culture

  • Erich Traub, Nazi Veterinarian Who Specialized in Foot and Mouth, Rinderpest and Newcastle Diseases

    Erich Traub, Nazi Veterinarian Who Specialized in Foot and Mouth, Rinderpest and Newcastle Diseases

    Erich Traub worked directly for Heinrich Himmler, head of the Schutzstaffel (SS), as the lab chief of the Nazis’ leading bio-weapons facility on Riems Island. Note: Riems is home to the oldest virological research institution in the world, now called the Friedrich Loeffler Institute, which was built by Friedrich Loeffler in 1910. Loeffler, a professor at the University of Greifswald, ran filtration tests in 1898 and found

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  • Nature’s First Green Fuel Is Gold: A Car That Runs on Urine?

    Nature’s First Green Fuel Is Gold: A Car That Runs on Urine?

    The concept of cars running on urine has been explored by several researchers, but it hasn’t yet resulted in a commercially viable vehicle. Here’s what happened with some of the key developments: Ohio University Research (2009): Professor Gerardine Botte developed a catalyst that could extract hydrogen from urine more efficiently than from water. This technology

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  • Light and Medical Tests

    Light and Medical Tests

    From Ask a Scientist: “Serum and plasma both come from the liquid portion of the blood that remains once the cells are removed, but that’s where the similarities end. Serum is the liquid that remains after the blood has clotted. Plasma is the liquid that remains when clotting is prevented with the addition of an anticoagulant.” The

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  • Albert Imre Szent-Györgyi – From Transylvania to Woods Hole (Vitamin C, Fumaric Acid, WWI, WWII, Vietnam War, Actin, Myosin, Muscles, Adrenal glands, Cancer, a Nobel prize, Apollonians and Dionysians, and something called the Constitution for the Federation of Earth)

    Albert Imre Szent-Györgyi – From Transylvania to Woods Hole (Vitamin C, Fumaric Acid, WWI, WWII, Vietnam War, Actin, Myosin, Muscles, Adrenal glands, Cancer, a Nobel prize, Apollonians and Dionysians, and something called the Constitution for the Federation of Earth)

    Albert Imre Szent-Györgyi[a] de Nagyrápolt (Hungarian: nagyrápolti Szent-Györgyi Albert Imre; September 16, 1893 – October 22, 1986) was a Hungarian biochemist who won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1937. He is credited with first isolating vitamin C and discovering the components and reactions of the citric acid cycle. He was also active in the Hungarian Resistance during World War II, and entered Hungarian politics after the

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  • Amygdalin and Laetrile

    Amygdalin and Laetrile

    Amygdalin (from Ancient Greek: ἀμυγδαλή amygdalē “almond”) is a naturally occurring chemical compound found in many plants, most notably in the seeds (kernels) of apricots, bitter almonds, apples, peaches, cherries and plums, and in the roots of manioc. Amygdalin is classified as a cyanogenic glycoside, because each amygdalin molecule includes a nitrile group, which can be released as the toxic cyanide anion by the action of a beta-glucosidase. Eating amygdalin will cause it to release cyanide

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  • UNITED STATES v. RUTHERFORD, 442 U.S. 544 (1979)

    UNITED STATES v. RUTHERFORD, 442 U.S. 544 (1979)

    The question presented in this case is whether the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act precludes terminally ill cancer patients from obtaining Laetrile, a drug not recognized as “safe and effective” within the meaning of § 201(p)(1) of the Act, 52 Stat. 1041, as amended, 21 U.S.C. § 321 (p)(1). Terminally ill cancer patients and their

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  • “Ye Therefore, Who Seek in Science a Means to Satisfy Your Passions, Pause in This Fatal Way: You Will Find Nothing but Madness or Death.”

    “Ye Therefore, Who Seek in Science a Means to Satisfy Your Passions, Pause in This Fatal Way: You Will Find Nothing but Madness or Death.”

    This is the meaning of the vulgar tradition that the devil ends sooner or later by strangling sorcerers. Eliphas Levi, Transcendental Magic Also… “We have said that impassioned ecstasy may produce the same results as absolute superiority, and this is true as to the issue but not as to the direction of magical operations. Passion

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  • Pistacia terebinthus aka the terebinth and the turpentine tree

    Pistacia terebinthus aka the terebinth and the turpentine tree

    Pistacia terebinthus also called the terebinth and the turpentine tree, is a deciduous tree species of the genus Pistacia, native to the Mediterranean region from the western regions of Morocco and Portugal to Greece and western and southeastern Turkey. At one time terebinths growing on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea (in Syria, Lebanon and Israel) were regarded as a separate species, Pistacia palaestina, but these are now considered to be a synonym of P. terebinthus. Description The terebinth is a deciduous flowering

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  • magical poop paper and the tree it rode in on

    magical poop paper and the tree it rode in on

    Welcome to the fascinating world of fecal forensics! Let’s dive into the delightfully disgusting details of the guaiac fecal occult blood test (gFOBT), a colorful adventure in colon cancer screening! Imagine a special paper that can detect invisible blood in your stool. That’s the gFOBT! Magic Resin It uses guaiac, a compound extracted from Guaiacum

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  • Isaac Asimov’s Thiotimoline

    Isaac Asimov’s Thiotimoline

    Thiotimoline is a fictitious chemical compound conceived by American biochemist and science fiction author Isaac Asimov. Isaac Asimov (1920 – 1992) was an American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University. During his lifetime, Asimov was considered one of the “Big Three” science fiction writers, along with Robert A. Heinlein and Arthur C. Clarke. A prolific writer, he wrote or edited more than 500 books. He also wrote an estimated 90,000

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