• Question: Hi....Do you have evidence to back up your predictions? Do you have any test results to prove your points?

    Asked by taz2010 to Claire, Greg, Jane, Jo, Nuruz, Vicki on 16 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Jo Broadbent

      Jo Broadbent answered on 15 Jun 2010:

      HI Taz

      Good question! I think you are definitely a budding scientist. You are so right – you must use evidence to back up predictions, and get results to prove your points.

      I use results from other scientists to design services to improve health. And if its a new service, I make sure we build in getting results to find out how well it actually worked. For example, we are helping GPs to find people who have serious health conditions and are using different approaches base don other people’s results. We want to compare how well the different approaches work in our community to see which actually works best.

      In heath services, things usually don’t work as well in ‘real life’ as they do in tests so we always need to keep getting results to ensure services keep working.

      Jo

    • Photo: Vicki Onions

      Vicki Onions answered on 16 Jun 2010:

      Hi Taz
      I have evidence from lab studies to show that tissue from ovaries that has been frozen and thawed does still work….for example the follicles in which the eggs grow are still alive and also some of the cells which make up the supportive tissue around the follicles are still alive and dividing. I will try and upload a picture for you on my profile bit (if i can work out how!) to show you some. So those results would support my prediciton that the whole ovary should work if you transplant it back in…however it doesn’t always work in practice 🙁

      hopefully i’ve just learnt how to put picutres in, so if it works, the picture below is a thin slice of ovarian tissue taken form a frozen and thawed whole ovary and stained with fluorescent stains which show live tissue as green and dead as red. Tihs picture shows most of the tissue is live and the green “halo’s” are live follicles (where the eggs grow) – i was mega excited when i got these reuslts

      [myimage1]

      hmm, not working – its on my profile page if you want to have a look

    • Photo: Greg FitzHarris

      Greg FitzHarris answered on 16 Jun 2010:

      Hi there — thats a very scientific question!!

      I suppose the answer is yes. Essentially thats how we work — we make a prediction (a ‘hypothesis’), and design an experiment which will answer the question. An example of this is a set of experiments we did recently…

      We hypothesised that a certain protein within the egg was very important for eggs to have the correct number of chromosomes (there were very good reasons to hypothesise this, which i wont bore you with here). So, to test this, we took good eggs with the correct number of chromoseomes and using some nifty techniques (which again ill spare you here), managed to get rid of that protein. We then counted the numberof chromosomes…and… low and behold… there was the correct number still. So, the hypothesis was WRONG!

      It doesnt matter that it was wrong — the important point is that the hyothesis was a sensible one (we werent the only people to have made this prediction) and that we now know the answer. We published that set of experiments in a science journal (like a magazine, in a way), so that other scientists know we’ve done it, and so know they dont need to do it any more…

      Nice Q

      Cheers
      G

    • Photo: Claire O'Donnell

      Claire O'Donnell answered on 16 Jun 2010:

      Yes. Before I suggest that a treatment might be a good thing for the NHS I have to be certain that the research evidence is strong enough to be sure that that’s right and that it will be just as effective people generally as well as the people who took part in the research.
      When I suggest a new way or working or using a treatment in a particular way it’s important that we have a clear idea of what the benefit of doing it will be so that we can judge if we’ve been successful or not and importantly if we haven’t to understand why. So, if some research suggests that the patients of doctors who do a lot of operations do better than those who do a few and I suggest that only a few doctors should do a particluar treatment and the others send all their patients to them, then I should see the number of people with complications fall and the number of people who do well rise.
      I think that Vicki, Nuruz, Jane and Greg will probably have more straightforward examples for you from their lab work.

Comments