Sandy's blog

New surgical freezing technique can convert sure death into 90pc survival rate

A ground-breaking technique that freezes bodies to the brink of death could help doctors in emergency surgery by putting patients into a state of suspended animation.

Surgeons are pioneering a method of inducing extreme hypothermia in trauma patients so their bodies shut down entirely during major surgery, giving doctors more time to operate.

The technique helps to reduce the damage done to the brain and other organs while the patient's heart is not beating.

Researchers will begin the first human trials of the technique, which involves replacing a patient's blood with a cold solution to rapidly reduce body temperature.

The cold treatment, being developed at Harvard Medical School and the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, will result in patient's bodies being cooled to as low as 10 degrees.

The normal body temperature is 37 degrees and humans usually die rapidly if the core body temperature drops below 22 degrees.

Dr Hasan Alam, the surgeon leading the research, said trials of the technique in animals had shown it to be hugely successful.

"By cooling rapidly in this fashion we can convert almost certain death into a 90 per cent survival rate," the Sydney Morning Herald quoted Alam as saying.

Just-right planet that can support life detected

It is not too hot and not too cold, and astronomers believe that a new planet detected outside our solar system may have a temperature that is just right to support life.

The planet orbits a red dwarf star called Gliese 581 and appears to be three times the mass of the Earth, the team at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and the Carnegie Institution of Washington said on Wednesday.

The team found it using indirect measurements from the Keck telescope in Hawaii, which has been used to scrutinize Gliese 581 for 11 years and has spotted other potential planets orbiting it.

"We had planets on both sides of the habitable zone -- one too hot and one too cold -- and now we have one in the middle that's just right," said Steven Vogt of UC Santa Cruz.

"The fact that we were able to detect this planet so quickly and so nearby tells us that planets like this must be really common," Vogt said in a statement.

Athletes find food at Games Village 'divine'

Hot chicken curry, butter chicken, vegetable biryani, gol gappas...Indian cuisine is giving a gastronomic high to foreign players and delegates at the Commonwealth Games Village. From 'awesome' to 'divine', the reactions have been superlative!

'I tried butter chicken and vegetable biryani for lunch and it was awesome. I am just loving the hot and spicy Indian curries served in the Games Village. I had heard a lot about Indian food in the past and it is the first time I got to eat it. It's divine,' Marilon Dozois Prevnt, Canadian weightlifter, told IANS.

The 24x7 dining area in the Village offers six different types of cuisine at each meal - athletes and officials can choose from American, Asian, African, Oceanian, Indian and Continental. The menu has 120 items that will be changed in a cycle of six days.

A workforce of 2,500, which includes 250 chefs, is working round the clock to make a variety of delicacies. The huge dinning area is expected to serve 36,000 meals to 7,000 players during the Oct 3-14 sporting event. It can serve 2,300 people at a time.

Indian Muslims divided over Ayodhya ruling

A day after a court ruled in favour of a Ram temple at the site of the razed Babri mosque in Ayodhya, many Muslims across India were clearly unhappy. Others felt it was time to move on.

As millions went into the details of the epoch-making three-judge bench verdict from the Allahabad High Court, some Muslims insisted that they had not got justice.

Muslim leaders who had championed the reconstruction of Ayodhya's 16th century Babri mosque, razed by Hindu mobs in 1992, were a disappointed lot -- having spent time and energy on the cause.

But many among the 140-million strong community felt the time had come to bury past bitterness, a line also advocated by the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), which has pledged to build a grand Ram temple on the ruins of the Babri Masjid.

In the latter category was Mohammed Hashim Ansari, a 90-year-old Ayodhya Muslim who has waged legal battles since 1961 over the disputed land where the mosque once stood.

The dispute was 'now a closed chapter', he said at his crumbling home in Ayodhya. 'Hindus should be allowed to build their temple.'

He does not want Muslims to approach the Supreme Court challenging the Thursday verdict that split up the disputed land into three -- two-thirds going to Hindus and a third to the Sunni Wakf Board.

In New Delhi, Mahmood Madani of the influential All India Muslim Personal Law Board said Muslims did not expect 'such a mixed verdict'.

The Social Network Trailer

"The Social Network" about billionaire and entrepreneur Mark Zuckerberg and how he started Facebook, the most successful social networking site on the internet.

India rejects RIM corporate email solution: report

India's telecommunications ministry has rejected a solution offered by Research In Motion for its BlackBerry corporate email services, and it has not been able to access chats on the messenger service either, the Economic Times reported on Friday.

The paper cited an internal note from the ministry saying security agencies have been unable to intercept or monitor secure email communication in readable format. The paper also said law enforcement agencies have failed to intercept chats on the BlackBerry Messenger platform.

Last week a government source told Reuters that India and RIM had hit technical glitches in their talks on access to corporate email, but access to the messenger services was satisfactory.

India, which along with several other countries has expressed concerns that BlackBerry services could be used to stir political or social instability, had threatened RIM with a ban if it were denied access to data.