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How mosquitoes find their targets (New discovery)

Scientists have figured out how the mosquito brain uses signals from its visual and olfactory systems to identify, track, and home in on a host for its next blood meal. For a new study in Current Biology, researchers conducted behavioral experiments and real-time recording of the female mosquito brain and discovered that when the mosquito's olfactory system detects certain chemical cues, they trigger changes in its brain that initiate a behavioral response: The mosquito begins to use her visual system to scan her surroundings for specific types of shapes and fly toward them, presumably associating those shapes with potential hosts. Only female mosquitoes feed on blood, and the results give scientists a much-needed glimpse of the sensory-integration process that the mosquito brain uses to locate a host. They say the findings will help develop new methods for mosquito control and reduce the spread of mosquito-borne diseases. The study focused on the olfactory cue that trigg...

Doctors more likely to recommend antihistamines rather than cough and cold medicine for kids

Date : July 29, 2019 Source : JAMA Pediatrics Summary : For respiratory infections in children under 12, physicians are increasingly more likely to recommend antihistamines and less likely to recommend cough and cold medicines, a new study found. Antihistamines are widely used over-the-counter to treat various allergic conditions. However, these medicines have little known benefit for children with colds, and some older antihistamines cause sedation and occasionally agitation in children. Antihistamines are widely used over-the-counter to treat various allergic conditions. However, these medicines have little known benefit for children with colds, and some older antihistamines cause sedation and occasionally agitation in children. The study, in  JAMA Pediatrics , found a sharp decline in cough and cold medicine recommendations for children under 2 after 2008, when the Food and Drug Administration recommended against the medicines for that age group due to safety concerns and un...

Drug Safety Evaluation (Book)

--------------Drug Safety Evaluation by Shayne Cox Gad-----------

Poisonous Sherlock Holmes

Toxic- Detective = Sherlock Holmes How Sherlock Holmes knew so much about poisons? Before there was Sherlock Holmes and his trademark deer stalker cap, there was an English physician, Dr. Arthur Conan Doyle. And before that there was just plain old Arthur Conan Doyle, a student at the University of Edinburgh Medical School, and where we will begin. On September 20th, 1879 the British Medical Journal published a letter entitled “Gelseminum as a Poison” in which Doyle recounts his use of a tincture of gelseminum. Obviously prone to experimentation, the 19-year-old Doyle was “determined to ascertain how far one might go in taking the drug, and what the primary symptoms of an overdose might be.” Allrighty then.  Doyle prepared a fresh tincture and recorded his observations like any good scientist should. Pharmaceutical research is not unlike being a detective, you are constantly searching for clues and formulating explanations for whatever results might be generated. Sh...