Background: Artemisia annua L.is a well-established medicinal herb used for millennia to treat parasites and fever-related ailments caused by various microbes. Although effective against many infectious agents, the plant is not a miracle cure and there are infections where it has proved ineffective or limited. It is important to report those failures. Methods: Here artemisinin, artesunate and dried leaf slurries of A. annua were used daily for 6 days in vivo against Babesia microti in mice 2 days post infection at 100 µg artemisinin/kg body weight. Parasitemia was measure before and 15 days days post treatment. Artemisinin and extracts of A. annua also were tested in vitro against six Candida sp. at artemisinin concentrations up to 180 µM and growth measured after cultures were fed drugs once at different stages of growth and also after repeated dosing. Results: A. annua , artesunate, and artemisinin were ineffective in reducing or eliminating parasitemia in B. microti -infected mice treated at 100 µg artemisinin/kg body weight. Although the growth of exponential cultures of many of the tested Candida sp. was inhibited, the response was not sustained and both artemisinin and Artemisia were essentially ineffective at concentrations of artemisinin at up to 180 µM of artemisinin. Conclusions: Together these results show that artemisinin, its derivatives, and A. annua are ineffective against B. microti and at least six species of Candida .

This is not a conventional essay and climate change is not a conventional subject. The issue's editors asked David Buckland and colleagues to “discuss the intersection of art and climate change science and specifically the Cape Farewell project's approach to curating and disseminating this intersection online, in gallery spaces, and in print.” Climate change is a future-truth; what humans are doing now will be realized in twenty to thirty years' time. The Cape Farewell project is a creative action-based research program evolved to pave the way for a sustainable future; in a way, it is an ambition to create the cultural equivalent of mathematical modeling—how to map the near future space from a position of culture, not science. This essay explores the genesis and history of the organization and the work it is currently undertaking, ultimately examining how culture can be a powerful tool to engage civic society with the enormous challenge of climate change.

No abstract

The Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast (now part of Belfast Health and Social Care Trust) hosted the North West Benchmarking Group's regional meeting on 28 January 2009, sponsored by Beagle Orthopaedics. Beaumont Hospital Dublin, the Walton Centre Liverpool, Greater Manchester Neuroscience Centre, and the Royal Victoria Belfast were represented. Apologies were received from The Royal Preston.