Vincent Eaton’s tale of his encounter with a tapeworm is both amusing and educating. It comes complete with luscious illustrations from Chris Bishop.
For some, everything that occurs at the toilet bowl requires denying. After voiding their bowels, they scamper to a corner, kneel and pray. Then there’s the type that actually bends down to study the stuff like tea leaves. Then there’s me.
Technology to grow replacement teeth could mean the end of dentures. Scientists at King’s College London have been awarded £500,000 to help them develop human teeth from stem cells. The company Odontis, set up by the college, hopes to develop its research for tests on humans within two years after successful research on mice. Stem cells, the so-called master cells, would be programmed to develop into teeth and then transplanted into the patient’s jaw where the gap is. It is thought it would then take two months for the tooth to fully develop — via Die Puny Humans
A truly extraordinary cure for some forms of blindness is being proposed. The idea is to add light-absorbing pigments from spinach to nerve cells in the retina, to make the nerve cells fire when struck by light. Eli Greenbaum’s team at the Oak Ridge National Laboratories in Tennessee has been exploring this possibility for several years. In their latest experiments, the researchers have shown that adding plant pigments to human cells makes the cells respond to light
A pregnant woman in Mexico gave birth to a healthy baby boy after performing a caesarean section on herself with a kitchen knife. It is thought to be the first known case of a self-inflicted caesarean in which both the mother and baby survived. The unidentified 40-year-old, who lived in a rural area without electricity, running water or sanitation that was an eight-hour drive from the nearest hospital, performed the operation when she could not deliver the baby naturally
Regular doses of worms really do rid people of inflammatory bowel disease. The first trials of the treatment have been a success, and a drinkable concoction containing thousands of pig whipworm eggs could soon be launched in Europe. At the moment the concoction cannot be stored for long, so doctors or hospitals would have to prepare fresh batches of the eggs for their patients. But a new German company called BioCure, whose sister company BioMonde sells leeches and maggots for treating wounds, hopes it will soon solve the storage problem
Western Australian Premier Geoff Gallop has defended the State’s new cannabis laws which come into effect today. People caught with a small amount of cannabis, or with no more than two plants, will either be fined or will have to complete a counseling session, rather than incur a criminal record
Researchers from the Johns Hopkins University have built electronic circuits which exhibit a rubbery behaviour. The flexible circuits, built by using gold springs, can stretch like rubber. And Nature says that these stretchy wires can be used to create artificial nerves bending inside our bodies or wearable electronics. Wiring like this could be woven into stretchy sports clothing and used to connect up sensors that monitor athletic performance. Rubbery electrodes made from biocompatible materials might be attached to a beating heart and used to sense impending problems
Scientists have found the cells that are the source of follicles and hair growth, a discovery that will energise research into treatments for thinning hair and baldness. An American team reported yesterday that it had become the first to isolate parent cells — stem cells — in mouse hair follicles that can regenerate hair, skin and follicles after being implanted into the skin of mice
HIV patients who are also infected by a second, mysterious virus are less likely to develop AIDS and die of the disease, suggests a new study. Up to six years after their initial HIV-infection, men whose blood contained the second virus — known simply as GB virus C (GBV-C) — were nearly three times less likely to die than HIV-positive men who did not have the secondary infection
An elderly Illinois couple, saying they are unable to pay as much as $1,000 each month for prescriptions, plans to venture into the war over drug imports today by filing a lawsuit against the government, arguing it is unconstitutional to prevent them from purchasing life-saving drugs at a lower price in Canada
Oral sex can lead to oral cancers. Researchers have shown that the human papilloma virus, an extremely common sexually transmitted infection long been known to cause cervical cancers, can also cause mouth cancers. Fortunately, the risk of developing oral cancer is tiny. Only around 1 in 10,000 people develop tumours each year, and most cases are probably caused by smoking and drinking. The findings could help improve treatments of oral cancers, and vaccines that protect against HPV are already being developed
British doctors will be able to prescribe maggots to National Health Service patients with infected wounds from Friday onwards, because the NHS had realised maggots were a cheaper and more beneficial way of treating wounds than using conventional medicine. Patients would be able to treat themselves at home and avoid the possibility of picking up a hospital infection. Maggots have been used for centuries to rid wounds of decaying flesh, but after the discovery of antibiotics their use went into decline
Drugs based on CSIRO’s research into the influenza virus have been shown to be effective, in laboratory tests, against a sample of an H5N1 influenza virus currently infecting chickens in Asia
A University of Pennsylvania researcher seeking ways to treat illness said studies in rats show muscle mass, strength and endurance can be increased by injections of a gene-manipulated virus that goes to muscle tissue and causes a rapid growth of cells, raising concerns that the virtually undetectable technology could be used illegally to build super athletes. None of which will bother Angle-grinder Man and his other non-powered superhero mates as they go about their daily crime fighting duties
Teachers in a German school were treated in hospital after gobbling up an anonymously donated chocolate cake, unaware it was laced with hashish
Greens MP Ian Cohen is reporting that the independent
NSW Advisory Council on Gene Technology has become nothing more than a rubber stamp for companies seeking to grow commercial-sized GM crops, despite legislation enforcing a three-year ban
Kids who spend their first year of life around dogs may have a lower risk of developing allergies, Dr James E Gern has found. Having a cat, however, appears to have no effect on allergy risk
Some people may be aware that a scene they are looking at has changed without being able to identify what that change is. This could be a newly discovered mode of conscious visual perception, according to psychologist Ronald Rensink, based at the University of British Columbia, who discovered it. He has dubbed the phenomenon mindsight
Vancouver is facing the worst outbreak of syphilis per capita in the developed world, with city health officials fearful of a looming epidemic of the sexually transmitted disease once thought almost wiped out in North America
Having learned nothing from the UK beef industry’s battle with BSE, the US agribusiness mouthpiece has announced that not only was the suspected animal still slaughtered for human consumption, but its remains went back into the food chain as animal feed. Nice head in the sand tactics, guys
RSS – Posts