FDA Warns Of E-Cigarette Risk

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The FDA Warns of Health Risks Posed by E-Cigarettes. Also known as “e-cigarettes,” electronic cigarettes are battery-operated devices designed to look like and to be used in the same manner as conventional cigarettes. Sold online and in many shopping malls, the devices generally contain cartridges filled with nicotine, flavor, and other chemicals. [...]

Behold! Phineas Gage revealed!

The Los Angeles Times reports that a daguerreotype depicting Phineas Gage has been discovered. In the next issue of the Journal of the History of the Neurosciences, an article establishing the identity of the man holding an iron rod (see photo to right) is that of Mr. Gage. This is the only known photograph of [...]

Couldn’t help but laugh at this ,metagenome project

I would have thought this to be an April’s Fool prank, except I came across the dataset while browsing the NCBI Short Read Archive. It did have me laughing out loud.
Metagenomic Analysis with Galaxy: Windshield Genomics and BeyondAnd in case one thought the title was jargon or a brand name
…we asked the followingquestions: “When [...]

FDA Issues Final Regulation on Dental Amalgam

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I’m pleased to say that after having a mouthful of these things, I’m now down to just one amalgam. OK, so the rest of my teeth are crowns, oh well. This FDA News Release, FDA Issues Final Regulation on Dental Amalgam, reports:

The regulation classifies dental amalgam into Class II (moderate risk). By [...]

You call this a photo-op, Mr. President?

Hello? Who is doing PR for President Obama? Why would you put this picture — the President trying out a surgical robot — on the White House web site?
Look at this post on medGadget for commentary.
So, Mr. Obama provides free nationwide marketing for this device, a machine that is totally counter to what [...]

Just say no to perspective pie charts!

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Several papers in a row tripped over one of my pet peeves. Why does anyone who cares about their data use a perspective pie chart?
Pie charts in general get little respect in the visualization community (Tufte hates them), but while I don’t love them I don’t hate them either. The scheme is intuitive [...]

Neuropathologist investigating a murder case is featured in People Magazine

Neuropathologists continue to show up in the national news media! After reporting recently about Dr. John E. Donahue’s appearance in The New York Post discussing the disposition of Michael Jackson’s brain, I was informed that Dr. Peter Cummings (pictured), neuropathologist for the Massachusetts Medical Examiner’s office, was featured in a People Magazine article in [...]

BID~Needham construction progress

Speaking of videos, click here to watch an update of the construction project at BID~Needham hospital. This video shows you the outside of the new emergency department and walks you through the new inpatient unit. The grand opening is planned for this fall.

Information Overload, the Index Medicus, and PubMed

Image by Nuevo Anden via Flickr
The growth of medical knowledge is difficult to visualize. One classic representation is the Index Medicus — a comprehensive index of medical journal articles — whose bound copies filled the shelves of medical libraries for 125 years. In 2004, however, the National Library of Medicine decided to stop publishing the [...]

Just what does a genome cost?

Scientists are rarely trained in finance, and even more rarely comfortable with it. In an ideal world, experiments just happen and somehow it all gets covered. But the reality is that experiments cost money.
Perhaps nowhere in biology has this been so at the front of attention as with genome sequencing, particularly since the [...]

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