Dead Sea: Coming to life

Climatotherapy: there is life in the Dead Sea.

Bringing new life to the dead zone.

The Gulf of Mexico “dead zone” reached a record 7,700 square miles in the summer of 1999. That year, heavier flow in the Mississippi River brought an abundance of nutrients to the Gulf, resulting in hypoxia, or inadequate dissolved oxygen in bottom waters that forces bottom-dwelling animals to either flee or die. With the year 2001 have come legislative efforts to reduce the dead zone—if not ki...

Bringing dead proteins back to life

A small molecule called EMD 57033 can repair motor proteins that have stopped working as a result of stress.

Evolution of genomic diversity and sex at extreme environments: fungal life under hypersaline Dead Sea stress.

We have found that genomic diversity is generally positively correlated with abiotic and biotic stress levels (1-3). However, beyond a high-threshold level of stress, the diversity declines to a few adapted genotypes. The Dead Sea is the harshest planetary hypersaline environment (340 g.liter-1 total dissolved salts, approximately 10 times sea water). Hence, the Dead Sea is an excellent natural...

Intensive care medicine: a specialty coming to LIFE.

The Lancet today includes three papers about intensive care medicine. The papers describe the evolution of the specialty, the demand for and ability to supply appropriate levels of care, and some of the commonly faced ethical dilemmas and challenges. These topics are apt in this period of economic constraint. Intensive care medicine consumes a considerable proportion of health-care resources an...