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13-Year-Old Finds Fungus Deadly To AIDS Patients Growing On Trees

Posted by samzenpus on from the nature-not-nurture dept.

An anonymous reader writes Researchers have pinpointed the environmental source of fungal infections that have been sickening HIV/AIDS patients in Southern California for decades. It literally grows on trees. The discovery is based on the science project of a 13-year-old girl, who spent the summer gathering soil and tree samples from areas around Los Angeles hardest hit by infections of the fungus named Cryptococcus gattii.

4 of 134 comments (clear)

  1. Wonderful title by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    I did'nt know there were AIDS patients growing on trees...

  2. Huh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    AIDS patients grow on trees now?

  3. It's a right-wing government conspiracy! by mmell · · Score: 3, Funny
    1) Create a disease which targets gays, blacks and IV drug users. Check.

    2) Disseminate a fungus which grows on trees so we can target those left-wing tree-huggers. Check.

    3) ???

    4) Profit!!!

    Damnit - I forgot the part where we nuke the whales. Oh, well - nothing's perfect.

  4. Re:The Tools of Science by Krishnoid · · Score: 5, Funny

    The girl did not do the science. She just assisted the scientists with the manual labor.

    So she's, what, a grad student?