The Universe Is Bigger Than We Know @beakers-and-telescopes - Tumblr Blog

Welcome to Beakers and Telescopes!

We are a team of 2 scientists who created this blog to talk about science that we're passionate about! Whether that's new discoveries that interest us or explaining topics in our field in a way that the average Tumblr user can understand, our goal is to get people as excited about science as we are.

If you have even a mild curiosity about what it would be like to live on Mars, new technology that creates electricity from the vibrations in the air around us, or how our body kills cancer every day, then give us a follow! And if there's anything you'd like to see us talk about or any questions you have, don't be afraid to drop in to our askbox :)

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#science #stem #scientists #studyblr #science side of tumblr #chemistry #biology #physics #astronomy #biochemistry #space

raccoonmilf

Here is my video (for now) on raccoon “domestication” and why that study is BS with actual statistics. Enjoy.

byjove

When you point out to people who are against animal testing that there are potentially lifesaving medications that need to be tested on mammals before going to trials that could potentially harm human lives, they’ll say shit like “We should test on prisoners instead.” Bitch. Why are you working for PETA? The WW2-era Imperial Japanese Army needs you. There is suchhhhhhh a strong thread of fascism laced through the current animal rights movement and in so many animal rights spaces and they’re extremely transparent about it.

constant-state-of-self-discovery

My only thing is how you can know it's even worth the money/effort/possible harm to the animal if you're not 100% sure it's even going to work similarly enough in humans to whatever you tested it on for it to matter you did anything at all? Or is there some part of it I'm missing bc I'd love to be proven wrong, I would legit prefer this be necessary if it's happening anyway lol

beakers-and-telescopes

As someone doing a PhD in biomedical sciences- we don't know with certainty that they will work in humans. But it's still very important to test in animals first, for two reasons:

1. Animal models are pretty good at eliminating potential drugs that would be toxic to humans. That means that, at the end of the animal trials, you may not know if a drug will be effective in the human trials (that's why they still need to test it in humans) but you can be pretty confident that the drug won't unexpectedly kill your human volunteers. Even for drugs that are "safe", animal studies can give you an idea of what doses are safe to help inform the following human studies

The 90% myth :: Understanding Animal Research https://share.google/h2lttZtbATO3p1rq7

2. The vast majority of animal research done is far before the point of testing medications. Before you have a potential drug candidate, you need to do experiments to see how a disease is effecting a body on a cellular and molecular level, what proteins and genes are involved, and how changing those proteins and genes can change how the disease effects the animal or cell. Only then can you even start to develop medicines. It is a process that requires the lives of many animals, but without that, we wouldn't even know how the body works and responds to disease well enough to make effective medications in the first place.

#biomedical research #animal testing #biomedical science

penny-anna

one of my fav tumblr phenomenons is when there's a poll where all the answers are just patently absurd and yet somehow there's a clear winner

penny-anna

it'll be like 'which of the world's oceans is the most fuckable' and i'll be like hmm well i'm not an oceanfucker so i don't really have an opinion on this but if i had to choose then i guess the pacific and then i vote and like 60% of people voted for the pacific and its like ok whats going on there

only-tiktoks

alexaloraetheris

Humans are good sometimes actually

petermorwood

The term "imping" was first mentioned in the 1200s when Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II included it in his book on falconry.

The actual practice of repairing feathers this way is almost certainly many centuries older.

dsudis

Technique developed at the University of Michigan provides a non-invasive alternative to surgery, chemotherapy and radiation treatments for

Histotripsy works by using targeted ultrasound waves to form microbubbles within the tumor. The forces created as those bubbles form and collapse cause the mass to break apart, killing tumor cells and leaving the debris to be cleaned up by the immune system.

What that could mean for patients is treatment without the physical toll of radiation or chemotherapy, fewer concerns with drug compatibility, far shorter recovery times than with surgery and less treatment discomfort.

And histotripsy’s potential benefits go beyond tumor destruction. In the last year, a pair of pre-clinical studies in rodents suggest that in the clean-up process, the immune system learns how to identify cancer cells as threats. This can enable the body to continue fighting the initial tumor and help activate a natural immune response to the cancer.

In the first study, even after destroying only 50% to 75% of the liver tumor volume by histotripsy, the rats’ immune systems were able to clear away the rest, with no evidence of recurrence or metastases in more than 80% of animals.

spooniestrong

Pritzker Molecular Engineering researchers led by Prof. Jeffrey Hubbell showed that their compound can eliminate the autoimmune reaction ass

rosslynpaladin

Is this a prank? What….

Edit: holy heck it’s real…

They might be able to help us…

otteroflore

The stage that they're at is animal testing but it sounds like it's been successful in mouse and primate models.

My understanding: The way autoimmune diseases usually seem to work* is the immune system is "flagging" the wrong thing as harmful/not needed and destroying it. The typical treatments for autoimmune diseases are just tamping the entire immune system down so it can't destroy anything, which leaves a person vulnerable to infection.

The newer method is basically "tricking" the body using a method that... the human body already came up with. Cells flagging the wrong thing apparently happens all the time, so there are multiple defenses against immune disease, and one of them is in the liver. So scientists figured out a way to tell the body "hey, you flagged this wrong" and sent it to the liver and the liver/body recognized this signal.

There is still a lot of work to be done and it sounds like this isn't foolproof (ie: what if the liver is whats broken? unsure, and what if the immune system flags things wrong again?) but this is literally so amazing. i was tearing up reading it, and i hope that everything goes well in clinical trials.

*theres like a lot medical science doesnt know about the immune system

moreclaypigeons

Thank you for this explanation/synthesis of the article! It's important for us to understand that they're still in early development and testing of these methods, but also that they've seen it work in mice and primates (rather than just petri dishes of human cells). I hope this goes well.

astridflies

Hi! I'm a microbiologist and I've done work in academia, pharma, and clinical trials.

So the most exciting thing about this article is the last paragraph tbh (working on getting the actual paper, it's not up on sci-hub yet).

The company mentioned, Anokion, has four registered clinical trials for both Celiac and MS patients. The trial for Celiac just submitted data from their phase 1 trial (meaning there's good data it is safe) and are recruiting for a Phase 1/2 trial (meaning they are now testing efficacy). After that, the big hurdle is phase 3, which looks at whether or not it is better than a current treatment. The projected completion date is spring 2025. They are also preparing for a Phase 2 trial but are not yet recruiting.

The phase 1 MS trial is currently active, estimated completion in summer 2024.

I checked the company website and it looks like they are in the process of submitting an investigational new drug (IND) application for Type 1 diabetes. This is the first step to starting clinical safety and efficacy trials.

Now clinical trials can get delayed for a variety of reasons, but this is a really good sign! It's way further along than I initially thought when seeing the news. If the treatment does well, we could see new drugs on the market for Celiacs as early at 2030ish and MS as early as 2035.

vaspider

I literally just burst into tears and woke up my partners.

Holy shit. The idea of not having celiac disease anymore is so completely overwhelming.

vaspider

Update: I have registered for the trial and if you also have celiac and want to register the link is here.

randomthingsthatilike1

holy fucking shit?????

@mamoru

mamoru

clinical trials, come get your clinical trials!

mindblowingscience

Scientists have discovered cannabidiol, a compound in cannabis known as CBD, in a common Brazilian plant, opening potential new avenues to p

Scientists have discovered cannabidiol, a compound in cannabis known as CBD, in a common Brazilian plant, opening potential new avenues to produce the increasingly popular substance. The team found CBD in the fruits and flowers of a plant known as Trema micrantha blume, a shrub which grows across much of the South American country and is often considered a weed, molecular biologist Rodrigo Moura Neto of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro told AFP in June. CBD, increasingly used by some to treat conditions including epilepsy, chronic pain and anxiety, is one of the main active compounds in cannabis, along with tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC – the substance that makes users feel high.

mindblowingscience

The seagrass beds and coral reefs surrounding the Japanese sub-tropical islands of Okinawa are some of the most biodiverse ecosystems on the

The seagrass beds and coral reefs surrounding the Japanese sub-tropical islands of Okinawa are some of the most biodiverse ecosystems on the planet. Home to more than 360 species of coral alone, these beautiful yet fragile underwater groves provide the habitat for countless species of animals. Now, researchers from Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST), as well as other universities in Japan and Australia, have made headway in cataloging this abundance of life by describing two new species of pygmy squid—the Ryukyuan Pygmy Squid (scientific name Idiosepius kijimuna, Ryukyu-himeika in Japanese) and Hannan's Pygmy Squid (Kodama jujutsu, Tsuno-himeika).

coprinellus-cluster

immature Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa/honeycomb coral slime mold! my fav slime mold 🤍

mindblowingscience

The Nobel Physics Prize was awarded on Tuesday to three scientists for their work on attoseconds, which are almost unimaginably short period

The Nobel Physics Prize was awarded on Tuesday to three scientists for their work on attoseconds, which are almost unimaginably short periods of time. Their work using lasers gives scientists a tool to observe and possibly even manipulate electrons, which could spur breakthroughs in fields such as electronics and chemistry, experts told AFP. Attoseconds are a billionth of a billionth of a second. To give a little perspective, there are around as many attoseconds in a single second as there have been seconds in the 13.8-billion year history of the universe.

Being able to operate on this timescale is important because these are the speeds at which electrons – key parts of an atom – operate. For example, it takes electrons 150 attoseconds to go around the nucleus of a hydrogen atom. This means the study of attoseconds has given scientists access to a fundamental process that was previously out of reach.

squided

I don't know if someone posted this a long time ago and that's why I know about it or it was cause I researched it myself but I haven't seen it around so I'm gonna post The Worlds Stinkiest Molecule

mindblowingscience

Inspired by a childhood in sun-baked Ethiopia, Heman Bekele wanted to tackle skin cancer. He came up with a topical cancer-fighting soap, an

Heman Bekele is not your typical high school student. Rather than spending his free time playing video games or staring at his phone, this 14 year-old from Fairfax, Virginia was calling professors and conducting experiments, all to invent a product he hopes could help change the world. His goal is to create a soap that could treat skin cancer, and to make it affordable for everyone who needs it. His work won him the grand prize in this year's 3M Young Scientist's Challenge, a competition that encourages kids to think of unique ways to solve everyday problems. Bekele's award-winning soap was inspired by his childhood in Ethiopia before moving to the United States at the age of 4. The soap delivers cancer- fighting drugs via lipid nanoparticles – which work to activate the body's immune cells to fend off cancer.

considernature

HEY. YOU.

YEAH. YOU.

IT'S TIME TO LEARN ABOUT MARINE IGUANAS.

Note: Consider Nature contains some strong language and adult themes which may be inappropriate for younger readers. Reader discretion is ad

cypherdecypher

Animal of the Day!

Brazilian Treehopper (Bocydium globulare)

(Photo in Public Domain)

Conservation Status- Unlisted

Habitat- Africa; Asia; North American; South America; Australia

Size (Weight/Length)- 6 mm

Diet- Sap

Cool Facts- No, those aren’t eyes. The Brazilian treehopper has a distinct protrusion sticking out of their thorax called a helmet. Scientists don’t fully understand why the insects grow these outgrowths, but it could be for a bizarre form of camouflage or dissuading predation. Despite being able to fly, the treehoppers only do so when startled. They prefer to crawl on the underside of leaves as they search for sap. Females lay their eggs directly inside the tissue of a leaf and after a few weeks a nymph emerges. After only a month of life, the Brazilian treehopper is ready to have offspring of their own.

Rating- 12/10 (Of the 3,270 treehopper species, this may be the weirdest.)

fuckyeahfluiddynamics

Blood Flow in a Fin

This award-winning video shows blood flowing through the tail fin of a small fish. Cells flow outward in a central vessel, then split to either side for the return journey. (Video and image credit: F. Weston for the 2023 Nikon Small World in Motion Competition; via Colossal) Read the full article

mindblowingscience

Naturally occurring superheavy elements beyond those listed in the periodic table could potentially explain why asteroid 33 Polyhymnia is so

Naturally occurring superheavy elements beyond those listed in the periodic table could potentially explain why asteroid 33 Polyhymnia is so dense, new research suggests. A handful of asteroids in our solar system are so dense that no element on Earth can explain their properties. Instead, they may be made of naturally occurring "superheavy elements" beyond those listed in the periodic table — our current best catalog of 118 chemical elements — new research suggests. "If asteroids do indeed contain superheavy elements, it would open numerous questions surrounding how these elements were formed and why we have not discovered them outside of asteroids yet," study co-author Johann Rafelski, a physics professor at the University of Arizona, told Live Science.

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