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28th Nov 2004
Safe Sex, & Cervical Cancer Vaccines
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In the run up to World AIDS week consultant GU medicine physician Dr Sarah Edwards joins us to talk about the present epidemic of sexually transmitted infections including chlamydia, HIV, herpes, syphilis and gonorrhoea, and Prof. Margaret Stanley, from the Department of Pathology at the University of Cambridge, discusses how she has developed a vaccine against human papilloma virus (HPV), the agent which causes cervical cancer. Also joining us on the show is Dr. Helen McShane, from Oxford University, to talk about a new vaccine she has developed to combat the huge global problem of tuberculosis (TB).
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Science News
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Imagine you're in a crowded pub, or out with someone you ought not to be, and your boss calls your mobile. The noise in the background would instantly belie your true whereabou... |
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A bag of pistachio nuts always contains a few unopened specimens, largely because the process used to sort the open from closed nuts is far from perfect. But now a Kansas-based... |
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How do you like the idea of having a real gold-fish. Not just an orange one, but one that really glows gold in the dark ? Because that's exactly what a Taiwan-based company hav... |
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An American man with a penchant for shooting things has come up with the world's first website that lets you hunt and shoot real animals on his Texas-based ranch, but without h... |
Questions

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How does breathable waterproof clothing work?
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Breathable waterproofs rely on the fact that water is very sticky. Water has an oxygen atom stuck onto two hydrogens, and looks like a tiny boomerang. The oxygen atom is quite negative and pulls electrons towards it. This means that there are plus and minus bits on the molecules which attract plusses and minuses on other molecules, making the molecules stick together. This attraction is known as hydrogen bonding and is the reason why water has a surface tension. When water forms into drops, they are very large and don't easily break into smaller ones. The fabric in breathable Gore-tex raincoats is called Teflon; the same material used on non-stick frying pans. The holes in the fabric are so tiny that 9 billion can fit into one square inch of the raincoat! When water leaves your body as water vapour, the molecules are small and can fit through the holes. When it reaches the outside of the raincoat, it condenses into big sticky raindrops that can't get back through. But your raincoat will only stay breathable if you keep it well waterproofed. Waterproofing creates a gradient between the inside and outside of the coat: the inside has lots of water vapour while the outside has no water because it has formed drops and run off the fabric. This gradient ensures water is pulled away from your skin and stops you getting sweaty inside your raincoat!
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Do fish ever get thirsty, and do they sweat?
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Bony fish that live in the sea have blood that is less concentrated (in terms of salt) than the water they live in. By a process called osmosis, these fish will lose lots of water into the sea. To stop them from dehydrating, bony fish drink lots of water. Although drinking salt water is never a good idea if you're a thirsty human, fish have special mechanism on their gills that enables them to excrete the excess salt they are drinking. By pumping the salts back out again, they are able to drink water without become even more dehydrated. In contrast, sharks make their bodies as concentrated as the water around them. They do this by building up levels of urea in their blood. This is why dead sharks smell like urine. Having highly concentrated blood also means that sharks won't do very well if put into freshwater - water will rush into the shark by osmosis and it might even explode! Sweating is a process designed to help organisms cool down. On land, sweat on the skin evaporates and takes heat away from the body, making you feel cooler. In the sea, water can't evaporate off the fish because they are already in water! So no, fish don't sweat.
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I had syphilis about 40 years ago. Why can I not give blood, and why am I now allergic to penicillin?
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Just as if you have a cut and get a scar, having syphilis will also leave a scar in your blood. This scar will be in the form of antibodies that won't disappear, so your blood screenings will always come up positive. If you are keen to give blood, you should probably go along to your local health clinic and ask for a test for syphilis. If you actually had another disease (such as gonnhorea) that leaves no trace, you will be able to give blood, But you are unlikely to be able to give blood if syphilis antibodies are present. As to your penicillin allergy, some people don't know they are allergic to something until they get exposed to it. If you were slightly allergic to penicillin before, receiving it for syphilis will have made your body expert at reacting to it with the result that any time you now take penicillin, your immune system will go into overdrive and give you an allergic reaction.
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I was looking at the moon and saw what looked like a huge great rock float past it. What was it ?
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To block out the moon it would have to have been a huge chunk of rock a long way off, or a smaller piece much closer to the Earth. But in either case we would have known about it because of the obvious risk to satellites and to the Earth itself. Also, it probably would have gone on to burn up in the atmosphere, producing a bright light which we would have seen. But it seems very unlikely that what you saw was actually in space. As it appeared so large, it could well have been an aeroplane, or possibly a helium weather balloon...or perhaps a stealth aeroplane or even a UFO !?
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Why does Indian tonic water stop restless legs?
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I'm not sure whether it can affect genuine restless leg syndrome, but tonic water can certainly help leg cramps because it contains quinine which is added to give it is bitter taste. Doctors sometimes prescribe quinine to people who complain of night time leg cramps. Perhaps your legs are restless because of cramps and the quinine in the tonic water you drink settles them down ?
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| Interviews
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Professor Margaret Stanley.
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Sarah Edwards
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Fact or Fiction
A surfer in California recently got the shock of his life when he
discovered he wasn't surfing a wave, but a whale
 
It's True - 60 year
old Spyros Vamvas realised that the giant wave he was riding was not a
wave at all - when it turned into a whale - He said "My board lifted
and I saw the whale's back - it was huge !"
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The right side of the brain contains more neurones (nerve cells) than
the left side
 
It's False - The left side of the brain usually contains,
on average, 200 million more cells than the right side.
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Inventors have come up with a device to switch off any television
in the world
 
It's True - San Francisco-based inventor Mitch Altman has
come up with the answer to those annoying TV sets blaring at you in public
places - a universal off switch. Called TV-B-Gone his key-fob sized device
tries every known infrared TV turn-off signal, one by one every second,
starting with the commonest ones. Peace at last !
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The thymus is a tiny gland in your brain
 
It's False - The pituitary
is a tiny gland found in the brain. The thymus is an organ found in the
chest which helps the white blood cells of your immune system to develop.
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The windiest place on Earth is the Sahara desert
 
It's False - Commonwealth
Bay, in Antarctica, is officially the windiest place on earth and is regularly
whipped by winds of over 200 miles per hour.
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You can kill a dog by feeding it chocolate
 
It's True - In addition
to making it morbidly obese, you can also poison a dog by feeding it chocolate.
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The vernal equinox occurs in autumn
 
It's False - The vernal equinox
is another name for the spring equinox and occurs at the end of March.
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On average, about 1 million people are killed by natural disasters
every year
 
It's False - It's in fact thankfully much lower - only about
80,000 people die annually, on average, due to natural disasters.
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Burps and farts are major contributors to global warming
 
It's True
- Gaseous eruptions from the bowels of farmyard animals, and quite possibly
some humans, account for up to 20% of worldwide annual emissions of the
potent greenhouse gas methane. Methane is even more effective than its
greenhouse counterpart carbon dioxide at trapping heat in the atmosphere
and warming up the planet.
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High-tech Japanese toilets contain a speaker system to help disguise
any embarrassing noises
 
It's True - The daintily-named Sound Princess
plays a recording of flushing water through a small speaker fitted to
the stall to help mask any naughty-noises produced by the occupant. They
are now standard in new buildings !
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