Tulasi Jinka

Hibernation is an essential survival strategy for some animals and scientists have long thought it could also hold promise for human survival. But how hibernation works is largely unknown. Scientists at the University of Alaska Fairbanks have successfully induced hibernation at will, showing how the process is initiated. Their research is published in the July 26 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience.

A hibernating animal has a reduced heart rate and blood flow similar to a person in cardiac arrest, yet the hibernator doesn’t suffer the brain damage that can occur in people.

“Understanding the neuroprotective qualities of hibernating animals may lead to development of a drug or therapy to save people’s lives after a stroke or heart attack,” said Kelly Drew, senior author and UAF professor of chemistry and biochemistry in the Institute of Arctic Biology.

Hibernating animals survive by severely reducing their metabolism, a condition called torpor, in which oxygen consumption can fall to as low as one percent of resting metabolic rate and core body temperature to near or below freezing temperatures.

Arctic ground squirrels, like all animals and people, produce a molecule called adenosine that slows nerve cell activity.

“When a squirrel begins to hibernate and when you feel drowsy it’s because adenosine molecules have attached themselves to receptors in your brain,” said Tulasi Jinka, lead author and a postdoctoral fellow in Drew’s lab.

The receptors can be regulated by a simple cup of coffee. A caffeine molecule is similar enough in structure to adenosine that it binds to the receptors and effectively stops or reverses the onset of drowsiness. Jinka and Drew wanted to know what substances trip the squirrels’ switch to start to hibernate.

“We devised an experiment in which non-hibernating arctic ground squirrels were given a substance that stimulated adenosine receptors in their brains. We expected the substance to induce hibernation,” Drew said. “We also gave a substance similar to caffeine to arouse hibernating ground squirrels.”

The non-hibernating squirrels were tested three times during one year. They were tested during the summer when they were not hibernating, again early in their hibernation season and a third time midway through the hibernation season. If animals were hibernating before the test, Jinka woke them up to see if the substance would cause them to go back into hibernation. To ensure that his expectations did not influence the results he delivered a placebo in the same manner as the drug and did not know which solution contained the active substance when he conducted the experiments.

Torpor was induced in all six of the squirrels awoken during mid-hibernation season, but in only two of the six from the early hibernation season group and in none during the summer season. The caffeine-like substance reversed torpor in all of the hibernating squirrels.

“We show for the first time that activation of the adenosine receptors is sufficient to induce torpor in arctic ground squirrels during their hibernation season,” Jinka said, who conducted this experiment while he was a graduate student.

What Jinka and Drew don’t yet know is how season causes the receptors to become increasingly sensitive to adenosine as the time of hibernation progresses.

Jinka and Drew are expanding their adenosine research to rats, which more closely resemble the physiology of humans.

“Rats allow us to move toward being able to apply this research to humans,” Jinka said.

ADDITIONAL CONTACTS: Tulasi Jinka, postdoctoral fellow, 907-474-1129, [email protected]. Kelly Drew, professor of chemistry and biochemistry, 907-474-7190, [email protected].

NOTE TO EDITORS: The lead author’s first name in his native Telugu language is Tulasiram. He has anglicized it to Tulasi, but in India Tulasi is a women’s name. Please note that email is the best method to contact Jinka.

Photo by Greg Walker
The unmanned aerial vehicle Scout flies over Prince William Sound during testing this month.

The use of unmanned aerial vehicles will have a new role in oil spill response capabilities in Alaska. The University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute and BP Exploration Alaska demonstrated the use of a three-pound unmanned aircraft, called “Scout,” as a way of gathering 3-D aerial data to aid in oil spill clean up efforts. Through the use of this technology, oil spill responders can complete Shoreline Clean-up and Assessment survey work with minimal impact on the shoreline or critical habitat.

The University of Alaska received approval from the Federal Aviation Administration to operate the unmanned aerial vehicle in Alaska for research purposes. The demonstration focused on improving oil spill response and clean up capabilities in the difficult terrain and conditions seen in Prince William Sound.

BP funded the demonstration that took place in mid-July and representatives from the U.S. Coast Guard and the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation also participated.

Aeryon Labs of Waterloo, Ontario designed the Scout as a multipurpose imaging and surveillance platform. The Scout is battery powered and has a range of up to 1.8 miles. Its flight duration lasts up to 25 minutes with a payload and can reach a maximum speed of 30 miles per hour.

The unmanned aerial vehicle is capable of retrieving high-resolution geo-referenced images of the coastline, stitched together to form a complete mosaic of the region of interest and used to generate a three-dimensional reconstruction of the area.

ADDITIONAL CONTACTS: Greg Walker, University of Alaska Unmanned Aircraft Program manager, at 907-455-2102 or [email protected]. Steve Rinehart, BP Exploration Alaska press officer, at 907-564-5668 [email protected]. Marni McVicar, Aeryon Labs, at 519-489-6726, x234 or [email protected].

NOTE TO EDITORS: Photos and videos are available at www.uafnews.com and www.aeryon.com.

Marmian Grimes
907-474-7902
7/25/11

The University of Alaska Fairbanks will be conducting a disaster response exercise this week, July 26 through 28.

During the exercise, there will be test communications and exercise activities happening at a variety of locations around campus and in the community. Visitors to campus are encouraged to watch for signs and emergency vehicles and plan for traffic delays at some locations on campus.

Exercise communications will be available online at uafalert.alaska.edu or by calling 474-7UAF.

MEDIA CONTACT: Marmian Grimes, UAF public information officer, at 907-474-7902 or via e-mail at [email protected].

ON THE WEB: uafalert.alaska.edu 

MLG/7-25-11/018psa-12

Marmian Grimes

907-474-7902

7/22/11

The University of Alaska Fairbanks will host experts from 12 nations July 24-27 for a workshop examining international policy issues involving the Arctic Ocean.

The workshop, “The Arctic Ocean Beyond National Jurisdiction,” is expected to draw about 60 arctic experts and policymakers from around the world.

“We will consider the politics, economics, legal frameworks and use of resources in the Arctic Ocean outside the bounds of national arctic nation jurisdiction,” said UAF professor Lawson Brigham, who is leading the workshop with UAF Vice Chancellor Mike Sfraga.

The workshop is an outgrowth of Chancellor Brian Rogers’ goal to position UAF as a leader in arctic policy issues.

The workshop highlights UAF’s unique role in discussions about the Arctic and ways in which these discussions affect the state of Alaska, Sfraga said.

Workshop speakers include U.S. Sen. Mark Begich, Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell, U.S. Arctic Research Commission chairwoman Fran Ulmer and Canadian Polar Commission chairman Bernie Funston. Three working groups will focus on living resources and scientific research, marine navigation and security, and international seabed and extended Continental Shelf.

The workshop is jointly hosted by the UAF School of Natural Resources and Agricultural Sciences and the UA Geography Program and the Marine and Environmental Law Institute at Dalhousie University, one of Canada’s leading universities emphasizing marine research. PEW Charitable Trusts is the workshop’s primary sponsor. Other sponsors include Total Foundation of France, the Canadian Consulate of Anchorage and the Natural Resources Defense Council. The workshop is not open to the public, however, the final workshop report will be publicly available.

ADDITIONAL CONTACTS: Nancy Tarnai, SNRAS information officer, at 907-474-5042 or [email protected] Mike Sfraga or Lawson Brigham at 907-474-7317.

NOTE TO EDITORS: Contact Tarnai to schedule interviews with participants during breaks and receptions.

Ned Rozell
907-474-7468
7/22/2011

An Alaska college professor was not surprised when the lights went out over the northern tier of the U.S. and southeast Canada about 10 years ago.

David Newman studies the workings of complex, chaotic systems as part of his research at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. He and three colleagues once wrote a paper about “cascading” power blackouts similar to the largest in the history of the world, which affected 50 million people on August 14, 2003.

Newman is a physics professor who uses a variety of computers to model gargantuan interconnected systems that fail catastrophically, including power transmission grids, intercity cars and trucks halted during traffic jams, and huge communications systems like the Internet, which can be disrupted by a single computer worm.

A satellite image of the northeastern U.S. taken by the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program on Aug. 14, 2003 at 9:03 p.m., when a blackout affected 50 million people.

From his office on the University of Alaska Fairbanks campus, Newman described the vulnerability of the large systems that bring power to homes in much of North America.

“Events like (the blackout of 2003) happen for two reasons: we sit on the teetering edge of collapse with our power demands, plus we’re interconnected,” he said.

Most cities do not have power generators large enough to provide enough electricity during times of peak demand, such as a hot summer day in New York City.

“If we had to supply each city on its neighboring power plants in times of peak need, forget it,” Newman said.

To satisfy the call for power at peak times, electrical utilities buy power from other plants. Though Alaska’s electrical power systems are separate from the Lower 48, a few large regions of the U.S. are connected. The intertwined nature of the system makes it possible to share electricity, but the connected lines also make the system prone to avalanching power outages, such as the blackout that cut the electricity of 50 million Americans and Canadians in nine seconds.

In a possible scenario for the blackout of 2003 reported by the Cleveland Plain Dealer, a 600-megawatt coal-fed generator in Eastlake, Ohio shut down, tripping a transmission line, then a second line sagged into a tree in a nearby town and shorted out. The damage to the second line shunted too much power to other lines in Ohio, many of which shut down. With so many customers then without electricity, power from generators working at full capacity surged through lines in central Michigan, causing protective relays to trip and shutting off power there. In seconds, the same scenario played out at power plants and transmission stations from Michigan to Toronto to New York, cutting electricity to a large portion of the U.S. but preventing serious damage to power plants and transmission lines.

One problem with the electrical system of North America is a 2 percent increase of U.S. power demand each year and a lack of simultaneous upgrades to power generators and transmission lines, Newman said.

“Couple this to some hot summer days and we have a system sitting on the edge waiting for something to push it over,” Newman wrote in an editorial he submitted to the Washington Post.

What’s the solution for the way we generate, transmit, and share our electricity? Newman said that while it will be possible to prevent the specific problems that caused the 2003 blackout, other, unpredictable problems as small as a squirrel chewing through insulation at a power-transmission substation will continue to threaten the system. In the short run, people can manage the power problem by installing more power wires to spread out the load and by increasing the capacity of power plants. In the long run, as Newman wrote in another paper “major disruptions from a wide variety of sources are a virtual certainty in a complex system.”

This column is provided as a public service by the Geophysical Institute at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, in cooperation with the UAF research community. Ned Rozell is a science writer at the institute. This column first appeared in 2003.

Marmian Grimes
907-474-7902
7/21/11

The University of Alaska Fairbanks is hosting free Alaska-themed lectures throughout the summer, Tuesdays and Wednesdays at 7 p.m. in Schaible Auditorium on the UAF campus.

On Tuesday, July 26, Marsha Munsell will offer the Land & Sea lecture “Fermentation: A New Look at an Old Preservation Method.” On Wednesday, July 27th, Lissa Hughes will give the Discover Alaska Lecture, “Community Resilience and Self-Reliance through Local Food.”

Lectures are free and open to the public.  For more information, including a full schedule of upcoming events, visit www.uaf.edu/summer or call 907-474-7021.

MEDIA CONTACT: Marmian Grimes, UAF public information officer, at 907-474-7902 or via e-mail at [email protected].

ON THE WEB:

http://www.uaf.edu/summer/summer-events/land-and-sea/

http://www.uaf.edu/summer/summer-events/discover-alaska/

NAW/7-21-11/016-12

Marmian Grimes
907-474-7902
7/20/11

The University of Alaska Fairbanks will host this week’s Family Cultural Night, Monday, July 25 at 7 p.m. in Schaible Auditorium on the UAF campus.

Join associate professor of German Josef Glowa as he shares experiences from his home country.

This family-friendly event is free and open to the public.  Parking is available at no charge in the evenings.

For more information visit www.uaf.edu/summer or call 907-474-7021.

MEDIA CONTACT: Marmian Grimes, UAF public information officer, at 907-474-7902 or via e-mail at [email protected].

ON THE WEB: http://www.uaf.edu/summer/summer-events/cultural-night/

NAW/7-20-11/015psa-12

Marmian Grimes
907-474-7902
7/20/11

The Alaska History Store at the University of Alaska Fairbanks will host its 20th annual Golden Days Sale July 21-23 on the main floor of Sadler’s Home Furnishings in downtown Fairbanks.

The sale will feature reproductions of Alaska’s historical photographs, maps and panoramas. Prices start at as low as $4 per print.

The sale will be open July 21-22 9:30 a.m. – 6 p.m. and July 23 from 9:30 a.m. – 3 p.m.

For more information call 907-474-6344 or visit www.alaskahistorystore.org.

MEDIA CONTACT: Marmian Grimes, UAF public information officer, at 907-474-7902 or via e-mail at [email protected].

ON THE WEB: www.alaskahistorystore.org

NW/7-20-11/014psa-12

Marmian Grimes
907-474-7902
7/19/11

The University of Alaska Fairbanks will be conducting a disaster response exercise on campus Tuesday, July 26 through Thursday, July 28. The event is scenario-based and will include responders from organizations throughout the Fairbanks North Star Borough.

Exercise activities will take place at a variety of locations on campus, including the Butrovich Building and West Ridge areas, the Taku parking lot and the University Park Building. Members of the public and campus community are encouraged to watch for emergency vehicles and be prepared to encounter traffic delays in some sections of campus.

Each day of the exercise will focus on a different aspect of emergency response. On the first day, law enforcement agencies will role-play their investigation to learn how the different jurisdictions might interact during a real domestic terrorism incident. On the second day, exercise controllers will simulate an explosion in the Taku parking lot and emergency responders will have an opportunity to practice mass-casualty search and rescue and medical triage. In addition, local hospitals will practice their plans for handling a surge of patients and the Butrovich Building will participate in a bomb threat exercise and evacuation. On the third day, UAF will activate its Campus Incident Management Team, which includes a variety of campus leaders and staff members who are trained to support emergency operations both at UAF and in the community.

ADDITIONAL CONTACTS: Randy Pommenville, UAF emergency management coordinator, at 907-474-5143 or [email protected]

NOTE TO EDITORS: Members of the media are invited to cover all or part of the exercise. Please contact Grimes by July 21, as journalists will need credentials to enter the exercise perimeter.

MG/7-19-11/013ma-12

Nancy Tarnai
907-474-5042
7/17/2011

If slow and steady truly does win the race, Nancy Davidian and Chris DuBois are on the right track at Arctic Roots Farm.

When the couple bought their 74 acres four years ago they weren’t even seeking to purchase that much land. “You can’t buy five acres,” DuBois said. “They’re either zoned inappropriately or priced for prime real estate.”

Davidian considers the property to be a heavenly place so they went ahead and settled on the old homestead. It took the first year to clean everything up, and because it came with three residences, they focused on getting the houses up to par to provide income for the farm.

Slowly, the couple has been working to get the farm operating. Every corner of Arctic Roots is ship-shape and the animals are fat and happy. In addition to 25 acres of hay, Davidian and DuBois raise geese, ducks, turkeys and chickens and they have bee hives. They are also steadily working to create a perennial garden in a one-acre moose-proof fenced area with gooseberries, cranberries, raspberries, currants, asparagus, horseradish and a variety of fruit trees.

Photo by Nancy Tarnai
Nancy Davidian and Chris DuBois at Arctic Roots Farm

Since Davidian and DuBois are both nurses, the farm is a second job for them. Davidian is a public health nurse and DuBois works at Fairbanks Memorial Hospital. They rent their “extra” houses as “bed and breakfast” lodging or as temporary lodging for newcomers.

“We are still trying to get off the ground,” Davidian said. “We spent a lot of time on infrastructure.” Carefully strategizing for the future, the couple created marketing plans for an on-site market, a you-pick farm and a community supported agriculture model where customers pay a flat fee at the beginning of the summer and get shares of whatever grows all season.

Davidian and DuBois greatly admire Calypso Farm and Ecology Center in Ester. “They are a role model for us,” Davidian said. “Promoting health and community are what we are trying to do too.” Though Calypso is a nonprofit and Arctic Roots is a business, the couple admires the foundations that Calypso has laid.

They even created a mission statement: “In a warm inviting atmosphere, Arctic Roots Farm is dedicated to a sustainable approach toward the production and sales of diverse, naturally grown whole foods and agricultural products that promote community, nutrition and health.”

Photo by Nancy Tarnai
Nancy Davidian and Chris DuBois at Arctic Roots Farm

While DuBois grew up on a wheat farm in eastern Colorado, he said he didn’t really have a strong knowledge of farming. “I’ve always been a gardener,” he said. The rest has been self-taught.

Davidian hails from an Ohio suburb and though she had an appreciation for the outdoors she wasn’t familiar with farming at all. But she appreciates the “back to basics” kind of life at Arctic Roots where it’s easier to see where food comes from and to make a cup of tea with herbs growing on the land.

Butchering their own birds causes Davidian to pay more attention to what she is consuming and to have more intention about what she eats, she said.

“I love being here,” she said. “I love the animals and dream about having more.” She finds it particularly sweet to share farm life with children from the neighborhood. The downside? Farming puts a damper on travel. “The animals depend on you, which is a nice thing but you’re always thinking about them.”

DuBois finds that farming keeps him physically fit. “It gives us a little better control of what we eat,” he said. The challenge to it is trying to stay out of debt. “We’re doing everything out of pocket so it is taking so long. By the time I’m 70 maybe it will be done.”

One thing he is wistful for is the close-knit farm community he recalls from his childhood. “You knew all the other farmers,” he said. “It’s not like that here.”

Arctic Roots supplies Homegrown Market with honey and Julia’s Solstice Café with eggs. The couple looks forward to establishing a CSA, even if it is only to people on their street, Esro Road at 4 mile Chena Hot Springs Road.

In the winter they enjoy cross-country skiing and Davidian knits, but this time of year they are devoted to the farm when they are not at their nursing jobs. “It’s definitely a learning place,” Davidian said.

Contact information:
www.arcticrootsfarm.com

This column is provided as a service by the UAF School of Natural Resources and Agricultural Sciences and the Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station. Nancy Tarnai is the school and station’s public information officer.