The title is a red herring, of course. It points to a typical ‘chickenand-egg question’: whether progress (in biomedical research and elsewhere) is driven per se by new technologies, or vice versa. Naturally, both scenarios exist. Optical mapping of functionreporting fluorescent dyes that can be washed into tissue via the vasculature, for example, has spawned huge improvements in spatio-tempora...

On leave for a couple of months from the American drug wars, visiting the drug policy, research and treatment networks in Great Britain, France, The Netherlands and Germany. Often I was hot on the heels of delegations of the US Drug Enforcement Agency and Willam Bennett's crew who are waging an aggressive campaign to persuade NATO partners to shift their priorities from the war against communis...

This month: better ways of asking "who's there?" using rRNA sequencing (Albertsen); "humanizing" yeast chromatin (Boeke/Truong); the cargo spectrum of nuclear pores (Mackmull/Beck/Ori); exon-specific mutation rates (Sabarinathan/Gonzalez-Perez/López-Bigas); synthetic virus-like particles (Lajoie/Butterfield); imaging the beating, developing heart (Scherf/Weber/Kohl/Huisken); and RNA-based FRET ...

Eleven species of Promecidia Lelej, 1996 are reviewed and keyed, and the diagnosis of the genus is given. The genus Promecidia is newly recorded from China and Promecidia abnormis Lelej, sp. n. (China: Guangdong, Hainan) and Promecidia chui Lelej & Xu, sp. n. (China: Yunnan, Hainan) are described and illustrated. New combination is proposed for Promecidia boopis (Kohl, 1882), comb. n. (from the...

Background & aims: Lead poisoning is a global problem and considered to be the most important environmental disease in children. Exposure to even low amounts of lead is dangerous. Lead containing eye make ups due to the long time contact with skin and eye mucosa can lead to blood and eye symptoms. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the amount of lead in powders of kohl in Kerman. Method:...

This study was undertaken in order to determine heavy metal contents in twelve (n = 12) henna brands and eleven (n = 11) kohl products. An analytical test was performed for Pb, Cd, Cu, and Zn in henna and kohl products using atomic absorption spectrophotometery. The overall mean concentrations of heavy metals in henna varied between 1.2 and 8.9 μg g(-1) for Pb; 0.8 and 18.6 μg g(-1) for Cd; 0.5...

BACKGROUND Cataracts are the leading cause of blindness worldwide, accounting for 13-27% of cases. Kohl-Chikni Dawa (KCD) is reputed for its beneficial effects in the treatment of premature cataracts. However, its efficacy is yet to be tested. To investigate the rationality of the therapeutic use of Kohl-Chikni Dawa (KCD) in Unani medicine. METHODS The effect of Kohl-Chikni Dawa eye drops on ...