 RE:Pick The Dow
BG,
Good call! Storm weakens, ugh
Hurricane Rita has clouded up the ole' Crystal Ball this week.
National Hurricane Center downgraded the storm to Category 4 from Category 5 during the afternoon,
some investors relaxed a little and starting searching for bargains after three down days.
"Everyone is just sitting back and watching their weather maps," Paul McManus senior vice president
and director of research, Independence Investment LLC. Traders sent theirsaid.
Moral of the story: Don't mess with Rita or Rita's in general.
Don't think about it, Don't even go there.......
Am Going with DOWN on Friday: Grand theory - traders will be too squimish about being
exposed over the weekend without knowing Rita's full fury.
What's that saying? "When it rains, it pours".
gl,
baz
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Stem Cells Help Mice Walk
Human stem cells transplanted into mice helped to repair their spinal cords.
September 20, 2005
California researchers have successfully transplanted human neural stem cells into mice with spinal
cord injuries and demonstrated improvements in the animals’ ability to walk, suggesting future
human treatments are a little bit closer, a leading scientific journal reported Tuesday.
The study, funded by the Christopher Reeve Foundation, was published in the online edition of
the journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS).
“These data suggest that hCNS-SCns [human CNS stem cells grown in a particular way] may possess
therapeutic potential for CNS injury and disease,” said the paper.The study showed that human neural
stem cells can not only survive transplantation in mice, but can also integrate into their injured
spinal chords. In particular, the data is the first to show that transplanted, human neural stem cells
can regenerate the fatty insulating sheath (called a myelin sheath), which is essential to their proper
function. “Mice that received these stem cells nine days after spinal cord injury showed improvements
in walking ability compared to mice that received either no cells or a control transplant of fibroblast
cells,” said Susan Howley, director of research for the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation.
“Sixteen weeks after transplantation, the human cells were killed by injection of a diphtheria toxin,” she added.
“As a result, the improvements in walking were abolished, which suggests that the transplanted human neural stem
cells are needed to maintain recovered function.”
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Take That Jaws!
Vladimir Vlad has patented in the US a wetsuit that takes advantage of the fact that sharks have sensitive
receptors in their snouts which detect electrical fields in the water. This helps them track prey, but if
the field is too powerful the shark backs off.
The suit has thin piezoelectric ceramic fibres woven into its fabric. The fibres extend along the body,
connecting to metal electrodes which harvest any charge generated when the piezo material is deformed by
the wearer’s movement.
During normal swimming, the suit generates several volts which flow through the water between the electrodes
to create a deterrent field. If the diver sees a shark a natural reaction, one suspects – the suit generates
much higher voltages and stronger fields.
If the shark still fails to get the message and bites the suit, it gets a shock in the mouth and gives up
its prey.
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