disease

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can be used to detect things an X-ray can’t. MRI can look for disease, bleeding, Parkinson’s disease and head injuries. For example,...

Positron emission tomography (PET) is a little different to other medical imaging techniques because it requires patients to be injected with a radioactive substance. The most...

Digital cameras are very useful for taking holiday snaps, but they are also useful tools for imaging inside and outside the body. For example, dentists use...

The best thing since sliced people? CT (computed tomography or computed axial tomography) is a way of scanning the whole body, or part of the body,...

Cancer is a word that can send shockwaves through a family. In some cases, it is completely treatable, and in others cases, it can change a...

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is one of the best techniques for imaging the brain because it gives very high quality images, with excellent contrast between the...

X-rays are a form of electromagnetic radiation. They strike an object and, depending on the density of the object, some of the X-rays will be absorbed....

A simple technique for looking for breast cancer involves feeling the breasts for an unusual lump which could be a tumour, but this is like feeling...

What’s going on inside us when we get sick? What do germs have to do with us getting sick? How does our body help us to...

Pig cell transplants raise ethical issues, such as whether it is right to use animals to benefit humans and what impact an individual’s right to treatment...

Clinical trials of Living Cell Technologies (LCT) pig cell transplants began in 2009. The trials show that encapsulated pig cells are safe and improve blood sugar...

A major risk of pig cell transplants is the spread of disease from pigs to humans. At Living Cell Technologies (LCT), they test donor pigs, pig...

Living Cell Technologies (LCT) sources pig cells for transplants from designated pathogen-free pigs housed in special facilities and looked after by trained staff who ensure they...

Living Cell Technologies (LCT) encapsulates pancreatic pig cells inside a special coating before transplanting them into type 1 diabetics. This prevents them from being rejected by...

Living Cell Technologies (LCT) is developing live pig cell transplants to treat type 1 diabetes. Cell transplants should give diabetics better blood sugar control, thus reducing...

Living Cell Technologies (LCT) is a New Zealand company at the forefront of xenotransplantation research. Use our resources to explore why and how they’re using pig...

In this activity, students use a template to make a model of an adenovirus and investigate the different shapes of different viral diseases and the similarities...

In this activity, students research and summarise the key features of bacteria, viruses and fungi. By the end of this activity, students should be able to:...

It doesn’t breathe, it doesn’t eat, it doesn’t excrete, and it doesn’t grow – so it can’t be alive, can it? It hijacks a living cell...

Bacteria range from the essential and useful, to the harmful. Essential bacteria Without the key functions of some bacteria, life on earth would be very different:...

Bacteria are single-celled organisms. They are prokaryotes and therefore do not have any cell organelles including a cell nucleus. They are believed to be one of...

Position: Senior research scientist, Plant & Food Research. Field: Phytochemical antioxidants. David was born in England and attended Wallington High School, near London, where he discovered...

Functional food is any processed food claimed to have a health-promoting or disease-preventing property that goes beyond the basic macronutrient and micronutrient functions. Common examples are:...

A number of scientific studies have shown that high consumption of fruits and vegetables correlates with good health and lower incidence of diseases like cancer and...