How I came to write a book about atomic energy and life
Working in the laboratory of Dr. William B. Cosgrove at the University of Georgia in 1976 spurred my interest in cellular atomic energy.
I’d begun graduate studies at the University’s Institute of Ecology in 1975, helped by a “non-teaching” fellowship from the National Science Foundation worth $3300/year. The powers that be said I could skip a MS degree and go directly for a PhD by demonstrating an ability to conduct research equivalent to that for an MS (but without the requirement to write a thesis).
That sounded good to me. Dr Cosgrove—a prominent authority on trypanosomes and other human parasites—provided space in his laboratory and access to equipment. He also suggested my research project—turning red blood cells inside out.
A few years earlier, Theodore Steck and co-workers had published a paper in Science, “Inside-Out Red Cell Membrane Vesicles: Preparation and Purification.” They described how to turn red blood cells into inverted “ghosts”: Disrupt the membranes and the red hemoglobin leaks out, then reseal them as inside-out vesicles.
The inside-out vesicles proved to be fairly leak-proof. This led researchers to study the enzymes that move substances in and out of red blood cells.
One of these enzymes is the sodium pump—the Na+/K+ ATPase enzyme. Found in all animals, it removes excess sodium ions (Na+) from the cell while letting in potassium ions (K+). As one might expect for an enzyme involved in transporting substances in and out of the cell, it is embedded within the cell membrane. Energy to run the pump is provided by splitting off the terminal phosphate group from adenosine triphosphate (ATP)—hence “ATPase.”
Human red blood cells are specialized for oxygen transport and carbon dioxide removal. Unlike other cells, they have no nucleus with chromosomes, and no mitochondria for producing ATP in larger amounts. They rely on “glycolysis”—splitting sugar molecules—to obtain enough ATP to drive enzymes like the Na+/K+ ATPase.
I would visit the local hospital and get a bag of donated blood that had passed its expiry date. Following the procedures in the paper by Steck and coworkers, I ruptured the cells, centrifuged them to separate the ghosts from the hemoglobin and other original cell contents, and resuspended them in a medium that induced them to reseal into inside-out vesicles.
The Na+/K+ ATPase enzyme, being embedded within the membrane, was retained in the vesicles and presumably remained functional. I was able to show that, with added ATP, the Na+/K+ ATPase enzyme pumped sodium into the resealed inside-out vesicles—success!
This piqued my interest in this enzyme. It was discovered in 1957 by a Danish scientist, Jens Christian Skou, who was awarded a Nobel Prize forty years later. I read articles about about the “ATP synthase” enzyme that produces the ATP energy to run the sodium pump, and about the Na+/K+ ATPase enzyme itself. To quote from the 1997 Nobel award speech:
“It functions as a biological “pump” that transports potassium ions into a cell, while transporting sodium ions in the opposite direction out of the cell. This is a process that requires a lot of energy, and up to one third of the ATP formed in the body may be used to drive the Na+,K+ pump.”
To provide a bit more detail, the enzyme transports three sodium ions (Na⁺) out of the cell and two potassium ions (K⁺) into the cell in a sequential, “ping-pong” fashion—not all at once.
This made me recall the “Biological Transmutations” book my father had given me several years earlier. A French researcher, Louis Kervran, proposed that cells can carry out nuclear reactions, such as the fusion of sodium and oxygen to make potassium, or even the splitting off of oxygen from potassium to make sodium.
I wondered if the sodium pump might use such reactions. Sodium-oxygen fusion reactions, which yield energy, could produce potassium within the cell. This energy could be offset by splitting oxygen off from potassium, a reaction that would require a lot of energy and leave sodium outside the cell.
I discussed this possibility with Dr. Cosgrove. Might there be any scientific journals that would be willing to publish this kind of speculation? He listened carefully. Rather than rejecting this outright, he said that a lot more work would be needed.
In the late 1990s the Greek scientist Panos Pappas proposed something along the same lines. Instead of pumping sodium and potassium ions back and forth across cell membranes, the cell transmutes these elements into one another. Pappas never published this in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.
Mainstream scientists would scoff at this. Ask AI about Kervran and it will say something like this: “It is important to note that Kervran's theories have no scientific basis and are completely discredited by modern physics, chemistry, and biology.”
I take issue with the notion that Kervran’s theories are “completely discredited.” Rather, they have never been seriously investigated. I lack the means to carry out such investigations, but my book suggests how this could be done—if there are any courageous scientists out there!
Comments