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Toe Cheese – It’s What’s For Dinner

Friday, November 22nd, 2013

Nope. We know what you’re wishing and your hopes are wrong. That’s not an old rice cake that someone dropped under the couch six months ago. It’s not a urinal cake either…because even that wouldn’t be as bad.

It’s exactly what your brain is screaming that it wasn’t right now…

That’s a block of cheese grown from…hold on to your lunch and put down anything you might be eating right now, kids…

Human toe cheese.

Not only did Christina Agapakis and Sissel Tolaas, who’re a part of an exhibit in Dublin called Grow Your Own…Life After Nature that is full of projects like this, create cheese wheels made from toe cheese. No. They swung for the wall by creating cheese wheels grown from other yummy ingredients like armpit sweat and bellybutton debris.

By scraping the bacteria from places that make every single one of cringe, they cultured that bacteria into cheese wheels that no one should ever, ever, EVER eat for fear of being that person for the rest of their lives.

But then again…if you served it to someone and they didn’t know what it was? Would that be a bad thing if they liked it?

You can let your last meal come up now.

[Sploid (via Gizmodo)]

Posted in Bacteria, Culture, Experiment, Science, Weird Foods | Comments Off on Toe Cheese – It’s What’s For Dinner

Cat’s Litterbox Causes Suicidal Tendencies!

Wednesday, July 4th, 2012

Feeling a little down lately? Maybe even depressed? Possibly eyeballing that extension cord in the garage and just thinking the world might be better off without you? Own a cat?

Then it’s really not you. You’re worthwhile. Stick around and enjoy life because it really is about to get better.

Just get rid of your cat and its litter box and all those suicidal feelings you’re having will go away.

Confused?

So was Dr. Teodor Postolache, an associate professor of psychiatry and director of the Mood and Anxiety Program at the University of Maryland School of Medicine after studies showed low-grade activity in the immune systems of suicide victims.

A new study is suggesting that there is a link between Toxoplasma Gondii and suicide attempts among women.

No…really…someone’s studying that.

Toxoplasma Gondii (T. gondii) has also been linked to schizophrenia and other psychological issues associated with suicide. So…what does all this have to do with your cat’s crapper? Easy…the T. gondii bacteria is often found in been-used cat litter. According to the US National Library of Medicine one of the ways you can get T. gondii is by:

Carelessly handling cat litter, which can lead to accidental consumption of infectious particles.

While the study points out it’s likely that while T. gondii might quietly be causing suicidal thoughts in women, it’s also possible that a large majority of the population is already walking around with this parasite in their bodies and just aren’t acting on the impulse.

“It appears that toxoplasmosis does things that unbalance emotional mental functioning,” said Raison, CNNHealth.com’s mental health expert. “Depending on other risk factors, maybe it makes you depressed, maybe it makes you impulsive.”

Here, kitty, kitty!

[CNN]

Posted in Bacteria, Disease | 1 Comment »

This Ugly Blob is the Future of New Materials

Monday, June 11th, 2012

That thing pictured over there to the right? That thing that looks like hair from your shower drain or a Giger-inspired coffee mug? It’s a living organism that just might be the future of how we harvest material for all of our tech needs.

Wait…wha?

That weird-looking thing is actually a genetically engineered living thing that, depending on the materials used to create it, produces various types of material including fiberglass and even magnetic nanoparticles.

Scientists at the University of California, Santa Barbara are continually tweaking the original DNA combinations used in these things to produce not only materials which we are currently using but to produce new types of materials that hadn’t even existed before.

Remember when your grandma would crochet a sweater for you that you’d never wear? In about ten years time you’ll be crocheting a Kevlar-like sweater for your grandchildren except that instead of rolls of yarn? You’ll have a bunch of THESE things producing all your Kevlar in different colors sitting in an adorable little basket covered in holograms of geese wearing bonnets.

[ARSTechnica”]

Posted in Bacteria, Biology, Experiment, Invention, Science, Weirdest Inventions | Comments Off on This Ugly Blob is the Future of New Materials