#at least its pretty much just epithelium

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Husband went to the doctor for allergy testing today.

He's allergic to dogs

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Did scientists discover a new shape? Well, first we have to define ‘shape.’ Also, ‘new.’

New Post has been published on https://nexcraft.co/did-scientists-discover-a-new-shape-well-first-we-have-to-define-shape-also-new/

Did scientists discover a new shape? Well, first we have to define ‘shape.’ Also, ‘new.’

“Scientists just discovered a new shape” makes for a great headline—and a lot of questions. Chief among them: What the heck is a new shape? How can a shape be new? Surely all shapes exist, at least in theory, and we’re just coming along and describing them. And while we’re on that note, what even is a shape?

The paper that sparked all these questions, published in Nature Communications this week, indeed reports a new shape called a “scutoid” in the epithelial cells making up human skin. It looks a bit like a column with one corner chopped off. It also seems to be somehow relevant to biological membranes and cellular function, but I was too boggled by the whole new shape concept to even begin wrapping my mind around the medical implications.

Google had no answers to offer. “How can there be a new shape?” Nothing. “What is a new shape?” Nada. “How can shapes be new?” Every query just turned up more headlines, none of them attached to stories that solved the mystery. It just made no sense to me. Shapes don’t get discovered—they just are. Right? Right??

Lost, frustrated, and losing hope that I’d ever find an answer that wasn’t Wikipedia’s pathetic definition of “shape,” I started emailing mathematicians. Thankfully, they had some answers.

“The question ‘Can there be new shapes?’ depends, as you realized, on the meaning of ‘new’ and ‘shape’,” says Matthew Gursky, a professor of mathematics at the University of Notre Dame. For the purposes of their article, he went on, the authors of the Nature Communications paper defined a shape as any body that occupies three-dimensional space, such as a cake or a rock (his examples, not mine). Gursky says mathematicians might not necessarily use “shape” in that way, but that that’s not really relevant—what matters is how the paper defines it. The paper is interested in talking about how the scutoid is relevant to biological objects like epithelial cells.

So is this shape really new? “It depends what you mean,” he says. “If by ‘new’ you mean that it didn’t exist before (like a new model of car), then the answer is ‘no,’ of course. What they mean by “new” is a shape that has never been mathematically described and studied.” It’s possible, of course, that someone else in some other discipline has described and studied the scutoid. Gursky notes that what’s new in one field can be well-known in another. “The same equations that describe the shape of soap bubbles also describe the shape of black holes, for example.”

To me, it makes no sense to say that something is “new” if you just happened to be the first person to describe it. I realize that by that argument there are no new species (barring those that evolve into distinct, previously nonexistent species)—there are only newly discovered species. To that I say: yes. I think that finding out about a frog that you didn’t know about before doesn’t make it new—it just makes it new to you.

So I asked the authors of the paper how a shape could possible be new. Surely there are already infinite shapes out in the world and we were merely coming along to describe them.

“There are indeed infinite forms,” says Javier Buceta, one of the study authors. We discover some of those shapes through practical uses, he says, like finding out about circles via the wheel. “Our research is sort of connected to that, because the scutoid was found in connection with a fundamental problem about how cells pack together to make tissues and organs, and until now nobody thought about it because there was no need to.”

Similarly, he says, the number 3.14159… (and so on) always existed, but at some point someone came along and called it pi because it became useful to give it a name and describe its features. Scutoids, like pi, are now of scientific interest, and so someone needed to come along to describe their features and give them a name.

All of this describing and naming only matters, though, if there is some larger issue at stake. “In the abstract, there may not be much to say about these particular shapes,” says Burt Totaro, a professor of mathematics at UCLA, “but the authors do have a point to make.” In a biological context like the epithelium, he notes, “it’s not good enough to think of cells as having a simpler geometric shape such as a prism or frustum (a slice of a cone). The outer surface and the inner surface of the cell are typically being squeezed in different directions, and so more complicated shapes arise inevitably.” If you’re interested in modeling how biological membranes work, then, you need to find a way to mathematically describe this “new” “shape,” and it’s pretty convenient to give it a name as well.

So, yes, as Buceta himself confirmed, the scutoid shape clearly already existed. In that sense it’s not “new.” And maybe it’s not even what some mathematicians would call a “shape.” But for the purposes of talking about mathematical descriptions of a three-dimensional object that’s suddenly become biologically relevant, let’s call it a new shape. Welcome to the world, little buddy.

Written By Sara Chodosh

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My experience with epi off crosslinking

Thought I would share my experience with epi off crosslinking.i had done almost two weeks ago (at least to the best of my memory). If you don’t want to read my super long recollect the most important advice I have is to definitely take the pain meds before you go to bed after the procedure. So, after I sign in in reception and take care of payment my mom and I get brought into one of the regular examination rooms. There one of the surgical assistant (not actually sure what his title is, who I’ll refer to as SA1) gives me this cool little blue kit full of pain pills, sleeping pills, numbing drops and these super intense light blocking sunglasses. He explains that I should basically sleep for the next day or so. He says to only take the numbing drops if I really need them because they can slow healing, but emphasize not to be a martyr. Then he pulls out this super fashionable surgical hat thingy and cover my hair. He also puts some gauze in front of my ears explaining that there’s going to be a ton of drops dripping off my face. Before he leaves the room he asks me if I feel nervous. I say “fuck yes” (i didn’t actually say that). So, he brings me a Xanax and some water. My mom and I chill in that room for a while, since they were a little behind schedule. A little while later Mr. Surgeon pops in for a quick chat and then I walk into the op room. The op room has a giant glass wall with with chairs on their outside, where my mom waits. The another surgical assistant (I’ll call her SA2) asks if I want another Xanax. I say yes and take it. Then I lie down on the fancy mechanical surgical bed and SA2 asks if I want a blanket. I had been warned it would be cold in there, so I had dressed in super comfy warm clothes. I declined the blanket. The surgical bed moves under this intimidating looking machine. SA1 puts numbing drops in my right eye. Then the surgeon takes over and insert the eye retractor thing to keep that eye open. He tells me to stare at the green light and then puts the alcohol solution in and removes the epithelium. This didn’t hurt at all, but it was super weird looking, since I could actually see it being kinda pushed off. My mom was apparently freaking out as the waiting area past the glass had a giant screen with a close up of my eye, but she still took pictures and videos. The next part was pretty boring as SA1 spent half and hour putting the riboflavin drops in periodically. The drops did make everything look yellowish. After the half hours up they put me under the uv light and continue to put in riboflavin drops. They put in more numbing drops as I ask for them, since it does start to burn. As my right eye is under the uv light, they remove the epithelium on my left eye and and start the half hour of just riboflavin drops on it. During the boring parts of just the drops and staring at the light SA1, SA2 and I are just talking about all sorts of random stuff. After my right eye was done with the light the surgeon returned and the worst part of the actual procedure happened. He flushed my right eye and then sort of wiped it. I’ll be honest this part hurt, but only for a few seconds.I think it’s because they also flushed away the numbing drops. Anyway he inserted a contact lens into that eye and removed the retractor. Next it was time for my left eye to go under the light, be flushed and have the contact put in. After I got up SA2 walked me to the waiting area where my mom was and took the sunglasses from the blue kit they gave and put them on me. My eyes seems to start watering like crazy right after she says they would. Then she asks if I would like another Xanax. I say no because at this point I already felt dizzy and disorientated, she tells me to take the sleeping pill 15 minutes before I get home (I live half and hour away) and my mom drive me home. When I got home the sleeping pill hadn’t kicked in and I was absolutely ravenous. I was kind of stupid and hadn’t really eaten all day because I was so nervous. Luckily my dad had picked me up some Taco Bell. With my hunger satiated I crawled into my bed and immediately fell asleep. Next thing I know I wake up at around 11 at night. My eyes are burning like crazy and I have no idea where the cool little blue kit is with all the pain pills. So, I go into my parents room wake my mom up and ask where she put the bag. She gives me a pain pill and is so freaked out she gets the air mattress and sleeps on my floor for the rest of the night. I’m too tired to argue. When I wake up the next day, I didn’t feel any pain, but I took another pain pill just in case. My post op appointment was in the morning, so I get dressed and my mom takes me. Doc says everything looks good, so I go back home and sleep basically all day. I pretty much only woke up to put in my eye drops and eat. I was crazy light sensitive that day. The next day not nearly as light sensitive, but I totally couldn’t stand looking at screens. I actually forgot to take my pain pills that day and it didn’t actually hurt anymore. I basically spent the next few days listening to audiobooks. When I went in for my one week post op to get the contacts removed (which itch like hell after a couple days). The doc said my right eye was looking great, but the epithelium of my left eye was growing all bumpy. Well that explains the big hazy spot. She says it may heal faster if the epithelium is removed again. So, she wants me to come back in two days, when the surgeon is in to check. Two days later he checks and we schedule to remove it this afternoon. Unfortunately, the building their office is in is having a power issue and even though the surgical room has its own generator the surgeon doesn’t want to do surgery there. I don’t blame him, but it does mean I have to go to their other office which is about an hour away. Well I end up getting there before my charts and the surgeon, so I have to wait awhile. The staff at this office seems a little frazzled since they just got a bunch of other patients including me from the other office coming in. Anyway, as I’m waiting one of the nurses comes in with another cool little blue kit. So, I basically get another free pair of sunglasses and a ton of pain and sleeping pills (that are still sitting in my bathroom unused). Weirdly they gave me more than last time. Nurse also gives me a xanax. Once I’m in the op room. I lie down on the bed and oh look SA2 works in this office too. I actually didn’t recognize her until she said something. Anywho, just removing the epithelium and putting the contact on only took like two minutes and I was out of the op room. SA 2 asks if I want another Xanax. This time I say yes. I’m much less disorientated this time. I go home, take a sleeping and pain pill (so didn’t want to wake up with that horrible burning again) and go to bed. The next day there wasn’t really any pain and the lights didn’t bother me at all. So, I guess it’s just the riboflavin drops and uv light that cause the light sensitivity. Today, I got that last contact off and the doc said it’s healing great. So, alls good apparently. My sights still a bit blurrier than usual, but not by much. Wow, that was way long than I expected. Sorry for the crappy writing. submitted by /u/marshire [link] [comments] https://www.reddit.com/r/Keratoconus/comments/7bj53s/my_experience_with_epi_off_crosslinking/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=tumblr