medicine

Here's another reason never to go swimming:

This rare form of parasitic meningitis—primary amebic meningoencephalitis (PAM)—is caused by an amoeba called Naegleria fowleri. That microscopic amoeba—part of the class of life called protozoans—is a naturally occurring organism that normally feeds on bacteria and tends to live in the sedimentary layer of warm lakes and ponds.

Now one research group is reporting a major step toward a touchy-feely prosthetic. A team of researchers from the University of Chicago and Johns Hopkins University performed a series of experiments that showed they could send electrical signals directly to the brains of rhesus macaques and that the macaques were able to interpret the signals as touches on different parts of their hands. Another series of experiments showed rhesus macaques could interpret different direct-to-brain signals as touches of varying pressure. A third explored whether direct-to-brain signals work quickly enough to be able to accurately tell macaques when a prosthetic is touching something and when it stops the touch.

Yu is a loggerhead turtle that lost her front fins to a shark attack. She is seen earlier this year wearing the latest in artificial flipper technology in Japan. The rubber limbs are attached to a soft vest that simply goes on over her head. "We have worked hard to design the vest in a way that prevents the turtle from taking it off unwittingly," said the aquarium's curator Naoki Kamezaki.

South Korean scientists say they have developed the world's first nanorobot that can selectively target and help treat cancer. The robot is guided through the body by genetically engineered bacteria to a tumor where it releases its cargo of cancer fighting drugs.