One tried and true anti-spin method utilized with CanSats (predecessors to CubeSats, see http://www.arliss.org/ is to attach a refrigerator magnet to one end of the satellite. The 'sat will flip 180 degrees as it passes over north and south poles, but remains otherwise in stable orientation. Sometimes simple is good:-)
-- A man is rich in direct proportion
to the number of things he can afford
to leave alone.
— Thoreau
All milk contains the protein alpha-lactalbumin, but only human breast milk contains the multimeric form (just means the protein has more than one peptide chain).
A decade of studies by Dr. Catharina Svanborg at Lund University in Sweden have demonstrated that human breast milk has efficacy against many forms of cancer, and that the agent responsible is multimeric alpha-lactalbumin. This unique protein selectively destroys malignant cells in two ways: by apoptosis on contact, and when morphologically transformed on contact with oleic acid in the stomach, it can migrate into the bloodstream, target cancer cells, slip in through the cell cytoplasm and destroy the malignant cell's RNA.
Problem: mother's milk tastes awful to adults, and breast milk banks are needed for infants.
If cloned cattle can produce milk containing multimeric alpha-lac, this would be of great interest to cancer patients.
I once worked for the Dayton Journal-Herald. The editor of the Horoscope Column was married to a woman whose belief in astrology was absolute. He often rewrote her horoscope prior to publication...
Flying from the Bahamas to the U.S. requires running the worst security gauntlet I've yet encountered. OTOH, passengers flying from Nassau to Canada have a separate international departures area where the screening is quite simple. I've lost my Elite status with Delta because I now fly out of Canada to nearly every destination.
Mod parent up. The meat industry once claimed that antibiotic resistance could not be transferred between species (see "Modern Meat, Orville Schell, 1985), an assumption we now know to be untrue. In the 1950s antibiotics were called "Wonder Drugs" because they could cure otherwise untreatable conditions, such as an infected wound. Sadly, we have squandered much of this medical arsenal for the short-sighted benefit of cheap meat.
The CNN story is a "user-submitted iReport," quite different from a news article. The iReport in turn, was plagiarized from an evangelical gloom-and-doom website, http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/index1374.htm
The toxic rain reported as resulting from oil dispersants was most likely caused by a FedEx fuel dump from 5,000 feet.
A friend with breast cancer recently flew from Canada to the Bahamas with a stopover in California where she was scheduled for a PET scan. The scan revealed a pleural effusion, fluid between the lung sac and chest wall. Her oncologist stated she should not fly again until the fluid was drained. The procedure, a thoracentesis or pleural tap is simple, ordinarily performed in the physician's examining room. My friend has excellent private health insurance and the insurer immediately assigned a case number to the incident. So far so good.
No physician would see us. The universal response was "we don't take walk-ins."
We decided to try face-to-face communication, and visited a large pulmonary practice. "We don't accept walk-ins" the receptionist explained. I replied, "I completely understand. I was a First Responder for 18 years, and every time I left a warm bed at 2 a.m. to help a stranger I knew I was putting my personal assets on the line. I always delivered the department lecture on liability. So I totally get it. Do you mind if we rest a few minutes before returning to the car?"
A few minutes later we were told that Dr. H. would see us. Said he has performed pleural taps countless times in his office. He would charge $100, or for a Canadian visitor would even do it for free, but no longer keeps the necessary tray on hand. Everything is now done in the hospital, where the procedure with tests and overnight stay will cost $30,000 - $40,000.
I telephoned the imaging center where the PET scan had been performed the previous day to ask if their invasive radiologist would perform a thoracentesis; my friend was an established patient there, not a "walk-in." He demurred but stated the condition was life-threatening and advised an immediate trip to ER.
Her PET was loaded on my laptop and we breezed through triage in two minutes flat. However, the thoracentesis was delayed by a mass casualty incident and she was given a room for the night. Hospital wanted to perform a PET scan even though we had the CD and written report from the previous day; finally common sense prevailed.
The following day she was brought to an examining room where a very young physician, still in his bicycle clothes and helmet, entered and introduced himself, drained 1.5 liters of fluid, applied a bandaid, and bade us farewell. A fifteen minute procedure.
Cost in any ER in Canada: $75. Cost in California: we're guessing $20,000. The hospital can sort it out with the insurers and we'll pick up the co-pay.
The experience has forever changed my view on the reasons for runaway health care costs in the U.S.A.
In 2008 I learned I had failed treatment for prostate cancer (72GY radiation & 2.5 years triple hormonal blockade). The disease was metastatic in skeleton and soft tissue with a PSA doubling time of 24 days which is very dangerous. Severe bleeding and bone pain quickly developed. Chemotherapy does not extend survival time for prostate cancer patients, moreover it has serious side effects. There was no clinical trial of DCA for prostate cancer. I decided to self-administer Sodium Dichloroacetate (DCA).
DCA is an orphan drug which for 30+ years has been safely used in the U.S.A. to treat infants born with congenial lactic acidosis; also to treat cerebral ischemia among other conditions, so it is well described in the literature and the side effects are understood. It is not completely benign but is far safer in my opinion than radiation, hormonal blockade or chemotherapy. I had already done my homework and knew to watch for hypoglycemia. I limited my dose to 15mg/kg and took benfotiamine to minimize peripheral neuropathy, R+Lipoic Acid for hepatic support, and arranged regular lab work to monitor liver function.
30 days after initiating DCA the pain in my hips and lower spine ceased. One day unremitting pain, the next day none. 60 days after starting DCA the profuse bleeding from bladder and colon ceased completely. My PSA doubling time dropped from 24 days to 72 months and stabilized.
I developed a little numbness in my toes, which was expected. That is reversible over time. As with many cancer drugs, the evil little cells eventually developed resistance to DCA and I resumed androgen blockade for a time before switching to another self-administered novel treatment. Because of DCA I enjoyed ten wonderful, pain-free months during which I traveled, worked outdoors, got a tan, recovered my strength and my spirits. I have no regrets, not one.
This pattern of temporary remission seems to be a typical experience for early adopters of DCA, although there have been a few reports of complete cures (prostate cancer, sarcoma). About 1,700 patients around the world are currently utilizing DCA as a cancer treatment, off-label. The most organized DCA treatment program is offered by the Medicor Clinic in Canada: http://www.medicorcancer.com/dca-reports.html
Reading about DCA on the web one encounters venomous hostility to self-administered novel treatments for cancer, and to the use of DCA in particular; sadly, one such source has been quoted today on/. A more appropriate reference might be this op-ed in the New York Times, "Patents Over Patients" http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/01/opinion/01moss.html
Whether it is more ethical to allow patients (and their doctors) to utilize an orphan drug off-label, or to tell them they can't utilize a molecule that may extend or even save their lives is a question for another discussion.
Signal strength is marginal where I live but EVDO is the only game in town. I use a 3G Sprint Aircard 597E with a 3 watt amplifier and external antenna on the roof, provided by evdoinfo.com. I get about 1.1mbps down and upload is fast enough that I don't think about it. Ping time to yahoo.com this evening is 79ms.
I've also installed broadband wireless routers with EVDO card, amplifier and antenna pre-configured by evdoinfo,com for friends in the area. Never a complaint from Sprint or Verizon, and my friends are delighted.
I've noticed that the routers establish a rock solid connection, whereas my Aircard 597E requires "Sierra Wireless Watcher LIte" software to "activate" the card. The Sierrra software crashes about 20 times a day and I am among the many who absolutely detest the software. Somewhere there is a Sierra QC engineer who did not put this on his resume.
I've had the contract for a couple of years; for $60/month I download >1 GB/day with no surcharge or complaint from Sprint. YMMV.
I see many benefits, from personal experience. The Mayo Clinic is all digital. As a patient moves from physician to physician during the day, successive doctors can view records updated in real time and videoconference with one another on the spur of the moment if a Dx needs clarification. Patients from out of town can zip through the system in a day. It's a snap to divert a patient to a specialist for a quick consult. Nothing falls through the cracks. Everyone can read the reports for a change. Net is better faster cheaper care and more personalized attention. At least this has been our family's experience with our 88 year young mom.
"If a company develops a cure for AIDS, cancer, or the common cold, then it stands to reason that the company is going to make a lot of money"
Not necessarily. Orphan drugs are not patentable and therefore pharmaceutical companies have no incentive to pick up the huge costs of clinical trials for promising but dirt cheap molecules like dichloroacetate, 3-bromopyruvate, melatonin, to name but three.
What five idiots moderated this post "insightful?"
I'm still around to write this because my oncologist kept such a clear focus on my disease stage and response to treatment. His knowledge, experience, intuition, and talent in asking the right questions achieved a miraculous outcome. Like a true/.er, I burned a lot of bandwidth researching the etiology of my phenotype; my long-suffering oncologist patiently fielded my unanswered questions, even though they were often beyond the scope of his practice. It was impressive watching him access data not avilable to me on a broadband connection, correctly interpreting my concern, and resolving the question in straightforward terms.
TFA simply describes one more tool among the vast array physicians keep in mind and utilize as needed. I've read thousands of abstracts and hundreds of journal articles and have a good grasp of the subject matter. I would trade all of that learning for a ten minute conversation with my oncologist.
ShawnX wrote, >Let's use our collective community to help rm -rf cancer!
Second that.
We can start by donating online to the University of Alberta Cancer Research Fund. Contributions support the continued work of Dr. Michelakis, author of the article in the journal Cancer Cell which kicked off all the fuss. Want to move the process forward? Vote with your credit card.
Slashdot Mirror
One tried and true anti-spin method utilized with CanSats (predecessors to CubeSats, see http://www.arliss.org/ is to attach a refrigerator magnet to one end of the satellite. The 'sat will flip 180 degrees as it passes over north and south poles, but remains otherwise in stable orientation. Sometimes simple is good :-)
--
A man is rich in direct proportion
to the number of things he can afford
to leave alone.
— Thoreau
All milk contains the protein alpha-lactalbumin, but only human breast milk contains the multimeric form (just means the protein has more than one peptide chain).
A decade of studies by Dr. Catharina Svanborg at Lund University in Sweden have demonstrated that human breast milk has efficacy against many forms of cancer, and that the agent responsible is multimeric alpha-lactalbumin. This unique protein selectively destroys malignant cells in two ways: by apoptosis on contact, and when morphologically transformed on contact with oleic acid in the stomach, it can migrate into the bloodstream, target cancer cells, slip in through the cell cytoplasm and destroy the malignant cell's RNA.
Problem: mother's milk tastes awful to adults, and breast milk banks are needed for infants.
If cloned cattle can produce milk containing multimeric alpha-lac, this would be of great interest to cancer patients.
I once worked for the Dayton Journal-Herald. The editor of the Horoscope Column was married to a woman whose belief in astrology was absolute. He often rewrote her horoscope prior to publication ...
Flying from the Bahamas to the U.S. requires running the worst security gauntlet I've yet encountered. OTOH, passengers flying from Nassau to Canada have a separate international departures area where the screening is quite simple. I've lost my Elite status with Delta because I now fly out of Canada to nearly every destination.
Mod parent up. The meat industry once claimed that antibiotic resistance could not be transferred between species (see "Modern Meat, Orville Schell, 1985), an assumption we now know to be untrue. In the 1950s antibiotics were called "Wonder Drugs" because they could cure otherwise untreatable conditions, such as an infected wound. Sadly, we have squandered much of this medical arsenal for the short-sighted benefit of cheap meat.
Reports appear bogus to me.
The CNN story is a "user-submitted iReport," quite different from a news article. The iReport in turn, was plagiarized from an evangelical gloom-and-doom website, http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/index1374.htm
The toxic rain reported as resulting from oil dispersants was most likely caused by a FedEx fuel dump from 5,000 feet.
http://www.tennessean.com/article/20100701/BUSINESS/100701010/FedEx-acknowledges-crew-dumped-fuel-over-Shelby-County-
Okay, I'll bite.
A friend with breast cancer recently flew from Canada to the Bahamas with a stopover in California where she was scheduled for a PET scan. The scan revealed a pleural effusion, fluid between the lung sac and chest wall. Her oncologist stated she should not fly again until the fluid was drained. The procedure, a thoracentesis or pleural tap is simple, ordinarily performed in the physician's examining room. My friend has excellent private health insurance and the insurer immediately assigned a case number to the incident. So far so good.
No physician would see us. The universal response was "we don't take walk-ins."
We decided to try face-to-face communication, and visited a large pulmonary practice. "We don't accept walk-ins" the receptionist explained. I replied, "I completely understand. I was a First Responder for 18 years, and every time I left a warm bed at 2 a.m. to help a stranger I knew I was putting my personal assets on the line. I always delivered the department lecture on liability. So I totally get it. Do you mind if we rest a few minutes before returning to the car?"
A few minutes later we were told that Dr. H. would see us. Said he has performed pleural taps countless times in his office. He would charge $100, or for a Canadian visitor would even do it for free, but no longer keeps the necessary tray on hand. Everything is now done in the hospital, where the procedure with tests and overnight stay will cost $30,000 - $40,000.
I telephoned the imaging center where the PET scan had been performed the previous day to ask if their invasive radiologist would perform a thoracentesis; my friend was an established patient there, not a "walk-in." He demurred but stated the condition was life-threatening and advised an immediate trip to ER.
Her PET was loaded on my laptop and we breezed through triage in two minutes flat. However, the thoracentesis was delayed by a mass casualty incident and she was given a room for the night. Hospital wanted to perform a PET scan even though we had the CD and written report from the previous day; finally common sense prevailed.
The following day she was brought to an examining room where a very young physician, still in his bicycle clothes and helmet, entered and introduced himself, drained 1.5 liters of fluid, applied a bandaid, and bade us farewell. A fifteen minute procedure.
Cost in any ER in Canada: $75. Cost in California: we're guessing $20,000. The hospital can sort it out with the insurers and we'll pick up the co-pay.
The experience has forever changed my view on the reasons for runaway health care costs in the U.S.A.
In 2008 I learned I had failed treatment for prostate cancer (72GY radiation & 2.5 years triple hormonal blockade). The disease was metastatic in skeleton and soft tissue with a PSA doubling time of 24 days which is very dangerous. Severe bleeding and bone pain quickly developed. Chemotherapy does not extend survival time for prostate cancer patients, moreover it has serious side effects. There was no clinical trial of DCA for prostate cancer. I decided to self-administer Sodium Dichloroacetate (DCA).
DCA is an orphan drug which for 30+ years has been safely used in the U.S.A. to treat infants born with congenial lactic acidosis; also to treat cerebral ischemia among other conditions, so it is well described in the literature and the side effects are understood. It is not completely benign but is far safer in my opinion than radiation, hormonal blockade or chemotherapy. I had already done my homework and knew to watch for hypoglycemia. I limited my dose to 15mg/kg and took benfotiamine to minimize peripheral neuropathy, R+Lipoic Acid for hepatic support, and arranged regular lab work to monitor liver function.
30 days after initiating DCA the pain in my hips and lower spine ceased. One day unremitting pain, the next day none. 60 days after starting DCA the profuse bleeding from bladder and colon ceased completely. My PSA doubling time dropped from 24 days to 72 months and stabilized.
I developed a little numbness in my toes, which was expected. That is reversible over time. As with many cancer drugs, the evil little cells eventually developed resistance to DCA and I resumed androgen blockade for a time before switching to another self-administered novel treatment. Because of DCA I enjoyed ten wonderful, pain-free months during which I traveled, worked outdoors, got a tan, recovered my strength and my spirits. I have no regrets, not one.
This pattern of temporary remission seems to be a typical experience for early adopters of DCA, although there have been a few reports of complete cures (prostate cancer, sarcoma). About 1,700 patients around the world are currently utilizing DCA as a cancer treatment, off-label. The most organized DCA treatment program is offered by the Medicor Clinic in Canada: http://www.medicorcancer.com/dca-reports.html
Reading about DCA on the web one encounters venomous hostility to self-administered novel treatments for cancer, and to the use of DCA in particular; sadly, one such source has been quoted today on /. A more appropriate reference might be this op-ed in the New York Times, "Patents Over Patients" http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/01/opinion/01moss.html
Whether it is more ethical to allow patients (and their doctors) to utilize an orphan drug off-label, or to tell them they can't utilize a molecule that may extend or even save their lives is a question for another discussion.
It's not BS. Last I checked you could put 1 KG into LEO for $25K. http://www.cubesatkit.com/
Cubesats typically hitch a ride with larger projects for cost efficiency.
http://cubesat.ece.uiuc.edu/
http://mtech.dk/thomsen/space/cubesat.php
http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/satellites/cubesats.php
My voicemail is transcribed to text and arrives as email. Huge timesaver.
I use www.phonetag.com ($10/month) but there are probably still free options as well.
Signal strength is marginal where I live but EVDO is the only game in town. I use a 3G Sprint Aircard 597E with a 3 watt amplifier and external antenna on the roof, provided by evdoinfo.com. I get about 1.1mbps down and upload is fast enough that I don't think about it. Ping time to yahoo.com this evening is 79ms.
I've also installed broadband wireless routers with EVDO card, amplifier and antenna pre-configured by evdoinfo,com for friends in the area. Never a complaint from Sprint or Verizon, and my friends are delighted.
I've noticed that the routers establish a rock solid connection, whereas my Aircard 597E requires "Sierra Wireless Watcher LIte" software to "activate" the card. The Sierrra software crashes about 20 times a day and I am among the many who absolutely detest the software. Somewhere there is a Sierra QC engineer who did not put this on his resume.
I've had the contract for a couple of years; for $60/month I download >1 GB/day with no surcharge or complaint from Sprint. YMMV.
H motor or larger. The vehicle described in parent is a scale model, not a model rocket.
The Office of Thrift Supervision was supervising AIG. Sure you want to trust their model? http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/26793903/the_big_takeover/print
Legal but very costly for Sprint EVDO users. The surcharge for VoIP on Sprint's EVDO network is something like $1 US per minute.
I sold my TV 25 years ago. Seriously. Problem solved.
I see many benefits, from personal experience. The Mayo Clinic is all digital. As a patient moves from physician to physician during the day, successive doctors can view records updated in real time and videoconference with one another on the spur of the moment if a Dx needs clarification. Patients from out of town can zip through the system in a day. It's a snap to divert a patient to a specialist for a quick consult. Nothing falls through the cracks. Everyone can read the reports for a change. Net is better faster cheaper care and more personalized attention. At least this has been our family's experience with our 88 year young mom.
I was young once, but I got over it. (Mark Twain)
"If a company develops a cure for AIDS, cancer, or the common cold, then it stands to reason that the company is going to make a lot of money"
Not necessarily. Orphan drugs are not patentable and therefore pharmaceutical companies have no incentive to pick up the huge costs of clinical trials for promising but dirt cheap molecules like dichloroacetate, 3-bromopyruvate, melatonin, to name but three.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/01/opinion/01moss.html?pagewanted=print
There is some activity in this area already: http://cubesat.calpoly.edu/ http://www.cubesatkit.com/ And for other form factors including picosats and Mars Rover type experiments, including a shakedown launch: http://www.arliss.org/
What five idiots moderated this post "insightful?"
/.er, I burned a lot of bandwidth researching the etiology of my phenotype; my long-suffering oncologist patiently fielded my unanswered questions, even though they were often beyond the scope of his practice. It was impressive watching him access data not avilable to me on a broadband connection, correctly interpreting my concern, and resolving the question in straightforward terms.
I'm still around to write this because my oncologist kept such a clear focus on my disease stage and response to treatment. His knowledge, experience, intuition, and talent in asking the right questions achieved a miraculous outcome. Like a true
TFA simply describes one more tool among the vast array physicians keep in mind and utilize as needed. I've read thousands of abstracts and hundreds of journal articles and have a good grasp of the subject matter. I would trade all of that learning for a ten minute conversation with my oncologist.
>Those with dial-up internet could face having their phone disconnected."
Um, yeah. Watch out for all those pirates who download music files over a dialup connection.
The acronym is TiTech. These kids design pico-satellites and put them into low earth orbit, among other things.
This is a good time to read (or re-read) Orville Schell's 1985 funny & sobering expose of the American meat industry, Modern Meat
ShawnX wrote,
s .cfm?typ=103&id=11&fund=191
>Let's use our collective community to help rm -rf cancer!
Second that.
We can start by donating online to the University of Alberta Cancer Research Fund. Contributions support the continued work of Dr. Michelakis, author of the article in the journal Cancer Cell which kicked off all the fuss. Want to move the process forward? Vote with your credit card.
More information, donor form here: http://www.uofaweb.ualberta.ca/campaign/prioritie
That explains why it "squirts" music. But does it vibrate?