Day: 01/07/2015

We’re all getting an extra second on June 30 this year .

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A leap second will be added on June 30, 2015, because the planet is out of sync with our atomic clocks.

This year will be one second longer than 2014. Scientists have announced that they’ll be adding an extra second, called a “leap second” to the UTC (coordinated universal time) clock on June 30 at 11:59:59.

That means the clock will read 11:59:60. This is because the Earth is moving a little slower than our super-accurate atomic clocks dictate, and it’s getting out of sync. In fact, while atomic time is constant, the Earth’s rotation is slowing down by around two thousandths of a second each day.

“The real simple explanation is the Earth is slowing down a little bit,” Nick Stamatakos, the head of the Earth Orientate Parameters at the US Naval Observatory told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

The decision comes from scientists at the Paris-based International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service, who take stock of how punctual our planet is.

It’s not a rare move – this is the 26th leap second that’s been added since 1972, and the last one was added in 2012. But it didn’t go entirely smoothly – lot of the software that supports websites couldn’t cope, and the leap second took out internet bigwigs Reddit, LinkedIn, Gizmodo and FourSquare.

This is because the Network Time Protocol that computers use to sync themselves up with the world’s atomic clocks. And when this protocol sees the same second being repeated on the clock, it assumes that something’s gone wrong and havoc ensues.

Google has come up with a technique to deal with the problem called a ‘leap smear’, but people are still worried about communication and banking disruptions.

And there are also concerns that too many leap seconds could ruin Greenwich Mean Time forever, as The Telegraph reports:

“Experts also fear that once this link is broken it could never be restored because although the Earth’s timekeeping systems are built to accommodate the occasional leap second, adding a leap minute or hour to global time would be virtually impossible.”

But while there are calls form the US government and other countries to get rid of leap seconds altogether due to disruptions, the rest of the world is keen to make sure that the Earth’s rotation and the atomic clock stay in sync.

Either way, the leap second is coming this year whether you like it or not.

The real question is, what are you going to do with it?

Why is it Good to Eat Garlic on an Empty Stomach?

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In many alternative and traditional forms of medicine, garlic is considered to be a great detox food that can cure many ailments. Many claim that garlic can cleanse the body from parasites and worms, prevent and cure diabetes, depression and even some cancer types.

Eating raw garlic is the best way to maximize its health benefits, far superior to any pills or supplements. Garlic produces allicin, an organosulfur compound that is created when garlic is crushed, chopped, or minced. Allicin is extremely unstable and quickly breaks down into other sulfur-containing compounds such as diallyl disulfide. These compounds react with the human body in various complex ways, appearing to lower blood pressure and reduce arterial fatty plaque build-up.

Although garlic is best eaten crushed whether raw or cooked, crushing damages the cells and allicin is released. Garlic destroys free radicals due to its antioxidant property. But, it should be consumed within an hour or two of activating the allicin (by crushing or mincing the garlic) to get the full potential health benefits. However, stomach acids can lower the effect of allicin, so try not to eat raw garlic on an empty stomach; even a glass of water first will help by lowering stomach pH slightly.

Heat can also destroy allicin and its resulting sulfur-containing compounds, so recipes that call for cooking garlic at high heat for long periods of time cancel out most of its healthy boosts. Baking or roasting whole cloves or heads of garlic also won’t produce allicin as the cloves must be crushed, chopped, or minced to mix the parts together that produce allicin.

Some research suggests that consuming garlic before you eat or drink anything can increase its power. But if you’re not used to eating garlic every day, it’s advisable to start slowing and build it up every day.Raw garlic mean that you have to peel it and chomp it down. It just shouldn’t be over-cooked. You can also eat it straight down the hatch and eat it at night, if you’re concerned about garlic breath.

If you are allergic to garlic, never eat it raw and if you get any skin outbreaks, high body temperature, or a headache, stop consuming it and consult a doctor.

High IQ could be shield against schizophrenia, scientists say.

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An Albert Einstein pumpkin is pictured at Madame Tussauds in New York (Reuters / Carlo Allegri)

An Albert Einstein pumpkin is pictured at Madame Tussauds in New York .

High intelligence might halt the development of schizophrenia, especially in genetically predisposed people, according to a large-scale study contradicting earlier, more conventional beliefs that braininess may increase risk of this disorder.

A team of US and Swedish scientists has recently established that intelligence quotient, or IQ, is an important “moderator” in the development of schizophrenia, but the link actually works the opposite way.

“If you’re really smart, your genes for schizophrenia don’t have much of a chance of acting,” said first author Kenneth S. Kendler, professor of psychiatry and human and molecular genetics at Virginia Commonwealth University.

More than 1.2 million Swedish males born between 1951 and 1975 and registered in the Military Conscription Register participated in the study that assessed their IQ at ages from 18 to 20, in late adolescence, and tracked the history of schizophrenia-related hospitalization until 2010.

High IQ lowers the risk of schizophrenia (Image from the study published in American Psychiatric Association)

High IQ lowers the risk of schizophrenia (Image from the study published in American Psychiatric Association)

It turns out, low IQ is among other factors – like fetal experience, childhood trauma or early drug use – contributing to the development of the mental illness, although there is a huge variation in the intelligence scores of people with schizophrenia.

“What really predicted risk for schizophrenia is how much you deviate from the predicted IQ that [you] get from your relatives,” Kendler said. “If you’re quite a bit lower, that carries a high risk for schizophrenia. Not achieving the IQ that you should have based on your genetic constitution and family background seems to most strongly predispose for schizophrenia.”

According to the study, a 1-point decrease in IQ increases the risk of schizophrenia by 3.8 percent, and the strongest effect was seen within families – it “nearly disappears at the highest IQ level.”

 

Probability of schizophrenia predicted by risk of illness in close relatives (Image from the study published in American Psychiatric Association)

Probability of schizophrenia predicted by risk of illness in close relatives (Image from the study published in American Psychiatric Association)

The study, dubbed “IQ and schizophrenia in a Swedish national sample: Their causal relationship and the interaction of IQ with genetic risk”, is said to be the largest study of the relationship between IQ and schizophrenia to date. It has been published recently in the American Journal of Psychiatry.

Schizophrenia is a mental disorder that often manifests itself with poor social interaction and loss of motivation and initiative. In extreme cases psychosis, a state of losing contact with reality, flooded with hallucinations, paranoia and delusions occur. Treatment may help some people recover from the illness, although others may be affected for years, demonstrating unusual or bizarre behavior.

In the US 2.4 million adults and almost a quarter of a million Australians suffer from this severe mental disorder, which occurs in about one in 100 people worldwide.

Antibiotic breakthrough could turn the tables in battle against superbugs .

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The powerful antimicrobial teixobactin was discovered using a new technique that could speed up the discovery of new antibiotics to tackle resistance
A scanning electron micrograph of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. Teixobactin kills a wide range of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, including MRSA.

A scanning electron micrograph of MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus)
Scientists have discovered a new class of antibiotic using a revolutionary procedure hailed as a game changer in the hunt for medicines to fight drug-resistant infections. The antibiotic, called teixobactin, kills a wide range of drug-resistant bacteria, including MRSA and bugs that cause TB and a host of other life-threatening infections.

It could become a powerful weapon in the battle against antimicrobial resistance, because it kills microbes by blocking their capacity to build their cell walls, making it extremely difficult for bacteria to evolve resistance.

“Teixobactin kills exceptionally well. It has the ability to rapidly clear infections,” said research leader Kim Lewis, director of the Antimicrobial Discovery Center at Northeastern University in Boston, US.

The public health threat of resistance was highlighted last year in a World Health Organisation report that warned the world was entering a “post-antibiotic era”. The UK’s chief medical officer, Sally Davies, has put antibiotic resistance on the government’s national risk register, alongside terrorist attacks and pandemic flu, and warned that without new antibiotics, more people will die after routine operations in the next 20 years. In December, a report commissioned by David Cameron warned that failure to tackle drug-resistant infections will cost the global economy up to £64tn ($100tn) by 2050.

In studies on mice, the new antibiotic wiped out infections of Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus pneumoniae, which can cause life-threatening blood and lung infections. It was also effective against Enterococcus, which can infect the heart, prostate, urinary tract and abdomen.

Most antibiotics are isolated from bacteria or fungi that churn out lethal compounds to keep other microbes at bay. But scientists have checked only a tiny fraction of bugs for their ability to produce potential antibiotics because 99% cannot be grown in laboratories.

Lewis’s group found a way around the problem by developing a device called an iChip that cultures bacteria in their natural habitat. The device sandwiches the bugs between two permeable sheets. It is then pushed back into the ground where the microbes grow into colonies.

The researchers found that after two weeks in the ground, the microbial colonies had grown enough to run tests on them. To do this, they covered the top of the iChip with layers of pathogens. Bugs that produced natural antibiotics revealed themselves by killing the pathogens above them.

Working with a Massachusetts-based company, NovoBiotic, and researchers at the University of Bonn, Lewis’s group screened 10,000 soil bacteria for antibiotics and discovered 25 new compounds. Of these, teixobactin was the most promising.

Teixobactin’s ability to kill bugs is only part of the attraction of the compound. Writing in the journal Nature, the scientists describe how none of the bacteria treated with the antibiotic showed signs of developing resistance.

The reason for the drug’s apparent resilience was discovered by Tanja Schneider in Bonn. Most antibiotics target bacterial proteins, but bugs can become resistant by evolving new kinds of proteins. Teixobactin works differently. It launches a double attack on the building blocks of bacterial cell walls themselves. “That’s an Achilles’ heel for antibiotic attack,” Schneider said. “It would take so much energy for the cell to modify this, I think it’s unlikely resistance will appear this way.”

Though promising, Lewis said that years more work lie ahead before the drug could be available. Human clinical trials could begin within two years to check its safety and efficacy, but more development would follow that. At the moment the drug would have to be given as an injection, but an oral pill would be more attractive.

Another shortcoming of teixobactin is that it only works against bacteria that lack outer cell walls, known as Gram-positive bacteria, such as MRSA, Streptococcus and TB. It doesn’t work against Gram-negative bacteria, which include some of the most worrying antibiotic-resistant pathogens, such as Klebsiella, E. coli and Pseudomonas.

Despite these limitations, the discovery of the antibiotic, and the process used to grow previously ungrowable microbes, has raised hopes among researchers in the field.

“What most excites me is the tantalising prospect that this discovery is just the tip of the iceberg,” said Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh. “It may be that we will find more, perhaps many more, antibiotics using these latest techniques.”

Turmeric Extract Improves Brain Function In One Dose .

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Your spice rack may contain the safest, most fast-acting, brain-boosting substance medical science has yet to confirm effective in a human clinical study. 

A remarkable new study published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology titled, “Investigation of the effects of solid lipid curcumin on cognition and mood in a healthy older population,” reveals that the primary golden-hued polyphenol found in the ancient Indian healing spice turmeric known as curcumin is capable of improving cognition and mood in elderly adults (60-85) when administered in either short-term [acute], chronic, or short-term-on-chronic dosage schedules.

The study involving 60 healthy adults found that a single dose of 400 mg of a solid curcumin formulation (trade name Longvida® (non-affiliate link)) resulted only one hour later in significantly improved performance on sustained attention and working memory tasks, compared with placebo.

Additionally, a chronic treatment schedule (4 weeks) resulted in improvement in working memory and mood, the latter of which was defined as a positive change in their “state [of] calmness, contentedness and fatigue induced by psychological stress.”

Finally, an acute-on-chronic treatment resulted in improved alertness and contentedness.

spice turmeric brain health 300x199 Turmeric Extract Improves Brain Function In One Dose

The authors commented that,

“To our knowledge this is the first study to examine the effects of curcumin on cognition and mood in a healthy older population or to examine any acute behavioral effects in humans. Results highlight the need for further investigation of the potential psychological and cognitive benefits of curcumin in an older population.”

The study reviewed several therapeutic properties of curcumin that may have relevance in improving underlying physiology associated with age-related cognitive decline and may help to explain its observed brain-boosting effects include:

      Curcumin may inhibit amyloid pathology  (a type of degenerative brain plaque found in Alzheimer’s disease)

Protect against oxidative stress

Reduce inflammation

Neuroprotective, promoting neurogenesis and neuroplasticity

Improve the functioning of neurotrasmitter systems

The study also pointed out that epidemiological evidence shows dietary curcumin consumption is associated with better cognitive function and lower dementia prevalence, and that animal research has demonstrated its ability to both and prevent neurological pathologies.

The reality is the positive results described in this study is not be surprising given all the research that exists on curcumin’s neuroprotective properties. The Greenmedinfo database has indexed over 1500 study abstracts on curcumin’s health benefits, covering over 600 different diseases, with 113 of these studies specifically addressing curcumin’s neuroprotective properties.

Consider also that recently a Groundbreaking Study Found Turmeric Extract Superior to Prozac for Depression, revealing again how remarkable curcumin is at improving mood and a sense of well-being.

We have also explored in depth a promising case study which found that turmeric produced a ‘remarkable recovery’ in Alzheimer’s disease patients, and performed a review of turmeric and other natural substances’ role in preventing and even reversing Alzheimer’s disease.

As evidenced by the study featured here, the medical community is increasingly being faced with compelling research suggesting that natural compounds and foods like turmeric provide suitable alternatives to pharmaceuticals. Increasingly, the public is learning to take back control of their healthby utilizing time-tested, food-based approaches that have been part of ancestral cultural practices for thousands of year. Why not look for preventive and truly regenerative solutions in the spice rack, and leave the medicine cabinet for acute care?

Are statin drugs the cause of widespread decline in brain function?

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Diseases of the brain are rampant in America today, and evidence suggests that a popular class of pharmaceutical drugs may be largely to blame. They’re known as statins, and the science behind how they function in the body reveals that these powerful drugs gradually degrade the brain by depriving it of cholesterol, leading to memory problems, dementia and other similar conditions.

In his book Lipitor: Thief of Memory, Dr. Duanne Graveline, M.D., wrote about his horrific experience with statins, and how they caused him to suffer two transient global amnesia events as well as chronic neuropathy. The former astronaut and aerospace medical research scientist explains how these traumatic events were the direct result of statins altering his brain.

His good friend Dr. David Brownstein also highlighted the mechanics behind this damage on his blog, pointing out that statins work by poisoning an enzyme known as HMG-CoA reductase, which the body uses to produce cholesterol, adrenal hormones, sex hormones and memory proteins. HMG-CoA reductase is also responsible for maintaining cell energy, which is needed by every system of the body.

Artificially blocking or otherwise inhibiting this vital enzyme is a recipe for health disaster, explains Dr. Brownstein, which is why he advises against anyone taking statin drugs. He also questions why any cognizant doctor would prescribe them, knowing that as many as 3.6 million people have reported brain dysfunction as a result of their use.

“You can’t poison a crucial enzyme or block an important receptor for the long-term and expect a good result,” explained Dr. Brownstein in his book Drugs That Don’t Work and Natural Therapies That Do.

Statins destroy the body and they don’t even work

Based on the thousands of entries published in the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Adverse Events Database, statins have been linked to everything from short-term memory loss and disorientation to chronic depression and dementia. This same database reports well over 100,000 adverse events in other areas as well, which based on the 1-10% reporting rate probably translates into millions of people harmed bystatins.

As we’ve reported in multiple instances, statin use is linked to liver damage, kidney poisoning, muscle pain and degradation, and heart failure, as well as many other health conditions. And the worst part is that statins have never even been shown to work as claimed, which means they’re both ineffective and highly destructive.

“Perhaps we could live with all these adverse drug reactions if statins significantly lowered the risk for cardiovascular disease. But, they don’t,” wrote Dr. Brownstein on his blog.

“Statins have never been convincingly shown to prevent a first heart attack in both men and women. In men, the best of the statin studies show a 1-4% reduced risk of preventing a secondary cardiac event. In women, the numbers are worse.”

This is highly disconcerting in light of calls by some medical professionals for statins to be handed out like candy, or even dripped into public water supplies alongside fluoride. This so-called “medicine” is wreaking havoc on public health, and it doesn’t even provide any legitimate therapeutic benefits. So why is it still on the market?

“These drugs frequently cause muscle damage, muscle cramps, muscle weakness, muscle aches, exercise intolerance (even in the absence of pain and elevated CPK — a muscle enzyme), sexual dysfunction, liver and nerve damage and other problems in 10-15 percent of patients who take them,” added Dr. Mark Hyman.

“They can also cause significant cellular, muscle, and nerve injury as well as cell death in the ABSENCE of symptoms.”

Sources:

http://blog.drbrownstein.com

http://www.amazon.com

http://www.drbrownstein.com

http://drhyman.com

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/048213_statin_drugs_brain_function_memory_problems.html#ixzz3OKxRVltu

First new antibiotic in 30 years discovered in major breakthrough .

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The discovery of Teixobactin could pave the way for a new generation of antibiotics because of the way it was discovered.
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Teixobactin has been found to treat many common bacterial infections such as tuberculosis

Teixobactin has been found to treat many common bacterial infections such as tuberculosis

The first new antibiotic to be discovered in nearly 30 years has been hailed as a ‘paradigm shift’ in the fight against the growing resistance to drugs.

Teixobactin has been found to treat many common bacterial infections such as tuberculosis, septicaemia and C. diff, and could be available within five years.

But more importantly it could pave the way for a new generation of antibiotics because of the way it was discovered.

Scientists have always believed that the soil was teeming with new and potent antibiotics because bacteria have developed novel ways to fight off other microbes.

But 99 per cent of microbes will not grow in laboratory conditions leaving researchers frustrated that they could not get to the life-saving natural drugs.

They discovered that one compound, Teixobactin, is highly effective against common bacterial infections Clostridium difficile, Mycobacterium tuberculous and Staphylococcus aureus.

Professor Kim Lewis, Director of the Antimicrobial Discovery Centre said: “Apart from the immediate implementation, there is also I think a paradigm shift in our minds because we have been operating on the basis that resistance development is inevitable and that we have to focus on introducing drugs faster than resistance

“Teixobactin shows how we can adopt an alternative strategy and develop compounds to which bacteria are not resistant.”

The first antibiotic Penicillin, was discovered by Alexander Fleming in 1928 and more than 100 compounds have been found since, but no new class has been found since 1987.

The lack of new drugs coupled with over-prescribing has led to bacteria becoming increasingly resistant to modern medicines.

Dame Sally Davies, the government’s Chief Medical Officer, said antibiotic resistant was ‘as big a risk of terrorism; and warned that Britain faced returning to a 19th century world where the smallest infection or operation could kill.

The World Health Oganisation has also classified antimicrobial resistance as a “serious threat’ to every region of the world which ‘has the potential to affect anyone, of any age, in any country”

However the new discovery offers hope that many new antibiotics could be found to fight bacterial infections.

Crucially, the scientists believe that bacteria will not become resistant to Teixobactin for at least 30 years because of its multiple methods of attack.

Testing on mice has already shown that the antibiotic works well at clearing infections, without side-effects. The team is now concentrating on upscaling production so that it could be tested in humans.

“Right now we can deliver a dose that cures mice and a variety of models of infection and we can deliver 10 mg per kg so it correlates well with human usage,” added Professor Lewis.

The breakthrough was heralded by scientists who said it could prove a ‘game-changer’ in the struggle against antimicrobial resistance.

Prof Laura Piddock, Professor of Microbiology at the University of Birmingham, said: “The screening tool developed by these researchers could be a ‘game changer’ for discovering new antibiotics as it allows compounds to be isolated from soil producing micro-organisms that do not grow under normal laboratory conditions.”

Prof Mark Woolhouse, Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology, from the University of Edinburgh added: “Any report of a new antibiotic is auspicious, but what most excites me about the paper is the tantalising prospect that this discovery is just the tip of the iceberg.

“Most antibiotics are natural products derived from microbes in the soil. The ones we have discovered so far come from a tiny subset of the rich diversity of microbes that live there.

“Lewis et al. have found a way to look for antibiotics in other kinds of microbe, part of the so-called microbial “dark matter” that is very difficult to study.”

Dr Angelika Gründling, Reader in Molecular Microbiology, Imperial College London said the discovery , ‘raises our hopes that new antibiotics can be brought to the clinics in the not too distant future.’

“The great hope is now that many more new antibiotics can be uncovered in a similar manner.”

Public Health England also welcomed the breakthrough.

“The rise in antibiotic resistance is a threat to modern healthcare as we know it so this discovery could potentially help to bridge the ever increasing gap between infections and the medicines we have available to treat them,” said Prof Neil Woodford, Head of Public Health England’s Antimicrobial Resistance and Healthcare Associated Infections Reference Unit.

The research was published in the journal Nature.

Rave drug holds promise for treating depression fast

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Companies and clinicians turn to ketamine to treat mental-health disorder as pipeline of new drugs dries up

Special K, or ketamine, a favourite drug at raves, is being considered as a treatment for depression.

Ketamine, a psychoactive ‘party drug’ better known as Special K, has pharma­ceutical companies riding high. Used clinically as an anaesthetic in animals and humans, it has proved an extremely effective treatment for depression, bipolar disorder and suicidal behaviour.

It also works incredibly fast. Unlike conventional antidepressants, which generally take weeks to start working, ketamine lifts depression in as little as two hours. “It blew the doors off what we thought we knew about depression treatment,” says psychiatrist James Murrough at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.

Companies are racing to develop patentable forms of the drug, and researchers are battling to understand how it affects the brain. An increasing number of clinicians are prescribing ketamine off-label for their patients, even as some of their colleagues worry that too little is known about its long-term effects.

The excitement over ketamine shows how badly new depression drugs are needed, says Thomas Insel, director of the US National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) in Bethesda, Maryland. Many drug companies have closed their mental-health divisions in the past five years, and there have been no significant advances in medication for depression in decades.

Today’s most common antidepressants target the brain’s serotonin or noradrenaline pathways (some target both). Ketamine blocks the signalling molecule NMDA, a component of the glutamate pathway, which is involved in memory and cognition. Before ketamine was studied, no one even knew that the pathway was involved in depression, Murrough says.

In 2013, his group published the largest trial of off-label ketamine carried out so far, with 73 participants. The trial found that the drug reduced depression 24 hours after treatment in 64% of patients who had tried three or more other medications with unsuccessful results. A second group received the sedative midazolam; in that case, the reduction was 28% (J. W. Murrough et al. Am. J. Psychiatry 170, 1134–1142; 2013). Murrough’s group is now imaging the brains of patients receiving ketamine treatment to try to dissect just how the drug works.

Murrough says that long-term studies of the drug’s effects should also be done before its use becomes widespread. And bioethicist Dominic Sisti of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia worries that too many physicians already consider it a standard part of their armamentarium. The way in which ketamine should be administered still needs to be worked out, says psychiatrist Kyle Lapidus at Mount Sinai Hospital. He already prescribes ketamine off-label for some patients, and guesses that dozens of physicians across the country do the same. At therapeutic doses, it often produces a dissociative, out-of-body sensation that lasts less than an hour. At higher doses, recreational users report experiencing a ‘K-hole’, a deeply disoriented state accompanied by vivid hallucinations.

Related stories

Companies hope to profit by developing patentable variations on ketamine for treating depression. A nasal spray containing a structural variant called esketamine earned a coveted ‘breakthrough therapy designation’ from the US Food and Drug Administration in 2013. The designation allows its manufacturer, Johnson & Johnson in New Brunswick, New Jersey, to fast-track esketamine through the regulatory process. The company plans to release the results of a 200-person study early this year; its head neuroscience researcher, Husseini Manji, says that initial results “look very good”.

Last month, a company called Naurex, based in Evanston, Illinois, released results from a 386-person trial showing that its own ketamine-like drug, GLYX-13, successfully treated depression in about half of patients, without hallucinatory side effects. Roche of Basel, Switzerland, is also expected to release results early this year from a 357-person trial of a drug called decoglurant, which targets the glutamate pathway.

It is unclear why ketamine’s psychoactive effects are considered a drawback, Sisti says. He questions the ethics of making patients pay more for a patented, non-dissociative drug if unmodified ketamine works just as well.

Ketamine’s fast action is particularly promising for suicide prevention, says Carlos Zarate of the NIMH. Instead of being committed to institutions for weeks of treatment, people who have just attempted suicide might be treated with ketamine and released in days or even hours. Zarate has found that ketamine seems specifically to affect the desire to attempt suicide, whether a person is clinically depressed or not (E. D. Ballard et al. J. Psychiatr. Res. 58, 161–166; 2014). That observation suggests that suicidal behaviour might be distinct from depression. Zarate is using ketamine to treat around 50 people with depression, some of whom have suicidal thoughts, to study these effects.

Early this year, his group will begin a multi-year study of people who have attempted suicide within the previous two weeks, imaging their brain activity and comparing them with people who attempted suicide more than a year previously and with people with depression who have never attempted suicide. Those who have recently attempted suicide will be enrolled in a clinical trial of ketamine; at the same time, Zarate hopes to learn more about what an actively suicidal brain looks like.

Nature
517,
130–131
(08 January 2015)
doi:10.1038/517130a

Medicinal Mushrooms Proving to Eradicate Human Papillomavirus

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Medicinal Mushrooms Proving to Eradicate Human Papillomavirus

 

Multiple studies are showing that medicinal mushrooms can treat and eradicate Human Papillomavirus (HPV) infections, which can lead to cervical cancer.

French Study Treating HPV With Reishi and Trametes

Research from France’s Medicine Information Formation conducted a study of 472 gingivitis patients who were swabbed and screened for HPV. They found that 61 of the patients were positive for either HPV16 or HPV18.

 

The researchers then randomized the HPV-positive patients and for two months the researchers treated 20 patients with the medicinal mushroom species Laetiporus sulphureus. The other 41 patients were treated with a combination of Trametes versicolor and Ganoderma lucidum.

 

After the two months, the researchers found that 88% of the 41 patients treated with Trametes versicolor and Ganoderma lucidum tested negative for HPV. In the other group, 5% tested negative for HPV.

U.S. Research Using Mycelia Extract on HPV

On the heels of this study comes research from the University of Texas Medical School and the UT Health Science Center. A series of studies – a small human study preceded by a study on mice – has shown that a medicinal mushroom extract called AHCC is effective in eradicating human papillomavirus (HPV).

 

The results of this study were presented at the 11th International Conference of the Society for Integrative Oncology in Houston on October 28, 2014.

 

In the study, ten women who tested positive for HPV were treated with the mushroom mycelia extract called AHCC.  AHCC stands for active hexose correlated compound. It is an extract from the mycelia of Shiitake mushroom (Lentinula edodes) along with other medicinal mushrooms. The mycelia is the root-like fingers that weave within the growing medium – whether soil or in the case of AHCC cultivation, within rice bran.

 

The patients were given three grams (3,000 mg) of the AHCC once a day for at least six months. During that period, eight of the patients tested negative for HPV, including three that were confirmed eradicated after stopping the AHCC treatment.

The other two patients are continuing the treatment.

 

The research, led by Dr. Judith Smith, a professor at the UTHealth Medical School, is now going to proceed to a Phase II clinical trial. Dr. Smith stated in a press release from the University ofTexas:

“We were able to determine that at least three months of treatment is necessary but some need to extend that to six months. Since AHCC is a nutritional supplement with no side effects and other immune modulating benefits, we will be planning on using six months of treatment in our phase II clinical study to have consistent study treatment plan. This confirms our earlier preclinical research.”

Preclinical Research Supported Eradication Hypothesis

The preclinical research Dr. Smith refers to is a study done on in vitro cells and mice. The researchers gave 50 milligrams per kilogram of the AHCC to mice with HPV16/18 for 90 days with 30 days of follow up, and compared to untreated mice.

This study found that for the cell treatments, seven days of AHCC treatment followed by seven days of no treatment resulted in eradication of the HPV. In the mice, 90 days of treatment with 30 days of no treatment resulted in eradication of the HPV. In mice treated with tumors, significant tumor suppression was found.

Other Research Confirmed Eradication

This study is confirmed by another study – this from Mexico’s National Institute of Public Health and the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

 

This study tested human cervical cells infected with human papillomavirus together with cervical cancer cells. The cells were tested variously with difference concentrations of Ganoderma lucidum mushroom extract (water extract) for 24 hours each. Different sources of Reishi mushroom s were also tested. One source was China, with two sources from Mexico.

 

After tested with nuclear DNA fragmentation, the researchers found that all three Reishi mushroom extracts inhibited the growth of cancer and the HPV infection among the cells.

HPV Infections Rampant

According to the CDC, there are at least 40 HPV types (possibly over 100) transmitted, with type 16 and 18 coming with the highest risk of cervical cancer later on. Over 14 million new cases occur within the U.S. each year. HPV occurs in both men and women, but is often reported among young women, often after recent sexual activity.

 

By age fifty, 80 percent of sexually active women will have had an HPV infection according to the Centers for Disease Control. HPV-16 appears to cause over 60 percent of all cervical cancer cases, with HPV-18 apparent in another 7 to 10 percent of cases. Approximately 90 percent of HPV infections are cleared by the immune system within two years. However, the remaining 10 percent face a high risk of cervical cancer.

REFERENCES:

Donatini B. Control of Oral Human Papillomavirus (HPV) byMedicinal Mushrooms, Trametes versicolor and Ganoderma lucidum: A PreliminaryClinical Trial. Int J Med Mushrooms. 2014;16(5):497-8.

 

Smith JA, et. al. Evaluation of active hexose correlated compound (AHCC) for the Eradication of HPV Infections in Women with HPV positive Pap Smears.

 

Hernández-Márquez E, Lagunas-Martínez A, Bermudez-Morales VH, Burgete-García I, León-Rivera I, Montiel-Arcos E, García-Villa E, Gariglio P, Madrid-Marina VV,  Ondarza-Vidaurreta RN.Inhibitory activity of Lingzhi or Reishi medicinal mushroom, Ganodermalucidum (higher Basidiomycetes) on transformed cells by human papillomavirus.Int J Med Mushrooms. 2014;16(2):179-87.

 

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http://www2a.cdc.gov/stdtraining/self-study/hpv/default.htm

Inside the Mercedes self-guiding car that’s built for luxurious living in, not driving

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  • German company Mercedes has unveiled their concept self-driving car, called the F015 Luxury in Motion
  • It has wide wheels to maximise passenger space, seating for four and uses ‘swivel chairs’ that rotate 30 degrees
  • They revealed the new vehicle at Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2015 in Las Vegas 
  • People can take manual control of the car or let it drive them, on the interior are touch screens to control features
  • Mercedes have not yet announced a release date or a price for the vehicle, which is just a concept for now

Google might have set the ball rolling with their prototype self-driving car, but it doesn’t exactly set the pulse racing with its looks.

So step in Mercedes, who have unveiled a sleek and stylish vehicle that they say could be the future of autonomous cars.

Revealed in a presentation at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, the F015 concept boasts rotating pedestal seats, carriage style doors – and of course, self-driving capability.

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German company Mercedes has unveiled their concept self-driving car (shown). Called the F015 it has wide wheels to maximise passenger space. They revealed the new vehicle at CES 2015 in Las Vegas. A single pane of glass covers the top of the car

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German company Mercedes has unveiled their concept self-driving car (shown). Called the F015 it has wide wheels to maximise passenger space. They revealed the new vehicle at CES 2015 in Las Vegas. A single pane of glass covers the top of the car

Mercedes unveils it’s sleek and stylish self-driving car

The car aims to provide a look at what the future of autonomous cars might look like when the roads are populated by ‘exclusive cocoons on wheels,’ said Dieter Zetsche, chairman of Daimler AG and head of Mercedes-Benz cars.

AUDI’S SELF-DRIVING MILESTONE

For CES 2015 Audi delivered its latest hi-tech innovation in a unique way.

The German car maker sent its self driving car on a 550-mile (885km) journey from San Francisco to Las Vegas.

The German auto-giant calls its self-driving technology ‘Piloted Driving’, and insists the sensors and equipment demonstrated in the vehicle are ‘production ready’.

As a result, the company claims it is on course to put driverless cars into commercial production as soon as next year.

Mercedes said they wanted to focus on some of the other aspects aside from just the technology that drives it, though.

And that led them to design a concept that might more resemble what self-driving cars of the future will look like.

‘Anyone who focuses solely on the technology has not yet grasped how autonomous driving will change our society,’ said Mr Zetsche.

‘The car is growing beyond its role as a mere means of transport and will ultimately become a mobile living space.’

The luxury sedan, which seats four, measures 17ft (5.2 metres) in length and 5ft (1.5 metres) high.

It is made of carbon-fibre, aluminium and high-strength steel. It’s designed to be able to use an electric motor and a hydrogen fuel cell.

Using its hybrid system it can travel 685 miles (1,100 km) on a single charge.

A single pane of glass covers the top of the car, extending from its long windshield to its sunroof.

In December 2014 Google unveiled the final design for its own self-driving car (shown), but it doesn't exactly have much of an aesthetic appeal. The first version came under fire for looking like a toy car - and a new rooftop sensor means the second now looks like a toy police car

In December 2014 Google unveiled the final design for its own self-driving car (shown), but it doesn’t exactly have much of an aesthetic appeal. The first version came under fire for looking like a toy car – and a new rooftop sensor means the second now looks like a toy police car
Mercedes' car, meanwhile, has space for four and uses 'swivel chairs' that rotate 30 degrees (shown) so that the passengers can talk to each other easily. A driver can also take manual control of the car, or just let it drive them autonomously

Mercedes’ car, meanwhile, has space for four and uses ‘swivel chairs’ that rotate 30 degrees (shown) so that the passengers can talk to each other easily. A driver can also take manual control of the car, or just let it drive them autonomously
The luxury sedan, which seats four, measures 17ft (5.2 metres) in length and 5ft (1.5 metres) high. It is made of carbon-fibre, aluminium and high-strength steel. It’s designed to be able to use an electric motor and a hydrogen fuel cell, and can travel 685 miles (1,100 km) on a charge

The luxury sedan, which seats four, measures 17ft (5.2 metres) in length and 5ft (1.5 metres) high. It is made of carbon-fibre, aluminium and high-strength steel. It’s designed to be able to use an electric motor and a hydrogen fuel cell, and can travel 685 miles (1,100 km) on a charge
While the car is self-driving, it can project LED lights on to the road (seen at the front) to let pedestrians know when to cross

While the car is self-driving, it can project LED lights on to the road (seen at the front) to let pedestrians know when to cross
Futuristic: A single pane of glass covers the top of the car, extending from its long windshield to its sunroof

Futuristic: A single pane of glass covers the top of the car, extending from its long windshield to its sunroof
Safety first: While the car is self-driving, it can project lights on to the road using its LED headlights to let pedestrians know when to cross

Safety first: While the car is self-driving, it can project lights on to the road using its LED headlights to let pedestrians know when to cross
There are six high-resolution touch-screens on the doors, which passengers can use to control the car's features or even see outside

There are six high-resolution touch-screens on the doors, which passengers can use to control the car’s features or even see outside

The F015 has large 26-inch wheels which are placed right in the corner of the vehicle, to maximise the amount of space inside.

Inside there are four pedestal seats, which rotate 30 degrees when the doors are opened and then move back to a straight position when the car moves.

There are also six high-resolution touch-screens on the doors, which passengers can use to control the car’s features or even see outside.

They can be controlled using gestures, eye-tracking or touch.

While the car is self-driving, it can project lights on to the road using its LED headlights to let pedestrians know when to cross.

The car can also switch to manual mode if you don’t want it to do all the driving, with the driver’s seat spinning to face forwards.

Mercedes haven’t announced when the F015 will be available yet, though, or how much it will cost.

But perhaps this provides a better idea of what self-driving cars of the future might look like.

The F015 has large 26-inch wheels which are placed right in the corner of the vehicle, to maximise the amount of space inside

The F015 has large 26-inch wheels which are placed right in the corner of the vehicle, to maximise the amount of space inside
The doors open like a carriage to reveal the spacious interior. Mercedes say such a design is more representative of a living space than a car

The doors open like a carriage to reveal the spacious interior. Mercedes say such a design is more representative of a living space than a car
The car aims to provide a look at what the future of autonomous cars might look like when the roads are populated by ‘exclusive cocoons on wheels,’ said Dieter Zetsche (shown), chairman of Daimler AG and head of Mercedes-Benz cars

The car aims to provide a look at what the future of autonomous cars might look like when the roads are populated by ‘exclusive cocoons on wheels,’ said Dieter Zetsche (shown), chairman of Daimler AG and head of Mercedes-Benz cars
Car of the future? Mercedes have yet to announce when the F015 will be available yet

Car of the future? Mercedes have yet to announce when the F015 will be available yet
The car can also switch to manual mode if you don’t want it to do all the driving, with the driver’s seat spinning to face forwards

The car can also switch to manual mode if you don’t want it to do all the driving, with the driver’s seat spinning to face forwards
Inside there are four pedestal seats, which rotate 30 degrees when the doors are opened and then move back to a straight position when the car moves

Inside there are four pedestal seats, which rotate 30 degrees when the doors are opened and then move back to a straight position when the car moves
Relaxing: Mercedes said they wanted to focus on some of the other aspects aside from just the technology that drives it

Relaxing: Mercedes said they wanted to focus on some of the other aspects aside from just the technology that drives it
Dieter Zetsche, chairman of Daimler AG and head of Mercedes-Benz cars, believes 'anyone who focuses solely on the technology has not yet grasped how autonomous driving will change our society'

Dieter Zetsche, chairman of Daimler AG and head of Mercedes-Benz cars, believes ‘anyone who focuses solely on the technology has not yet grasped how autonomous driving will change our society’
Mr Zetsche said: 'The car is growing beyond its role as a mere means of transport and will ultimately become a mobile living space'

Mr Zetsche said: ‘The car is growing beyond its role as a mere means of transport and will ultimately become a mobile living space’