SCIENCE IN THE NEWS WEEKLY
Flu in the Lab, Brains in the Courtroom
Seeking to prevent future shortages, researchers are looking for new ways to produce flu vaccines. The standard technique, in use for more than 50 years, involves growing modified versions of the targeted flu inside chicken eggs. Innovators are trying to produce recombinant virus in cell cultures, to develop a means to inject flu DNA sequence directly into people and to produce in the laboratory proteins normally manufactured by flu viruses in infected people's bodies.
In criminal proceedings, brain imaging has been brought into a criminal courtroom as evidence. For what may be the first time, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was presented by the defense during the sentencing phase of a murder trial. The scan results were used to argue that a convicted child rapist and murderer had a brain disorder.
Oh, and it's time to add skin color to a quality that's in the eye of the beholder. A new study suggests that we mentally alter politicians' skin tones depending upon how we feel about them. In a study using photographs of President Barack Obama, people who like the president reported he had lighter skin than those who dislike him.
In truth, appearances are deceiving in many contexts, including the microscopic. Many people don't like the image of bacteria coating their bodies. But evidence is mounting that some bacteria that dwell on people's skin may keep in check inflammation triggered by injury and unwanted bacteria.
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