Purdue works to transform Ebola virus from killer to healer Purdue works to transform Ebola virus from killer to healer

Wired News: DigiPens Search for Write Market

Anoto -- the Swedish company that developed the technology for sticking a tiny camera in a pen and transferring the information to a computer or cell phone -- has lined up partners around the world to begin rolling out digital pens.
"We're tapping into pen and paper, the largest information infrastructure in the world," said Anoto CEO Christer Fåhraeus. "It's a market that isn't going away."

Coase's Penguin, or, Linux and The Nature of the Firm
http://www.benkler.org/CoasesPenguin.PDF

The Political Economy of Open Source Software (2000)
http://www.ciaonet.org/wps/wes02/

papers on open source software and related topics by Eric von Hippel
http://web.mit.edu/evhippel/www/Publications.htm

Developing Open Source Software to Advance High End Computing (2000)
http://www.ccic.gov/pubs/pitac/pres-oss-11sep00.pdf

Slashdot | Microsoft Ordered to Carry Java

I've seen a lot of comments here about how this is government intrusion and has no place in a free market.

That, dear friends, is complete bullshit.

Homing Devices for Your Kids These days, panoptic vigilance is a much more practical matter, as the advent of kid-tracking technology for the consumer market shows. A company called Wherify Wireless in Redwood Shores, Calif., sells a satellite location device designed to be worn by young children. For $399 and a monthly service fee ranging from $25 to $50, parents can outfit their kids with a chunky plastic watch in ''cosmic purple'' or ''galactic blue'' that will transmit the wearer's location using signals from the Global Positioning System's network of satellites. Parents can retrieve the location on the Internet or by calling a Wherify operator.

Even Blind People Can Draw What has really shocked cognitive scientists, however, is that many blind artists seem to have the tricks of the Renaissance buried inside their brains. Foreshortening, vanishing points and other devices of modern pictorial realism -- techniques that artists in the Middle Ages lacked -- can be found in blind art.

'C.S.I.' Myth, The Smooth criminals can apparently train themselves to beat the polygraph machine -- which measures pulse and breathing rates, sweating and blood pressure -- by using Valium and obscure muscular acrobatics involving their sphincters.

Unexamined Life Is Worth Living, The In his recently published book, ''Strangers to Ourselves,'' Wilson argues that the real key to our behavior lies in a part of the brain known as the adaptive unconscious. Evolved perhaps before consciousness itself, it is the realm responsible for such indispensable cognitive skills as acquiring language, sizing up situations quickly, detecting signs of danger, sussing out relationships -- skills that everyone uses every day without even realizing it. Think of the adaptive unconscious as the generator in the basement that hums along unnoticed, but without which little could happen.

Hybrid That Gets 239 M.P.G., The

f r e e g o r i f e r o | weblog

Living for Tomorrow | Metropolis Magazine | December 2002 Whether the project will succeed in persuading developers and builders to take on its means and methods is a big question. MIT's would not be the first project to be thwarted by industry recalcitrance. Even the government-backed, multibillion-dollar initiative of the 1970s, Operation Breakthrough--which set out to increase housing production and reduce costs with an engineered approach to building--failed to infiltrate what is essentially a craft-based industry. Bob Kuehn, a Massachusetts builder, welcomes MIT's initiative but remains skeptical about its applicability. "Frankly I don't see it," he says. "There are too many barriers from the way the craft unions are organized. It's hard to come in and say, 'This used to be carpentry, but now it's somebody else's work.' I can remember when we stopped using lumber and went to metal studs, and what a big fight that was."

Larson pulls no punches when it comes to depicting the industry: "It's fragmented, conservative, worried about lawsuits, resistant to change, and involves labor-intensive processes that no industry in the world would use."

Living for Tomorrow | Metropolis Magazine | December 2002

Learning Circuits -- ASTD's Online Magazine All About E-Learning

You've probably heard of XML but may not know what it is or why you should care about it. Well, here’s why: The promise of e-learning is the ability to develop content (about learners or for the actual course) that’s reusable anytime, anywhere, any way you want. Unfortunately, that just isn't possible…yet. Enter XML, which according to many geeks—our own Answer Geeks included—has the potential for revolutionizing the Web.

Treating schizophrenia: New strategies Schizophrenic patients tend to show atrophy or lowered

Scientific American: Top SciTech Gifts 2002

Adopt a Whale
For only $54 dollars, you can help support research on killer whales and claim one for your very own or for a friend. The killer whale adoption program from the Vancouver Aquarium Marine Science Center sends you an ID photo and biography of your whale, an adoption certificate, a CD featuring the sounds of British Columbia's killer whales and newsletter about the research program. You choose your whale from a pull-down menu: Balaklava, Clio, Echo, Izumi, Nimpkish, Whisky and pals are waiting.
http://www.clamshell.org/

Antidepressant-Induced Sexual Dysfunction Associated with Low Serum Free Testosterone SUMMARY

In the course of an evaluation for treatment of antidepressant induced sexual dysfunction (ASD) with a new agent, an unforeseen pattern emerged in the pre-treatment laboratory assessment. Free serum testosterone levels in both men and women study subjects were found to be below the normal ranges in 75 percent of subjects in this small study. There were no other consistent laboratory findings that could account for such a high percentage correlation. Further inquiries into the possible causes for decreased serum testosterone and its association with ASD seems warranted.

INTRODUCTION

Antidepressant induced sexual dysfunction (ASD) is a well recognized complication of treatment for mood and anxiety disorders (Gitlin 1997). Recent discoveries have helped to provide effective remedies for this significant obstacle to patient compliance and successful treatment outcome (Cohen 1997, Gitlin 1997, Bartlik 1995). However, no remedy is 100% effective. In addition, there is no fully satisfactory theory that explains the physiologic mechanisms responsible for the varied aspects of sexual dysfunction observed (Sussman 1998). In the course of an evaluation of treatment for ASD in a community office based research setting, a striking pattern emerged in the laboratory screening protocol. Free testosterone levels were found to be subnormal in 15 of 20 patients. No other consistent laboratory value nor physical examination finding could account for this observation. Causes for reduced free testosterone and its effect on sexual function are discussed with implications for future research and treatment strategies.

Dental History Fluoride is a chemical found in many substances. In the human body, fluoride acts to prevent tooth decay by strengthening tooth enamel and inhibiting the growth of plaque-forming bacteria. After researchers discovered this characteristic of fluoride, fluoridation -the process of adding the fluoride to public water supplies-began.

It all started with Frederick S. McKay, a Colorado Springs, Colorado, dentist, in the early 1900s. McKay noticed that many of his patients had brown stains, called "mottled enamel," on their teeth. McKay set out to find the cause, helped by researcher Greene V. Black (1836-1915) of Northwestern University and other dentists. By 1916, Mc Kay believed the mottling was caused by something in the patients' drinking water. By 1928, he concluded that mottling was linked to reduced tooth decay.

United Press International: Aromatherapy, lights soothe dementia