using your cd-rom to test for anthrax

I freakin found it.
http://www.beyondtomorrow.com.au/stories/ep23/anthrax.html

© Beyond Entertainment Limited 2005Note the copyright.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

And that means?

That means it is an entertainment program. And absolutely none of the points I raised earlier have been refited.We never doubted that you saw such a program. The only issues were those I raised. The implications that this is some new thing that will be used outside the lab or that the technology was as you described it is simply silly.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

No, it's an entertainment company who does the producing, just like imax, or national geographic. It has no reflection on the program itself.If you want to learn how it works you can follow the contact info at the bottom of the page:
Contact:
Dr. Cameron L. Jones
Swinburne University of Technology
Phone +61 (0)3 9214 8267
Fax +61 (0)3 9819 0821This message has been edited by riVeRraT, 04-06-2006 02:54 PM

But I don't need to know how it works. What we are discussing is your presentation of the subject. It's entirely possible that you simply completely misunderstood what the program presented, but what this thread is about is what you presented in the OP. and that is just plain hilarious.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I found a link to a very short article about this here:
Error 401 - Intranet | Swinburne University of TechnologyIt seems that the CD isn't blank but has some sort of pattern of data on it and different substances would scatter the light differently, so there might be some way of identifying what was on the disk. The thing is, if it were anthrax, the last thing you would want to do is handle it, much less spin it around at very high speeds. It would be slung all over the place if the cd wasn't sealed properly. It seems to be still in the research phase at any rate and may use special equipment not just any old cd drive as the article does refer to "new CD sensor technology".

I can even see some advantages of such a portable instrument for field identification. It was the specific items outlined in the OP that I was discussing, and every single one of the issues I identified still stands.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Just had a look at the university website:

quote:

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The CD itself can be thought of as a petri dish - the substance that is added interferes and ”scatters’ the CD content introducing a new way of analysing it. The analog laser light interference pattern is then converted into a digital signal from the changes in voltage with this process all occurring in a matter of seconds.

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The next step for the research, according to Jones, is standardising the hardware and software behind the myriad of CD and DVD drive models available, as well as testing other sensitive biological or chemical agents that have been used in bioterrorism.

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Also, This goes into it in more detail. Finally, here is a paper on the topic.

quote:

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A CD-based biosensor device for quantitative determination of the differential Gram stain has been developed using consumer-grade hardware, and does not require a light microscope for analysis. The method has been tested against five strains of bacteria, against larger yeast cells, and against an image template that could be printed directly onto CD in different
colours.

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An equation has been developed and applied to help in bacterial classification by relating properties of mechanical drive performance with nanoscale bit level data comparisons. The cells act like nonlinear photonic filters, and IR-light scattering through the
deposits under rotation acts like a spectral map for spatial properties of the biological population.

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hilarious, is that a Christian term, or is that how you love me like you love yourself?I pretty much got it word for word how it happened, except maybe for the temp of the oven, which I may have not heard correctly.If you weren't so busy trying to make me look like a fool, you might have learned something. I can't see how your approach is even remotely Christian.But if I was to examine everything you said, you would find that if you watched the show, that you were completely wrong in all of your assertions, but one. Nothing was negated. They used an ordinary cd rive, that is what they said on the show, not a special one.They also said blank cd.

Thank you for posting that.They did mention that similiar technology can be used to identify bacteria. According to crash this is impossible?

Hence the plastic cover, that jar said won't fit in the drive. cough cough.

LOLThe world IS flat, really!!!You just cannot be wrong, is that it?

Jar may well be wrong about this. He may also have a much better BS detector than you do. I wouldn't get to much of your own skin in this when you don't actually know much about what you saw.Jar is pointing out (guessing I think) some problems with this idea. Until they are answered we don't know who is wrong.I think that past threads suggest that your BS detector is very weak indeed. You should take that into consideration.The truth is we don't know enough but if I have to guess I'd say this is BS.There is some hint that it isn't. I think I've gotten a wee bit closer to the source.http://www.beyondtomorrow.com.au/stories/ep23/anthrax.htmlGoing from there to the Swinburne U. website leads to a dead end for some reason. There is one paper in their newsletter that talks about early anthrax detection but no more.I think we need to email Dr. Jones.

According to Modulus' link to the primary literature, RiverRat's description is pretty darn good.The group used standard blank CD-Rs, and analyzed them in a standard CD-ROM drive in a PC laptop running Windows.As long as the contamination issue is properly dealt with, this seems like a great, portable, cheap, and easily accessible system for on-site analysis. All someone would really need is the CD covers and analysis software, (and perhaps protective gear depending on the type of sample they were analyzing). Everything else can be bought at the mall.Interesting find, RiverRat.