New Drug For MS

Multiple sclerosis, or MS, is an autoimmune disease where the body’s immune system attacks the myelin sheets around the neuronal axons, which causes disturbance in the conduction of action potentials. MS is usually treated with interferon beta-1a, but now a new drug, Alemtuzumab, has been shown to be far more effective. Alemtuzumab was originally used to treat chronic lymphocytic leukaemia, and it it works by destroying all of the body’s lymphocytes. In MS, it is these lymphocytes that attack the myelin sheets, so scientists theorized that it could possibly be effective in MS also. Well,  Alasdair Coles et al. did a study, and Alemtuzumab completely outperformed interferon beta-1a, reducing the number of relapses by 78% and reduced the risk of developing disability by 71%, compared to the conventional treatment. The theory is that by killing all the existing lymphocytes, you sort of “reboot” the immune system, and the new cells produced does not have the antibodies that causes the old ones to be so destructive towards myelin. Alemtuzumab is actually the first drug ever that has been shown to halt and even reverse the pathological processes of MS. Granted, there were some side effects, but nothing that could not be managed with other drugs. So, extremely promising…

Molecular model of Alemtuzumab

X-Rays From Tape

The phenomenon has been known since the 50s, that unrolling tape in a vacuum produces x-rays. However, researchers, lead by Carlos Camara, recently found that a lot more x-rays than previously thought are produced, enough to even do x-ray imaging. The basic principle behind this phenomenon is this: As you unpeel a tape, some electrons are left behind on the surface. This makes the piece of tape positively charged, while the surface becomes negatively charged. The positive tape will then attract the left-behind electrons due to the electrostatic forces of opposite charges. As the electrons get closer to the tape they accelerate, and when they hit the tape they will bounce off other electrons and nuclei. This again causes electrons to loose some of their energy in the form of emitted photons, and an estimated one in 10 000 electrons will produce a energetic “X-ray” photon. Camara and his team managed to produce a huge amount of x-ray radiation from this process, enough to even take an x-ray photo of Camaras finger. One application of this is to make cheap and easy x-ray machines, which would be really beneficial. A gallery of pictures of the process can be found here.

Photo: Carlos G. Camara, Juan V. Escobar, Jonathan R. Hird and Seth J. Putterman

 Red is the roll of tape, blue is the piece being removed. The bursts of red are the sticky strands coming off.

My Top 5 Health Cranks

This post will be pretty much dedicated to five people I utterly despise. They take advantage of people by conning them into buying their special kind of bs for whatever ails them, thus preventing them from seeking out a doctor to get some real help. They have no regard for other peoples lives, as long as they make som money. And here is the list: