During his homily this Easter, Pope Benedict argued that medical science, in trying to defeat death, is leading humanity toward likely condemnation. It’s a position at odds with the value of life, one that the Church will likely revise years from now, replaying the institution’s embarrassment over censoring Galileo. “Let us reflect for a moment,” [...]

continue reading.....

What a great story in today’s SF Chronicle. Hazel Soares now 94, has been married twice, raised six kids, seen two economic depressions, 15 U.S. presidents and two world wars. She’s been a working single mother, a nurse, a concert event organizer and an art lover. She has more than 40 grandchildren. And next month, [...]

continue reading.....

From the Telegraph: The research into how Planarian worms can regrow body parts – including a whole head and brain – could one day make it possible to regenerate old or damaged human organs and tissues, the University of Nottingham said. The research, led by Dr Aziz Aboobaker, a Research Councils UK Fellow in the [...]

continue reading.....

This is a great article on organ printing by Cnet. Organovo is working on blood vessels before attempting to print larger organs since oxygen is an issue.

continue reading.....

A gene that controls racism appears to exist. However, if you disable it, you get something called Williams syndrome, a disorder where people have problems identifying others with malevolent intentions. Here’s the story, which cites research from Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg of the University of Heidelberg in Germany.

continue reading.....

In his Easter homily, Pope Benedict argues that attempting to prolong life is not a goal worthy of our efforts. Here’s how he put it: Modern medical science strives, if not exactly to exclude death, at least to eliminate as many as possible of its causes, to postpone it further and further, to prolong life [...]

continue reading.....

Interesting press release from Duke University: “Over the past 170 years, in the countries with the highest life expectancies, the average life span has grown at a rate of 2.5 years per decade, or about 6 hours per day….It is possible, if we continue to make progress in reducing mortality, that most children born since [...]

continue reading.....

From the WSJ: “Scientists from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas and others have shown they can keep certain types of cells living forever, including those from the breast, skin, retina and, recently, the colon, by adding telomerase to keep telomeres intact or repair those that became too short. Now researchers are [...]

continue reading.....