health
bioephemera | March 17, 2011
I guess it's not surprising, my dopamine is rising
And my glutamate receptors are all shot
I'd surely be bemoaning all the extra serotonin
But my judgement is impaired and my confidence is not
Allosteric modulation
No Long Term Potentiation
Hastens my inebriation
Give me a beer. . .
Physiology professors, I trust you know what to do with this holiday treasure by cadamole. Nothing makes neurobiology seem relevant like a beer.
aardvarchaeology | March 11, 2011"The main strength of the book lies in the description of the numerous ways in which peat was utilised in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The author clearly proves that peat is a fascinating substance with qualities that made it suitable for a wide variety of tasks, from horse bedding, to soap and paper manufacture and as a soil improver and building material. In the UK and Germany its properties were even promoted in health spas, with treatments such as immersion in hot electrified peat and the even less enticing hot rectal peat douche."
Richard Brunning reviewing Ian Rotherham…
aardvarchaeology | March 3, 2011Sweden is shaped like a ski, and people live mainly in the southern quarter, but in the other three-quarters there are many skiing resorts. I've been going there every few years since I was three. I'm not a competitive or particularly elegant down-hill skier, but I enjoy it and I can get down all kinds of slopes and I rarely fall.
In recent years my wife and I have taken the kids to one of the country's southernmost skiing resorts, simply because if one of you is going to spend most of their time on the kiddy slope with a neophyte, then there is little reason to drive for seven hours one way…
bioephemera | February 13, 2011The placebo effect, of course!
A video by Daniel Keogh (Twitterfeed) and Luke Harris.
h/t Ed Yong.
gregladen | February 8, 2011A Better Grip: T Cells Strengthen Our Hand against Influenza Clinical Infectious Diseases, 52 (1), 8-9 DOI: 10.1093/cid/ciq018Flu vaccines are important and useful, but also relatively ineffective compared to many other vaccines. Immunity is imperfect, there are many 'strains' of influenza in a given year only some of which are addressed by the available vaccine (though often the most common ones) and one year's vaccine does not provide immunity to subsequent years' influenza because the virus changes so much. Well, actually that's not exactly true: The influenza virus has various…
bioephemera | February 4, 2011
PMS Quilt, 2008
hand embroidered and crocheted pantyliners
Laurel Roth
Yes, that is just what it says it is: a collection of pantyliners embroidered with profanity.
One thing is clear about artist Laurel Roth: she is not afraid to make viewers uncomfortable. Her series "Hope Chest" is constructed of hygenic accessories embroidered with "off-kilter reflections on biology, fertility, and the ever-changing roles of women" - like the f-word. Embellished with beads, rose thorns, and crochet, the embroideries are twee, kitschy decor - or they would be, if not for their bluntly worded messages.…
aardvarchaeology | February 4, 2011Before modern hygiene and housing standards, children died in droves of infections in the West. Now few do, but instead they are increasingly bothered by allergies, which are immune-system malfunctions. The current view among researchers is that there is a connection here. Live in dirt, and you will get infections that may kill you, but you won't get allergies.
The Skeptikerpodden podcast has an interesting interview with bacteriologist Agnes Wold that touches upon about this issue. It made me wonder.
The kids who get allergies today: are they the ones who would have survived 200 years ago,…
bioephemera | January 25, 2011
I think DNA is amazing. I think biotech inspires great design. And if you've read this blog at all, you know I love sciart. But I just cannot understand the new infogenetics product from DNA 11 - the company behind that trendy gel electrophoresis wall art. While I'd normally just say "I don't get it" and move on, DNA 11 claims that their "augmented art" is "the ultimate intersection of biology, art and technology." I don't know how that could get more squarely in the BioE wheelhouse. So let's take a closer look at how, exactly, biology and art intersect in the "Ancestry Portrait" (pictured…
gregladen | January 24, 2011And most of them are boys with their toys
Yesterday a few miles northeast of here, two dudes had a head-on collision in their snow machines. The snow machines burst into flames, one of the drivers died and the other is apparently in critical condition. Elsewhere in the state a man died of CO poisoning in his fish house, and as is often the case in these situations, a rescuer had some trouble as well and needed to be treated. If you heat your ice house with something that burns, remember that it will put out deadly carbon monoxide (and use up your oxygen as well, but those are two distinct…
gregladen | January 20, 2011Well, maybe, but probably not. Even though milk allergies in infants and very young toddlers are the most common food allergy, they still occur in only about 2.5 percent of the population in the US and other Western groups. For this reason, I was rather perplexed some months back when I encountered a group of eight mothers randomly assembled, three of whom had infants with milk allergies. Two of the mothers had started to eliminate all dairy from their diets, including eggs, in order to reduce the effects of the milk allergy on their infants. Who were breastfeeding.
I realized that…
gregladen | January 19, 2011Bedbugs (Insects of the Cimicidae family, commonly Cimex lectularius) are annoying, might carry diseases (though this is unclear, so probably nothing importat1, and are apparently becoming more common in the US. Interestingly, there has been very little study done of their genetics. A new study just out in PLoS ONE looks at the bedbug genome in an effort to better understand pesticide resistance in these pesky critters.
The current working hypothesis is that pesticide resistance in bedbugs results from point mutations in certain genes, though there may be another explanation. Bedbugs…
gregladen | January 17, 2011It is very reasonable for a parent to worry about vaccines. For one thing, most of them involve sticking the baby or child with a sharp object, thus making the little one cry, and it would be abnormal to not have an automatic reaction to that. For another thing, they are drugs, in a sense. When the little one is ill, and you call in to the health care facility in the hopes that there will be some useful advice, most of the time you hear "No, we no longer recommend giving [fill in the blank with a medicine you thought might work] to children under [one or two months older than your child].…
bioephemera | January 17, 2011Observatory is hosting another great event tonight:
From Heumann Heilmittel, "Eine Reise durch den menschlichen Körper" (1941)
Body Voyaging: an illustrated lecture with Kristen Ann Ehrenberger
Date: TONIGHT, Monday, January 17th
Time: 8:00 PM
Admission: $5
Presented by Morbid Anatomy
We human beings have a seemingly insatiable desire to experience the bodies underneath our skins. While many scholars have treated the subject of looking into or through bodies via medical imaging, one perhaps understudied trope is that of "body voyaging." A few writers and artists have imagined what it…
aardvarchaeology | January 17, 2011Noted skeptical author and podcaster CJ Ãkerberg takes a look at one of the most active and visible anti-vaccine cranks in Sweden, Sanna Ehdin, and at the history of vaccination. The entry was originally published in Swedish on the Tankebrott blog, and I asked CJ to translate it for Aard.
In Sweden we have been quite fortunate to not have the same, vociferous anti-vaccination movement as seen in the US and the UK. But this has changed in recent years. Perhaps it was the slightly chaotic handling of the A(H1N1) vaccination. Perhaps it is due to the fact that some well-regarded figures in…
gregladen | January 13, 2011According to the FluView report for the week ending January 1, influenza activity has picked up over the last few weeks in the United States. This increase in activity is typical of the start of flu season. The number of states reporting regional or widespread influenza activity increased. Although influenza activity can rise and fall during an influenza season, activity in the United States generally peaks in January or later in most years.
CDC
Of concern: Britain is experiencing a bit of a spike in flu cases and flu deaths, and it is thought that the "swine flu" H1N1 version that emerged…
bioephemera | January 11, 2011The NYT has a great little article about Chevalier Jackson, a turn-of-the-century doctor who kept a collection of foreign objects removed from people's throats. Dr. Jackson
"preserved more than 2,000 objects that people had swallowed or inhaled: nails and bolts, miniature binoculars, a radiator key, a child's perfect-attendance pin, a medallion that says "Carry me for good luck." . . . He was so intent on assembling his collection that he once refused to return a swallowed quarter, even when its owner threatened his life."
On February 18, the Mutter Museum, which owns Jackson's collection,…
bioephemera | January 10, 2011. . . from gun violence.
A new PSA campaign is based on artwork by artist Francois Robert. Via fubiz.
aardvarchaeology | December 27, 2010
The Swedish Skeptics' annual awards for 2010 were just announced.
Ãsa Vilbäck, MD, receives the Enlightener of the Year award,
"... who has described diseases and treatments in an unbiased and informative manner on her TV show Dr. Ãsa on Swedish state television. By upholding a good popular science standard on her show, Ãsa Vilbäck has emphasised clearly the importance of evidence-based medicine. She has also warned viewers of dangerous alternative medical methods."
Enlightener Vilbäck receives a cash prize of SEK 25 000 ($3700, â¬2800).
The Stockholm Initiative lobby group receives the…
bioephemera | December 22, 2010
National Museum of Health & Medicine has an amazing flickrstream of vintage medical photographs and other ephemera. Lately they've been adding diagnostic/documentary photos of Civil War soldiers, as well as some military propaganda posters (anti-VD and anti-food waste, of all things). This series of photos of a lab setup for measuring cranial capacity are my favorites. Check out the handled basket of skulls! And they're using an "insufflator!" I did not even know that was a word.
Happy holidays to our friends at Bottled Monsters and thanks for all the wonderful photos!