ScienceDaily: Strange Science News

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• In hairless man, arthritis drug spurs hair growth -- lots
• Feel-good hormones could cause UV addiction
• Sweetest calculator in the world: Sugar molecules used as part of a chemical sequence for information processing

In hairless man, arthritis drug spurs hair growth -- lots Posted: 19 Jun 2014 09:53 AM PDT A man with almost no hair on his body has grown a full head of it after a novel treatment. There is currently no cure or long-term treatment for alopecia universalis, the disease that left the 25-year-old patient bare of hair. This is the first reported case of a successful targeted treatment for the rare, highly visible disease.

Feel-good hormones could cause UV addiction Posted: 19 Jun 2014 09:52 AM PDT Sun lovers eagerly flock to the beach every summer, despite widespread awareness of the risk of skin cancer. A new study reveals that chronic exposure to UV radiation causes the release of feel-good hormones called endorphins, which act through the same pathway as heroin, leading to physical dependence, tolerance, and addiction-like behavior in rodents. The findings could explain why people have an instinctive desire to be in the sun, despite its known health risks.

Sweetest calculator in the world: Sugar molecules used as part of a chemical sequence for information processing Posted: 19 Jun 2014 06:56 AM PDT A rectangular plastic board with 384 small wells is the setting for a chemist-researcher. The chemist carefully pipets some drops of sugar solution into a row of the tiny reaction vessels. As soon as the fluid has mixed with the contents of the vessels, fluorescence starts in some of the wells. What the chemist does here – with his own hands – could also be called in a very simplified way, the 'sweetest computer in the world'. The reason: the sugar molecules used are part of a chemical sequence for information processing.

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