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skeleton enhancement
medical mysteries
A Happy Ending to the Movie "Pi" in Real Life
If you saw Darren Aronofsky's frenetic, disturbing flick Pi, you know that its hero, a supergenius who invents a super algorithm, meets a rather terrible end. Though he wants to use his algorithm for the forces of good, he's pursued by evil corporate schemers who want to use it to predict the stock market. Eventually our hero has to destroy his work in a tragic, horrifying scene I won't spoil for you. But the New York Times is reporting today on a real-life inventor of super algorithms whose entanglement with the financial industry did not end tragically. In fact, billionaire David E. Shaw used the cash he gained from developing computer-based strategies for Wall Street trading to found a company whose new mega-computer places them on the cusp of making tremendous medical discoveries about proteins (pictured). More »
medical tech
Five Advances That Have Revolutionized Medicine Since 1948
Britain's National Health Service was created 60 years ago, so the BBC asked a bunch of doctors for their opinions on the most revolutionary changes to medicine in that time. The list they created reveals that the outlandish science-fiction of 1948 is commonplace today.The way we treat our health problems has been utterly transformed in the last six decades - here's how. More »
mad medicine
Synthetic Replacement Veins Will Make You a Cardiovascular Cyborg
Next-gen cyborgs will have human blood flowing through artificial veins (pictured), and their organs will be grown in a lab to act just like real organs, only better, stronger, faster. We have the technology. The next time someone you know gets a coronary bypass, they might come out of the operation as a cyborg. In fact, there is a new field of biotech whose practitioners are calling themselves cyborg engineers. More »
mad science
The Artificial Virus with Nanotech Tentacles
The first artificial virus was created in 2003 — to cure people, not kill them. A virus can deliver cures to cells just as easily as it delivers death. The problem with artificial viruses is that no one has been able to make them the proper shape to serve as a therapeutic delivery system. But now, Korean scientists have created a virus that could deliver a remedy directly to a patient's cells with far greater efficiency than past attempts. The key lies in those Lovecraftian tentacles extending from the virus. More »
plague
Meet the Bacteria that Will Cause the Next Pandemic
It could be the beginning of a new global pandemic. Leptospirosis is a bacterial disease spread from animals to humans through water contaminated by infected urine. In severe cases, it can lead to liver failure, kidney failure, meningitis and eventually death. While it's been contained historically through screening and antibiotics, medical researchers in Peru recently stumbled across a new species of Lepto so genetically mutated that current tests for the disease don't detect it. More »
radiation
One Pill Could Cure Radiation Sickness
Radiation exposure is going to be a serious problem after the nuclear apocalypse, or when your orbital home is going to be bombarded with plenty of dangerous cosmic radiation from solar flares. And in fact, it's already a problem now in many workplaces where people work with radioactive materials. But a solution may be in sight with a new pill, Protectan, that developer Cleveland BioLabs promises can prevent radiation sickness. More »
nanotech
Nanopaper Can Identify Deadly Bacteria in the Water
Worried about the bacteria in your water? Just dip a test-strip coated with a special mix of nanoparticles into your glass, and watch the result. If the strip changes color, don't drink. Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of Massachusetts have devised a way to instantly identify several species of bacteria using a blend of charged polymers and gold dust. The implications are fairly staggering for medicine, but also for national security. More »
interview
io9 Asks Barth Anderson Why Plague Lit Left SF Behind
Where are all the science fiction books about plagues and bioterror? There's been a huge surge in deadly-disease books in non-SF genres since 9/11 — from non-fiction books like Hot Zone to medical thrillers like Leonard Goldberg's Fever Cell to literary works like Thomas Mullen's The Last Town On Earth. But the disease-paranoia wave has mostly passed science fiction by. How come? We asked Barth Anderson, author of science-fiction disease book The Patron Saint of Plagues. More »
nanotech
NASA Wants To Slice Your Brain With Nanoknife
Carbon nano-tubes aren't just gorgeous, they might also save your brain one day. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory is teaming up with a cancer center, City Of Hope, to develop a new minimally invasive type of brain surgery using carbon nanotubes. Researchers hope that these sharp-tipped tubes, 50,000 times narrower than a human hair, can deliver cancer-fighting agents directly to the brain. Tests in mice found the nanotubes were non-toxic and could deliver actual genetic information to the brain. Here's an image of the first "nanoknife," developed by NIST and University of Colorado in 2006. [ScienceDaily]
repo! the genetic opera
"Repo! The Genetic Opera" is an Epic of After-Market Body Parts
Darren Lynn Bousman's Repo! The Genetic Opera is one of the two organ repossession movies coming out this year, and now it's gone viral with a creepy-looking donation poster (jump below see it) urging you to give until it hurts. This "Warnerian-Rocky Horror-meets-Bladerunner musical" takes place in a future where massive organ failures plague humankind. But the sickly masses can ward off death by financing an easy-clone organ implant from GeneCo. If you can't pay when the loan comes due, a repo agent will yank your fancy new organs like a bad tooth. And it's an opera, of course. We've got the awesome repo poster below. More »
medical imaging
This Is What Game Consoles Really Do To Your Brain
Video game tech could literally save your brain. Currently, when your neurologist needs to make a snap judgment about brain surgery, a 3-D brain image like the one above might not be ready for hours — far too long in an emergency. But now the Mayo Clinic is teaming up with IBM to develop ways to create a 3-D image from an MRI or CT scan in minutes, thanks to microprocessor architecture developed for the Sony PlayStation 3, which amps those scans up like Sonic the Hedgehog. Brain image from Harvard. [Computerworld]
retro neurosurgery
Nineteenth Century Biotech for Brains and Unknown Maladies
Imagine living at a time in history when this "trephine drill" was a cutting-edge neurosurgery tool. This device, on display at Phisick Medical Antiquities Collection, would grip the skull of the patient while the doctor turned the handle on the skull drill. The groovy innovation here? You could quickly pull the drill bit back when you popped through the skull, so you weren't as likely to hit brain. Nice. Another biotech invention of the nineteenth century after the jump. More »
surgery
