- Mad scientist alphabet blocks – For the budding evil genius in your life. Thanks, Alicia, these are wonderful!
- Revenge of the clones – “What happens when a group of streptococci stick to cells in your throat and start to make toxins? Your body fights back by making clones.” Does anyone else hear ominous music?
- Snake-eating spider – Is this the new alligator vs. python internet meme? Also, this is why Australia scares me.
- MacGyvering a medical centrifuge
Re: centrifuge – I already spend too much time at http://www.instructables.com.
@w_nightshade: Homemade centrifuges are well known to make awesome winter holiday presents, you know. Who *doesn’t* want to be able to separate their own blood samples?
Hmm, must have been a pretty small snake as a redback spider varies from the size of a pea to a small marble.
Now funnelweb spiders on the other hand…
http://www.virginmedia.com/images/funnel-web-spider-431×300.jpg
The movie on clonal selection was amazing. I am boggled by the amount of work the body does just to survive and the number of systems that mindlessly work together for that purpose.
@Lyc:
It does appear to be a very small snake. Here are some more pictures:
http://tools.cairns.com.au/photo_gallery/photo_gallery_popup.php?category_id=3511&offset=0
But still, a spider eating a snake is horribly upsetting to us arachnophobes.
@Amanda: http://is.gd/4tZ3
That centrifuge reminds me of a news story back in March in which a neurosurgeon (Henry Marsh) pointed out that, in a pinch, a $45,000 medical drill can be replaced by a $45 Bosch cordless drill from the hardware store.
I also remember something from last year about someone making microfluidic channel molds using Shrinky Dinks.
And there’s all sorts of DIY plans for ECG and EEG using a computer’s microphone input.
It’d be interesting to see a collection of MacGyvered medical tools all in one place.
I got that thing with the Black Widow a while back, but it was found by a lady called Tania Robertson working at an electrical firm in Bloemfontein in South Africa. I kinda liked that story better, me being a homesick South African.
Spiders are cool :)
Mad scientist alphabet blocks.
I know what I want for christmas
Gotta get the blocks for me…I mean my kids.
Great vid on clonal selection. Gonna keep that bookmarked so I can show it the next time I teach an immunology section in a microbiology class. This seems to be a tough subject for most of my students to get a handle on.
Just in case that spider doesn’t scare you, check out this one:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/earth/2008/10/22/easpider122.xml