Tag: health

Fukushima butterflies mutations

Fukushima butterflies mutations

Genetic mutations have been found in three generations of butterflies living near Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant. The gruesome discovery has led scientists to fear that the leaking radiation could affect other species.

The study was published by Scientific Reports. Researches said that around 12 per cent of pale grass blue butterflies that had been exposed as larvae to nuclear fallout developed abnormalities, including broken or wrinkled wings, changes in wing size, color pattern changes, and wider-than-normal variations in numbers of spots on the butterflies.

Though the insects were mated in a lab well outside the fallout zone, about 18 per cent of their offspring displayed similar problems, said Joji Otaki, an associate professor at Ryukyu University in Okinawa, in southwestern Japan.

That figure rose to 34 per cent in the third generation of butterflies – even though one parent from each coupling was from a group unaffected by radiation.

Researchers also collected another 240 butterflies in Fukushima last September, six months after the disaster. Abnormalities were recorded in 52 per cent of that group’s offspring – “a dominantly high ratio,” Otaki told AFP.

Cypriots still heaviest smokers in EU

Cypriots still heaviest smokers in EU

CYPRIOTS are the heaviest smokers in the EU puffing 20.5 cigarettes daily, according to a survey conducted as part of the European Commission’s campaign ‘Ex-smokers are unstoppable.’

According to the survey – conducted by iCoach, a digital health platform aimed at helping smokers kick the habit – only one in ten Cypriot smokers have given up smoking, since 2011, and those who still smoked,  consumed the highest number of cigarettes in the EU at 20.5 cigarettes daily.

However, most smokers in Europe – 46 per cent – consume 11-20 cigarettes daily, with the EU average amounting to 14.2 cigarettes daily.

Cyprus was also ranked eighth among European countries, with 30 per cent of its population currently smoking. Ranking first was Greece at 40 per cent and last was Sweden at 13 per cent.

Mobilegs Crutches

I hope I’ll never need to use any crutches, but if I ever do, I’ll probably settle for a pair of these.  I’ve shown them around to a few people, and each one of them who tried walking with the regular crutches, agreed that Mobilegs Crutches are superior in design.  I found them while reading “design is everybody’s business“.

2.  Purposeful – We design to solve a problem.

When one of Herman Miller’s designers, Jeff Weber, broke his foot, he realized how awfully-designed crutches were.  Not just uncomfortable, they can damage nerves, arteries, and tissue, and it’s easy to slip and cause more pain or more injury.  So he went about designing a better crutch (Mobilegs).  This is a perfect example of the purposefulness that informs the company’s designs.

This is What Snake Venom Does to Blood!

I’ve seen numerous TV programs and documentaries about snakes.  But none of them has been this crystal clear.  Here is a full understanding of how screwed you are if the snakes bites you, in just over a minute.  Just imagine your blood turning into this jelly while inside your veins! How much heart work would be needed to push it through, and how useful that would be to your muscles, internal organs, and the rest?

Via The Laomedon!