Word: toxins
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...water from Cambodia and sent them to the U.S. for analysis. The State Department, in turn, sent the samples to private American laboratories without revealing the source of the evidence or why it was to be examined. The civilian scientists found that the samples contained the chemical agent trichothecene toxin, known as T2. Soviet scientists have published articles on how to mass produce T2, which occurs naturally in grain molds common in the Soviet Union...
Infant Botulism. Botulism usually comes from eating improperly canned food contaminated by toxin produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum. Four years ago, researchers at the California health department found that babies with no obvious exposure to such canned foods were coming down with the disease. C. botulinum bacteria are ubiquitous. They thrive in the earth and are spread as spores through dust in the air as well as on vegetables, fruits or in honey. Adults regularly ingest the microbes but customarily suffer no harm. The spores remain dormant in the adult intestine. For as yet unknown reasons, the intestines...
...Human Factor, Greene's 22nd novel, combines the shadow world of spies and the games they play with a pervasive spiritual malaise. Secret codes and assassination by peanut-mold toxin entice the reader into the author's gloomy inner sanctum. As usual, the workmanship is superb-almost too good. At times the novel reads as if Greene had entered a Graham Greene write-alike contest. The principal character is British Intelligence Agent Maurice Castle-a surname that pointedly suggests the guarded and lonely aspects of both the man's profession and character. The settings include the nondescript...
...awesome properties. On the plus side, fast-breeder nuclear reactors, which are generally fueled with plutonium and U-238, can not only generate electricity but also produce more plutonium fuel than they consume. On the other hand, plutonium, even in tiny quantities, is searingly radioactive and ranks with botulin toxin as one of the world's most poisonous substances. Moreover, with as little as 12 Ibs. of plutonium, the right equipment and expertise in handling the stuff, almost any government-or terrorist outfit-could make a nuclear bomb...
...risks thus seem very much smaller than the public has been led to believe. Nevertheless, it is important to keep all the probabilities low. For example, even if a toxin-producing strain could survive only very briefly in the gut, a large enough dose might meanwhile cause disease. Hence a major benefit from the current discussion could be the requirement that those working in this area learn and use the standard techniques of medical microbiology, at least until we have acquired much more experience...