A Virus that Attacks Brain Cancer 131
Ponca City, We Love You writes "In the past few years, scientists have looked to viruses as potential allies in fighting cancer. Now researchers at Yale University have found a virus in the same family as rabies that effectively kills an aggressive form of human brain cancer in mice. Using time-lapse laser imaging, the team watched vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) rapidly home in on brain tumors, selectively killing cancerous cells in its path, while leaving healthy tissue intact. 'A metastasizing tumor is fairly mobile, and a surgeon's knife can't get out all of the cells,' says Anthony Van den Pol, lead researcher and professor of neurosurgery and neurobiology at Yale. 'A virus might be able to do that, because as a virus kills a tumor cell, it could also replicate, and you could end up with a therapy that's self-amplifying.' It's not yet clear why VSV is such an effective tumor killer, although Van den Pol has several theories. One possible explanation may involve a tumor's weak vascular system. Vessels that supply blood to tumors tend to be leaky, allowing a virus traveling through the bloodstream to cross an otherwise impermeable barrier into the brain, directly into a tumor."
is this an "I am Legend" promo? (Score:3, Funny)
Good news and bad news (Score:5, Funny)
Patient: And the bad news?
Doctor: We gave you rabies.
That's pretty cool, and I hope it's life saving. (Score:3, Funny)
On a tangent, it upsets me when people talk about how the government shortchanges the field of stem cells, when practically nobody is talking about zombie-centric methods of treatment. I swear, you have all these good ideas and can back them up with sound science, and it is as if no one is listening.
Oh well, maybe one day we can grow up in a world where somebody can truthfully say, "... if it wasn't for the walking dead, I wouldn't be here!"
Re:Good news and bad news (Score:5, Funny)
Re:is this an "I am Legend" promo? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:is this an "I am Legend" promo? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:beat me too it (Score:5, Funny)
You see, I, the great Doctor Alexander von Hubris, have found a means by which to re-animate dead cells! But those foolish, short-sighted politicians cut my funding! My colleagues called my research "irresponsible" and "dangerous". And the ethics review panel called my experiments "troubling" and "unnecessarily painful". The fools! They laughed, they all laughed!
But now, I can cure all diseases, because I have now found a way to bring dead tissue back to life! Yes, certain... shall we say, sacrifices... had to be made, but it was all in the name of science! And now, now I have found that which mankind has always dreamed of: a path to immortality. And nothing, I tell you, nothing can possibly go wrong! Tonight, I will test my technique on myself, and then you will see, you will all see!
Re:is this an "I am Legend" promo? (Score:2, Funny)
Because we can use the virus to kill the cancer, then bacteria to kill the virus, then worms to eat the bacteria, birds to eat the worms, cats to eat the birds, dogs to eat the cats, and gorillas to kill the dogs. Don't worry, the gorillas won't be a problem because they'll eventually freeze* to death.
*Note: does not apply to tropical climates
Re:is this an "I am Legend" promo? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:is this an "I am Legend" promo? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Human cells in mice? (Score:3, Funny)
then I say let's make it profitable! (Score:5, Funny)
In the end the hunter gets a happy picture of a bald person with a dart in their ass as a trophy and the patient gets their expensive treatment. We could handle vaccinations for poor 3rd world kids the same way. Next time Angela Jolie goes to bumbuck nowhere I say we hand her a rifle with MMR shots.
Re:is this an "I am Legend" promo? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:is this an "I am Legend" promo? (Score:3, Funny)