First and foremost, Spring is a mere week away and our friends up north can crawl out of their storm cellars and feel the vibe. Oh, it could snow again but the March snows arrive timidly, with a lack of confidence, well aware that their days are numbered by the rising temperatures. Northern residents, bullied and cowed by earlier blizzards, sneer at March snow, laugh in its face, full of the buoyancy and bluster the Vernal Equinox provides. Carloads of them drive to the beaches with their heaters on full-blast to reassure themselves that the ocean is still there and that Summer is packing its bags for the eventual migration upwards. School kids rush to their calendars daily, magic markers in hand, to strike through another day, another impediment to the freedom of June. Workmen in warm gloves and puffy jackets are busily sweeping the aisles at Fenway Park and Yankee Stadium, aware that the first cries of “Play Ball!” will ring out in two weeks.
Democratic presidential candidates are rushing out of the woodwork, plentiful as stoners at a Willie Nelson concert, all seeking to be the knight who slays the dragon and frees the maiden from the tower. President Lincoln Lite is pacing in nervous circles, teetering on the brink, looking for a ship to sail through the inevitable tsunami, as nervous deserters go AWOL from his army and deliver sordid secrets to the enemy.
It’s a time of hope and renewal, full of budding fringe trees and returning robins, of brilliant dogwoods and cheerful azaleas, of spirited Spring garden festivals and jaunty travelers fleshing out Summer vacations. If there is bad news somewhere in the neighborhood, let’s put a muzzle on it for a bit while we enjoy the optimism of the moment. There’s Good News afoot and we’re here to dwell on it.
One Puff Over The Line
The ever-expanding miracle of marijuana has now reached Israeli cancer patients. As a means of providing immediate pain relief to the afflicted, scientists in that country have developed a cannabis inhaler for patients who cannot or prefer not to smoke the not-so-evil weed. The inhaler attaches to a vaporizer to which the patient adds the measured dose of cannabis extract for inhalation. The extract includes a precise dose of active ingredients. The greatest potential for cannabis delivered via a measured dose is its applications for palliative cancer patients who suffer from symptoms of cancer pain.
“Every piece of clinical research that helps manage treatment using medical cannabis is important,” says Dr. Itay Gur-Aryeh, director of the Pain Unit at Sheba Hospital, Tel Hashomer. “Delivering treatment by inhalation is characterized by a quicker response time than oral or sublingual tablets.” Research on the inhaler is being conducted by Rafa and Panaxia, two Israeli-based pharmaceutical companies and the products are due for distribution to pharmacies this year. Zig Zag papers stock dipped slightly at the news.
Not to be outdone, American scientists have come up with a nasal spray for depression called esketamine and marketed under the brand name Spravato. The spray will be prescribed alongside an oral antidepressant to adults who have developed treatment-resistant depression. Most antidepressants on the current market take weeks and even months to take effect, which is why they now have a net under the Golden Gate Bridge. Spravato, alleluia, will relieve depressive symptoms in a matter of hours, which means your sulky Aunt Celia might take a sudden u-turn on her trip to the deep waves off Daytona. The drug does stir a little controversy because it is a chemical variant of ketamine, an anesthetic which has historically been abused for recreational purposes in club scenes and party situations. But hey---any old port in a storm, right?
I Can See Clearly Now, The Rain Has Gone
Well, whoop-de-do! Looks like millions of blind people could have their vision restored using stem cells taken from the eyes of dead guys. Yes, really. Eight patients with a common condition which destroys vision have had the affected area repaired and two were even able to read again after having macular degeneration. The revolutionary treatment may lead to a cure for blindness cause by damage to the cornea, the protective surface of the eye which often becomes clouded in older people through injury or infection.
The findings from this small study are very promising and show the potential for safe stem cell eye surgery as well as improvements in eye repair,” said study leader Baljean Dhillon, professor of clinical ophthalmology at the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences. And you thought all they did in Scotland was make tape and strong whiskey.
Describing the breakthrough as a “world first,” Dhillon and the boys said their work sheds light, so to speak, on the causes of sight disorders and illustrates how eye damage once thought permanent can be fixed. If Irish Eyes Are Smiling, and of course they are, Scottish eyes now have a silly grin.
….And No More Riding In The Back Of The Bus
As if things weren’t bad enough for Lake Erie, which is forced to live just outside the posh environs of Buffalo, N.Y. and Toledo, Ohio. Five years ago, millions of nearby residents found themselves in the middle of a water crisis caused by chemical pollution in the lake. The runoff resulted in a toxic algae bloom which led Ohio legislators to warn folks in the area against drinking tap water for several days. Well, those people in Toledo just had it up to here, and they promptly voted in favor of legislation granting Lake Erie its very own Bill of Rights, protecting it from similar chemical disasters. The law recognizes the rights of the lake and its watershed and empowers citizens to stand up for the lake and take legal action when those rights are violated.
“It was definitely a long, hard struggle against polluters to get to this day,” reflected Crystal Jankowski, a Toledoan for Safe Water organizer. “We started this more than two years ago and had to overcome election board decisions and protests in court just to get on the ballot. But now we have a first-of-its-kind initiative to acknowledge the rights of an entire specific ecosystem.”
The language of the amendment known as LEBOR was drafted with assistance from the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund and is in accordance with the larger Rights of Nature movement and philosophy which has resulted in Ecuador’s 2008 constitutional acknowledgement of the rights of Mother Nature; New Zealand’s 2014 granting of legal personhood to the Te Ureware forest; and India’s courts ruling in 2017 that the Ganges and Yamuna rivers have rights to exist, thrive and evolve. You go, Toledo! Now, let’s get to work on the Cincinnati Reds.
They Walk Among Us
Well, one of them does, anyway. That would be Jareth Nebula, a nippleless alien with a penchant for contemporary Japanese pop culture, a dearth of eyebrows and a fondness for lip, septum and nose bridge piercings. “I’ve always been obsessed with aliens, with what it means to be an extraterrestrial” says Jareth. “So the idea of being an agender alien fit perfectly as an identity for me.” Good thing. Mr. Nebula has just about run out of alternate categories.
Jareth Nebula originally transitioned from female to male when he or she was 29. He wasn’t always Jareth, though, purloining the name from David Bowie’s character, Jareth the Goblin King, from Jim Henson’s 1986 cult classic fantasy film, Labyrinth. The Washington native and barbershop receptionist was disappointed to discover that his gender transition didn’t quite fill the bill, however, and still ached to solve a lifelong void which inspired him to go through with it in the first place. Therefore, Jareth decided to label himself genderless or gender-neutral as opposed to the chic gender-fluid, which refers to a person whose gender identity is not fixed or a person who feels he/she could be a mix of both genders. Nebula felt it only proper to therefore have his nipples removed, adorn his face with a swath of piercings and wear an otherworldly layer of makeup to look “less human.” Seems like he did a pretty good job.
“I don’t think or feel like humans,” Jareth tells us. I can’t really explain it---I’m simply otherworldly. I didn’t feel comfortable as either gender or even anything in between. I know I’m stuck in a human form and that’s how I’m perceived by others, but to me, I’m and alien with NO gender.”
Modern society has come a long way in its tolerance for/acceptance of the LGBTQ community. The United States Supreme Court legalized gay marriage in June, 2015 and Gay Pride Parades have generally proliferated across the country in recent years with decreasing animosity. Jareth’s particular identity may be a new outpost in bizarre even to the most accepting members of society, but few people are surprised these days and even less seem too concerned. That’s good news for whatever aliens are headed this way in the future. We used to surround the UFOs and blast away. Now, the aliens are popular inclusions on the late-nite TV shows. Progress, as ever, is our most important product.
Of Axolotls And Men
If you’re unfamiliar with the word “axolotl,” you never read Mad Magazine when you were a kid. Mad had a penchant for tossing around words like “halavah,” “fershlugginer” and “axolotl” without ever telling its young readers what the words meant. We thought the words were hilarious and maybe even a little made up but now we know the axolotl---also know as the Mexican walking fish---is a merry little fellow with four legs, a crown of feathery gills and a long, tapered tail fin, available in an assortment of colors and always carrying a smile on his face. And no wonder. The axolotl is the only animal extant which can regenerate almost any part of its body. As long as they are not beheaded, these fish can grow back a nearly perfect replica of just about any body part, including up to half of their brains, according to Jeramiah Smith, associate professor of biology at the University of Kentucky, who happens to be an expert on axolotl DNA.
At 10 times the size of the human genome, the axolotl genome was no small beast to tackle. “This thing’s HUGE,” said Melissa Keinath, a postdoctoral fellow at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Baltimore. Building off a previous study, Dr. Keinath and her homies mapped more than 100,000 pieces of DNA onto chromosomes, the structures that package DNA in the nucleus of each cell. The axolotl genome is the largest genome to be assembled at this level.
Ultimately, knowing how DNA is positioned along chromosomes “allows you to start thinking about functions and how genes are regulated,” said Randall Voss, a professor of neuroscience at UK and a member of Keinath’s team. For instance, much of the genome consists of noncoding DNA sequences that turn genes off and on. Often, these noncoding sequences occur on the same chromosome as the genes they interact with.
“Once these relationships are known, then we can ask questions about whether the same kind of control happens in other animals, like humans,” explained Jessica Whited, a professor and limb regeneration expert at Harvard Medical School. Overall, she added, that will help scientists understand whether there are predictable ways to render humans more like axolotls, able to replace their own parts, and lending a new meaning to the old expression, “Hey, Dad---give me a hand.” (No booing, please.)
I Had This FEELING I Was Forgetting Something….
Ever leave something in the airport waiting room, get on the plane and suddenly remember your mistake as the pilot was taxiing down the runway? Did you think for the briefest moment you might timidly ask the stewardess to turn the plane around and go back for your package? No, us either. That’s laughingstock country. But one little lady in Saudi Arabia was so bold as to ask that Saudi flight SV83, in the air and headed for Kuala Lumpur, return to King Abdul Aziz International Airport to retrieve her baggage.
The pilot of the airliner was initially uncooperative. “Of course we can’t go back!” he shouted. “What in heaven did she leave back there, anyway?”
“Her baby,” the stewardess said.
The plane promptly made a u-turn, returned to the terminal and they all lived happily ever after.
The End.
