At first, nothing happened. But after 10 days, hell broke loose in his hospital room. He began shaking with chills. His temperature shot up. His blood pressure shot down. He became so ill that doctors moved him into intensive care and warned that he might die. His family gathered at the hospital, fearing the worst.
A few weeks later, the fevers were gone. And so was the leukemia. - (NYT Link)
posted by Slap*Happy
on Sep 14, 2011 -
63 comments
"Someone messed it up bad. The world went to pieces. It was dog eat dog and everyone for himself. Along came an unlikely hero. You....The future can be saved. The knowledge is inside the Four Rooms of Kharon." From the info page: "Kharon 4a is an online adventure game dealing with biotech issues. The makers of the game have worked closely with the Norwegian Biotechnology Advisory Board during the creative process - to ensure the scientific validity of the game content. So, having played Kharon 4a, you will be left with not only an interesting and entertaining online experience, but you will also be familiar with the most imporant aspects of bio technology." They also warn that it's "the hardest Flash game ever made" and that you'll probably give up after five minutes.
posted by Gator
on Jan 26, 2006 -
12 comments
In a surprise move,
Anheuser-Busch has gone up against some of the biotech firms that would like to grow genetically-modified (GM) rice containing
human DNA. The biotech firm that grows it says that their rice contains synthetic human genes which the company hopes to harvest and refine for use in medicines to fight diarrhea and dehydration.
Anheuser-Busch's concerns are not with the science of biotech, but rather the risk of crop-contamination, as has happened with farmers not only in the
U.S. and
Canada, but
all over the world. The USDA has issued rice-tweakers
Ventria Bioscience and 300 other biopharmers permission to plant various augmented plants around the country since 1995, but Anheuser-Busch is the first large corporation to threaten a boycott - unusual, because
poultry and beef stock (PDF) are
fed this kind of thing every day, and have been
for the past 20 years. I guess the Budweiser brewers just don't want to see '
dead people' in their suds...
On the flip-side of this occurrence, the response of the
anti-stem cell activists has been nothing short of sensory-deprivation. Shouldn't six-packs, cornfields and
Porky be given the same human rights as the unborn?
Also related:
Contaminated: The New Science of Food (quicktime movie)
posted by vhsiv
on Apr 14, 2005 -
31 comments
Biojewelry : Now you and your betrothed can exhange ring made of bone.
Your own bone. I, for one, welcome the day when consumer biotech makes our lives.....weirder. (Some pics not safe for the squeamish.)
posted by gnutron
on Feb 25, 2005 -
15 comments
The failure of biotech. "In June 1996, the University of California, Davis, began an unprecedented effort to help the West African nation of Mali, using the promising and controversial new tool of agricultural biotechnology... Eight years later, no help whatsoever has arrived... In the hopes that inspired the effort - and the missteps that stifled it - lies a drama larger than the sum of its parts, one that shows both the promise and pitfalls of the largest technological leap in American agriculture since the tractor: biotechnology." The start of a five-part series in the
Sacramento Bee: long, but well worth it. (Via
MonkeyFilter.)
posted by languagehat
on Jun 6, 2004 -
17 comments
Required Reading from the President's Council on Bioethics.
Each of the readings that follow - which include poetry, short stories and more - is accompanied by a brief introduction and questions about the bioethical implications of the work. The new booklist includes James Watson, Tolstoy, Shakespeare and Ovid. Via the WSJ.
posted by turbodog
on Apr 18, 2003 -
2 comments
They're farther along than I thought... You may have heard about Nexia Biotechnology, who have put spider genes into goats to get milk with spider silk protein in it. I thought it was still in the research phase, but Nexia have apparently
gone to market with the stuff. They've signed agreements with several manufacturers to produce spider silk protein-based products such as lightweight ballistic armor (like Kevlar, only lighter and non-toxic to produce) for the armed forces and super-strong sutures and prosthetic ligaments for medical supply companies.
posted by RylandDotNet
on Jul 21, 2002 -
7 comments
A major advance in genetically modified foods. Developed with government funding, and intended eventually to be given away to farmers, there has been a major success in the use of salt water to irrigate crops. They've developed a tomato which grows fine in salt water or on salty soil. Thousands of lives will be saved in parts of the world where fresh water for irrigation is scarce, including up to one third of the arable land in India where salt has been accumulating. Interestingly, these tomatoes are so good at what they do that they remove salt from the soil, improving it. The genetic modification which was done to these tomatoes should be possible with many other crops, including especially rice (on which major effort in Egypt is underway now).
posted by Steven Den Beste
on Jul 30, 2001 -
39 comments
If computer engineering defined the last half of the twentieth century, then
biotech will surely define the first half of the twenty-first century.
posted by Steven Den Beste
on Jan 5, 2001 -
5 comments
True or not?! One of the weirdest things I've ever seen on the web. I was
sure this was a hoax and kept digging for confirmation and never found it.
posted by norm
on Nov 3, 2000 -
11 comments
