http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/39098 2017-07-09T21:35:55Z 2017-07-09T21:35:55Z Sokol, Joshua (Joshua Daniel) http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/101365 2016-03-01T07:16:42Z 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z

The reef at the end of the world Sokol, Joshua (Joshua Daniel) Flippers first, I splash into the year 2100. Graduate student Hannah Barkley and I are swimming in Nikko Bay, among the Rock Islands of Palau. Here the warm blue-green water resembles naturally what the tropical Pacific will be like by the end of the century, as carbon emissions take an ever-greater toll on the seas. It should be a window into a dire, climate-change future. But things here look fine. In Palau's Nikko Bay and a few other acidified Rock Island sites, life appears to be shrugging off a sneak preview of the coral-reef apocalypse. Now Barkley, her boss Cohen, and the rest of the team are trying to answer a few pressing questions. Are the corals really okay? And if so, how? Moreover, what does that mean? Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Comparative Media Studies, 2015.; Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.

2015-01-01T00:00:00Z Schwartz, Sarah L. (Sarah Leah) http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/101364 2016-03-01T07:16:42Z 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z

Owning the code of life : human gene patents in America Schwartz, Sarah L. (Sarah Leah) In 2013, the United States Supreme Court heard the case of Association of Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics. The case asked one question: are human genes patentable? Gene patents became commonplace during the biotechnology revolution of the 1980s, but generated a complex web of moral, legal, and biological questions. While some viewed gene patents as necessary in promoting and sustaining innovation, others felt that owning the code of life was morally and legally misguided. This tension played a central role in the early years of the Human Genome Project, and continued as people experienced the challenging consequences of assigning property rights to our shared biology. Several patients with genetic diseases were forced to navigate limited or expensive testing because of a company's genetic monopoly. Some scientists worried that their research might infringe a patent. When the Supreme Court decided the Myriad trial, ruling that unaltered human genes were not patent-eligible, their decision marked a surprising and historic shift in the relationship between patent law and fundamental biology-but questions and uncertainty about a future without gene patents remain. Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Comparative Media Studies, 2015.; Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.; Includes bibliographical references (pages 49-54).

2015-01-01T00:00:00Z Nowogrodzki, Anna (Anna Rose) http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/101363 2016-03-01T07:16:41Z 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z

Sex, drugs, and women's desire Nowogrodzki, Anna (Anna Rose) Low desire is the most common sexual dysfunction in women. Pharmaceuticals are being developed to treat it, most notably Flibanserin, owned by Sprout Pharmaceuticals. Sometimes inaccurately referred to as "female Viagra," Flibanserin actually treats an entirely different problem. Viagra allows men to get an erection, meaning that it treats physical arousal problems. Flibanserin, and other drugs for low sexual desire in women, act on the brain. Women with low desire don't have a problem with physical arousal or with orgasm, but with desiring sex before it starts. Most women with low sexual desire disorder have partners with higher desire than they do. So is low desire a medical, physiological problem in the brain? Or is it a sociocultural, interpersonal issue? Some experts think that the majority of women with what has been called a "disorder" of low sexual desire have no abnormal physiological problem, but instead are living in a sociocultural and medical system that encourages them to think of themselves as broken, and may be best treated with non-pharmaceutical methods. Other experts think that low desire is a physiological problem and drugs are important to treat it. Cultural shame around communicating about sex, undervaluing of women's sexuality compared to men's, and unrealistic sexual expectations all feed into and complicate the issue. Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Comparative Media Studies, September 2015.; Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. "September 2015."; Includes bibliographical references (pages 28-34).

2015-01-01T00:00:00Z Greshko, Michael A. (Michael Anthony) http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/101362 2016-03-01T07:16:40Z 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z

There and back again? : reproducibility and the hunt for a human compass sense Greshko, Michael A. (Michael Anthony) Living creatures must navigate their environments in search of food, reproductive opportunities, and better habitats, and they use many stimuli in order to do so. After centuries of skepticism, biologists in the 1960s convincingly demonstrated that the Earth's weak, omnipresent magnetic field was also detectable by animals trying to orient themselves in space, a sense dubbed magnetoreception. Long enchanted with animal migration, University of Manchester biologist Robin Baker asked a fateful question: Why not humans? From 1976 to the late 1980s, Baker amassed evidence that he claimed as proof that humans had a magnetic homing sense. When Baker's experimental subjects were blindfolded and displaced in a variety of settings, they could orient better than chance toward their original location or along assigned compass directions. Subjects wearing magnets on their heads, however, could not. Problematically for Baker, his peers were largely unable to replicate his results, leading to a passionate academic debate that lasted throughout the 1980s. His critics lambasted him over issues of experimental design, unconscious bias, and statistical false positives, while Baker accused his critics of misrepresenting their own data. Having exhausted his interest in the field-and undoubtedly weary of the challenges to his work-Baker stopped studying magnetoreception in the late 1980s, though he stands by his claims to this day. No researcher since has taken up the question of human magnetoreception with similar commitment, and Baker's results have remained controversial and largely unaccepted by the larger scientific community. Baker's case illustrates the necessity of reproducibility in science and underscores science's messy realities, a point similarly shown by controversial incidences of "pathological science," including Blondlot's discovery of N-rays, Weber's detection of gravitational waves, and Fleischmann and Pons' announcement of cold fusion. Baker's pursuit of the human magnetic sense also provides insight into the importance-and potentially self-deceiving dangers-of passion as a motivating force for scientists. Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Comparative Media Studies, 2015.; Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.; Includes bibliographical references (pages 31-35).

2015-01-01T00:00:00Z