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(CNN) -- In what is being heralded as a "first-ever procedure," surgeons removed a healthy kidney through a donor's vagina, the Johns Hopkins Medical Center has announced. Although the procedure has been previously done to extract cancerous and nonfunctioning kidneys that threatened a patient's health, the January 29 surgery was the first time it was done for donation purposes, the center said in a news release issued Monday. "The kidney was successfully removed and transplanted into the donor's niece, and both patients are doing fine," Dr. Robert Montgomery, chief of transplant surgery at Johns Hopkins, said in the release. The surgery is considered less invasive and could pave the way for an increase in organ donations, it added. "Removing the kidney through a natural opening should hasten the patient's recovery and provide a better cosmetic result," Montgomery said. He told CNN on Tuesday, "We want to make it easier for people to donate, to have less impact on their lives, [be] in hospital a shorter amount of time and get back to their lives quicker." Don't Miss The woman was chosen to be the first donor to undergo the procedure because a previous hysterectomy enabled doctors to operate without a uterus obstructing their efforts, he added. The three-hour procedure typically allows the donor to return home within 24 hours. The more traditional surgery requires a 5- to 6-inch incision through the abdominal wall and generally is followed by two or three days of hospitalization. "If you asked our patient, she said it was like getting a tooth removed. She was walking that night and left the next day," Montgomery said. The procedure is done by inserting "wand-like cameras and tools" through small incisions in the abdomen and navel. Doctors then insert a hollow tube through the vagina with a bag at the end. Once the kidney is cut loose, surgeons use video from the cameras to guide them as they maneuver the bag around the organ, place it in the tube and pull it out through the vaginal opening, Montgomery said. A kidney weighs approximately one pound and is roughly the size of a clenched hand. In an effort to ensure a more sterile procedure, the vagina is treated with Betadine, a sterilizing solvent commonly applied during surgery. But some physicians wonder how clean the procedure can actually be. "It's good to take such [sterilization] measures," said Dr. Jihad Kaouk, director of laparoscopic and robotic surgery at the Cleveland Clinic. "But the tube touched the vagina. And the bag touched the tube. And the bag touched the kidney" He added, "delivering a kidney from the vagina, which is not sterile -- is it a potential risk or a real risk? We'll find out now." Kaouk also expressed concern over the quality of the kidney once it has been squeezed into a tube. "The concept of minimizing incisions and decreasing pain after surgery is always a good idea, but we should always check at what price," he said. Source
Women with larger chins are more likely to cheat on their partners, according to research. Psychologists have found that adult females who have prominent chins are more sexually active than those with softer features, yet are less attractive to men looking for a long-term partner. Larger chins on women are often caused by a high level of the male growth hormone testosterone, present in all women in various amounts. The hormone also increases sexual assertiveness in a woman, a tendency more commonly attributed to males. The researchers, from four universities across the US and Canada, took a group of young women and questioned them on their sexual histories and fantasies. These women were then rated by a group of men on their desirability as a life partner. It was concluded that men will shun women with such masculine features when looking for a long-term partner because they fear being cuckolded. Psychologists believe it is linked to their evolutionary desire to have a partner who will produce children for only one man. Authors of the study, published in the journal Personality And Individual Differences, said: "The findings are important in demonstrating that perceptions of women as desirable and trustworthy long-term mates can be reliably gleaned by men from viewing only the women's facial features. "Results suggest that information about women's sexual unrestrictedness, which is related to their risk of infidelity, can potentially be conveyed by the masculinity of women's faces." The theory has many examples in the celebrity world. Actress Meg Ryan, 47, who has a strong chin, famously cheated on her husband Dennis Quaid with her co-star Russell Crowe. However, the actress Joanne Woodward, who has a dainty jawline, was happily married for 50 years to Hollywood icon Paul Newman until his death in September. Dr Lorne Campbell, a psychologist from Western Ontario University, who took part in the project, wrote: "It is difficult to conceal physical features, such as facial characteristics, that are partly governed by testosterone and reliably correlate with one's sexual history and attitudes. The research is the first to our knowledge to suggest that a more masculine facial appearance in women might convey their sexual unrestrictedness and perhaps their long-term mate quality." Source Image Above: Rumer is daughter of Bruce Willis and Demi Moore. She has a huge ass chin.
Men smell of cheese while women smell of onions, new research claims, after tests were conducted on the two sexes' armpits. Scientists at Firmenich, a company in Geneva that researches flavours and smells for the food and perfume industry, took samples of armpit sweat from 24 men and 25 women after they had spent time in a sauna or 15 minutes on an exercise bike. When the samples were analysed, the team found those from women contained high amounts of an odourless sulphur-containing compound, according to New Scientist magazine. When this mixed with bacteria usually found under the arm, it was transformed into a chemical called thiol, well known for its onion-like smell. Men however sweat in a different way - scientists found high levels of an odourless fatty acid which released a cheesy smell when exposed to enzymes produced by bacteria in the armpits. Christian Starkenmann, who led the study, said: “Men smell of cheese, and women of grapefruit or onion.” A team of independent testers recruited by the scientists also found the smell from women’s armpits was more unpleasant. It is thought the study could be used to develop deodorants aimed specifically at men or women. Not all scientists are convinced the experiment can be repeated outside Switzerland however as people have different diets and genes elsewhere in the world. Professor Tim Jacob, who researches the science of smell at Cardiff University, said: “Other factors include what you eat, what you wash with, what you wear and what genes you inherit.” Last month it was reported that a woman can subconsciously tell when a man is sexually attracted to her by the smell of his sweat. According to researchers from Rice University in Texas, men sweat different according to what mood they are in and women’s brains can pick up if a man is interested in her. Source
January 26, 2009-- She's one of the world's best-preserved bodies: Rosalia Lombardo, a two-year-old Sicilian girl who died of pneumonia in 1920. "Sleeping Beauty," as she's known, appears to be merely dozing beneath the glass front of her coffin in the Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo, Italy. Now an Italian biological anthropologist, Dario Piombino-Mascali of the Institute for Mummies and the Iceman in Bolzano, has discovered the secret formula that preserved Rosalia's body so well. (Piombino-Mascali is funded by the National Geographic Society's Expeditions Council. National Geographic News is owned by the National Geographic Society.) Piombino-Mascali tracked down living relatives of Alfredo Salafia, a Sicilian taxidermist and embalmer who died in 1933. A search of Salafia's papers revealed a handwritten memoir in which he recorded the chemicals he injected into Rosalia's body: formalin, zinc salts, alcohol, salicylic acid, and glycerin. Formalin, now widely used by embalmers, is a mixture of formaldehyde and water that kills bacteria. Salafia was one of the first to use this for embalming bodies. Alcohol, along with the arid conditions in the catacombs, would have dried Rosalia's body and allowed it to mummify. Glycerin would have kept her body from drying out too much, and salicylic acid would have prevented the growth of fungi. But it was the zinc salts, according to Melissa Johnson Williams, executive director of the American Society of Embalmers, that were most responsible for Rosalia's amazing state of preservation. Zinc, which is no longer used by embalmers in the United States, petrified Rosalia's body. "[Zinc] gave her rigidity," Williams said. "You could take her out of the casket prop her up, and she would stand by herself." Piombino-Mascali calls the self-taught Salafia an artist: "He elevated embalming to its highest level." Source
Could The Force be with you? A toy due in stores this fall will let you test and hone your Jedi-like abilities. The Force Trainer (expected to be priced at $90 to $100) comes with a headset that uses brain waves to allow players to manipulate a sphere within a clear 10-inch-tall training tower, analogous to Yoda and Luke Skywalker's abilities in the Star Wars films. No, you're not tapping into some "all-powerful force controlling everything," as Han Solo said in the movies. But you are reaching out with mind power via one of the first mass-market brain-to-computer products. "It's been a fantasy everyone has had, using The Force," says Howard Roffman, president of Lucas Licensing. Mind-control games may be the coming thing: Mattel plans to demonstrate a Mind Flex game (also due this fall), which uses brain-wave activity to move a ball through a tabletop obstacle course, at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Thursday. In the Force Trainer, a wireless headset reads your brain activity, in a simplified version of EEG medical tests, and the circuitry translates it to physical action. If you focus well enough, the training sphere, which looks like a ping-pong ball, will rise in the tower. A state of deep concentration is needed to achieve a Force-full effect. "When you concentrate, it activates the training remote," says Frank Adler of toymaker Uncle Milton Industries, which is creating the Trainer. "There is a flow of air that will move the (ball). You can actually feel like you are in a zone." Star Wars sound effects and audio clips emitted from the base unit "cue you in to progress to the next level (from Padawan to Jedi) or when to move the sphere up or down to keep challenging yourself," Adler says. "Until today, EEG technology has been designed for rigorous medical and clinical applications with little regard to price (and) ease of use," says Greg Hyver of NeuroSky, which developed the brain-wave technology for both games. "We are putting this exciting technology into everyone's living room." Source Have any interesting articles you'd like to share? Article Request Thread.
ROME (Reuters) - Italian and British scientists want to exhume the body of 16th century astronomer Galileo for DNA tests to determine if his severe vision problems may have affected some of his findings. The scientists told Reuters on Thursday that DNA tests would help answer some unresolved questions about the health of the man known as the father of astronomy, whom the Vatican condemned for teaching that the earth revolves around the sun. "If we knew exactly what was wrong with his eyes we could use computer models to recreate what he saw in his telescope," said Paolo Galluzzi, director of the Museum of History and Science in Florence, the city where Galileo is buried. Galileo, who lived from 1564 to 1642, is known to have had intermittent eye problems for the second half of his life and was totally blind for his last two years. "There were periods when he saw very well and periods when he did not see very well," said Dr. Peter Watson, president of the Academia Ophthalmologica Internationalis and consultant to Addenbrooke's University Hospital, Cambridge. Watson, who has studied Galileo's handwriting, letters and portraits of the astronomer, suspects he may have had unilateral myopia, uveitis -- an inflammation of the eye's middle layer -- or a condition called creeping angle closure glaucoma. Watson believes Galileo did not acquire his eye problems by looking at the sun but by systemic illnesses, including an attack when he was young that left him temporarily deaf and bloody discharges and arthritis so severe he was bedridden for weeks. He was under particular stress when he was tried for heresy by the Inquisition because the Copernican theory he supported conflicted with the Bible. One of the "errors" that Galileo made, which Galluzzi suspects may have been attributed to his bad eyesight, is that he believed Saturn was not perfectly round but may have had an irregular, inflated side. With his 20-power telescope and with his eyes in bad shape he might have mistaken Saturn's gaseous ring to surmise that it was formed of one planet with two moons as satellites. "This was probably a combination of errors. He probably expected to find satellites and his eyesight may have contributed to some confusion," said Galluzzi. "A DNA test will allow us to determine to what measure the pathology of the eye may have 'tricked' him," he said. "If we discover the pathology he suffered, we can formulate a mathematical model that simulates the effects it would have had on what he saw and using the same type of telescope he used we can get closer to what he actually saw," Galluzzi said. "We only have sketches of what he saw. If we were able to see what he saw that would be extraordinary," he added. Galileo was buried in Florence's Santa Croce Basilica about 100 years after his death. Before, his remains were hidden in a bell tower room because the Church opposed a proper burial. His bones were stored together with those of one of his disciples, Vincenzo Viviani, and those of an anonymous woman. Galluzzi and others believe the bones belong to the most beloved of Galileo's three illegitimate children, Sister Maria Celeste, a nun who died when she was 33. She was the subject of the 1999 international bestseller "Galileo's Daughter," by Dava Sobel. DNA would determine if she is his daughter. Galluzzi said he was waiting for permission from the Church to exhume the body and then would form a committee of historians, scientists and doctors to oversee the project. Source
Women anticipate a rush of anticipation and optimism as they prepare to apply make-up, according to brain function research by Japanese scientists. The findings are the result of more than two years of research by cosmetics giant Kanebo but came as a surprise to the team, headed by brain scientist Dr Ken Mogi. The researchers had expected to find that women experience positive emotions after they had applied the make-up. The company's "Cosmetics, Beauty and Brain Science" project determined that there are distinct cognitive activities involved in a woman's perception of her face with and without make-up. Using a brain scanner, the scientists were able to monitor activity in the caudate nucleus of the brain and confirm that when a woman sees her own face without make-up, she anticipates how she will eventually appear to others and a "reward system" is activated, releasing dopamine to give sensations of pleasure. "We know from previous research that when this area of the brain is activated we can derive pleasure from certain activities," said Keishi Saruwatari, of Kanebo's laboratories. "We interpret that as meaning that when a woman looks at her face she is imagining how she will look when she has applied her make-up. "There is a mixture of expectation, encouragement and ambition," he said. "Make-up contributes to building relationships with others and feelings of pleasure in women." The research focused on female responses, but the team believes similar feelings may be at work when a man shaves or puts on cologne of a morning. "We can now not only put a functional value on a product now, but also measure the emotional appeal," said scientist Yasuhiko Tanaka. "By using quantifiable research, we will be able to strengthen the emotional value of a product and enable us to develop more appealing versions." Source
Article Submitted by master911. Heavy coffee drinkers are more likely to have hallucinations or feel "the presence of dead people", according to new research. A UK-based study quizzed 200 students on their caffeine intake and found those with the highest consumption were also more prone to report seeing, or hearing, things that were not there. Those who consumed a daily equivalent of seven cups of instant coffee or more - high caffeine users - were three times more likely to have extra-sensory experiences than low users, who had less than one cup daily. The Durham University study took in all caffeine consumption including coffee but also tea, caffeinated energy drinks or chocolate bars and caffeine pills. "This is a first step towards looking at the wider factors associated with hallucinations," said lead author, Simon Jones, a PhD student at the university's psychology department. "Previous research has highlighted a number of important factors, such as childhood trauma, which may lead to clinically relevant hallucinations. "Given the link between food and mood, and particularly between caffeine and the body's response to stress, it seems sensible to examine what a nutritional perspective may add." When under stress, the body releases a stress hormone called cortisol. More of this stress hormone is released in response to stress when people have recently had caffeine. It is this extra boost of cortisol which may link caffeine intake with an increased tendency to hallucinate, say the scientists. "However, one interpretation may be that those students who were more prone to hallucinations used caffeine to help cope with their experiences," said study co-author Dr Charles Fernyhough. "More work is needed to establish whether caffeine consumption, and nutrition in general, has an impact on those kinds of hallucination that cause distress." People taking part in the study reported "seeing things that were not there, hearing voices, and sensing the presence of dead people". Mr Jones said such hallucinations were not necessarily a sign of mental illness, and around three per cent of people regularly heard such voices. Source
Love really could be a drug, say scientists, who believe that one day the feelings may be induced by popping a pill or smelling perfume. It may not be the most romantic gesture but scientists are developing drugs that can boost that most human of emotions. They are studying the brain chemistry responsible for the complex feelings that draw us to a particular member of the opposite sex and help keep us monogamous. Animal testing is beginning to shed light on the complex neural and genetic components of love in the same way they have led to pharmaceutical therapies for anxiety, phobias and post-traumatic stress disorders. The behavioural scientist Professor Larry Young, of Emory University, Georgia, writing in the journal Nature, said: "For one thing, drugs that manipulate brain systems at whim to enhance or diminish our love for another may not be far away." Experiments have already shown a nasal squirt of the hormone oxytocin enhances trust and tunes people into others' emotions. Websites are marketing products such as Enhanced Liquid Trust, a cologne-like mixture of oxytocin and chemical scents called pheromones "designed to boost the dating and relationship area of your life". Prof Young said: "Although such products are unlikely to do anything other than boost users' confidence, studies are under way in Australia to determine whether an oxytocin spray might aid traditional marital therapy." Prof Young said: "The hormone interacts with the reward and reinforcement system driven by the neuro-transmitter dopamine – the same circuitry that drugs such as nicotine, cocaine and heroine act on in humans to produce euphoria and addiction. "Dopamine-related reward regions of the human brain are active in mothers viewing images of their child. Similar activation patterns are seen in people looking at photographs of their lovers." Source
Article Submitted by master911. You are shopping when you receive a text message on your mobile phone. It is from the parking meter telling you that you have been given a fine. A science-fiction nightmare? No, this could soon be the reality of urban parking if smart meters already in use in France are picked up around the world. About 60 French councils have installed a system developed by Technolia, an engineering company, that detects the presence of vehicles and alerts police if drivers stay over their allotted time, The Australian reports. "We are revolutionising parking with the individual monitoring of spaces," said Claude Zandona, the company's managing director. The meters create magnetic fields capable of registering the metal mass of vehicles. They have a direct computer link to a police station. Under a mechanism adopted by towns such as Issy-les-Moulineaux, on the outskirts of Paris, cars are allowed 20 minutes of free parking. If they stay longer, the smart meter sends a message to a police control room, which alerts officers through their mobile telephones 15 minutes later. "That way police and wardens don't have to spend the day walking up and down the road," said Mr Zandona, who said he wanted to introduce the technology to other countries. "The police can go and sit in a cafe if they like and just pop out when they get a message to say a car is parked illegally. "They have an 80 per cent chance of finding the car still there between 12 and 18 minutes after the limit, we have found." Councils say the main intention behind using a 20-minute limit is to encourage a quick turnover of vehicles and generate increased custom for shops. Mr Zandona said: "It's the shopkeepers who are happy. For them, it's a question of no parking, no business. So the bigger the turnover of vehicles, the better it will be for them." In France, where only one in five drivers bothers to pay for a parking ticket - partly because the fine is only E11 ($21)- the arrival of the meters signals something of a social upheaval. Mr Zandona envisages a system in which motorists would pay with a personal identification number incorporated into their mobile telephones. "The meter would then send a text message to warn you five minutes before your time was up. You could buy more time through your phone if you wanted," he said. "But if you didn't, you'd get another message to say you'd overstayed and been fined." He said the fines could be sent directly to drivers' homes, reducing or even eliminating the need for wardens. Source
