Excerpt: “You have a culture of bacteria and a computer that is monitoring how happy they are, namely how fast they grow,” explained Kishony. “If they are growing too fast it adds more drug.” In essence, it keeps the bugs unhappy and unhealthy, thus pressuring them continuously to adapt.”
Awake, and dreaming out loud:
It may soon make sense to use pheromones responsible for quorum sensing in one strain to suppress the pathological growth of other strains. The effect could potentially be measured in the morbidostat that these researchers designed. Measurements could help detail the molecular mechanisms involved in the typical colonization by one organism (in one tissue). This might avoid any harm done by attempts to entirely eliminate it, along with many commensal others. For example, few people know that broad spectrum antibiotics can cause peripheral neuropathy, although many people know about associated maladies of the digestive tract. The morbidostat could result in treatments that would suppress infection to levels typically managed by a competent immune system and reduce problems with mutations, as well as reduce the potential side effects. Antibiotic-induced peripheral neuropathy may be reason enough for the FDA to push for more research into molecular mechanisms, as indicated in their “Critical Path Initiative” for drugs that alter behavior; especially now that we are learning more about how bacteria influence our behavior.
James Vaughn Kohl was the first to accurately conceptualize human pheromones, and began presenting his findings to the scientific community in 1992. He continues to present to, and publish for, diverse scientific and lay audiences, while constantly monitoring the scientific presses for new information that is relevant to the development of his initial and ongoing conceptualization of human pheromones.
Recently, Kohl integrated scientific evidence that pinpoints the evolved neurophysiological mechanism that links olfactory/pheromonal input to genes in hormone-secreting cells of tissue in a specific area of the brain that is primarily involved in the sensory integration of olfactory and visual input, and in the development of human sexual preferences. His award-winning 2007 article/book chapter on multisensory integration: The Mind’s Eyes: Human pheromones, neuroscience, and male sexual preferences followed an award winning 2001 publication: Human pheromones: integrating neuroendocrinology and ethology, which was coauthored by disinguished researchers from Vienna. Rarely do researchers win awards in multiple disciplines, but Kohl’s 2001 award was for neuroscience, and his 2007 “Reiss Theory” award was for social science.
Kohl has worked as a medical laboratory scientist since 1974, and he has devoted more than twenty-five years to researching the relationship between the sense of smell and the development of human sexual preferences. Unlike many researchers who work with non-human subjects, medical laboratory scientists use the latest technology from many scientific disciplines to perform a variety of specialized diagnostic medical testing on people.
James V. Kohl is certified with:
* American Society for Clinical Pathology
* American Medical Technologists
James V. Kohl is a member of:
* Society for Neuroscience
* Society for Behavioral Neuroendocrinology
* Association for Chemoreception Sciences
* Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality
* International Society for Human Ethology
* American Society for Clinical Laboratory Science
* Mensa, the international high IQ society
