Category Archives: Immortality Medicine

An elegant young woman is smiling at the camera in the photo. Henrietta Lacks still had her life ahead of her. She was married with five children, but then an aggressive cancer ended her life early. The American died 1951, with 31 years. And yet it has given the world an unprecedented gift: She left behind immortal cells that have changed the world, said her grandson, Alfred Carter, in Geneva last week. There the World Health Organization (WHO) honored Lacks, 70 years after her death. Millions of people owe their lives to Henrietta Lacks.

Lacks had come 1951 to the Johns Hopkins Clinic in Baltimore near Washington with bleeding. Doctors diagnosed cervical cancer. Despite treatment, she died a few months later. A tissue sample taken from Lacks became a medical sensation. The cell biologist George Gey and his wife Margaret started a culture as usual, but unlike before, the cells did not die after a short time. Lacks cancer was so aggressive that the cells doubled every 18 hours.

The HeLa cell line named after the first letter of Lacks first and last name is legendary in medical circles. It became a cornerstone of modern medicine. There are now other cell lines, but the HeLa cells are robust and therefore continue to be in great demand. 50 Millions of tons have been produced and researched so far, said WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan. More than 75 studies based on research on HeLa cells, said they.

They were used to develop the polio vaccine, lots of drugs against cancer, HIV and AIDS, leukemia and Parkinsons. HeLa cells also played an important role in the development of the vaccines against the Sars-CoV-2 coronavirus, said Swaminathan.

Companies have patented certain uses of the cells and have made a lot of money with them. The German cancer researcher Harald zur Hausen found the human papilloma viruses HPV 16 and HPV 18 that led to the development of the HPV vaccine. He got the Nobel Prize for it.

In all of this there was no mention of Lacks or her family. It took 70 years until the honor ceremony for Henrietta Lacks at the WHO. Words cannot describe how much that means to me, said her son Lawrence Lacks (87) moving in Geneva. Grandchildren and great-grandchildren celebrated the moment, but it was clear that the family was disappointed.

Lacks actually only achieved fame through the bestseller The Immortality of Henrietta Lacks by the US science journalist Rebecca Skloot 2010. She described the familys annoyance to the rzteblatt at the time: On the one hand (are) the cells of Henrietta, who have done so much for humanity and with which some companies have earned a lot of money, and on the other hand, they themselves, who still lack the money to go to the doctor. Racism played a role: The African American Lacks was poor, people like her were ignored, ignored and not respected at the time.

Henrietta Lacks was taken advantage of, said WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus now frankly. Cells were removed from her without asking. She would have been happy to know that her suffering had saved so many people in the end, said Tedros. But the end does not justify the means.

Tedros, like the family, avoided the ongoing medical disadvantage of the worlds poor. It is true that the HPV vaccine was also created with the help of HeLa cells. But while young people in rich countries can be vaccinated with it without any problems, the substance is offered in less than a quarter of the poorest countries.

The family now has the HeLa 100 Initiative launched to celebrate Lacks unique contribution to medicine and make it known. We also want to promote equality in health for all and social justice, said her great-granddaughter Victoria Baptiste in Geneva. The family has at the beginning of October, on 70. Anniversary of Lacks death, a first lawsuit filed against a biotech company. She accuses her of doing business with cells taken from Henrietta Lacks without consent in a racist medical system. Further lawsuits against other companies are to follow, as the familys lawyers in Baltimore announced. (dpa)

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The immortal cells without which many therapies would not exist IMIESA - IMIESA

The Gynostemma Extract Market is slated to witness an exhilaration In Upcoming Years. The current situation calls for creating value and novel services for numerous stakeholders through innovation and acquisition of capabilities for rapidly adapting to the altering circumstances. As such, the profoundness of transformation concerning organizations and businesses activities, competencies, processes, and models is expected to be seen all through in the forecast period.

Gynostemma is an indigenous to countries such as China, southern Korea, northern Vietnam, and Japan.Gynostemma extract is famous for itsherbal medicineproperties which has influential adaptogenic andantioxidanteffects which increases longevity. Gynostemma extract has various therapeutic qualities such as lowering high blood pressure and cholesterol along with strengthening the immunity of the individual.

The species gynostemma such as G. pentaphyllum is widely distributed outside of China, which ranges from Southeast Asia to India to Korea and Japan. Gynostemma extract is mostly used as an herbal medicine. Gynostemma extract is also mostly consumed as herbal tea and is also available as an alcohol extract.

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Gynostemma plant is also known as immortality herb by local inhabitants in China and nearby countries. Gynostemma extract contains endogenous cellular which is a powerful antioxidant enzyme known as superoxide dismutase. Gynostemma extract also increases the activities of T lymphocytes, macrophages, and natural killer cells which acts as a tumor inhibitor.

Among these, capsule segment is expected to fuel the Gynostemma extract market over the forecast period. On the basis of application, the market is segmented into pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, food and beverages, and others.

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On analyzing the demand of Gynostemma extracts in form of capsule or pill, it was assessed that pharmaceutical and cosmetics supplements industry acquires majority of share in terms of volume. Primary reason behind its increasing demand for Gynostemma extracts in global level market is due to its richness in natural quality and organic nature.

In cosmetic supplement industry, Gynostemma extracts capsule or pill is consumed widely on a large scale by the people having skin related issues. Hence, the global Gynostemma extract market is expected to significantly increase the revenue contribution over the forecast period.

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Increasing usage of gynostemma extract in form of capsules or pills in dietary supplements worldwide has strengthened the growth of global Gynostemma extract market and hence is projected to significantly expand the revenue contribution of the market over the forecast period.

Nowadays consumers are mostly influenced towards that product which has natural quality, organic in nature and also good for their health, due to which it has higher demand among growing economies of world. On the other side as per the current market trend, Gynostemma extract powder is trending in market because of its wide application in pharmaceuticals, cosmetics and food and beverage products.

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Some of the key players identified across the value chain of the global Gynostemma extract market includes Nutra Green Biotechnology Co. Ltd, Shannxi Undersun Biomedtech Co. Ltd, Novoherb Technologies, Mountain Rose Herbs, Xian Tianxingjan Bio-products Co. Ltd., Huaian Chenhui Chemical Co., Ltd., Xian Natural Field Bio technique Co. Ltd., and others.

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Offbeat Thought-Process To Turn The Tide In Favor Of Gynostemma Extract Market The Manomet Current - The Manomet Current

In science fiction, the end of the world is a tidy affair. Climate collapse or an alien invasion drives humanity to flee on cosmic arks, or live inside a simulation. Real-life apocalypse is more ambiguous. It happens slowly, and theres no way of knowing when the Earth is really doomed. To depart our world, under these conditions, is the same as giving up on it.

And yet, some of your wealthiest fellow earthlings would like to do exactly that. Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and other purveyors of private space travel imagine a celestial paradise where we can thrive as a multiplanet species. Thats the dream of films such as Interstellar and Wall-E. Now comes news that Mark Zuckerberg has embraced the premise of The Matrix, that we can plug ourselves into a big computer and persist as flesh husks while reality decays around us. According to a report this week from The Verge, the Facebook chief may soon rebrand his company to mark its change in focus from social media to the metaverse.

In a narrow sense, this phrase refers to internet-connected glasses. More broadly, though, its a fantasy of power and control.

Beyond science fiction, metaverse means almost nothing. Even within sci-fi, it doesnt mean much. No article on this topic would be complete without a mention of the 1992 novel Snow Crash, in which Neal Stephenson coined the term. But that book offers scarce detail about the actual operation of the alternate-reality dreamworld it posits. A facility of computers in the desert runs the metaverse, and the novels characters hang out inside the simulation because their real lives are boring or difficult. No such entity exists today, of course, just as no real product even approximates the rough ideadrawn from Stephenson or William Gibson or Philip K. Dickof having people jack into a virtual, parallel reality with goggles or brain implants. Ironically, these writers clearly meant to warn us off those dreams, rather than inspire them.

In the simplest explanation, the metaverse is just a sexy, aspirational name for some kind of virtual or augmented-reality play. Facebook owns a company called Oculus, which manufactures and sells VR computers and headsets. Oculus is also making a 3-D, virtual platform called Horizonthink Minecraft with avatars, but without the blocks. Facebook, Apple, and others have also invested heavily in augmented reality, a kind of computer graphics that uses goggles to overlay interactive elements onto a live view of the world. So far, the most viable applications of VR and AR can be found in medicine, architecture, and manufacturing, but dreams of its widespread consumer appeal persist. If those dreams become realized, youll probably end up buying crap and yelling at people through a head-mounted display, instead of through your smartphone. Sure, calling that a metaverse probably sounds better. Just like the cloud sounds better than, you know, a server farm where people and companies rent disk space.

Its absurd but telling that the inspiration for the metaverse was meant as satire. Just as OZY Media misinterprets Shelley, so Zuck and crew misconstrue metaverse fiction. In Snow Crash, as in other cyberpunk stories (including the 1995 Kathryn Bigelow film Strange Days), the metaverse comes across as intrinsically dangerous. The books title refers to a digital drug for denizens of the metaverse, with harmful neurological effects that extend outside it.

That danger hasnt survived the metaverses translation into contemporary technological fantasy. Instead, the concept appeals to tech magnates because it connects the rather prosaic reality of technologized consumer attention to a science-fictional dream of escape. You can see why Zuckerberg, plagued by months and years of criticism of his decidedly low-fidelity social networks and apps, might find an escape hatch appealing. The metaverse offers a way to leave behind worldly irritants and relocate to greener pastures. This is the rationale of a strip miner or a private-equity partner: Take what you can, move on, and dont look back. No wonder fictional worlds with metaverses are always trashed.

The fantasy is bigger, though. CEOs in tech know that billions of people still live much of their life beyond computer screens. Those people buy automobiles and grow herb gardens. They copulate and blow autumn leaves. Real life still seeps through the seams of computers. The executives know that no company, however big, can capture all the world. But there is an alternative: If only the public could be persuaded to abandon atoms for bits, the material for the symbolic, then people would have to lease virtualized renditions of all the things that havent yet been pulled online. Slowly, eventually, the uncontrollable material world falls away, leaving in its stead only the pristinebut monetizablevirtual one.

The technical feasibility of such an outcome is slight, but dont let that bother you. More important is the ambition it represents for tycoons who have already captured so much of the global populations attention: Even as a hypothetical, a metaverse solves all the problems of physics, business, politics, and everything else. In the metaverse, every home can have a dishwasher. Soft goods such as clothing and art (and receipts for JPEGs) can be manufactured at no cost and exchanged for nothing, save the transaction fees charged by your metaverse provider. A metaverse also assumes complete interoperability. It offers a path toward total consolidation, where one entity sells you entertainment, social connection, trousers, antifreeze, and everything in between. If realized, the metaverse would become the ultimate company town, a megascale Amazon that rolls up raw materials, supply chains, manufacturing, distribution, and use and all its related discourse into one single service. It is the black hole of consumption.

Postmodern critics celebrated and lamented metadiscursivitythe tendency to talk about talking about things as a substitute for talking about them. Then going meta became a power move online, a way of getting atop and over a person, product, or idea in a futile attempt to tame it. In an era of infinite, free connectivity, meaning became so plentiful that it began to seem suspect. Going meta short-circuited the need to contend with meaning in the first place, replacing it with a tower of deferred meanings, each one-upping the lasts claim to prominence. Memes meme memes, then appear on T-shirts, then recur as Instagrammed latte art.

As I write this, a rumor about the rumor about Facebooks metaversal rebranding is circulating: Bloomberg reported yesterday that the company already owns meta.com, meta.org, and perhaps dozens of other meta-names, domains, handles, and properties. What better way to go meta on going meta than to rename the company Meta? (Later in the day, the technology writer Casey Newton reported that Zuckerberg is now leaning away from Meta as the name.)

Despite its slipperiness, going meta has another, firmer meaning. In Greek, the prefix meta () refers to transcendence. About-itselfness, the way ironists and epistemologists use the term today, offers one interpretation. But meta- also has a more prosaic meaning, referring to something above or beyond something else. Superiority, power, and conquest come along for the ride: A 1928 book on eugenics is titled Metanthropos, or the Body of the Future. A metaverse is a universe, but better. More superior. An berversum for an bermench. The metaverse, the superman, the private vessel of trillionaire intergalactic escape, the ark on the dark sea of ice melt: To abandon a real and present life for a hypothetical new one means giving up on everything else in the hopes of saving oneself. Thats hubris, probably. But also, to dream of immortality is to admit weaknessa fear that, like all things, you too might end.

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Facebook Understands the Metaverse All Too Well - The Atlantic

Mind & Matter is a new monthly column by Nick Jikomes, PhD, Leaflys Director of Science and Innovation.

In November 1963, the writer and psychedelic explorer Aldous Huxley laid in bed, unable to speak. He was dying of cancer. One of his final acts was to pass a handwritten note to his wife Laura.

His famous last words: LSD, 100 g, intramuscular.

It was Huxleys dying wish: a large dose of acid, please. Laura Huxley fulfilled the request twice during her husbands final hours.

First synthesized 25 years before Huxleys death, LSD was still legal in 1963. Scientists were studying it as a potential treatment for alcoholism and other ailments, as well as investigating its similarity to other psychedelics. It wasnt until 1968 that the federal government outlawed these drugs due to their association with the cultural turbulence of the 1960s.

Today, several decades later, terminal cancer patients are once again taking psychedelics. This time around the drugs are being administered by doctors and scientists in controlled settingsand they are not microdoses. The results of this research have been nothing short of remarkable.

Terminal patients often suffer from feelings of intense anxiety and despair after receiving their diagnoses. For many, this is just too much to bear. The overall suicide risk for these patients is double or more compared to the general population, with suicide typically occurring in the first year after diagnosis.

Terminal patients have twice the suicide risk of the general public. Psychedelics may help reduce their fear and suffering.

Thats where psychedelic therapy may help. After a single large dose of psilocybin, taken in a curated space and supervised by a pair of doctors, many patients report feeling reborn. Its not that the underlying physical disease has been cured. Rather, the drug prompts a shift in the theme of their emotional self-narrativefrom anxiety and despair to acceptance and gratitude.

It may seem curious to think about psychedelic drugs, often associated with hippies and the Grateful Dead, as clinical-grade tools for overcoming our primordial aversion to death. But maybe it shouldnt be. Maybe this is only surprising if your window of historical perspective is too narrow. Maybe these novel findings are, in a sense, a return to somewhere weve been before.

In late 2020 I spoke to Brian Muraresku, author of The Immortality Key: The Secret History of the Religion With No Name, about the use of psychoactive plant medicine throughout antiquity. Our podcast conversation covers this history in more detail, but its clear that humanitys relationship with psychoactive plants extends back at least to ancient Greeceif not further. Its hard to look at prehistoric cave paintings like the Tassili mushroom figure and not wonder if psychedelics played a part in their creation.

Western philosophy may have developed with help from psychedelics as well. In Platos well-known allegory of the cave, a group of prisoners live chained to a cave wall, seeing nothing but the shadows of objects projected onto it by fire. The shadows are their reality; they know nothing outside of it. Philosophers, Plato states, are like prisoners freed from the cave. They know the shadows are mere reflections, and they aim to understand deeper levels of reality.

If that sounds like someone whos explored those deeper levels with psychedelic assistancewell, maybe it was. In his book, Brian Muraresku explores the significance of the Eleusinian Mysteries, secret ceremonies that involved death and rebirth. For centuries, philosophers and mystics traveled to the Greek town of Eleusis to partake in a ritual that involved an elixir known as pharmakon athanasias, the drug of immortality.

Within the toolkit of the archaic techniques of ecstasyplant medicine just being one among manysomething you find again and again, in Ancient Greece and other traditional societies, is this sense that to die in this lifetime, or achieve a sense of timelessness in the here and now, is the real trick. -Brian Muraresku

Contemporary archaeologists, digging outside Eleusis, have unearthed ancient chalices containing a residue of beer and Ergotized grain. Ergot is a fungus that grows on grain. It produces alkaloids similar to LSD. Its possible, then, that influential thinkers like Plato were inspired by genuine psychedelic experiences.

This connection between psychedelics and death didnt end with Eleusis. It survived, often repressed and hidden from view, right through the time of Aldous Huxley.

In the 1960s, Timothy Leary co-wrote a book called The Psychedelic Experience: A manual based on the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Leary, the exiled Harvard professor and psychedelic guru, dedicated the book, with profound admiration and gratitude, to Aldous Huxley. It opens with a passage from The Doors of Perception, Huxleys essay on the psychedelic experience. Huxley is asked if he can fix his attention on what the Tibetan Book of the Dead calls the Clear Light. He answers yes, but only if there were somebody there to tell me about the Clear Light.

It couldnt be done alone. Thats the point of the Tibetan ritual, he says: You need somebody sitting there all the time telling you whats what.

Huxley was describing a trip sitter, someone who guides a person along their psychedelic journey. Sometimes its an ayauasquero in the heart of the Amazon. Sometimes its a doctor holding your hand in a hospital.

In his book, Leary grounded Eastern spiritual concepts in the understanding of neurology we had at the time. The states of consciousness achieved by meditation masters and those induced by three hits of Orange Sunshine, he wrote, may actually be the same. Both involve dissolving the ego (death) and allowing it to recrystallize as the default mode of consciousness returns (rebirth).

Leary wasnt talking about magic. Scientists know these as non-ordinary brain states, inducible by rigorous attentional practice (meditation), pharmacological intervention (psychedelics), and organic decay (dying).

The ability of psychedelics to induce these remarkable brain states may also be why theyre showing such promise in alleviating the very ordinary fear of death.

So what, exactly, has recent research on psilocybin as an end-of-life anxiety treatment involved?

A few small studies have seen psilocybin administered to dozens of cancer patients. Theyve been conducted in a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled fashion. In general, a large majority of patients showed sustained, clinically significant reductions in measures of psychosocial stress and increased levels of overall well-being.

For example, in one study, 80% of the patients found that a single dose of psilocybin quickly relieved their distress. Remarkably, in some patients that positive effect lasted for more than six months.

Whats going on at the neuronal level to produce those changes? We dont know for sure, but some preclinical research has given us a hint. Both psilocybin and LSD have been shown to induce rapid and lasting antidepressant effects in lab animals.

Early studies hint at how psychedelics may produce positive changes in the brain.

Early indications are that psychedelics may allow brain circuits to rapidly sprout new physical connections.This is exciting, but again: These are non-human studies, and its early.

Its gratifying to see any of these studies happening, frankly. This is research thats been stalled by the Schedule I status of psychedelics for half a century. Much of this work requires obtaining a special federal waiver to study banned substances, which slows progress.

Fortunately, the FDA recently designated psilocybin therapy as a breakthrough therapy and the DEA has proposed increasing the supply of psilocybin for research. This should speed up the rate at which we understand the clinical efficacy of psilocybin and related psychedelics.

Heres more good news: In terms of psilocybins efficacy as a treatment for end-of-life anxiety, larger human trials are already underway.

Dr. Stephen Ross, one of the fields leading researchers, has described the significance of this work: If larger clinical trials prove successful, then we could ultimately have available a safe, effective, and inexpensive medicationdispensed under strict controlto alleviate the distress that increases suicide rates among cancer patients.

In one sense, Aldous Huxley was ahead of his time. More than a half-century before todays renaissance in psychedelic research, his own experiences had evidently brought him to the conclusion that the best way to experience death was in a psychedelic trance.

In another sense, though, Huxley was one in a long line of creators stretching back to ancient Greek philosophers and perhaps even to prehistoric cave artists. They may all have used psychedelics to catalyze their outward creativity and comfort their inner distress.

Huxley titled his famous introspective essay, The Doors of Perception, after a quote from the English poet, William Blake: If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to [us] as it is, infinite.

We will never know what he experienced in the final hours before his death, after handing that note to his wife. I like to think that for him, the last breath seemed to last forever.

To learn more about Mind & Matter and listen to the podcast that inspired this article, visit THIS link.

Nick Jikomes

Nick is Leafly's Director of Science & Innovation and holds a PhD in Neuroscience from Harvard University and a B.S. in Genetics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is the host of a popular science podcast, which you can listen to for free at: http://www.nickjikomes.com

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Death and psychedelics: How science is reviving this ancient connection - Leafly

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Who among us has not dreamed of having superpowers? We are urged thereto by the avalanche of comics, movies, novels, and roleplaying games featuring abilities beyond mortal ken. Yet not all superpowers are created equal. Other abilities have disquieting consequences for their possessors.

Im not going to talk about superhumans with powers that would kill them or their friends if exercised. No one dreams of being any of the following:

Im talking, here, about powers that appear on their surface to be useful but later reveal themselves to be harmful to, or at least extremely alienating for, those who wield them. Below are my musings about five such examples

Many characters in comicsthe Human Torch, the other Human Torch, Flame Princess, and othershave the ability to cloak themselves in flames or in some cases (like Willy Pete (content warning) or Brimstone) are composed entirely of fire. Usually, such powers confer a degree of invulnerability to attack (ever try to shoot a fire to death?) and invulnerability to fire itself. A tricky power, which recurs again and again in comics because beings sheathed in flame look awesome.

Theres a downside, in that there are few problems that can be solved by setting things on fire. Also, human surroundings arent designed for fire resistance. Whole neighborhoods could go up in flames if the superhuman isnt careful. Ditto fields and forests. Best to keep Johnny Storm far from the West Coast during the drier months. Or entirely, just to be on the safe side.

It is also true that fire is a horrific weapon. Burns are a painful way to die. Burn scars and associated trauma can be debilitating. Comics tend to handwave away these facts. But they are real. There is a reason Protocol III to the Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons limits use of incendiary weapons against civilians.

***

Wouldnt it be great to be able to run across the country in a heartbeat, to clean ones house in a blink of an eye, to compose an overdue Tor.com article in one flat second? Except, of course, speeders are only fast from the perspective of normal people. From their own point of view, they move at regular speeds. Tasks that those around them think are finished almost instantly are still time-consuming from the viewpoint of someone whose perceptions work a thousand times faster.

Furthermore, from the speedsters perspective, everyone around them moves at the speed of cold molasses. A five-minute conversation might to them feel like it consumed weeks. Alan Moore once described the Flash as a man who moves so fast that his life is an endless gallery of statues. How horrific is that?

***

Anyone who has ever struggled to understand other people or to make themselves understood might wish for the ability to imprint information directly into someone elses mind (or conversely, to retrieve information from said other persons mind and figure out exactly what they are trying to say). Telepathy provides convenience and clarity.

The catch is that telepathy provides convenience and clarity. People are used to the privacy of their own minds; they share with others only that which they believe socially acceptable to share. Scan someones mind and who knows what you might discover? Particularly if the person being scanned makes the mistake of trying not to think of whatever terrible inner thoughts they might have Humans have conversational circumlocution for a reason, as Poul Andersons Journeys End demonstrated. Treasure your inability to communicate.

***

Wanting godlike intelligence also seems like something of a no-brainer. What could possibly go wrong with enhanced cognition (leaving aside the fact that there are lots of different forms of intelligence)? Intelligence is a powerful tool, an advantage that one might expect would allow the possessor to circumvent any obstacle, social or physical.

Exceptunless youre willing to contrive some way to boost everyone elses intelligence, you are consigned to a lifetime as the smartest person in the room. You will be the person on whose shoulders others will happily drop the weight of the world. Worse, you may be the person whose advice is frequently dismissed because nobody around them can understand the logic behind said advice, even when you take the time to dumb it down for them. Just ask Brainiac 5!

Far worse is the possibility that your exalted cognition may allow you to fully comprehend the reality of impending doom without being able to do anything to prevent doomsday. Not every problem has a solution. Ignorance can be bliss.

***

Indestructability has many, many positive aspects, starting with being indestructible. I cannot speak for the rest of you but whenever I am on fire, bleeding from conversational head wounds, hastily batting off fire-ants, or experiencing the immediate effects of having just been stabbed with semi-molten glass, I do yearn for a slightly greater resistance to physical harm than I seem to have. Even regenerative powers would be useful.

The catch in many cases has to do with time. Indestructible characters often gain comparative immunity to aging. On a personal level, this is awesome. On a social level, it means everyone around one is a mayfly. Every social connection between immortals and mortals is temporary by its nature. Its the nature of life that we will outlive some friends. The excessively durable can count on outliving all of them, along with the cultures they grew up in, entire cycles of civilizations, their home worlds, and possibly the universe itself. But at least they will have lots of time to contemplate their situation.

***

Now, arent you happy to be your ordinary self?

No doubt you have your own examples of stock superpowers with unacknowledged drawbacks, or else you would like to dispute the points above. Comments are, as ever, below.

In the words of Wikipedia editor TexasAndroid, prolific book reviewer and perennialDarwin Award nomineeJames Davis Nicoll is of questionable notability. His work has appeared in Publishers Weekly and Romantic Times as well as on his own websites,James Nicoll Reviewsand the Aurora finalistYoung People Read Old SFF(where he is assisted by editorKaren Lofstromand web person Adrienne L. Travis). He is a four-time finalist for the Best Fan Writer Hugo Award and is surprisingly flammable.

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Five Superpowers That Just Aren't As Fun as They Sound - tor.com

Alchemy is an ancient and subtle art. For thousands of years alchemists performed research into the ultimate nature of reality to find ways to produce everything gold to immortality. While alchemy came to be seen as a foolish endeavour that was hunting after things that were never there the work of alchemists produced chemicals and techniques still in use today. But thats not to say that alchemists did not end up doing some pretty strange things in their pursuits.

Here are ten of the weirdest things about alchemy and alchemists.

Top 10 Facts About the Great Beast Aleister Crowley

Alchemists were some of the greatest thinkers of their age. They wanted to know everything but sometimes their curiosity led them to attempt the impossible. John Damian de Falcuis was an Italian doctor and alchemist who convinced the king of Scotland to fund his research. Huge amounts of alchemical ingredients were provided at vast expense to the crown in hopes that Damian would be able to find a new way of making gold. Unfortunately he failed to do this but he did try to impress the king in other ways.

The poet William Dunbar wrote A Ballad of The False Friar of Tongland, How He Fell in the Mire Flying to Turkey, which mocked the career and works of John Damian. In particular it recounts Damians attempts to fly from the walls of Stirling Castle using a pair of wings he built for himself. Apparently Damian really did manage to fly, for at least a moment. Then he crashed into a pile of muck and broke his leg.

Damian managed to explain his failure to fly to the king. He ascribed the blame to the fact that there were some hen feathers in the wings which yearn for and covet the midden and not the sky. A bad bird-man blames his feathers.

Roger Bacon (In Our Time)

Roger Bacon was one of the great minds of the 13th century. So impressive were the range of his achievements that he was known to his colleagues as doctor mirabilis. He is credited with helping to develop the scientific method by putting emphasis on actually testing results. But like others of his day he also spent a lot of time working on alchemy.

Among the alchemical works attributed to Bacon are ones describing the hunt for the Philosophers Stone. His work discusses many of the processes used by alchemists of the time. Truly, whoever knows how to do these things would have the perfect medicine, which the philosophers call the Elixir, which immerses itself in the liquefaction as it is consumed by the fire and does not flee.

His most famous alchemical act however was the supposed creation of a Brazen Head. In a 16th century work called The famous historie of Fryer Bacon we are told how Bacon made a head from bronze that would reveal the secrets of the universe. To do this he makes a perfect model of a human head from metal, including its brain, and sets it to work. Unfortunately Bacon slept through the words of wisdom the head finally spoke. Time is. Time was. Time is past.

Some of the greatest discoveries in the history of science were made by accident. and the same is true of alchemy. Hennig Brand lived in the 17th century and was a keen alchemist. He used the wealth brought to him by his first wife to pursue his hunt for the Philosophers Stone. This didnt work out and he spent all of his first wifes money. A second fortuitous marriage gave him more means to carry on the hunt.

Brands big idea was that urine could be used to produce silver. So Brand took urine and boiled it down. A lot of urine. This left some solid residue that Brand could work with. He added this to a furnace and heated it red hot. Suddenly a luminous cloud of fumes formed and a liquid poured out that caught fire. When this liquid was captured and covered it glowed for hours with a green light. Brand had discovered the element Phosphorous.

To get around 120 grams of phosphorous Brand had to boil down over 5,000 litres of urine.

One of the highest mysteries in alchemy was on how to create life. Among the most famous alchemists of all time was Jabir ibn Hayyan and much of his work involved the struggles to make new life.

Jabir, known as Geber to European alchemists, lived in the early 8th century and became so famous that many works of alchemy were ascribed to his name. He is sometimes called the father of chemistry because he discovered ways of creating inorganic compounds from organic substances. Jabir also claimed to have invented an elixir that could restore health.

I saw her almost dead, her strength very much depleted. But I had a little of the elixir with me and of this I made her drink the amount of 2 grains in 3 oz. of pure oxymel. By God and by my Master, I had to cover my face before the maiden, for in less than half an hour her perfection was restored even to a higher degree than she had formerly possessed.

He also worked on creating synthetic life from inanimate sources a process known to Islamic alchemists as Takwin. Among the recipes Jabir, or those writing in his name, have left us are methods of making snakes, scorpions, and even humans in the alchemical lab. So far no one has actually managed to follow Jabirs instructions successfully.

Kings, Queens, Popes, and Emperors have all poured fortunes into alchemy. Throughout history the lure of creating precious metals from nowhere has been a powerful one for those in power. But when the alchemists inevitably failed they often found themselves with an angry and vengeful patron. One punishment for alchemists was to hang them on a scaffold gilded with gold to show the fruits of their false promises.

Henry IV of England issued a law in 1404 called The Act Against Multiplication. This was not a law against mathematics but one that banned alchemy. The multiplication in question was the multiplication of precious metals. The worry was that if someone found out how to make gold or silver it would make the crowns currency worthless.

In 1317 Pope John XXII issued a decretal called Spondent Pariter that banned alchemy. The pope called alchemy The Crime of Falsification. If an alchemist claimed to have made a precious metal then they would be fined the weight of that metal in gold. Those who could not pay were sentenced to prison. John XXII characterised alchemists as Poor themselves, the alchemists promise riches which are not forthcoming.

John Dee was one of the foremost alchemists and magicians of Elizabethan England. He was even an advisor for a time to Elizabeth I and was the first person to suggest the formation of a British Empire. Unfortunately Dee was less lucky in his choice of advisors and he fell in with a number of charlatans.

One of Dees partners was Edward Kelley who was well known as an alchemist. It was Elizabeths hope that Dee and Kelley could produce enough gold to solve Englands financial troubles. Kelley, despite his reputation, failed to make any gold or much money for himself. He did find a way to solve his own personal money worries by suggesting to Dee that an angel had told him they should share all their possessions and even their wives.

Dee was apparently convinced that Kelley was a conduit for angelic chats. He was sure that by talking to angels he could gain access to the wisdom of the universe. To consult angels Dee and Kelley used a scrying stone of polished obsidian. But on another occasion an angel actually handed over the stone that was to be used. Dee described how:

I cam within 2 feet of it, I saw nowthing, then I saw like a shadow on the ground.. hard by my books under the west window. The shadow was roundish, and less than the palm of my hand. I put my hand down upon it, and I felt a thing cold and hard, which taking up, I perceived to be the stone before mentioned.

Johann Conrad Dippel who lived at the end of the 18th century may have had one of the most eventful lives of all alchemists. So eventful that he might have been the inspiration for Victor Frankenstein.

Dippel was many things. As a theologian he found himself in the middle of many disputes. His views were so controversial that he found himself banned from whole countries like Sweden and Russia. In between religious fights he spent his time working on creating an elixir of good health.

This elixir was made by boiling up bones, blood, and other fluids in iron vessels. The end result of this was a tar-like and brown fluid that smelled atrocious. Instead of curing all illness it merely stimulated most people exposed to it, or stimulated them to run away. It is said that Dippel offered to swap the recipe for his invention for the deeds to Castle Frankenstein. In the Second World War this Dippels Oil was used to poison wells to prevent enemies using them. Because it was not deadly this was not strictly in breach of the Geneva Conventions.

Since his death it has been claimed that Dippel was the inspiration for Frankenstein because he used to steal bodies for his experiments. What we do know from his writings was that he was interested in whether the soul could be transferred to a dead body.

Isaac Newton was one of the brightest people of the 17th century and not just because he worked so much on the physics of light. He was a mathematician and physicist who created some of the most important works in those fields. Yet we now know that much of his time was dedicated to the study of alchemy. One scholar has said Newton was not the first of the age of reason, he was the last of the magicians. In Newtons papers there are nearly one million words that he wrote about alchemy.

The work Newton did in science was not always fully separate from his alchemical research. Alongside his work on optics can be found references to alchemical ingredients like Neptunes Trident, Mercurys Caducean Rod, and Green Lyon.

Newton suffered a nervous breakdown while pursuing his alchemy. It is entirely possible that mercury fumes produced in his research contributed to his mental instability. One chemical demonstration known as Dianas Tree convinced him that metal was imbued with some form of life when he saw crystals of silver forming.

We may have Newtons fondness for alchemy to thank for the colours of the rainbow. It was Newton who demonstrated that white light is made up of a spectrum of colours and he named seven of them. Most people cant really see a difference between indigo and violet yet Newton wanted there to be seven colours because seven was important in alchemical symbolism.

Chrysopoeia, the transmutation of base metals into gold, was one of the key goals of alchemy. Yet despite the claims of countless alchemists over the centuries there was never any successful demonstration of lead changing into gold for all their efforts. With the development of modern chemistry we learned that no amount of boiling, mixing, or burying in manure would change one element into another. But physics offered one method to transmute metals.

The development of nuclear physics allowed scientists to probe the workings of the atom. Elements are defined by the number of protons in their nucleus and that is why chemical processes will never transform one element into another. But by bombarding nuclei together physicists were able to change bismuth atoms into gold ones.

Unfortunately it turns out that the energy and technology needed to smash atoms together is far more expensive than any gold that might be produced.

Chinese alchemists had reached a high level of technical skill long before Europeans began trying the subtle art. Over 2000 years ago an alchemist known to us only as Fang claimed that she had found the true method making silver.

Fang was closely associated with the Imperial Court and may even have taught alchemy to one of the Emperors consorts. From the methods that Fang was described as using it seems that she may have found a way of using mercury to purify silver. This is a technique that is still used. When mercury is added to ores with high levels of precious metals the metals dissolve in the mercury but are left behind when the mercury evaporates.

Unfortunately Fang was not as lucky in her choice of husband. Her husband could not stand that she knew this secret. Fang would only explain that the knowledge of alchemy cannot be gained unless one has the right destiny. Unhappy with this her husband beat her, but still she would not reveal the secret.

According to our sources Fang never did give up the true nature of her alchemy but her husband kept tormenting her for it. Eventually she was driven mad, ran from the house naked, covered herself in mud, and then diedtaking the secret to her grave.

fact checked by Jamie Frater

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10 Amazing Alchemical Tales - nation.lk - The Nation Newspaper

Associate Professor Tony Cesare with members of his lab team at CMRI. Follow the lab on Twitter @TheCesareLab

The immortals we all carry are stem cells that are like universal patches that convert into whatever cells are needed at that moment skin cells, bone, hair, gut. Stem cells must be ever ready, so their telomeres are kept permanently long by an enzyme called telomerase. Stem cells are the only cells in the body that get this telomerase attention.

That means, once a stem cell becomes a specific type of cell, it no longer has a way to keep its telomeres long, says Cesare. From then on, the telomeres shorten every time it divides.

The internet snake oil sellers have grabbed onto the telomerase enzyme as a possible doorway to health and extended longevity, recommending it as a supplement to keep telomeres long, but as one of the worlds most knowledgeable people on the subject, Cesare advises against.

By giving a cell telomerase, and artificially extending its life, you're interfering in how telomeres prevent damaged cells multiplying and how they prevent tumours from happening, he says. Use telomerase in this way, and I believe the result could be cancer. To underscore the point, consider this: there is one other group of cells unexpectedly kept immortal by telomerase: cancer cells.

Cancer is a wily adversary: evading the immune system; hijacking the bodys nutrition sources to feed itself; riding the bloodstream to other parts of the body. And yes, cancer tricks telomerase into elongating telomeres, thereby allowing its cells to replicate ad infinitum.

We don't study specifics like pancreatic cancer or breast cancer, says Cesare. We're interested in what damage occurs with the DNA that allows a cell to become cancerous, to become immortal.

The crossroads of telomerase, cancer and stem cells is proving to be a rich source of new insights, not just about cancer and longevity, but also for the burgeoning field of regenerative medicine; the idea being that if stem cells can transform into almost any other cell in the body, could they be used to generate body tissues for transplantation?

Much of Cesares research is now focused on how telomeres control the delicate balance between allowing and preventing cell division.

It is a strange contradiction of short telomeres that while they are associated with the conditions of aging, they are also critically important in preventing cancer. Cesare was the first to understand a critical step in this cancer prevention mechanism and how it relates to cell division.

When actual DNA is damaged (as opposed to the telomeres), a signal stops cell division from happening until the DNA is repaired. Then cell division starts again. Cesare found that short telomeres can turn on the damage signal to stop cell division, while also preventing repair from happening. In effect, permanently retiring the cell.

Allowing that cells with short telomeres are reaching the end of their usefulness, and may indeed be making poor copies of themselves, preventing these cells from multiplying reduces the possibility of cancers developing.

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Cancer treatment: where DNA, stem cells and cell immortality meet - News - The University of Sydney

The last time they see each other, the night my mother dies, my daughter crawls into her lap and they cuddle on the big couch in front of the big TV downstairs in the big house that belongs to us all. This house has arms long enough to wrap around us all. Bedrooms and balconies and a kitchen big enough to sit in.

I notice that my mothers hands are puffy and her face is tired. I tell her to drink her medicine. Her arms squeeze her grandbaby and she says of course she will. She doesnt. The tragedy has already been scripted. We are living through the last lines of the book of her life and we do not yet know it. Hours later, cradled by her bathtub in the house she loves, surrounded by her children and their children, my mother dies.

My sadness at my mothers death is compounded by my daughters confusion. What do you call this? Sadness squared perhaps. But the two of us are not alone in our sense of abandonment. We are all bereft my sisters and our husbands and my father, who becomes a ghost of himself almost immediately. Heartache multiplied by infinity.

I never imagined what it might mean for my daughter to lose my mother. I thought only about her losing me. This is the problem with the calculus of risk; you never quite get the formula right.

Insurance policies ask what you will do in the event that both spouses die, but tragedys portfolio is complex. I never considered that I would lose my mother at the same time that my daughter would lose her grandmother; multiple losses embodied in one womans unexpected death.

The rituals that followed the vigils and the singing and condolences gave shape to our mourning. But after the early bursts of tears, after the praises have been spoken, and the good days remembered, and the lament cried, and the grave closed, there is no company in grief, says American author Ursula Le Guin. It is a burden borne alone.

After the mourning, as grief set in and hardened, there followed a time of utter desolation. Her death sent me into the territory of panic I had first encountered at 12. I was no longer 12, but I was still terrified by the knowledge that she had been claimed by what James Baldwin describes as the terrifying darkness from which we come and to which we shall return.

46

This has been a pandemic of a year but still somehow this miraculous thing has happened to my daughters body. She has stretched and blossomed and suddenly there is this and she is in tears and does not want to grow up and we are staring at one another in shock and grief and wonder. I assume she can bear life and it makes me sad and strangely complete to know that one day I will have outlived my usefulness to the planet, and she will remember me, and, in this way, I too will live.

I had no more answers in the wake of my mothers death than I did when I lay shuddering in my bed in the months after the Challenger exploded. What I had what I have always had is an instinct to survive. And this instinct so clear in the very fact of my daughter and the need for me to keep her safe has been my saving grace.

As a child I wept at the sight of seven men and women burning on the television screen. As a young woman I cried at the sight of a plane crashing into sky and steel. In the months that followed, as war rained on innocents in the aftermath, I marched to mourn the deaths of strangers. In my forties I lost my mother and felt that I would die from the pain of it.

Through it all, I have been fearful and anxious and still I have stared death in the face. Lifes hardest moments do not require courage, they simply require accompaniment. And this I have had in abundance all the days of my life.

Sisonke Msimang is the author of Always Another Country: A Memoir of Exile and Home and The Resurrection of Winnie Mandela. Last week she won the Western Australian Writers Fellowship at the WA Premiers Book awards.

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BOOK EXTRACT: Sisonke Msimang on death and dying - Business Day

People are becoming increasingly aware of the many ways in which fungi support life on our planet. They break down decaying organic matter, improve soil health, and form close relationships with plants and animals.

Throughout the millennia, humans have developed a profound connection with these fascinating organisms. We have used mushrooms for nutritional, medicinal, and religious purposes since prehistoric times. However, they are now becoming more popular than ever, and mushroom supplements are all the rage.

This article explores some of the best-known mushroom supplement benefits and why they are in such high demand.

What Are Mushroom Supplements?

However, the mushrooms that you typically find in the supermarket are just the tip of the iceberg. Although there is a greater variety available than ever before, there are many more unsung heroes of the mushroom world.

Many of these species are too woody or bitter to be edible in a conventional sense but hold great therapeutic potential. Sometimes known as medicinal or functional mushrooms, these species are rich in bioactive compounds that can influence both body and mind. They have a broad range of benefits, including supporting digestion, immunity, mental function, and more.

Despite these mushrooms positive influence on our health, they are not generally known for tasting great. They can also be tricky and time-consuming to prepare. Thats where medicinal mushroom supplements come in. An ever-increasing number of people are tuning in to this effective and hassle-free way to benefit from mushrooms daily.

So, what are the options, and how do you choose the right product for you? Lets take a closer look.

Mushroom Supplements: Types and What to Look For

A wide variety of mushrooms can be classified as functional or medicinal. Some of the best-known examples include reishi, lions mane, turkey tails, cordyceps, and chaga, although there are many more.

The most traditional methods of consuming these fungi involve simmering them in water to create mushroom broths or teas. Unfortunately, the process is slow and requires more time than most peoples hectic schedules allow. Thats why mushroom supplement companies tend to offer a selection of alternatives.

For example, mushroom powders are a popular and adaptable option. It is possible to add them to smoothies, soups, or pretty much any food or beverage imaginable. However, depending on the recipe, the mushroom taste and powdery texture may be noticeable.

Some brands offer their powders in the form of mushroom drinks. They include a blend of specially selected ingredients that complement the fungis natural flavor. The most popular products include classics like mushroom coffee and more decadent options, including hot chocolate and chai latte.

Mushroom capsules are another great choice. They consist of mushroom powder in a capsule casing, allowing consumers to swallow them like pills. They are perfect for people with little spare time or who prefer to take their mushrooms on the go.

Regardless of the mushroom type and dosage form, customers should look for a reputable brand that uses organic, natural ingredients. In an ever-expanding market, it is essential to thoroughly research the options to find a quality product that meets your needs.

One company that fits the bill is VidaCap. A relative newcomer to the industry, the brand is already making waves with its Pure Mushrooms and Mushroom Blends. Their USA-made capsules are among the strongest on the market today. They are also vegan and gluten-free, meaning everyone can enjoy the benefits of mushrooms.

What Are Mushroom Supplements Good For?

The main active components of most mushrooms are complex carbohydrates called beta-glucans. Our bodies cannot digest these large molecules readily, so they act as dietary fiber.

Therefore, they help to support digestive and metabolic function. Mushrooms also promote immune health, which is one of the most significant benefits of mushroom supplements.

Various species also contain unique compounds that provide them with additional effects. Here are just a few of the reasons why people choose to take these products:

Reishi

As well as promoting general wellbeing, reishi reportedly has soothing properties due to its high concentration of aromatic triterpenes. Therefore, many people choose reishi as a relaxation and sleep aid.

Lions Mane

Lions mane contains unique chemicals that promote nerve growth and function in the brain. Therefore, many people take it to improve mental function, focus, and clarity.

Turkey Tails

These mushrooms are especially rich in beta-glucans and are best-known for their influence on the immune system. They also promote digestive health and general wellbeing.

Cordyceps

People use cordyceps for many reasons, although athletes particularly favor them. They are said to promote performance and recovery, improve energy, and more.

Chaga

It is known as an immune system enhancer and promotes gut health and metabolism. People also use it as an everyday supplement to improve general wellbeing.

Can You Take Mushroom Supplements Daily?

Mushroom supplements are ideal for everyday use. In fact, taking them regularly is the best way to maximize their benefits. They contain fiber, protein, vitamins, and minerals that contribute to your daily nutritional requirements and support optimal health.

Moreover, mushrooms are considered a food supplement, and there should be no issues with long-term use. However, it is essential to choose a reputable brand that is transparent about its products ingredients.

Premium-grade items should come with lab reports to confirm that they are free from pesticides, heavy metals, mold, and other harmful contaminants.

What Are the Side Effects of Mushroom Supplements?

Most people can take mushroom supplements without experiencing any adverse effects. However, some individuals could have an allergic reaction to some of the ingredients. Therefore, anyone who knows they have an allergy to mushrooms or any other substances should exercise caution.

Other possible side effects of mushroom supplements include gastrointestinal upsets due to their high fiber content. However, these are unusual and should only occur when taking very high doses. People with sensitive digestive systems should start with a small amount and increase it gradually to reduce the risk of reactions.

Bottom Line on Mushroom Supplement Benefits

The health benefits of mushroom supplements are numerous. They include supporting gut health, metabolism, immunity, and much more. There are also a variety of different mushrooms with unique properties to suit every individuals needs.

Mushrooms are generally considered safe, providing the products are well-manufactured and free from contaminants. The best brands provide lab reports to confirm their supplements purity and potency.

Why not give mushroom supplements a try and see for yourself how much better you could feel?

Natalie Saunders is an acupuncturist, natural health enthusiast, and lover of all things fungal. She studied in the UK and China before becoming a freelance writer in the health and wellness niche. She is one of the contributors to VidaCap, a functional mushroom supplement brand that supplies organic medicinal fungi products.

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What Are the Benefits of a Mushroom Blend Supplement? - Riverfront Times