A bill recently introduced to the California legislature would require all female children to be vaccinated for HPV (human papilloma virus, which causes some forms of cervical cancer and genital warts). Parents, however, are outraged by this bill because the vaccine would protect against a virus that is technically a sexually transmitted disease. Some are going so far as to say that it encourages teenage sex and promiscuity.
I hate to tell them (well, no, I don't, but allow me the figure of speech) but women are not exposed to HPV solely through sex; it is not uncommon for rape …
Today's the fifth of January - the TARDIS is supposed to be ready at the body shop by now. Cross your fingers, everyone.
thunderbird -ProfileManager - For when you absolutely, positively have to do things to your e-mail configuration that would make any sane system administrator (hush, you!) cringe. Laptop users take note: SanDisk is going to unveil its next generation storage drives at CES next week, namely, 32GB flash drives for portable computers. The drives are built using solid-state flash technology, which means no moving parts (and thus, lower power requirements). For a while they've been available for certain applications outside …
Here's an article just in from the "In other news, fire is hot and water is wet" department: A study shows that studies funded by companies tend to frame the products of those companies in a better light. A three step study of 111 dietetic studies of soda milk, and water was performed in such a way that the groups of researchers were ignorant of the conclusions of the others (the protocol is outlined in the article, it's pretty neat) to determine if the findings of the studies would be helpful or harmful to the bottom line of the organisation …
Something that a lot of people might not know: Radiation detection equipment is being deployed more and more in government facilities and major public events (such as the Superbowl) to detect people that might be carrying radioactive materials or even nuclear weapons (the latter is highly improbable for many reasons, most of which have to do with how heavy fissile materials are and the requisite size of nuclear warheads). The reason this is now known is because radiotherapy patients are tripping those alarms in public and are being questioned as a result. Geiger counters are in use at this time …
New and interesting developments in the field of neuroprosthetics! Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania are culturing living data cables by stretching nerves! Because nerves do not mix well with nonorganic structures unless they are coated with organic compounds and practically grown there, the most ideal way of growing nerves is to take a section of viable nerve tissue, culture it in a growth medium, and slowly stretch the section of nerve. The idea is that the neurons are stretched away from one another, so the neuronal bodies and axons will lengthen to fill the space. Interestingly, nerves will stretch …
