Viruses to the rescue —

Technology Review's list of 35 Innovators Under 35 includes Timothy Lu, an MIT researcher who is engineering viruses designed to seek out and destroy biofilms — bacterial colonies that stick together on a surface, like bits of pear suspended in the world's most disgusting jell-o salad. Biofilms have been implicated in human disease, especially chronic infections like those that can happen in the urinary tract and inner ear. But the first place Lu's biofilm-eating viruses will likely be put to work is cleaning out ducts in industrial HVAC systems. (Via Carl Zimmer) — Maggie •

This is absolutely wonderful, and absolutely not for the squeamish.

Defective Heart Girl Problems is a blog where physicist Summer Ash has blogged her experience with finding out that she has a defective heart valve and getting treatment to deal with that defect. The image above shows her scar from her recent surgery.

Ash went through surgery to repair her heart on July 18th. Here's how she explains the problem:

I recently discovered that I was born with a congenital heart defect known as bicuspid aortic valve disease (BAVD). It’s not a disease, per se, so much as a defect. Most people (roughly 99% of them) are born with a tricuspid aortic valve. I am the lucky 1% born with a bicuspid valve. (I am the 1%!)

As a bonus, being born with this genetic mutation also means the lower part of my aorta, the part that connects to the aortic valve and helps channel the flow of oxygenated blood into the arteries, has less fibrillin-1 – a protein that helps to maintain the structural integrity of the aortic wall. This means that my aorta is prone to “stretching out” and even the normal stress of blood flow coming out of the heart and being channelled to the rest of the body is enough to cause it to start ballooning outward.

The nominal course of BAVD usually entails the aortic valve calcifying and stiffening later in life (60s – 70s), ending in valve replacement surgery. Some people will also need the root of their aortas replaced at this time, some may not. My problem is that my aorta is jumping the gun; it’s already stretched out to the point where it’s considered an aortic aneurysm. I like to imagine it as a hipster, dilating before it’s cool to do so.

On July 29, she posted the full story of her surgery, including photos of her visible heart and really clear, well-written explanations that describe what her surgeon's did while they were rooting around in her chest cavity. It's graphic. And it's not for everybody. But it's also extremely powerful storytelling about both medical science, and the experience of having something go wrong with your body that you can't control. Highly recommended.

Read Summer Ash's description of her surgery

(Via Jennifer Ouellette)

Banana slugs are hermaphrodites. Every slug has both a penis (which pops out of a pore on its head, like you do) and a vagina. Or, rather, every slug should have a penis. The truth is that quite a few of them don't and the story behind that discrepancy is rather strange and horrifying. Since there's little I love more than strange and horrifying stories from nature, you get to hear all about it.

At The Last Word On Nothing, Cassandra Willyard tells the story of a nearly 100-year-old effort by scientists to understand why some banana slugs appear to be missing their penises, or have penises that are stunted. We have known since 1916 how those penises came to be missing. Willyard describes the situation, which you can also watch in action in the video above:

Banana slugs begin their mating with a few vicious love nips. Then the animals curl around each other, forming a bright yellow yin-yang symbol. Next, they insert their penises. (Remember, they both have one.) In some cases, one slug provides sperm and the other slug receives it. More often, the slugs swap sperm. Copulation can last many hours. Then, in most cases, the slugs withdraw and part ways.

Heath caught a couple of slugs in the act. He noted the biting and the insertion. And then Heath observed something puzzling. As the slugs were withdrawing their penises, “one of the animals turned its head and commenced to gnaw upon the walls of the organ,” Heath wrote. The biting was “unusually vigorous,” he added, “and within a very few minutes the penis was entirely severed.”

The confusing part is why the hell they do this to each other.

Willyard says the best idea so far is that the penis eating represents a sort of sperm competition—a way of ensuring that the slug you just mated with isn't going to get a shot at mating with anybody else. But that's really just an educated guess.

What I like best about this story (besides the shock and awe) is that it handily illustrates one of the difficulties inherent in scientific research. In many cases, it's quite easy to answer the question, "What happens?" A century ago, scientists could easily observe and document the penis-eating behavior. All it took was somebody with sufficient interest in the question that they were willing to spend time watching many, many examples of slug sex.

But the "Why" is sometimes trickier.

Read the full story at The Last Word On Nothing

Video courtesy University of California Santa Cruz graduate student Brooke Miller. See more of her work on banana slug sex.

Also included: Some fun with Latin vocabulary. Did you know that dolichophallus means "long penis"? You're welcome.

Via Ed Yong

How's this for an amusing case of photographic mis-identification? Call it "Dueling Disgustingness". Last week, New Scientist posted this lovely image of a blue-spotted sea urchin, taken by nature photographer David Fleetham.

New Scientist identified the photo as depicting said sea urchin in the process of expelling its own guts out of its mouth. Which, gross, but okay. That's reasonable. A surprising number of underwater animals eat in this manner, using the acids in their guts to dissolve prey before they actually slurp it up as a slurry.

But, at the Echinoblog, Smithsonian invertebrate zoology researcher Christopher Mah makes a compelling case against New Scientist's interpretation. That's not actually the sea urchin's mouth, says Mah. In fact, it's the opposite. That's a (rare) photo of a sea urchin taking a dump.

Mah has a lot of good photos that make his case quite well. You should check them out. Then, join me in contemplating this thought: If Mah is right, doesn't sea urchin poop look a lot like Dippin' Dots?

The New Scientist blog post—featuring lots of cool info about sea urchins

Christopher Mah's analysis of the photo, explaining why he thinks it shows a pooping sea urchin, rather than one that is eating something.

David Fleetham's website—for more (less disgusting) photos of nature

Via Scicurious

Cannibal news: MMA fighter, high on ’shrooms, ate friend’s still-beating heart —

A California judge has determined that a 27-year-old mixed martial arts fighter accused of killing his friend and sparring partner "by ripping his still-beating heart from his chest after gruesomely beating and torturing" him is mentally fit to stand trial. Prior to the attack, the two had consumed mushroom tea. There have been an awful lot of news stories like this one, this week. (thanks, @mattbors) — Xeni •

Profile pic Alex Kinyua, aka COREeye67, used for his "WARRIOR SYNDICATE RADIO (WSR-366)" podcast.

Maryland resident Alexander Kinyua reportedly confessed to police that he killed his a man who lived with his family for months by cutting him up with a knife, then eating his heart and parts of his brain.

The Baltimore Sun reports about the online life of Kinyua, an electrical engineering major at Morgan State University and long-time member of its ROTC program. He was "always in his own little world, preaching everywhere he went and talking about how he was writing a book," said one acquaintance.

Kinyua's online life included a self-published podcast, motivational videos on YouTube, lots of Facebook posts, a manic stream of internet comments directed at media figures and celebrities, and plans to self-publish an e-book.

Read the rest

Miss Cakehead sends us these "Incredible and gross chicken feet cake pops created for the Evil Cake Shop by Miss Insomnia Tulip."

The feet are made from vanilla & raspberry cake, triple dipped in white chocolate with the pop hand painted to resemble a boiled chicken foot; the chicken dipping sauce pop (top) covered with coloured piping gel; the battered chicken foot pop is covered with the dipping sauce and crushed citrus sprinkles to resemble batter. Ruddy amazing Yorkshire based baking talent and a really innovative cake pop design to boot.

Boiled Chicken Feet – Extreme Cake Pops (Thanks, Miss Cakehead)

A Reddit thread called "Did you ever think you were going to die from a shit?" sparked a lyrical/scatological series of reminisces of epic dumps, including a two part series by ErikPDX recalling a storied moment of colonic glory following a period of post-surgical bedrest during which he consumed enormous amounts of painkillers and protein shakes without bestirring himself to relieve himself, until such time as his body could stand no more. Mr PDX included a picture of the result. I beg you not to click the link in his post which leads to it.

My entire body tingled. I felt lighter. I was covered in sweat, and breathing heavily. I felt high, delirious, in shock and awe. Great waves of increasing euphoria washed over me. Feelings of amazing pleasure I simply cannot describe. I felt as if I was bathing in a golden light of goodness. This was a transcending event. I felt like I had just touched the universe itself.

Did you ever think you were going to die from a shit? (self.AskReddit)

A rather implausible report in Chinasmack (translated from the Chinese journal 163) says that a zookeeper saved a rare, born-in-captivity baby Francois Leaf Monkey from surgery by licking its anus until it passed the whole peanut it ate after a thoughtless patron tossed it to him. Reportedly, the anus-licking proceeded for over an hour.

50-year-old Zhang Bangsheng used warm water to clean a small Francois’ Leaf Monkey’s buttocks, then began using his mouth to lick it, not stopping for over an hour, until the little monkey defecated a single peanut. Only after the peanut was defecated did Zhang Bangsheng laugh with satisfaction.

As it is understood, this small Francois’ langur is only 3 months old, and is the first Francois’ Leaf Monkey to be born in nearly 10 years at this animal park. The Francois’ langur is a rare primate from Guangxi and Guizhou and is amongst the nation’s most protected animals. Because it is so precious, the zoo gave it to model worker and high-level expert Zhang Bangsheng to care for and raise.

The accompanying photo is rather ambiguous.

Zoo Caretaker Licks Monkey’s Butt To Help It Defecate (via JWZ)

At Popperfont, the great David Ng discusses the biological and/or evolutionary steps necessary to produce a theoretical real-life unicorn. I find it delightfully ironic that his first possible route involves something that, if I were to show you pictures of it*, you would probably request a unicorn chaser.

Basically, some kinds of tumors can produce little horn-like protrusions from the surface of the skin. (Sometimes these tumors are malignant, sometimes not.) If the tumor formed right in the middle of a horse's forehead ... et voila! You've got a unicorn.

This is not as unlikely as it sounds, by the way. The Mutter Museum has a wax model of the head of a French woman, Madame Dimanche, who had one of these tumor horns removed from the middle of her forehead when she was 82 years old. This happened sometime around the beginning of the 19th century. At the time of removal, the horn was 9.8 inches long.

And, yes, this would be roughly the same way that you get a jackalope.

Read David Ng's full discussion of several possible ways to produce a real-life unicorn

*Needless to say, all links shall be followed at the viewer's own risk. I am not responsible for lost appetites.

Image: Unicorn, a Creative Commons Attribution (2.0) image from robboudon's photostream