Weekly collection of the best in offbeat, weird news (from an offbeat, weird guy)
Glowing kitties may hold the key for AIDS vaccine
USA
This kitten may have the key to protect humans against HIV, the lentivirus that causes AIDS. He was genetically modified at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. And yes, he glows in the dark.
His fluorescent fur and claws – which glow green in certain lighting – are not a side-effect of the gene that makes the cat resistant to the feline form of the HIV, known as the Feline Immunodeficiency Virus. It’s caused by another gene that produces the Green Fluorescent Protein, which is naturally produced by the jellyfish Aequorea victoria. The Mayo Clinic team lead by Dr. Eric Poeschia inserted this gene alongside the anti-viral gene to track the cells: “We did it to mark cells easily just by looking under the microscope or shining a light on the animal.”
The antiviral gene, which comes from a rhesus macaque, produces a less fun but much more useful protein, a restriction factor called TRIMCyp. This protein can make T-cells—the blood cells that fight infections – resist viruses that cause AIDS in “a wide range of species”, according to Dr. Laurence Tiley of the University of Cambridge.
Dr. Poeschia says that this research will benefit humans: “One of the best things about this biomedical research is that it is aimed at benefiting both human and feline health. If you could show that you confer protection to these animals, it would give us a lot of information about protecting humans.”
So far, Dr Poeschia’s team has only exposed cells extracted from the genetically-modified cats to the virus. The test was a complete success and the next step on their research is to inject the virus in the cats themselves.
Wait, that’s MY move!
CHINA
A motorist is threatening legal action after a police camera allegedly caught him speeding while squeezing his female passenger’s breast.
Businessman Deng Jialin has been fined the equivalent of £20 for driving at nearly 60mph in a 50mph zone – but that is the least of his worries.
He says the image, which was published by local media after it was posted on an Internet forum, has been digitally manipulated.
And he is threatening to sue local traffic police, who he believes leaked the photograph, for breach of his privacy.
The photograph shows Deng driving his Nissan 4WD vehicle on a motorway between Santai and Shehong in Sichuan Province, China.
It later emerged that the woman in the picture is not his wife but a local university student.
But Deng, who runs his own company, says it’s a fake and is threatening to sue the Mianyang Traffic Bureau.
“I was driving alone that day, and there was no one in my passenger seat,” he insisted.
Traffic officials have promised to investigate the incident and say they will review policy to better protect people’s privacy.
UK Police set up a ‘Hip Hop Shop’ to lure criminals
LONDON
Criminals and drug dealers were caught in an undercover sting after police officers posed as staff in a fake hip hop music shop.
A total of 37 armed criminals and drug dealers, including 30 gang members, have been jailed for a total of more than 400 years following the ‘sting’ operation in the shop, called Boombox, in Edmonton, north London.
Codenamed Operation Peyzac, the $800,000 operation involved undercover officers kitting out as a fully operating rap and hip hop music store, with a private back room which was used to carry out deals with drug and gun sellers, and the store was wired with CCTV and recording equipment.
The ‘shop’ operated for more than 12 months and officers, who were trained in the sort of music they were selling, were able to film the trading of firearms, ammunition and drugs.
One time they captured a man on CCTV selling undercover police four guns. He had travelled to the shop on a busy bus with the loaded weapons hidden in a plastic bag.
In total 21 firearms were removed from the streets.
The men were jailed for firearms offenses and for dealing drugs including crack cocaine, heroin, crystal meth and ecstasy.
The enterprising officers came up with the plan following a tip-off gangs were operating in the neighborhood after five young men were murdered in nearby Enfield between January and July 2008, including four teenagers.
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