Given the high resistance to heat and radiation of the infectious
agent in BSE type diseases has there been any research into the
possibility that high heating or radiation might cause the protein
deformations seen to accompany these diseases?
I'm thinking of the reports that high heating of beef can produce
cancer causing chemicals.
Bob Clark
enigl at aol.com (Davin C. Enigl) wrote in message news:<3ca62a11.27924152 at news.earthlink.net>...
> On Fri, 29 Mar 2002 15:10:21 -0600, "Paul F. Dietz"
> <dietz at interaccess.com> wrote:
>> >"Davin C. Enigl" wrote:
> >
> >> Yet, I read prions survive 1000C for 1 hour, and higher temperatures
> >> that would normaly "ash" naked amino acids.
> >
> >I seriously doubt prions survive unchanged for 1 hour at 1000 C.
> >Perhaps they get converted to a carbonized nanolump that
> >has a similar shape and can initiate the same conformational
> >chain reaction in the affected proteins.
> >
> > Paul
>> Well, never-the-less the I read article claimed the prion was still
> caused BSE, so I was not affected very much if at all -- certainly not
> to the point where anyone would claim they were denatured.
>> This "survival after ashing" was also stated as a fact, by Paul
> Brown's research at the US National Institutes of Health.
>> As you know, catalysts like prions must be quite specific via the
> "lock and key" theory. Therefore, I can not see how a break in say,
> the beta sheet conformation could still cause disease. The alpha
> helical form (normal) is easily denatured however.
>> Also, sterilization by heat alone is not enough to make me comfortable
> . . . we add a 1.0 M NaOH flood over the item to be sterilized and
> then autoclaving at 132 C for 5 hours is our current standard, --
> UCSF recommended this some years ago. I am not sure what F sub-zero
> at 132C that works out to for 1000C for 1 hour dry heat, -- but the
> NaOH water solution certainly must lower the D-value more than
> autoclaving alone.
>> This has significance for extreme-ophile research and
> Astromicrobiology theory.
>> -- Davin
