Voyager Online: Sci Facts

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So you're into sci fi? But what about sci fact? Sometimes fact is stranger than fiction...

Each month our very own Voyager Science Queen* will bring you interesting, quirky and downright bizarre tid bits from the world of science. And its all completely, totally, 100% true!

July Sci-Facts

Australian Achievements

In the last month, there have been two major Australian scientific breakthroughs that caught the attention of the world media. In my own quiet way, I have felt a flush of patriotic fervour at our ingenuity, or in other words: Aussie Boffins Rock!

New for Old

A team from the Monash University Medical School in Melbourne, Victoria, have propagated mouse stem cells to regenerate a thymus. The team isolated a population of epithelium stem cell markers from a mouse thymus, and were successful in growing these harvested cells into a fully functioning thymus. Previously, American scientists had managed to grow these cells in a three-dimensional carbon matrix, but hadn't managed to produce an actual functional organ.

This is the first time that science has managed to grow an entire organ. Up until now the only other 'regrown organ' was the skin, used mainly in medicine for burn victims. As no one can survive the loss of their entire skin surface, no individual has had his or her entire skin surface regrown.

To give the reader some of the technical background: The thymus plays a vital part in the immune system for both mice and humans, by supplying the T-cells that attack bodily invaders. The thymus is a temporary organ, attaining its largest size at the time of puberty. It ceases to grow after puberty, and then gradually dwindles until it almost disappears. Epithelium cells make up sheets of tissue that cover or line the external and internal body surfaces, including the thymus. Stem cells are 'juvenile' cells, still able to proliferate and differentiate.
The next goal of the research team is to identify and isolate epithelium stem cells from a human thymus. Dr Jason Gill, spokesman for the research team, said such stem cells were theorized to be present in humans and he would be very surprised if they were not there and accessible at the cell surface, as they are in a mouse thymus. If (and when) the goal of a regrown human thymus is achieved, such a development will be able to help treat people with AIDS, some types of cancer and other diseases of the immune system.

Now, I know that stem cell research is a subject that inflames its fair share of antagonism and passion. Why does any new type of research attract the phobic? Stem cell research need not involve the death or injury of embryos, nor is it the first step in the breeding of 'replacement' humans to be harvested for body parts. Scientists are human beings, fallible and flawed, but they are not mad or unethical, nor are they generally misguided. If stem cell research can help cure cancer and other dreadful diseases, it is an area of research that MUST not be opposed.

Beam me up, Scotty!

Well, science has finally caught up with Science Fiction. As you would have seen in the news, the first working teleporter has been invented. Or has it?

Team leader Ping Koy Lam claimed the technology is the same as that used in Science Fiction series such as 'Star Trek'. "What we have demonstrated here is that we can take billions of photons, destroy them simultaneously, and then recreate them in another place," Lam told 'The Australian' newspaper.

What the team at the Australian National University has managed to achieve is to take apart an encrypted laser beam and simultaneously rebuild a replica beam approximately a meter away. Using a process called 'quantum entanglement', the team effectively teleported a radio signal contained in the laser beam of light from one place to another. (This paragraph is a direct quote from the newspaper article.)

To me, this isn't a real teleporter. However, the breakthrough does open up the possibility for future super-fast and super-secure communications systems, as the process is developed for practical uses in the real world.
Even the research team that developed the process can't see human teleportation occurring any time soon. It's a quantum leap from a photons of a laser beam to the complex biological system that a human being represents; so 'beaming up' is still Science Fiction...for now. One can't help wonder though: if it was possible to teleport a human, is the instant destruction of your body a little death? Is the reconstruct really you, or just a copy?

*The Voyager Science Queen is also known as Lynne Green

So, who is this woman who attempts to entertain us with Science?

Well, I really am a scientist. I have a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Queensland, in Zoology. And, at the moment, I am working in a Pathology laboratory.

I have always been intensely curious about every aspect of our universe, from the teeny tiny workings of the gene right up to the mind-bending forces that are twisting and knotting inside a blackhole. So, now I am sharing a brain stuffed full of trivia…and hopefully entertaining people at the same time.

As well, I write Fantasy stories and novels. One day, I hope to have a book published, but don't hold your breath. Reading is my other major love, and my favourite authors are Terry Pratchett and Isaac Asimov, though I could list hundreds of others. If I had one wish, I ask for more time to write!

Read previous Sci-Facts:

Getting Your Attention
May Sci-Facts
After the Big Bang
The Big Bang
Ashes to ashes; Dust to dust
Twists in the tale
Robots in the Swim and other things
The Tachyon and other things

Looking for more scientific oddities? Have you checked out Dr Steven Juan's website? He is, quite literally, the wizard of odds!