Tag: medicine

What’s it like in Level 4?

Download the audio version.Get my science column weekly as a podcast. *** It’s a staple of movies and TV shows: the Level 4 lab, where scientists in “space suits” race against the clock to find a cure for a mysterious ailment. But what’s it like to work in a Level 4 laboratory in real life? …

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Robot and human surgeons compare micro-gravity operating skills

Good news for future space travelers: the world’s first demonstration of robotic surgery in a simulated micro-gravity environment takes place this week, in a collaborative effort between SRI International and the University of Cincinnati. On four parabolic flights September 25 to 28 aboard a NASA C-9 aircraft (nicknamed the “Weightless Wonder“), a human surgeon will …

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A needle today keeps disease away

Download the audio version.Get my science column weekly as a podcast. **** Children, I have observed (and recall, for my own childhood has not yet faded into the misty depths of time) do not enjoy getting stuck with needles. And yet, getting stuck with needles is a part of growing up, because vaccinations, unpleasant as …

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Break out the bubbly…the bubbly diet soda, that is

I was recently chided for drinking too much Diet Coke. “It may not have sugar, but it has aspertame, which is just as bad if not worse!” Well, “Pbbbbbbt!“: “A sweeping review of research studies of aspartame says there is no evidence that the non-nutritive sweetener causes cancer, neurological damage or other health problems in …

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The real health-care crisis…

…”Internet-Induced Hypochondria.”

Source of fever identified

Humans have been dealing with fevers for millennia. Now scientists have, for the first time, identified the precise location in the brain that generates fever in the body: During periods of inflammation, such as when the body is fighting an infection or illness, the body produces hormones known as cytokines. The cytokines, in turn, act …

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Prosthetics

Humans are amazing creatures, but we aren’t invulnerable, and every so often, we lose a piece of ourselves to accident, attack or disease: a finger, a toe, a hand, a foot, or even an entire limb. And sometimes, of course, due to a genetic problem, we’re even born without a particular appendage. This is hardly …

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Here’s hoping it works!

A universal ‘flu vaccine is in the first stage of human tests: This vaccine is intended to provide protection against all ‘A’ strains of the virus that causes human influenza, including pandemic strains.***At the moment, Phase I clinical trials on humans are underway – that is, the candidate vaccine is being administered to a small …

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Aha! I knew I had a good reason not have an iPod!

The headphones can conduct electricity into your head if you’re struck–or nearly struck–by lightning! Talk about music that will “blow your mind”…

Another reason to never even try a cigarette:

Apparently inhaling a single cigarette can be enough to trigger nicotine addiction: A new study published in the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine shows that 10 percent of youth who become hooked on cigarettes are addicted within two days of first inhaling from a cigarette, and 25 percent are addicted within a month. The …

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Wine’s not just good for your heart…

…it may also (both red and white) combat tooth-decay and upper-respiratory-tract-infection bacteria.

Good news for carnivores!

Recent studies published in the journal Cancer Science have disproved the common myth that consumption of red meat increases colorectal cancer risk.Read the whole thing.

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