside and an outside and its metabolism, reads (...) and expresses the genetic program carried by the genome. This highly abstract organisation is implemented using concrete objects and dynamics, and this is at the cost of repeated incompatibilities (frustration), which need to be sorted out by appropriate «patches». After describing the organisation of the genome into the paleome (sustaining and propagating life) and the cenome (permitting life in context), we describe some chemical hurdles that the cell as to cope with, ending with the specific case of the methionine salvage pathway. (shrink)

Integrated developmental and elemental information in teeth provide a unique framework for documenting breastfeeding histories, physiological disruptions, and neurotoxicant exposure in humans and our primate relatives, including ancient hominins. Here we detail our method for detecting the consumption of mothers’ milk and exploring health history through the use of laser ablation‐inductively coupled plasma‐mass spectrometry (LA‐ICP‐MS) mapping of sectioned nonhuman primate teeth. Calcium‐normalized barium and lead concentrations in tooth enamel and dentine may reflect milk and formula consumption with minimal modification during (...) subsequent tooth mineralization, particularly in dentine. However, skeletal resorption during severe illness, and bioavailable metals in nonmilk foods, can complicate interpretations of nursing behavior. We show that explorations of the patterning of multiple elements may aid in the distinction of these important etiologies. Targeted studies of skeletal chemistry, gastrointestinal maturation, and the dietary bioavailability of metals are needed to optimize these unique records of human health and behavior. (shrink)

An influential position in the philosophy of biology claims that there are no biological laws, since any apparently biological generalization is either too accidental, fact-like or contingent to be named a law, or is simply reducible to physical laws that regulate electrical and chemical interactions taking place between merely physical systems. In the following I will stress a neglected aspect of the debate that emerges directly from the growing importance of mathematical models of biological phenomena. My main aim (...) is to defend, as well as reinforce, the view that there are indeed laws also in biology, and that their difference in stability, contingency or resilience with respect to physical laws is one of degrees, and not of kind . (shrink)

Unless one embraces activities as foundational, understanding activities in mechanisms requires an account of the means by which entities in biological mechanisms engage in their activities—an account that does not merely explain activities in terms of more basic entities and activities. Recent biological research on molecular motors exemplifies such an account, one that explains activities in terms of free energy and constraints. After describing the characteristic “stepping” activities of these molecules and mapping the stages of those steps onto the stages (...) of the motors’ hydrolytic cycles, researchers pieced together from images of the molecules in different hydrolyzation states accounts of how the chemical energy in ATP is transformed in the constrained environments of the motors into the characteristic activities of the motors. We argue that New Mechanism’s standard set of analytic categories—entities, activities, and organization—should be expanded to include constraints and energetics. Not only is such an expansion required descriptively to capture research on molecular motors but, more importantly from a philosophical point of view, it enables a non-regressive account of activities in mechanisms. In other words, this expansion enables a philosophical account of mechanistic explanation that avoids a regress of entities and activities “all the way down.” Rather, mechanistic explanation bottoms out in constraints and energetics. (shrink)

The intersection of biology and religion has spawned exciting new areas of academic research that raise issues central to understanding our own humanity and the living world. In this comprehensive and accessible survey, Michael L. Peterson and Dennis R. Venema explain the engagement between biology and religion on issues related to origins, evolution, design, suffering and evil, progress and purpose, love, humanity, morality, ecology, and the nature of religion itself. Does life have a chemical origin - or (...) must there be a divine spark? How can religious claims about divine goodness be reconciled with widespread predation, suffering, and death in the animal kingdom? Peterson and Venema develop a philosophical discussion around such controversial questions. The book situates each topic in its historical, scientific, and theological context, making it the perfect introduction for upper-level undergraduates, graduate students, scholars, and the interested general reader. (shrink)

Exposure of man to chemical agents can occur intentionally, as in the treatment of disease, or inadvertently because the environment contains a wide range of synthetic or naturally occurring chemicals. The alkylating agents are a diverse group of compounds (Fig. 1) and comprise a good example of such xenobiotics, since much is known about their occurrence, and their biological effects include carcinogenicity, mutagenicity, toxicity and teratogenicity.Exposure to potentially carcinogenic alkylating agents such as nitrosamines may occur occupationally, from cigarette smoke, (...) from certain foodstuffs and even endogenously through the ingestion of the appropriate precursor chemicals.1 At the other extreme, the cytotoxic effects of agents such as the chloroethylating nitrosamides or mustards have been exploited in the design of certain antitumour drugs.2 The effectiveness of antitumour agents and the other, mostly adverse, biological effects of alkylating agents have been ascribed to their ability to damage cellular macromolecules, in particular DNA. This review concentrates on investigations carried out over the past two years on the role of DNA damage in carcinogenesis, but we shall see how recent advances in this area of research have also led to a better understanding of the mechanisms of the cytotoxic effects of alkylating antitumour agents. (shrink)

An emergent contradiction in the contemporary development of biological control is that of the prevalence of the substitution of periodic releases of natural enemies for chemical insecticides and the dominance of biotechnologically developed transgenic crops. Input substitution leaves in place the monoculture nature of agroecosystems, which in itself is a key factor in encouraging pest problems. Biotechnology, now under corporate control, creates more dependency and can potentially lead to Bt resistance, thus excluding from the market a key biopesticide. Approaches (...) for putting back biological control into the hands of farmers (from artesanal biotechnology for grassroots biopesticide production Cuban style to farmer-to-farmer IPM networks, etc.) have been developed as a way to create a farmer centered approach to biological control. (shrink)

Advances in molecular biology have generally been taken to support the claim that biology is reducible to chemistry. I argue against that claim by looking in detail at a number of central results from molecular biology and showing that none of them supports reduction because (1) their basic predicates have multiple realizations, (2) their chemical realization is context-sensitive and (3) their explanations often presuppose biological facts rather than eliminate them. I then consider the heuristic and confirmational (...) implications of irreducibility and argue that purely biochemical approaches are likely to be unsound and to be unable to confirm an important range of statements. I conclude by sketching criteria for scientific unity that do not entail reducibility and yet leave an important place for identifying underlying mechanisms. Molecular biology, properly understood, provides an excellent paradigm of non-reductive unity between different explanatory levels. (shrink)

This chapter sets the scene for the subsequent philosophical discussions by surveying a number of biological interventions that have been used, or might in the future be used, for the purposes of crime prevention. These interventions are pharmaceutical interventions intended to suppress libido, treat substance abuse or attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), or modulate serotonin activity; nutritional interventions; and electrical and magnetic brain stimulation. Where applicable, we briefly comment on the historical use of these interventions, and in each case we discuss (...) the evidence that they are effective, or might become so with further refinement. The chapter concludes with a comment on some potentially significant differences between the varieties of intervention that we canvass. (shrink)

A general equation is derived describing the concentration of all possible complexes of a central molecule with a set of ligands bound to the central molecule. This deduction allows the reaction rate constants for the binding of a given molecule to the central molecule to depend on the species of molecules already bound and the location of the molecules already bound. The model thus allows for structural alteration of the central molecule by binding. Functions describing the concentration dependence of any (...) effect whatever depending on the distribution of complexes are deduced. Possible applications and methods of application are indicated.II est dérivé une équation qui décrit la concentration des toutes les complexes d'une molécule centrale avec une collection de ligands connectés à la molécule centrale. La déduction montre comme les coefficients de la rapidité de reaction entre la molécule centrale et les molécules de la collection dépend de l'espèce et de la location des molécules déjà connectées.La modèle dérivée de l'équation montre les changements structurelles par la connection. Les functions qui décrivent la dependence de chaque effet à la concentration, sont dérivés. Ces effects dépendent aussi à la distribution des complexes. Des applications et des méthodes sont indiqués.Eine allgemeine Vergleichung hat man bekommen welche die Konzentration aller möglichen Komplexen eines zentralen Moleküles mit einer Reihe von „Ligands” verbunden mit dem zentralen Molekül beschreibt. Diese Folgerung gestattet dass die Reaktiongeschwindigkeit Konstanten für die Bindung eines gegebenen Moleküles mit dem zentralen Molekül abhÄngt von den Arten schon gegebenen Molekülen und die Ortsbestimmung der schon gebundenen Molekülen. Das Model zeigt die strukturelle Änderungen des zentralen Moleküls durch Bindung. Funktionen, die die Konzentrationband jedes Effektes beschreiben dass abhÄngt von der Distribution der Komplexen, sind abgeleitet.Mögliche Anwendungen und Methoden von Anwendung sind dargelegt. (shrink)

The question that probably emerges when the title of this work is read is if it is possible to establish any relation between philosophy and a scientific discipline such as molecular biology. The common opinion, shared even by many renowned biologists and philosophers, is that each of these disciplines has got its own without taking into account the results of the other. However, the relation between science and philosophy is nowadays one of the most challenging topics, where philosophers and (...) biologists meet and each other to better understand what life is and how it works. Philosophical concepts such as information, causality, semiotics and function can be seen as instruments for a philosophical approach to biological topics. The aim of this work is to see if, studying a biological example in depth, there are elements that fit with the informational paradigm that is proposed as a philosophical framework. Biology has been considered as a discipline in which objects can be reduced to the laws of physics and chemistry. A different approach can be seen in this work. The philosophy of Charles Sanders Peirce can help us to see biological systems as informational systems, where molecules are more than their chemical structure, indeed, the cell can deal with them from a semiotic point of view; that is, treating them as signs that stand for other molecules or processes, allowing the system to canalize all this information to its own benefit. (shrink)

A strong motivation for the human genome project was to relate biological features to the structure and function of small sets of genes, and ideally to individual genes. However, it is now increasingly realized that many problems require a "systems" approach emphasizing the interplay of large numbers of genes, and the involvement of complex networks of gene regulation. This implies a new emphasis on integrative, systems theoretical approaches. It may be called 'holistic' if the term is used without irrational overtones, (...) in the general sense of directing attention to integrated features of organs and organisms. In the history of biology, seemingly conflicting reductionist and holistic notions have alternated, with bottom-up as well as top-down approaches eventually contributing to the solutions of basic problems. By now, there is no doubt that biological features and phenomena are rooted in physico-chemical processes of the molecules involved; and yet, integrated systems aspects are becoming more and more relevant in developmental biology, brain and behavioural science, and socio-biology. -/- . (shrink)

I introduce a range of examples of different causal hypotheses about human mate selection. The hypotheses I focus on come from evolutionary psychology, fluctuating asymmetry research and chemical signaling research. I argue that a major obstacle facing an integrated biology of human behavior is the lack of a causal framework that shows how multiple proximate causal mechanisms can act together to produce components of our behavior.

In this article I think through Black feminism and queer theory to critically analyze toxicology. I focus on toxicology's conception of endocrine-disrupting chemicals, a class of toxicants that can cause epigenetic changes leading to inheritable health issues. I suggest that Black feminist interventions are particularly necessary for the study of toxicants because multiply marginalized populations are disproportionately more exposed to EDCs. The structural preconditions that generate this uneven, racialized, and sexualized toxic body-burden threaten to turn cultural constructions of race and (...) sex into biological realities. My discursive analysis of key scientific texts on toxicology, EDCs, and epigenetics underscores how Eurocentric biases and eugenic logics permeate and co-constitute biochemical matter. I further argue that these texts’ un/articulated norms regarding the human, sexual behavior, and evolutionary fitness undermine the usefulness of toxicological assessments for environmental justice. I close by urging scientist scholar-activists to reconceive the study of toxicants. A Black feminist approach to toxicity, I suggest, would not only situate chemical exposures in their sociopolitical contexts, but also radically revision what it means to be human. (shrink)

An influential position in the philosophy of biology claims that there are no biological laws, since any apparently biological generalization is either too accidental, fact-like or contingent to be named a law, or is simply reducible to physical laws that regulate electrical and chemical interactions taking place between merely physical systems. In the following I will stress a neglected aspect of the debate that emerges directly from the growing importance of mathematical models of biological phenomena. My main aim (...) is to defend, as well as reinforce, the view that there are indeed laws also in biology, and that their difference in stability, contingency or resilience with respect to physical laws is one of degrees, and not of kind. In order to reach this goal, in the next sections I will advance the following two arguments in favor of the existence of biological laws, both of which are meant to stress the similarity between physical and biological laws. (shrink)

Antipsychotic medications are sometimes imposed on psychiatric patients deemed dangerous to themselves and others. This is based on the assumption that treatment is safe and effective, and that recovery depends on biological adjustment. Under new laws, patients can be required to remain on these medications after leaving hospitals. However, survivors attest that forced treatment used as a restraint can feel like torture, while the consequences of withdrawal can also be severe.

When “general physiology” emerged as a basic field of research within biology in the early nineteenth century, Henri Ducrotay de Blainville (1777–1850) on the one hand and Johannes Peter Müller (1801–1858) on the other appealed to chemical analysis to account for the properties and operations of organisms that were observed to differ from what was found in inorganic compounds. Their aim was to establish laws of vital organization that would be based on organic chemical processes, but would (...) also be of use to explain morphological and functional differences among life forms. The intent of this paper is to specify for each of these leading physiologists the different presuppositions that provided theoretical frameworks for their interpretation of what they conceived of as laws of organization underpinning the dynamics of vital phenomena. Blainville presumed that the properties of organic compounds depended on the chemical properties of their constitutive molecules, but combined according to patterns of functional development, and that the latter could only be inferred from an empirical survey of modes of organization across the spectrum of life forms. For Müller, while all vital processes involved chemical reactions, in the formative and functional operations of organisms, these reactions would result from the action of life forces that were responsible for the production of organic combinations and thus for vital and animal functions. As both physiologists set significant methodological patterns for their many disciples and followers, their respective quasi-reductionist and anti-reductionist positions need to be accounted for. (shrink)