Blogs / Discoblog

Have you ever tasted spoiled beer? Twenty-six-year-old Monique Haakensen once did. A few years ago, when the Canadian woman watched her brothers attempt to brew their own beer, the end result smelled like cheese and tasted awful.

To figure out what caused the beer to go bad, Haakensen, a University of Saskatchewan graduate student, bottled the beer and brought it into the lab. Using a technique called polymerase chain reaction, she was able to discover two new genes (hitA and horC) that hastened the growth of bacteria in beer.

Normally, bacteria don’t grow in beer, but when there’s a resistance-associated gene in the brew, certain strains can thrive. The most common bacteria that causes beer spoilage is lactic acid bacteria (LAB). Haakensen looked to see how LAB’s isolates, Lactobacillus and Pediococcus, grew in beer. By using this new form of DNA testing, Haakensen can now tell breweries how quickly their beer will go bad by checking for the presence of either hitA or horC.

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Remember how all the Prozac we’ve been flushing through our systems (and our sewers) was entering the water supply and messing with the fish? Well, a new argument claims that this is precisely what’s going on with men who’re having a little trouble in the fertility department. And just who is making this rather dubious claim? None other than the Pope himself.

According to His Eminence, the demon birth control is finding its way from the urine of loose women into the otherwise-pure systems of unsuspecting males, robbing them of their baby-making mojo.

Pedro Jose Maria Simon Castellvi, president of the International Federation of Catholic Medical Associations, stated that the pill “has for some years had devastating effects on the environment by releasing tonnes of hormones into nature,” and as a result “[w]e have sufficient evidence to state that a non-negligible cause of male infertility in the West is the environmental pollution caused by the pill.”

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Many people (Discoblog editors included) who crave that mid-afternoon cookie fix may joke that they have a sugar addiction, but now scientists have made it official. Researchers at Princeton University report that sugar-loving mice demonstrate all three criteria of addiction: increased intake, withdrawal, and cravings that lead to relapse.

Previous work has shown that mice deprived of food for several hours and then allowed to binge on sugar water (with concentrations similar to that of soft drinks) soon developed addictive behaviors. Sugar intake causes the release of dopamine in the brain, a reward chemical. After a month of sugar binging and increased dopamine levels, the rats’ brains developed fewer dopamine receptors and more opioid receptors—changes similar to those observed in mice on cocaine and heroine.

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Scientists have discovered two pounds of a dried plant that turned out to be the oldest marijuana in the world. Inside one of the Yanghai Tombs excavated in the Gobi Desert, a team of researchers found the cannabis packed into a wooden bowl resting inside a 2,700-year-old grave. It was placed near the head of a blue-eyed, 45-year-old shaman among other objects like bridles and a harp to be used in afterlife.

At first, the researchers thought the dried weed was coriander. Then they spent 10 months getting the cannabis from the tomb in China to a secret lab in England. Finally, the team put the stash through “microscopic botanical analysis” including carbon dating and genetic analysis, and discovered the stash was really pot.

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As truffle season kicks into gear, the French are taking drastic measures to save their highly-prized black truffle, which sells for more than a $1000 a kilo. Apparently, 40 to 50 tons per year (the current output) of the pungent, lumpy fungus with reported aphrodisiac powers isn’t enough to satiate the bon vivants. A hundred years ago, the country was producing 1,000 tons per year of truffle, but global warming and the decline of farming have made the delicacy harder to find.

Truffles are tricky to grow. They require a symbiotic relationship with specific types of trees. The Black Périgord Truffle, known as the “black diamond,” grows exclusively on the roots of oak trees.

Now, as a last ditch effort to save the truffle industry, French scientists are turning to cloning. The Financial Times reports:

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No one will stop you from puttering around the supermarket in sweat pants and mangy hair, but the produce selection faces far more stringent standards. Throughout Europe, crooked cucumbers, forked carrots, and bananas with one too many blemishes have been banned from the markets for the past two decades. But a new decision by the European Union will lift appearance-based restrictions for 26 types of fruits and vegetables, including asparagus, cherries, and onions, allowing all shapes and sizes to vie for a place in your shopping cart. Ten other types of produce, including apples, peaches, and tomatoes, will enjoy relaxed standards, but misshapen individuals will still need to be labeled as such.

Proponents of irregular produce cited the recent economic downturn and the wastefulness of throwing away produce just because they are the “wrong” shape. However, political support for the new standards was far from unanimous, with 16 out of the EU’s 27 nations voting against the changes. The new rules will take effect next July. Produce not included in the list, like bananas, will still have to pass strict beauty standards.

Authorities were eager to offer their praise of the deregulation:

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• Recession? What recession? Home builders turn to unused shipping containers for building materials (though honestly it’s hard to fault their innovation).

• Scientists in Mexico successfully turn tequila into diamond films. Sales of Cuervo skyrocket.

• Watching TV makes you pregnant! Well, not really. But a new study seems determined to link the two. Granted, eating junk food may have just as much of a link.

• Wine connoisseurs, guard your fridges: The newest MLB secret may be keeping balls in a humidor (uh, baseballs, of course).

• Literature in the Internet age: The Twitter novel. ‘Nuff said.

• Think we’ve got a health care crisis brewing? Well here’s something to chew on: Leprosy is still present in the U.S. We wonder what the Aetna coverage is like for that one.

• They love these in Alaska: “A warty, sometimes spotted, reddish, forearm-long fellow with meaty muscles.”

• Don’t feel guilty: There’s a scientifically good reason to gorge yourself on Halloween candy.

• You think being stuck in a cubicle is bad? NASA builds a computer therapist for depressed astronauts.

• Halloween Costumes + Animal Sex = Green Porno (totally safe for work!)

• Just one look from Sir David Attenborough makes carnivorous frogs want to have babies.

• Yet another nutty animal recue mission: Polar bear falls into a dry moat and refuses to use the stairs.

Female coffee drinkers beware: that Pumpkin Spice Latte might shrink your breasts. Or so you would think, if you scanned the headlines last week. A new study in the British Journal of Cancer [subscription required] has incited mass hysteria over a tenuous link between coffee intake and breast size. The Telegraph warns: “Drinking Too Much Coffee Could Shrink Women’s Breasts,” while UPI throws in a pun: “Study: Cups of Java Cut Cup Size.” But the best comes from the New York Post: “Women Face Drink & Shrink Dilemma, Coffee Poses a Booby Trap.”

But before you pour that cup of coffee down the sink (or “accidentally” spill it on your busty archnemesis) let’s take a closer look at that study:

Researchers from Sweden recruited 269 women (average age was 29) to have their breast size measured and to answer a questionnaire about coffee intake and other lifestyle choices. All the women were from families at high risk for breast cancer and about half carried a gene, CYP1A2*1F, that is associated with breast cancer. Essentially, the researchers were studying the relationship between CYP1A2*1F, breast size, and coffee intake. The gene is known to control the metabolism of the hormone estrogen as well as certain chemicals found in coffee; it’s also been linked to higher breast density and thus higher breast cancer risk.

This is what they found:

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First the dogs, then the infants—it was just a matter of time before the melamine scandal would hit the adult entertainment sector. And then word came last Friday that the U.K.’s Food Standards Agency was issuing an alert against certain “novelty products” —namely, strawberry-flavored body pens and chocolate-flavored “willy spreads,” an edible balm that can be slathered on the penis.

The sex products contained levels of melamine up to 100 times over the legal limit, set at 2.5mg/kg. Melamine is a nitrogen-containing toxin that has recently been found in pet foods, baby formulas, and White Rabbit candies manufactured in China. It’s added to spike the amount of protein that shows up in food tests.

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