Chocolate compounds fight high cholesterol

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Chocolate has received a lot of attention for being a treasure trove of nutritional goodness. Polyphenols in cacao beans are linked to promoting heart, brain, and liver health, which has sparked renewed interest in chocolate as a medicinal food. And a new study adds to the growing list of benefits, showing that chocolate polyphenols also help to lower bad cholesterol.

Published in the journal Diabetic Medicine, the study tested the effects of polyphenol-rich chocolate in a group of 12 volunteers with type-2 diabetes. After 16 weeks, the researchers from Hull University in the U.K. discovered that the polyphenols helped lower participants' bad cholesterol levels while raising good cholesterol levels.

"Chocolate with a high cocoa content should be included in the diet of individuals with type-2 diabetes as part of a sensible, balanced approach to diet and lifestyle," said professor Steve Akin, author of the study.Read more...

AyurGold for Healthy Blood

PathXL in the Classroom

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"Students have been delighted with its (PathXL’s) ease of use and its 24 hour, 365 day accessibility." Dr. Stephen McCullough, Head of Anatomy, Queens University Belfast

i-Path’s PathXL software continues to provide an innovative approach to classroom learning. A number of leading educational centres in the UK and further afield are recognising the benefits that PathXL can bring to medical education.

Queen's University, Belfast (link) is an institution with a world-class academic reputation and is a member of the Russell Group of leading UK universities. Conventional microscopy was proving to be ineffective in teaching the approximately 2300 students in the School of Medicine, Dentistry and Biomedical Sciences; it was time consuming, difficult to establish standards in teaching or examining and unpopular among students.

With the help of i-Path, Queen’s introduced a virtual microscopy solution. By using PathXL, virtual slides could be viewed on-line and used in the same way as a conventional microscope by large numbers of students or trainees over a computer network, thus avoiding the necessity for them to be at a particular venue at a set time to attend a teaching or training session.

PathXL has helped enhance the learning experience of students who can practice histology in a digital environment in both the classroom and at home. ?PathXL facilitates group learning as it enables students to discuss interesting slides on large computer monitors by viewing them digitally. In addition, with classroom control software, tutors can control single or multiple classroom monitors and communicate with individual students, with groups or the entire classroom from the front of the class.

"This versatile system has allowed us to construct practical classes that can interactively link a range of study material including virtual slides, micrographs, x-rays, anatomical specimens and lecture material." Dr. Stephen McCullough, Head of Anatomy, QUB

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The University of Glasgow, School of Veterinary Medicine (link) has also chosen PathXL to help transform its learning environment.

In 2010 a new course in veterinary pathology was introduced for the undergraduate veterinary students, focussing on developing their enthusiasm for pathology in both practical, clinical and research contexts.

PathXL now provides the students with access to histopathological slides, including cytological smears. This system has been used to enhance laboratory-based microscopy classes at the University of Glasgow by enabling students to view, at their convenience, labelled slides in their area of study.

"Research has shown that veterinary students are comfortable with this type of computer-based study of pathology, committing larger periods of time to study of the course material than they are able to in microscope-based classes alone"  Dr. Pamela Johnston, University of Glasgow, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine

PathXL has also been used in institutions such as Michigan State University (Veterinary Online Atlas), Nottingham University Hospital (Education Portal) and the Pathological Society (Educational Portal).

 

PathXL – Key Benefits For StudentsEnhanced learning experience

  • Ease of use
  • Freedom from optical stress
  • Better image quality
  • Time saving

Path XL – Key Benefits For Administrators

  • Ability to construct course-specific modules
  • Versatility
  • Practical classes can include a range of resources
  • Slides available to everyone at the same time
  • Cost savings

i-Path has a unique team of scientists and software developers that can offer advice and consultancy on a wide range of issues relating to virtual microscopy.

For further information please visit http://www.i-path.co.uk or contact us at contact@i-path.co.uk.

 

New Digital Pathology Vendor – Welcome to DigiPath, Inc.

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A new digital pathology vendor hits the market today.  Affordable and innovative solutions to meet both clinical and research/biopharma needs will be required for DigiPath in an increasingly competitive landscape, particularly for hospitals - both community-based groups and academic medical centers to be successful.  Check out their new website at http://www.digipath.biz for more information.

DigiPath DigiPath, Inc.™ today announced its entry into the digital pathology market. DigiPath provides the next generation of affordable, innovative, and reliable digital pathology solutions. DigiPath’s solutions will support community pathology practices, hospitals, academic medical centers, reference laboratories, biopharma organizations, and life science research institutions.

“The medical community is looking for more affordable, innovative, and reliable digital pathology solutions to assist in enhancing patient care,” commented Keith Kaplan, M.D., Editor, Digital Pathology Blog™ at http://www.tissuepathology.com. “DigiPath seems well positioned to help our community practices expand digital pathology adoption.”

“In June 2010, we surveyed over 400 CLIA™ certified labs concerning digital pathology adoption”, stated Jondavid Klipp, Publisher, Laboratory Economics™. “55% of the respondents said that digital pathology was too expensive. Affordability is an important concern to pathology laboratories.” 

“The DigiPath team brings a combined 60 year experience within the digital pathology field”, said Eric Stoppenhagen, Chief Executive Officer. “Our team pioneered digital pathology by implementing over 500 installations worldwide. During the coming years, DigiPath will be providing affordable, innovative, and reliable digital pathology solutions.”

About DigiPath, Inc.

DigiPath, Inc. provides the next generation of affordable, innovative, and reliable digital pathology solutions. DigiPath’s advisors bring over 60 years combined expertise in pioneering digital pathology, implementing over 500 installations at community pathology practices, hospitals, academic medical centers, reference laboratories, biopharma organizations, and life science research institutions worldwide.

Visit http://www.digipath.biz monthly to see new solutions emerge during 2011.

 

SAFE HARBOR STATEMENT

This Press Release may contain certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. DigiPath has tried, whenever possible, to identify these forward-looking statements using words such as "anticipates," "believes," "estimates," "expects," "plans," "intends," "potential" and similar expressions. These statements reflect DigiPath's current beliefs and are based upon information currently available to it. Accordingly, such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which could cause DigiPath's actual results, performance or achievements to differ materially from those expressed in or implied by such statements. DigiPath undertakes no obligation to update or provide advice in the event of any change, addition or alteration to the information catered in this Press Release including such forward-looking statements.

 

 

 

 

Leica Microsystems Launches SCN400 F Combined Fluorescence and Brightfield Slide Scanner

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Leica continues to innovate in short order considering how long they have been in the digital pathology market I think this is very quick to launch a florescent scanner.

Leica is now offering a combined brightfield and fluorescent scanner and image management application that may be attractive to the research world as well as large clinical laboratories.  See link below to preview some of their images.  

Welcome your feedback on the blog about image quality, much like Facebook on Leica's iPad application.

Multi-channel fluorescent scanning for Digital Pathology

Wetzlar, Germany. Leica Microsystems announces the release of the Leica SCN400 F combined fluo­rescent and brightfield digital slide scanner. The SCN400 F brings together Leica’s award winning brightfield slide scanning capabilities and multi-channel fluorescence imaging in a single platform, providing versatility to researchers and core laboratories utilizing Digital Pathology.

By employing two separate illumination and scanning methods, the Leica SCN400 F ensures excellent brightfield scans and crisp multi-channel fluorescent images from one device. Scanned slides are readily re­viewed online through the SlidePath Digital Image Hub web-viewer, incorporating the ability to turn on and off separate channels with the click of a button to examine each marker individually.

To view a sample fluorescent image, please visit our Virtual Slide Gallery at http://www.leica-microsystems.com/products/digital-pathology.

Dr. Donal O’Shea, Head of Digital Pathology in Leica Microsystems says, “The Leica SCN400 F is a significant breakthrough for researchers looking for an affordable solution for scanning brightfield and fluorescent slides. With the ever growing adoption of immunofluorescent staining in research to study multi-marker co-expression in oncology and neuroscience, we see the SCN400 F as a valuable tool for core laboratories, bringing increased efficiency and quality to research practices.”

The Leica SCN400 F is the newest scanning solution in the Total Digital Pathology portfolio, demon­strating Leica’s drive and innovation in this market. Leica Microsystems’ broad range of interoperable Digital Pathology components provides customers with the flexibility to choose the solution that is right for their needs.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Leica Microsystems is a world leader in microscopes and scientific instruments. Founded as a family business in the nineteenth century, the company’s history was marked by unparalleled innovation on its way to becoming a global enterprise.

Its historically close cooperation with the scientific community is the key to Leica Microsystems’ tradition of innovation, which draws on users’ ideas and creates solutions tailored to their requirements. At the global level, Leica Microsystems is organized in four divisions, all of which are among the leaders in their respective fields: the Life Science Division, Industry Division, Biosystems Division and Medical Division.

Leica Microsystems’ Biosystems Division, also known as Leica Biosystems, offers histopathology labo­ratories the most extensive product range with appropriate products for each work step in histology and for a high level of productivity in the working processes of the entire laboratory.

The company is represented in over 100 countries with 12 manufacturing facilities in 7 countries, sales and service organizations in 19 countries and an international network of dealers. The company is head­quartered in Wetzlar, Germany.

 

"The Secret Museum: Collections as Muse," Artist Talk and Artifacts from the Stores, Natural History Museum, London, Thursday July 7

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Hi all! Will be giving a free and open-to-the-public artist's talk augmented by artifacts drawn from the stores at the London Natural History Museum this Thursday at 2:30. Full details follow; hope very much to see you there!

The Secret Museum: Collections as Muse with artist Joanna Ebenstein
Artist Talk with Artifacts from the Stores
Museum of Natural History, London, Attenborough Studio
Thursday July 7
2:30 PM

Ancient wood and glass cases, elaborate labels from centuries past, rows of dusty bell jars, atmospherically decayed specimens, the unintentionally surreal and sublime vistas of the Museum backstage... these are the kinds of things that intrigue and inspire New York artist Joanna Ebenstein. Today, join her for a look at some of her artwork engaging with these themes. Also on view will be a variety of rarely seen artifacts specially drawn for this talk from the Natural History Museum's extensive and astounding stores.

More here.

Marching Armies Vs Sprinting Platoons

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The Path Ahead for NASA: Lewis & Clark and the Settlers, SpaceRef

At a press conference at NASA KSC several days ago I asked the following question of NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver: "Yesterday you went on SpaceX tour [with the media] here at the Cape. We all heard talk of launching the Falcon 9 rocket with single digit number of people using launch and mission control rooms smaller than the one we are in today. And they want to do it with even fewer people. And they have competitors. NASA is about to embark on development of SLS, Orion, missions to asteroids, and the continued operation of the ISS. Will NASA ever approach the levels of innovation and efficiency as are evidenced by SpaceX and other companies? If so, when? If not, why not? I guess the real question I have is, its the 21st century. Indeed we have already used up 10% of it. Can NASA continue to justify operations that use a marching army when the private sector can do it with a sprinting platoon?"

Not Just Sci-Fi Anymore: Students Create Gesture-Controlled Robot Drones | Discoblog

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Combining the Kinect‘s body-scanning camera with overhead cameras, students at ETH Zurich’s Flying Machine Arena have created a nifty quadrocopter that’s controlled with simple gestures. Move around your right arm and the drone follows a similar path; raise your left arm and it flips; clap and it lands.

Hey, this is sort of like that sci-fi movie where people virtually controlled robots with just their body movements. It’s the weekend and we can’t think of the film—help us out in the comments section.

(via PopSci)

Exhibit spotlights caricatures, political cartoons by physician (7/10) – The American Press (blog)

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Exhibit spotlights caricatures, political cartoons by physician (7/10)
The American Press (blog)
After medical school and residency in Switzerland, he worked as a medical delegate and medical doctor in Africa and Asia, and also performed as a physician for medical evacuations in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. He came to America in the late ...

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Melancholia | Bad Astronomy

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I’ve been hearing rumors about an end-of-the-world movie called "Melancholia", and I finally stumbled on a trailer for it:

It looks pretty interesting. Without too many spoilers — it’s in the trailer, after all — the doomsday is caused by a planet approaching the Earth, and we hear someone say it was hidden behind the Sun.

Now, I’ll say that’s not really possible. A planet falling in from deep space and approaching us close enough to harm us would be visible for decades, and since the Earth circles the Sun once per year there’s no way the Sun could hide it for very long — if the Sun were hiding it in April, for example, by November it would be high in the night sky and visible to everyone. At first I interpreted the line to mean it was orbiting the Sun on the opposite side of our orbit, but that doesn’t work either; a planet big enough to hurt us would have revealed itself through its gravitational influence on other planets long before now (Gerry and Sylvia Anderson did a movie in the 60s based on this called "Journey to the Far ...


Funding, curriculum keys to Western Michigan University medical school – Kalamazoo Gazette – MLive.com

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Kalamazoo Gazette - MLive.com
Funding, curriculum keys to Western Michigan University medical school
Kalamazoo Gazette - MLive.com
By Margaret DeRitter | Special to the Gazette KALAMAZOO – Since a $100 million gift to Western Michigan University's planned medical school was announced in March, the school has received $7 million more in donations and commitments, according to a ...

An Aluminized Future World?

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Is aluminum the material of the future? If you accept the opinion of Alcoa CEO Klaus Kleinfeld, it is. During the next 50 years, demand will create an "aluminized world," he predicts, citing urbanization and the need for efficient transportation and infrastructure. Will aluminum be the key to fuel-e

The Biologically-Inspired Glass Work of Danish Artist Steffan Dam

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Wow. I have just come across the exquisite, biologically-inspired glass work of Danish artist Steffan Dam. The work--organized into series titled "Flower Blocks," "Specimen Blocks," "Fossils" and "Marine Biology--reminds me quite a bit of the work of revered natural history artists Ernst Heackel and Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka.

Above are just a few of my favorite pieces; I highly encourage you to visit the website to see the full collection by clicking here; you can also download a PDF catalog of his work by clicking here.

Via Wunderkammer.

Cabinet Cards / Storydress II, Albumen Print Photographs of Life-size Paper Mache and Plaster Sculpture, Christine Elfman, 2008

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Cabinet Cards / Storydress II

albumen prints from wet-plate collodion negatives
4.25 x 6.5 inches, series of 5 mounted on cabinet cards
6.5 x 8.5 inches, series of 10 framed
2008

Storydress II is a series of photographs of a life-size paper mache and plaster sculpture. The dress is made of paper mache stories that I recorded of my great-grandmother’s autobiographical reminiscences. Each photograph contains legible words. The sculpture was photographed with the wet-plate collodion negative process, printed on handmade gold-toned Albumen paper, and burnished onto antique Cabinet Card mounts. For exhibition the cabinet card photographs are displayed using an antique wooden Graphoscope (magnifying device) and shelf.

Finding unknown relatives in my family photograph collection, and noticing old photographs of anonymous people in antique stores, I was taken by how many people were forgotten regardless of photography’s intention to “Secure the shadow, ‘ere the substance fades away.” The older the picture, the more forlorn the subject appeared to me. Holding their image, I was impressed with their absence. Storydress II tries to show this underlying subject of photographic portraiture. The 19th century cabinet card is turned inside out, revealing the presence of absence in a medium characterized by rigid detail and anonymity. The figure of reminiscence, cast in plaster, parallels the poetic immobility of the head clamp, used in early photography to prevent movement during long exposures, aptly defined by Barthes as “the corset of my imaginary existence”. The life size cast figure wears a paper mache dress made of family stories: recorded, torn up, and glued back together again. The tedious processes involved in making both the subject and photograph are offerings to time’s taking.

I really, really love this piece--which uses as its base a life-size paper mache and plaster sculpture!--and encourage you to visit Christine Elfman's website and click on "view close up here" to appreciate it fully. Or click on image to see a pleasing larger version.

Via Foxes in Breeches.

Increasing primary-care providers critical – TheDay.com

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Increasing primary-care providers critical
TheDay.com
The Association of American Medical Colleges estimates that by 2015 the nation faces a shortage of about 21000 primary-care physicians. Faced with the prospects of massive medical school debt, medical school graduates are moving to better-paying ...
Training doctors as a shortage loomsSignOnSanDiego.com
The shortage of MDsThe Keene Sentinel

all 6 news articles »

How did modern humans settle the world? | Gene Expression

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In lieu of lots of text, above is a stylized representation of the routes which Neo-Africans took ~50 thousand years ago from their point of departure to parts unknown. The two colors represent two models. The red lines show two major streams issuing out of Africa, a northern route which pushed into the heart of Central Asia, and a southern oceanic one, which pushed all the way into Australia. The second differs, with eastern and western branches of non-African humanity. The models really start to break down within the last ~10,000 years. For example, by either model India has seen an admixture even between the two branches in the Holocene. Additionally, there may have been “false dawns” and admixtures.

In the early 2000s I accept the probable likelihood of the first model. But today I am more leaning toward the second. What’s your stance, and why? I’ll give my rationale below….

The primary reason I’m skeptical of the northern vs. southern route is that Melanesians are clearly southerners, while East Asians and Europeans are northerners. But the phylogenetic stuff I’ve run myself and that I’ve seen using autosomal data sets indicate that ...

The practice does not invalidate the principle | Gene Expression

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This is a big time for space, though not in a good way. The James Webb Telescope is in jeopardy, and the space shuttle program finally expired. I don’t talk about space too much on this weblog because I wouldn’t add any value. I leave the details and nuances to those who know better. But in my earliest interests in science astronomy and physics played a big part in bringing home to me the wonder of it all. At the end of the day nature is one, and the great mystery is divided into pieces due to our own cognitive limitations, not because it lacks coherence.

As far as personal biography one of my first memories which has an exact date is the return of Columbia from orbit on April 14th, 1981.* I recall being somewhat confused as to the shape of the vessel. It seemed awkward and ungainly even compared to the small planes which I had in my toy collection at the time. As I came to understand the nature of the space shuttle I felt a conjoined tendency toward awe at its technological sophistication and ambivalence at the expense of manned space flight. ...

Harvard Medical School Adviser: The risks, benefits of weight-loss surgery – Detroit Free Press

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Harvard Medical School Adviser: The risks, benefits of weight-loss surgery
Detroit Free Press
Because of these and other complications, lifelong medical surveillance is important. Even with the risks, the American Heart Association supports weight-loss surgery for severely obese individuals who have not had success losing weight by traditional ...

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