Pill-popping ancients liked a good dose of vegetables, archaeobotanists have found after analyzing plant DNA in Greek-made pills from a 130 BC shipwreck.
Though archaeologists have known about the ship since the 1980s, this is the first time researchers have had a crack at analyzing the drugs found onboard. Using the GenBank genetic database as their guide, they have found that the pills appear to contain carrot, parsley, radish, alfalfa, chestnut, celery, wild onion, yarrow, oak, and cabbage.
Geneticist Robert Fleischer of the Smithsonian’s National Zoological Park says that many of the ingredients match those described in ancient texts, New Scientist reports. Yarrow was meant to slow blood coming from a wound, and carrot–as described by Pedanius Dioscorides, a pharmacologist in Rome–was thought to ward off reptiles and aid in conception.
Fleischer and colleagues presented these first results yesterday at the Fourth International Symposium on Biomolecular Archaeology in Denmark, and Nature’s blog The Great Beyond reports that the pills also contained some surprises. For one, researchers found sunflower or helianthus believed to be a New World plant unknown to the Europeans until the 1400s. Now researchers must determine if the ancient Greeks really prescribed sunflower concoctions or if the some modern, ancient drug handlers contaminated the find. They also hope to find “theriaca,” a medicine described in ancient texts as containing 80 different plants–a pill to put the modern health drink V8 to shame.
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Image: Wikimedia Commons / Dioscorides: Materia Medica.
Just in time for the release of Denny’s new Fried Cheese Melt, a study in The American Journal of Cardiology questions if cholesterol-reducing drugs called statins might pair well with fast food. A side of McStatins with that Big Mac, the study suggests, could decrease the risk of cardiovascular disease.
Using data from previous studies, researchers in the UK compared the decreased risk of cardiovascular disease from taking statins to the increased risk caused by sucking down a cheeseburger and milkshake. From their abstract:
“The risk reduction associated with the daily consumption of most statins, with the exception of pravastatin, is more powerful than the risk increase caused by the daily extra fat intake associated with a 7-oz hamburger (Quarter Pounder®) with cheese and a small milkshake.”
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I scream, you scream, we all scream… for the medicine given to recovering cancer patients.
The Scientist reports that LactoPharma, (a “collaborative research venture between the University of Aukland, the New Zealand government, and the country’s largest dairy company, Fonterra Ltd.”) has created a therapeutic, strawberry-flavored ice cream called ReCharge.
ReCharge ice cream has gone through a string of taste-tests to ensure that the product satisfies the palette. However, one ingredient is a mandatory keeper: Lactoferrin, a protein found in milk that possesses the power to impede tumor growth and improve intestinal immune response. Because side effects of chemotherapy include the destruction of neutrophils (while blood cells) and intestinal cells, which often leads to infection and digestive problems, University of Auckland biologist Geoff Krissansen decided to test bovine lactoferrin on chemotherapy patients to see whether it could counter these side effects.
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Seeking out new chemicals that could help scientists develop new medicines and drugs might not be so hard after all—maybe we just need to look for bright colors.
When insects like ladybugs, tiger moths and many others don brilliant hues, they’re saying, “Don’t eat me—I’m full of toxins and taste terrible.” The insects have to get those chemicals from somewhere, and the mostly likely candidates are the plants they live and feed upon. Scientists from the Smithsonian’s Tropical Research Institute in Panama say that these plants, with their weird cocktails of toxins, could be best the best sources of new drugs for humans, if we could only find them.
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Prozac (and the rest of the SSRI family) may not do much as far as treating most cases of depression, but it turns out it might do wonders for lazy eye. A team of Finnish and Italian researchers announced that the drug, when administered to rats with impaired vision, played a role in correcting their eyesight. Even better, they think it could have the same effect on the two to three percent of humans who have amblyopia, or lazy eye, the most common cause of visual impairment among children.
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The dramatic thriller involving our drug-contaminated drinking water, starring a 2,500-word article by the Associated Press, has been taking over the headlines today (that is, at least, until the Feds found out how much Spitzer paid for hookers) . During the AP’s investigation, they reviewed published scientific reports, analyzed federal drinking water databases, visited environmental study sites and treatment plants, and interviewed hundreds of officials, academics, and scientists. The results: trace amounts of pharmaceuticals, including antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers, and sex hormones contaminate the drinking water of 41 million Americans, including the watersheds of 28 metropolitan areas.
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