Caffeine, cocaine, and painkillers detected in sharks from The Bahamas | Hacker News Reader

Caffeine, cocaine, and painkillers detected in sharks from The Bahamas

sciencedirect.com

76 pointsLostMyLogin54 comments

This classifies Cocaine Shark as a documentary https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocaine_Shark

indeed

"The film features various mutated creatures, none of which are actually sharks on cocaine as the title suggests." they had one job

One. Job.

So much potential in that franchise. Cocaine moose, cocaine snake (or Snakes on Cocaine, which could have the line “I want these mother f’ing snakes off mother f’ing cocaine!”), cocaine lion, cocaine hippo, cocaine alligator…

Or even Cocaine Bear: https://m.imdb.com/title/tt14209916

that's what the person you're replying to was referring to

Meh, i think branching out to different animals is a mistake. They could have evolved beyond comedy to drama by instead putting the bear on meth in the sequel. Follow the bear through its downward spiral losing its teeth and eventually hitting bottom drinking its own urine to stay high. The redemption ark could be an unlikely friendship formed with one of the campers it mauled in the first movie sparked by the bear sobering up and doing the apology tour.

That sounds more like magic mushrooms bear, in which the bear realizes all life is one and to maul other beings is to maul yourself.

Not surprising. A lot of these substances get metabolized, or just diluted by water and filtered out without being like, magically deconstructed and turned into all CO2 and H2O and N2. So a lot of wacky chemical compounds humans tend to consume tend to get detected wherever humans gather and discharge bodily fluids that eventually reach the ocean. This does not immediately indicate that e.g. evil corporations are dumping toxic wastes, forever plastics pieces are leaching out scary additives, etc.

Hm, I'm not convinced this is contamination from human waste. The quantity of caffeine and painkillers a human consume should be too small. Also, the body does break caffeine and painkillers, the amount in waste shouldn't be meaningful

If diluted in the oceans I would say that it would be undectable. Cocaine is even harder, because it is not commonly consumed, it is for a group of people, but not enough for the statistics

The measured concentrations are on the order of 1-20 ng/mL in blood. Cmax in humans when taking those drugs are about 100-1000x higher.

I wouldn't put too much weight on the finding that those with detections had different urea/lactate etc. There might be something underlying explaining both drug and physiology, like age.

Could still be bad to have chronic exposure at such low levels - also fish physiology is different.

this clearly points to an previously unknown seasonal migration from wall st.

The Shark of Wall St

Clearly there are missing parts, or opportunites, in the two trilogies.

[Cocaine] Shark | Wolf | Bear [of Wall St]

...on a plane.

It has the potential for a whole cinematic universe.

... in the multiverse.

Who are we kidding, this is literally Marvel's combinatorial formula.

Seasonal migration from Wall Street to the Bahamas? 'Previously unknown?' A bit déclassé maybe, but...

I wonder how much of this is just that our tests are getting more sensitive.

Exactly, the detection itself doesn't mean anything. Is the dose relevant? If not, then not. And the dose likely isn't relevant.

Agreed. When you zoom in, even the normal life stuff can give you concern. I showed my kids what creatures live on their and others' bodies. You have millions of microscopic arachnids called Demodex mites living in your hair follicles and sebaceous glands, particularly on your face. My wife gave me an evil look as I showed my children this fact in online vids and pics. Granted these are symbiotic/parasitic relationships of life, but still, the closer you look, the more you see!

OK - but had you been to the Bahamas recently when you decided to do that....

Not millions

Correct, not millions of Demodex mites, which are usually in the hundreds to thousands on a typical, non-infested human. The millions should be the general amount of mites and other symbiotic/parasitic on and in your body. Thanks!

You can say what you like about the dose being pharmacologically ineffective but I want my sharks completely sober.

Why does that matter?

Reggae Shark is Real https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3ytTKZf344&list=RDA3ytTKZf3...

Party on, sharks!

After the "plastic glove" smoking gun the other day, I wonder if this is another instance of lab contamination making it into the results.

Unlike plastic gloves, researchers don’t typically bring these substances into the lab.

Alas, that was the joke.

researchers party too

Maybe you just aren't getting invited to the cool labs?

It just sounds like you've been to really lame labs

#justlikeus

These sharks surely know how to party!

They probably ate lawyers from New York who were on vacation…

I see they've graduated High School

Thank god, it's not microplastic!

Does that make for more aggressive sharks in the waters with unexplained behaviors?

Is caffeine really that bad?

Sharks obtain cocaine by eating people?

Maybe it says something about the people taking cocaine and go swimming with sharks.

Sharks are on cocaine for the same reason it rains birth control now.

Now all they need is blackjack and hookers.

First it was cocaine bear, and now cocaine shark.

We've already had Cocaine Crabs from Outer Space: https://imdb.com/title/tt28651516/

Do they write Rust?

No because if they did they’d tell you about it in the first sentence

if someone uses */Linux, writes rust, and is a vegan, what do they tell you first?

They tell you about free software and what it means and no not like beer.

https://blog.ari.lt/media/86b362afea5c76f61ed65da4762b91fda1...

Well I don't think Cocaine Snail would have been a blockbuster

There's a whole movie about a snail that's super fast (Turbo). An adult version of that isn't so far fetched.

I grew up with that movie. It was weird

Reply on news.ycombinator.com