Office by Alex Penny
Two parts science, one part humor, one tablespoon of sarcasm, and a strip of bacon. This is the life of a medical student. This blog covers the three things I find most vital: science, medicine, and humor. Read on and live.
Ciao volevo mandarvi anche io un cuore.
Un muscolo che lavora instancabilmente, il cuore non può mai concedersi riposo, per tutta la vita deve lavorare 24 ore su 24
(via medical-lab-minds)
(Source: bored-im, via hippyscientist)
(Source: raiseusfromperdition, via hippyscientist)
—
Neil deGrasse Tyson
(via geo0o)
The Defibrillator Toaster
My mom would be so annoyed… every morning I would run into the kitchen screaming “WE’RE LOSING THEM!!! BEEP BEEP BEEPBEEPBEEP!”
“DON’T YOU DIE ON ME, DAMNIT!!! NURSE, WE NEED 12 CC’S OF CREAM CHEESE, STAT!!!”
He’s bread, Jim.
Time of deliciousness: 7:15 A.M
If we don’t restart his heart , he’s toast!
JESUS CRUST.
JAM IT!
“Daddy’s in a butter place now, kids.”
omfg
(Source: secretsbest, via mymedspace)
Difference Between Astronomy and Astrology
by Carl Edward Sagan — From Cosmos: A Personal Voyage
There are two ways to view the stars, as they really are.. or as we might wish them to be. These, are the Pleadeas a group of young stars leaving their stellar nurseries, gas, and dust, and this.. is the Crab Nebula, a stellar graveyard where gas and dust are being dispersed back into the interstellar medium. Inside it lies a pulsar. Both the Pleadeas and the Crab Nebula are in a constellation where Astrologers long ago named Taurus The Bull, They imagined it to influence our daily lives. Astronomers say, that the Planet Saturn is an immense globe of hydrogen and helium and circled by a ring of snowballs 50,000 Kilometers wide and that Jupiter’s great red spot was a giant storm raging for perhaps a 1,000,0000 years.
But Astrologers see the Planets, as affecting human character and fate. Jupiter represent a regal baring and a gentle disposition and Saturn the gravedigger fosters they say, stress, suspicion & evil. The Astronomers Mars was as real as the Earth, a world awaiting exploration. But the Astrologers saw Mars as a warrior a creator of quarrels, violence, and destruction. Astronomy and Astrology were not so distinct, for most of human history the one encompassed the other. But there came a time when Astronomy escaped from the confines of Astrology. The two traditions became to diverge in the life and mind of Johannes Kepler. It was he who demystified the heavens by discovering that a physical force laid behind the motions of the Planets.
He was the first astrophysicist and the last scientific astrologer. Intellectual foundations of astrology were swept away 300 years ago and yet it is still taken serious by yet many people. You ever notice how easy it is to find a magazine about astrology? Virtually every newspaper in America has a column on Astrology. Almost none, have even a weekly column on Astronomy. People wore Astrological pendants, checked their Horoscopes before leaving the house, even our languages preserve some astrological consciousness. For example take the word, “Disaster” it comes from the Greek for “Bad Star” Italians believed disease was caused by the influence of the stars its the origin of our word “Influenza”. The Zodiacal signs used by Astrologers even ornament this statue of Prometheus in New York City.
Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods…
(via scinerds)
Barreleye
Macropinna microstoma
With a head like a fighter-plane cockpit, a Pacific barreleye fish shows off its highly sensitive, barrel-like eyes—topped by green, orblike lenses—in a picture released today but taken in 2004. The fish, discovered alive in the deep water off California’s central coast by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), is the first specimen of its kind to be found with its soft transparent dome intact. The 6-inch (15-centimeter) barreleye (Macropinna microstoma) had been known since 1939—but only from mangled specimens dragged to the surface by nets.
Photos © Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute
(via scinerds)
(Source: olialia, via illbeadoctorsomeday)
First things first, note the spelling. It defies that “I before E” thing. Now that we’ve moved past that, today we’re going to talk about caffeine, my favorite molecule.
Caffeine, or 3,7-dihydro-1,3,7-trimethyl-1H-purine-2,6-dione, is an organic molecule commonly found in all sorts of things that we love and I hold near and dear. Coffee is a prime example; 7 oz of drip coffee will contain roughly 160mg of the stimulant, while 2 oz of espresso will have roughly 100mg. In contrast, those energy drinks we hear so much about like Red Bull pack only 80 mg per 8.4 oz can. Really, step up and get on the level of coffee, energy drinks. The molecule acts as an antagonist to the adenosine receptors, a G-protein coupled receptor which plays a role in dopamine release, the sleep-wake cycle, and monitors energy levels in terms of available ATP. When caffeine is consumed, metabolism is lightly stimulated and it acts as an overall central nervous system stimulant.
Chocolate contains small amounts of caffeine, and larger amounts of theobromine, a bitter alkaloid compound which is actually strikingly similar in composition to caffeine.
Theobromine pictured above. (We’re not that different, you and I, chocolate addicts…)
Caffeine readily crosses the blood brain barrier, so it rapidly effects the central nervous system. Its other effects, including bronchodilation, smooth muscle relaxation, increased lipolysis (benefit, right?), diuresis, and blood vessel dilation are attributed to its metabolites, which includes theobromine, predictably.
Due partly to how awesome it is, and partly to the dopamine reward system effect, caffeine is actually pretty addictive when presented in large doses frequently and can have some pretty nasty withdrawal effects which, oddly enough, mimic that of heroin withdrawal in lessened severity. Headaches, chills, irritability, nausea, fatigue, and desire for coffee are all commonly associated with caffeine withdrawal. A lot of hype goes out to caffeine and people worry about its long term use, though few studies have linked significant issues with caffeine consumption and many actually suggest benefits of moderate caffeine use, including decreased risk of Parkinson’s disease, heart disease, type 2 diabetes, certain cancers, and dementia, all things we’d like to avoid.
Go on out there and raise a cup of joe to the greatest molecule ever and think a bit… Coffee was supposedly discovered when goats were noticed to “dance” after eating the cherry-like fruits of the coffee plant. Your morning brew was all started by some hyperactive goats.
Just a neat image of the microtubules (green) and DNA (red) in a cancer cell. This image was the winning image in the 2011 IN Cell Analyzer Image Competition. The other entries can be viewed here.
Image: Geoffrey Grandjean, MD Anderson Cancer Center/GE Healthcare
(Source: 14-billion-years-later, via illbeadoctorsomeday)
I know this is a bit older, but I can’t read enough about this. This is indescribably huge and somewhat poetic almost…
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2012-02/no-pulse-how-doctors-reinvented-human-heart
The above is a link to an article about the beatless artificial heart which gave a man an extra five weeks of life (he passed away due to other problems), and may give people much longer, healthier lives in the future.
Here is a video.
This transmission electron micrograph (TEM) revealed some of the ultrastructural morphology displayed by norovirus virions, or virus particles.
“Norovirus (formerly Norwalk agent) is an RNA virus (taxonomic family Caliciviridae) that causes approximately 90% of epidemic nonbacterial outbreaks of gastroenteritis around the world, and may be responsible for 50% of all foodborne outbreaks of gastroenteritis in the United States.”
