European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - March 2, 1993, Darmstadt, Hesse Scientists launch 200-year study of truffles fungi and healthy forests by Jeff Barnard the associated press Joyce Eberhart Knelt on the Forest floor using a Short handled Rake to probe the Damp decomposing twigs leaves and Needles for living hidden treasures a truffles and mushrooms. Quot found one Quot the Oregon state University research assistant said holding it up for Mike Amaranthus a Forest service soil scientist. Quot Ruiz Pogan pars to a he said reciting the truffle s Genus and species. Eberhart put it in a paper Sample bag and logged its location entering another piece of data in the Start of a 200-year study to map the secrets of the Forest that lie underground. Quot i feel like the people who designed the cathedrals and never saw Quot them actually built Amaranthus said. Quot we want to have some Good Baseline data so someone Ielse can make Good evaluations in the a ecologists have known for 100 years and foresters for perhaps 30 years that fungi that produce the mushrooms and truffles known As Mycorrhiza have evolved a partnership with Trees without which. Neither one can live. Meanwhile High prices for wild mushrooms have drawn crowds of commercial pickers into the Northwest Woods for a Harvest reported at $g0. Million last year in Oregon atone by the state department of agriculture a that leaves people like Amaranthus wandering whether the mushroom Rush ultimately could threaten the entire Forest where mushrooms and truffles make it possible for Trees to weather drought and draw nutrients from the soil. Quot there is no Good information Quot Amaranthus said. Quot the Only tiling we 1 have is the european experience which is a severe decline in the population of. Wild edible to find out he has researchers mapping fungi in Forest Sites from Alaska . Forest service soil scientist Mike Amaranthus worries that commercial mushroom picking is threatening the ecological balance in healthy forests to Southern Oregon which will be visited periodically to see How they fare after logging and fire. It s part of an Effort to gain a deeper understanding of How die Forest As a whole works. Quot it seems like All this should have been done before it s so fundamental Quot Amaranthus lamented. In 3 5 years of studying mushrooms Jim Trappe professor of Forest science at Oregon state University has never enjoyed abundant funding. And so Little work has been done on truffles which fruit underneath the Duff on the Forest floor that new species Are popping up All the time. The North. American ruffling society in Corvallis has at least 50 species in its herbarium waiting to be described and named. Quot i think we Are talking about Many Many hundreds of speeds yet to be discovered Quot Trappe said. The relationship Between Trees and mushrooms is Complex. Trees draw on different fungi in the various seasons of their lives. A single thimble Ful of soil can contain Miles of fungal filaments. After a Forest is clearcut the fungi die out within several months. Amaranthus said 95 percent of All Plant life depends on Mycorrhiza fungi to draw water and nutrients from the soil. The fungi attach to the roots of a Douglas fir for example and spread their Long hairline hyphae throughout the soil. There they link up with other Trees rain soaked logs and even rocks to pump water and nutrients to the Host. In return the fungi draw sugars from the tree. Quot the great evolutionary leap of plants was due to this Amaranthus said. Quot it allowed them to colonize a great hostile Amazon Frog mucus could Lead scientists to leap Forward in psychotropic drugs by the associated press most travellers take Home souvenirs suitable for entertaining guests. Katherine Milton tucked Frog mucus into her suitcase on leaving Brazil and May have advanced Medicine too. Quot it s just second nature to me to always reject Quot said Milton an Anthropol Gist at the University of California at Berkeley who first encountered the mucus in 1 >�17 watching a Hunting ritual. The material is now under stud at the National institutes of health in Bethesda my. Scientists found a peptide Adena Reutin in the Frog secretion a discovery published recently in the proceedings of the National Academy of sciences. The presence of the peptide Means the mucus May hold Promise for drugs to treat depression and stroke said Thomas Spande an Nih chemist. Milton came across the Frog mucus while studying How South american indigenous Peoples use the Forest for food and Medicine. Intrigued by Burn Marks on mayor Una Indian Hunters she asked How the Burns got there. The Hunters ran into the Forest and Quot came Back with the most Beautiful Frog i d Ever seen in my life she said. The men poked the Frog with a stick until it secreted a Glossy substance meant to spoil any predator s appetite. The Hunters mixed the mucus with saliva to make a paste burned themselves scratched off the burned skin and rubbed in the paste Quot within five to 10 minutes they Are in dire Straits Quot Milton said. The men vomited their eyes and lips puffed up and they Lay prostrate for about a Day. Once recovered the men claimed they could now Hunt All Day with Little food or drink and their arrows never missed. Quot in Many of these rituals just the Shock and the pain May cause the release of certain peptides that in fact make you feel pure Strong. Invincible Quot Milton said. That observation she said led her to think the substance deserved further investigation. Perhaps a used in smaller amounts a it would help in fighting psychological problems. To your health approving new drugs passive smoking s risk by or. Simeon Margolis the Baltimore Sun a can you explain Why it takes so Long before a promising new drug is available. A t perhaps a description of the approval process will explain Why it takes so Long an costs the pharmaceutical company so much Money before a drug is approved by the food and drug administration. A the pharmaceutical company does Laboratory and animal studies to show safety a and activity of the drug against a disease. Time 3v4 years. A the company files an investigation Al new drug application with the Fra to begin trials of the drug on people. The institutional review Board where the study will be conducted must also of the application. A phase i clinical trials determine Safe doses of the drug As Well As How die body handles the drug in 20 to 80 Normal healthy volunteers. Time 1 year. A phase u clinical trials Are carried out in 100 to 300 volunteers to assess drug effectiveness. Time 2 years. A phase 111 clinical trials Monitor How Well the drug works and Side effects of the drug in 1,000 to 3,000 patients. Time 3 years. Elf the results of these three phases of clinical trials demonstrate the safety and effectiveness of the drug the company files a new drug application with the Fra. The Fra reviews the data from the animal testing and clinical trials and decides whether to approve the drug. Time 6 months to 3 approval of the application allows physicians to prescribe the drug for their patients. My wife keeps nagging me about smoking in the House. She says it is my decision whether to kill myself by smoking cigarettes but that smoking in the House endangers her and our children. Is she right a experts now generally agree that significant health risks Are associated with secondhand or passive smoking that is inhaling other people s tobacco smoke. Recent estimates suggest that passive smoking is responsible Lor about 50,000 deaths annually among american nonsmokers. Passive smoking has recently been ranked right behind Active smoking and alcohol As the third leading cause of preventable death in this country. Studies show that smoke coming from the end of a burning cigarette Sld Stream smoke contains larger amounts of the substances that cause heart disease and lung cancer than is inhaled by the smoker directly through the cigarette. Noxious compounds in Sid Stream smoke Are carried on smaller particles than those found in direct smoke and Are deposited deeper in the lungs. Small particles Are cleared More slowly by the natural defences of the lungs and substances carried on these particles slowly dissolve into the lung tissues then enter the bloodstream where they add to narrowing of the coronary arteries. Or Simeon Margolis is a professor of Medicine and biological chemist at Johns Hopkins school of Medicine in Baltimore my. 20 the stars and stripes a tuesday March 2/1993
