Healthcare and Alternative Medicine by MyBiologica.com

sabato 1 marzo 2014

Dispelling The Cancer Myths: Everyone Deserves The Best Care

http://www.mybiologica.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/0d0f78770277-300x300.jpg

Dispelling The Cancer Myths: Everyone Deserves The Best Care

via Cancer Treatment Mexico:

As we look at the biggest myths surrounding cancer we come to the fourth, and one of the most terrifying myths; the belief of some people that they do not have the right to cancer care. The fact is...

Read More: Dispelling The Cancer Myths: Everyone Deserves The Best Care

Living Beyond Breast Cancer and Ally Organizations Host Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Awareness Day Twitter Chat

http://livingbeyondbc.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/twitterchat_event-banner.jpg?w=300&h=111

Living Beyond Breast Cancer and Ally Organizations Host Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Awareness Day Twitter Chat

via LBBC’s Blog:

In recognition of Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Awareness Day, Living Beyond Breast Cancer (LBBC) has partnered with Triple Negative Breast Cancer Foun...

Read More: Living Beyond Breast Cancer and Ally Organizations Host Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Awareness Day Twitter Chat

New fast and furious black hole found

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_science/~4/j_H65P1r538

A team of Australian and American astronomers have been studying nearby galaxy M83 and have found a new superpowered small black hole, named MQ1, the first object of its kind to be studied in this much detail.Astronomers have found a few compact objects that are as powerful as MQ1, but have not been able to work out the size of the black hole contained within them until now.The team observed the MQ1 system with multiple telescopes and discovered that it is a standard-sized small black hole, rather than a slightly bigger version that was theorised to account for all its power.Curtin University senior research fellow Dr Roberto Soria, who is part of the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) and led the team investigating MQ1, said it was important to understand how stars were formed, how they evolved and how they died, within a spiral shaped galaxy like M83.”MQ1 is classed as a microquasar — a black hole surrounded by a bubble of hot gas, which is heated by two jets just outside the black hole, powerfully shooting out energy in opposite directions, acting like cosmic sandblasters pushing out on the surrounding gas,” Dr Soria said.”The significance of the huge jet power measured for MQ1 goes beyond this particular galaxy: it helps astronomers understand and quantify the strong effect that black hole jets have on the surrounding gas, which gets heated and swept away.”This must have been a significant factor in the early stages of galaxy evolution, 12 billion years ago, because we have evidence that powerful black holes like MQ1, which are rare today, were much more common at the time.”"By studying microquasars such as MQ1, we get a glimpse of how the early universe evolved, how fast quasars grew and how much energy black holes provided to their environment.”As a comparison, the most powerful microquasar in our galaxy, known as SS433, is about 10 times less powerful than MQ1.Although the black hole in MQ1 is only about 100 kilometres wide, the MQ1 structure — as identified by the Hubble Space Telescope — is much bigger than our Solar System, as the jets around it extend about 20 light years from either side of the black hole.Black holes vary in size and are classed as either stellar mass (less than about 70 times the mass of our Sun) or supermassive (millions of times the mass of our Sun, like the giant black hole that is located in the middle of the Milky Way).MQ1 is a stellar mass black hole and was likely formed when a star died, collapsing to leave behind a compact mass.The discovery of MQ1 and its characteristics is just one of the results of the comprehensive study of galaxy M83, a collection of millions of stars located 15 million light years away from Earth.M83, the iconic Southern-sky galaxy, is being mapped with the Hubble Space and Magellan telescopes (detecting visible light), the Chandra X-ray Observatory (detecting light in X-ray frequencies), the Australia Telescope Compact Array and the Very Large Array (detecting radio waves).ICRAR is a joint venture between Curtin University and The University of Western Australia which receives funding from the State Government of Western Australia.

Read More: New fast and furious black hole found

Sterile flies save food crops, millions of dollars in eradication efforts

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/sciencedaily/plants_animals/agriculture_and_food/~4/BkB06qojYlg

Irradiated, sterile flies dropped over seaports and agricultural areas to mate with unsuspecting females save food crops and millions of dollars in prevented infestations and the ensuing eradication efforts. But blasting these secret-suitor insects with radiation via electron beams, X-rays or gamma-rays, tends to make them weaker than typical males — and not so appealing to females as possible mates.What sterile-insect operations need, says University of Florida insect physiologist Daniel Hahn, is the insect world’s version of George Clooney: 52 years old, gray-haired and still dazzling the ladies.Hahn, an associate professor with UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, and his former postdoctoral associate, Giancarlo Lpez-Martnez, now an assistant professor at New Mexico State University, describe in research publications this month and last, that sterilizing insects in a low-oxygen environment helps create suitors who more closely resemble the suave Clooney than do those sterilized in a normal-oxygen environment.”Our males (insects) are not only more sexually competitive, they are maintaining their sexual competitiveness and their virility, into old age,” Hahn said, “and that has the potential to make them much better biological control agents.”The sterile insect technique, or SIT, has been used for decades and is considered a much preferable alternative to spraying pesticides over urban or suburban areas near major ports. In this biological control method, large numbers of sterile, male insects are released to compete with wild males for the attention of invasive wild females.A female duped into accepting a sterile male would then find herself without offspring, thus trimming the population and its threat to the state’s important agricultural crops. The technique has been used effectively against the Mediterranean fruit fly, called the Medfly, and the cattle-infesting screw-worm fly, among others.Florida spends roughly $6 million a year using SIT to prevent Mediterranean fruit fly infestations, while California spends about $17 million a year. Because of the inherent dangers in importing even one Mediterranean fruit fly into the state, in their recent studies, Lpez-Martnez and Hahn investigated the physiological effects of applying low-oxygen treatments prior to and during irradiation sterilization on two other plant pests: the Caribbean fruit fly and the invasive cactus moth.The “low-oxygen effect” has been known for decades, but the physiological basis for it had never been rigorously tested or analyzed, Hahn said. They suspected, and found, that under the low-oxygen conditions, the insects’ cells would produce antioxidants that can help better protect them from the off-target radiation damage.Some operations that rear and sterilize insects, such as one in Guatemala that produces many of the sterile medflies dropped over Florida’s major ports roughly every seven days, do employ low-oxygen conditions, called hypoxia or anoxia. But many others don’t, he said, including those who rear and sterilize the cactus moth.The reseachers found using a low-oxygen environment during sterilization boosted the sterile males’ longevity as well as their ability to attract and successfully mate. They found that the positive effects of low-oxygen treatments even extended into their ‘old age’ — in the insects’ case, about 30 days under cushy laboratory conditions.Treatments that both improve the sexual performance of sterile males and maintain high performance longer in older males can substantially increase the effectiveness and decrease the economic costs of SIT programs, Hahn said.The January paper was published by PLoS One, and the February paper in the Journal of Economic Entomology. Hahn and Lpez-Martnez were joined as authors of that paper by James Carpenter of the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service in Tifton, Ga., and Stephen Hight of the USDA-ARS at Florida A&M University in Tallahassee.

Read More: Sterile flies save food crops, millions of dollars in eradication efforts

Can an app help make life easier for children with ADHD?

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/sciencedaily/living_well/~4/DU5d931-JL4

We have tended to associate welfare technology with support for the elderly. Now researchers are looking at whether technology such as digital calendars and smartwatches can also provide support for children with autism and ADHD.Being able to function well in the morning is a challenge for parents of children with cognitive problems. Small details such as putting their leggings on inside out, or an adult saying something ‘the wrong way’ can trigger a temper tantrum and ruin the entire day. Children can become unruly, and some even become aggressive when something prevents them from following their routines and habits.This is one of many insights that researchers from SINTEF have learned from interviews with mothers of children who have autism or ADHD. “Being able to function well on a day-to-day basis is a big problem for these children — and for their families,” say Lisbet Grut and ystein Dale of SINTEF.Technology that can helpPrevious studies have shown that ordinary aids such as mobile phones and MP3 players can help young people with Asberger’s and autism to plan time and activities. Smartwatches may be able to help remind sufferers about appointments and tasks, and various software on smartphones and tablets can help them visualise sequences and structures in activities. The researchers believe that by developing aids such as this, they could help provide support in everyday situations. Now they want to test out their theories.Find solutions and allocate responsibilityA survey has already been carried out, in which researchers interviewed staff from NAV, Centres for Assistive Technology, service providers to the municipalities, assistive technology suppliers and selected families.Lisbet Grut explains that the aim has been to find out where the problems lie, and what the essential factors are in finding a solution. “ADHD is a group that is easily neglected, and it is difficult to help sufferers, because their problems are varied and complex,” she says. “But we believe that the work we are doing now will help us to find some good solutions, and provide clearer distinctions between the roles and responsibilities of the various support service organisations.”Service mechanism for rule-governed behaviour?The interviews with the mothers and the support services revealed that assistive technology tends to be provided more on the basis of a diagnosis than on functional problems and needs. …

Read More: Can an app help make life easier for children with ADHD?

Mesothelioma: What is - Types - Evolution - Symptoms

http://www.mybiologica.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Mesothelioma-1-240x300.png

Mesothelioma: What is?
The mesothelium is a tissue that lines, such as a thin film, the inner wall of the chest and abdomen and the space around the heart.
This membrane is also of most of the internal organs and protects them thanks to the production of a particular liquid lubricant that...

Read More: Mesothelioma: What is - Types - Evolution - Symptoms

#Mesothelioma, #Mesothelioma-Evolution, #Mesothelioma-Of-The-Tunica-Vaginalis, #Mesothelioma-Symptoms, #Pericardial-Mesothelioma, #Peritoneal-Mesothelioma, #Pleural-Mesothelioma