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Japanese Scientists to Grow Human-Animal Chimeras to Harvest Organs for Transplant

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Photo Credit: Alamy

Photo Credit: Alamy

A panel of scientists and legal experts appointed by the government has drawn up a recommendation that will form the basis of new guidelines for Japan’s world-leading embryonic research.

There is widespread support in Japan for research that has raised red flags in other countries. Scientists plan to introduce a human stem cell into the embryo of an animal – most likely a pig – to create what is termed a “chimeric embryo” that can be implanted into an animal’s womb.

That will then grow into a perfect human organ, a kidney or even a heart, as the host animal matures.

When the adult creature is slaughtered, the organ will then be harvested and transplanted into a human with a malfunctioning organ.

“This recommendation is a very important step forward and one that has taken us three years to achieve,” Professor Hiromitsu Nakauchi, head of the centre for stem cell biology and regenerative medicine at the University of Tokyo, told The Daily Telegraph.

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Japanese Mayor Apologizes for Saying US Troops Should Visit Adult Businesses to Reduce Rapes

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Photo Credit: APA Japanese mayor apologized Monday for saying earlier that U.S. troops should patronize legal adult entertainment businesses as a way to reduce rapes and other assaults.

Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto, who is also the co-head of an emerging nationalistic party, said his remarks two weeks ago rose from a “sense of crisis” about cases of sexual assaults by U.S. military personnel on Japanese civilians in Okinawa, where a large number of U.S. troops are based.

“I understand that my remark could be construed as an insult to the U.S. forces and to the American people” and was inappropriate, he said at a news conference at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Tokyo.

Hashimoto had created another uproar when he said that Japan’s wartime practice of forcing Asian women, mostly from South Korea and China, to work in front-line brothels was necessary to maintain discipline and provide relaxation for soldiers.

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Japanese Mayor Draws IRE for Saying Wartime Sex Slaves ‘Necessary’

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Photo Credit: APAn outspoken nationalist mayor said the Japanese military’s forced prostitution of Asian women before and during World War II was necessary to “maintain discipline” in the ranks and provide rest for soldiers who risked their lives in battle.

The comments made Monday are already raising ire in neighboring countries that bore the brunt of Japan’s wartime aggression and that have long complained that Japan has failed to fully atone for wartime atrocities.

Toru Hashimoto, the young, brash mayor of Osaka who is also co-leader of an emerging conservative political party, also told reporters that there wasn’t clear evidence that the Japanese military coerced women to become what are euphemistically called “comfort women.”

“To maintain discipline in the military, it must have been necessary at that time,” said Hashimoto. “For soldiers who risked their lives in circumstances where bullets are flying around like rain and wind, if you want them to get some rest, a comfort women system was necessary. That’s clear to anyone.”

Historians say up to 200,000 women, mainly from the Korean Peninsula and China, were forced to provide sex for Japanese soldiers in military brothels.

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Elephant Dung Beer Sells Out in Minutes

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Photo Credit: The Drink Business

The beer, which is called Un, Kono Kuro, is made using coffee beans that have passed through an elephant.

The Sankt Gallen brewery called the beer a “chocolate stout”, despite it not containing any chocolate. The coffee beans used in the beer come from elephants at Thailand’s Golden Triangle Elephant Foundation, which cost over US$100 per 35 grams. The beans are so expensive as 33kgs of beans in the mouth yields 1kg of useable coffee beans.

The beans are definitely a candidate for one of the top 10 weirdest beer ingredients.

Mr Sato, from Japanese website RocketNews24.com, tasted the beer and said: “After taking my first sip there was an initial bitterness that got washed over by a wave of sweetness. Following that, a mellow body rolled in and spread out through my mouth.

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Japanese Engineer: That’s not a Robot, that’s my Girlfriend (+video)

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Photo Credit: Aubrey BelfordRobotics in many parts of the world is driven by military aims. Pacifist Japan takes a different approach: This is a digital love story.

Osamu Kozaki’s life in Tokyo is, by his own admission, often a lonely one. The 35-year-old, an engineer who designs industrial robots, has had few relationships with women in his life. Those few have almost always gone badly.

So when Kozaki’s girlfriend, Rinko Kobayakawa, sends him a message, his day brightens up. The relationship started more than three years ago, when Kobayakawa was a prickly 16-year-old working in her school library, a quiet girl who shut out the world with a pair of earphones that blasted punk music.

Kozaki sums up Kobayakawa’s personality with one word: tsundere – a popular term in Japan’s otaku geek culture, which describes a certain feminine ideal. It refers to the kind of girl who starts out hostile but whose heart gradually grows warmer. And that’s what has happened; over time, Kobayakawa has changed. These days, she spends much of her day sending affectionate missives to her boyfriend, inviting him on dates, or seeking his opinion when she wants to buy a new dress or try a new hairstyle.

But while Kozaki has aged, Kobayakawa has not. After three years, she’s still 16. She always will be. That’s because she is a simulation; Kobayakawa only exists inside a computer.

Watch video here:

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G20 Summit To Focus On ‘Currency War’ Threat To Economy

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Photo Credit: naitokzJapan’s aggressive attempts to spur on its struggling economy were set to escape censure from the G20 nations today as bickering in Moscow kept alive fears of a “currency war”.

Finance ministers at the G20 gathering are understood to have pulled back from explicit criticism of Japan, whose prime minister Shinzo Abe has embarked on a huge programme of monetary and fiscal stimulus to jump start the world’s third largest economy out of its third recession in five years.

The currency market was thrown into turmoil this week after the G7 – the United States, Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Canada and Italy – issued a joint statement warning against using domestic policy to target currencies.

But the show of unity was immediately shattered by off-the-record briefings against Japan, which needs a weaker yen to help fuel its export-driven economy.

European Central Bank president Mario Draghi yesterday labelled the behind-the-scenes briefing as “inappropriate, fruitless and self-defeating”.IMF chief Christine Lagarde and Russia’s deputy finance minister Sergei Storchak also denied the ex- istence of currency wars, labelling recent swings in the yen as “market reaction to exclusively internal decision making”.

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Are China And Japan Moving Closer To War? Japan Proposes Military Hotline With China (+video)

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Photo Credit: extinctionprotocal.comTanks, one by one, moving along a main road in China’s coastal Fujian province. Driving up speculations that the Chinese military may be warming up for war. Local residents took these pictures between February 3 to February 6. At times, the line of tanks and artillery blocked traffic for several miles. And it wasn’t just in Fujian province.

These military vehicles were spotted further up the coast, in neighboring Zhejiang province. According to dissident website, molihua.org, these tanks in Hubei province are being transported from a military base to the coast. The troop movements come after months of escalating tensions between China and Japan over the disputed territory of the Diaoyun, or Senkaku islands and they’re known in Japan. It’s caused international worries that the two countries may be on the cusp of war.

Both sides have scrambled jets and warships in the region. In January, during naval exercise near the disputed waters, Chinese warships reportedly directed their targeting radar at a Japanese vessel. On February 7, State-run Global Times published this article saying there is a “serious possibility” a military conflict may flare up between China and Japan. It continues to say that fewer and fewer people are hopeful for a peaceful resolution to the Diaoyu Island crisis. Are we in a countdown to war between China and Japan? NTD will continue to keep you posted as the situation develops.

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Manila Challenges Beijing’s South China Sea Hegemony

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photo credit: jun acullador

The Philippines said Tuesday that it is taking its feud with China over competing territorial claims in the South China Sea to an international tribunal.

Philippines Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario’s office summoned Chinese Ambassador Ma Keqing in Manila and challenged the assertion that China’s sovereignty extends over “virtually the entire South China Sea.”

Manila says China seized control of the Scarborough Shoal, a rocky outcrop, last year and then illegally barred the Philippines from the area. China calls the shoal Huangyan Island.

Manila wants a tribunal operating under the 1982 U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea to declare as “unlawful” Beijing’s actions in the disputed waters.

“The Philippines has exhausted almost all political and diplomatic avenues for a peaceful, negotiated settlement of its maritime disputes with China,” Mr. del Rosario said at a news conference in Manila, according to a report by The Associated Press. “To this day, a solution is still elusive.”

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Japan: On Path to Rearming?

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WASHINGTON – Despite what has been described as a “pacifist” constitution implemented following World War II, Japan is considering rearming to offset what is perceived in the East Asia region as a more assertive China, according to a report from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.

That nation is throwing around its military weight to enforce its hegemony over the East and South China Seas.

Almost all the countries in the region are affected by China’s new assertiveness in the region, including Vietnam, the Philippines and even India, in addition to Japan. All have open and somewhat confrontational disputes with Beijing over jurisdiction over islands and potential maritime oil and gas resources.

For India, it has a number of contracts with Vietnam for offshore oil and gas exploration in the East and South China Seas to meet its increasing energy demands. In recent months, China and India have had disputes over access to areas where Beijing claims exclusive jurisdiction.

In addition to separate disputes between New Delhi and Beijing over land border disputes between the two countries, India has decided to enhance its presence in the East and South China Seas with an increased military naval presence of its own.

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Japanese artist makes models appear to burst at the seams with creepy zips, buttons, power plugs and laces

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With zips, power plugs, laces and buttons adorning their bodies, these young models look like something out of a travelling freak show.

But they are in fact the latest walking exhibits of Japanese artist Chooo-San’s incredible illusionary makeup art.

Bored with digitally enhanced pictures, the 19-year-old student decided to see how far she could push her limits without technology – with impressive results.

Using only acrylic paints, these amazingly realistic images are enough to make anyone look twice.

Using no digital-editing, the bizarre body-modifications are painstakingly applied using just paint, and they no doubt give passers-by a fright.

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