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Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

economist.com

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Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#41

Post by Consultant32452 »

melling wrote: post #31
sidcool wrote: post #26

Parkinson's, Alzeimers and other neurological disorders will be cured in the future. What bothers me is that people from past and present will continue to suffer until then. We need to support scientists more.

Within the next 150 years, we’ll probably turn most diseases into something treatable as we slowly acquire knowledge. Of course, imagine if we started rapidly acquiring knowledge, I’d be saying within 75 years. Your choice.

I wonder if "science" generally suffers the same plight that is discussed in The Mythical Man Month. I suspect it does.

Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#42

Post by 089723645897236 »

bookofjoe wrote: post #28

First epilepsy (dogs), now Parkinson's. Leads me (retired neurosurgical anesthesiologist) to wonder if ALL pathology has an olfactory component that, with sufficient sensitivity of instrumentation, can be detected. Perhaps we won't require a "Star Trek"-type imaging device: just stand still and let the mass spectrometer do its thing.

The only way this wouldn't work is if there is a smell your body makes that never leaves your body. But otherwise it seems pretty reasonable that you could read offgassing as a way of detecting underlying effects.

I'm right there with you though, I bet the tricorder has a nose not a eye.

Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#43

Post by galangalalgol »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #41
melling wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Within the next 150 years, we’ll probably turn most diseases into something treatable as we slowly acquire knowledge. Of course, imagine if we started rapidly acquiring knowledge, I’d be saying within 75 years. Your choice.

I wonder if "science" generally suffers the same plight that is discussed in The Mythical Man Month. I suspect it does.

If you know what you need to do you can only split the tasks to a certain granularity without losses. But if you don't know what you need to do, then you can have large number of independent teams trying different things with no penalty.

Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#44

Post by melling »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #41
melling wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Within the next 150 years, we’ll probably turn most diseases into something treatable as we slowly acquire knowledge. Of course, imagine if we started rapidly acquiring knowledge, I’d be saying within 75 years. Your choice.

I wonder if "science" generally suffers the same plight that is discussed in The Mythical Man Month. I suspect it does.

So, you think science one big problem that we’re trying to solve?

Personally, I’d say it’s more like millions of smaller problems.

Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#45

Post by [deleted] »

anisppp wrote: post #32
bookofjoe wrote: post #28

First epilepsy (dogs), now Parkinson's. Leads me (retired neurosurgical anesthesiologist) to wonder if ALL pathology has an olfactory component that, with sufficient sensitivity of instrumentation, can be detected. Perhaps we won't require a "Star Trek"-type imaging device: just stand still and let the mass spectrometer do its thing.

Wow so 2 whole things are able to be identified by volatile chemicals and this leads to all?! And I wonder how people like Holmes are able to survive for >10 years. We can deliver nicotine via patch, so obviously all drugs should be delivered that way. We can measure glucose from a drop of blood so obviously it follows that all blood tests run that way. Where is the evidence that even a small fraction of the most com…

[deleted]

Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#46

Post by tzs »

bitexploder wrote: post #33
anisppp wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow so 2 whole things are able to be identified by volatile chemicals and this leads to all?! And I wonder how people like Holmes are able to survive for >10 years. We can deliver nicotine via patch, so obviously all drugs should be delivered that way. We can measure glucose from a drop of blood so obviously it follows that all blood tests run that way. Where is the evidence that even a small fraction of the most com…

He was just speculating. Also, dogs can smell cancer in humans.

> Also, dogs can smell cancer in humans

...and the impending onset of dangerously low blood sugar, well before the person realizes that something is wrong. There are diabetes assist dogs available for this [1].

[1] https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/diabetes/expe...

Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#47

Post by dTal »

kierenj wrote: post #23
dustindiamond wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is a heisenbug?

To me, it's a bug which disappears when a debugger is attached... by observing it you're modifying the behaviour. I see the other comment here, I'd not heard of that explanation..

It doesn't have to involve a debugger. I had a sporadic bug once that couldn't be reproduced, which turned out to only appear when one performed an action quickly. When debugging, one tends to perform the steps to reproduce carefully, and hence slowly...

Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#48

Post by tzs »

bookofjoe wrote: post #28

First epilepsy (dogs), now Parkinson's. Leads me (retired neurosurgical anesthesiologist) to wonder if ALL pathology has an olfactory component that, with sufficient sensitivity of instrumentation, can be detected. Perhaps we won't require a "Star Trek"-type imaging device: just stand still and let the mass spectrometer do its thing.

I'd expect you'd still need the imaging devices for many things. An olfactory test might tell you that there is a tumor in there somewhere, for example, but to treat it you probably need precise location, size, and shape.

Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#49

Post by mncharity »

bookofjoe wrote: post #28

First epilepsy (dogs), now Parkinson's. Leads me (retired neurosurgical anesthesiologist) to wonder if ALL pathology has an olfactory component that, with sufficient sensitivity of instrumentation, can be detected. Perhaps we won't require a "Star Trek"-type imaging device: just stand still and let the mass spectrometer do its thing.

Years ago I saw a case study go by. Despite negative tests, an elderly wife was sure something was wrong with her husband. He turned out to have a lung abscess. I no longer recall details, but the hypothesis was she could smell the rot on his breath in bed.

Re: Scientists discover the chemicals behind the unique Parkinson’s smell

#50

Post by tepper09 »

hobs wrote: post #37
anisppp wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dogs have been shown to detect certain cancers at later stages (which greatly limits use as a screener.. not to mention how does the sensitivity/specificity compare to state of the art). This is not surprising since as cancers advance they cause gross biochemical changes. The further issue diagnosing cancer/no cancer or epilepsy/no is an easy problem. But train a dog/machine on 1000 or more rare diseases. Now selecti…

So the original "sniffer dog" study (The Lancet 8640)[0] pretty much covers a dog sniffing out a melanoma BEFORE it got to a later stage, and saved a woman's life. I also dont understand how training a machine would have selectivity issues. Machines dont "get trained" on one thing. 0: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S014067368...

That is not a study. That is a case report written as a letter to the editor. That meets no scientific rigor at all and no generalizable conclusions can be drawn from it, it provides an anecdote for further research. It also doesn’t suggest that sniff tests would fare better compared to any other screening system for melanoma.
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