features
Battalion/Page 3B
February 24, 1983
Low salt diet retrains
aste buds, study says
United Press International
[NEW YORK — A low
diuin diet, it turns out,
[■eventually tricks or retrains
tlje taste buds, according to
■searchers at the Universit\
|t)l Pennsylvania.
As a result — and despite
Be difficulty at the start of
Rich a diet — salt) foods alter
| while come across as less
■pealing.
I The report in the Atner-
Rm journal of Clinical Nutt i-
■>n is based on a taste studs
scientists at the university's
Kmell C'hemical Senses
lenter.
The researcliers said their
■ttch supports impressions
■om physicians and low
■clium dieters. 1 hey said also
Bat it contradicts earlier ex-
iriniental studies which con-
^^1 tended that sodium restric-
Ttion must inevitably produce
craving for salt.
The backdrop, as sketched
in the report:
• Sodium balance in an
organism is influenced by
many factors, including dis
ease, diet and hormonal state.
In many animal species,
sodium loss triggers salt in
take. When laboratory anim
als. for example, are made
sodium deficient, they in
crease their intake of salt solu
tions. They even accept strong
salt solutions previously
avoided.
• People also show altered
taste and increased salt intake
after sodium depletion, re
search evidence suggests.
Even moderate decreases in
sodium ingestion for 24 hours
is supposed to induce a
heightened liking for salty
soups.
These reports on clinical
studies contrast with what is
called anecdotal evidence —
clinical impressions of doctors
and self-reports f rom patients
on low sodium diets.
The anecdotal evidence
suggests that as a result of re
stricting sodium intake, peo
ple come to prefer less salty
food, the Pennsylvania scien
tists said.
During their research, the
investigators tried to resolve
these contradictory reports.
They theorized that if the
taste buds indeed work
against people on low sodium
diets, then some method must
be found to circumvent the
taste changes.
The battle with salt goes on
because excessive salt intake
has been traced to high blood
pressure in susceptible per
sons.
other
epartnw
Patents are sticky business
United Press international
NEW YORK — Judicial un-
familiarity with patents and in
consistency in the handling of
patent cases in federal courts are
contributing to a widening in
novation gap in the United
States, according to one of the
nation’s most prolific inventors.
Jerome Lemelson, who holds
350 patents and has 90 more
pending, said when patents are
disputed or infringed in the Un
ited States, in only about one
case in six is the patent holder
upheld by the courts. On the
other hand, in Germany, Japan
and Britain, the patent holder is
upheld eight out often times, he
said.
“This creates a climate of
futility for inventors and makes
business f irms reluctant to invest
in new patents. That in turn cre
ates an innovation gap and helps
to reduce the American tech
nological edge.” he said.
Lemelson said the courts’
seeming prejudice involves a
feeling that many patents violate
the spirit of the antitrust laws
and create monopolies, and
more importantly, a naive belief
that the federal patent office is
too generous in granting patents
on devices and ideas that are
“obvious,” and therefore are not
real inventions.
But Lemelson contends
judges of the ordinary federal
courts are not really" competent
to determine whether an idea or
an invention is obvious.
Something that may seem ob
vious to the ordinary judge after
someone has thought of it and
patented it may not seem ob
vious at all to the Patent Office’s
staff of experienced examiners
or to persons with technological
expeitise in the particular field.
“What it amounts to,” Lemel
son said, “is that the American
inventor and the company
whose business depends on pa
tent protection are up against a
double standard of government
enforcement — and the stan
dards of the Patent Office and
the ordinary federal courts
don’t jibe.”
Prof. Irving Kayton, who
teaches patent law at George
Washington University in
Washington, I).CL, said the trou
ble is not so much that the dis
trict courts are too hard on pa
tents as that they are inconsis
tent in determining whether an
idea or a device is patentable.
Agreeing in general with
Lemelson's assessment, Kayton
called the situation in recent
years a “nightmare.” Federal
judges follow a multiplicity of
standards, he said; even change
their own standards sometimes
as often as ten times in two years.
Fie said the new patent
appeals court created last Octo
ber will follow sound law and
this should result in uniform
standards ultimately.
Another beneficial step,
Lemelson said, would be to insti
tute a formal challenge period
for claiming new patents are in
valid and unenforceable.
Lemelson said “the industrial
establishment” is partly to blame
for lhe situation, as he sees it.
“Too often, the inventor who is
legitimately trying to protect his
rights faces a battery of lawyers
with many bags of tricks aimed
at burying him in paper work
and in legal bills for litigation
that will drag on for years.”
orse shooting prompts
i5 investigation of ranch
I United i’ress International
lions—tkiBOUSTON — f he shotgun
a report ilfijoting of a 9-year-old horse at
changesi-Branch for neglected or mist re
tted animals has caused of fic ials
imisdesiii :ointensify ef forts to find a new
ickness, a mie for the animal shelter,
^abilitydi ;>tiicials said.
lose eteHInvestigators I tiesday said
parity din pey had no clues or motives into
crelionta the shooting of Alias, who was
tend to shot twice with a shotgun last
and iheieleek. The horse scrambled for
dercapaci 'over in the barn, but collapsed
sm and par ihdj died of wounds to t heabdo-
relive, glen and chest, Harris Countv
nassdecrei'Bserve Deputy George Hueb-
gih is lost, net said.
o repair(WHuebner said the shooting
dingtoat tvas the latest in a series of inci-
autilv di dents at the Human Ranch since
nartw
October. Equipment and a
horse have been stolen.
“It's like stealing from an
orphanage,” Huebner said. “It’s
more likely vandals, because
there have been reports of trou
ble with horses in that area of
town."
Huebner said apparently
there were no witnesses to the
shooting that killed Atlas, one of
2b horses rounded up by Harris
County Animal Cruelty En
forcement deputies last summer
and send to tire Humane Ranch
for rehabilitation.
“ The fact that buckshot was
used to kill the horse means
there are no markings that can
be traced to a gun," Huebner
said.
Huebner said the shooting
prompted officials to renew
efforts to find a new home for
the ranch, which has operated
on rent property for more than
thr ee years.
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