Accidental but important scientific findings

Dengue virus transmitted sexually, monitoring the ocean currents thanks to toy ducks . is the discovery discovered through experiment incidentally.

Science always contains many interesting things. In order to get the experiments, successful inventions relied heavily on the diligence and persistence of scientists' research, but sometimes it also needed some luck.

The findings below are mostly found by luck and "accidental" . Let's review some of such cases through the summary of Listverse page below.

1. Sexually transmitted dengue virus

If you want to find a different way that a disease can be transmitted, you can't design an accurate experiment to test it. And the idea of ​​making an infected person have a purpose that is against morality, is not surprised to know the first case study.

In 2008, scientists recorded the first case of dengue virus infection through sexual intercourse rather than mosquito bites. That is the case of biologist Brian Foy infected with dengue when working in a field in Senegal. But when he returned, his wife was also found to have symptoms of dengue infection while his children were not.

At this time, she did not leave the living area and mosquitoes transmitted to Mr. Foy were not there. A medical expert who discovered and concluded that Foy was infected with a rare disease called Zika and was often mistaken for dengue fever.

Zika virus belongs to the family of Flaviviridae virus and similar virus causes dengue fever, yellow fever. It is transmitted by three common Aedes mosquitoes in Senegal but not in Colorado where Brian's wife lives.

With a series of tests, the scientists gave an explanation, the virus was transmitted sexually when Mr. Foy returned from his trip.

2. Monitor the ocean currents thanks to toy ducks

For scientists, the work of tracking ocean currents is quite difficult because of the vast ocean. Most of the monitoring and measuring devices used were missing at sea.

In 1992, an accident in the Pacific Ocean caused containers containing about 29,000 plastic toys to float on the water, used in bathrooms like green frogs, red beavers, yellow ducks . falling into the sea. .

When the toy spills over the ocean surface, each one driftes and ends their "voyage" in different locations. These 'friendly floating friends' drifted to Hawaii and Alaska, some went north and reached the North Pole, stopping in Scotland .

However, it was this accidental drift of ducks and frogs . that oceanographers were able to calculate the time that the circuits of ocean currents needed to complete a cycle.

3. Desiccant

One of the most strictly controlled criteria in the production of medical drugs and electronics is to keep everything completely dry. However, few people know that this desiccant has caused researchers at Uppsala University (Sweden) to think hard.

Although many experiments have been carried out, the results obtained by scientists are still zero. Incidentally, in a time of neglect to clean up the lab for 2 weekends, on Monday, the researchers The rescue was happy to discover a gel that formed and contained material elements that they had always been looking for.

This element not only absorbs water at a crazy level (only 1 gram can be used for a surface area of ​​800m ² ), but also requires less energy to produce. After a year of experimentation, they were able to refine this process and include significant commercial applications.

4. The growth period of fat cells

A group of scientists are trying to find out how humans can quickly increase or decrease fat cells in the body. Previous studies suggest that, when weight changes, we do not change the number of fat cells, it just goes away or is filled with different fat masses.

The question is, can our bodies create other cells to replace dead fat cells or keep them forever.

For moral reasons, scientists cannot perform experiments on humans. But based on the food, the number of people suffering from radiation exposure during the 1950s nuclear tests of the United States and the Soviet Union, scientists were able to delve into this issue further.

By comparing the sample of fat cells of people before being infected with radiation and after being exposed to radiation, researchers can calculate the average life of that cell. Interestingly, the number of fat cells increases rapidly in adulthood and this level remains throughout the development process.