“Naegleria fowleri wants brrraiinss!”

No, not Season 4 of Jersey Shore, this is some truly traumatic Tuesday Science! Last weekend, a 16-year old girl in Florida died due to a rare species of amoeba infecting her brain cavity and eating her brain. Naegleria fowleri infects neural tissue and consumes it. The resulting swelling and neural damage cause death within days. It’s rare enough that it claims a human life, but also rare enough that doctors might miss it before it’s too late.

Her distraught mother reports the teenager went swimming in a local lake, and within hours began to suffer headaches and nausea. Her mother took her to two hospitals but they were too late to save her as her condition worsened. Most likely the amoeba had entered her head through her nose and made its way through the fluid rich environment into her skull where it multiplied and began to feast on her frontal lobe. As her body attempted to fight off the infection, cranial swelling ensued, further damaging the soft tissue.

[Source: io9]