Politicome vs Corpusome

Are you as happy as a kid on his way to Disney World when you see a story on bribes from foreign countries, destroying subpoenaed emails or taking classified documents home? Or are you thinking it’s all like Captain Renaud in Casablanca, “I’m shocked, shocked to find out that there’s gambling going on in here. Your winnings sir. “Thank you very much.” That’s politics and the inevitable political corruption that seems to follow. Let’s call it the collection of politicians and their interrelationships, the “politicome.”

If that’s beginning to bore or depress you, try following the new sciences for a while.

The new sciences associated with the body are every bit as fascinating as ChatGPT. We are standing on the precipice of being able to alter our health in ways unimaginable a few presidents ago. The ones associated with the body have the suffix “omes” and include the collection of genes (genomes), microbes (microbiome), proteins (proteome) and now, electricity (electrome). Collectively, we could call them the “corpusome” (corpus is Latin for body).?

Mapping, or hacking, the human genome has brought tools like CRISPR-Cas9 that is allowing us to precisely edit genes to modify cells, tissue or organs. The promises associated with altering genes include eradicating genetic and non-genetic diseases as well as making better foods, green biofuels.?

Understanding the microbiome, the 39 trillion bacteria, viruses, archaea, and fungi that live in and on us will allow us to control the mix of bacteria to our benefit. Those benefits include reducing disease, obesity, and depression.?

The proteome is our collection of proteins that repair cells and make new ones. Some proteins coordinate biological processes and others help protect the body from foreign invaders. Mapping the proteome may help diagnose diseases and outcomes and provide for better more precise treatment of disease for individuals, i.e., precision medicine.

I have just finished a new book called, We Are Electric: Inside the 200-year Hunt for Our Body’s Bioelectric Code, and What the Future Holds. This book hypothesizes that the electrome may be even more important than the genome, microbiome and proteome .

In the book, author Sally Adee discusses the fact that the electricity that comes out of your electric socket is different from the bioelectricity that controls much of how our bodies work. In fact, every single cell in the human body - bone, skin, nerve, and muscle, is like a tiny rechargeable battery and governs how we develop into a human, how we heal, whether we get cancer or even how long we live.?

The book goes through multiple examples of how tinkering with the body's electrical circuits affects us. First, there was Geovanni Aldini in 1803 who administered a jolt from a battery he created to give him “a few days of insomnia but also a strange feeling of elation.”?

In the 1960s, Robert Heath treated a patient who wished to be “cured” of his homosexuality that was making him suicidal. Heath implanted his patient with an implant stimulator that focused on the brain’s pleasure centers and reward circuits. He reported that the patient “simulated himself…to...almost overwhelming euphoria and elation, and had to be disconnected, despite vigorous protests.”

In 1999, researchers in Belgium implanted DBS electrodes into people’s brains. Later, similar experiments allowed a thirteen-year-old autistic teenager to speak for the first time and allegedly stopped obese people from overeating and anorexic people from undereating. Other trials saw dramatic improvement from depression.?

In 2014, a paralyzed volunteer had two electrode arrays implanted into areas of the brain whose neurons respond to sensations in the fingers. As electricity was sent into brain neurons, he lay blindfolded next to a five-fingered robotic arm and was able to correctly identify which finger a researcher touched on the robotic hand.

Today, Elon Musk’s brain-computer startup, Precision Neuroscience, is clinically testing an FDA approved BCI (brain-computer interface) system that will also help paralyzed patients operate digital devices.

Using the cell's bioelectricity, we hope to be able to control epigenetics (gene functions) and ultimately prevent cancers from metastasizing, cure Parkinson’s, depression, addiction, regrow appendages or organs, and even reverse aging.

Ultimately, the copusome - the genome (and epigenome), microbiome, proteome and electrome are all part of the same body and work together. The claims about how they will help us are overlapping which implies that understanding how they interact and how they can be modified will someday soon help us to cure or prevent diseases and perhaps live much longer and healthier.

As for the “politicome,” vote em out, jail em, I don’t know – but for some of us, it’s getting a little tiresome and is not as interesting as the “corpusome.”

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