Srinivas Padma: Personal Musings on Life, Growth, and Connections

Will Dunham Washington: TREATING SKIN wounds with a gel made from a patient's own blood platelets can speed healing, said researchers in a study showing how doctors may be able to harness the body's innate healing ability. Skin wounds treated with this gel healed about 10 per cent more quickly than wounds in the same people treated with only an antibiotic ointment, a recent study in the Archives of Facial Plastic Surgery showed. The researchers cautioned that this was a small pilot study - only eight people were examined - but said the concept could change the way doctors deal with wounds, from surgical incisions to, potentially, internal injuries. "I'm excited about it because it changes our way of thinking about wounds. Instead of passively just watching it heal, we can now actively intervene to possibly speed it up," said study leader Dr David Hom of the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine in Ohio. Hom said in a telephonic interview that improving woun...

Let’s learn about Thomas Alva Edison who patented 1093 inventions in his lifetime Undoubtedly one of the greatest inventors of all time, many of Thomas Alva Edison’s inventions changed man’s lifestyle. The electric bulb, sound recording and a crude form of movies were just a few of them. Born in 1847, in Ohio, USA , Edison had little formal schooling. Yet, he was fascinated by science. He spent his young adulthood working extremely hard, and would often spend days experimenting, just to make something work. In 1869, Edison moved to New York City, where he improved upon a machine called the ‘ticker’ that was used to relay information about the stock market. With the money he earned from this, Edison built what he called an ‘ invention factory ’ at Menlo Park, near New York. This was, in fact, the world’s first research laboratory. His next major contribution was in 1877, when he invented the phonograph , a device used to record and playback sounds. What is interesting is that although ...

Electrical or electromagnetic devices have come into vogue among migraine researchers Amanda Schaffer In ancient Rome, patients with unbearable head pain were sometimes treated with jolts from the electricity-producing black torpedo fish, or electric ray. Electric fish have long disappeared from the medical armamentarium. But recently, electrical or electromagnetic devices that hark back to the head-zapping torpedo fish have come into vogue among the country’s prominent migraine researchers. Two different kinds of stimulatory devices are now in large-scale clinical trials for possible use in patients with the most severe migraine cases. The the two kinds of stimulatory approaches are occipital nerve stimulation, or ONS, and transcranial magnetic stimulation, or TMS. In occipital nerve stimulation, a pacemakerlike device is connected to electrodes placed at the back of the head just under the skin. Electrical current is delivered through these electrodes, with the goal of inhibiting or ...