Recent comments in /f/askscience

DudoVene t1_j1pxfc1 wrote

Reply to How does mRNA vaccine help the immune system identify cancer cells? by adamgerges

hi. cancerous cell may exhibit different receptors in their membrane (exposed to extracellular media) than healthy cells. in some cancer, thoses receptors may allow the cell to "refuse" to kill themselves (and so clear the ill cell) by a natural mechanism.

consequently, antibodies (wherever they came, naturally produced by the body, or by RNA vaccines) that targets thoses receptors should be able to recognize a cancerous cell in a normal population and engage the immune system in the elimination of the cell.

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EstaLisa t1_j1pvnb7 wrote

Reply to comment by PercussiveRussel in I recently learned that humans can smell rain / petrichor (ozone and geosmin) better than sharks smell blood, now considering we don't have any extra hyper specific olfactory organs like some other animals do, how do we achieve this level of detection? by Corvuscoraxaphro

released from bacteria in the soil. there‘s a microcosm museum in amsterdam where you can smell on a tube with said bacteria in it. i couldn‘t stop smelling. it was a wonderful experience.

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wattnurt t1_j1ptwas wrote

Reply to What % of people got long covid who were vaccinated VS those who weren't? by CarrionAssassin2k9

As the other user pointed out, long Covid is incredibly problematic because until rather recently, every researcher used their own definition of the condition, that's why you would get one study saying 3% have it, and another saying 30% have it. On top of that, almost all studies I've seen have used self-assessment by patients of whether they think they have it, which of course has a ton of issues as you would imagine.

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