The Loch Ness Monster

The Loch Ness monster exists. How do I know?
Because my grandfather saw it - not just once but twice.
There are newspaper articles about his sightings so they must be real!
He saw it once in 1939 and then again in 1950. He was a local businessman - a pillar of the community and a scientist.
Today at the Science Festival I went to an all day talk, bringing together all the current research and thoughts on Nessie.
What they all seemed to be saying is this. -
An awful lot of people have spent an awful lot of time and money over the last 50 years or so - trying to find Nessie
and
they have not succeeded
and I for one rejoice.
It cannot be proved that Nessie exists
But
It cannot be proved that Nessie does not exist.

Above is the well known photo taken by a Harley Street Surgeon. Later a man came forward saying it was a hoax but many believe that he was just settling a score. The Mail had paid him to run another hoax in which he used an umbrella stand made from the foot of a hippopotamus to make possible Nessie prints. The hoax was discovered when someone noticed that all four were left feet. He was sacked by The Mail. His revenge was to produce a story  claiming that the surgeon's photo was a hoax. Maybe it was!

The newspaper article just above here is the one from 1950 giving my grandfather's description of what he saw. He was by the Loch - at Foyers with two other people. They all saw it.

3D printing, copyright and patents

I went to a fascinating lecture at the Science festival  - on 3D printing.
One speaker runs the chemistry department at Glasgow University, where they are already using 3D printing to make some drugs / medicines.
The other speaker was an expert in litigation in areas such as patents and copyright in 3d printing.
The 3rd speaker was a brilliant computer geek.
I knew that it was possible to scan and print a small object such as a spoon. I had no idea that the technology had advanced as far as it has. There seems to be no limits to what it is going to be able to do.
It has already been used in plastic surgery for a woman who was having to have a large part of her jaw removed for cancer. They were able to scan the area before removal and print out a prosthesis which exactly replicated her face.
But back to medicines.
The professor told us that soon everyone will be able to have a small printer like a microwave in the kitchen and be able to print out our own medicines. We will of course need a recipe.
How will this affect the drug companies?
It will make it very difficult for them to patent their drugs.
Another example given was spare parts for our cars. If we need a part we might be able to go on the internet and find a recipe for it and just print it out at home on our 3D scanner. But - it might be a poor recipe and we might not have the best quality ingredients and that could be dangerous in a car.
So - instead
We might go down to somewhere like Halfords. They would have the accurate licensed recipe from the car manufacturer and ingredients. They would then print the part out in their 3D printer. No need for them to stock parts for every car and no delay for you while they order them up from somewhere miles away.
The other worry is guns. Print your own gun!
Fancy a pair of designer sun glasses like your friend has. Well - just copy them in the scanner!
The law has not begun to catch up and it is going to be a minefield that makes file sharing on the internet look like nothing

Saint Anthony

In the middle of Edinburgh is a bit of countryside called The Queens park.  It has a hill called Arthur's seat  - which was a volcano
What I never knew, until this week, was that it also has a picturesque ruined chapel called St Anthony's Chapel - next door to St Anthony's well.
Apparently there is more than one St Anthony.
There is the well known St Anthony - good for finding things.
There is also a St Anthony who is good for skin complaints.
In long ago times, people with skin problems would flock to St Anthony's well to take the water and pray in the chapel.
Now - the water in the well is piped away and it is covered with a huge boulder (carried down to Edinburgh from the far North by a glacier after the ice-age).
The ruined chapel is sometimes used as a romantic backdrop for wedding photos.
St Anthony was born in 250 AD in Egypt  He gave away all his worldly goods and lived a  hermit's life in the desert. He was a very holy man. He asked that the site of his burial be unmarked but it was discovered and his relics were later thought to cure certain  painful skin diseases such as ergotism, erysipelas and shingles.
Erysipelas became known as St Anthony's fire
The Knights Hospitallers of St Anthony, were an organisation that cared for the sick all across Europe. In the 15th century they had a skin hospital in Leith (Edinburgh)
Saint Anthony is also the patron Saint of pigs, butchers and bacon!
http://web.undiscoveredscotland.com/edinburgh/stanthonys/

Prostate Cancer genetic markers found

Men the world over should rejoice at the medical news this week.  Genetic markers have been found connected to the nasty kind of prostate cancer.
Prostate cancer can almost be divided into two types
1. A friendly, very slow growing variety in which a man will probably die old of something quite different.
2. A very nasty, very fast growing variety which will kill a man off within 10 years or less.
Both types can be picked up by a simple screening blood test called a PSA.
The trouble is that it does not tell you which type it is.
So the poor man has to have a biopsy of the prostate which is done by sticking biopsy needles into it via the inside of his bum (anus/rectum).
If by chance a patch of cancer is picked up by one of the needles it can be looked at under a microscope and some idea of how nasty the type is ascertained.
If really nasty then treatment choice is easy - removal.
BUT
What to do -
if nothing is picked up by any of the needles???
if the PSA keeps getting worse???
What to do
No man wants to needlessly have his prostate obliterated by surgery or radiotherapy. It can have annoying affects on his ability to pee and poo and on his sex life.
Up until now you had to treat 12 to 48 men unnecessarily in order to save the life of one man
However - NOW - the great news
A simple £30 DNA blood test (on the NHS) can give the answer
Well it will do in about 5 years when they have it finally sorted.
They have tested lots of men with and without cancer and pinned down specific genetic markers . If a man has those then he is at very high risk of having nasty prostate cancer and once his PSA starts going up he needs his prostate obliterated.
Men that don't have those genetic markers can relax and stop worrying.
A statement issued said
"Take a room of 100 men. At the moment if I did a test of them all, I could split them into two thirds with a low risk and one third with a high risk. With this new test though I can pick out the one man in 100 with 4.7 times risk
There have been similar findings for breast cancer in women and also for ovarian cancer
It is also great news for children of parents with any of those cancers because they will be able to check out whether they need worry about themselves
Genetics is wonderful

It's not Hollywood - it's Holyrood

America has Hollywood - a very new place.
Scotland has Holyrood - a very ancient place.
Holyrood is a small area in Edinburgh, where now stands the beautiful Royal Holyrood Palace and  the ruins of Holyrood Abbey.
It is at one end of the Royal Mile. Edinburgh Castle is at the other end.
Sadly Holyrood now also houses the extremely ugly new Scottish Parliament buildings.
But
What does Holyrood mean?
Well - being Scotland there is an old legend.
About 1166  - just 100 years after '1066 and all that'  when William the Conqueror and his Normans invaded England - King David the first ruled in Scotland.
He liked to hunt in the Royal Forest, part of which was the area now called Holyrood and the rest was the area now called The Queens park (Arthur's Seat and Salisbury Crags)
In Scotland, hunting on The Sabbath is a no-no. The Sabbath is The Lord's day.
But - one Sunday - King David sneaked out after a stag.
He found one, but it turned out to be no ordinary stag. It was white and it had a cross sticking out of it's forehead!
Now I know what I would think if my husband came back from hunting talking about white stags and crosses but things must have been different then.
In Scotland  - a cross used to be called a rood.
King David took it as a holy sign that he should not have been hunting on The Sabbath.
To assuage his guilt he commanded that an abbey be built at the place where he saw the stag  with it's Holy Cross. Hence the name Holy Rood - Holyrood
And - so the legend goes one -
The Rood - the miraculous cross from the stag- was preserved there on the high altar until about 1346 when someone nicked it.
Perhaps Hollywood should make a film about Holyrood

Why old people die after a fall

It is well known that elderly people fall, break a hip, get pneumonia and die.
BUT WHY?
Younger people fall, break a hip and get better.
There is a branch of science that studies ageing  - called gerentology.
They have discovered that when something traumatic happens to you - such as breaking your hip -
it causes 2 chemicals to be produced in your blood.
These nicely balance each other.
When you are over age 60 and you have that same trauma -
it causes lots of 1 chemical (cortisol) to be produced
but
the ageing person can't make enough of the other one (DHEAS)
Without the balance of that second chemical, the first chemical reduced the persons ability to fight infection
So
You get pneumonia or MRSA
and die
The gerentologists are pushing for all hospitals to have the second chemical (DHEAS) available to be given to all trauma patients over the age of 60

DNA - Should the police keep records of us all

I used to think that it would be an excellent idea for everyone to have their DNA tested and for there to be a central DNA record. My thoughts were, that when a crime was committed the police would be able to find the perpetrator straight away.
If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear
BUT
I went to a talk from one of the world authorities on Forensics and
NO
"It would be a very bad idea"  he said
He explained
All of us have 2 parts to our DNA (one from Mum and one from Dad)
Quite often samples of DNA found at crime scenes are not pure, they are mixed with someone else's.
So, at the crime scene, one DNA could be A+B
and the other one, the one it is mixed with,  C+D
They are mixed together and so when tested,  the results might come up with B+C (or A+D)
So
If there was a central register, with the DNA of everyone in the country, they would look up B+C
and
It might be mine - a complete innocent who had never been anywhere near the scene of the crime.
They would claim they had DNA evidence that I had been there
FRIGHTENING