Caught in a nano-trap

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ETH Zurich scientists have developed a comparatively simple non-contact method to hold nanoparticles at a given location in a liquid for any length of time, thus enabling them to be studied at leisure, something which had previously only been possible using elaborate methods.

Researchers examine effects of household titanium dioxide nanoparticles on marine ecosystems

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While swimmers and boaters along any shore consider the slimy green film that coats everything from rocks to docks as a nuisance, University of New Haven (UNH) chemical engineering student Nicole Reardon and Assistant Professor Shannon Ciston, Ph.D. think otherwise. They view the slime, or biofilm, as a complex community that may hold the key to informing humanity of the true environmental impact of the chemical nanoparticles that find their way from area kitchens, baths and garages into Long Island Sound.

Unregulated DTCG saved my life.

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Ok, so if Ellen Matloff hasn't flipped her bobbed haircut, 99245 without 60 min of MD care-insurance billing head yet, then this story will make her and the rest of the counselors who get mad when untrained MDs do BRCA testing flip out.

A woman's husband on DNADay takes advantage of 23andMe's rock bottom 99 USD fee. Clearly intended to double their database.....which it did

Only to have her HUSBAND open her results and

WHAMMO! You are a BRCA1 carrier! Mazel Tov! Not exactly the "fun" he had been looking for when he saw that flyer.....

Why does Myriad market to doctors? Their stance "We are missing a ton of BRCA mutations out there"

I agree.

So you would think I am happy that an unregulated DTCG testing company that the FDA pilloried finds a medically valid BRCA1 mutation that wasn't suggested by doctors.

Well, here's the shocker.

I am glad they found it.
Yes, thank god someone did before she had ovarian or breast cancer! If she would have, penetrance here is NOT 100% guys......

I am also glad that the woman who had the test was mentally stable enough and smart enough to seek professional help. I wonder what her husband and her do for a living?
I wonder if they are college educated. I wonder if there demographic is anything like the majority of the United States.....probably not....Oh wait. Princeton Grad, Prior Google Grad, CEO....yeah sounds just like my cousin Billy in Dushore PA (FYI I don't have a cousin Billy) But Dushore is in BFE.....

I am not glad that everyone is NOT like Mrs. Steinberg or her husband. In the right hands and with easy access to health professionals this works, sometimes........That is why the FDA has stepped in. Not everyone lives like the Steinberg's

Without professionals and without a level head, this could be a problem.

But the news story re-emphasizes what is crystal clear. This is an unregulated company that delivered a medical diagnostic. This result then drove clinical decision making.

Seriously. The DTCG BRCA test is a medical test. I think the FDA gets that part. Despite what DTCG says.

The Sherpa Says: I am happy for this woman. We need more testing, I agree with Myriad. I also think CGCs should be out teaching doctors rather than letting pharma reps do it. In fact excellent CGCs like Ms. Matloff should never see patients and should instead teach doctors how to do cancer counseling everyday. That is what is needed here, more education given to those who need it. Because clearly the doctors who told Mrs Steinberg (I assume she is AJ) that she wouldn't "need" genetic testing despite the family history of cancer are likely in need of some schooling.

Tomorrow Night at Observatory! Mark Jacobson on "The Lampshade: A Holocaust Detective Story from Buchenwald to New Orleans"

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Tomorrow night at Observatory, join Mark Jacobson--author of the new book The Lampshade: A Holocaust Detective Story from Buchenwald to New Orleans--as he details the story of his journey into the world of myth, madness and history prompted by the delivery of a lampshade made of human skin upon his doorstep.

You can read an excerpt from the book (which will be available for sale and signing at the event) in New York Magazine by clicking here.

Full details follow; hope very much to see you there!

The Lampshade: A Holocaust Detective Story from Buchenwald to New Orleans
An illustrated lecture and book signing with Mark Jacobson, author
Date: Friday, October 22
Time: 8:00
Admission: $5
Books will be available for sale and signing

Few growing up in the aftermath of World War II will ever forget the horrifying reports that Nazi concentration camp doctors had removed the skin of prisoners to makes common, everyday lampshades. In The Lampshade, bestselling journalist Mark Jacobson tells the story of how he came into possession of one of these awful objects, and of his search to establish the origin, and larger meaning, of what can only be described as an icon of terror.

Jacobson’s mind-bending historical, moral, and philosophical journey into the recent past and his own soul begins in Hurricane Katrina–ravaged New Orleans. It is only months after the storm, with America’s most romantic city still in tatters, when Skip Henderson, an old friend of Jacobson’s, purchases an item at a rummage sale: a very strange looking and oddly textured lampshade. When he asks what it’s made of, the seller, a man covered with jailhouse tattoos, replies, “That’s made from the skin of Jews.” The price: $35. A few days later, Henderson sends the lampshade to Jacobson, saying, “You’re the journalist, you find out what it is.” The lampshade couldn’t possibly be real, could it? But it is. DNA analysis proves it.

This revelation sends Jacobson halfway around the world, to Yad Vashem in Jerusalem and to the Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany, where the lampshades were supposedly made on the order of the infamous “Bitch of Buchenwald,” Ilse Koch. From the time he grew up in Queens, New York, in the 1950s, Jacobson has heard stories about the human skin lampshade and knew it to be the ultimate symbol of Nazi cruelty. Now he has one of these things in his house with a DNA report to prove it, and almost everything he finds out about it is contradictory, mysterious, shot through with legend and specious information.

Through interviews with forensic experts, famous Holocaust scholars (and deniers), Buchenwald survivors and liberators, and New Orleans thieves and cops, Jacobson gradually comes to see the lampshade as a ghostly illuminator of his own existential status as a Jew, and to understand exactly what that means in the context of human responsibility.

Mark Jacobson has been a staff writer and contributing editor at the Village Voice, Esquire, Natural History, Rolling Stone. He is currently contributing editor at New York Magazine. He is the author of many books including the novels Gojiro and currently, The Lampshade: A Holocaust Detective Story From Buchenwald to New Orleans, as recently featured in a recent issue of New York Magazine. To find out more, click here.

To find out more, click here. You can get directions to Observatory--which is next door to the Morbid Anatomy Library (more on that here)--by clicking here. You can find out more about Observatory here, join our mailing list by clicking here, and join us on Facebook by clicking here.

Dry and Dusty or Wet and Wild

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Where I live, we had a recent dry spell (until today) of 24 days.   This is nothing,  compared to some parts of the world where it has not rained in a year or six months.  Some places, like Central America, have seen unusually torrential rains this year.   Droughts, torrential rains, and violent storms are all part of the future as our climate changes due to human-caused global warming.

There’s a new report on the global drought situation.  The report is by Aiguo Dai, originally of China, and his report was published by the  National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).  He also writes extensively about the water cycle and how global warming is affecting that.

Climate change: Drought may threaten much of globe within decades

October 19, 2010 — The United States and many other heavily populated countries face a growing threat of severe and prolonged drought in coming decades, according to a new study by National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) scientist Aiguo Dai. The detailed analysis concludes that warming temperatures associated with climate change will likely create increasingly dry conditions across much of the globe in the next 30 years, possibly reaching a scale in some regions by the end of the century that has rarely, if ever, been observed in modern times.

Using an ensemble of 22 computer climate models and a comprehensive index of drought conditions, as well as analyses of previously published studies, the paper finds most of the Western Hemisphere, along with large parts of Eurasia, Africa, and Australia, may be at threat of extreme drought this century.

In contrast, higher-latitude regions from Alaska to Scandinavia are likely to become more moist.

Dai cautioned that the findings are based on the best current projections of greenhouse gas emissions. What actually happens in coming decades will depend on many factors, including actual future emissions of greenhouse gases as well as natural climate cycles such as El Niño.

The new findings appear this week as part of a longer review article in Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change. The study was supported by the National Science Foundation, NCAR’s sponsor.

“We are facing the possibility of widespread drought in the coming decades, but this has yet to be fully recognized by both the public and the climate change research community,” Dai says. “If the projections in this study come even close to being realized, the consequences for society worldwide will be enormous.”

While regional climate projections are less certain than those for the globe as a whole, Dai’s study indicates that most of the western two-thirds of the United States will be significantly drier by the 2030s. Large parts of the nation may face an increasing risk of extreme drought during the century.

Other countries and continents that could face significant drying include:

Much of Latin America, including large sections of Mexico and Brazil
Regions bordering the Mediterranean Sea, which could become especially dry
Large parts of Southwest Asia
Most of Africa and [...]

The Moon Has Much To Offer

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Strange Lunar Brew, Paul Spudis

"Just after it has been relegated to a "been there, done that" status, the Moon again shows us we have a lot to learn about its history, physical state and the potential value of its resources. We must take the initiative to learn more as the Moon is crucial in developing and advancing a sustainable space faring infrastructure."