Evidence Based Science

Crown Flash - "New" Electromagnetic activity observed above Thunderstorm

2011-11-19T08:51:00.001-08:00

Crown Flash - "New" Electromagnetic activity observed above Thunderstorm! You may know my fascination with the electromagnetic activity above thunderstorms from the Sprite posts. This "new" one seems to have a name already. The YouTube videos (see links) are awesome visual evidence of something observed many times. But as we see in science, observations are often dismissed (with no good reason), and it isn't until somebody gets a video or a picture that can't be scoffed away, that "the mainstream" grudgingly admits defeat. (note that Wikipedia has no entry yet). Phil Plait was also unaware of the term in his piece on the YT videos.

Links

Forgetomori

Amateur Science page

Google Scholar

(more to come)

Another web article on sprites and blue jets

2011-01-21T15:44:00.001-08:00

Gigantic Jets Connect Thunderclouds to the Ionosphere

and

Video of giant sprites

Calomel once more --> Mercury(I) chloride

2011-01-17T19:43:00.000-08:00

Calomel in America: Mercurial Panacea, War, Song and Ghosts

Calomel in American Medicine

Parts of the book. For those who read and remember the Calomel posts from 2008

I've learned a lot more about 'medicinal' mercury since then.

Health Debate Short on Evidence-Based Science?

2011-01-13T20:00:00.001-08:00

While searching Google for the phrase "Evidence-Based Science", came across this 2009 article, (which was new to me), and because I named this blog Evidence-Based Science, here is a link to the page and a comment.

A poll released Sept. 2 shows extraordinary levels of enthusiasm for policies that would help doctors and patients know what works in medicine, what doesn't work and for which patients. In a poll of 800 California voters conducted by Lake Research, 88 percent of respondents said they believe it is important that doctors have access to scientific evidence that compares the effectiveness of different treatments. Nearly half, 46 percent, consider it extremely important.
Health Debate Short on Evidence-Based Science

This seems like one of those obvious moments. What would be surprising in this case, would be if most people DIDN'T show "extraordinary levels of enthusiasm for policies that would help doctors and patients know what works in medicine"!!

I mean, come on! When it comes to your well being, your family and your health, your pocketbook, wouldn't most people choose knowing what actually works?

It seems self evident. Much like Evidence-Based Science. Does anyone want science that is not based on evidence?

Gamma Rays, Lightning and Antimatter, Oh My!

2011-01-13T00:45:00.000-08:00

I posted about Red Sprites and Blue Jets before. Amazing events that occur above thunderstorms, all the time. It has been known for some time that thunderstorms also produce gamma rays, but now it looks like some of these gamma rays are being produced by antimatter. Which is produced by lightning in thunderstorms, or more likely the events occurring above the storm, hence the link to the previous post about what is going on above the clouds.

It's big news in the world of science. From NASA

Jan. 11, 2011: Scientists using NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope have detected beams of antimatter produced above thunderstorms on Earth, a phenomenon never seen before.

Scientists think the antimatter particles were formed inside thunderstorms in a terrestrial gamma-ray flash (TGF) associated with lightning. It is estimated that about 500 TGFs occur daily worldwide, but most go undetected.

We may never look at a thunderstorm the same again. Science, like Nature, is awesome.

Global Warming, Climate Change

2011-01-08T02:05:00.000-08:00

For more than a year I have been researching, investigating and trying to learn about climate, weather, climate change and what goes under the name "Global Warming".

There are few entries here about this, and none that try to present the evidence based science view. This is because it is extremely complicated, and the evidence is involved with politics, as well as emotions and possibly other factors, making it extremely hard to be able to present evidence. Even the evidence is argued about, and sometimes changed!!

Frustrating. More to come.

How the oceanic tides actually work

2011-01-07T09:57:00.001-08:00

As so often is the case, reading the Wikipedia article on the Tides can be educational, and unless the page was vandalized right before you read it, most likely accurate.

In simple terms, regarding how the tide works, if you are standing on the beach watching it, the tide is a giant wave.

Seriously. The tide is a giant wave passing you by. When the crest comes down (or up) the coast, the water rises, at the peak of the wave, it is high tide. As the wave goes on by, the water goes down, at the trough of the wave, it is low tide. It is a giant circular wave that rotate around a point, and the high tide you see is the same crest of the wave each time. There is only one wave that makes both tides each day.

If you are standing on one of the rare places that has only one high tide, it is still the same thing, a giant wave, circling. Some places have a mixed tide, where both kinds of tides interact with each other, so two (or more) giant waves are causing the tide.

You can see the points (nodes) that the waves circle around in the graphic on Wikipedia.

Here is an animation I made that shows the waves in motion, along with the moon moving. The large bar is full moon, the small bar is the other side of the planet, the water can either be high is light color, or dark, it doesn't matter. It is just a model of what the oceans look like.

The water moving animation I "borrowed" from Steve Dutch and his
website on tides

I edited the original, just doubled it and added the bars. I did not create the original water animation. Steve would probably be pissed if he knew.

Extensive satellite measurements of the oceans show that the ocean actually does behave a lot like that model, but not as clean and easy to see. But the tides actually are giant circular waves. The ocean does not follow the moon around the earth like many people want to believe. The 'two bulges' theory is not an accurate representation of how the oceanic tides work.

Look at the southern ocean and watch the tide around Antarctica. There are two high tides a day there (and two low tides as well). The same 'wave' makes them both, which you can see for yourself. That 'wave' actually moves faster than the moon, which is nothing like the theory that there are two bulges. You can see this for yourself.

This is all backed by the best evidence we have at this time. Now you know something amazing about how the tide actually work.

Global Warming

2010-06-17T05:24:00.001-07:00

Have an honest debate on global warming

High Sticking: The Flaws of the IPCC and the Hockey Stick Model

Sea Level Rises…What Sea Level Rises?

Curry: On the credibility of climate research

A small random web page of note. Unusual Words

2010-06-04T08:49:00.001-07:00

Unusual Words

Ride Like the Wind (only faster): Viral brainteaser infects the net

2010-05-06T09:57:00.000-07:00

Ride Like the Wind (only faster): Viral brainteaser infects the net

In Praise of Science

2010-04-29T18:50:00.000-07:00

I owe my life to science. And my livelihood.

I want to say thank you to scientist and science, of all kinds. Yes there are bad things that science can be used for, but with out science, I wouldn't be alive. Much less able to complain about them.

Tiny trackers reveal the incredible flight plans of the Arctic tern

2010-04-09T12:59:00.001-07:00

Chasing daylight – tiny trackers reveal the incredible flight plans of the Arctic tern

Worth reading the entire blog entry there.

Update on Sprites

2010-04-09T12:57:00.001-07:00

Sprite Streamers: Storms' Hyper-Velocity Ball Lightning?

New high speed video of sprites above thunderstorms!

Massive high speed ball lightning? From the video it looks like the charges descend from above the storm! As ball lightning.

That is incredibly awesome.

Contrails, (Kerosene, Water Vapor, Sulfur Dioxide, Nitrous Oxide, Carbon Dioxide), Ozone and Climate

2010-03-28T23:13:00.001-07:00

Contrails, (Kerosene, Water Vapor, Sulfur Dioxide, Nitrous Oxide, Carbon Dioxide), Ozone and Climate.

This one is so huge it defies easy description. Some info and links, more to be added. I've spent months on this, just starting to collate and make some sense of it.

Cirrus clouds are formed when water vapor freezes into ice crystals at altitudes above 8000 meters (26,000 ft).

The stratosphere is situated between about 10 km (6 miles) and 50 km (31 miles) altitude above the surface at moderate latitudes, while at the poles it starts at about 8 km (5 miles) altitude.

The Antarctic ozone hole is produced every spring over the earth's south pole because of the special conditions that are present in the stratosphere over Antarctica and the presence of completely anthropogenic chemicals spilled into the environment called chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).

Since 1974 scientists have known that chlorine can destroy ozone, but no one thought the destruction would be very rapid. Events over the Antarctic region proved them wrong. The ozone hole story began at Halley Bay in Antarctica, where British scientists had been measuring ozone in the atmosphere since 1957. In 1976 they detected a 10% drop in ozone levels during September, October, and November—the Antarctic spring.
Since ozone concentrations over this region often vary from season to season, the researchers weren't concerned, even as the springtime declines occurred repeatedly. It wasn't until their instruments registered record low levels of ozone in 1983 that they realized something important was happening. By then, record springtime ozone declines had occurred during seven of the previous eight years.

Using satellite images of sea ice and computer models the scientists discovered that the ozone hole has strengthened surface winds around Antarctica and deepened the storms in the South Pacific area of the Southern Ocean that surrounds the continent. This resulted in greater flow of cold air over the Ross Sea (West Antarctica) leading to more ice production in this region.

Fact: There is no such thing as a "Chemtrail". Contrails are safe and are a natural phenomenon. They pose no health hazard of any kind.

Abstract. This study is devoted to the possible presence of cirrus clouds in the stratosphere.

Abstract The distribution of many chemical constituents of the atmosphere (e.g., ozone) is at least partially determined by the distribution of net radiative heating in the atmosphere. In this paper, we demonstrate the significant effect of high cirrus clouds on the net radiative heating of the tropical lower stratosphere.

Using simulations, we determine the influence of stratospheric aerosol and thin cirrus clouds on the performance of the proposed atmospheric correction algorithm for the moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer (MODIS) data over the oceans.

Nitrous oxide is emitted from natural sources and as a byproduct of agricultural fertilization and other industrial processes. Calculating the effect on the ozone layer now and in the future, NOAA researchers found that emissions of nitrous oxide from human activities erode the ozone layer and will continue to do so for many
decades.

The recent SUCCESS measurements made right behind jet engines reveal that the sulfuric acid forms either within the engine or immediately after it is ejected, says Anderson.

What this observation means for clouds and climate remains unclear. Yet many meteorologists think that increasing jet traffic in the last several decades has altered weather in noticeable ways.
In 1981, climatologist Stanley A. Changnon of the Illinois State Water Survey in Champaign reported that the Midwest had grown significantly cloudier during the 1960s and 1970s, with the greatest changes seen in areas of high jet traffic.
He also noted a narrowing of the gap between high and low temperatures, possibly attributable to the increase in clouds.

If Global Warming Is Real Then Why Is It Cold?

2010-01-25T21:30:00.001-08:00

A funny blog with a bunch of cartoons about the current cold and Global Warming.

Not science based, but sometimes you have to laugh.

Carbon Dioxide. The science isn't easy

2010-01-25T21:28:00.001-08:00

Sources of CO2 and how much stays in the atmosphere, how and where it is measured, it isn't as simple as it sounds.

How much is man made?
Different sites say different things.
Why does it rise?
There are mysteries still.
Skeptical Science has a page
How much is from volcanoes is a real mystery.
How do volcanoes effect climate?
More mystery.
Many interesting things are online. Some people are skeptical.
I can't blame them, I mean,

Why an active volcano to measure CO2?
Lots of interesting information on that blog.
Monitoring CO2 elsewhere.
Greenhouse Background

This entry is mostly saving links so I can look into this later.

A bunch of Global Warming and Greenhouse gas links

2010-01-24T20:21:00.001-08:00

This needs tons of time and energy, links for storage purposes.
Climate change emails
Glaciergate threatens confidence in climate change
Himalayan glaciers not
melting (06) Zhang Wenjing
Jeff Kargel on melting glaciers, May 29, 2002
The only document with both scientists in it (Glaciergate, Zhang Wenjing and Jeff Kargel)
Scare tactics on melting ice
Judging GW as a theory

Carbon Dioxide Higher Today Than Last 2.1 Million Years

Bad Greenhouse
Big skeptics vs warmers graphic
No greenhouse effect
There is no greenhouse effect
In defense of the greenhouse effect
Knut Ångström on Wikipedia
John Tyndall book, scanned and for free

Historical Perspectives on Climate Change

By James Rodger Fleming (Google books preview)
Oceans not rising
Summary of Global Warming
The Greenhouse Effect explained

The Heartbeat of the Oligocene Climate System

Effect of Tambura on Climate
Blaming warming on volcanoes
Volcanic eruptions help remove CO2
(that one is fantastic)
Warming or cooling?
CO2 and the volcanoes
Global warming fraud?
Global warming in perspective
Denial Depot
Hide the decline
More Hide the decline

Sahara Desert Greening Due to Climate Change?

2010-01-23T23:15:00.001-08:00

From National Geographic no less

Desertification, drought, and despair—that's what global warming has in store for much of Africa. Or so we hear.
Emerging evidence is painting a very different scenario, one in which rising temperatures could benefit millions of Africans in the driest parts of the continent.

Scientists are now seeing signals that the Sahara desert and surrounding regions are greening due to increasing rainfall.

An explosion in plant growth has been predicted by some climate models.
For instance, in 2005 a team led by Reindert Haarsma of the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute in De Bilt, the Netherlands, forecast significantly more future rainfall in the Sahel.
The study in Geophysical Research Letters predicted that rainfall in the July to September wet season would rise by up to two millimeters a day by 2080.
Satellite data shows "that indeed during the last decade, the Sahel is becoming more green," Haarsma said.
Even so, climate scientists don't agree on how future climate change will affect the Sahel: Some studies simulate a decrease in rainfall.
"This issue is still rather uncertain," Haarsma said.
Max Planck's Claussen said North Africa is the area of greatest disagreement among climate change modelers.
Forecasting how global warming will affect the region is complicated by its vast size and the unpredictable influence of high-altitude winds that disperse monsoon rains, Claussen added.
"Half the models follow a wetter trend, and half a drier trend."

One reason I am skeptical of Climate Science.

Surprising discovery? Or just good science?

2010-01-19T13:15:00.001-08:00

... taking into account the data recorded for the level of solar radiation, the scientists made a surprising discovery: in the 1940s and in the summer of 1947 especially, the glaciers lost the most ice since measurements commenced in 1914. This is in spite of the fact that temperatures were lower than in the past two decades. "The surprising thing is that this paradox can be explained relatively easily with radiation," says Huss, who was recently appointed to the post of senior lecturer at the Department of Geosciences at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland.
On the basis of their calculations, the researchers have concluded that the high level of short-wave radiation in the summer months is responsible for the fast pace of glacier melt. In the 1940s, the level was 8% higher than the long-term average and 18 Watts per square metres above the levels of the past ten years. Calculated over the entire decade of the 1940s, this resulted in 4% more snow and ice melt compared with the past ten years.
Furthermore, the below-average melt rates at the measurement points during periods in which the glacier snouts were even advancing correlate with a phase of global dimming, between the 1950s and the 1980s.

When Science makes assumptions, they are often huge assumptions

2010-01-19T07:31:00.000-08:00

Planetary Boundaries: A Safe Operating Space for Humanity

Stockholm, September 23, 2009

The scientists emphasize that the rapid expansion of human activities since the industrial revolution has now generated a global geophysical force equivalent to some of the great forces of nature.

"We are entering the Anthropocene, a new geological era in which our activities are threatening the Earth’s capacity to regulate itself. We are beginning to push the planet out of its current stable Holocene state, the warm period that began about 10,000 years ago and during which agriculture and complex societies, including our own, have developed and flourished," says co-author Professor Will Steffen, Director of the ANU Climate Change Institute at The Australian National University. "The expanding human enterprise could undermine the resilience of the Holocene state, which would otherwise continue for thousands of years into the future."

First assumption, the Earth regulates itself.

Second assumption, that the author of this piece knows what the future holds.

Neither are presented with evidence, theory and the peer reviewed process normally required for scientific knowledge to be accepted.

This isn't science, it is religion.

Data strongly suggests that these GM maize varieties induce a state of hepatorenal toxicity

2010-01-11T21:51:00.000-08:00

Int J Biol Sci 2009; 5:706-726 ©Ivyspring International Publisher

Research Paper

A Comparison of the Effects of Three GM Corn Varieties on Mammalian Health

Effects were mostly concentrated in kidney and liver function, the two major diet detoxification organs, but in detail differed with each GM type. In addition, some effects on heart, adrenal, spleen and blood cells were also frequently noted. As there normally exists sex differences in liver and kidney metabolism, the highly statistically significant disturbances in the function of these organs, seen between male and female rats, cannot be dismissed as biologically insignificant as has been proposed by others..

We therefore conclude that our data strongly suggests that these GM maize varieties induce a state of hepatorenal toxicity. This can be due to the new pesticides (herbicide or insecticide) present specifically in each type of GM maize, although unintended metabolic effects due to the mutagenic properties of the GM transformation process cannot be excluded.

de Vendômois JS, Roullier F, Cellier D, Séralini GE. A Comparison of the Effects of Three GM Corn Varieties on Mammalian Health. Int J Biol Sci 2009; 5:706-726.

Global Warming, Climate Change

2010-01-11T11:24:00.000-08:00

The data, it does not match

Norway Lights explained

2009-12-10T17:36:00.001-08:00

On my new blog, which isn't 100% evidence based.

The plural of anecdote is data

2009-11-30T09:08:00.001-08:00

From askville (Amazon) Nelson W. Polsby PS, Vol. 17, No. 4. (Autumn, 1984), pp. 778-781. Pg. 779: Raymond Wolfinger's brilliant aphorism "the plural of anecdote is data" never inspired a better or more skilled researcher.

I e-mailed Wolfinger last year and got the following response from him:

"I said 'The plural of anecdote is data' some time in the 1969-70 academic year while teaching a graduate seminar at Stanford.

The occasion was a student's dismissal of a simple factual statement--by another student or me--as a mere anecdote. The quotation was my rejoinder.

Since then I have missed few opportunities to quote myself. The only appearance in print that I can remember is Nelson Polsby's accurate
quotation and attribution in an article in PS: Political Science and Politics in 1993; I believe it was in the first issue of the year."

I also e-mailed Polsby, who didn't know of any early printed occurrences.

What is interesting about this saying is that it seems to have morphed into its opposite -- "Data is not the plural of anecdote" -- in some
people's minds. Mark Mandel used it in this opposite sense in a private e-mail to me, for example.

Fred Shapiro

-------------------------
From MPC Publog -

The Plural of Anecdote is Data
Perhaps the most memorable quote of the STM meeting was dropped by MIT Sloan School of Management Economist Erik Brynjolfsson, who directs the Center for Digital Business. (It turns out the quote is attributable to Berkeley Political Scientist Raymond Wolfinger, who apparently coined it in the 60s or 70s. Lots of people quote its opposite [The plural of anecdote is NOT data] and try to attribute the source of that quote...Isn't Google great for trivia questions?)

The world as you've never seen it before

2009-11-21T07:23:00.001-08:00

Worldmapper: All kinds of maps to peruse.

Strange as it may be, cancer, cancer deaths, or even cause of deaths is missing from the statistics there.

More random science

2009-11-21T06:09:00.001-08:00

'Fly Paper' Created to Capture Circulating Cancer Cells
ScienceDaily (Nov. 19, 2009) — Just as fly paper captures insects, an innovative new device with nano-sized features developed by researchers at UCLA is able to grab cancer cells in the blood that have broken off from a tumor.

These cells, known as circulating tumor cells, or CTCs, can provide critical information for examining and diagnosing cancer metastasis, determining patient prognosis, and monitoring the effectiveness of therapies.
Metastasis -- the most common cause of cancer-related death in patients with solid tumors -- is caused by marauding tumor cells that leave the primary tumor site and ride in the bloodstream to set up colonies in other parts of the body.
The current gold standard for examining the disease status of tumors is an analysis of metastatic solid biopsy samples, but in the early stages of metastasis, it is often difficult to identify a biopsy site. By capturing CTCs, doctors can essentially perform a "liquid" biopsy, allowing for early detection and diagnosis, as well as improved treatment monitoring.
To date, several methods have been developed to track these cells, but the UCLA team's novel "fly paper" approach may be faster and cheaper than others -- and it appears to capture far more CTCs.
Surprising stats about kids and injury and death
Some of the facts about sports and recreational injury may surprise you. For example, when we hear about sports injury, many of us immediately think of contact sports like football. While these sports are associated with higher injury rates, injuries from recreational activities and individual sports are more likely to be severe when they occur. Incidence of injury also varies by age group: young children (ages 5 to 9) are more likely to sustain playground- and bicycle-related injuries, while older children are more likely to suffer from bicycle- and sports-related injuries and overexertion.

Injury risks by activity:

·        Baseball has the highest fatality rate among all sports for children ages 5 to 14. Each year, three to four children die from baseball-related injuries.

·    Gymnastics-related injuries caused more than 21,200 children ages 5 to 14 to be treated in hospital emergency rooms in 2002.

·        In 2001, 134 children ages 14 and under died in bicycle-related crashes.

·        Since 1992, at least 87 children ages 14 and under have died from inline skating injuries. The majority of these deaths were from collisions with motor vehicles.

·       Each year, nearly 20 children ages 14 and under die from playground-related injuries.

·        In 2001, more than 74,500 children ages 14 and under were treated in hospital emergency rooms for trampoline-related injuries.

·      More than 51,300 children ages 14 and under were treated in hospital emergency rooms for unpowered scooter-related injuries in 2002. Since 2001, at least 10 children ages 14 and under have died as a result of this type of injury.

·     In 2002, at least 44 children ages 14 and under died and nearly 20,300 were treated in hospital emergency rooms for ATV-related injuries.

The Peanut allergy, Calomel and Thalidimide

2009-11-20T14:48:00.001-08:00

A brief bit of original thought here. Peanuts, Calomel and Thalidomide all have something in common it seems.

Animal testing will not show the effects they can have on children, or a developing fetus.

Large studies also would miss the possible fatal consequence of these substances on children, that have an allergic reaction to them.

This is one of the blind spots of modern science. All the double blind testing in the world may not reveal what will actually happen when human children are exposed to something that may harm them.

The Hygiene and the pool chlorine hypothesis

2009-11-20T14:44:00.001-08:00

Both the pool chlorine hypothesis and the Hygiene hypothesis are worth a read.

Worms, Chili Peppers and Cancer

2009-11-20T14:42:00.001-08:00

Helminthic Therapy (it means using worms to treat disease)

OK that is just unexpected. A recent House episode used this as part of the story.

Capsaicin, the active ingredient in peppers, kills cancer cells.

PubMed (many many studies there)
Now a new treatment involving resiniferitoxin's cousin, capsaicin, is showing promise in killing tumor cells.
Yes, Chillies kill cancer cells.

This isn't even News.

Chili peppers have many uses.

Fantastic Thalidomide Blog entry

2009-11-20T10:31:00.001-08:00

What is Thalidomide
Thalidomide was one of the greatest cases in history of a drug disaster tragedy being caused by animal research.

First of all, Thalidomide had been tested on animals extensively prior to its marketing.

Even now, despite the clinical evidence to the contrary, British health authorities like the Medical Research Council maintain that the vast bulk of evidence from laboratory and animal tests is against thalidomide having any genetic effects.

The tragedy caused by Thalidomide in the 1960s was due to its teratogenic effects, ie effects on the foetus. Teratological effects of drugs were little known then. They were brought to public attention because of the Thalidomide tragedy on humans, therefore only after it. How on earth could animal researchers have thought of those effects before the disaster?

Even after the Thalidomide caused birth deformities in humans, researchers tried to reproduce the same effect in dozens of species of lab animals without success.

Reporting is science

2009-11-20T10:07:00.001-08:00

From scientificblogging

...there are three forms of news communication: Reporting; journalism and opinion.
Reporting is stenography -- "here's what happened, here's what was said."

Journalism is interpretation -- "here's what happened, here's what was said, here's what it probably means."

Opinion is verdict -- "here's what I think happened, here's what I think was meant by what was said, here's what I believe it to me."

Print news must learn to teach its customers the differences between these phases.
And what, some of you are wondering, does any of this have to do with science?

Reporting is science: the careful observation and recording of the event.
Journalism is hypothesis.
Opinion is entertainment.

More about Pink disease

2009-11-20T09:02:00.001-08:00

http://www.jrank.org/health/pages/33432/pink-disease.html

Pink disease (acrodynia, erythredema), named because of the skin colour of the sufferers, was once a serious disease of infants and young children. It appeared in the western world about the turn of the 20th century, particularly in English-speaking countries. Babies turned bright pink and became ill, intolerant to light, lost their appetites, and became utterly miserable, often rejecting even their mothers. Some lost fingers and toes from gangrene and, on average, 7% of sufferers died.

A random selection of science based stories from the Internet

2009-11-20T08:57:00.001-08:00

PARIS: Slowing population growth would help battle global warming, says an unprecedented U.N. report that links demographic pressure and climate change.
"Slower population growth... would help build social resilience to climate change's impacts and would contribute to a reduction of greenhouse-gas emissions in the future," the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) says.

-----------------------------------------
Plants may not have eyes and ears, but they can recognize their siblings, and researchers at the University of Delaware have discovered how.
The ID system lies in the roots and the chemical cues they secrete.
The finding not only sheds light on the intriguing sensing system in plants, but also may have implications for agriculture and even home gardening.
The study, which is reported in the scientific journal Communicative & Integrative Biology, was led by Harsh Bais, assistant professor of plant and soil sciences at the University of Delaware.
-----------------------------
Braking News: Particles from Car Brakes Harm Lung Cells
ScienceDaily (Nov. 20, 2009) — Real-life particles released by car brake pads can harm lung cells in vitro. Researchers writing in BioMed Central's open access journal Particle and Fibre Toxicology found that heavy braking, as in an emergency stop, caused the most damage, but normal breaking and even close proximity to a disengaged brake resulted in potentially dangerous cellular stress.
--------------------------------------

Solving the 50-Year-Old Puzzle of Thalidomide
ScienceDaily (Nov. 20, 2009) — Research into the controversial drug thalidomide reveals that the mechanism through which the drug causes limb defects is the same process which causes it to damage internal organs and other tissues. The article, published in Bio-Essays, outlines the challenges surrounding thalidomide research and claims that confirmation of a 'common mechanism' could lead to new treatments for Leprosy, Crohn's Disease, AIDS and some forms of cancer.

----------------------------------------

Birth of New Species Witnessed by Scientists

On one of the Galapagos islands whose finches shaped the theories of a young Charles Darwin, biologists have witnessed that elusive moment when a single species splits in two.

---------------------------------

Counting by countries

2009-11-16T14:15:00.000-08:00

Back on September 22, 2009, I mentioned the new flag counter, and the numbers.

Here is the current stats from the new counter.

The second counter confirms that it isn't search engines hitting this blog. It must be real people.

What is up with that?

46 different countries have visited this site!

	Country	Visitors	Last New Visitor
1.	United States	1,197	November 16, 2009
2.	Canada	54	November 15, 2009
3.	United Kingdom	29	November 15, 2009
4.	Mexico	12	November 9, 2009
5.	Australia	11	November 12, 2009
6.	India	9	November 4, 2009
7.	Turkey	7	November 8, 2009
8.	Philippines	5	November 15, 2009
9.	Ireland	5	November 9, 2009
10.	Indonesia	4	November 14, 2009
11.	Iran, Islamic Republic of	4	November 13, 2009
12.	Korea, Republic of	3	November 8, 2009
13.	Germany	3	November 6, 2009
14.	Saudi Arabia	3	October 2, 2009
15.	Zambia	3	September 20, 2009
16.	Netherlands	2	November 16, 2009
17.	Egypt	2	November 13, 2009
18.	Finland	2	November 12, 2009
19.	Italy	2	November 12, 2009
20.	Nigeria	2	November 10, 2009

21.	Malaysia	2	November 9, 2009
22.	Singapore	2	October 29, 2009
23.	Norway	2	October 27, 2009
24.	Virgin Islands, U.S.	2	October 23, 2009
25.	Ghana	2	September 30, 2009
26.	South Africa	2	September 12, 2009
27.	Unknown - Satellite Provider	1	November 11, 2009
28.	Russian Federation	1	November 5, 2009
29.	New Zealand	1	November 3, 2009
30.	Romania	1	November 3, 2009
31.	Austria	1	November 2, 2009
32.	Colombia	1	November 1, 2009
33.	Sri Lanka	1	October 22, 2009
34.	Jordan	1	October 20, 2009
35.	Serbia	1	October 16, 2009
36.	Taiwan	1	October 15, 2009
37.	Rwanda	1	October 14, 2009
38.	Puerto Rico	1	October 6, 2009
39.	Panama	1	October 3, 2009
40.	Bahamas	1	September 20, 2009

41.	Kuwait	1	September 18, 2009
42.	United Arab Emirates	1	September 16, 2009
43.	Thailand	1	September 15, 2009
44.	Luxembourg	1	September 15, 2009
45.	Bahrain	1	September 14, 2009
46.	Trinidad and Tobago	1	September 13, 2009

Why this Blog?

2009-11-16T12:47:00.000-08:00

This is my way of noting things I find interesting, in regards to science. It also keeps me from getting into stupid online arguments with anonymous people. Or getting upset with Wikipedia, when it is obvious that some editors there don't want all the valid information about science to be available. On Wikipedia.

The Wikipedia guidelines actually suggest you start a blog if you have anything original you want to say.

Water vapor from Shuttle exhaust may cause high unusual polar clouds

2009-11-16T12:41:00.001-08:00

Solid Rocket Booster exhaust left behind during a Space Shuttle launch
From Aerospaceweb

Shuttle exhaust ends up at Arctic?

It is likely water vapor from the Space Shuttle launch causes rare clouds in upper atmosphere -

MAHRSI allowed scientists to follow the plume’s rapid pole-ward transport and then to observe a discrete region of ice clouds as it appeared in the Arctic near the end of the mission. Stevens and colleagues find that the water contained in these clouds is consistent with the amount injected into the thermosphere by the shuttle on its ascent off the east coast of the United States.

“This study is important because it shows that there is a new source of water ice for the polar upper atmosphere,” said Stevens, lead scientist for MAHRSI. “Our results indicate that the water vapor released by launch vehicles can end up in the Arctic mesosphere.”

About half of the water vapor exhaust from the shuttle’s main fuel tank is injected into the thermosphere, typically at altitudes of 64 to 71 miles (103 to 114 km). Stevens and colleagues found that this water vapor can then be transported all the way to the Arctic in a little over a day, much faster than predicted by models of atmospheric winds. There is currently no explanation for why the water moves so quickly.

Stevens and colleagues also include observations from a ground-based experiment in Norway measuring water vapor moving toward the Arctic Circle. These observations reveal the passage of a large plume of water vapor overhead a little over a day after the same (STS-85) shuttle launch, confirming the plume trajectory inferred from the MAHRSI measurements.
As the water vapor moves to the Arctic it falls from the warmer thermosphere down to colder areas in the mesosphere. Over the North Pole in the summer mesospheric temperatures can plummet below minus 220 Fahrenheit (minus 140 Celsius), the lowest found in the Earth’s atmosphere. At these temperatures, water vapor condenses into ice particles and clouds form.
“The amount of water found here is tiny compared to the amount in the lower atmosphere,” Stevens said. “But the long term effects in the upper atmosphere have yet to be studied.”

from NASA

This is mentioned here -

Space shuttle exhaust hints comet caused Tunguska blast

Was the Tunguska explosion of 1908 caused by a comet hitting Earth? That's the claim of a new study based on the behaviour of water vapour from the space shuttle's exhaust. But other scientists dispute the claim, and say the evidence still points to a stony meteoroid as the culprit.
The explosion was somewhere in the megaton range, and destroyed a great swathe of forest in eastern Siberia. The most likely cause is the impact of an object from space, exploding as an air-burst several kilometres up. What type of object is unclear, however, because no large solid remnants have been found.
A more nebulous kind of clue comes in the form of strange glowing clouds that lit up the night sky of Europe only a day after the Tunguska event. These were probably noctilucent clouds: rare clouds of ice crystals that appear about 85 kilometres above the ground. They are high enough to reflect sunlight even after the sun has set.

Acrodynia (or pink disease)

2009-11-08T04:26:00.001-08:00

If you look on Wikipedia for Pink Disease (Acrodynia) it will redirect you to a minor entry buried in Mercury Poisoning. If you want real evidence based science then Read here
(Journal of the Royal Science of Medicine)
What you will find in that article is that mortality was 10%. Which means 10 percent of the children you had Pink Disease died. You won't find that on Wikipedia (at present). As is often the case, the people removing information from Wikipedia about this are the same ones that constantly remove valid information about mercury in many other articles.

Even so, Old Wikipedia articles can be informative.

Wikipeida article on Acrodynia on 24 June 2006

Acrodynia (or pink disease, erythredema, erythredema polyneuropathy, Bilderbeck's, Selter's, Swift's and Swift-Feer disease) refers to a condition of pain and dusky pink discoloration in the hands and feet most often seen in children chronically exposed to heavy metals, especially mercury.
The word is derived from the Greek, where ακρος means high (as in:in an extremity) and οδυνη means pain. As such, it might be (erroneously) used to indicate that a patient has pain in the hands or feet. However, acrodynia is a disease rather than a symptom^[1].

Causes

Mercury compounds like calomel were historically used for various medical purposes: as laxatives, diuretics, antiseptics or antimicrobial drugs for syphilis, typhus and yellow fever^[2] . Teething powders were are widespread source of mercury poisoning until the recognition of mercury toxicity in the 1940s.
However, mercury poisoning and acrodynia still exist today ^[3]. Modern sources of mercury intoxication include broken thermometers ^[4].

Symptoms

Besides peripheral neuropathy (presenting as paresthesia or itching, burning or pain) and discoloration, swelling (edema) and desquamation may occur.
Since mercury blocks the degradation pathway of catecholamines, epinephrine excess causes profuse sweating (diaphora), tachycardia, salivation and elevated blood pressure. Mercury is suggested to inactivate S-adenosyl-methionine, which is necessary for catecholamine catabolism by catechol-o-methyl transferase.
Affected children may show red cheeks and nose, red (erythematous) lips, loss of hair, teeth, and nails, transient rashes, hypotonia and photophobia. Other symptoms may include kidney disfunction (e.g. Fanconi syndrome) or neuropsychiatric symptoms (emotional lability, memory impairment, insomnia).
Thus, the clinical presentation may resemble pheochromocytoma or Kawasaki disease.
There is some evidence that the same mercury poisoning may predispose to Young's syndrome (men with bronchiectasis and low sperm count)^[5].

Therapy

The standard of care is discontinuation of the environmental exposure, and chelation therapy (with EDTA or maybe better, DMSA).

References

^ Horowitz Y, Greenberg D, Ling G, Lifshitz M. Acrodynia: a case report of two siblings. Arch Dis Child 2002; 86: 453.
^ Beck C, Krafchik B, Traubici J, Jacobson S. Mercury intoxication: it still exists. Pediatr Dermatol 2004; 21: 254-9. PMID 15165207
^ Weinstein M, Bernstein S. Pink ladies: mercury poisoning in twin girls. CMAJ 2003; 168: 201. PMID 12538551
^ Torres AD, Rai AN, Hardiek ML. Mercury intoxication and arterial hypertension: report of two patients and review of the literature. Pediatrics 2000; 105: E34. PMID 10699136
^ Hendry WF, A'Hern FPA, Cole PJ. Was Young's syndrome caused by mercury exposure in childhood? BMJ 1993;307:1579-82. PMID 8292944

The previous version

Acrodynia (or pink disease) refers to a condition of pain and dusky pink discoloration in the hands and feet most often seen in children chronically exposed to heavy metals, especially mercury.

Causes

Mercury compounds like calomel were historically used for various medical purposes: as laxatives, diuretics, antiseptics or antimicrobial drugs for syphilis, typhus and yellow fever^[1] . Teething powders were are widespread source of mercury poisoning until the recognition of mercury toxicity in the 1940s.
However, mercury poisoning and acrodynia still exist today ^[2]. Modern sources of mercury intoxication include broken thermometers ^[3].

Symptoms

Therapy

The standard of care is discontinuation of the environmental exposure, and chelation therapy (with EDTA or maybe better, DMSA).

References

^ Beck C, Krafchik B, Traubici J, Jacobson S. Mercury intoxication: it still exists. Pediatr Dermatol 2004; 21: 254-9. PMID 15165207
^ Weinstein M, Bernstein S. Pink ladies: mercury poisoning in twin girls. CMAJ 2003; 168: 201. PMID 12538551
^ Torres AD, Rai AN, Hardiek ML. Mercury intoxication and arterial hypertension: report of two patients and review of the literature. Pediatrics 2000; 105: E34. PMID 10699136
^ Hendry WF, A'Hern FPA, Cole PJ. Was Young's syndrome caused by mercury exposure in childhood? BMJ 1993;307:1579-82. PMID 8292944

Swine flu vaccine for swine

2009-11-02T07:04:00.000-08:00

I came up with a thought, that pigs would be the perfect animal to test swine flu vaccines on. A quick search found a multitude of information about this.

The Chronicle Feds mulled swine flu vaccines for pigs after herd caught H1N1

Scientist have decoded pig DNA

And then, surprise surprise, the pig site offers a swine flu vaccine, for swine!

Evidence. Science. I love the Internets.

I was wrong, people do argue about real science!

2009-11-02T06:57:00.000-08:00

In the interest of advancing human knowledge, I did some research, and found that some people are quite willing to argue about real science. Hard science. Chemistry.

So my previous musings were just what they sounded like, musings, with no evidence to back them up. And based on experience, using internet forums as a source, I can state with more confidence, that real science is no defense against somebody arguing.

Nobody argues about real science

2009-10-23T22:18:00.000-07:00

If you are anything like me, your first reaction to such a statement, "Nobody argues about real science", is an urge to argue about it.

Which I can understand.

Now before you read the very long rambling half baked ideas behind this audacious topic, and if you are the kind of person who is easily annoyed, and short of time, (in which case why are you even reading some blog), here is the short version.
Real science is the kind that any rational intelligent person can comprehend, understand, and an experiment can demonstrate the science. Repeatedly.

Nobody argues about it because the experiment or demonstration shows what happens. And even if it isn't understood why, what happens is still observable.

So nobody argues about it.

The long version.

I was thinking about another topic, and rather than respond, I thought for a while about the very idea of arguing about a scientific matter. Why does anyone argue about science?

I ran down several paths in the mind, and all of them ended in eternal arguments. This reminded me of several topics online, as well as several Wikipedia articles, which are eternal battle grounds. While the matter is in the realm of science, it is an argument.

So I thought about physics, about hard science, about things we take for granted, physical reality, the laws of physics, things that anyone can demonstrate, can do experiments to see what is what.

Then there are the everyday scientific realities that probably don't even have a science experiment about them. We all know about these things long before we get to first grade. Real things, like running into objects, and what happens when we impact an immovable object with our legs. Or our nose. What happens in the very real sense of our experience.

Things like what happens if you fall and hit the ground. While mundane and seemingly not scientific, they are, in essence, science of a concrete matter. Nobody argues against hard science. Real hard science. Not even people who hate science argue about the hard science.

OK maybe somewhere some how somebody might, because it is possible in our vast planet people might believe and say anything. But in the real world, with real rational people, nobody argues about hard science. (If you have had an online argument where somebody argues that running into solid objects doesn't hurt, well, I guess my whole topic just went to hell).

I'm speaking strictly of a certain kind of scientific knowledge that is shared by everyone.

Hard science, real science, the kind where the result is obvious. Where the same thing always happens.

Like physics. Or math. Simple math, not the hard kind with symbols that somebody made up and only really smart math people can even understand what is being discussed.

So I came up with the phrase, "Nobody argues about real science". Like when you drop something heavy and it falls. Or you hit a window pane with a big hammer and it breaks. Nobody says something like, "Well, you know, just because you hit that window really hard with that hammer, that doesn't mean it caused the window to break", nobody would say that. And if they did, well, we would make fun of them or something. Or sue them, depending on circumstances.

The same goes for gravity, or electricity, or magnetism, or heat, or mixing an acid with a base, or throwing things into a fire. Real science is the kind where you can do the experiment your self, and you damn well know what will happen. Every time.

Nobody argues about real science. But things that are not settled, that can't be settled, boy do people argue about them.

Mercury, Mercury, and then there is Mercury

2009-10-21T16:25:00.001-07:00

Blood and Brain Mercury Content in Infant Monkeys after Exposure to Methylmercury or Thimerosal
Thomas M. Burbacher, Ph.D.
University of Washington
R01ES003745 and P30ES007033
Background: There has been great interest and debate over the past decade regarding the use of the mercury-containing preservative thimerosal and autism. According to some published reports, autism rates around the world are rising and the rise coincides with the availability of more vaccines containing thimerosal and a lowering of the age at which vaccines are given to babies. Thimerosal, which is about 50% ethylmercury, has been used since the 1930’s in vaccines to prevent bacterial and fungal contamination, particularly in multidose containers. Mercury has long been known to be a neurotoxicant, but much of the scientific literature has focused on methylmercury. In 1999, an FDA review noted that with the increased number of vaccines then recommended for infants, the total amount of mercury in vaccines containing thimerosal might exceed recommended levels. To be cautious, the U.S. Public Health Service and the American Academy of Pediatrics asked doctors to minimize exposure to thimerosalcontaining vaccines and manufacturers to remove thimerosal from vaccines as soon as possible.
Advance: To further understand the differences in absorption and metabolism of both forms of mercury, a team of NIEHS-supported investigators exposed 41 neonatal Macaca fasicularis, or "crab-eating" monkeys to either thimerosal or methylmercury. These monkeys are considered a very good model for human infants. Monkeys in the thimerosal group received a series of injections typical of what a human infant would receive over the first few weeks of life. Those animals in the methylmercury group were given equivalent doses of mercury through a feeding tube. Initially, absorption and distribution of total mercury appeared to be similar between the two groups. However, ethylmercury from thimerosal was cleared much faster than methylmercury. Peak blood concentrations of mercury were three times higher in the methylmercury group. Brain concentrations of total mercury were significantly lower for the thimerosal group; however, a higher percentage of the total brain mercury was in the form of inorganic mercury for the thimerosal group (37% vs. 7%).
Implications:The authors conclude that knowledge of the fate and transport of methylmercury is not a suitable surrogate for risk assessments for exposure to thimerosal. Therefore, additional research is necessary to fully characterize the biotransformation of thimerosal so that a meaningful interpretation of any developmental effects from immunization with thimerosal-containing vaccines can be determined.

EMERGENCY OVERVIEW

Appearance: silver liquid.
Danger! Corrosive. Harmful if inhaled. May be absorbed through intact skin. Causes eye and skin irritation and possible burns. May cause severe respiratory tract irritation with possible burns. May cause severe digestive tract irritation with possible burns. May cause liver and kidney damage. May cause central nervous system effects. This substance has caused adverse reproductive and fetal effects in animals. Inhalation of fumes may cause metal-fume fever. Possible sensitizer.
Target Organs: Blood, kidneys, central nervous system, liver, brain.

Potential Health Effects
Eye: Exposure to mercury or mercury compounds can cause discoloration on the front surface of the lens, which does not interfere with vision. Causes eye irritation and possible burns. Contact with mercury or mercury compounds can cause ulceration of the conjunctiva and cornea.
Skin: May be absorbed through the skin in harmful amounts. May cause skin sensitization, an allergic reaction, which becomes evident upon re-exposure to this material. Causes skin irritation and possible burns. May cause skin rash (in milder cases), and cold and clammy skin with cyanosis or pale color.
Ingestion: May cause severe and permanent damage to the digestive tract. May cause perforation of the digestive tract. May cause effects similar to those for inhalation exposure. May cause systemic effects.
Inhalation: Causes chemical burns to the respiratory tract. Inhalation of fumes may cause metal fume fever, which is characterized by flu-like symptoms with metallic taste, fever, chills, cough, weakness, chest pain, muscle pain and increased white blood cell count. May cause central nervous system effects including vertigo, anxiety, depression, muscle incoordination, and emotional instability. Aspiration may lead to pulmonary edema. May cause systemic effects. May cause respiratory sensitization.
Chronic: May cause liver and kidney damage. May cause reproductive and fetal effects. Effects may be delayed. Chronic exposure to mercury may cause permanent central nervous system damage, fatigue, weight loss, tremors, personality changes. Chronic ingestion may cause accumulation of mercury in body tissues. Prolonged or repeated exposure may cause inflammation of the mouth and gums, excessive salivation, and loosening of the teeth.

The source document upon which this CICAD is based is the Toxicological profile for mercury (update), published by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry of the US Department of Health and Human Services (ATSDR, 1999). Data identified as of January 1999 were considered in the source document. Data identified as of November 1999 were considered in the preparation of this CICAD. Information on the availability and the peer review of the source document is presented in Appendix 1. Information on the peer review of this CICAD is presented in Appendix 2. This CICAD was considered at a meeting of the Final Review Board, held in Helsinki, Finland, on 26–29 June 2000 and approved as an international assessment by mail ballot of the Final Review Board members on 27 September 2002. Participants at the Final Review Board meeting are presented in Appendix 3. The International Chemical Safety Cards for elemental mercury and six inorganic mercury compounds, produced by the International Programme on Chemical Safety, have also been reproduced in this document.
Mercury is a metallic element that occurs naturally in the environment. There are three primary categories of mercury and its compounds: elemental mercury, which may occur in both liquid and gaseous states; inorganic mercury compounds, including mercurous chloride, mercuric chloride, mercuric acetate, and mercuric sulfide; and organic mercury compounds. Organic mercury compounds are outside the scope of this document.
Elemental mercury is the main form of mercury released into the air as a vapour by natural processes.
Exposure to elemental mercury by the general population and in occupational settings is primarily through inhaling mercury vapours/fumes. The average level of atmospheric mercury is now approximately 3–6 times higher than the level estimated for preindustrial ambient air.
Dental amalgam constitutes a potentially significant source of exposure to elemental mercury, with estimates of daily intake from amalgam restorations ranging from 1 to 27 µg/day, the majority of dental amalgam holders being exposed to less than 5 µg mercury/day. Mercuric chloride, mercuric oxide, mercurous acetate, and mercurous chloride are, or have been, used for their antiseptic, bactericidal, fungicidal, diuretic, and/or cathartic properties. A less well documented use of elemental mercury among the general population is its use in ethnic or folk medical practices. These uses include the sprinkling of elemental mercury around the home and automobile. No reliable data are currently available to determine the extent of such exposure.
Analytical methods exist for the specific assessment of organic and inorganic mercury compounds; however, most available information on mercury concentrations in environmental samples and biological specimens refers to total mercury.
Intestinal absorption varies greatly among the various forms of mercury, with elemental mercury being the least absorbed form (<0.01%) and only about 10% of inorganic mercury compounds being absorbed. For elemental mercury, the main route of exposure is by inhalation, and 80% of inhaled mercury is retained. Inorganic mercury compounds may be absorbed through the skin in toxicologically relevant quantities.
Elemental mercury is lipid soluble and easily penetrates biological membranes, including the blood–brain barrier. Metabolism of mercury compounds to other forms of mercury can occur within the tissues of the body. Elemental mercury can be oxidized by the hydrogen peroxide–catalase pathway in the body to its inorganic divalent form. After exposure to elemental mercury or inorganic mercury compounds, the main route of excretion is via the urine. Determination of concentrations in urine and blood has been extensively used in the biological monitoring of exposure to inorganic forms of mercury; hair mercury levels do not reliably reflect exposure to elemental mercury or inorganic mercury compounds.
Neurological and behavioural disorders in humans have been observed following inhalation of elemental mercury vapour, ingestion or dermal application of inorganic mercury-containing medicinal products, such as teething powders, ointments, and laxatives, and ingestion of contaminated food. A broad range of symptoms has been reported, and these symptoms are qualitatively similar, irrespective of the mercury compound to which one is exposed. Specific neurotoxic symptoms include tremors, emotional lability, insomnia, memory loss, neuromuscular changes, headaches, polyneuropathy, and performance deficits in tests of cognitive and motor function. Although improvement in most neurological dysfunctions has been observed upon removal of persons from the source of exposure, some changes may be irreversible. Acrodynia and photophobia have been reported in children exposed to excessive levels of metallic mercury vapours and/or inorganic mercury compounds. As with many effects, there is great variability in the susceptibility of humans to the neurotoxic effects of mercury.
The primary effect of long-term oral exposure to low amounts of inorganic mercury compounds is renal damage. Inorganic forms of mercury have also been associated with immunological effects in both humans and susceptible strains of laboratory rodents, and an antibody-mediated nephrotic syndrome has been demonstrated through a variety of exposure scenarios. However, conflicting data from occupational studies preclude a definitive interpretation of the immunotoxic potential of inorganic forms of mercury.
Mercuric chloride has been shown to demonstrate some carcinogenic activity in male rats, but the data for female rats and for mice have been equivocal or negative. There is no credible evidence that exposure of humans to either elemental mercury or inorganic mercury compounds results in cancer.
There is convincing evidence that inorganic mercury compounds can interact with and damage DNA in vitro. Data from in vitro studies indicate that inorganic mercury compounds may induce clastogenic effects in somatic cells, and some positive results have also been reported in in vivo studies. The combined results from these studies do not suggest that metallic mercury is a mutagen.
Parenteral administration of inorganic mercury compounds is embryotoxic and teratogenic in rodents at sufficiently high doses. Animal data from studies in which the exposure pattern was similar to human exposure patterns and limited human data do not indicate that elemental mercury or inorganic mercury compounds are developmental toxicants at dose levels that are not maternally toxic.
Several studies are in agreement that mild subclinical signs of central nervous system toxicity can be observed among people who have been exposed occupationally to elemental mercury at a concentration of 20 µg/m³ or above for several years. Extrapolating this to continuous exposure and applying an overall uncertainty factor of 30 (10 for interindividual variation and 3 for extrapolation from a lowest-observed-adverse-effect level, or LOAEL, with slight effects to a no-observed-adverse-effect level, or NOAEL), a tolerable concentration of 0.2 µg/m³ was derived. In a 26-week study, a NOAEL for the critical effect, nephrotoxicity, of 0.23 mg/kg body weight was identified for oral exposure to mercuric chloride. Adjusting to continuous dosage and applying an uncertainty factor of 100 (10 for interspecific extrapolation and 10 for interindividual variation), a tolerable intake of 2 µg/kg body weight per day was derived. Use of a LOAEL of 1.9 mg/kg body weight in a 2-year study as a starting point yields a similar tolerable intake.

Why Evidence Based Science?

2009-10-18T21:55:00.000-07:00

This is the curious state of debate about the government’s two main weapons in the fight against pandemic flu. At first, government officials declare that both vaccines and drugs are effective. When faced with contrary evidence, the adherents acknowledge that the science is not as crisp as they might wish. Then, in response to calls for placebo-controlled trials, which would provide clear results one way or the other, the proponents say such studies would deprive patients of vaccines and drugs that have already been deemed effective. “We can’t just let people die,” says Cox.

Students of U.S. medical history will find this circular logic familiar: it is a long-recurring theme in American medicine, and one that has, on occasion, had deadly consequences.

Shannon Brownlee writing for The Atlantic

Interested? Go read the article. It is better than anything I could write. But the above is almost exactly why I started this Blog. The people who are promoting "Science Based Medicine" are some of the worst at looking at data and evidence, when it goes against what they already KNOW IS TRUE. They don't even want to do experiments, if they are to investigate what the ALREADY KNOW IS TRUE.

They don't want anyone else doing experiments either.

The scientific evidence for Tamiflu and Relenza is thin at best

2009-10-18T21:47:00.001-07:00

Again from The Atlantic article (which you should just go read the entire thing).

As with vaccines, the scientific evidence for Tamiflu and Relenza is thin at best. In its general-information section, the CDC’s Web site tells readers that antiviral drugs can “make you feel better faster.” True, but not by much. On average, Tamiflu (which accounts for 85 to 90 percent of the flu antiviral-drug market) cuts the duration of flu symptoms by 24hours in otherwise healthy people. In exchange for a slightly shorter bout of illness, as many as one in five people taking Tamiflu will experience nausea and vomiting. About one in five children will have neuropsychiatric side effects, possibly including anxiety and suicidal behavior. In Japan, where Tamiflu is liberally prescribed, the drug may have been responsible for 50 deaths from cardiopulmonary arrest, from 2001 to 2007, according to Rokuro Hama, the chair of the Japan Institute of Pharmacovigilance.
Such side effects might be worth risking if the antivirals prevented serious complications of flu, such as pneumonia, hospitalization, and death. Roche Laboratories, the company licensed to manufacture and market Tamiflu, says its drug does just that. In two September2006 press releases, the company announced, “Tamiflu significantly reduces the risk of death from influenza: New data shows treatment was associated with more than a two third reduction in deaths,” and “Children with influenza [are] 53 percent less likely to contract pneumonia when treated with Tamiflu.” Once again cohort studies (the same kind of potentially biased research that led to the conclusion that flu vaccine cuts mortality by 50 percent) are behind these claims. Tamiflu costs $10 a pill. It is possible that people who take it are more likely to be insured and affluent, or at least middle-class, than those who do not, and a large body of evidence shows that the well-off nearly always fare better than the poor when stricken with an infectious disease, including flu. In both 2003 and 2009, reviews of randomized placebo-controlled studies found that the study populations simply weren’t large enough to answer the question: Does Tamiflu prevent pneumonia?
As late as this August, the company’s own Web site contained the following statement, which was written under the direction of the FDA: “Tamiflu has not been proven to have a positive impact on the potential consequences (such as hospitalizations, mortality, or economic impact) of seasonal, avian, or pandemic influenza.” An FDA spokesperson said recently that the agency is unaware of any data submitted by Roche that would support the claims in the company’s September 2006 news release about the drug’s reducing flu deaths.

The impact of flu vaccine hard to determine

2009-10-18T21:41:00.001-07:00

From the Atlantic Monthly
Demonstrating the efficacy (or lack thereof) of vaccine and antivirals during flu season would not be hard to do, given the proper resources. Take a group of people who are at risk of getting the flu, and randomly assign half to get vaccine and the other half a dummy shot. Then count the people in each group who come down with flu, suffer serious illness, or die. (A similarly designed trial would suffice for the antivirals.) It might sound coldhearted, but it is the only way to know for certain whether, and for whom, current remedies actually work. It would also be useful to know whether vaccinating healthy people—who can mount an immune response on their own—protects the more vulnerable people around them. For example, immunizing nursing-home staff and healthy children is thought to reduce the spread of flu to the elderly and the immune-compromised. Pinning down the effectiveness of this strategy would be a bit more complex, but not impossible.
In the absence of such evidence, we are left with two possibilities. One is that flu vaccine is in fact highly beneficial, or at least helpful. Solid evidence to that effect would encourage more citizens—and particularly more health professionals—to get their shots and prevent the flu’s spread. As it stands, more than 50 percent of health-care workers say they do not intend to get vaccinated for swine flu and don’t routinely get their shots for seasonal flu, in part because many of them doubt the vaccines’ efficacy. The other possibility, of course, is that we’re relying heavily on vaccines and antivirals that simply don’t work, or don’t work as well as we believe. And as a result, we may be neglecting other, proven measures that could minimize the death rate during pandemics.

Healthy young woman disabled for life by Seasonal Flu Vaccine

2009-10-14T15:48:00.001-07:00

A 25 year old woman in Ashburn, Virginia has come down with a severe debilitating neurological disorder days after receiving a seasonal flu vaccination. Desiree Jennings has been diagnosed with dystonia, a very rare neurological condition known only to be triggered in adults by head trauma, drug use, and poisoning. Prior to receiving the recent flu shot Desiree was a healthy, active cheerleading ambassador for the Washington Redskins as well as an employee for America Online.
The Examiner

Desiree Jennings is trapped in her body. Intellectually she's all there, but her muscles are fighting each other. She's been diagnosed with dystonia, an extremely rare and debilitating neurological disease.
WUSA9

Desiree is a “one in a million” person. Tragically so.
She is “the one”.
Apparently, the one person in a million, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), who may have developed severe and possibly life-threatening side effects from getting a seasonal flu vaccine seven weeks ago at a Safeway in Reston.

The Loudon Times

The story broke last night on TV. It is already going worldwide.

Yesterday there was only one online mention of this, (The Loudon Times). Nothing on FOX News, Reuters, cnn, Google News, nothing.

Today, it appears on NBC Washington.

Just showed up on FOX.

Fluoride is still a poison

2009-10-11T08:41:00.001-07:00

This is not disputed by evidence. Or science. It is just the nature of fluoride, to be a deadly poison.

So why is it in your drinking water? And bath water, and lawn water, and food processing water. And the water you rinse your eyes with, and OK all water that comes out of the tap? (If you live where water is fluoridated)

This is one of those interesting science things that wouldn't stand up today for a minute. But because it is old, somehow it keeps on going. Like cancer causing cigarettes. Or alcohol.

A little fluoride in your toothpaste can make your teeth stronger. But like the label says, don't swallow it, it is poisonous.

That much is true. A long time ago somebody thought it would help to put it in drinking water so everybody would have stronger teeth. Because back then they thought drinking it would make your teeth stronger. So they did. They added poison to the drinking water.

To understand how insane this is, it might help to use an example from right now.

Right now a lack of Vitamin D is causing health problems for some people. So let's put Vitamin D in the drinking water. That way everybody will get some. It will help.

If that sounds crazy, then you understand fluoride in the drinking water. If you also understand why it will never happen, then you know about the difference between modern thinking and old thinking.

I could post a bunch of links to explain all of this, but some things are not worth the time.

Fluoride is still a poison.

Nothing anyone says will change the facts on this one.

Secret Life of your Barain

2009-10-06T11:59:00.001-07:00

Fascinating PBS web site

Colloidal Silver, nano-silver, emerging dangers of new technologies

2009-10-06T10:11:00.001-07:00

Study
Challenges
Nanoparticles can be dangerous
Silver nanoparticles Banned as pesticide
Health risk of nanoparticles

Swine flu vaccine safety

2009-10-06T10:08:00.001-07:00

Product Insert

Sometimes Wikipedia is fantastic. Vitamin D revisited

2009-10-03T14:51:00.000-07:00

I was going to do an entry on Vitamin D, but the Wikipedia article is very extensive and worth reading.

Role of Vit D in immunomodulation

The hormonally active form of vitamin D mediates immunological effects by binding to nuclear vitamin D receptors (VDR) which are present in most immune cell types including both innate and adaptive immune cells. The VDR is expressed constitutively in monocytes and in activated macrophages, dendritic cells, NK cells, T and B cells. In line with this observation, activation of the VDR has potent anti-proliferative, pro-differentiative, and immunomodulatory functions including both immune-enhancing and immunosuppressive effects.^[54]
VDR ligands have been shown to increase the activity of natural killer cells, and enhance the phagocytic activity of macrophages.^[17] Active vitamin D hormone also increases the production of cathelicidin, an antimicrobial peptide that is produced in macrophages triggered by bacteria, viruses, and fungi.^[55] Vitamin D deficiency tends to increase the risk of infections, such as influenza^[56] and tuberculosis^[57]^[58]^[59]. In a 1997 study, Ethiopian children with rickets were 13 times more likely to get pneumonia than children without rickets.^[60]
Effects of VDR-ligands, such as vitamin D hormone, on T-cells include suppression of T cell activation and induction of regulatory T cells, as well as effects on cytokine secretion patterns.^[61] VDR-ligands have also been shown to affect maturation, differentiation, and migration of dendritic cells, and inhibits DC-dependent T cell activation, resulting in an overall state of immunosuppression.^[62]
These immunoregulatory properties indicate that ligands with the potential to activate the VDR, including supplementation with calcitriol (as well as a number of synthetic modulators), may have therapeutic clinical applications in the treatment of inflammatory diseases (rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis), dermatological conditions (psoriasis, actinic keratosis), osteoporosis, cancers (prostate, colon, breast, myelodysplasia, leukemia, head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, and basal cell carcinoma), and autoimmune diseases (systemic lupus erythematosus, type I diabetes); central nervous systems diseases (multiple sclerosis); and in preventing organ transplant rejection.^[54]
A 2006 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, reported evidence of a link between Vitamin D deficiency and the onset of multiple sclerosis; the authors posit that this is due to the immune-response suppression properties of Vitamin D.^[63] Further research indicates that vitamin D is required to activate a histocompatibility gene (HLA-DRB1*1501) necessary for differentiating between self and foreign proteins in a subgroup of individuals genetically predisposed to MS.^[64]

^{YouTube Video}
^{about Vitamin D and disease}

Nigella sativa?

2009-10-03T08:27:00.001-07:00

While researching resveratrol I came across studies on Nigella sativa.

Based on these results, the inhibitory effects of essential oil on HNE activity are due to the presence of bioactive molecules, mainly carvacrol this compound is an inhibitor of HNE and could be considered as a natural antielastase agent and possible candidate for phytotherapy in the treatment of injuries that appear in some pathologic cases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and emphysema.

_____________________________________

The essential oil significantly inhibited neutrophil chemotaxis from 0.05 to 0.5 mg mL(-1). The inhibitory concentrations (IC(50)) showing 50% inhibition to induced neutrophil chemotaxis, and control movement were 0.08 and 0.07 mg mL(-1), respectively. The human neutrophil elastase secretion was inhibited by essential oil at a concentration dependent manner from 0.5 to 2.5 mg mL(-1). The components of essential oil are potent inhibitors for polymorpho nuclear leukocytes functions.The observed inhibition of neutrophil functions occurred via intracellular pathway. Active serine protease could be essential for neutrophil responding process and/or signal transduction pathways.

Swine flu, swine flu vaccines, what to believe?

2009-09-28T14:44:00.000-07:00

Listening to crazy internet talk radio about a Navy ship with vaccine related deaths, including the Captain of the ship, I realized that there is a way to reassure the public, as well as the Doctors and Nurses who are being required to take the vaccines this year.

The story yesterday that was supposed to reassure us was really bad.

But, onboard Navy ships, as well as isolated military bases, there is a captive audience of test subjects for the vaccines.

Navy ship-men don't just up and die. Neither do military personal stationed on remote bases. It is extremely rare for them to die, or even get really sick.

So give them all the vaccines, and record if any side effects, especially sudden death, occur. This data, evidence based science, would do more to help the public, as well as Doctors and researchers, than all the talk in the world.

Or even better, be scientific about it, and give half the vaccine, and the other half the same chemicals, but with no flu virus of any kind (not actually aa placebo, but will allow for more data to be gathered).

Then a week later , if nobody gets sick or dies, give the placebo group the vaccine.

That is evidence based science at work. So of course they won't do it. It would be too scientific.

Nasal Douche??? Urea? Ear drops??

2009-09-27T08:41:00.001-07:00

A mish mash that needs to be worked into a coherent post. A nasal douche system that is supposed to work better than salt water up the nose.
__________________________________

How does RinoFlow work?
RinoFlow is used in a simple two-phase process:
During Phase One a gentle saline mist sprays up through your nostril into the nasal cavity to:

soften inflamed membrane walls

thin nasal secretions so that mucous will drain naturally and easily

irrigate the nasal passages by softening and humidifying mucous membranes.

During Phase Two, the mist is redirected to provide additional cleaning that helps promote drainage of the sinuses for added relief.

______________________________
Ingrediants in Murine eye drops

Polyvinyl alcohol (PVOH, PVA, or PVAL) is a water-soluble synthetic polymer (not to be confused with polyvinyl acetate, a popular wood glue).
__________________________________

Part of Murine ear drops
Urea or carbamide is an organic compound with the chemical formula (N H₂)₂C O. The molecule has two amine (-NH₂) residues joined by a carbonyl (-CO-) functional group.

__________________________________

Tetrahydrozoline is a derivative of imidazoline, which is found in over-the-counter eye drops and nasal sprays. Other derivatives include naphazoline, oxymetazoline, and xylometazoline. Poisoning can result from an overdose.
Tetrahydrozoline is an alpha agonist^[1] and its main mechanism of action is the constriction of conjunctival blood vessels. This serves to relieve the redness of the eye caused by minor ocular irritants.

__________________________________

Warnings
For use in the ear only.
Do not use if:
• if you have ear drainage or discharge, ear pain, irritation or
rash in the ear or are dizzy; consult a doctor
• if you have an injury or perforation (hole) of the eardrum or
after ear surgery, unless directed by a doctor
• for more than 4 consecutive days
When using this product, avoid contact with the eyes.

Stop use and ask a doctor if:
• excessive ear wax remains after use of this product for 4 consecutive days
Keep out of reach of children. If swallowed, get medical help or contact a Poison Control Center right away. If accidental contact with eyes occurs, flush eyes with water and consult a doctor.

Other information
Caution: Tip of bottle should not enter ear canal. Never use instruments like cotton swabs, toothpicks or hairpins to
remove wax from ear canal.

This product is not intended to restore hearing loss due to medical reasons. In such cases, consult a doctor. Remove any hearing aids while using this product. Protect from heat and direct sunlight. Secure cap tightly on bottle when not in use. Murine Ear Drops foam on contact with ear wax due to the release of oxygen.

Murine® Earwax Removal Drops

Doctor-Recommended, fast-acting Carbamide Peroxide Ear Wax Removal Aid.

__________________________________
The ear drops have urea in them.

__________________________________

What the hell?
__________________________________

Combined with peroxide. Must investigate this.

HIV

2009-09-26T22:00:00.001-07:00

Now there is a subject to blog about.

Remember this one?

2009-09-23T09:23:00.000-07:00

Evidence Based Science: Of all the nerve ...

Well, I joined a forum and some of the people on it actually know the person I was talking about.

This should be interesting.

The two counters do not match up

2009-09-23T08:10:00.003-07:00

Current visitors by Flag Counter.

The numbers and countries do not match up with the other counter.

Country	Count
United States	2602 (61.67%)
Unknown	1061 (25.15%)
Australia	141 (3.34%)
Canada	141 (3.34%)
United Kingdom	72 (1.71%)
Philippines	43 (1.02%)
Singapore	38 (0.90%)
India	26 (0.62%)
New Zealand	17 (0.40%)
Netherlands	16 (0.38%)
Turkey	15 (0.36%)
Ireland	13 (0.31%)
Germany	13 (0.31%)
Malaysia	11 (0.26%)
Iran, Islamic Republic of	10 (0.24%)

	Country	Visitors	Last New Visitor
1.	United States	508	September 23, 2009
2.	Canada	9	September 22, 2009
3.	India	4	September 22, 2009
4.	Zambia	3	September 20, 2009
5.	Australia	2	September 22, 2009
6.	Saudi Arabia	2	September 19, 2009
7.	South Africa	2	September 12, 2009
8.	Ghana	1	September 22, 2009
9.	Egypt	1	September 21, 2009
10.	Bahamas	1	September 20, 2009
11.	Kuwait	1	September 18, 2009
12.	United Arab Emirates	1	September 16, 2009
13.	Thailand	1	September 15, 2009
14.	Luxembourg	1	September 15, 2009
15.	Bahrain	1	September 14, 2009
16.	United Kingdom	1	September 14, 2009
17.	Trinidad and Tobago	1	September 13, 2009
18.	Mexico	1	September 13, 2009
19.	Singapore	1	September 11, 2009

Two weeks worth of data

2009-09-23T08:10:00.001-07:00

If you look at the country/flag counter, that is who and how many visited this blog in the last two weeks.

870 page views. Which is strange, this blog is not even ready to go online yet.

When people decide what is evidence, Science suffers

2009-09-23T08:07:00.001-07:00

What is not repeated, is often misunderstood.

New counter, old counter

2009-09-22T16:51:00.000-07:00

The new counter (by country) has been a huge help. It isn't just Google bots and Bing hitting the blog.

The old counter doesn't store more than a years results, so here is an update from that little freeware tool.

Browser	Count
Internet Explorer 7.0	1907 (50.28%)
Internet Explorer 6.0	616 (16.24%)
Internet Explorer 8.0	185 (4.88%)
Firefox 3.0.5	114 (3.01%)
Firefox 3.0.13	97 (2.56%)
Firefox 3.0.1	88 (2.32%)
Firefox 3.0.10	87 (2.29%)
Firefox 2.0.0.11	83 (2.19%)
Firefox 3.5.2	82 (2.16%)
Firefox 3.0.3	76 (2.00%)
Safari 525.27.1	58 (1.53%)
Firefox 3.0.7	57 (1.50%)
Firefox 3.0.11	49 (1.29%)
Firefox 2.0.0.16	45 (1.19%)
Firefox 3.0.4	44 (1.16%)
Safari 525.20.1	43 (1.13%)
Firefox 3.0.6	42 (1.11%)
Firefox 3.5.3	42 (1.11%)
Firefox 3.0.8	40 (1.05%)
Firefox 2.0.0.12	38 (1.00%)

Country	Count
United States	2582 (61.53%)
Unknown	1058 (25.21%)
Australia	141 (3.36%)
Canada	141 (3.36%)
United Kingdom	72 (1.72%)
Philippines	43 (1.02%)
Singapore	38 (0.91%)
India	26 (0.62%)
New Zealand	17 (0.41%)
Netherlands	16 (0.38%)
Turkey	15 (0.36%)
Ireland	13 (0.31%)
Germany	13 (0.31%)
Malaysia	11 (0.26%)
Iran, Islamic Republic of	10 (0.24%)

Feeling lonely is actually bad for you.

2009-09-22T16:16:00.000-07:00

What a surprise!
From Salon

Cacioppo, an evolutionary psychologist who has studied social connection for 30 years, stresses that chronic loneliness has well-documented health effects. For decades, scientists have known that social isolation impacts our health in ways comparable to the effects of high blood pressure, lack of exercise, obesity and smoking. In short, being lonely is bad for you. But what Cacioppo and his colleagues have found is that it's not literally being alone, but the subjective experience known as loneliness that causes harm.
"Whether you're at home with your family, working in an office crowded with bright and attractive young people, touring Disneyland, or sitting alone in a fleabag hotel on the wrong side of town, chronic feelings of loneliness can drive a cascade of physiological events that actually accelerates the aging process," he writes.
While brief periods of loneliness, such as your first semester away at college, or following the death of your spouse, doesn't appear to cause grave harm, chronic loneliness does. The long-term lonely are likely to suffer more diseases at an earlier age, and die younger than those who feel close to others. By middle age, the lonely drink more alcohol, eat more fat and exercise less than their more social fellows. The experience of feeling lonely -- whether or not you're surrounded by family, friends and co-workers -- impacts stress hormones, immune function and heart health.

The impossibility of the numbers

2009-09-09T20:37:00.000-07:00

According to the web counter this blog, with it's huge lack of updating, is still recieving massive amounts of visits.

It has to be search spiders or something. Or is the web so damn big that just anything gets attention like that?

Added a new counter to see if anything can be determined.

Another project that life left behind

2009-07-27T07:03:00.000-07:00

An article on Homeopathic remedies that are not Homeopathic would be good. A somebody told me last night that they thought Homeopathic meant "Home Remedy".

Science marches on

2008-11-19T09:10:00.001-08:00

Gulf War syndrome finally recognized as "real".

Rogue waves, Freak waves, Monster waves

2008-11-14T11:59:00.001-08:00

Interesting phenomenom. Remind me to do an entry on this.

Of all the nerve ...

2008-10-07T08:34:00.000-07:00

After presenting an evidence based, scientific and reasonable response, I was met with silence. I actually got the last word in.

How strange.

Taking on professional ignorance

2008-09-04T04:40:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I may have started an online conflict with a Pro, who's ignorance, either deliberate or true ignorance, (who can say), was so glaring I didn't resist the urge to correct her.

My comment was "moderated", so I am waiting to see if it is worth following up. I don't usually leave comments on other Blogs, not wanting them to repay in kind. This could change. I am struggling for a hypothesis to explain why a trained scientist could be so deluded and unscientific in matters of Medicine.

Cure for Cancer found, still not much News coverage

2008-09-01T11:46:00.000-07:00

Dichloroacetate (DCA), which was found to cause cancer cells to die, still not making it to the News. Even with Clinical trials underway, and multiple sources of evidence showing it is safe, and it works, somehow just isn't being covered by any News agencies.
(As always, don't take my word for it, do a search yourself.)

DCA research isn't receiving any funding from Drug Companies (no surprise there, it can't be patented), Insurance Companies, Government Agencies, or even the Cancer Foundations.

Meanwhile, after begging for money, the discoverer (Dr Evangelos Michelakis) is doing human trials. Note that he discovered DCA killed cancer cells in 2005, but kept it to himself for two years.

And it looks like Harvard Medical School didn't listen to the skeptics, and went ahead and did some testing on their own.

Dichloroacetate (DCA) Promising for Endometrial Cancer

A safe, cheap cure for some cancers. But with out profit, it is slow going. Meanwhile, several patented treatments which failed clinical trials, are still going to be used anyway.

When Medicine is about profit, only the Drug companies profit. No evidence yet, but I'm sure other countries are doing their own tests. No doubt some clinic is already using it to reduce or stop cancer.

But until somebody spends the millions to get it approved, it is considered quackery.

In anecdotal news, several people have reported curing skin cancer in less than two weeks, by putting it on the skin cancer itself. This is not considered evidence based medicine however. Until millions of dollars have been spent, years have passed, and multiple trials have been done, one can not say anything actually has cured skin cancer.

Not that those facts are going to stop somebody with cancer from trying. After all, if you are going to die, what have got to lose?

In case you are wondering how safe DCA is, several extensive studies were done, all of which declared it very safe. These studies were done not because of any concern about the drug, (it is very rarely used), but because it is found in drinking water, a by product if chlorination. People were concerned it might CAUSE cancer, so they did a lot of testing.

Funny thing, no matter how much they gave rats, they never got cancer.

(links for evidence for all this in the works)

The Nose knows, how we smell alarm signals

2008-08-31T16:59:00.000-07:00

Scientist close in on HOW we smell danger

From the NYTimes:
How the Nose Sniffs Danger in the Air

KENNETH CHANG

Published: August 22, 2008

The next time someone says, “I smell danger in the air,” that might literally be true — and the odor might be coming from you.

At the tip of the noses of mammals, including humans, is a ball of nerve cells known as the Grueneberg ganglion, named after Hans Grueneberg, the scientist who described the structure in mice in 1973.

Grueneberg thought it was just a nerve ending. Only in last few years, after scientists devised strains of mice that glow green under fluorescent light, did they deduce that the Grueneberg ganglion is a component of the olfactory system. But they still did not know what the ganglion smelled.

In the Aug. 22 issue of the journal Science, researchers at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland report that they have figured it out, at least for the green-glowing mice.

All sorts of organisms, including plants, insects and mammals, release “alarm pheromones” when they sense danger; the pheromones waft through the air to warn others. Very little is known about the alarm pheromones of mammals other than that they exist. Scientists have not identified the compounds; they do not know where in the body the pheromones are produced. Nonetheless, the Lausanne scientists could collect the pheromones by simply stressing mice and sucking up the air around them.

When other normal mice were exposed to the danger-scented air, they froze in their tracks. But mice whose Grueneberg ganglia had been excised did not notice anything wrong and continued to wander around their cages without a care in the world.

And still you come ...

2008-08-31T16:57:00.000-07:00

I don't understand it, how do all these people even know this exists?

Country	Count
United States	281 (78.27%)
Unknown	36 (10.03%)
United Kingdom	10 (2.79%)
Australia	9 (2.51%)
Canada	7 (1.95%)
Germany	5 (1.39%)
Japan	2 (0.56%)
Switzerland	2 (0.56%)
Colombia	1 (0.28%)
Austria	1 (0.28%)
Belgium	1 (0.28%)
Spain	1 (0.28%)
Romania	1 (0.28%)
Panama	1 (0.28%)
Mexico	1 (0.28%)

Stop! Stop!

2008-08-22T04:12:00.000-07:00

No updates, no links anywhere, yet still, you come.

Country	Count
United States	197 (76.65%)
Unknown	20 (7.78%)
United Kingdom	10 (3.89%)
Australia	7 (2.72%)
Canada	7 (2.72%)
Germany	5 (1.95%)
Japan	2 (0.78%)
Switzerland	2 (0.78%)
Colombia	1 (0.39%)
Austria	1 (0.39%)
Belgium	1 (0.39%)
Spain	1 (0.39%)
Romania	1 (0.39%)
Panama	1 (0.39%)
Mexico	1 (0.39%)

More mysterious stats

2008-08-04T04:10:00.000-07:00

Wow. Who are these people?

Country	Count
United States	152 (80.42%)
United Kingdom	9 (4.76%)
Unknown	7 (3.70%)
Australia	5 (2.65%)
Canada	5 (2.65%)
Germany	4 (2.12%)
Malaysia	1 (0.53%)
Romania	1 (0.53%)
Spain	1 (0.53%)
Switzerland	1 (0.53%)
Belgium	1 (0.53%)
Austria	1 (0.53%)
Mexico	1 (0.53%)

Why is space mostly dark?

2008-05-04T19:01:00.000-07:00

A mystery still not explained by science.

How did you find this Blog?

2008-04-23T08:15:00.001-07:00

Country	Count
United States	136 (83.95%)
United Kingdom	8 (4.94%)
Canada	5 (3.09%)
Australia	4 (2.47%)
Germany	3 (1.85%)
Unknown	2 (1.23%)
Spain	1 (0.62%)
Malaysia	1 (0.62%)
Austria	1 (0.62%)
Romania	1 (0.62%)

Cells have huge electric charges

2008-04-05T19:56:00.001-07:00

A new nanoscale tool reveals strong electric fields inside cells.

Using novel voltage-sensitive nanoparticles, researchers have found electric fields inside cells as strong as those produced in lightning bolts. Previously, it has only been possible to measure electric fields across cell membranes, not within the main bulk of cells. It's not clear what causes these strong fields or what they might mean. But now that it's possible to measure them, researchers hope to learn about disease states such as cancer by studying these electric fields.

University of Michigan researchers led by chemistry professor Raoul Kopelman encapsulated voltage-sensitive dyes in polymer spheres just 30 nanometers in diameter. When illuminated with blue light, the voltage-sensitive dyes emit a mixture of red and green light; the exact frequency of light emitted is influenced by the strength of local electric fields, allowing the researchers to measure those fields. Testing these nanoparticles in the internal fluid of brain-cancer cells, Kopelman found electric fields as strong as 15 million volts per meter, perhaps five times stronger than the field found in a lightning bolt.

http://www.technologyreview.com/Biotech/19841/?a=f

Ear wax

2008-04-05T19:56:00.000-07:00

I get slightly irate when I hear about people with ear wax problems. In all cases, it turns out the cause is avoiding warm water, specifically submerging the head in warm water.

Even cool water (pools, oceans, rivers, lakes and such) works, if one immerses the head in water with regularity.

No sources are going to be provided for this one. The removal of built up ear wax is done by using warm water. Or in extreme cases, chemicals and physical means.

But from an evidence based scientific view, nobody who regularly bathes in warm water, which means submerging the head in warm water, suffers from ear wax build up.

(Ear wax dissolves in warm water)

Aloe Vera

2008-04-03T02:42:00.001-07:00

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/picrender.fcgi?artid=1313538&blobtype=pdf

Evidence for wound healing, treating herpes, psoriasis, acne (postdermabrasion), etc etc

Evidence Based Science: Gardasil Vaccine, Medical deception

2008-03-13T11:54:00.000-07:00

Evidence Based Science: Gardasil Vaccine, Medical deception

Magnetism effects the brain, as well as all cells

2008-03-13T11:50:00.000-07:00

Need links to current and past research here.

Persistence of Contradicted Claims in the Literature

2008-03-10T16:59:00.000-07:00

The problem can be that with any strongly held opinion, it is hard to change your mind. Human psychology is such that people look for facts that confirm pre existing beliefs and ignore those that contradict them. Medicine is no different and it is interesting how misinformation persists when it is contradicted by good data.

The JAMA published an article last month entitled “Persistence of Contradicted Claims in the Literature .”

JAMA. 2007 Dec 5;298(21):2517-26.
Persistence of contradicted claims in the literature.
Tatsioni A, Bonitsis NG, Ioannidis JP.

Gardasil Vaccine Part 2

2008-03-09T05:26:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm in the thick of it now. With Google listing this blog, I feel the intensity of taking on the massive powers that be, in regards to a huge amount of money and power. Oh great. Just what I need, more stress.

While I discovered this deception all on my own, while searching for information about it, I discovered it isn't even news. For example, from Thursday, May 10, 2007 12:45 AM CDT

http://www.pantagraph.com/articles/2007/05/10/opinion/letters/126022.txt

According to published research, complication rates among Gardasil recipients were as high as 92 percent, similar to the control group receiving a neurotoxic aluminum adjuvant rather than saline. Fetal death was as high as 38 percent following vaccination, according to Merck.

The FDA has listed over 900 adverse Gardasil reactions including menstrual problems, seizures and syncope. Regarding efficacy, there are two Gardasil researchers who have spoken out against the premature conclusions of a ``cancer cure.''

It is not surprising that peer-reviewed literature has not raised greater concern about safety and effectiveness when over 40 percent of co-authors were Merck employees, including patent holders. According to Lancet (2005), Merck's Vioxx killed as many as 61,600 Americans, despite dozens of poorly designed, peer-reviewed papers touting its safety and enthusiastic approval by a conflicted FDA that routinely ignores long-term outcomes. My opinions are based upon peer-reviewed science and government documents.

Public health officials often readily accept the steady stream of disinformation and marketing propaganda from an FDA and CDC whose advisory board members, according to several congressional hearings, are frequently tied to pharmaceutical giants like Merck that have funded and created science aimed at delivering profits over safety.

Dr. David Ayoub

Oh well, it was news to me!

Looking at the information from the trials, there is one bright spot. Without meaning to, they did a double blind test on the aluminum salts used in the vaccine. Look at the charts!
from http://www.merck.com/product/usa/pi_circulars/g/gardasil/gardasil_pi.pdf

Side effects, listed by vaccine, "placebo", and saline injection. How interesting. More to come, more to come.

Gardasil Vaccine, Medical deception

2008-03-09T04:12:00.000-07:00

This phrase, "The placebo consisted of the same adjuvant", only appears in two documents on the world wide web.

The placebo consisted of the same adjuvant

OK now it appears in three documents. This being the third one. I find that hard to believe, but you can do a search yourself with Google, Google Scholar, Google News, and Google blog search, and discover this for yourself.

(edit) Google already found this entry! It even lists it on the web search. (/edit)

It appears here, www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1525-1438.2007.01123.x
and here, broken link-> http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/IHUB_downtime02.htm

One is a broken link, the other wants 39 US dollars to read it. Considering the volume and page numbers have question marks, I think I will try an alternative method of finding the article.

www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1525-1438.2007.01123.x
International Journal of Gynecological Cancer
Vol. 0 Issue 0 Page ???

Safety and immunogenicity of a vaccine targeting human papillomavirus types 6, 11, 16 and 18: a randomized, placebo-controlled trial in 176 Korean subjects

S. KANG, K.H. KIM, Y.T. KIM, Y.T. KIM, J.H. KIM, Y.S. SONG, S.H. SHIN, H.S. RYU, J.W. HAN, J.H. KANG, S.Y. PARK

It doesn't really matter, the issue isn't with the article at all. It is with the entire methodology of how they "tested" the Gardasil vaccine. During the clinical trials, they didn't use a placebo, they used amorphous aluminum hydroxyphosphate sulfate as the placebo.

Here is the abstract for the trial.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17986242

We performed a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study in 176 volunteers aged 9-23 years. Using a 2:1 ratio for randomization, 117 women were assigned to quadrivalent HPV (20 mug type 6, 40 mug type 11, 40 mug type 16, and 20 mug type 18) vaccine and 59 women to placebo. Individuals received vaccine at day 1, month 2, and month 6 and provided blood samples for analysis at enrollment at month 7. Analyses were done as specified in the study protocol. Quadrivalent HPV vaccine was generally well tolerated, with no vaccine-related serious adverse experiences. Quadrivalent HPV vaccine induced seroconversion for each vaccine-related HPV type. At month 7, vaccine-induced type-specific antibody titer was high. In conclusion, administration of quadrivalent HPV VLP vaccine to Korean women aged 9-23 years was generally well tolerated and highly immunogenic.

Note the bolded parts of the abstract. Just like all the other abstracts about Gardasil and clinical trials, they don't tell you the truth. They didn't use a Placebo, they used amorphous aluminum hydroxyphosphate sulfate dissolved in saline solution.

I am not making this up. So when they claim there were no adverse effects, they are comparing the vaccine to a big slug of aluminum injected into muscle tissue. Let me repeat that.

So when they claim there were no adverse effects, they are comparing the vaccine to a big slug of aluminum injected into muscle tissue.

You might think that is more than a bit deceptive. Because it is. In fact, it is a huge deception. It makes the entire clinical trial an example of bad science, bad medicine, and it is the opposite of Evidence Based Science.

How could the FDA approve that? How can anyone who is a scientist look at that and not see it?

This could be an entire series. This is unbelievable. As a scientific, rational person, I am deeply disturbed by this.

Which brings us back to that phrase, "The placebo consisted of the same adjuvant". Redefining placebo isn't just against the rules, it is against the very basis of science, medicine and evidence based science.

Animals and earthquakes

2008-03-09T03:49:00.000-07:00

Anecdotal evidence for thousands of years says some animals can detect earthquakes before they get bad.

Science is undecided.

Can you trust Wikipedia?

2008-03-06T05:37:00.000-08:00

Not really. We do a fine job, but even the self referenced Wiki information tells you to not use Wiki as your only source, and to check the information.

Which is really good advice.

Just found this Blog, Quantum Weirdness

2008-02-27T06:01:00.000-08:00

Quantum Blog
http://quantumweird.wordpress.com/2007/06/06/double-slit-weirdness/

An entire blog could be done about Quantum Theory. OK, there is an entire blog.

Vitamin D3

2008-02-14T14:30:00.000-08:00

http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/84/4/694

Vitamin D₂, if given in high enough doses, prevents infantilerickets and is capable of healing adult osteomalacia. However,the inefficiency of vitamin D₂ compared with vitamin D₃, ona per mole basis, at increasing 25(OH)D is now well documented,and no successful clinical trials to date have shown that vitaminD₂ prevents fractures (19-21, 47). Given the assumption thatthe intake of any nutrient will deliver defined effects [ie,supplementation with vitamin D will lead to an increase in 25(OH)Dor fracture prevention], it is clear that vitamin D₂ does notfit this current nutritional notion. This is not to suggestthat vitamin D₂ is not efficacious, but, because the units ofthe 2 forms is clearly not equivalent, likely due to its distinctmetabolic features and diminished binding of vitamin D₂ metabolitesto DBP in plasma, continual application of vitamin D₂ in clinicaluse, including in research trials, only serves to confound ourunderstanding of optimal vitamin D dosing recommendations. Furthermore,the public expects to derive the equivalent effect per unitdose of vitamin D, whether it is vitamin D₂ or vitamin D₃. Thescientific community is aware that these molecules are not equivalent.Therefore, vitamin D₂ should no longer be regarded as a nutrientappropriate for supplementation or fortification of foods.

More Mercury Madness

2008-02-14T14:07:00.000-08:00

J Child Neurol. 2007 Nov;22(11):1308-11.

Blood levels of mercury are related to diagnosis of autism: a reanalysis of an important data set.
Desoto MC, Hitlan RT.
Department of Psychology, University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Iowa 50614, USA. cathy.desoto@uni.edu
The question of what is leading to the apparent increase in autism is of great importance. Like the link between aspirin and heart attack, even a small effect can have major health implications. If there is any link between autism and mercury, it is absolutely crucial that the first reports of the question are not falsely stating that no link occurs. We have reanalyzed the data set originally reported by Ip et al. in 2004 and have found that the original p value was in error and that a significant relation does exist between the blood levels of mercury and diagnosis of an autism spectrum disorder. Moreover, the hair sample analysis results offer some support for the idea that persons with autism may be less efficient and more variable at eliminating mercury from the blood.
PMID: 18006963 [PubMed - in process]

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http://www.scipub.org/fulltext/ajbb/ajbb4273-84.pdf
Oxidative Stress in Autism: Elevated Cerebellar 3-nitrotyrosine Levels

American Journal of Biochemistry and Biotechnology 4 (2): 73-84, 2008
ISSN 1553-3468
© 2008 Science Publications
Corresponding Author: Elizabeth M. Sajdel-Sulkowska, D.Sc., Harvard Medical School/Brigham and Women’s Hospital,
Department of Psychiatry, BLI-151, 221 Longwood Ave., Boston, MA 02115, USA
73

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/
A comparative evaluation of the effects of MMR immunization and mercury doses from thimerosal-containing childhood vaccines on the population prevalence of autism.

Mercury and autism: accelerating evidence?

Mercury in babies first haircuts

Baby teeth are a good measure of cumulative exposure to toxic metals during fetal development and early infancy, so this study suggests that children with autism had a higher body burden of mercury during fetal/infant development. Antibiotic use is known to almost completely inhibit excretion of mercury in rats due to alteration of gut flora. Thus, higher use of oral antibiotics in the children with autism may have reduced their ability to excrete mercury, and hence may partially explain the higher level in baby teeth. Higher usage of oral antibiotics in infancy may also partially explain the high incidence of chronic gastrointestinal problems in individuals with autism.

Calomel, they used to give it to children ...

2008-02-11T07:31:00.000-08:00

It may be hard to believe now, but this was considered good science at one time, and was used for teething with babies. It was called Calomel, but it is Mercury.

Mercurous Chloride MSDS information

3. Hazards Identification
Emergency Overview
--------------------------
WARNING! HARMFUL IF SWALLOWED, INHALED OR ABSORBED THROUGH SKIN. CAUSES IRRITATION TO SKIN, EYES AND RESPIRATORY TRACT. MAY CAUSE ALLERGIC SKIN REACTION. MERCURY COMPOUNDS AFFECT THE KIDNEYS AND CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM.

J.T. Baker SAF-T-DATA^(tm) Ratings (Provided here for your convenience)
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Health Rating: 3 - Severe (Poison)
Flammability Rating: 0 - None
Reactivity Rating: 0 - None
Contact Rating: 3 - Severe (Life)
Lab Protective Equip: GOGGLES; LAB COAT; PROPER GLOVES
Storage Color Code: Blue (Health)
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Potential Health Effects
----------------------------------

Inhalation:
Causes irritation to the respiratory tract. Symptoms include sore throat, coughing, pain, tightness in chest, breathing difficulties, shortness of breath and headache. Pneumonitis may develop. Can be absorbed through inhalation with symptoms to parallel ingestion.
Ingestion:
Toxic! Average lethal dose for inorganic mercury salts is about 1 gram. May cause burning of the mouth and pharynx, abdominal pain, vomiting, bloody diarrhea. May be followed by a rapid and weak pulse, shallow breathing, paleness, exhaustion, tremors and collapse. Delayed death may occur from renal failure.
Skin Contact:
Causes irritaton. Symptoms include redness and pain. May cause burns. May cause sensitization. Can be absorbed through the skin with symptoms to parallel ingestion.
Eye Contact:
Causes irritation to eyes, may cause burns and eye damage.
Chronic Exposure:
Chronic exposure through any route can produce central nervous system damage. May cause muscle tremors, personality and behavior changes, memory loss, metallic taste, loosening of the teeth, digestive disorders, skin rashes, brain damage and kidney damage. Can cause skin allergies and accumulate in the body. Repeated skin contact can cause the skin to turn gray in color. Not a known reproductive hazard, but related mercury compounds can damage the developing fetus and decrease fertility in males and females.
Aggravation of Pre-existing Conditions:
Persons with nervous disorders, or impaired kidney or respiratory function, or a history of allergies or a known sensitization to mercury may be more susceptible to the effects of the substance.

Wiki page on this

Some photos and information here

PubMed article

Unregulated potions still cause mercury poisoning
		The toxicity of inorganic mercury, known as the mercuric or mercurous form, has been recognized for centuries. Roman historians noted that men working inSpanish cinnabar mines, rich in red mercuric sulfide, developed tremors, mental deterioration, and ataxia. The idea for Lewis Carroll's mad hatter inAlice in Wonderland came from his knowledge of the neural toxicity of mercuric nitrate, which was used in the fur industry to make felt. Mercurous compounds became the most common form of mercury used in medicinal preparations. They are often regarded as safe and nontoxic, reflected in the innocent names of the preparations, which suggest gentleness and beauty : sweet sublimate, mercurous dulcis, and calomel (fromcalos, meaning “good,” and melas,“black”). Calomel, or mercurous chloride, probably originated inChina and was used by Paracelsian physicians in the 16th century. It was used to treat malaria and yellow fever, and a preparation called “wormchocolate” or “worm candy” was given to patients infested with helminths.¹ Toxic effects were soon noticed in individuals given large doses for long periods, in whom excessive salivation, gum inflammation, loosening of the teeth, gastrointestinal upset, and an ashen appearance developed. They had troubling neurologic symptoms, such as arm and facial tremors, hyperfine, ataxia, and erethism—unusual timidity and personality change.In 1825, a poem appeared in a Virginia publication warning physicians of the dangers of calomel : “Since Calomel's become their boast,/How many patients have they lost,/How many thousands they make ill,/Of poison, with their calomel.”²^(p253) Some physicians became alarmed by the toxicity of mercury-containing medicines. ¹ In1822, Samuel Thomson declared that, the practice of giving poison as medicine, which is so common among the medical faculty at the present day, is of the utmost importance to the public....and [I] enforce in the strongest manner on their minds the pernicious consequences that have happened and are daily taking place by reason of giving mercury, arsenic, and other deadly poisons to cure diseases.³ The toxic potential of calomel was highlighted in 1948. A Cincinnatipediatrician discovered that a common infantile and childhood illness called acrodynia or “pink disease” was caused by the widespread use of calomel in treating childhood teething and constipation.⁴ As late as 1950,acrodynia accounted for more than 3% of admissions to children's wards inLondon hospitals. Official statistics record that 585 children died of pink disease between 1939 and 1948 in England and Wales. Because of the recognition of mercury's toxicity, compounds containing mercury have been banned from almost all regulated drugs and over-the-counter preparations in the United States and many other countries. But mercury still appears in unregulated potions, as shown by Weldon and colleagues' study. The authors report a series of patients in whom elevated urinary concentrations of mercury developed, and they had symptoms suggestive of inorganic mercury poisoning, such as tremor and paresthesia. The women had used a cream containing calomel for a prolonged period, and enough mercury had become systemically absorbed to produce a marked rise in urine mercury. Women usually bought the cream in Mexico, although one fifth had obtained it in theUnited States at flea markets or health shops. Such beauty creams are available worldwide and have been associated with renal and peripheral nerve damage. Other unregulated potions containing mercury are available in the UnitedStates. Kang-Yum and Oransky report the cases of 3 patients who developed in organic mercury poisoning from Chinese herbal and patent medicines taken orally or as salves.⁵ Their article includes a table listing 18 different Chinese patent medicines that contain mercurials. Physicians should think of mercury intoxication in all patients with unexplained neurologic or cognitive symptoms. Patients who have had access to unregulated products, from either the United States or elsewhere, are most at risk. If the diagnosis is suspected, the patient's mercury levels should be measured and then the suspected product analyzed.

Hard to imagine.

Vaccines, Mercury, death, related issues

2008-02-10T13:26:00.000-08:00

Just found this Blog
http://0mercury.blogspot.com/2008/01/greatest-lie-ever-told.html

and this one
http://whychiropractic.blogspot.com/2008/02/vaccinations.html

Oh no. Will have to do an entire entry on these issues.

Mercury is bad for you, and your children too.

2008-02-05T12:23:00.000-08:00

Update on Mercury, especially in regards to your teeth.

The idiocy of how they said they tested mercury in children.

Articles related to the original scientific discovery of Mercury being bad for you.

From
http://www.holistic-dentistry.com/artamalgam.asp

Alfred Stock (1876-1946) was a famous German inorganic chemist who is still recognized as a pioneer in his specialty. (The German Chemical Society awards an Alfred Stock Memorial Prize for inorganic chemistry, http://www.gdch.de/ehrung/). Stock was himself the victim of a chronic intoxication by mercury vapour, which was not uncommon (though poorly recognized) among chemists at that time. He became deeply involved in this problem, and wrote some 50 papers on various aspects of mercury during the years 1926-1943, many of which are still well worth reading for their amazingly modern educational content, insightful observations, and important experimental results.

http://www.lichtenberg.dk/mercury_vapour_in_the_oral_cavit.htm

MERCURY VAPOUR IN THE ORAL CAVITY - IN RELATION TO NUMBER OF AMALGAM -SURFACES / GOLD / PORCELAIN, AND THE CLASSIC SYMPTOMS OF CHRONIC MERCURY POISONING.

Abstract

This study shows that individuals with dental amalgam fillings who exhibit symptoms typical of chronic mercury poisoning, all have mercury vapour concentrations in their oral cavity far higher than acceptable levels and on average, higher than the maximum permitted levels for the industrial environment.

Original paper (PDF)

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This Matter of Gravity

2008-02-02T09:13:00.000-08:00

This is a very complicated issue. The inverse square law, a fundamental part of the theory of gravity, is under investigation. While it works just fine for calculating orbits, launching space craft and building bridges, it isn't exactly correct it seems. Was Newton wrong about his famous Law of Gravity?

An interesting article here, a new theory.

Outer space: A matter of gravity

by John D. Barrow
When Isaac Newton reflected upon his law of gravitation — the famous "inverse square law" which states that the force of gravitational attraction between two masses whose centres are separated by a distance r is inversely proportional to r² — he realised there was a big gap in his arguments. Filling that gap delayed the publication of his momentous Principia until 1687. He had been assuming that the gravitational force exerted by a sphere is exactly the same as that exerted by an idealised point of the same mass located at its centre — let's call it the spherical property. He had assumed that this was always true, but maybe it wasn't. It certainly made life easier to assume it to be true. Planets could be thought of as mere points feeling the gravitational pull of a point-like Sun as they traced out their oval orbits in his notebook, just as they did around the solar system.
Eventually, in the first part of the Principia, Newton was able to show that his assumption had been a good one, but along the way he discovered some other things that are at least as surprising. If the law of gravitational force between two masses separated by a distance r is proportional to rⁿ then the only values of n for which the spherical property holds are n = -2, which gives the inverse square law, and n = +1, giving the so-called "harmonic law". The other possible laws with different values of n wouldn't allow us to replace a sphere by just a single point of any mass and get the same results. Newton was no doubt relieved to discover that his intuition had been right all along.

Newton studied the n = +1 law because it was easy to solve but he discarded it as being of no scientific interest for the study of gravity because it required forces between masses to increase as their separation grew in space. He didn't know of any natural forces that behaved like that. Gravity certainly didn't. Nearly 125 years later, Pierre Laplace went a step further and showed (what Newton likely knew) that the most general possible force law that has the spherical property is just the sum of any n = -2 law and any n = +1 law. So a mass m is accelerated by another mass M by a gravitational force equal to
Gravitational Force = -GMm/r² + mλr,
where G is the Newtonian gravitational constant. Here, I have equipped one of the constants of proportionality, -GMm which gives Newton's law of gravity, with a minus sign because gravity is attractive. The other, λ, will be repulsive if λ is positive, and so it appears with a plus sign. The second term (λr) is strange and, like Newton before him, Laplace ignored it in matters of gravity....
continued here

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Testing the gravitational inverse-square law

If the universe contains more than three spatial dimensions, as many physicists believe, our current laws of gravity should break down at small distances

Nothing seems more certain than the "fact" that there are three dimensions of space. But can we be sure that there are only three dimensions? Imagine a tightrope walker balancing on a cable high above the ground. To the tightrope walker the cable is effectively a 1D object, because he only needs one coordinate to specify his position as he walks back and forth. But an ant, for instance, sees the cable as a 2D object, because it can crawl along and also around the cable.

Torsion pendulum

Today, increasing numbers of physicists are seriously questioning whether we are like tightrope walkers, unaware of the true number of dimensions in space. New ideas from theoretical physics suggest that the best way to discover the actual dimensionality of space is to study how the gravitational attraction between two objects depends on the distance between them.
The whole story on this here

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverse_square_law

Red Sprites and Blue Jets

2008-02-02T09:04:00.000-08:00

Red Sprites and Blue Jets are names for electromagnetic events that occur above thunderstorms. While they are one of the most abundant events on our planet, most people have never witnessed either. In fact, photographs of them are rare, and movies even more so.

So we have these incredible, huge events, taking place all the time, all over our world, that most have never witnessed, and even with advanced sensing equipment and cameras, including from the Space Shuttle and Space Station, we have very little evidence.

These are not small discharges of energy, they can be 75 miles high, and a hundred square miles wide.

I find that amazing.

So here is some of the evidence.

A movie
http://elf.gi.alaska.edu/movies/wf3541.mpg
and the website
http://elf.gi.alaska.edu/#why

NASA
http://wwwghcc.msfc.nasa.gov/skeets.html

Howstuffworks has a video on lightning, that contains some excellent research footage of sprites.
This page has the video link.

Extensive research and documentation here (pdf)
http://www-star.stanford.edu/~vlf/publications/theses/cpblThesis.pdf

Observational Science and You Part Two

2008-02-01T20:12:00.000-08:00

In the original post about this, I became fascinated by the data on you, the reader, and despite my desperate inquiries, I still know nothing about how you found this half finished effort.

In fact, some of you know far more than I do at this point. The latest data on you, is here:

Country	Count
United States	60 (86.96%)
Germany	3 (4.35%)
United Kingdom	2 (2.90%)
Austria	1 (1.45%)
Canada	1 (1.45%)
Malaysia	1 (1.45%)
Romania	1 (1.45%)

Browser	Count
Firefox 2.0.0.11	56 (81.16%)
Internet Explorer 7.0	11 (15.94%)
Internet Explorer 6.0	1 (1.45%)
Safari 523.12.2	1 (1.45%)

OS	Count
WinXP	68 (98.55%)
MacOSX	1 (1.45%)

So if you are in Austria, Canada, Malaysia or Romania, you know who you are. The lone Mac user also knows.

I, I am clueless. And avoiding finishing that entry on DMSO, as well as several new entries.

I have 112 entries to go. And every single one of them requires hours of work. And I still did nothing on the first three entries, all of which are crucial to everything else. Half baked. Half baked indeed.

What is a Scientific Law? Theory? Hypothesis?

2008-02-01T11:40:00.000-08:00

A lot of information from various sources, discussing the Laws of Physics and other matters.

A scientific law or scientific principle is a concise verbal or mathematical statement of a relation that expresses a fundamental principle of science, like Newton's law of universal gravitation. A scientific law must always apply under the same conditions, and implies a causal relationship between its elements.

A law differs from a scientific theory in that it does not posit a mechanism or explanation of phenomena: it is merely a distillation of the results of repeated observation. As such, a law limited in applicability to circumstances resembling those already observed, and is often found to be false when extrapolated.

Honderich, Ted, ed., "Laws, natural or scientific", Oxford Companion to Philosophy, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 474–476

Ehrenberg, Andrew S C , "Even the Social Sciences Have Laws," Nature, 365 (30), 385.

From Encarta

Scientific Law, in science, principles that are taken to be universally applicable. Laws (for instance, Boyle's law and Newton's laws of motion) form the basic theoretical structure of the physical sciences, so that the rejection of a law by the scientific community is an extremely rare event. On occasion a law may be modified, as was the case when Albert Einstein showed that Newton's laws of motion do not apply to objects traveling at speeds close to that of light.

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A nice explanation from a Teacher:

LAW
1) An empirical generalization; a statement of a biological principle that appears to be without exception at the time it is made, and has become consolidated by repeated successful testing; rule (Lincoln et al., 1990)
2) A theoretical principle deduced from particular facts, applicable to a defined group or class of phenomena, and expressible by a statement that a particular phenomenon always occurs if certain conditions be present (Oxford English Dictionary as quoted in Futuyma, 1979).
3) A set of observed regularities expressed in a concise verbal or mathematical statement. (Krimsley, 1995).
THEORY
1) The grandest synthesis of a large and important body of information about some related group of natural phenomena (Moore, 1984)
2) A body of knowledge and explanatory concepts that seek to increase our understanding ("explain") a major phenomenon of nature (Moore, 1984).
3) A scientifically accepted general principle supported by a substantial body of evidence offered to provide an explanation of observed facts and as a basis for future discussion or investigation (Lincoln et al., 1990).
4) 1. The abstract principles of a science as distinguished from basic or applied science. 2. A reasonable explanation or assumption advanced to explain a natural phenomenon but lacking confirming proof (Steen, 1971). [NB: I don't like this one but I include it to show you that even in "Science dictionaries" there is variation in definitions which leads to confusion].
5) A scheme or system of ideas or statements held as an explanation or account of a group of facts or phenomena; a hypothesis that has been confirmed or established by observation or experiment, and is propounded or accepted as accounting for the known facts; a statement of what are held to be the general laws, principles or causes of something known or observed. (Oxford English Dictionary, 1961; [emphasis added]).
6) An explanation for an observation or series of observations that is substantiated by a considerable body of evidence (Krimsley, 1995).

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Scientific Laws, Hypotheses, and Theories

Lay people often misinterpret the language used by scientists. And for that reason, they sometimes draw the wrong conclusions as to what the scientific terms mean.

Three such terms that are often used interchangeably are "scientific law," "hypothesis," and "theory."

In layman's terms, if something is said to be "just a theory," it usually means that it is a mere guess, or is unproved. It might even lack credibility. But in scientific terms, a theory implies that something has been proven and is generally accepted as being true.

Here is what each of these terms means to a scientist:

Scientific Law: This is a statement of fact meant to explain, in concise terms, an action or set of actions. It is generally accepted to be true and univseral, and can sometimes be expressed in terms of a single mathematical equation. Scientific laws are similar to mathematical postulates. They don't really need any complex external proofs; they are accepted at face value based upon the fact that they have always been observed to be true.

Specifically, scientific laws must be simple, true, universal, and absolute. They represent the cornerstone of scientific discovery, because if a law ever did not apply, then all science based upon that law would collapse.

Some scientific laws, or laws of nature, include the law of gravity, Newton's laws of motion, the laws of thermodynamics, Boyle's law of gases, the law of conservation of mass and energy, and Hook's law of elasticity.

Hypothesis: This is an educated guess based upon observation. It is a rational explanation of a single event or phenomenon based upon what is observed, but which has not been proved. Most hypotheses can be supported or refuted by experimentation or continued observation.

Theory: A theory is more like a scientific law than a hypothesis. A theory is an explanation of a set of related observations or events based upon proven hypotheses and verified multiple times by detached groups of researchers. One scientist cannot create a theory; he can only create a hypothesis.

In general, both a scientific theory and a scientific law are accepted to be true by the scientific community as a whole. Both are used to make predictions of events. Both are used to advance technology.

In fact, some laws, such as the law of gravity, can also be theories when taken more generally. The law of gravity is expressed as a single mathematical expression and is presumed to be true all over the universe and all through time. Without such an assumption, we can do no science based on gravity's effects. But from the law, we derived Einstein's General Theory of Relativity in which gravity plays a crucial role. The basic law is intact, but the theory expands it to include various and complex situations involving space and time.

The biggest difference between a law and a theory is that a theory is much more complex and dynamic. A law governs a single action, whereas a theory explains an entire group of related phenomena.

Theories can be tweaked, but they are seldom, if ever, entirely replaced.
-------------------------------------------------------

From About.com

Words have precise meanings in science. For example, 'theory', 'law', and 'hypothesis' don't all mean the same thing. Outside of science, you might say something is 'just a theory', meaning it's supposition that may or may not be true. In science, a theory is an explanation that generally is accepted to be true. Here's a closer look at these important, commonly misused terms.
Hypothesis
A hypothesis is an educated guess, based on observation. Usually, a hypothesis can be supported or refuted through experimentation or more observation. A hypothesis can be disproven, but not proven to be true.
Theory
A scientific theory summarizes a hypothesis or group of hypotheses that have been supported with repeated testing. A theory is valid as long as there is no evidence to dispute it. Therefore, theories can be disproven. Basically, if evidence accumulates to support a hypothesis, then the hypothesis can become accepted as a good explanation of a phenomenon. One definition of a theory is to say it's an accepted hypothesis.

Law
A law generalizes a body of observations. At the time it is made, no exceptions have been found to a law. Scientific laws explain things, but they do not describe them. One way to tell a law and a theory apart is to ask if the description gives you a means to explain 'why'.
There is no 'proof' or absolute 'truth' in science. The closest we get are facts, which are indisputable observations. Note, however, if you define proof as arriving at a logical conclusion, based on the evidence, then there is 'proof' in science. I work under the definition that to prove something implies it can never be wrong, which is different. If you're asked to define hypothesis, theory, and law, keep in mind the definitions of proof and of these words can vary slightly depending on the scientific discipline. What is important is to realize they don't all mean the same thing and cannot be used interchangeably.
See More About:
chemistry definitions
hypothesis
scientific laws
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Scientific Hypothesis, Theories and Laws
The principles and theories of science have been established through repeated experimentation and observation and have been refereed through peer review before general acceptance by the scientific community. Acceptance does not imply rigidity or constraint, or denote dogma. Instead, as new data become available, previous scientific explanations are revised and improved, or rejected and replaced. Science is a way of making sense of the world, with internally-consistent methods and principles that are well described. There is a progression from a hypothesis to a theory using testable, scientific laws. Only a few scientific facts are natural laws and many hypotheses are tested to generate a theory. Find out how scientific hypotheses, theories and laws describe the natural world.
What is a hypothesis?
A hypothesis is an idea or proposition that can be tested by observations or experiments, about the natural world. In order to be considered scientific, hypotheses are subject to scientific evaluation and must be falsifiable, which means that they are worded in such a way that they can be proven to be incorrect.
What is a scientific theory?
To scientists, a theory is a coherent explanation for a large number of facts and observations about the natural world.
A theory is:
Internally consistent and compatible with the evidence
Firmly grounded in and based upon evidence
Tested against a wide range of phenomena
Demonstrably effective in problem-solving
In popular use, a theory is often assumed to imply mere speculation, but in science, something is not called a theory until it has been confirmed over many independent experiments. Theories are more certain than hypotheses, but less certain than laws. The procedures and processes for testing a theory are well-defined within each scientific discipline.
What is a scientific law?
A scientific law is a description of a natural phenomenon or principle that invariably holds true under specific conditions and will occur under certain circumstances.

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SCIENTIFIC LAWS and THEORIES
Here are a couple of definitions of each word.
LAW
1) An empirical generalization; a statement of a biological principle that appears to be without exception at the time it is made, and has become consolidated by repeated successful testing; rule (Lincoln et al., 1990)
2) A theoretical principle deduced from particular facts, applicable to a defined group or class of phenomena, and expressible by a statement that a particular phenomenon always occurs if certain conditions be present (Oxford English Dictionary as quoted in Futuyma, 1979).
3) A set of observed regularities expressed in a concise verbal or mathematical statement. (Krimsley, 1995).
THEORY
1) The grandest synthesis of a large and important body of information about some related group of natural phenomena (Moore, 1984)
2) A body of knowledge and explanatory concepts that seek to increase our understanding ("explain") a major phenomenon of nature (Moore, 1984).
3) A scientifically accepted general principle supported by a substantial body of evidence offered to provide an explanation of observed facts and as a basis for future discussion or investigation (Lincoln et al., 1990).
4) 1. The abstract principles of a science as distinguished from basic or applied science. 2. A reasonable explanation or assumption advanced to explain a natural phenomenon but lacking confirming proof (Steen, 1971). [NB: I don't like this one but I include it to show you that even in "Science dictionaries" there is variation in definitions which leads to confusion].
5) A scheme or system of ideas or statements held as an explanation or account of a group of facts or phenomena; a hypothesis that has been confirmed or established by observation or experiment, and is propounded or accepted as accounting for the known facts; a statement of what are held to be the general laws, principles or causes of something known or observed. (Oxford English Dictionary, 1961; [emphasis added]).
6) An explanation for an observation or series of observations that is substantiated by a considerable body of evidence (Krimsley, 1995).

Some scientists will tell you that the difference between them is that a law describes what nature does under certain conditions, and will predict what will happen as long as those conditions are met. A theory explains how nature works. Others delineate law and theory based on mathematics -- Laws are often times mathematically defined (once again, a description of how nature behaves) whereas theories are often non-mathematical. Looking at things this was helps to explain, in part, why physics and chemistry have lots of "laws" whereas biology has few laws (and more theories). In biology, it is very difficult to describe all the complexities of life with "simple" (relatively speaking!) mathematical terms.
Regardless of which definitions one uses to distinguish between a law and a theory, scientists would agree that a theory is NOT a "transitory law, a law in waiting". There is NO hierarchy being implied by scientists who use these words. That is, a law is neither "better than" nor "above" a theory. From this view, laws and theories "do" different things and have different roles to play in science. Furthermore, notice that with any of the above definitions of law, neither scientists nor nature "conform" to the law. In science, a law is not something that is dictated to scientists or nature; it is not something that a scientist or nature has to do under threat of some penalty if they don't conform.
source

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Scientific law

true or (more weakly understood) well confirmed or established. On realist conceptions the laws of science are generally regarded as expressing the [causal} laws according to which all occurs, or by which all is governed. See cause, determinism.
[Philosophical Glossary]
<2001-06-22>

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Scientific Laws and Theories
A scientist seeks to understand both how and why nature works. But scientists are far more successful at understanding the "hows" than the "whys". We are good at recognizing patterns in nature and predicting them. But our understanding of the complexities of nature has just begun. Although we would always like to know why some phenomenon occurs in nature, extracting this information can be very difficult. On the other hand, discovering how nature works through the patterns and order revealed through scientific experiments can lead to general laws from which predictions about the phenomenon in question can be made. It is important to understand at the outset that science does not require an answer to the question of why something happens, only how. The degree of success of a scientific law, theory or model is judged by the accuracy that they can predict phenomena.
A scientific law is a rule or a set of rules which generalizes the behavior of some phenomenon in nature. For example, Newton's First Law of Motion states that every object either remains at rest or in continuous motion with constant speed unless acted upon by a force. A scientific law is subjected to rigorous testing by a variety of experiments which are repeated many times. A valid scientific law can accurately predict natural phenomena. For example, Newton's First Law of Motion predicts that a student wearing in-line skates coasting with constant speed atop a flat, horizontal, friction-free surface would continue forever if there were no outside forces acting on the skates. If we knew the student's speed, we could predict how far the student would travel in a given amount of time. For example, if moving with a constant speed of 2 m/s for 5 sec, how far would the student move? Here we appeal to Newton's First Law, which stated algebraically is the familiar expression, distance = speed x time or d = vt.
A theory , as opposed to a scientific law, is usually not as thoroughly tested by experiments. Either a law or a theory can sometimes explain the actual cause of the phenomenon. However, neither a law nor a theory needs to specify a cause of phenomena in nature to be considered successful. Rather to become acceptable to the community of scientists as scientific laws and theories, whether in the form of statements or algebraic expressions, the laws and theories must merely be capable of reliable predictions of natural phenomena. Scientific inquiry in the physical sciences generally proceeds not with hypothesis testing, but by developing and refining "models".
The modeling approach to learning science developed by David Hestenes and his colleagues at Arizona State University has also proved to be a very effective way to learn science¹. We will be following the modeling approach in doing experiments in this manual.
There are basically two stages in the modeling approach: 1) model development and 2) model refinement. The first stage is generally conceptual, and the second stage refines the initial model into numerical or mathematical models. Here we will emphasize the first stage of the modeling approach to scientific inquiry, namely, model development.

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Scientific Law: A general statement based on the observed behavior of matter, to which no exceptions are known.
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scientific law
Definition
Independently and sufficiently verified description of a direct link between cause and effect of a phenomenon, deduced from experiments and/or observations. Also called laws of science, scientific laws are considered established and universally applicable (to certain class of things or phenomenon under appropriate conditions) but not necessarily definitive.
scientific law is in the Information & Knowledge Management subject.
scientific law appears in the definitions of the following terms: rule of thumb, scientific method, statistical law, Pareto principle, science and laws of science

A List of Scientific Laws
Michael Shermer on "The Scientific Method"

Magnetic fields that map the brain may also treat its disorders

2008-02-01T08:16:00.000-08:00

Welcome to transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), one of the hottest research tools in neuroscience. Since its invention 15 years ago, TMS has become a relatively simple, noninvasive, and usually painless way to electrically stimulate specific brain regions. It's power tantalizes investigators who want to unravel how the human mind works. More recently, TMS has also grabbed the attention of physicians and psychologists, who predict that it has the potential to treat conditions ranging from epilepsy to stuttering to depression.

There's preliminary evidence, for example, that TMS offers a less drastic alternative to electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), the treatment of last resort for people with severe depression. At the same time, investigators acknowledge that there's much they don't know about how TMS affects the brain.

You, me and Mercury

2008-01-31T07:34:00.001-08:00

A quick look at my limited data set. An obvious ploy to avoid either a new entry, or working up an old one. Yes, I am a lazy sumbitch today. But after wasting a minute reading this almost useless dreck,
take a look at new image of the planet mercury.

Country Count

United States 52 (88.14%)

Germany 2 (3.39%)

United Kingdom 2 (3.39%)

Austria 1 (1.69%)

Canada 1 (1.69%)

Romania 1 (1.69%)

Observational Science and you

2008-01-30T06:45:00.001-08:00

Some will try to tell you that science is based on theory and experimentation. Yet vast amounts of scientific knowledge and conclusion is based on observation alone. Of course to be scientific observation is combined with record keeping, logical analysis of data gathered, efforts to refine and objectify the observation, sharing information with other scientist, and repeated observation. This is critical for observation to be considered scientific.

To be scientific, others must be able to repeat the observation, or view records that have been made of observed events. Weather, (Meteorology), Astronomy, Oceanography, Geology, the list is long of observable nature and branches of science that study nature. Experiments are limited, so science will focus on better ways to observe and record what is occurring, to gain understanding of the nature of our Universe.

Oh, but what about you? The reader of these words, that would be you, right now, at this very moment, a scientific event is happening. You, or more precisely, the computer you are using, as well as other factors, is being recorded. Your attention has become a matter of science, a record is being made. The time, the place, the type of computer, the browser, all are being added to a scientific database of information about this blogger.com page.

Don't worry, your privacy isn't being violated, no personal data is being recorded, your Internet number (IP address) isn't recorded, or available to myself, or anyone else reading here.

This data is only being studied by myself. It is most interesting because I have made no effort to publicize or announce these humble efforts. And unless you say something, I don't have any scientific knowledge of how you came to be spending your time reading here.

And due to the limited amount of data that is actually recorded, it is possible that nobody has read anything, that the page loaded onto your computer, but was not viewed. To the mindless server that is gathering the traffic data, it is the same event.

One way I can learn more is to have you input information, by adding a comment, where you become part of the science, rather than just an observer. That nobody has, is understandable. I wouldn't either, if this was somebody else's blog.

Because you are, at this point in time, a small part of a data set, you will know more than most if I do a scientific thing, and share information with you. At this exact moment, according to the best information I can gather, here is what I know about you, the anonymous eyeballs out there in the world.

Where you are (at this moment)

Country Count
United States 47 (92.16%)
United Kingdom 2 (3.92%)
Austria 1 (1.96%)
Germany 1 (1.96%)

What Browser you are using:
Browser Count
Firefox 2.0.0.11 41 (80.39%)
Internet Explorer 7.0 8 (15.69%)
Internet Explorer 6.0 1 (1.96%)
Safari 523.12.2 1 (1.96%)

OS Count
WinXP 50 (98.04%)
MacOSX 1 (1.96%)

So, in regards to observational science and you, by looking at this information, somebody can make conclusions, based on the evidence presented.

The most obvious is that one person using a Mac (I envy you) viewed a page. Because I have data from the past, I know that same viewer used Safari 523.12.2 to load a page. I suspect you are in England, based on other data.

None of this is proof. It is a conclusion based on observation, drawing on limited data. The data could be flawed, my interpretation could be flawed. To know with certainty, in a scientific sense, all factors that might distort the information have to be corrected, or accounted for.

This doesn't mean it isn't a scientific conclusion, conclusions based on available knowledge are often wrong. As more data is gathered, our understanding will increase, and at some point, in regards to some things, we can reach a level of surety, where the matter will not be "do we know", but more along the lines of "how do we know", "why did it happen", "can we predict future events", and other questions. Science marches on.

And that is it for this Wednesday morning. If you have slogged all the way down here reading this, thank you. I don't know who you are, and you may not know who I am, but you certainly seem interested. That is a wonderful quality in a human being.

That you are a human being, I would say with 100% certainty. Some things we know to be true. Of course I could be wrong, and you are an alien from another planet, which means I was 100% wrong. But if that is the case, I don't care! It means that an alien is reading my blog, and understands written English, and that scientific discovery is so huge nobody will care that I was wrong about saying you were human.

Do you think there is even the slightest chance of that?

Based on my knowledge, I would say no. But I could be wrong.

The Healing Power of Placebos

2008-01-29T15:38:00.000-08:00

This one is huge. No time to flesh it out. If you are reading this somehow (I have no idea how you found this blog), keep in mind this is more like a Wiki than a blog. I am updating and linking all entries over time.

Table of Contents
FDA Consumer magazine
January-February 2000

The Healing Power of Placebos

by Tamar Nordenberg

One patient stands out in the memory of Stephen Straus, M.D., for her remarkable recovery, more than 10 years ago, from chronic fatigue syndrome. The woman, then in her 30s, was "very significantly impaired," says Straus, chief of the Laboratory of Clinical Investigation at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. "She had no energy, couldn't work, and spent most of her time at home." But her strength was restored during a study to test the effectiveness of an experimental chronic fatigue drug.

"She and her parents were so thrilled with her recovery that they were blessing me and my colleagues," recalls Straus, the principal investigator on that study.

Like many drug studies, the chronic fatigue medication trial was a "placebo-controlled" study, meaning that a portion of the patients took the experimental drug, while others took look-alike pills with no active ingredient, with neither researchers nor patients knowing which patients were getting which.

It's human nature, Straus explains, for patients and investigators alike to try and guess in each case: Is it the real drug or a dummy pill? But people shouldn't kid themselves, he says, that they can consistently tell the actual drug from the sham by seeking out tell-tale signs of improvement.

Turns out, the woman's quick turnaround from chronic fatigue occurred after taking placebo pills, not the experimental drug. Straus says, "She was amazed by the revelation that she'd gotten better on placebo."

Research has confirmed that a fake treatment, made from an inactive substance like sugar, distilled water, or saline solution, can have a "placebo effect"--that is, the sham medication can sometimes improve a patient's condition simply because the person has the expectation that it will be helpful. For a given medical condition, it's not unusual for one-third of patients to feel better in response to treatment with placebo.

"Expectation is a powerful thing," says Robert DeLap, M.D., head of one of the Food and Drug Administration's Offices of Drug Evaluation. "The more you believe you're going to benefit from a treatment, the more likely it is that you will experience a benefit."
Complete article

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

2008-01-28T16:56:00.000-08:00

From the Center for Disease Control

CFS Home > About CFS > CFS Definition

The Revised Case Definition (abridged version)

The 1988 chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) working case definition (Holmes, et al) did not effectively distinguish CFS from other types of unexplained fatigue. For this reason, it was decided during a 1993 meeting of CFS investigators to develop a logical revision of that definition. The core of the revised CFS case definition is a set of uniformly applicable guidelines for the clinical and research evaluation of CFS and the other forms of fatigue.
In the revised definition, a consensus viewpoint from many of the leading CFS researchers and clinicians (including input from patient group representatives), chronic fatigue syndrome is treated as a subset of chronic fatigue, a broader category defined as unexplained fatigue of greater than or equal to six month's duration. Chronic fatigue in turn, is treated as a subset of prolonged fatigue, which is defined as fatigue lasting one or more months. The expectation is that scientists will devise epidemiologic studies of populations with prolonged fatigue and chronic fatigue, and search within those populations for illness patterns consistent with CFS.

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1: Clin Exp Rheumatol. 2006 Mar-Apr;24(2):179-82. Links: A first study of cytokine genomic polymorphisms in CFS: Positive association of TNF-857 and IFNgamma 874 rare alleles.
Carlo-Stella N, Badulli C, De Silvestri A, Bazzichi L, Martinetti M, Lorusso L, Bombardieri S, Salvaneschi L, Cuccia M.
Immunogenetics Laboratory, Dept. of Genetics and Microbiology, University of Pavia, Italy. nickics@ipvgen.unipv.it
OBJECTIVE: In the past two years we have developed a biological bank of genomic DNA, cDNA, serum and red blood cells of Italian patients with certified CFS from the two Italian referral centers for the syndrome. Recent studies have shown an imbalance in cytokine production in disease states similar to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), such as sickness behavior, both in animals and in humans. However we notice that serum cytokine concentrations are often inconstant and degrade rapidly. With this in mind, we investigated cytokine gene polymorphisms in 80 Italian patients with CFS in order to ascertain whether in this group of patients it is possible to describe a genetic predisposition to an inflammatory response. METHODS: We analyzed the promoter polymorphisms of IL-10, IL-6 and the IFNgamma 874 T/A polymorphism in intron 1 with a PCR-SSP method (Cytogen One Lambda Inc. Canoga Park, CA, U.S.A) in 54 patients and TNF-308 G/A and -857 C/T promoter polymorphisms with a PCR-RFLP method (in 54 and 80 patients respectively). RESULTS: There is a highly significant increase of TNF -857 TT and CT genotypes (p = 0.002) among patients with respect to controls and a significant decrease of IFN gamma low producers (A/A) (p = 0.04) among patients with respect to controls. CONCLUSIONS: We hypothesize that CFS patients can have a genetic predisposition to an immunomodulatory response of an inflammatory nature probably secondary to one or more environmental insults of unknown nature.
PMID: 16762155 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
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1: Nippon Rinsho. 2007 Jun;65(6):1121-33.Links: [School phobia and childhood chronic fatigue syndrome (CCFS)]
[Article in Japanese]
Tomoda A.
Department of Child Developmental Sociology, Faculty of Medical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Kumamoto University.
Chronic fatigue occurring in previously healthy children and adolescents is a vexing problem encountered by pediatric practitioners and the impact of fatigue in youngsters should not be underestimated. In its severe form, it is often associated with mood disorders. Findings in children and adolescent cases suggest that severe unexplained fatigue might precede the development of fatigue-related illness, such as childhood chronic fatigue syndrome (CCFS). This is a disabling condition characterized by severe disabling fatigue and a combination of symptoms, the prominent features being self-reported impairments in concentration and short-term memory, sleep disturbances and autonomic symptoms that cannot be explained by medical or psychiatric illness. We have encountered such patients with these complaints; their major symptoms include: general fatigue, fever, headache (not migraine), and memory disturbance. From our clinical experience, we have inferred that patients with CCFS might experience changes in brain function levels, which induce an autonomic imbalance and engender symptoms such as general fatigue, higher-order level cognitive dysfunction, and memory disturbance.
PMID: 17561707 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

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Chronic fatigue syndrome researchers offer physical evidence
Main Category: Depression
Article Date: 24 Aug 2004 - 0:00 PST

A University of Alberta study has verified that there is physical evidence for those who suffer from chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), giving new weight to the often stigmatized and misdiagnosed disorder. Research just published in the "International Journal of Psychophysiology" determined that, using independent criteria, CFS can be distinguished from depression--two disorders that share many of the same symptoms.

CFS is an often debilitating disorder, characterized by a constellation of symptoms including fever, sore throat, headache, muscle weakness, myalgias, post-external malaise, sleep and cognitive disturbances. The level of disability varies for people with CFS, but some individuals find they are unable to return to work or function normally on a day-to-day basis. Unfortunately, many of these symptoms are subjective in nature and are difficult to quantify or confirm, says Hannah Pazderka-Robinson, the lead author on the study. Not only does the stigma attached with the disorder play an emotional toll on the patient, but it has implications for insurance claims as well.

"There are a number of medical professionals who don't believe that CFS exists in the first place," said Pazderka-Robinson. "The problem is, both CFS and depression are characterized by very similar profiles. Imagine a patient who approaches a doctor and tells him they feel depressed and tired all the time.

"Since depression shows a high co-morbidity with CFS, some CFS patients are often given antidepressants--that don't work or work poorly, since they do not address the underlying condition. Again, when these medications don't work, physicians sometimes jump to the conclusion that there isn't really anything, physically, wrong. Obviously, both misdiagnosis and the tendency for doctors to treat these patients as if they're not really sick can be extremely distressing. It can also undermine the patient's trust in the doctor and make them less likely to seek treatment if the condition worsens."

Article here
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Evidence for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome?
Proteins in Spinal Fluid May Be Markers of Syndrome, Early Tests Show
By Miranda Hitti
WebMD Medical News
Dec. 1, 2005 -- Scientists may have found biological evidence of chronic fatigue syndrome.
Chronic fatigue syndrome involves severe, unexplained tiredness that lasts for at least six months and doesn't improve with rest.
Chronic fatigue syndrome often greatly interferes with patients' lives. But it hasn't been well understood from a scientific point of view, and its cause is unknown.
The new evidence lies in patients' spinal fluid. Tests show 16 proteins in the spinal fluid of people with chronic fatigue syndrome but not in healthy people, according to a study in BMC Neurology.
link

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Chronic fatigue syndrome may be a legitimate neurological condition

Researchers might have found evidence that chronic fatigue syndrome is a real and legitimate neurological condition.

A pilot study published in the open access journal BMC Neurology reveals that patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) have a set of proteins in their spinal cord fluid that were not detected in healthy individuals. These proteins might give insight into the causes of CFS, and could be used as markers to diagnose patients with CFS.