2 posts tagged “wired”

Via WIRED

Heart Transplants Keep Pumping

The story: In the U.K., surgeons transplanted the first "beating heart" into a British patient. Instead of being frozen for several hours, a new machine kept the heart pumping during transfer from donor to patient.

The upside: A "living heart" could survive longer before being transplanted.

The caveat: Heart transplants remain rare: Only about 2,016 were performed in the United States in 2004, a slight decrease from 2003.

Factoid: Cornea, kidney and liver transplants are more common in the United States than heart transplants.

Look, Ma, No Pulse!
Topic: Heart

Oh, the pulse. So 2005.

In today's bit of OMG medical news, a Canadian man has received a heart device that pumps on a continuous basis.

The new mechanical heart, which is powered by batteries located in pouches on [the patient's] body, provides a continuous flow of blood so the patient has no pulse.

[He] happens to be the only individual currently living in Canada without a pulse and without a measurable blood pressure,” [a doctor] said Wednesday.

The device is reportedly being tested in Canada and the U.S., so some Americans might be going around pulseless too.

At right is the patient, riding a bicycle holding the device that got implanted into his body.

Question: If he doesn't have a pulse, how do quickly you figure out if he's alive or dead, such as during a medical emergency?

Robot

Robot Identifies Human Flesh As Bacon

Let the robot holocaust commence: robots think we taste like bacon.

Researchers at NEC System technologies and Mie University have designed the cute little guy to the right: a metal man gastronomist, "an electromechanical sommelier", capable of identifying wines, cheeses, meats and hors d'oeuvres. Upon being given a sample, he will speak up in a childlike voice and identify what he has just been fed. The idea is that wineries can tell if a wine is authentic without even opening the bottle, amongst other more obscure uses...like "tell me what this strange grayish lump at the back of my freezer is/was."

But when some smart aleck reporter placed his hand in the robot's omnivorous clanking jaw, he was identified as bacon. A cameraman then tried and was identified as prosciutto.

Absolutely horrifying. Like cows, once robots taste blood, their hunger for human flesh can never be satiated. Japanese unveil robot wine steward

via WIRED

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