The Health Weblog
In this video, ASAPScience speculates about what we’ll be like in another 1,000 years.
And their roundup of the predictions seems nothing if not interesting.
Intro) 3 Examples:
Over the past 10,000, 150, and 65 years, we’ve become tolerant of milk, grown 10cm taller & lived 20 years longer. All due to science in farming, healthcare & diet.
So: What else could happen going forward? You know, besides Google Glass…
Awhile back, we told you about the amazing 3D-Printed bones designed by Dr. Susmita Bose.
Since then, there’s been another development that will add to the final consumer product, just like the 3D-Blueprinting side we saw from the guys who put the motorcyclist back together.
–What Dr. Richard Oreffo’s team did was to research all different kinds of Materials, Composites, Plastics, Minerals and many different kinds of Shapes & Layouts. -And they arrived at something really interesting…
Ever see those LED brushes on late-night TV that say they’ll grow your hair back? -Well, it turns out they work; -or at least the theory anyway.
Results were spotty, and the principles weren’t well-understood; -until now.
Using low-powered lasers, some creative dentistry & great analysis, a Harvard team has figured out how to regenerate the bony-core of teeth in 12 weeks, using only light.
(not as impressive as growing a whole new tooth, but anyway)…
Nerve injuries of all types are terrible events for anyone experiencing them.
And the outlook is generally-poor, because we really don’t heal as well as Dr. Connors in The Amazing Spiderman.
So George Bittner’s UT team has come up with the obvious solution: Turn people into crocodiles.
They soon discovered that was really hard to do. So for the time being, they came up with a workaround: Stop the ‘scarring’ process & get things back together…
In the future, thyroid medication and the problems that necessitated it, may be a thing of the past.
Thanks to some groundbreaking work by Sabine Costagliola at the Free University of Brussels, our old friend the Stem Cell has slain yet another dragon.
What Sabine’s team did was to get stem-cells to produce 2 compounds only found in the thyroid.
They then grew these special cells in petri-dishes,…
Awhile ago Stephen Power, like many unfortunate motorcyclists, got into a very serious wreck.
He didn’t die.
-But he Did break: both arms, both cheek bones, both eye-sockets, his upper jaw, his right leg so badly it needed a bone-graft, and for the hat-trick he also managed to crack his skull.
So OK, not good. But, before they decided to give 3D-reconstruction-wizard…
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The interesting intersection between the ‘Old’ and New sciences of Stem Cells and 3D-Printing is starting to provide some amazing developments in both Life-Extension and Replacement-Parts.
The well-known windpipe-replacement is also one of the bigger successes in that category as of late.
*However, to make these things Truly Useful, there are still quite a few obstacles to overcome.
-And now, Make that quite a few, -Minus One.
Jennifer Lawrence Lewis and her team have come up with quite an ingenious…
“I trembled, and my heart failed within me; when, on looking up, I saw, by the light of the moon, the daemon at the casement.”*
Imagine if you had to learn how to be an Architect or Civil-Engineer, but you weren’t allowed 2x4s, wood, bricks, cement, steel I-beams, bolts, nails, mud, hay, cow-butts; -nothing in the way of building-supplies,
And all you were allowed to do was take apart existing skyscrapers, experiment, and sketch?
Well, that phase in Brain-Science is over…
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Whiskey The Dog is a four-legged test-pilot for the future of skeletal biotech.
He’d gotten sick and needed some work on his jaw.
But rather than just go the standard route where things never quite return to normal, Drs. Huey, Arzi and Verstraete at UC Davis came up with a new experiment to try on Whiskey and 7 of his closest friends.
Using some titanium brackets, a hard-sponge-bone-scaffold and special proteins, they were able to fill in a full 2-inch-long gap in his jaw.
Within 3 months…
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And on the Running theme, anyone who’s had a joint issue for whatever reason, can attest to how hard it is to get back on your feet.
Well, buck up little camper, Because: Science!
By synthesizing a new combination-gel that unites two different types, that then absorb calcium molecules, scientists at Harvard have come up with what they think might be a pretty good Replacement for Cartilage…
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