Fairy tales are not just fantasy?

Children all over the world love fairy tales. The story has a plot associated with magic and demons, handsome princes and beautiful princesses or girls, always evoke rich imagination and swept the children into the wonderland.

However, for adults, most fairy tales seem unrealistic and cannot be built on any foundation of truth. However, if we look at fairy tales under the scientific lens, we may find that some of them are not necessarily products of imagination.

Poison apple

In the story of ' Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs' , Princess Snow White bites an apple and immediately falls unconscious, then only wakes up by the kiss of her true lover - the handsome prince. Scientists have a simple explanation for Snow White's long, temporary sleep: Listeria monocytogenesis.

Snow White wakes up after a long sleep thanks to the kiss of the handsome prince.

This is a rod-shaped bacterium that resides in many foods, including apples.'It causes meningitis and is often able to cause confusion and shock to lead to coma in humans ,' said Dr. George Thompson, associate professor of pharmacy at the University of California (USA). said.

However, unlike fairy tales, in real life, we don't just need a kiss to awaken the person who is comatose due to meningitis, unless that kiss, somehow, imbues a dose of antibiotics. heavy.

However, the kiss of true love can also create miracles. In 2009, a woman in England fell into a coma after a heart attack. She only stirred two weeks later when the distressed husband asked for a kiss from his wife. And the wife seemed to respond by turning her head and pouting to kiss, according to the Daily Mail.

Wooden people, tree people

Pinocchio, the wooden boy.

In the novel entitled 'Pinocchio's Adventures' in 1883 by Carlo Collodi, the main character Pinocchio is a wooden doll boy made by a toy maker named Geppetto in a small Italian village. create. Pinocchio is deeply loved until one day, the fairy appears and gives the boy a miracle to become a person.

However, in the fairy tale series 'Once Upon a Time' of ABC channel, we see the plot built in the opposite direction: Pinocchio, now a grown man in one Real magic world, start turning back into wood. This episode, of course, is meaningless unless Pinocchio is infected with epidermodysplasia verruciformis - a rare dermatological disorder characterized by a high risk of epidermal cancer. Poor immunity can make people very susceptible to the human papilloma virus (HPV), including those that cause a hard, lumpy, acne-like bump or hump.

'The tree' Dede Koswara in Indonesia.

A few years ago, Dede Koswara, an Indonesian, shocked the world with parts that grew like bark spreading on his hands and feet. Doctors identified Koswara's condition as a combination of both epidermodysplasia verruciformis and the HPV-2 virus. The virus has invaded the victim's skin cells, causing them to produce keratin - the essential fiber protein for animal hair, nails and horns. Because Koswara's immune system is weakened, acne keratin grows out of control, forming dense, rough plates. That unusual appearance makes people nicknamed him 'tree man'.

Monsters and wolves

Beauty and the Beast

The fairy world is full of examples of werewolf-like creatures, such as the Monsters character in 'Beauty and the Beast' or the fairy-tale wolf 'Red Riding Hood'. However, these frightening werewolves may be just the unfortunate victims of an incurable disease.

Hypertrichosis or so called 'werewolf syndrome' is characterized by excessive appearance of hair on all or only certain areas of the body. Sometimes a person is born full of hair because the mutation is rare. Meanwhile, others may have 'werewolf syndrome' when they grow up due to the side effects of certain drugs or chemicals or even cancers.

The 11-year-old Indian boy Pruthviraj Patil suffers from 'werewolf syndrome'.

The first recorded case of 'werewolf syndrome' in the world belonged to the Gonzales family in the Canary Islands in the 1600s. The strange disease appeared in both Petrus Gonzales, 2 daughters, a son and his nephew. By the nineteenth century, people with Hypertrichosis such as Jo-Jo 'dog face boy', Lionel 'lion face man' and 'bearded lady' all became stars in the show's performances. circus due to the attraction of everyone's curiosity.