Month: June 2012

Marblar, creating community for science and invention

If you are a working scientist, a recovering scientist, a revolutionary, or simply a geek looking for new innovations, take a look at Marblar. They’re creating a community to open up the process of invention and finding the right home for those inventions.

They call themselves “a democratic playground for creativity”, which sounds like fun and suggest that the community will bring together great ideas and great inventions. Apparently, it’s a three-step process: Scientists post their discoveries, you join other “marblars” to find creative ways to use those discoveries, finally you earn points, meet inventors and join startups. It sounds like a game, but as long as you don’t lose your marbles, it could be a game-changing game…

I asked Gabriel Mecklenburg from Marblar to explain a bit further:

“We work with universities to find dormant IP (i.e. the >90%) that isn’t being licensed or spun out and write it up in a challenge format – can you come up with a novel and commercially viable application for this? (A bit like Innocentive in reverse).” He adds that the challenges are always associated with points and trophies in the form of marbles (for e.g. top-voted ideas, offering helpful advice on other people’s ideas, winning competitions etc.) and some will have prize money associated with them. “It’s all about making the experience really fun for the users and creating a community where they can be proud of their “in-game” achievements,” he told me. “The inventor may then choose what to do with the winning entry (no IP is signed over to us). With our pilot challenge, they are in talks with the winner about starting a company based on his idea – not too bad for our first go.”

Marblar is run by three grad students from Oxford, Kings College London and Imperial College London who say they know only too well the pain of research just ending up in some drawer!

Patent pressure – who does intellectual property protect?

Patent pressureGreg Aharonian has said for many years that the patent system is bust. If it weren’t how could there possibly be tens of thousands of software patents given that so many of them are simply variations on the spreadsheet, word processor, file compression, and image editing? I followed Aharonian’s patent news service from around 1994-5 for several years and several times gave him a mention in the Feedback section of New Scientist when he published a particularly poignant item. I’ve not really kept anything more than a weather eye on patents and the broader area of intellectual property, although I have covered specific aspects during my almost quarter century in science communication.

Patents and IP expert Robert Pitkethly of Oxford University, UK, argues how IP systems depend on awareness of intellectual property but has found through a large-scale survey of UK industry that while larger companies are more IP aware, SMEs (small to medium-sized enterprises) and the vast numbers of “micro” enterprises are often wholly unaware of the IP system. He suggests that the IP system is the driver of innovation and that it underpins the growth of those micro and SMEs. An understanding and awareness of patents, copyright, trademarks, registered designs, the need for confidentiality, and other factors are thus vital particular at the start-up phase.

“Enabling SMEs and micro-enterprises to use their IP to grow into larger companies which are successful not just locally but internationally, is thus an essential role of IP awareness promotion,” Pitkethly explains in the journal IJTM. He adds that it is not only important that small firms are made aware of the various IP systems, but that improving awareness feeds back into the system itself underpinning its relevance. Of course, the “open” movement whether in science, innovation, or any other area might argue that IP concerns actually stifle innovation. It is nevertheless difficult to see what incentive there would be for a smaller company to develop its inventions, whether pharmaceuticals or vacuum cleaners if there were no protection of their designs to allow them to recoup their costs, make a profit and re-invest in their business to come up with the next invention.

Research Blogging IconRobert H. Pitkethly (2012). Intellectual property awareness Int. J. Technology Management, 59 (3/4), 163-179

Are we overdiagnosing the worried well?

NHS Choices comments on a powerfully argued and controversial paper in the British Medical Journal that claims many people are being diagnosed and treated for mild health problems that left alone might never cause any harm.

The magazine lists the common conditions that the authors claim are being overdiagnosed:

Breast cancer — a systematic review suggests that a third of breast cancers detected by screening might not cause harm or early death.

Thyroid cancer — detecting thyroid abnormalities is common, but risk low.

Gestational diabetes — an expanded definition means one in five pregnant women are diagnosed inappropriately.

Chronic kidney disease — an expanded definition means 10% of Americans are classified as having the disease but fewer than 1 in 1000 will develop end-stage kidney disease.

Asthma — asthma is often underdiagnosed, but a third of those being treated may not have the condition.

Pulmonary embolism — potentially fatal but new, sensitive tests detect smaller clots that may not require treatment.

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) — a widened definition of this condition has led to overdiagnosis

Osteoporosis — expanded definitions means many women being treated even if at low risk of fractures.

Prostate cancer — Prostate specific antigen (PSA) may lead to overdiagnosis in more than 60% of men.

High blood pressure — authors suggest “substantial overdiagnosis” of high blood pressure.

High cholesterol — almost 4 in ever 5 people treated for high cholesterol may actually have near-normal cholesterol levels.

You can read the full assessment of the BMJ paper in NHS Choices.

Take flight

Airport X-ray security body scanners are anything but risky business. Indeed, you will be exposed to the same dose of ionising radiation in just two minutes of your flight once you’re at high altitude. So, an 8-hour flight is equivalent to having 240 full-body scans. They reckon you’re well within safety limits at having 5000 scans a year, but that equates to only about 20 8-hour flights.

Frequent flyers be warned: every time you climb aboard one of those jet-powered metal tubes and take to the air you are being bombarded with cosmic rays. The term cosmic rays is something of a misnomer as there aren’t really any rays present, that’s purely historical, cosmic rays are composed of high-energy sub-atomic particles, mostly protons (89%), 10 are helium nuclei (better known as alpha particles) and the remaining 1% are electrons (beta particles) and other spurious entities such as antimatter particles.

These cosmic particles can have energies 7 or 8 orders of magnitude greater than the energies produced by our particle accelerators here on earth. The earth’s atmosphere and magnetic field does deflect much of the cosmic bombardment so that life can survive, but, as I said frequent flyers (which includes pilots and air crew) can experience double the dose of ionising radiation of those whose feet stay firmly on the ground.

Airport X-ray scanners generate not cosmic particles, but X-rays, but to the atoms and molecules from which we are made it is the energy that they carry not their physical nature that matters. X-rays and cosmic particles will ionize atoms and molecules, once ionized these atoms and molecules are highly unstable and can fall apart or react with other nearby atoms and molecules to generate new ions. If the molecules in question are proteins this can lead to the breakdown and death of the cells using those proteins. Damage the DNA and the cell might die or it might become cancerous, replicating endlessly without the usual constraints.

Of course, we could spend hours debating the relative risk, you might even think about calling me on your mobile phone with worry (they don’t produce nor receive ionising radiation). But, for many people the high-altitude flight and the pointless X-ray body scan at the airport are often followed by two weeks lying almost naked on a hot beach during the daylight hours to expose one’s skin to hour upon hour of ultraviolet radiation and evenings are spent smoking cigarettes and drinking copious amounts of alcohol. There’s undeniable risk and then there’s risk you can deny if it would spoil your holiday to admit it exists…

Interestingly, Samanda Correa of the National Nuclear Energy Commission in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and colleagues have used a statistical method known as a Monte Carlo simulation to calculate the change in risk of developing cancer associated with exposure to X-ray body scanners. The team points out that these scanners while well known for their use in airports as an anti-terrorism measure are also widely used in prisons to combat smuggling. Their research suggests that one would need to have 130 scans to be exposed to 0.25 millisieverts of ionising radiation, which is considered the annual safe limit for members of the public. The increase in cancer risk for just a handful of scans per year is very, very low. They say it only becomes significant for those having dozens of scans annually, but even then it is a small increase.

I still suspect the sunburn, the booze and the cigarettes will do you in before the X-ray scanners get you…

Research Blogging IconSamanda Cristine Arruda Correa, Josilto Oliveira de Aquino, Edmilson Monteiro de Souza, & Ademir Xavier da Silva (2012). Evaluation of the dose and of the risk of cancer induction associated with the use of transmission X-ray body scanners using the Monte Carlo MCNPX code Int. J. Low Radiation, 8 (5/6), 340-354

The matter of the lost dark matter

Dark matter might be found in hornets’ nests and cans of worms but not necessarily in the real world of cosmology and science. I recently reported on the work of Christian Moni Bidin which reveals serious discrepancies in science’s claims for the existence of dark matter. Of course, such observations would inevitably draw criticism and a recent blog post highlights these as well as pointing to another preprint that contradicts the work.

It has always struck me that dark matter, and indeed, dark energy are kludge factors to shoehorn observations into current theories. They allude not to mysterious, invisible forces, but to gaps in our understanding, surely. As Feynman once said: “It doesn’t matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn’t matter how smart you are. If it doesn’t agree with experiment, it’s wrong.”

With that thought in mind, I asked Moni-Bidin to comment on the blog post. This is what he had to say:

“The blogger writes: ‘In my earlier post I remarked that this study makes a number of questionable assumptions about the shape of the Milky Way Halo – they take it to be smooth and spherical’. This is a bad misunderstanding of my work,” Moni-Bidin says, “which I found often reported in other sites also. My measurement of the mass density does not require any assumption about the shape of the Halo, spherical, flat, cubic or whatsoever. Contrary to previous works, it is model-independent. Then, I compare the results with the predictions of spherical halos, but simply because it is the most favourable case for the dark matter models, a prolate halo giving trouble to the theory itself, and an oblate halo being in larger discrepancy with the results. Moreover, I did not create those models. Had the specialists theorized that the dark halo was triangular, I would have compared with triangular models, it’s not a choice of mine.”

He comments more generally about the very common criticism that “the results rely on too many assumptions and some should be wrong”. “Maybe,” he says. “But, I share my assumptions with all previous literature (which is celebrated as detecting much dark matter). Simply, they are so basic that many works did not even mention them, but you can see that they are inside any formulation. The difference is that previous work assumed them plus other strong simplifying hypothesis, which I could release because today we have large databases available that once were prohibitive. But this is what we call science: when you match the models, the assumptions are OK, when not, the same assumptions must be wrong.”

It will be interesting to see the outpouring of hornets as the papers wend their way through the refereeing process. I will keep you informed.

A QR code for emergencies

Lifesquare is offering users in Marin County, California, a simple way to embed their essential health information, blood group, GP’s name and address, next of kin, medications, allergies, pre-existing conditions, etc into a QR code that emergency responders could scan at the scene of an incident or accident to ensure they don’t dose you up with any meds you shouldn’t have.

I assume you’re meant to print it off and put it in your wallet or purse, but you could have the QR code tattooed on to the back of your hand, forehead or some other prominent place. No, seriously, is the modern equivalent of the SOS Talisman from off of 1970s TV.

To be honest, you could set this up to point to a page on your website or a hosted page (in your DropBox folder or elsewhere) with your health details without using Lifesquare and particularly if you’re not in Marin County. There are countless QR code generators out there. You could also include your organ donor status in your QR code as well as information on any special wishes you have regarding your treatment should you not regain consciousness after an incident.

Lycopene and cancer prevention

Over the years there has been a lot of tomato talk, about how lycopene, the red pigment found in this fruit (yes, it’s definitely a fruit, it’s got seeds), could ward off cancer, specifically prostate cancer. It has also been linked to protecting us from cardiovascular disease, per the common discussions about the so-called Mediterranean diet. It is not a panacea and tests and trials have been small-scale. Nevertheless, as with the likes of that other infamous compound, resveratrol found in red wine, researchers are keen to demonstrate a link with their particular natural chemical and disease prevention.

In the first June issue of SpectroscopyNOW I discuss tests on lycopene extracted from tomatoes that seem to show it offers a certain level of protection against liver cancer triggered by nitrosamines, in lab mice at least. Ashwani Koul and his colleagues at Panjab University in Chandigarh, India, have been doing the research with interesting results. I asked Koul about the impetus:

“Since time immemorial, the tomato has formed an integral component of food, both traditional and western form,” he told Sciencebase. “It is used widely as a vegetable and is abundantly used in the preparation of sauces, curry, soup etc. throughout the world. Epidemiological studies indicate that populations consuming high amounts of vegetables including tomato, in their diet have a reduced incidence of several types of cancer.” So that’s the start of it…

“Over the years, lycopene, a nutrient found in tomatoes, has drawn much attraction for its ability to combat several chronic diseases including cancer,” he adds. “Moreover, lycopene being a component of major dietary source (tomato) finds acceptance with the population and its use is also not restricted as is the case with synthetic chemopreventive agents.” Indeed, lycopene is already marketed as a supplement, although specific health claims are not permitted under FDA rules for supplements without additional regulatory approval.

“With the studies planned and in progress we intend to determine the optimum levels of lycopene as a cancer chemopreventive agent, so as to tap its maximum potential,” Koul told me. “Further, we aim to investigate the detailed underlying mechanism of its cancer chemopreventive potential. Such studies would scientifically validate the anticancer abilities of phytonutrients present in vegetables including lycopene.”

You can read the full story on SpectroscopyNOW.

Tomato photo via CC on flickr.