Trending News Today: 10% of Faces Missed When Applying Sunscreen

The University of Maryland School of Pharmacy is seeking to provide educational standards and training to prospective workers for the medical marijuana industry, according to The Washington Post. The university is partnering with the advocacy group Americans for Safe Access to offer classes through its online certifications platform. The group will provide the instructors and course material, which will then be adjusted to fit the pharmacy school’s curriculum, the Post reported.

Individuals miss an average of 10% of their faces when applying sunscreen, a new study found. According to Medical Xpress, more than 90% of basal cell carcinomas occur on the head or neck, with 5% to 10% of all skin cancers occurring on the eyelids. For the study, 57 participants were asked to apply sunscreen to their face. Photos were then taken with a UV-sensitive camera before and after the sunscreen was applied. The investigators used a custom-designed program to segment and analyze the photos to examine how thorough each participant was in covering their whole face. The results of the study showed that on average, individuals missed 9.5% of the entire face, with the most commonly missed areas being the eyelids and the area between the inner corner of the eye and bridge of the nose. The experiment was repeated, but this time the investigators armed the participants with extra information about skin cancers of the eyelid region, Medical Xpress reported. The findings showed a slight improvement in sunscreen coverage, with 7.7% of the face left unprotected.

Canadian scientists have synthesized a cousin of the smallpox virus, a deadly disease eradicated in 1980. According to The Washington Post, the development was a wakeup call, as some scientists fear that smallpox could be revived through synthetic biology. The experiment cost a total of $100,000 plus labor, and investigators used commercially available genetic material to recreate the extinct horsepox virus, the Post reported. Lead researcher David Evans noted that the synthetic virus is not harmful to humans, and that the primary goal of his research efforts is to develop new vaccines and cancer treatments.