Friday Fun: sperm bags & the trachea that should have spoken up

Did you hear the one about the lady who hatched baby squid from her teeth? Disgusting, but true. A recent case study in the Journal of Parasitology reports on “Penetration of the oral mucosa by parasite-like sperm bags of squid: a case report in a Korean woman.”
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21834723

A 63-yr-old Korean woman experienced severe pain in her oral cavity immediately after eating a portion of parboiled squid along with its internal organs. She did not swallow the portion, but spat it out immediately. She complained of a pricking and foreign-body sensation in the oral cavity. Twelve small, white spindle-shaped, bug-like organisms stuck in the mucous membrane of the tongue, cheek, and gingiva were completely removed, along with the affected mucosa. On the basis of their morphology and the presence of the sperm bag, the foreign bodies were identified as squid spermatophores.

Then there’s the one about the medical student who rescued a body part from airport security. A professor at Bristol University, UK was attempting to transport a stem-cell generated trachea from England to Barcelona via airplane for a transplant operation, but was stopped by airport security because the container violated the liquid limit. A medical student with a pilot friend stepped in and flew the trachea privately to Spain in time for surgery, for a mere $21,000. The story and associated scientific articles can be found via NPR’s Health and Science blog.