The universe: Not expanding as fast as you think

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Rumors of our universe’s rapid expansion may have been greatly exaggerated. According to new research led by University of Arizona astronomers, the type of supernova used to measure that growth are actually far more diverse than previously realized.

The findings, published last week in The Astrophysical Journal, reveal that these supernovae fall into distinct populations that had not been previously recognized. The authors believe that the revelation could have a significant impact on their understanding of just how rapidly the universe had been expanding since the Big Bang and other key cosmological issues.

Not all type Ia supernovae are created equal

The exploding stars at the heart of the matter, type Ia supernovae, have long been considered so uniform that researchers have used them as cosmic “beacons” through which they can measure and observe the depths of the universe. However, the UA team revealed that this is not necessarily the case, and that type Ia supernovae actually fall into different populations.

Lead author Peter A. Milne and his colleagues compare the discovery to purchasing different types of 100-watt light bulbs at the store, then taking them home and finding that, even though they are all supposed to be the same brightness, there are actually some variations.

“We found that the differences are not random, but lead to separating Ia supernovae into two groups, where the group that is in the minority near us are in the majority at large distances – and thus when the universe was younger,” explained Milne, an associate astronomer with the UA’s Department of Astronomy and Steward Observatory.

“There are different populations out there, and they have not been recognized,” he added. “The big assumption has been that as you go from near to far, type Ia supernovae are the same. That doesn’t appear to be the case,” and that could indicate that the acceleration of the expansion of the universe isn’t happening quite as quickly initially believed.

Subtle differences become more obvious in the UV spectrum

The currently accepted view is that the universe is expanding at an ever-increasing rate as it is being ripped apart by a mysterious force known as dark energy, the authors noted. The theory is based on the discovery that some supernovae appear fainter than predicted because they moved further away from Earth than expected based on a constant rate of universal expansion.

This seemed to indicate that the rate at which stars and galaxies move away from one another is increasing, and that some force has been tearing the universe apart faster and faster. The theory is based on the concept that type Ia supernovae are all the same brightness when they explode, and that the far-off supernovae are fainter than expected because they are farther away.

However, Milne and his colleagues observed a large sample of type Ia supernovae in ultraviolet and visible light using observations from both the Hubble telescope and the Swift satellite, and found that subtle differences between the populations in visible light were more obvious in their follow-up observations in the UV spectrum.

“The realization that there were two groups of type Ia supernovae started with Swift data. Then we went through other datasets to see if we see the same. And we found the trend to be present in all the other datasets,” Milne said. “As you’re going back in time, we see a change in the supernovae population. The explosion has something different about it, something that doesn’t jump out at you when you look at it in optical light, but we see it in the ultraviolet.”

“Since nobody realized that before, all these supernovae were thrown in the same barrel. But if you were to look at 10 of them nearby, those 10 are going to be redder on average than a sample of 10 faraway supernovae,” he added. “We’re proposing that our data suggest there might be less dark energy than textbook knowledge, but we can’t put a number on it.”

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Overweight people less likely to develop dementia

Written By: Emily Bills
Emily Bills

Provided by Dr. Nawab Qizilbash, The Lancet

Middle-aged people who are underweight (with a Body Mass Index [BMI] less than 20 kg/m2 [1]) are a third more likely to develop dementia than people of similar age with a healthy BMI, according to new research published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology journal.

The findings, which come from the largest ever study to examine the statistical association between BMI and dementia risk, also show that middle-aged obese people (BMI greater than 30 kg/m2) are nearly 30% less likely to develop dementia than people of a healthy weight, contradicting findings from some previous research, which suggested that obesity leads to an increased risk of dementia.

Researchers based at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, and OXON Epidemiology, both in London, UK, analysed data from the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD), a large database of patient information recorded during routine general practice over nearly 20 years, representing around 9% of the UK population.

Association between BMI and dementia risk

The researchers analysed the medical records of nearly two million (1,958,191) people with an average (median) age of 55 years at the start of the study period, and an average (median) BMI of 26.5 kg/m2, just within the range usually classed as overweight. During an average (median) of nine years follow-up, nearly fifty thousand (45,507) people were diagnosed with dementia.

People who were underweight in middle age were a third (34%) more likely to be diagnosed with dementia than those of a healthy weight, and this increased risk of dementia persisted even 15 years after the underweight was recorded.

As participants’ BMI at middle age increased, the risk of dementia reduced, with very obese people (BMI greater than 40 kg/m2) 29% less likely to get dementia than people in the normal weight range. An increase in BMI was associated with a substantial steadily decreasing risk of dementia for BMI of up to 25 kg/m² (classed as a healthy weight). Above a BMI of 25 kg/m² (classed as overweight or obese), dementia risk decreased more gradually, and this trend continued up to a BMI of 35 kg/m² or higher.

The association between BMI and dementia risk wasn’t affected by the decade in which the participants were born, nor by their age at diagnosis. Adjusting for confounding factors known to increase the risk of dementia, such as alcohol use or smoking, made little difference to the results.

According to study author Professor Stuart Pocock from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, “Our results suggest that doctors, public health scientists, and policy makers need to re-think how to best identify who is at high risk of dementia. We also need to pay attention to the causes and public health consequences of the link between underweight and increased dementia risk which our research has established. However, our results also open up an intriguing new avenue in the search for protective factors for dementia – if we can understand why people with a high BMI have a reduced risk of dementia, it’s possible that further down the line, researchers might be able to use these insights to develop new treatments for dementia.” [2]

“The reasons why a high BMI might be associated with a reduced risk of dementia aren’t clear, and further work is needed to understand why this might be the case,” adds Dr Nawab Qizilbash from OXON Epidemiology in London, UK and Madrid, Spain, the study’s lead author. “If increased weight in mid-life is protective against dementia, the reasons for this inverse association are unclear at present. Many different issues related to diet, exercise, frailty, genetic factors, and weight change could play a part.” [2]

Writing in a linked Comment, Professor Deborah Gustafson from SUNY Downstate Medical Center in New York, USA, says, “The published literature about BMI and dementia is equivocal. Some studies report a positive association between high mid-life BMI and dementia, whereas others do not… Many considerations are needed in the assessment of the epidemiology of the association between BMI and late-onset dementia, as is the case for many recorded associations involving late-life disorders. To understand the association between BMI and late-onset dementia should sober us as to the complexity of identifying risk and protective factors for dementia. The report by Qizilbash and colleagues is not the final word on this controversial topic.”

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The do’s and don’ts of interview body language

Written By: Emily Bills
Emily Bills

Abbey Hull for redOrbit.com – @AbbeyHull4160

You got the call two days ago to set up an interview with your dream job. You’ve got it all prepared—your resume, your outfit, the perfect words to say, it’s all ready to go. However, have you ever stopped to think what your body may be saying for you? Listen to what Alison Craig, image consultant and author of Hello Job! How to Psych Up, Suit Up, & Show Up, and Mark Bowden, author of Winning Body Language, as they help explain what your body may be saying for you.

Your interview starts in the room: FALSE

Your interview starts the moment you step out of your car in the parking lot. Craig and Bowden both agree that you are continuously being observed on your way in and out of your interview. “You don’t know who could be in the parking lot with you, looking at you from a window or standing next to you in the elevator,” Craig stated. “Your body should tell anyone who might be watching that you’re confident and calm. It’s not the time to be frantically searching through your portfolio for printouts of your resume.”

That goes for the waiting room of the interview too—hiring managers often ask their receptionists for their opinions on interview candidates. The secret to nonchalant success? “Sit with your profile to them,” Bowden says. “It makes them feel comfortable, and if they’re comfortable, they’re more likely to form a good impression.”

First impressions mean everything: TRUE

Since your interview has already begun, watch your body language in both the interview chair and the waiting room. Don’t sit with your shoulders hunched and chin down, as you will appear closed off. Sit with your back straight and your chest open, not puffed, in order to look confident and assertive. However, avoid throwing out your legs or leaning back into your arms, as these may make you appear too comfortable and confident to the point of arrogance.

There is a perfect handshake: TRUE

We all have heard of this one before, but there really is a perfect handshake. The key is to find balance between the overly aggressive death hold handshake (we’ve all experienced it at least once), and the limp fish handshake (a.k.a. boneless to the point of difficulty shaking).

Also, when offering your right hand to shake, make sure your right hand is free of your belongings to make a handshake easy, and offer your hand with your palm slightly upward, a “sign that you’re giving them status,” says Bowden. Never take the second step and cover your partner’s hand with the hand you’re not shaking with—this can be interpreted as a sign of domination, or in this case an unfavorable feeling when interviewing for their job.

Eye contact is good so I should stare them down: FALSE

Eye contact is also a balanced body language. Maintain eye contact with your interviewer as it shows interest and paying attention, but don’t stare them down. Perfect balance? Charisma coach Cynthia Burnham says to try and hold your interviewer’s gaze for one extra second before breaking contact. This way, you will maintain confidence without making them uncomfortable once the connection has been made.

Departure is just leaving: FALSE

When the interview is over, remember—you’re still being interviewed! Calmly gather your things, and if it’s not convenient to shake all the peoples’ hands in the room, be sure to shake hands with the hiring manager or the worker who brought you in as a thank you for their time.

Disclaimer: While reading body language is all in good fun and can help us read a situation, you must use caution when attempting to read your interviewer and have them read you. Not all body language is as it seems, and so using context clues will help. While maintaining good posture and eye contact and handshakes are all strengths in an interview, the interviewer may be trained to recognize when someone is uncomfortable or not being themselves. The number one rule in any interview is to be yourself, because that is the person they’re hiring. Also, during the interview, try not to read the body language of the interviewer—chances are that person has been trained not to give away too much. Be yourself and don’t let it get to you if his arms are crossed or he breaks eye contact—it may be cold in the room, and the air conditioning could be blurring his contacts.

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Would Lincoln have survived being shot today?

Written By: Christopher Pilny
Christopher Pilny

Will Hadden for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

The assassin ascends the stairs to the private balcony where his unsuspecting prey is waiting.

The prey watches the performance below him, oblivious to his own approaching doom. He knows nothing until he hears the firing of a derringer, and by then it’s too late.

The shot rings out. The crowd screams. The assassin flees.

And by the next morning, the President is dead.

Abraham Lincoln, 16th President of the United States, was shot in the back of the head by John Wilkes Booth on April 14th, 1865, mere days after the end of the long and bloody Civil War.

As the 150th anniversary of Lincoln’s death nears (April 15th), one can’t help but wonder: Would the President have survived if he’d had access to today’s medical technologies? Would modern science have any impact on his chances for survival?

But first: The nature of the fatal injury
Almost immediately after being shot, Lincoln was rushed from Ford’s Theatre to a nearby house and treated for his injury.
However, in 1865 there was little in the way of medicine, technology or trauma care for something as severe as Lincoln’s fatal wound, said Dr. Allen Sills, a neurosurgeon at Vanderbilt Hospital in Nashville, Tennessee.
“There was no way to monitor intracranial pressure, there was no way to image the brain and the array of medications that were available were extremely limited,” Sills said. “I think that traumatic injuries to the brain were treated probably treated much like traumatic injuries to other parts of the body where physicians and surgeons tried to stop the bleeding and give general supportive care and hope for the best.”
According to Lincoln’s autopsy report, the bullet entered Lincoln’s skull through his occipital bone “about one inch to the left of the median line and just above the left lateral sinus, which it opened.”

lincoln shot

Currier & Ives depiction of the Lincoln assassination.


From there, the bullet tore into Lincoln’s dura mater, worked its way through the cerebrum’s left posterior lobe and entered the left lateral ventricle.
The bullet finally came to rest in the white matter of the cerebrum above the anterior portion of the left corpus striatum.
This caused Lincoln’s brain to compress against the inside of his skull. Like tissue anywhere else in the body, the brain naturally swells after sustaining a traumatic injury.
However, while an injured arm or leg can freely expand without restriction, the brain can only swell so much due to the skull surrounding it.
“You have to think of the brain as existing inside a closed box, that’s what the skull really is,” Sills said. “The skull really can’t expand, it’s not elastic at all and it’s very rigid. So, when the brain is injured and it starts to swell, it causes a dramatic increase in the pressure inside the skull.”
To ease this pressure, the doctors treating Lincoln repeatedly probed his wound to remove the blood and thereby keep the pressure down. This only prolonged the inevitable and didn’t affect his long-term chance for survival, Sills said.
The bleeding finally stopped due to the extremely high pressure in Lincoln’s brain tissue, which in turn caused his brain to fail entirely and ultimately led to his death.
But what if this were to happen today?
If Lincoln were alive in 2015, he would find himself privy to numerous developments in medicine and science.
In the last few decades alone there have been multiple breakthroughs just in the field of neurosurgery and how the brain is treated, from CAT scans to metabolic suppression, Sills said.
“Probably the biggest innovations in the last two to three decades have been our ability to measure intracranial pressure continuously,” he said. “Additionally we have a much greater range of medications we can use to decrease pressure in the brain and to decrease the amount of energy the brain is requiring at any given time.”
Besides being able to medicate and image the brain to look for structural damage, Sills said the understanding of the variables affecting each patient’s survival has also evolved during the past few years.
So, with all that in mind, what would happen if Lincoln were shot today in the exact same way as on that fateful night in 1865?
The first step, said Sills, would be to secure Lincoln’s airway by placing a breathing tube directly down his windpipe.

“When the brain has a severe injury, respiration and control of respirations can become very irregular, and that actually contributes to a worsening of the injury,” he said.

The second reason for this is so doctors can help decrease the pressure in the brain by manipulating the ratio of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the body, which helps ease the swelling of brain tissue.
Once this was done, doctors would stabilize and continuously monitor Lincoln’s blood pressure and while at the same making sure enough blood was flowing to the brain in spite of the injury.
Lincoln would then be given medicine and treatment to ease the intracranial pressure, then undergo a CAT scan to determine if surgery was needed “immediately, on a delayed basis or not at all,” Sills said.
However, Sills noted that surgery isn’t very common in most cases of penetrating brain injuries from gunshot wounds.
“Surgery is not extremely common because the nature of the injury doesn’t lend itself to the need for surgery, but that’s obviously decided on a case-by-case basis,” he said.
Even when patients survive such injuries, Sills said many of those patients will suffer from disabilities. These can range from loss of vision to loss of speech or movement, but the deficiencies, if any, are determined by how much of the brain is damaged by the incoming bullet.
The verdict
Despite the advantages of modern technology and medicine, Sills said that Lincoln probably still wouldn’t have survived his traumatic gunshot wound.
Lincoln was shot at close range in the back of the head with a .44 caliber bullet. This fact, coupled with the path carved by the bullet through his brain, means that not even modern science could have saved Lincoln’s life.
And even if he’d lived, Lincoln certainly wouldn’t have resumed his duties as president.
“I think based on the descriptions that we have, that even if he had been literally across the street from a modern major trauma center, this would have likely been a fatal injury. But, if he had survived, there would have been significant disability that he would have incurred,” Sills said.
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Filipina new mothers have more sex to secure father’s commitment, study suggests

Written By: John Hopton
Emily Bills

John Hopton for redOrbit.com – @Johnfinitum

We are unlikely to think of the weeks after childbirth as the steamiest time in a relationship, in fact the only thing getting steamy in most houses after a baby is born is the diaper. Yet a survey of women in the Philippines indicates that new mothers there actually increase their sexual activity during the period in which they are breastfeeding.

One theory for this is that rather than having an increased sex drive soon after giving birth, the women are having more sex to please their partner and ensure their commitment. The continued support of the male partner is very important once a baby has arrived, of course.

Goodness knows what this says about the male mindset, if they are thinking: Well, I’m getting plenty of action so I’ll probably stick around and raise my own child, but the theory is nevertheless the most prominent one put forward by Michelle Escasa-Dorne of the University of Colorado, who conducted the research. The study appears in Springer’s journal Human Nature.

The biological anthropologist questioned 260 women who were in a relationship and living in the Philippines’ capital, Manila. Of these, 155 women still breastfed. They completed questionnaires about their sexual functioning and menstrual cycles, as well as about how satisfied and committed they were in their current relationships. The women were between 18 and 35 years old, mostly married, well-educated, and had on average two or three children.

A huge contrast to the West

“Even though a breastfeeding woman may not be sexually proactive, she may respond favorably when her partner initiates sexual activity. Maintaining the relationship may be important if one’s current partner is beneficial to the partnership and to the tasks of parenting,” Escasa-Dorne said in a press release.

This is in contrast to new mothers in the West, according to previous studies. Research in Western societies looking at the first six weeks after giving birth showed that women tend to devote more time to their offspring’s well-being than to their partner. This leads to lower relationship satisfaction and less intercourse between partners, and a shift in focus from mating to parenting.

Escasa-Dorne did question whether cultural norms influenced some of the Filipinos women’s responses to questions about their relationships. She noted that childless women may be more hesitant to admit their openness or enjoyment of sexual intimacy than those who have given birth. In the Philippines, many couples continue to live with their parents or in-laws after being married, especially if they have not yet had children.

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SpaceX to attempt daring rocket landing…again

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

It looks like SpaceX will make another attempt at landing the first stage of its Falcon 9 rocket on a barge in the Atlantic Ocean. This follows the launch of its Dragon capsule to the International Space Station (ISS) on Monday, according to various media reports.

Its last attempt to pull of the maneuver took place in January, and while the booster was able to reach the drone spaceport ship, it landed too hard and was damaged in the process. The firm is hoping to improve upon those results following this ISS cargo resupply mission.

Try, try again

During the previous attempt, the Falcon 9 booster rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, jettisoned the Dragon capsule, and made its way back to Earth. It was attempting to land on a barge located in the waters 200 miles east of Jacksonville.

The 70-foot wide, 14-story tall rocket reached the platform, which was 300 feet across and 100 feet wide, but the fins lost power. The engines tried and failed to restore the rocket to its proper landing angle, causing it to come in hard and at a 45-degree angle. The impact caused damage to the engine section and legs, and residual fuel triggered an explosion.

On Monday, SpaceX will try again as the Falcon 9 and Dragon cargo capsule are scheduled to lift off from Cape Canaveral at 4:33pm EDT, and according to Space.com, CEO Elon Musk said that the hypersonic grid fins will have additional hydraulic fuel this time around, meaning that the stabilizers should not run out and suffer another failure.

Don’t forget about the ISS resupply mission

While the company’s progress towards developing fully reusable rockets to reduce the cost of space travel is garnering all the headlines, the primary mission for Monday’s launch is to deliver Dragon and its 4,387 points of food, supplies, and experiments to the orbiting laboratory.

This is the sixth of 12 scheduled cargo missions under SpaceX’s $1.6 billion dollar contract with NASA, according to reports. Dragon is scheduled to arrive at the ISS on Wednesday, where it will spend five weeks before returning to Earth with over 3,000 pounds of equipment and refuse. It will land in the Pacific Ocean, where it will be recovery crews will retrieve it.

Florida Today reports that there is a 60 percent chance of favorable weather for the launch.

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Tomb reveals man sacrificed, buried with noblewoman

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

History is filled with examples of retainers being killed and buried with their masters, but a newly discovered tomb in South Korea indicates that the country was an early practitioner of gender equality, as a male was sacrificed to be entombed with a noblewoman.

The burial ground, discovered by researchers at the Cultural Heritage Administration in South Korea and the topic of a Friday Discovery News report, was found near the city of Gyeongju on the southeastern coast of South Korea and dates back to the fifth or sixth century.

A noblewoman from an ancient kingdom

These were not star-crossed, ill-fated lovers, the website explains. The man was clearly a human sacrifice who was murdered so that he could be buried along with the woman – who based on the teeth and leg bones found at the scene, would have been in her thirties.

The two of them were found in a tomb constructed out of soil and stone in Gyeongju, which was the capital city of the ancient kingdom of Silla. Silla came in to existence in 57 BC and lasted for nearly an entire millennium, until 935 AD. Over that time, it produced 56 monarchs, “intricately crafted gold ornaments, and beautiful Buddhist temples,” according to Discovery News.

“She wore a belt which appears to be decorated with gold earrings and gold leaf,” officials at the Cultural Heritage Administration said in a statement. She had also been buried with a necklace made from beads and jade green jewels, and records from the Silla dynasty indicate that she was most likely a noblewoman who was skilled on horseback and could use weapons.

Evidence that the man was a human sacrifice

The position of the man’s teeth and bones indicate that the man, who may have been younger than the woman, lay in a parallel position with his head next to hers. Since no accessories that belonged to him were found, and given the fact that females were viewed highly in the Silla kingdom, experts believe he was a human sacrifice.

“This is not the first case where a male sacrifice is buried in a female’s tomb,” Kim Kwon-il, a researcher with the Foundation of Silla Cultural Heritage Research, told Korean newspaper JoongAng Daily on Friday. “However, male sacrifices were often buried in the room where the artifacts were, as guards, so to speak, for the dead.”

“The man could have been a servant, body guard, or lover,” Lee Han-sang, professor at Daejeon University, an expert in Silla history, told South Korea’s The Chosun Ilbo. He added that the find showed “an unknown type of burial of the living with the dead in the Silla period.”

A sword, pottery and horse riding equipment, all believed to belong to the woman, were also found in a separate room within the tomb. A total of two-dozen tombs have already been found at the site, and excavation will continue there until the end of the month.

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Astronaut photographs MLB stadiums as seen from space

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

NASA astronaut and Expedition 43 commander Terry Virts is an avid baseball fan, and with the 2015 Major League Baseball season kicking off this week, he has recently started taking pictures of MLB stadiums from space and sharing them as part of a social media game.

According to Space.com, Virts is capturing images of US cities that have baseball fields from the International Space Station (ISS) and posting them on his Twitter account along with the hashtag #ISSPlayBall. However, instead of identifying each picture, he’s making a game out of it.

In space, can you tell Fenway Park from Wrigley Field?

Virts started snapping photos of the 28 cities that host MLB teams during Spring Training last month, according to NASA, and he is asking his followers to look at the pictures and guess the cities. Sometimes he posts a group of different pictures and asks his followers to choose which one is the right city, and other times he will present it as a multiple choice question.

Virts, who said he grew up in Baltimore as a fan of the Orioles, is taking the pictures from the space station’s Cupola, an observatory module with a 31-inch window – the largest ever used in space, the agency said. He helped build the Cupola as a member of the space shuttle Endeavour crew in February 2010, during what was the US Air Force Colonel’s first-ever space flight.

Sharing his experiences in space through unique photos

The Expedition 43 commander said that he “started a lifelong love of baseball” and his beloved Orioles during the 1970s and 80s, and played the sport through high school. The new project lets him combine his love of the game with his passion for taking creative pictures while in orbit, and he said that he hopes that the game will give people a new perspective on their cities.

“This is my favorite thing to do in orbit,” Virts said in a statement. “I like to try to think of creative ways to take pictures, from a new perspective, or with new lighting. There is always something interesting looking out the window – if it’s lightning, an aurora, city lights at night, interesting geology on Earth, wide angle ‘big picture’ scenes of the Earth as a planet, the moon, planets or even stars- there is never a lack of good subject matter.”

“You just have to be prepared and able to use the camera very quickly and proficiently,” he added. “At the speed we travel a good picture is often fleeting and only available for a few seconds.  It’s also fun to take time-lapse sequences that we can turn into movies that brings the view a little more to life.  But as good as the camera is, it’s just not even close to the same thing as being here in person.”

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Google files patent for social media spoiler blocker

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Social media has become a proverbial minefield for television and movie spoilers, but Google appears to be coming to the rescue with a new tool that will allow you to interact with friends on Facebook and Twitter without having Daredevil or Game of Thrones ruined for you.

According to CNET, the Mountain View, California-based tech giant filed for a patent Tuesday for a “system and method for processing content spoilers.” Essentially, the tool would detect and remove spoilers about TV shows, books, and movies from your social media news feeds.

Super-smart tracking and censoring

Those spoilers would remain hidden from your accounts until you’re up-to-date on your favorite types of media, something that has become increasing challenging in a world where on-demand viewing and binge-watching of films and programming is starting to become the norm.

Instead of a keyword based filter which blocks all content related to specific topics, the proposed Google filter would utilize technology that tracks all episodes of a show that users have watched and automatically censor content in a person’s Facebook or Twitter feed pertaining to shows and movies that the user had not yet seen, the website explained on Thursday.

The post itself would still be there, but if the system flags it as a spoiler, you would not be able to view it unless you wanted to – then the spoiler tag could be overridden and the post viewed. The system would be dependent upon users either manually logging into an account or allowing their media viewing habits to be tracked automatically Google’s software.

Bad news for Game of Thrones fans, though

While Google filed for a patent on the filet from the US Patent Trademark Office on Tuesday, that doesn’t mean that we can expect to see it anytime soon. For one thing, the patent does not even outline which social networks it would work with, nor is there any indication of how the company planned to integrate the filter into third-part sites like Facebook.

It sure as heck won’t be here in time for Sunday’s fifth-season premiere of Game of Thrones, CNN Money noted, and a Google spokesperson said that it may never even be released: “We hold patents on a variety of ideas – some of those ideas later mature into real products or services, some don’t. Prospective product announcements should not necessarily be inferred from our patents.”

We are crossing our fingers for this one!

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A vampire bat’s favorite food is bacon, study says

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

People love bacon. It’s widely consumed, it gets added to things like ice cream and pizza crust (praise the gods), it’s inspired a long line of Internet memes, and was even given its very own holiday. But as it turns out, humans aren’t the only ones with a taste for bacon.

Writing in a recent edition of the Journal of Mammalogy, researchers from the National Institute of Amazonian Research in Manaus, Brazil analyzed the feces of vampire bats to find the favored prey of the creatures and found that they also seem to have a taste for “the other white meat.” It sounds like redOrbit has something in common with vampire bats.

Searching for bacon bits in vampire bat feces

The study authors explained that they studied DNA fragments found in vampire bat (Desmodus rotundus) droppings to discover exactly what the creatures preferred to dine on. Morphological identification of the prey fragments would normally be impossible, however, because of the bats’ exclusive blood-based diet.

So, they modified an existing technique and used it to isolate and amplify the genetic material of five potential prey species in the bat feces (chickens, pigs, dogs, cattle, and humans), according to Science. The team then spent a total of 47 nights in 18 villages in the Amazon region, capturing and collecting scat samples from a total of 157 vampire bats.

Over 60 percent of the viable samples collected contained chicken DNA, with pig DNA showing up in approximately 30 percent of them. While the bats ate more chicken, they also had greater access to chicken than pigs. Once the authors adjusted the results based on the availability of the respective animals, they calculated that vampire bats actually preferred pork.

Not eating it for the flavor

In fact, the Brazilian researchers calculated that vampire bats were actually seven times more likely to feed on pigs than the availability of the creatures would indicate. So why do they seem to seek out these creatures? Experts believe that it is because the bats’ saliva has an easier time liquefying mammal blood, and because pigs have a high concentration of red blood cells.

“This project that they did was my dream,” Gerry Carter, a University of Maryland graduate student who was not involved in the new research but who had conducted similar research as an undergraduate in the past, told Science. “I wanted to go to the Amazon and apply this technique. Ten years later, to see this applied in the field is great.”

Carter added that he was surprised that they were able to extract DNA from the samples, since precious little genetic material is able to survive the digestive process. The key, according to the website, was refrigerating the samples as quickly as possible after capture. In their analysis, the authors also found no evidence of human DNA in the feces of the wild vampire bats, so we’re safe (for now).

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Can you fart your way through space?

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

In order to leave the Earth’s atmosphere, a spacecraft requires a rocket capable of providing enough thrust to escape the planet’s gravity. Theoretically speaking, could a person make their way to space using, um… an “alternative” means of propulsion?

Or, to put it more bluntly, could you fart your way through space?

Believe it or not, the folks at PBS Space Time tackled the issue in a recent webcast, investigating whether or not a person could use flatus expelled through the anus as a means of space travel. As it turns out, it is theoretically possible to travel through the abyss using your bodily gases.

Breaking wind and rocket propulsion: not too different after all

The key word is theoretically, because the first thing that the webcast points out is that a person would not be able to wear a spacesuit in order for flatulence-based space travel to work – or, at the very least, he or she would need a suit that could allow the gas to escape, unlike the suit in Rocketman.

If you assume that is possible, then the laws of physics dictate that fart travel is space is possible. This would be possible since rockets work by pushing fuel in one direction, and physics cause a push-back that propels the rocket in the opposite direction, upwards, and off the planet’s surface. The process is actually more complicated than that, but that’s generally how spacecrafts lift off.

Flatulence, the video explains, is essentially just throwing gas out of your body in much the same way that a booster pushes fuel during rocket launches. Passing gas produces gas on a small-scale, meaning that it does not cause any noticeable push-back, but it would be a different story in the near-vacuum conditions of space.

300,000 years would be one loooooong fart

So while the answer is technically, yes, you could travel through space using only “natural gas,” it wouldn’t exactly be a speedy way of getting from Point A to Point B. According to PBS Space Time, it would take the average person 300,000 years to fart their way from the Earth to the moon – provided you were already in space when you started.

If you’re trying to start from the planet’s surface, forget it – the video explains that, even if you started out from low Earth orbit, you would fall short of escape velocity by a factor of about one million, pretty much dooming your one-man, burrito-powered EVA from the start.

“Even the most prolific farter would be hard pressed to toot their way to anywhere in less than several hundred years,” Gizmodo added, noting that peeing would actually be a better solution, “so just keep that in mind the next time you’re floating just a few too many meters from the ISS and need to dodge a deadly cloud of space debris. And stay hydrated.”

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Does eating out cause high blood pressure?

Written By: Eric Hopton
Emily Bills

Eric Hopton for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

A quick dash to the local burger joint or a slap-up splurge at a swanky restaurant will cause pain to your pay check and your blood pressure. New research suggests that eating out increases the risk of hypertension or pre-hypertension. (BP readings with a systolic pressure from 120 to 139 mm Hg or a diastolic pressure from 80 to 89 mm Hg are considered prehypertension. Readings greater than or equal to 140/90 mm Hg are considered hypertension).

The study of university students by scientists from the Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School Singapore (Duke-NUS) is the first ever to show such a link between meals eaten away from home and high blood pressure. Previous studies show that eating out is associated with higher calorie, saturated fat, and salt intake. This is a perfect pathway to high blood pressure.

Globally, high blood pressure is the leading risk factor for death associated with cardiovascular disease. Even young adults with slightly elevated blood pressure have a greater risk of developing hypertension.

Duke-NUS Professor Tazeen Jafar designed and supervised the study to find behaviors associated with hypertension in a young adult population in Southeast Asia. Her team, including Duke-NUS medical student Dominique Seow, surveyed 501 university-going young adults aged 18 to 40 years in Singapore. Data on blood pressure, body mass index and lifestyle, including meals eaten away from home and physical activity levels, were collected.

Analysis of the data found pre-hypertension in 27.4% of the total population, while 38% ate more than 12 meals away from home per week. Pre-hypertension was more common in men (49%) than in women (9%). Those who had pre-hypertension or hypertension were more likely to eat more meals away from home per week, have a higher mean body mass index, have lower mean physical activity levels, and be current smokers.

Just once is too often

Dr. Jafar’s team have demonstrated a clear link between pre-hypertension and hypertension with meals eaten away from home. They found that even eating one extra meal out raised the odds of prehypertension by 6%.

“While there have been studies conducted in the United States and Japan to find behaviors associated with hypertension, very few have surveyed a Southeast Asian population,” said Dr. Jafar. “Our research plugs that gap and highlights lifestyle factors associated with pre-hypertension and hypertension that are potentially modifiable, and would be applicable to young adults globally, especially those of Asian descent.”

The team hope the findings can be used to modify behavior through changes in clinical and policy recommendations. Clinicians can intervene to advise young adults to modify their lifestyle behaviors while food policy changes can be made to regulate salt and fat in eateries. Clinicians can also advise younger male patients that they are at higher risk for pre-hypertension in order to make them more aware of their predisposition to the condition.

This study was published in the American Journal of Hypertension and was supported by the Duke-NUS Signature Research Programme, with funding from the Singapore Ministry of Health.

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Self-driving cars more likely to cause motion sickness

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Driverless cars could potentially be safer, and will likely cut down on the stresses of driving in rush hour traffic and on superhighways, but those benefits may come with a price, according to a new survey from the University of Michigan’s Transportation Research Institute.

As it turns out, being free from the responsibilities of operating a motor vehicle could lead to an increase in motion sickness due to the other activities that ex-drivers decide to do while their cars or trucks automatically ferry them to work, school, the movie theater, or the gym.

Make sure you bring your barf bags

In the study, UM researchers Michael Sivak and Brandon Schoettle asked over 3,200 adults from the US, the UK, India, China, and Japan what they planned to do in an autonomous motor vehicle since they no longer had to worry about making lane changes or adhering to the speed limit.

According to Engadget, some of the primary responses they received indicated that people would be reading, testing, watching television, playing games, or working while their car did the driving for them. Each of those activities, Sivak and Schoettle explained, can cause intense dizziness and nausea while in a moving vehicle, meaning that you might want to take precautions.

“Motion sickness is expected to be more of an issue in self-driving vehicles than in conventional vehicles,” said Sivak, explaining that the three primary factors contributing to the condition, “conflict between vestibular (balance) and visual inputs, inability to anticipate the direction of motion, and lack of control over the direction of motion,” are elevated in driverless cars.

Ways to combat the barf

He added, “The frequency and severity of motion sickness is influenced by the activity that one would be involved in instead of driving,” and that between six and 12 percent of American adults would be expected to experience moderate-to-severe motion sickness at some point.

Similar percentages would also apply to residents of the UK, India, China, Japan, and Australia, the researchers added. On the flip side, their report found that over 60 percent of people in the US (and similar percentages elsewhere) would watch the road, talk on the phone, or sleep while their car was operating. Those activities would not necessarily lead to motion sickness.

Thus, as Engadget said, “The best way to combat car sickness, then, is to use your travel time to talk to fellow passengers, or to rest, relax, and take a nap.” For those who participate in activities that could result in nausea, however, the study authors suggest equipping the cars with oversized windows, forward-facing displays and seats that recline but do not swivel.

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Fibromyalgia

How Transdermal Medications can Provide Relief from Pain

Written By: Fibromyalgia Treating

Transdermal Medications for fibromyalgia

There are many different treatments for fibromyalgia because not everyone will experience the same reaction to treatment methods. Fortunately, since there are many other options, doctors can try different treatment methods or adjust medication dosages until an effective method is found for their patients.

Fibromyalgia treatments may include eating a healthy diet, exercise, taking medications to help with pain and to relax tense muscles or the use of transdermal medications.

What are Transdermal Medications?

Instead of taking an oral medication to treat fibromyalgia, a transdermal medication is applied and absorbed through the skin. This allows the medication to enter the bloodstream to provide pain relief quickly. There are several types of transdermal medications including ointments, gels, creams and patches. These topical medications can often be bought over-the-counter, but there are prescription transdermal medications as well. Most transdermal medications used for fibromyalgia provide the sufferer with pain relief.

How Transdermal Medications Work

These medications are absorbed through the largest organ of the body, which is the skin. Your skin performs many functions including regulating your body temperature and controlling the loss of fluids. Since your skin has many layers and includes a network of blood vessels, topical medications enter the bloodstream at a steady rate, helping to provide long lasting pain relief.

In addition to being absorbed into the skin to allow the medication to enter the bloodstream, they also work on the nerve endings in the skin. The skin is covered by a multitude of nerve endings which receive different messages about the conditions around you. If they receive pain messages, they are sent to the spinal cord and travel to the brain. However, topical pain medications block messages triggering pain from being received from the brain.

Types of Transdermal Medications for Fibromyalgia

Transdermal medications are becoming popular among fibromyalgia sufferers because of the benefits they have over oral medications. These benefits include ease of use, fewer side effects and long-lasting pain relief. There are several types of topical medications that can help provide pain relief patients need to feel better and to have more freedom of movement. Here are some of the transdermal medications that are usually prescribed to fibromyalgia sufferers.

Zonalon Cream – 5% Doxepin

This topical medication contains doxepin, which is a tricyclic anti-depressant. It helps relief pain by block receptors that send and receive pain messages and by also blocking sodium channels. The cream also stimulates opioid receptors that help to enhance pain relief. Zonalon can help to provide significant pain relief for fibromyalgia patients. The cream takes about three weeks to become fully effective and it can be applied up to four times a day.

Menthol Creams

Menthol is an ingredient that can be found in peppermint and other natural oils. It is often used in over-the-counter analgesic creams to help provide pain relief as they help block kappa opioid receptors. When creams with this ingredient are applied, there is a cool, tingling feeling on the skin. The menthol will then warm up, helping to provide relief for stiff muscles. When regularly used, menthol creams will help to increase pain tolerance.

Transdermal Cream Side Effects

One of the main benefits for using transdermal creams is the reduction in side effects.  Since the medication is not taken orally, upset stomachs, diarrhea and nausea can be avoided. However, they do have some side effects. Some patients may experience a rash or irritation on the site where the medication is applied, some topical creams may cause allergic reactions, dry mouth, headaches and drowsiness are some of the other side effects that some users may experience.

Transdermal Patches

Medicated patches are the latest type of pain medication that can help reduce pain and provide relief over a prolonged period of time. There are several types of patches that can be used by fibromyalgia patients to relieve pain.

Fentanyl Patches

This patch is usually sold under the brand name Duragesic and it can provide pain relief for up to 72 hours. Since it is an opioid pain medication, it is usually recommended for patients that are already using some type of opioid medication and for those with opioid tolerance. It works by allowing fentanyl to bind to pain receptors to help provide pain relief.

Fentanyl has to build up in the bloodstream in order to work effectively, so it takes about 12 hours to begin to work. Since the opioids in the patch bypass the stomach, they have fewer side effects than oral opioids that can cause nausea, diarrhea and constipation.

Lidoderm Patch – 5% Lidocaine

Lidocaine is an anesthetic that is used in many areas of medicine and in dentistry.  Anesthetics can be successfully used to treat fibromyalgia especially in the specific areas where the pain is at its worst. The lidoderm patch releases a constant supply of lidocaine into the skin.

Lidocaine blocks pain signals before they reach the brain, which prevents the body from receiving signals to feel pain. Fibromyalgia patients report a reduction in pain when using the lidoderm patch and they also experience an improved ability to sleep after using the patch for three weeks. Up to three patches can be applied within 12 hours.

Patch Side Effects

Depending on which patch is used, there may be few side effects. The possible side effects when using the lidoderm patch include skin irritation and swelling.  With the fentanyl patch, there are a few more side effects associated with it. These side effects include dizziness, lightheadedness, weakness and possibly a shortness of breath.

 

Other Transdermal Medications for Fibromyalgia

 

Along with the transdermal topical medications and pain patches mentioned here, there are many other options that you can discuss with your doctor.  If you find oral medications too upsetting for your stomach, transdermal medications may be a good option for pain relief.

Further reading:

Pain Management and Fibromyalgia http://rxnations.com/pain.php

Treatment & Medications http://www.transdermalinc.com/knowledge-base/articles/treatment-medications

Prehistoric mosasaurs gave birth in open ocean

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

The large, extinct marine reptiles known as mosasaurs gave birth to their young while in the water, not on land or near the shore as previously believed, according to new research published online Friday in the journal Palaeontology.

In the study, Daniel Field from the Yale University department of geology and geophysics, and his colleagues examined the fragmentary cranial remains of two neonatal mosasaurs, which were recovered from the open sea, and concluded that they were likely born in that setting.

Youngest mosasaurs fossils ever found in the open ocean

According to the authors, the fossils they analyzed are the youngest mosasaur specimens ever discovered. Field reportedly found them in the collection at Yale’s Peabody Museum, and said that they had been collected more than a century ago and misidentified as birds.

The cranial remains were originally recovered from the pelagic zone of the Niobrara Formation in North America, and their presence in waters located so far from shore indicate that even the youngest mosasaurs occupied oceanic habitats, and probably began their lives there.

“Mosasaurs are among the best-studied groups of Mesozoic vertebrate animals, but evidence regarding how they were born and what baby mosasaur ecology was like has historically been elusive,” said Field, who is also affiliated with the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History’s Department of Vertebrate Zoology in Washington DC.

No on-shore nurseries

Based on their findings, they concluded that these ancient reptiles (which could grow to lengths of more than 50 feet) gave birth to their young in the open ocean, not near land. The discovery will help answer long-standing questions about the early environment of the mosasaur, which roamed the waters in the era of the dinosaurs before dying out 65 million years ago.

Co-author Aaron LeBlanc, a doctoral candidate at the University of Toronto at Mississauga, and Field concluded that the specimens also showed a wide variety of different teeth and jaw features found only in mosasaurs. He explained that, despite previous theories, these marine predators did not lay eggs on beaches, and probably did not have on-shore nurseries for newborns.

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This week in obvious science

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Shayne Jacopian for redOrbit.com – @ObviousScience

Welcome back to This Week In Obvious Science! In this week’s installment, the world of science shows us that early treatment for medical problems is a good idea, cocaine is bad for fetuses, and surprising infants can teach them a lesson.

1. Early physical therapy for low back pain reduces costs, resources via American Physical Therapy Association

So….kind of like taking your car to the repair shop as soon as the “check engine” light comes on typically costs you less money than if something flies off the vehicle on the highway?

Cool. Ok!

2. Functional brain organization of newborns altered by prenatal cocaine exposure via University of North Carolina

Wait, what? Pregnant women shouldn’t do lines off a stripper’s a**? That can hurt an infant’s brain? Since when?

3. Element of surprise helps babies learn via John Hopkins University

Indeed, that is often the case.

Baby reaches for tray of cookies on stove. Baby places hand on hot burner. Baby is surprised. Baby learns.

Okay, okay. This study is neat because it shows that surprise is the most effective way for babies to learn—based on what they’ve already learned, babies form predictions about the world around them. When those predictions are challenged, they are more likely to learn something new, adding to their body of knowledge and informing their future predictions.

In fact, we thought it was so cool, we published it as a story on Sunday.

4. Muscles matter in baseball injuries via Northwestern University

This study found that elbow muscles play a significant role in pitching-related injuries.

“Muscles matter in baseball. We showed that a pitcher could be at a really high risk or a really low risk of elbow injury, depending on how strong and capable his muscles are.”

The researchers continued: “Pitchers are literally throwing so hard that the motion itself acts to tear the elbow joint apart. But why doesn’t it?”

Wait for it…

“The answer is the strength of the muscles and the ligaments. That’s what keeps the bones together.”

For more, check out our Twitter handle @ObviousScience

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Amygdala determines ‘cooties’, ‘crushes’ in developing brain, study says

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Once believed to be the brain’s “threat detector,” new research from the University of Illinois suggests that the amygdala plays a key role in determining how people respond to members of the opposite sex throughout their lives – even as those responses change over time.

In findings reported earlier this week in the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, UI psychology and Beckman Institute professor Eva Telzer and her colleagues explain that they found signals in that part of the brain which reflect both the aversion of members of the opposite gender in young kids, and the growing interest in the other sex that typically takes place during puberty.

The ‘cooties’ phase eventually gives way to apathy…

Telzer and her colleagues evaluated the attitudes of 93 children towards both their same-sex and opposite-sex peers, and used functional MRI scans to track the flow of oxygenated blood in the brains of 52 youngsters. They found that the amygdalas of children between the ages of four and seven respond more to opposite-sex faces, but saw no difference in older prepubescent kids.

The UI professor explained that it was not surprising that very young children pay close attention to gender: “We know that there are developmental changes in terms of the significance of gender boundaries in young kids. We also know about the whole ‘cooties’ phenomenon,” in which young children act as if members of the opposite sex could infect them with some parasite or disease if they get too close. Children at this age prefer company of their same-sex peers, she noted.

“Only the youngest children in our sample demonstrated a behavioral sex bias such that they rated same-sex peers as having more positive (and less negative) attributes than opposite-sex peers,” the researchers wrote. The interest in opposite-sex peers tends to fade later in childhood, Telzer added, and the amygdala of 10- to 12-year-old kids did not respond differently in any way when show the faces of both same-sex and opposite-sex peers.

… but once puberty hits, everything gets turned upside-down!

Once puberty hits, the youngsters once again become increasingly interested in members of the opposite-sex, and they may begin experiencing a crush – becoming infatuated with a member of the other gender, the National Institute of Mental Health-funded study concluded.

“When puberty hits, gender becomes more significant again, whether it’s because your body is changing, or because of sexual attraction or you are becoming aware of more rigid sexual boundaries as you become more sexually mature,” said Telzer. “The brain is responding very appropriately, in terms of what’s changing developmentally.”

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T-rex cousin may have been canniablistic

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Injuries found on the skull of a type of Tyrannosaur known as a Daspletosaurus are consistent with an attack by another member of the genus, and evidence that the creature had been bitten after death indicate that the T. rex cousin may have been cannibalistic.

Dr. David Hone from Queen Mary, University of London, lead author of a study detailing the analysis of the Daspletosaurus specimen in question, reports that the creature suffered multiple injuries in battles with another Daspletosaurus during its life, and that it had been bitten after death by another tyrannosaur following its demise.

It’s a hard knock life for dinos

Daspletosaurus, a large carnivore that was slightly smaller than a Tyrannosaurus and lived in Canada, was both an active predator and scavenger, the researchers explained in their study, which was published this week in the journal PeerJ. This particular dino was comparable in age to an older human teenager, was nearly six meters long, and weighed 500 kilograms.

In studying the specimen, Dr. Hone and his colleagues found multiple injuries on its skull that would have occurred during its life, including several apparent bites that left marks close to the shape of tyrannosaur teeth. One bite to the back of its head stood out in particular, as it caused part of the skull to be broken off and left a circular tooth-shaped puncture in the bone.

“This animal clearly had a tough life suffering numerous injuries across the head including some that must have been quite nasty. The most likely candidate to have done this was another member of the same species, suggesting some serious fights between these animals during their lives,” the dinosaur expert explained in a statement Thursday.

Creature sustained injuries both before and after its death

Since the alternations to the surface of the creature’s bones are indicative of the healing process, the researchers said that it is likely that the wounds were not fatal. Likewise, there is no evidence to suggest that the Daspletosaurus was killed by another tyrannosaur, but the damage done to the jaw bones and the preservation of the skull appear to indicate that another tyrannosaur (perhaps a member of the same species) bit into and ate part of the animal once it started decaying.

While battles between large carnivorous dinosaurs are well known, and there is prior evidence of cannibalism in some species of these creatures (including tyrannosaurs), Dr. Hone and co-author Darren Tanke of the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Alberta stated that they have found what seems to be a unique record of both pre- and post-mortem injuries in a single individual.

“Although we did already have evidence for combat in tyrannosaurs and even cannibalism, you never want to try to extrapolate from too little information – though that can be forced on you in paleontology – so any extra data or support for an idea is really important,” Dr. Hone explained to redOrbit via email on Friday morning.

Dinosaur research done crowdfunding style

Another noteworthy aspect to the research was the fact that it was crowdfunded thanks to the contributions of visitors to the website Experiment.com. The authors acknowledge that multiple donors contributed financially to the project, allowing the research to take place and the paper to be written and published. In return, they have made their paper fully open to the public.

Dr. Hone told redOrbit that he first became involved in the work after being invited by Tanke, who had helped excavate and prepare the specimen. Tanke had already “noted the bites and had a decent idea of the likely way this had come about,” and asked Dr. Hone to collaborate on the paper due to his “strong interest in bites and feeding traces.”

“I do a lot of outreach work, and had seen crowdfunding start to be used for science, I thought I would try it. I do like to try and get people involved in the process and while obviously I did need the support to carry out the work, I provided reports on the progress and spoke to the backers about the project to try and make the whole process more involved.”

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Intellicare app is your new personal therapist

Written By: Brett Smith
Emily Bills

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Siri and Cortana are personal digital assistants that can help us schedule appointments, send texts, or book a restaurant reservation. But what about tending to mental health?

Well, researchers at Northwestern University, with funding from the National Institutes of Health, have developed a ‘mobile therapist’ in the form of a suite of mini-apps called Intellicare.

Intellicare’s “Thought Challenger” app can help those of us who are too self-critical. “Worry Knot” can help alleviate stress before a big interview or presentation. “Aspire” can help you with motivation and inspiration.

“This is precision medicine for treating depression and anxiety delivered directly to the user,” said David Mohr, director of the Center for Behavioral Intervention Technologies at Northwestern University. “Using digital tools for mental health is an important part of our future. It will help the millions of people who want support but can’t get to a therapist’s office.”

Validated by years of research

Each mini-app was designed by clinicians at Northwestern, and Intellicare suggests a different one each week to keep a user stimulated and thinking about boosting his or her mental health. The clinicians behind the app said they filled the apps with various techniques validated by years of research.

“We know these approaches work,” Mohr said. “They are designed to teach many of the same skills that therapists try to teach people. Different things work for different people. The goal is to find what’s right for you.”

While the field of mental health apps is creating a lot of buzz these days, many of the apps available are poorly designed and not founded on proper psychological theory, Mohr said. Also, people may download the apps, but not use them often. Mohr noted that it’s essential to generate apps that can continue to provide new strategies, so people continue to stay involved and interested with the app.

Because many people do not get sufficient care for anxiety and depression due to time constraints, cost, or reluctance to speak with a therapist, mental health care delivered on mobile devices has the potential to help millions of people. Over 20 percent of Americans will have substantial symptoms of depression or anxiety annually, but only around one-fifth of people with a mental health problem get decent care, the Northwestern team said.

Intellicare also gives users with the opportunity to provide feedback and even participate in a study designed to increase the suite’s effectiveness.

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New device could help doctors better study disease

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Doctors and engineers at UCLA have developed a new device that could help them study how diseases develop by making it possible to inject large particles into cells at high speed, allowing them to capture higher-quality images inside the fundamental biological units.

The tool, which the researchers believe could lead to new breakthroughs in medical research, is described as a highly-efficient automated device that delivers cargo such as antibodies, bacteria, nanoparticles and enzymes into mammalian cells at a rate of 100,000 cells per minute (compared to a rate of just one cell per minute for currently available technology).

Turning up medical research to full BLAST

Eric Pei-Yu Chiou, an associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and of bioengineering at the university’s Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science and lead author of a new study published online this week in the journal Nature Methods, and colleagues from the engineering school and the David Geffen School of Medicine, created the device – which they have dubbed a biophotonic laser-assisted surgery tool (BLAST).

Unlike currently available methods to deliver particles up to one micrometer in size into cells, which are slower and involves the use of syringe-like tools, BLAST is a silicon chip that has a series of micrometer-wide holes, each of which surrounded by an asymmetric and semicircular coating of titanium. Beneath those holes is a liquid that contains the particles to be delivered.

The UCLA team explains that the titanium coating of the chip is heated, which boils the water layer adjacent to parts of the cell and creates a bubble that bursts near the cell membrane. This produces a large, quick fissure reaction that allows the particle-filled liquid underneath the cells to be inserted into them before the membrane reseals. The entire silicon chip can be scanned by lasers in about 10 seconds, allowing for a near-instantaneous and precise insertion.

Using the device to study mitochondrial mutations, pathogens

Using BLAST’s ability to insert large cargo into cells could ultimately result in scientific and medical advances that were not previously possible. For instance, gaining the ability to deliver mitochondria could alter a cell’s metabolism, allowing researchers to study diseases caused by mutations in mitochondrial DNA. It could also let researchers analyze the how genes involved in the lifecycle of invasive pathogens function, and how the cell defends against them.

The device can reportedly deliver cargo to 100,000 cells at once, and co-author Dr. Michael Teitell, head of the division of pediatric and developmental pathology, said that the “new information learned from these types of studies could assist in identifying pathogen targets for drug development, or provide fundamental insight on how the pathogen-host interaction enables a productive infection or effective cellular response to occur.”

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How storytelling in video games can help treat autism

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

As a video game enthusiast, it can be disheartening to see so many scientific studies done on the negative effects of the medium, but a new paper published this week in Social Psychological and Personality Science looks at the positive aspects of storytelling through software.

In their study, University of Freiburg psychologist Daniel Bormann and Tobias Greitemeyer of the University of Innsbruck in Austria suggest that non-violent video games that allow players to play a role and make meaningful choices may benefit people with autism or similar disorders.

Probing the impact of video game storytelling on players

As Bormann explained in a statement, “The motivation to engage in and enjoy video games corresponds with principals that apply to human motivation in general… [and] successful game franchises offer players a spectrum of meaningful choices to shape the game’s narrative and environment, provide carefully balanced challenges, or encourage players to experience social connectedness and meaningful social interactions.”

In addition, previous research has indicated that satisfying those needs leads to an increase in the motivation to continue playing, as well as enhanced well-being and a more immersive experience overall. The authors set out to further investigate by determining whether or not storytelling was able to foster immersion and change how players could assess the mental states of others.

In order to test if storytelling in games could create the type of emotional bond characteristic of immersion, Bormann and Greitemeyer randomly assigned study participants to play one of two different titles. In the first, Gone Home, the gamer plays as a female US student who has just returned after spending a year overseas and must find out why her family vanishes. In the other title, Against the Wall, players climb an infinite wall and little narrative is involved.

For Gone Home, one group of players were given the game developer’s instructions and another was told to register, memorize, and evaluate various properties of the game. After 20 minutes of play, all participants were told to complete a task in which they assessed facial emotions, as well as to complete a survey to assess their sense of immersion and the level of need satisfaction that they experienced during their gaming sessions.

Playing story-rich video games could help people with autism

Bormann and Greitemeyer found that the narrative game elements contributed to creating a more immersive experience for the player, and that being immersed in a game’s story supports players in perceiving opportunities to make meaningful choices and establishing relationships. Furthermore, their research revealed that these types of games affected their ability to assess the mental states of others (a phenomenon also known as “theory of mind”).

“Although the effects regarding theory of mind were relatively small, we were excited to see initial evidence for the short-term enhancement through in-game storytelling,” said Bormann. “Importantly, this effect was specific to the condition in which participants actively engaged in the games narration, while the mere exposure to the narrative video game did not affect theory of mind, in comparison to playing a neutral video game.”

Their findings indicate that in-game storytelling contributes to a more immersive and satisfying overall gaming experience, and that playing these types of games can hone skills that can be used in real life on a regular basis. While more research needs to be done, Bormann believes that this type of research could ultimately used to develop tools to treat condition such as autism, which are characterized by impairments in social interaction.

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Solar eruptions can cause significant damage to unprotected planets

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

The natural magnetic bubble surrounding the Earth known as the magnetosphere could be an essential part of what makes our planet habitable, according to new research investigating the impact of solar eruptions on the atmosphere of Venus.

Venus, which does not have a protective magnetosphere, was hit by an Interplanetary Coronal Mass Ejection (ICME) in December 2006, and the authors of the new study explained that the slow-moving solar material’s impact resulted in a significant loss of atmospheric oxygen.

Does a planet need a magnetosphere to be habitable?

According to NASA, ICMEs and other types of coronal mass ejections are larger eruptions of solar material capable of disrupting the atmosphere surrounding a planet. On Earth, the impact of these events are lessened somewhat due to the magnetosphere. Venus, though, is not so lucky.

“What if Earth didn’t have that protective magnetosphere?” pondered Glyn Collinson, a scientist at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland and first author on a paper published earlier this week in the  Journal of Geophysical Research. “Is a magnetosphere a prerequisite for a planet to support life? The jury is still out on that, but we examine such questions by looking at planets without magnetospheres, like Venus.”

While the US space agency points out that we don’t know exactly what is essential for a planet to support biological life, the interplay between the Earth and the sun does play a critical role, and the magnetosphere is unquestionably involved in maintaining the balance between receiving the right amount of energy to support life while sheltering the planet from harsher solar emissions.

An “unimpressive” CME causes a dramatic reaction

The December 2006 incident that took place on Venus may have been slow-moving, but was nonetheless powerful enough to cause rip away what NASA refers to as “dramatic amounts” of oxygen from the planet’s atmosphere, causing it to be lost forever. Learning why a relatively small CME had such a dramatic impact could go a long way towards determining whether or not life is possible on planets without a magnetosphere.

Collinson began his work by studying data from the ESA’s Venus Express spacecraft, and found that on December 23, 2006, the world’s atmosphere leaked oxygen at one of the highest densities ever recorded. At that same time, the data also revealed something unusual occurring in the solar wind constantly passing by the planet, so he joined forces with Goddard scientist and solar wind specialist Lan Jian to investigate further, and the duo found evidence of the CME.

That CME, which originated on December 19, would have been travelling approximately 200 miles per second – a relatively slow speed by CME standards and roughly the same velocity as the solar wind itself, according to NASA. Collinson called it “fairly unimpressive” but noted that Venus itself “reacted as if it had been hit by something massive.”

New insight into the potential habitability of extra-solar planets

The effects of the CME also built up over time, the researchers added, tearing off a portion of the planet’s atmosphere and yanking it out into space. While the findings do not prove that these small eruptions will always produce similar effects, it does show that such a response is possible and appears to  underline the importance of a magnetosphere in protecting a planet from space weather events of solar origin.

Venus is 10 times hotter than Earth and has an extremely thick atmosphere, and the researchers believe that vulnerabilities to solar storms could help explain why those extreme conditions exist on the planet. Whether or not that is the case, they also noted that understanding the effect that the lack of a magnetosphere has on a planet like Venus could help experts better understand the potential habitability of planets located outside our solar system.

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NASA to investigate ‘Four Corners’ methane mystery

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Scientific investigators from NASA, the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences in Colorado and several other institutions are joining forces to investigate a mysterious methane hotspot located in the Four Corners regions of the southwestern US.

Using a suite of both airborne and ground-based instruments, they are hoping to find out why a small area near the intersection of Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah was found last fall to be giving off the highest concentration of the greenhouse gas anywhere in America.

NASA to use spectrometers to aid ongoing research

Christian Frankenberg, a scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California, was among those who first reported the methane concentration at the Four Corners region. Data from an ESA satellite confirmed the discovery, and showed that there was a persistent atmospheric hot spot there where methane emissions from 2003-2009 were far higher than estimated.

However, those observations were not detailed enough to reveal the source of the methane, the US space agency said. Possible sources include venting from oil- and gas-related activities (such as coalbed methane exploration and extraction), active coal mines and natural gas seeps.

Recently, researchers from CIRES, the NOAA’s Earth Systems Research Laboratory and the University of Michigan launched a field campaign known as TOPDOWN (Twin Otter Projects Defining Oil Well and Natural gas emissions) 2015. TOPDOWN is using airborne and ground-based instruments to investigate possible sources of the hot spot, and starting on April 17, JPL scientists will be joining the research initiative.

“With all the ground-based and airborne resources that the different groups are bringing to the region, we have the unique chance to unequivocally solve the Four Corners mystery,” explained Frankenberg. His team will be using two complementary remote sensing instruments on a pair of Twin Otter research aircraft: one spectrometer that will map the entire region and a second which will be flown over suspected methane sources for more sensitive measurements.

Coordinated methane investigation is a “win-win”

One of the mission’s investigators, Eric Kort from the University of Michigan, called the project a “grassroots effort… to better understand methane emissions from the Four Corners” through a wide array of different methods. Each partner agency has and will be deploying its own suite of instruments, including chemical detection equipment and wind profiling arrays.

By combining their efforts the investigators said that they hope to quantify the overall methane emissions in the region, as well as pinpoint the exact amount being contributed by various sources and track changes over the course of the one-month study. Frankenberg called the study “a win-win for all participants. It is a unique opportunity to characterize the region’s methane budget using both remote sensing and local measurements in a coordinated effort.”

“If we can verify the methane emissions found by the satellite, and identify the various sources, then decision-makers will have critical information for any actions they are considering,” added Gabrielle Pétron, a scientist at CIRES and the NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory.

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Ancient human fossils reveal diversity in early populations

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Two different fossils discovered just meters away from one-another suggest that early modern humans had a significant level of physical diversity, according to new research published online earlier this week in the open-access, peer-reviewed journal PLOS One.

By comparing a skull discovered at a cave in Laos in 2009 with a mandible located nearby in 2010, University of Illinois anthropology professor Dr. Laura Shackelford and her colleagues found that there was likely “a large range of morphological variation” in early modern humans.

Fossils from an important site in human migration

Both of the fossils were recovered from a cave called Tam Pa Ling in the Annamite Mountains, and the cranium is the oldest modern human fossil ever discovered in Southeast Asia. It’s discovery pushed back the date of modern human migration to the region by up to 20,000 years, revealing that humans migrated there from Africa far earlier than previously thought.

“The Tam Pa Ling site and fossils have significance for understanding the earliest migrations of modern humans into eastern Asia,” Dr. Shackelford told redOrbit via email. “This region is an important crossroads for early people who were migrating either to East Asia or to Australasia, and until recently the area has been completely unexplored.”

In her email, Dr. Shackelford added that the bones found at the Laos mountain cave site were “the oldest fossils from mainland Southeast Asia – and, in fact, outside of Africa or the Levantine corridor – that have secure dates and are definitively modern in their appearance. They show a great deal of interesting diversity that tell us a lot about these early humans.”

Same era, same location, but vastly different features

The jaw is roughly the same age as the skull, Dr. Shackelford’s team said, but unlike the cranium it was found to possess traits of both modern and archaic humans. For instance, it has a chin and other discrete traits consistent with early modern humans, the authors wrote, but retains a robust lateral corpus and internal corporal morphology typical of archaic Old World humans.

The mandible is “incredibly small in overall size,” the professor explained, and the presence of its protruding chin is more in line with typical modern human anatomy. On the other hand, the thick bone that the jaw has to hold molars in place are “more common of our archaic ancestors.”

“Mosaic morphology” not all that uncommon

Dr. Shackelford, who co-led the study with anthropologist Fabrice Demeter of the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, explained that this combination of archaic and modern human traits is not all that unusual. Fossils recovered from Africa, Eastern Europe and China also demonstrate the same type of what the authors call “mosaic morphology” as the mandible.

“Some researchers have used these features as evidence that modern humans migrating into new regions must have interbred with the archaic populations already present in those regions,” the study author explained in a statement. “But a more productive way to look at this variation is to see it as we see people today – showing many traits along a continuum.”

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Complex organic molecules found in infant star

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) telescope, astronomers have for the first time found the building blocks of life in the protoplanetary disk surrounding a young star, detecting evidence of carbon-based molecules close to the million-year-old MWC 480.

Karin Öberg, an astronomer with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) and lead author of a paper published in the journal Nature, detected complex cyanides in the star’s protoplanetary disk. This discovery suggests that the rich organic chemistry responsible for the creation of our Earth and Sun also exist elsewhere in the universe.

How is this like our own solar system?

Öberg’s team detected both the complex carbon-based molecule methyl cyanide (CH3CN) and its simpler relative hydrogen cyanide (HCN) in the outer reaches of MWC 480’s protoplanetary disk, a region believed to be similar in nature to our solar system’s Kuiper Belt (an area which is located beyond Neptune and is home to icy objects known as planetesimals).

The early chemistry of our solar system, including that from the period during which the planets formed, is recorded within comets, the researchers explained. As the worlds evolved, comets and asteroids from the outer reaches of the solar system are believed to have seeded the still-evolving Earth with the water and organic molecules required for the eventual formation of life.

“Studies of comets and asteroids show that the solar nebula that spawned our Sun and planets was rich in water and complex organic compounds. We now have evidence that this same chemistry exists elsewhere in the universe, in regions that could form solar systems not unlike our own,” Öberg said in a statement, noting that the molecules discovered near MWC 480 have also been found in similar concentrations in our own solar system’s comets.

Complex cyanides can thrive in forming solar systems

Located approximately 455 light-years away in the Taurus star-forming region, MWC 480 has roughly twice the mass of our Sun, and its disk is still in the earliest stages of development. The disk only recently coalesced out of a cold, dark nebula of dust and gas, and while astronomers have yet to discover any signs of planetary formation there, higher resolution observations could reveal structures similar to the similarly-aged HL Tau.

Cyanides, especially methyl cyanide, are important because they contain the carbon-nitrogen bonds necessary for the formation of the protein building blocks called amino acids. These molecules are efficiently produced in cold, dark interstellar clouds, but experts were not certain if they could form and survive in the energetic environment of a newly forming solar system.

Thanks to observations made using ALMA, the study authors now known that they can easily survive in such conditions, as a far greater abundance of the molecules were found in MWC 480 than would exist in interstellar clouds. In fact, they report that there was enough methyl cyanide in the star’s protoplanetary disk to completely fill every ocean on Earth.

This indicates to astronomers that protoplanetary disks can efficiently form complex organic molecules, and that they can do so in a relatively quick period of time. This rapid formation is also vital to outplace forces that would otherwise rip apart those molecules, they noted, and the region of MWC 480 where this activity takes place would be similar to the comet-forming area of our own solar system (comparatively speaking, though MWC 480 is much larger).

On the prowl for alien life, we are not special 🙁

Astronomers speculate that as this solar system continues to evolve, the organic molecules that are found in comets and other icy bodies will ultimately be transferred to environments that are better suited for supporting life. So what does this mean for the search for alien life?

“From the study of exoplanets, we know our solar system isn’t unique in having rocky planets and an abundance of water,” Öberg said in a statement. “Now we know we’re not unique in organic chemistry. Once more, we have learned that we’re not special. From a life in the universe point of view, this is great news.”

The CfA astronomer told redOrbit via email that the discovery of complex cyanides, which she calls “some of the most interesting organics present in our own Solar Nebula,” can be found in “at least one other protoplanetary disk,” which indicates that “something like the Solar Nebula’s complex organic chemistry is present where exo-planets are forming.”

Öberg added that she was impressed with “just how good ALMA is.” She said that it was “really exciting” to work with the instrument, and that it “still blows [her] mind that we can take chemical images of Solar Systems in the making hundreds of light years away. With this new capability we were almost bound to find something really interesting, and of course we did.”

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Scientists Discuss The Reality Of A Zombie Apocalypse: Exclusive

Written By: editor
Sam Savage

[ Watch the Video: Microbiologists Discuss The Chances For A Zombie Apocalypse ]

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Hollywood has amplified the idea of a zombie apocalypse for a long time, and the stories have grown increasingly popular in pop culture, particularly due to TV shows like ‘The Walking Dead’ and movies like ‘World War Z.’

However, when you take science fiction out of the equation and add real-world science into it, a zombie virus looks a little less far-fetched, and perhaps a little more realistic.

RedOrbit reached out to a couple of microbiologists to weigh in on the subject of a “what-if” zombie virus in a real-world science-driven scenario. The scientists were asked to dream up a scenario in which a zombie virus could become reality, taking Hollywood out of the picture and instead use what they know about microbiology. Interestingly, both scientists had the same answer for a source: rabies.

“I think that the Zombie Virus already exists (almost): Rabies. Infection is nearly 100 percent lethal, i.e. it turns you into the walking dead (for a while at least), and it causes you to change your behavior by reprogramming you to bite other people to spread the infection. Now if only it kept the corpse walking around,” Jonathan D. Dinman, PhD, Professor in the Department of Cell Biology and Molecular Genetics at the University of Maryland, told redOrbit.

Essentially, the rabies virus would need to be slightly altered, or would have to evolve, in a way to keep people kicking and screaming for their next victim rather than killing them off just a few days after symptoms occur.

Rabies has to incubate inside the body before showing signs of infection, which includes anxiety, confusion, hallucinations, paralysis, agitation, hyper salivation, difficulty swallowing and hydrophobia — fear of water. This incubation period can last anywhere from 10 days to a year, meaning a “zombie virus outbreak” may look a little slower and less “viral” than movies tend to portray.

“When we think of rabies, we think of dogs with foaming mouths but this virus is actually the most likely to mutate into something that would be similar to a ‘zombie virus’,” Dr. Samantha Price, an HCPC registered Biomedical Scientist and Research Information Co-ordinator for the UK MND Association, told redOrbit.

“The common symptoms of rabies are dislike of ‘bright lights’ and a fear of water. When you think of the film ‘I am Legend’ the zombie-like creatures here dislike both of these things. Rabies is also transmitted via bodily fluids, bites etc and due to the virus making the individual increasingly aggressive the symptoms of rabies seem to be more alike to a Hollywood zombie than you probably previously thought,” said Dr Price. “Rabies is, however, highly fatal so the virus would need to mutate in a way that would make it less fatal — so that it could cause a ‘zombie-like’ outbreak.”

The idea of a virus evolving is not unheard of, and it’s also already being witnessed with another microorganism. Superbugs are a sub-population of  microorganisms, usually bacteria, that have antibiotic resistance. In layman’s terms, superbugs have found a way past our armor, and it did it in just 90 years after penicillin was first discovered.

So how would rabies evolve into a superbug-like-virus that could potentially be deemed a zombie virus? Dr. Dinman may have the answer.

“So, you start with Rabies virus, but you engineer it so that it doesn’t actually kill you. It just takes over your brain and makes you want to bite other people to spread itself. Infected people just become automatons devoted to spreading the virus. The main viral property you’d want to change would be to convert it from causing an acute infection (like Ebola which tends to kill the victim quickly) to persistent infection (like Herpes, which stays with you for your entire life). Functions you’d want the infected person to retain would be metabolism (so they can produce more virus) and motility (so they can get from victim to victim). You would want the virus to cause infected people to lose the ability to think independently (and therefore come up with a cure). Hey, aren’t we talking about internet trolls here,” Dr. Dinman told redOrbit.

Some conspiracy theorists say a zombie virus is already here and its known as LQP-79. This virus is allegedly a “mental virus infection” that derived from the 79th attempt at developing a “Lysergic Quinine Protein” in a bid to create a mind control substance. According to theories, the virus was supposed to be contained to training facilities, but not only have samples been released, the media is playing cover-up by hiding information on this story from the public. Obviously, this story has been proven time and time again to be a hoax, but it has become so popular that even the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) acknowledged the term “LQP-79” had been one of the top searched terms on the government agency’s website in May 2012.

While LQP-79 is a “Hollywood-scenario,” rabies is a real virus that has to be contained by vaccinating pets yearly. The government has actually made laws requiring rabies vaccinations to ensure that pets do not help spread a virus that is commonly found in bats and raccoons. The concept of altering a rabies virus may seem like cheating when describing “real-world” scenarios, and one could even say it would take an evil genius to construct a virus as brutal as the one Dr. Dinman described. Maybe even an evil genius as brilliant as Mother Nature.

“Mother Nature is a serial killer. No one’s better, or more creative. Like all serial killers, she can’t help but have the urge to get caught or what good would all those brilliant crimes do if no one takes the credit? So she leaves crumbs. Now the hard part, is seeing the crumbs, the clues there. Sometimes it’s in your thoughts where the most brutal part of a virus is. Turns out to be the chink in its armor. And she loves disguising her weaknesses as strengths. She’s a bitch.” — Andrew Fassbach, a character in the movie and novel World War Z, who is tasked with saving a world overwhelmed with zombies.

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PROTECT YOUR FAMILY: The Vaccine Book: Making the Right Decision for Your Child (Sears Parenting Library)

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What brain-controlled prosthetics tell us about the brain

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Recent advancements in the field of neuroprothetics could make it possible to learn more about how the brain stores and accesses information while also providing new insights into conditions such as epilepsy and Parkinson’s disease, researchers claim in a new study.

Writing in the journal Neuron, Dr. Karen Moxon, a professor at the Drexel University School of Biomedical Engineering Science and Health Systems, and Guglielmo Foffani from San Pablo University in Spain construct a framework to show how brain-machine interfaces (BMIs) can be used as tools to help address the “fundamental questions in neuroscience.”

Studying brain-machine interfaces to learn about the mind

While BMIs are typically used in the form of neuroprosthetics to help individuals recover from the loss of motor function, observing their operation may also help scientists study the processes through which a person’s brain to encode new data. In this way, the subject of BMI experiments could provide real-time insight into various processes that take place in the brain.

“The observed subjects of BMI experiments can also be considered as indirect observers of their own neurophysiological activity, and the relationship between observed neurons and (artificial) behavior can be genuinely causal rather than indirectly correlative” – characteristics that defy the “classical object-observer duality,” according to Dr. Moxon and Foffani.

This makes neuroprosthetics “particularly appealing for investigating how information is encoded and decoded by neural circuits in real time, how this coding changes with physiological learning and plasticity, and how it is altered in pathological conditions,” they added. “Within neuroengineering, BMI is like a tree that opens its branches into many traditional engineering fields, but also extends deep roots into basic neuroscience beyond neuroprosthetics.”

Using neuroprosthetics to provide real-time brain feedback

Dr. Moxon, then a postdoctoral researcher in Drexel’s medical school, participated in the first study to ever examine how the brain could be connected to a operate a prosthetic limb, and she and her co-author cite examples from their own research they were able to isolate and study new regions of the brain thanks to advances in BMI technology over the years.

“We believe neuroprosthetics can be a powerful tool to address fundamental questions of neuroscience,” she said. “These subjects can provide valuable data as indirect observers of their own neural activity that are modulated during the experiments they are taking part in. This allows researchers to pinpoint a causal relationship between neural activity and the subject’s behavior rather than one that is indirectly correlative.”

Neuroprosthetics, Dr. Moxon added, could help scientists overcome obstacles to brain-related research by proving the direct correlation between a subject’s action and the behavior of their brain cells to prove that neurons are the actual cause of a specific behavior. In addition to acting like a surrogate body part, the BMI device can provide real-time feedback from the brain.

BMIs could lead to new epilepsy, Parkinson’s treatments

“Subjects can be viewed as indirect observers of their own neurophysiological activity during neuroprosthetic experiments,” Dr. Moxon said. “To move the prosthesis they must think both about the motor functions involved and the goal of the movement. As they see the movement of the prosthetic their brain adjusts in real time to continue planning the movement.”

This is done without the regular feedback from the moving body part, since the prosthetic unit acts like a stand-in for that part of the body, she explained. This separation of planning and control of movement was essential to her research on how the brain encodes for the passage of time, she added, noting that this is just one example of research into the BMI-brain function link.

Dr. Moxon said that there have been “tremendous advancements in neuroprosthetic technology” over the past 15 years. “The BMI research paradigm opens doors for a new understanding of how we control our own brain function including neural plasticity,” she added, “and this has the potential to lead to new treatments and therapies for epilepsy, Parkinson’s and other pathologies.”

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Mars-sized body struck Earth, formed moon, study says

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Geologists from the University of Maryland have uncovered new evidence supporting the belief that the moon formed after a roughly Mars-sized body struck and merged with Earth, causing the formation of a large debris cloud that ultimately coalesced and formed our satellite.

While that notion of lunar formation has been widely accepted over the past three decades, it did have some issues: namely that the isotopic compositions of the Earth and the moon (their genetic fingerprints, essentially) appeared to be too similar to one another to support the scenario.

Problems with the current theory of lunar formation

The size of the moon and the physics of its orbit around support this merger theory, but if a third-party was involved in the formation process, than the moon should carry the so-called “isotopic fingerprint” of that entity. Since the third-party, which has been dubbed Theia by scientists, came from elsewhere in the solar system, it should have a far different fingerprint than Earth.

To investigate, UMD geology professor and study co-author Richard Walker and his colleagues generated a new isotopic fingerprint of the moon that focused on an isotope of Tungsten that can be found in both Earth and the moon. Their research, which has been published Wednesday in the journal Nature, is the first to reconcile the unexpectedly similar isotopic fingerprints of Earth and the moon with the currently accepted model of lunar formations, the authors claim.

“The problem is that Earth and the moon are very similar with respect to their isotopic fingerprints, suggesting that they are both ultimately formed from the same material that gathered early in the solar system’s history,” Professor Walker explained. “This is surprising, because the Mars-sized body that created the moon is expected to have been very different. So the conundrum is that Earth and the moon shouldn’t be as similar as they are.”

Differences in a Tungsten isotope help resolve the issue

Other theories have surfaced over the years to help explain the similarities, including one which suggested that the debris cloud caused by the impact mixed with the Earth before condensing to form the moon, and another suggesting that an unusual collision caused the moon to form out of materials originating from Earth, not Theia itself.

Evidence indicates that both Earth and the moon gathered additional material after the primary impact took place, and that our planet then collected more of this debris and dust. This dust and debris contained high amounts of Tungsten, including relatively small amounts of a lighter isotope called Tungsten-182. In theory, the moon should have more Tungsten-182 than Earth, and that’s exactly what Walker and his colleagues found when comparing rocks.

“The small, but significant, difference in the Tungsten isotopic composition between Earth and the moon perfectly corresponds to the different amounts of material gathered by Earth and the moon post-impact,” the professor said. “This means that, right after the moon formed, it had exactly the same isotopic composition as Earth’s mantle.”

The discovery supports the notion that the mass of material that was created by the impact and which went on to form the moon mixed together before cooling, explaining the overall isotopic similarities between the moon and Earth, the researchers said. It also all but eliminates the idea that Theia had a similar composition to Earth, or that the material involved in lunar formation came primarily from our planet.

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Fibromyalgia

Treating Vulvodynia and Fibromyalgia

Written By: Fibromyalgia Treating

Treating Vulvodynia and Fibromyalgia

One of the most painful effects that sometimes happens in women who have fibromyalgia is a disorder known as vulvodynia. Obviously, pain during sex is a side effect of fibromyalgia, and your menstrual cycle can cause a lot of pain as well, but vulvodynia is something entirely different.

This is a constant pain that is in your vulva (which is in your vagina), and it makes it difficult to do things like having sex. But why is it so intertwined with fibromyalgia? And what can we do in order to try and find relief from the issues that come with the vulvodynia and fibromyalgia pain?

Why Are Vulvodynia and Fibromyalgia So Interconnected?

As mentioned above, vulvodynia is one of those disorders that make it difficult for you to have sex. You constantly have itching, burning, and other painful sensations throughout your vaginal area. It’s sensitive to the touch and it may be difficult for you to even move your legs on certain days. All in all, this disorder makes it hard for us to even function, let alone trying to make love with a partner or clean the area and keep it hygienic.

But why is it so linked with fibromyalgia? What happened to make it so that the two disorders almost always happen together? Honestly, that’s a bit mystery, because researchers aren’t even completely sure of the original cause of vulvodynia or fibromyalgia.

That being said, there are a few possible theories out there that overlap between the two, thus making it seem as if they could be the reason for a woman to end up having both disorders.

The first reason is because of inflammation. Since inflammation is so common in fibromyalgia, the fact that your vulva gets inflamed isn’t really an odd thing. There are also theories out there related to the nerve problems that both of the disorders have to deal with – since you’re hypersensitive with both of the disorders, it’s no wonder that you end up dealing with one or the other.

In the worst cases of both vulvodynia and fibromyalgia, you can end up having muscle spasms as well. As you can see, there’s just so much overlap that it’s not really surprising (or rare) that women with fibromyalgia end up with vulvodynia, and vice versa (even though the latter is a lot less common than the former).

What Treatments Can We Use for Vulvodynia and Fibromyalgia?

This is a great question, because sometimes it is difficult for us to find treatments that allow us to get relief from both of the disorders. Luckily, there are a few ways that have been shown to work effectively, so you want to make sure that your doctor tries all of these before putting you on multiple medications at the same time.

There are some things that you can do yourself in order to help reduce the pain from vulvodynia and fibromyalgia. Don’t use anything with scents or other irritants, especially on your undergarments.

Avoid using scented soaps and wear cotton undergarments and menstrual napkins/tampons. Sit on a foam seat in order to reduce the pressure on your vulva. Take baths regularly and try mediation or yoga in order to help relax the muscles, thus reducing the spasms and tension that can happen in your vaginal area.

Then, you’ve got the other types of treatment that your doctor may prescribe for your specific case of vulvodynia and fibromyalgia. Here are some of the most commonly prescribed or recommended medications and treatments that doctors will tell you to consider when you are suffering from both of these disorders at the same time.

– Medical creams that help to numb and loosen up the area – lidocaine is one of the most common types, but others are out there as well.

– Nerve blocks, which “cut off” the nerves so that the area isn’t as oversensitive – but this may cause a lack of pleasure during sex as well, so you want to be careful.

– Anti seizure medications and other medications that are used to treat muscle spasms. These help to relax your muscles and help your body to be able to deal with the pain more readily.

– Types of physical therapy and exercise, both of which can help your body to be more flexible and to strengthen your muscles, thus reducing the spasms and other problems that may be going on in and around your vulva.

– In the worst cases, your doctor may recommend that you go to a gynecologist, because they will be able to give you other alternatives that can help reduce the stress from the vulvodynia end of your pain. Sometimes, surgery is necessary because the pain is so bad. Basically, if the tissue is damaged and the nerves aren’t going to correct themselves, it may be better to remove some of the tissue instead.

Your treatment plan may include one, some, or even all of the things that we’ve mentioned here. As with most fibromyalgia and vulvodynia treatment plans, the plan needs to be personalized to you and the problems that you are dealing with on a daily basis. Everyone is different, so understanding that and making sure that you are getting the relief that you deserve should be the main focus of the specialist(s) that you are working with.

There are lots of options for treating vulvodynia and fibromyalgia, thankfully, so it’s not something that you’re stuck with. You should be able to enjoy sex again, and you should be able to have a better overall quality of life if you get treatment as soon as possible.

As you likely know, problems like these can have a lot of negative effects on your marriage and your sex life if you don’t get the pain under control. So, by considering different treatment options, you can determine which treatments work for the two diseases and which ones don’t. Consult with your doctor in order to get a solid diagnosis and to figure out what your treatment plan needs to look like.

Further reading: 

Women’s Issues: Vulvodynia http://www.fibromyalgia-symptoms.org/vulvodynia.html

Help for Vulvodynia; Maybe Also Fibromyalgia, Cystitis, IBS http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/resolution-not-conflict/201111/help-vulvodynia-maybe-also-fibromyalgia-cystitis-ibs

Vulvodynia: Causes, Symptoms, and Treatments http://www.webmd.com/women/guide/vulvodynia

World’s largest amphibian feeds on prey approaching from the side

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

The world’s largest living amphibian, the Chinese giant salamander (Andrias davidianus), is capable of feeding not only on prey located directly in from of it, but also on creatures which approach from the side, thanks to a newly-discovered quick-strike technique.

The mechanism was discovered by Josep Fortuny from Institut Català de Paleontologia in Spain and his colleagues using three-dimensional modeling to explain the feeding mechanisms of the endangered creature. The findings were published Wednesday in the journal PLOS One.

Creating a 3D model of the salamander’s bite

The Chinese giant salamander uses a sit-and-wait strategy combined with his sudden bite to dine on approaching worms, crustaceans, fish, amphibians and small mammals. Now, thanks to a new 3D model, Fortuny’s team explains in detail the feeding mechanisms utilized by the creature.

They modeled the biomechanics of its bite using 3D CT-scan images of the giant salamander’s skulls, then applying a numerical technique known as finite element analysis to investigate the distribution of the forces within the creature’s skull. That analysis revealed that, in addition to feeding on prey located in front of it, it can also perform quick strikes to either side.

Once the salamander has its prey trapped, it pulls it to the back of the jaw to perform an even stronger bite, preventing its would-be victim from escaping. The authors believe that this skill may be related to the architecture of the creature’s skull, since unlike most salamanders, it does not have bone connecting its maxilla with its  anterior quadrato-squamosal region.

Using the model to learn how bite mechanics evolved

Fortuny, along with colleagues from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya – BarcelonaTech in Spain, the University of Vienna’s Department of Integrative Zoology and the Institute of Systematic Zoology and Evolutionary Biology at Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena in Germany, believe that the discovery could shed new light on how early tetrapods and amphibians fed.

“Jaw prehension… and ‘secondary’ bites, also called ‘manipulation bites’ (i.e. holding, subduing or crushing prey after initial capture), are essential feeding mechanisms in extant amphibians and are performed both on land and in water,” the authors wrote. “Capturing prey by direct bites has also been suggested to represent the ancestral terrestrial prey capture mode in early tetrapods that evolved from aquatic feeding modes.”

“To improve grip when capturing prey by the jaws, some groups of early amphibians had a well-developed labyrinth tooth structure, with different teeth rows on the skull and jaws and, in some groups, fangs that probably further helped to catch and kill the prey,” they added. “Accordingly, form and function of the biting system not only determine the success of energy uptake in extant amphibians but also played an essential role during the evolution of tetrapods.”

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Adding fish could help coral reefs recover, new study claims

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Restoring fish populations to coral reef systems could be the key to helping those ecosystems recover, according to a new study based on an assessment of fish biomass and functional groups from over 800 coral reefs worldwide and published in the journal Nature.

As part of their research, scientists from the Australian Institute of Marine Science, the Wildlife Conservation Society and elsewhere used their data to estimate recovery periods for both lightly fished and overfished reefs. The authors speculate reefs could become more resilient to climate change and other threats if their fish populations are maintained and/or restored.

“By studying remote and marine protected areas, we were able to estimate how much fish there would be on coral reefs without fishing, as well as how long it should take newly protected areas to recover,” lead author M. Aaron MacNeil from the Australian Institute of Marine Science said. “This is important because we can now gauge the impact reef fisheries have had historically and make informed management decisions that include time frames for recovery.”

Fish biomass thresholds for healthy coral reefs discovered

Based on current estimates, global warming, pollution, coastal development and other hazards have combined to threaten approximately three-fourth of the world’s coral reefs. Also, climate and fishing-related disturbances have caused 20 percent of reefs to disappear over the last 30 years, and just 27 percent of coral reefs are currently within marine protected areas.

In their new study, MacNeil and his colleagues found that a coral reef with no fishing averages 1,000 kilograms per hectare of fish biomass, while the fish biomass threshold for an extremely overfished reef (one that is close to total ecological failure) is 100 kilograms per hectare. Those which maintained 500 kilograms of fish biomass per hectare were found to have their ecological functions preserved while also sustaining fisheries, suggesting that this is a potential target.

Those findings are based on what the authors are calling the first-ever empirical estimate of coral reef fisheries recovery potential. The research included marine reserves and fishing closures as a control for estimating healthy fish biomass, as well as reefs located in sites representing a broad spectrum of fishing intensity rates, including heavily-fished locations in the Caribbean and those that were said to be high in fish biomass such as the Easter Islands.

Using the information to map out a coral reef recovery plan

MacNeil’s team found that 83 percent of the 832 reefs surveyed contained less than the 500 kilogram fish biomass threshold needed to stave off decline and keep their ecological integrity. They developed models to determine how much time it would take different reefs to recover, and found that a moderately-fished reef required an average of 35 years to rebound, while the most extremely damaged ones could take nearly six decades with adequate protection.

In addition, the study found that the certain types of fish could play key roles in restoring reef health. For instance, those reefs that were most degraded were found to be lacking in the types of fish known as browsers (such as parrotfish, rudderfish and surgeonfish), grazers (rabbitfish or damselfish), scrapers/excavators (parrotfish) and planktivores (fusiliers). The findings indicate that those species provide services which corals rely upon in order to recover.

“The methods used to estimate reef health in this study are simple enough that most fishers and managers can take the weight and pulse of their reef and keep it in the healthy range,” said Tim McClanahan, senior conservationist at WCS and a co-author on the study. “Fishers and managers now have the ability to map out a plan for recovery of reef health that will give them the best chance to adapt to climate change.”

“Reef fish play a range of important roles in the functioning of coral reef ecosystems, for example by grazing algae and controlling coral-eating invertebrates, that help to maintain the ecosystem as a whole,” added co-author Nick Graham of James Cook University. “By linking fisheries to ecology, we can now make informed statements about ecosystem function at a given level of fish biomass.”

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Color-changing windows harvest energy from wind, rain

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Smart windows that can harvest electricity from wind or precipitation could be a future source of renewable energy, according to new research published recently in the journal ACS Nano.

According to Science, the windows were able to produce up to 130 milliwatts per square meter, which would be enough to power a smartphone in sleep mode, and Dr. Zhong Lin Wang, co-developer of the technology and a nanoscientist at the Georgia Institute of Technology, and his colleagues believe that it could ultimately serve as a power source for some electronics.

Breaking down the smart window technology

The glass used in this new smart window technology uses nanoscale generators that are powered by static electricity produced by friction when two materials come into contact with one another. The generators are placed in two layers atop a lone pane of glass, and once activated, they create an electric current that tins the clear window a dark shade of blue, Science explained.

The generators that make up the outermost layer harvest static energy from precipitation. As a raindrop falls, the contact between air and water creates a positive charge in the droplets. Since the glass is coated with a negatively charged silicone material known as polydimethylsiloxane, an electric current is produced after the raindrop makes contact with the window’s surface.

Located beneath the first layer of nanogenerators is a second that harvests energy from the wind, the website added. This layer is made up of two sheets of charged, transparent plastic separated by nanoscopic spring coils. As wind makes contact with the smart window, the springs compress and cause charged plates of plastic approach one another, creating an electric current.

Promising research, but there is still work to be done

In their study, Dr. Wang and his colleagues explained that the self-powered system “is a promising concept for wireless networks due to its independent and sustainable operations without an external power source.” They added that their work is “a substantial advancement toward the practical application of nanogenerators and self-powered systems.”

However, Science pointed out that there are still obstacles to overcome before the technology could become commercially available. Currently, the glass has no way to store the energy that it generates, the website said. To fix the issue, Liming Dai, a nanomaterials engineer at Cleveland-based Case Western Reserve University who was not involved in the research, told the website that see-through supercapacitors could be embedded into the glass without harming visibility.

“My research over the last 10 years has been to build the self-powered system so that a device operates by the energy acquired from its working environment without purposely apply an electric power,” Dr. Wang told redOrbit via email, adding that this was the “major motivation” that inspired he and his colleagues to develop the nanogenerator-based system.

He said that the success of their wind- and rain-converting window was an “outstanding” step forward in the field of self-powering technology. Such advances could infinitely extend the life of a battery “by constantly charging it using the energy converted from the environment,” Dr. Wang added. “This type of research has important applications in sensor networks, wearable electronics, personal electronics, medical science, national security and environmental science.”

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Three new species of ‘dwarf dragons’ discovered

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Cue the Game of Thrones theme song! A trio of new wood lizards, creatures also known as “dwarf dragons” due to their resemblance to the mythical beasts, have been found and identified by scientists in Peru and Ecuador.

The discovery, which was reported in the April 6 edition of the journal ZooKeys, brings the total number of wood lizard species to 15, according to National Geographic. Since 2006, the number of known wood lizards has nearly doubled, giving the South American reptiles one of the fastest discovery rates of the past 10 years, the website noted in an article published Monday.

Meet the new dwarf dragons

The new wood lizard species are known as the Alto Tambo wood lizard (Enyalioides altotambo), which occurs in northwestern Ecudaor; the rough-scaled wood lizard (E. anisolepis), which can be found on the Amazonian slopes of the Andes in both southern Ecuador and northern Peru; and the Rothschild’s wood lizard (E. sophiarothschildae), which resides in northeastern Peru.

The Alto Tambo wood lizard “differs from other species of Enyalioides in having dorsal scales that are both smooth and homogeneous in size, a brown iris, and in lacking enlarged, circular and keeled scales on the flanks,” lead investigator Omar Torres-Carvajal of the Museo de Zoología QCAZ at the Catholic University of Ecuador in Quito and his colleagues wrote.

The unique features of the rough-scaled wood lizard include “scattered, projecting large scales on the dorsum, flanks, and hind limbs, as well as a well-developed vertebral crest, with the vertebrals on the neck at least three times higher than those between the hind limbs.” The male Rothschild’s wood lizard has a white throat and black and turquoise-colored scales.

How the new wood lizards were found and identified

It took the research team nearly a decade to identify the lizards due to political unrest in Ecuador, Nat Geo explained. Torres-Carvajal told the website that he was “a very lucky guy” to have been part of the findings, which started with the discovery of E. altotambo in 2005. He noted that it was similar to a related species, E. oshaughnessyi, but with different color eyes and smooth skin.

The rough-scaled wood lizard was found along the border of Peru and Ecuador in 2014, Torres-Carvajal said. “I’m looking at them saying, ‘This is something new, because it has a combination of traits that I’ve never seen before.’ It was almost immediate – immediate and very exciting.”

Pablo Venegas, a taxonomist at the Center for Ornithology and Biodiversity in Lima, Peru who consults with the Ecuadoran museum, recognized the white throat scales from lizards he found in Peru in both 2003 and 2008. DNA testing confirmed that all three belonged to the same species, and a second white-throated wood lizard, E. sophiarothschildae, was later identified as the study authors continued to examine different specimens collected by Venegas.

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10 reasons you should strengthen your brain-gut connection

Written By: Christopher Pilny
Christopher Pilny

Nadia Tarazi for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
In the last few years, there has been mounting research focused on the role that gut balance plays in a balanced mind. As just one example, The National Institute of Health (NIH) has spent millions on the Human Microbiome Project that studies the various ways that microbiome impact health and disease, as well as supporting a 2014 Mental Health research program aimed at understanding the microbiome-brain connection. The results so far are promising: multiple studies link a strong gut-brain connection (or what scientists refer to as the “gut-brain axis”) to improved mental outlook, mood swings, and focus.
Of course, you only have to ask someone with constipation how their mood is to know that this research is really just confirming what Hippocrates declared two thousand years ago: “all disease begins in the gut.”
10 ways balancing your gut-brain axis helps balance your state of mind:

  1. Your gut has its own nervous system (commonly known as the “Second Brain”) that operates and reacts independently from the brain. (See Dr. Michael Gershon’s The Second Brain: A Groundbreaking New Understanding of Nervous Disorders of the Stomach and Intestine)
  2. The gut sends more signals to the brain (via the vagus nerve) than the brain sends to the gut.
  3. A healthy gut helps ensure you absorb the micronutrients that fuel your brain and balance your moods.
  4. Healthy gut bacteria have been linked to a more balanced mental state; while unhealthy bacteria have been linked to mood imbalances, brain-fog and irritability.
  5. You have ten times more gut bacteria than you do cells in your body.
  6. Neurotransmitters are produced and live in your gut, including the majority of your serotonin.
  7. Approximately 70% of your immune system lives in the mucus lining of your gut, acting as the first line of defense for the majority of toxins.
  8. A strong gut-brain axis has been linked to balanced eating.
  9. Data indicates that people with mental health issues are more likely to have digestive health issues.
  10. The foods you eat directly impact the health of your gut lining, the absorption of nutrients, and your state of mind.

This interconnectedness between the brain and gut plays a fundamental role in appetite, energy, mood and digestion. When any of these four health factors (or “brain-gut balance pillars”) are out of balance, the others tend to follow.
For example, when you are going through a stressful few days, you may notice you are more likely to eat erratically, have digestive issues, and not sleep well. Likewise, when you have eaten too much sugar or caffeine, you’ll probably notice increased distractibility, gut complaints, and energy swings.
Supporting any of the four pillars helps balance the other three. When you sleep well, exercise, and eat well, your digestion will be better, and so will your mood. To maintain gut-brain balance and live a stable and thriving life, these four pillars have to work in tandem.
Luckily, there are a few simple steps you can take to help support your brain-gut connection: Absorb plenty of micronutrients to help balance your mind and digestive tract (learn more: the health buzzword that’s here to stay), support healthy gut bacteria with probiotics and prebiotics, take care of your gut lining with whole foods, healthy fats, and amino acids like L-glutamine, avoid foods that you don’t digest well, and stay hydrated.
Taking care of your gut is key. You aren’t just what you eat: You are what you absorb.
Read more from Ms. Tarazi, here: What are micronutrients?
Nadia Tarazi, MBA, MA, CPCC, is an Executive Coach and Founder of MicroNourish®. Nadia developed the MicroNourish System after dramatically improving her own focus, digestion, and relationship with food through micronutrition. The premier system includes micronutrients and digestive formulas designed to target brain and gut balance for inner balance, mental clarity, and calmer eating. Nadia curates the online magazine, You Are What You Absorb®, which features experts sharing practical advice on good nutrition and mind-body balance; she also developed the mobile app, ThinkPal®, which generates coaching questions to help people get unstuck.
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Aluminum battery fully charges in one minute

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Researchers from Stanford University have developed a quickly-recharging, long-lasting, safe and inexpensive alternative to lithium-ion and single-use alkaline batteries that currently power most modern electronics – one which reportedly takes about one minute to fully recharge.

“We have developed a rechargeable aluminum battery that may replace existing storage devices, such as alkaline batteries, which are bad for the environment, and lithium-ion batteries, which occasionally burst into flames,” explained Hongjie Dai, a professor of chemistry at the California university. “Our new battery won’t catch fire, even if you drill through it.”

“Less explode-y” batteries are definitely a good thing

According to Engadget, the new aluminum-ion battery Dai and his colleagues are working on is far more reliable than previous attempts to build a power source using the element, and is able to withstand over 7,500 recharge cycles without capacity loss (compared to around 100 for previous attempts). It can also be built at “a fraction of the price” and is “less explode-y than lithium.”

The low cost, low flammability and high-charge storage capacity of aluminum has long made it an attractive material for use in batteries, the Stanford researchers explained. Several attempts at building one have been made over the past few decades, but coming up with a version that can be widely used has been difficult because of the inability to find materials which can produce a sufficient amount of voltage after repeated charging cycles, they added.

Dai’s team stumbled across a possible solution to that problem, however, “accidentally” finding that carbon-based graphite could be used as the positive electrode (with aluminum serving as the negative one). To create their battery, they placed a graphite cathode, and aluminum anode, and a ionic liquid electrolyte (essentially a room-temperature salt) in a flexible polymer-coated pouch.

Promising, but still a work in progress

The researchers report that their battery is safer than the conventional lithium-ion batteries used to power smartphones and laptops, which Dai noted “can be a fire hazard” and bulk shipments of which have been banned recently by some airliners. Conversely, the Stanford-developed battery, “won’t catch fire, even if you drill through it,” according to the chemistry professor.

“In our study, we have videos showing that you can drill through the aluminum battery pouch, and it will continue working for a while longer without catching fire,” he added. “But lithium batteries can go off in an unpredictable manner – in the air, the car or in your pocket. Besides safety, we have achieved major breakthroughs in aluminum battery performance.”

In addition to being a faster, cheaper and safer way to power electronics, the researchers (who have published a paper on their work in the journal Nature) believe that their battery could also be used to store renewable energy on the power grid. However, the device can only produce two volts of power and carry just 40 watts of electricity per kilogram in its current form (versus 3.6 watts and 206 W/kg power density for a lithium ion battery), according to Engadget.

“Improving the cathode material could eventually increase the voltage and energy density,” said Dai. “Otherwise, our battery has everything else you’d dream that a battery should have: inexpensive electrodes, good safety, high-speed charging, flexibility and long cycle life. I see this as a new battery in its early days. It’s quite exciting.”

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Dawn performing ‘flawlessly’ after one month at Ceres

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

It was one month ago Monday that NASA’s Dawn spacecraft entered orbit around the dwarf planet Ceres, and the US space agency issued an update this week assuring that the probe was still in good health and performing “flawlessly” as it continued its research.

Dawn was continuing to thrust using its ion engine as planned, and that force and Ceres’ gravity are combining to slowly maneuver the spacecraft into a circular orbit around the dwarf planet. It continues following its planned trajectory around dark side of Ceres, NASA added.

Getting settled before starting its science campaign

The spacecraft reached Ceres on March following a journey of more than 7 1/2 years. Once it entered orbit, its momentum carried it to a higher altitude, maxing out at an altitude of 46,800 miles (75,400 kilometers) on March 18. As of April 6, Dawn was roughly 26,000 miles (42,000 kilometers) above Ceres and was descending towards its first planned science orbit.

NASA said that the next optical navigation images of the dwarf planet are scheduled to be taken on April 10 and April 14, and should be available online following initial analysis by the science team. In the first image, Ceres will resemble a thin crescent, while it will appear slightly larger in the second. Dawn’s prime science campaign is scheduled to begin on April 23, once the probe is at its science orbit altitude of 8,400 miles (13,500 kilometers) above the surface.

Zooming in on Ceres’ two mysterious bright spots

Sometime early next month, the quality of images captures by Dawn should improve to the point where the entire surface will come into view – including the two enigmatic bright spots that have garnered a lot of attention from the scientific community since their discovery earlier this year.

Many scientists have hypothesized about what those bright spots might be. Last month, a study indicated that they were most likely ice, though other experts have said that volcanic activity or patches of salt may have caused those features to reflect sunlight. NASA said that, officially, it remains unknown what those unusual reflections represent, but their true nature should become more clear as Dawn moves closer to the region where those spots are located.

The bright spots will not be in view for the April 10 images, unfortunately, and it is not certain that they will be in view for the April 14 set, the US space agency noted. So it appears as though a definitive answer as to exactly what is causing those features may have to wait.

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Lab-grown hamburger could soon be $36/pound

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

If you were intrigued by laboratory-grown hamburgers when they were first created by Professor Mark Post of Maastricht University in the Netherlands last year, but were put off by the thought of paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for one, we’ve got some good news for you!

According to CNET, the cost of making a burger from what Professor Post refers to as “cultured meat” was a steep $273,000 (€250,000) a little over a year ago, but those costs could soon fall to just $30 per pound ($65 per kilogram, or about $9.10 per 140-gram patty) in the near future.

Bringing lab-grown Big Macs one step closer to fruition

That reduction in cost depends on the production of lab-grown beef production being scaled up drastically, Post told Australia’s ABC News on Friday. Even though each burger contains about 20,000 thing strands of lab-grown tissue, Post estimated that up to 10,000 kilos (11 tons) of meat could be produced from just a single small piece of muscle using his method.

Despite the lower cost of production, and the fact that the research involved in developing the technique used to produce the beef has already been completed, there are still some obstacles to overcome, CNET said. For instance, while the production method is effective, it is rather slow and currently is only viable on a small scale. It needs to become faster and more efficient before it can become produce enough product to become a viable alternative on the market.

Those advances need to come without the use of growth hormones, which the website points out tend to make consumers uncomfortable. Furthermore, the Post’s current technique uses fetal calf serum as a medium in which to grown the meat cells, but since this substance is made out of the blood of baby cows, it could be difficult to produce enough serum for large-scale production.

So why bother with law-grown hamburgers at all?

Advocates note that there are many potential advantages to Post’s lab-grown beef, staring with the fact that it would significantly reduce the need for cows to be slaughters. In addition, it could save on land use, water and energy required for livestock, and reduce the production of methane and other greenhouse gases. Also, since cows are inefficient at converting vegetable proteins into animal proteins, Post told ABC News that his method could prevent food from being wasted.

However, while the cost issues are being addressed, there’s still the matter of taste. ABC News said that the beef “passed the food critics’ taste test,” CNET noted that some experts said that the lack of fat in the lab-grown product “resulted in a lack of juiciness and flavor.” Post and his colleagues are reportedly working on fixing this issue by growing fat cells in the laboratory.

All in all, the whole thing reminds us of one of our favorite ’90s movies:

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Fibromyalgia

Neurotransmitter Medications and Fibromyalgia

Written By: Fibromyalgia Treating

Neurotransmitter Medications and Fibromyalgia

Even though there are a lot of different symptoms that are associated with the early stages of fibromyalgia, especially with women, it’s important to note that depression, anxiety, and other mental health issues are at the top of those problems. It’s not odd for men and women to have to take some sort of anti anxiety or anti depression medication as part of their fibromyalgia treatment plan.

That being said, there have been a lot of tests regarding neurotransmitter medications and fibromyalgia. These medications are typically used for mental health issues, but in recent years, have also started use for those suffering from other fibromyalgia symptoms.

What Are Neurotransmitter Medications and What Do They Do?

Neurotransmitter medications are medications that focus on the brain and the chemicals that it creates. As you likely know, the brain makes a lot of different chemicals, all which are used for various tasks. Sometimes, you don’t get enough of some of these chemicals, and at other times, you get too much.

There are a few neurotransmitters that are related to your mental health, including serotonin. If your brain is absorbing too much serotonin or it is not making enough in the first place, you can end up having symptoms of mental health disorders, including depression and anxiety.

So, neurotransmitter medications, as their name suggests, actually focus on helping the brain to create more of these chemicals and/or they make it so that your brain is not absorbing as many of them. These medications are usually used in order to help people who are struggling with depression.

As your brain develops more of these chemicals, the depressive symptoms start to reduce, allowing the patient to “feel better” a lot of the time. Even though they may not totally eliminate all of the symptoms that you are experiencing, they can definitely help

How Are Neurotransmitters Related to Fibromyalgia?

So, where do neurotransmitters come into play when it comes to your fibromyalgia symptoms? There are a few ways that this can happen. First off, a person who has fibromyalgia is more susceptible to struggling with mental health disorders like anxiety and depression.

Some of this is because of all of the issues that happen in the nervous system, but it can also happen because of the chemical imbalances that are going on. On top of that, it could just be there because you’re so stressed out and worried about the pain that you can’t handle the emotions that come with it. It’s okay, however, and there is help for it.

Another way that neurotransmitters may be related to fibromyalgia is because of what we discussed above. They develop a lot of the different chemicals that our brain uses in order to help our mood. But, some of those same chemicals could also play a role in helping us to reduce the pain that we feel on a regular basis.

Since with fibromyalgia, we’re a lot more sensitive to pain, it can be really helpful to take something that allows us to have a higher pain threshold. That way, we may still be in pain, but we can cope with it a lot better than we would.

The connection between neurotransmitters and pain is still being studied. Even though we know that chemicals like serotonin can play a huge role in helping to reduce pain, it hasn’t been proven yet just how much of a difference it can make for fibromyalgia patients.

There are still tests ongoing and there are a lot of studies that are trying to unlock these sorts of things. If, however, we find a definite connection, it’s going to be more likely that we can find a cure that will last for the long turn.

What Can Neurotransmitter Medications Do For Fibro Patients?

So, what can neurotransmitter medications do for people who are suffering from fibromyalgia? We understand that it’s related to depression, but what can they do for the rest of your oversensitive nervous system? There are a lot of things that have been suggested, and there are definitely changes that are noticed in those that take these medications. Here are just a few of the fibromyalgia symptoms that may have been reduced or eliminated through the use of neurotransmitter medications.

– People who suffer from fibromyalgia often have issues with sleeping and fatigue. By taking these medications, they have been shown to have a bit more energy and they are able to sleep better throughout the evening.

– There are a lot of connections between fibromyalgia and depression, so even if other symptoms have not been alleviated by the medication, it should help the depression subside, even slightly.

– Because of the connections between pain and neurotransmitters, it’s incredibly likely that these medications will be able to help people feel less pain, have more flexibility, and be able to go through other forms of therapy without as much pain or frustration.

– Cognitive function is often affected by fibromyalgia pain. This is usually referred to as “fibro fog.” The parts of cognitive function that are most often affected are attention, concentration, and memory. By going on a neurotransmitter medication, you may start to notice that you are able to concentrate better, or that your fibro fog isn’t as bad when you have a flare up or other complications related to your fibromyalgia symptoms.

These aren’t the only ways that they could be helping, but from the studies that have already been done, these are the ones that seem to be the most obvious and out in the forefront.

There is still a lot of research that needs to be done in this area of study, but at this point in time, the research is incredibly promising, especially for those who have been looking for the best way to deal with their fibromyalgia symptoms. You may be able to get in on a trial or your doctor may be willing to see if these specific medications can work for your symptoms.

Further reading:

Neurotransmitters in Fibromyalgia & Chronic Fatigue Syndrome http://chronicfatigue.about.com/od/treatingfmscfs/a/neurotranshub.htm

Neurotransmitter Medications and Fibro http://www.fibromyalgia-symptoms.org/neuotransmitters-and-fibro.html

UPDATE: NASA lightning map reveals where it strikes most

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Update: April 8, 2015 8:51AM CST

Since the publication of our original article, we heard from Dr. Daniel Cecil, a member of the Global Hydrology and Climate Center’s lightning team who passed along some cool information about the lightning map, the satellites responsible for the data and related research.

“We use satellites to measure lightning because that allows us to look across large parts of the globe with essentially equal detectability,” Dr. Cecil told redOrbit via email, explaining that the bulk of the observations come from the Lightning Imaging Sensor (LIS) on the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite, which originally launched in 1997.

TRMM was supposed to be used for just a three-year mission, he noted, but actually went on to have a lifespan of more than 17 years. However, Wednesday April 8 is expected to be its last day of service, as its instruments are scheduled to be shut off in preparation for de-orbiting.

In 2016, the next-generation GOES-R satellite will replace TRMM, and will feature a lightning mapper for continuous observations of lightning. As the satellite’s mission is coming to an end, Dr. Cecil said that he “can’t think of the right words for conveying” how much the satellite has “exceeded our expectations,” and that he believed that its LIS instrument has played a key role in helping scientists better understand differences in thunderstorms all over the world.

“The basic maps show that central Africa has the most lightning in general,” the NASA scientist explained, “[but] digging into the data, we see that thunderstorms occur most often throughout the year there, but individual thunderstorms tend to be stronger (higher flash rates) in subtropical places like northern Argentina, the central US, and Pakistan.”

“In the early days of collecting this data, there was frequent speculation that we would see a trend toward increased lightning due to global warming,” he added. “Of course there has been very little (if any) global warming since then, and no long-term trend in the lightning data. There is a lot of interesting year-to-year variability for different parts of the globe, which seems more important to understand.”

Finally, Dr. Cecil recommended that anyone interested in further investigating the US space agency’s satellite-based lightning climatology program should visit the webpage http://lightning.nsstc.nasa.gov/data/data_lis-otd-climatology.html for “a lot of neat animations for looking at how lightning varies with time of day or day of year, besides the maps of annual-mean flash rate as highlighted recently on the NASA Earth Observatory web page.”

Original: April 6, 2015 11:58AM CST

If you’re trying to avoid lightning strikes (which most of you probably are), make sure you steer clear of land located close to the Equator! A new map compiled by the folks at NASA shows what regions of the world are most likely to experience these sudden electrostatic discharges.

The map was created using data obtained by the Lightning Imaging Sensor (LIS) on NASA’s Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission satellite from 1998 through 2003, as well as the Optical Transient Detector (OTD) on the OrbView-1/Microlab satellite from 1995 through 2000, the US space agency explained. Flashes above 38 degrees north were based on OTD data only.

Lightning can strike far more than twice in some places

According to Discovery News, the data showed that lightning strikes were more likely to occur on land than in the water because solid earth absorbs sunlight and heats up more quickly than water. As a result, there is stronger convection and greater atmospheric instability on land, which leads to formation of storms capable of producing thunder and lightning.

NASA scientists note that the data also revealed some unusual regional trends. For instance, they observed a high number of flashes in the Brahmaputra Valley of far eastern India during the month of May. This is due to unstable heating and weather patterns that occur just prior to the start of the monsoon, which brings a significant amount of rain but far less lightning.

Central Africa and northwestern South America, on the other hand, tend to have large amounts of lightning throughout the entire year, the agency revealed. The map also indicates that the most lightning flashes occur in the far eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, and Lake Maracaibo in northwestern Venezuela (which reportedly has lightning storms 300 nights per year).

Meet the instruments

TRMM, a research satellite jointly operated by NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, is designed to measure rainfall for weather and climate research purposes. The primary goal of its mission was to enhance understanding of the distribution and variability of precipitation within the tropics as part of the current climate system’s water cycle.

OrbView-1/Microlab, on the other hand, was an imaging satellite designed to collect affordable, high-quality images of the Earth for various purposes. Its OTD instrument counted the number of lightning flashes, measured their intensity, and noted the time and location of occurrence. It was also a prototype for the TRMM’s Lightning Imaging Sensor (LIS) instrument.

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Health

Nosebleeds Can Be an Early Warning Sign to More Serious Health Problems

Written By: Sam Savage
Sam Savage

UPDATE:

HEALTH experts have warned that frequent nosebleeds could be a sign of much more serious medical conditions.

While nosebleeds are common in pregnancy, for those on blood- thinning drugs and as a result of injuries and allergies, frequent bleeding could be an early sign of serious problems.

And a host of other minor ailments, including swollen ankles, headaches and moles, can also act as vital warnings of health concerns.

Regular nosebleeds can be an indication of high blood pressure, the bleeding disorder haemophilia and, in rare cases, nose cancer.

Research suggests one in four people suffer regular nosebleeds but around 74 per cent of them are unaware of how serious they could be. Roddy Morrison, chairman of the Haemophilia Society, said: “Some 20,000 people in the UK are diagnosed with a bleedingdisorder.

Warning “However, it is estimated that a further one per cent of the population remains undiagnosed.”

Nosebleeds are just one of the body’s many early warning signals.

Here’s our guide to knowing what your body is trying to tell you.

The “thunderclap” headache is a severe sudden headache which reaches maximum intensity within a minute and lasts between an hour and 10 days.

They could be nothing to worry about or a symptom of minor problems such as sinus infections.

But in some instances, it can be caused by bleeding on the brain, an unruptured aneurysm or other blood vessel problems.

A headache that occurs during sex could also, on occasion, indicate something much more serious, like a stroke or haemorrhage.

Sharp, stabbing headaches caused by bending, coughing, laughing or sneezing could just be increasing blood pressure but, if they are frequent, severe or lengthy, they could point to problems such as brain tumours.

Everyone is prone to bumps and bruises but an unusual amount of bruising could be the first sign of a blood disorder like leukaemia, especially in children.

Dry, greasy and unmanageable hair or hair that is turning grey prematurely could be a sign of a poorly functioning thyroid.

Coughing and wheezing could be the symptoms of asthma but it could also be the early stages of lung cancer.

New moles and black spots that itch, bleed or increase in size are classic signs of skin cancer.

Women suffering fatigue may need more than just an early night – research has shownwomen are more likely to suffer tiredness rather than chest pains prior to a heart attack.

Lumps in the armpits could be blocked sweat glands or a build-up in the hair follicles but they could also be an early sign of cancer.

Blood in stools or in vomit could be a sign of an ulcer or cancer. Swollen ankles could be just water retention, an allergic reaction or even the result of poorly fitting shoes but it is possible that they could be a symptom of deep vein thrombosis,circulatory disorders or diabetes An increasedurge to urinatecould be a signal of both diabetes or prostate cancer in men.

Bleeding after the menopause could be harmless, caused by the use of birth control pills or a hormonal imbalance, but it could also be a sign of non-cancerous growths in the uterus or uterine cancer Many diseases and serious conditions can be detected bychanges in fingernails and toenails.

Flaky, split and ridged nails can be a sign of nutritional deficiencies and may show that you are not absorbing nutrients from your food.

Splitting nails may denote a lack of essential fatty acids which help protect against heart disease and arthritis, while white patches often indicate a zinc deficiency.

Nails with a blue tint may show circulatory disorders. Kidney disease can make nails half pink and half white, while lung diseases and diabetes can make nails thick and yellow

Read more here: Nosebleeds

Using sound to separate cancer cells from blood cells

Written By: Christopher Pilny
Christopher Pilny

Provided by A’ndrea Elyse Messer, Penn State University
Separating circulating cancer cells from blood cells for diagnostic, prognostic and treatment purposes may become much easier using an acoustic separation method and an inexpensive, disposable chip, according to a team of engineers.
“Looking for circulating tumor cells in a blood sample is like looking for a needle in a haystack,” said Tony Jun Huang, professor of engineering science and mechanics. “Typically, the CTCs are about one in every one billion blood cells in the sample.”
Existing methods of separation use tumor-specific antibodies to bind with the cancer cells and isolate them, but require that the appropriate antibodies be known in advance. Other methods rely on size, deformability or electrical properties. Unlike conventional separation methods that centrifuge for 10 minutes at 3000 revolutions per minute, surface acoustic waves can separate cells in a much gentler way with a simple, low-cost device.
Acoustic-based separations are potentially important because they are non-invasive and do not alter or damage cells. However, in order to be effective for clinical use, they also need to be rapidly and easily applicable.
“In order to significantly increase the throughput for capturing those rare CTCs, device design has to be optimized for much higher flow rates and longer acoustic working length,” said Ming Dao, principal research scientist, materials science and engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “With an integrated experimental/modeling approach, the new generation of the device has improved cell sorting throughput more than 20 times higher than previously achieved and made it possible for us to work with patient samples.”
The researchers worked both experimentally and with models to optimize the separation of CTCs from blood. They used an acoustic-based microfluidic device so that the stream of blood could continuously pass through the device for separation. Using the differential size and weight of the different cells they chose appropriate acoustic pressures that would push the CTCs out of the fluid stream and into a separate channel for collection. They report their results today (Apr. 6) in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Tilted-angle standing surface acoustic waves can separate cells using very small amounts of energy. The power intensity and frequency used in this study are similar to those used in ultrasonic imaging, which has proven to be extremely safe, even for fetuses. Also, each cell experiences the acoustic wave for only a fraction of a second. In addition, cells do not require labeling or surface modification. All these features make the acoustic separation method, termed acoustic tweezers, extremely biocompatible and maximize the potential of CTCs to maintain their functions and native states.
If two sound sources are placed opposite each other and each emits the same wavelength of sound, there will be a location where the opposing sounds cancel each other. Because sound waves have pressure, they can push very small objects, so a cell or nanoparticle will move with the sound wave until it reaches the location where there is no longer lateral movement, in this case, into the fluid stream that moves the separated cells along.
The researchers used two types of human cancer cells to optimize the acoustic separation — HELA cells and MCF7 cells. These cells are similar in size. They then ran an experiment separating these cells and had a separation rate of more than 83 percent. They then did the separation on other cancer cells, ones for which the device had not been optimized, and again had a separation rate of more than 83 percent.
“Because these devices are intended for use with human blood, they need to be disposable,” said Huang. “We are currently figuring out manufacturing and mass production possibilities.”
Physicians could use the devices to monitor how patients reacted to chemotherapy, for initial diagnosis and for determining treatment and prognosis.
“This work, involving a highly cross-disciplinary group of medical doctors, engineers, computational biologists, and device experts, has led to the design and development of a label-free platform for identifying and separating CTCs while preserving the integrity of the cell,” said Subra Suresh, president, Carnegie Mellon University and part of the research team. “It promises to offer new avenues for basic research into the pathology and metastasis, and for clinical diagnosis of rare tumor cells.”
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What are micronutrients?

Written By: Christopher Pilny
Christopher Pilny

Nadia Tarazi for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Every week a new buzzword emerges in the health and wellness world. Whether it’s a new ingredient, dietary style, or superfood, it can be hard to distinguish between real breakthroughs and passing trends. But you know micronutrients are more than a passing trend when the World Health Organization (WHO) describes them as “magic wands” for your body.

Micronutrients are the trace minerals and vitamins you need in steady doses to kick-start your core bodily processes. According to the Micronutrient Research Center at Oregon State University, these tiny nutrients are needed in constant supply for energy metabolism of neurons, neurotransmitter synthesis and nerve impulse propagation. In other words, they help run your brain and Central Nervous System.

Examples of micronutrients include:

–                 Iodine, which helps operate your thyroid and maintain brain health

–                 Zinc, which activates over 300 enzymatic reactions in the brain and body, including the production of neurotransmitters.

–                 Manganese, chromium, magnesium and Vitamin B12, which play a pivotal role in mood and outlook

Essential micronutrients are those that you can’t produce in adequate amounts in your body, and must be consumed. You may only need these nutrients in trace amounts, but as the World Health Organization puts it: “As tiny as the amounts are…the consequences of their absence are severe.”

An increasing body of research links micronutrient sufficiency to a better state of mind, including improved focus, stable moods, a more positive general outlook, and a calmer relationship with food.

Which begs the question: Could the decline of micronutrients in the Standard American Diet (SAD) be related to the high number of people dealing with overwhelm, blues, stress and cravings?

Micronutrients originate in the soil, which means that if your fruits and vegetables are not grown in nutrient-dense soils, and are not preserved well through the processes that bring them to your plate, there will be less micronutrients available for you to absorb.

Once consumed, micronutrients are absorbed into your bloodstream via more than 30 receptor points throughout your digestive system, where they interact with each other to help facilitate absorption: for instance, magnesium facilitates the absorption of potassium and calcium. So, good digestion is key to ensuring maximum micronutrient absorption.

Given that micronutrients play such a pivotal role in activating and regulating the processes that balance your mind, eating, energy, and digestion, it is not surprising that more health practitioners and individuals are reporting mental wellness breakthroughs when they absorb high-quality micronutrients.

The increased attention that micronutrients are getting, and the mounting evidence of their positive impact on mental well-being, suggests there are many more breakthroughs still to come. Which is why micronutrients are more than just a trend, and most definitely a health buzzword that’s here to stay.

Because, you are what you absorb.

Nadia Tarazi, MBA, MA, CPCC, is an Executive Coach and Founder of MicroNourish®. Nadia developed the MicroNourish System after dramatically improving her own focus, digestion, and relationship with food through micronutrition. The premier system includes micronutrients and digestive formulas designed to target brain and gut balance for inner balance, mental clarity, and calmer eating. Nadia curates the online magazine, You Are What You Absorb®, which features experts sharing practical advice on good nutrition and mind-body balance; she also developed the mobile app, ThinkPal®, which generates coaching questions to help people get unstuck.

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The sun experiences seasonal changes, study finds

Written By: Brett Smith
Christopher Pilny

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – @ParkstBrett

Our sun goes through a few activity cycles and a new study has identified one such cycle that is almost seasonal in nature.

According to the report, published in the journal Nature Communications, the nearly two-year cycle appears to be caused by shifts in the bands of powerful magnetic fields in each solar hemisphere. These bands also aid in shaping and approximately 11-year solar cycle that is part of a lengthier cycle that lasts approximately 22 years.

“What we’re looking at here is a massive driver of solar storms,” said study author Scott McIntosh, director of the High Altitude Observatory at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). “By better understanding how these activity bands form in the Sun and cause seasonal instabilities, there’s the potential to greatly improve forecasts of space weather events.”

Two overlapping parallel bands

The new study is one of a number of papers by the same study team that examines the affect of the magnetic bands on many connected cycles of solar magnetism. In a paper published last year, the authors indicated that the approximately 11-year sunspot cycle is driven by two overlapping parallel bands of reverse magnetic polarity that slowly move over nearly 22 years from high solar latitudes toward the equator, where they meet and dissipate.

The team recognized the twisted, ring-shaped stripes by using on a number of NASA satellites and ground-based assets that collect data on the structure of the Sun, the nature of solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs). These findings exposed the bands in the form of variances in the density of magnetic fuel that went up from the solar interior, through transition area known as the tachocline and on to the surface, where they associated with shifts in flares and CMEs.

In the new study, the researchers determined that the migrating rings generate seasonal variations in solar activity that are as robust as those seen in the more familiar 11-year counterpart cycle. These seasonal variants take place individually in both the northern and southern halves of the Sun.

“Much like Earth’s jet stream, whose warps and waves have had severe impact on our regional weather patterns in the past couple of winters, the bands on the Sun have very slow-moving waves that can expand and warp it too,” said study author Robert Leamon, a solar physicist at Montana State University.

The newly-found variability also explains why powerful solar flares and CMEs often peak a year or more after the maximum number of sunspots. Based on the study findings, the answer seems to be that seasonal changes cause an uptick in solar disruptions long after the peak in the solar cycle.

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Health

Why do penises curve?

Written By: Duana Welch, Ph.D.
Christopher Pilny

When I told Facebook readers I’d planned an article on curvature of the male member, one guy gave this hint as to why penises aren’t straight: “Let’s just say, if he’s left-handed, it will curve left, and if he’s right-handed, it will curve right.”

Yet in my extensive reading on the effects of male masturbation, 100% of the studies indicate that flogging your dolphin is good for you; it’s even good for your romantic relationships, helping you last longer in partnered sex, and taking care of your needs if your partner is not quite as randy as you are.  Not one scientific exploration of wanking showed any ill effects. In a nutshell, the “It’ll bend your dong” idea needs to go the way of “It’ll make you go blind.” Hopefully you know that isn’t true.

So if masturbation isn’t creating the penile curve, what is?

At the physiological level, one cause is a rare and painful condition known as Peyronie’s. Masturbation is definitely not a cause, but vigorous partnered sex where the penis gets traumatically injured may be a contributor; penetrating a partner who is on top of you is risky business from a broken-penis perspective! Otherwise, there’s no clear indicator of where this buildup of fibrous tissue comes from. If your curvature is causing you discomfort, or if it’s so bent that erection or intercourse is difficult or impossible, then it’s time to get thyself to a doctor to discuss an array of effective treatments.

Yet for well above 90% of men, a slight curve to the left or right is noticeable but normal; it doesn’t create pain or impair function. Despite the terms “boner” and “love muscle”, the human penis lacks muscle or bone; erection happens when three spongy areas—two along the shaft’s top, and one along its bottom– fill with blood.  But the penis does have a two-sided root that anchors it to the pubic bones. Human anatomy rarely yields perfect symmetry; if the root is shorter on one side, the penis will bend in that direction, just as most men have one testicle that hangs lower because of different lengths of the testes’ separate spermatic cords.

But why have a curve at all?

In a word: women.

Men and women shape one another’s physiology by preferentially mating with people who have what they want, and selectively shunning the rest. Male preference for large breasts has, for instance, resulted in female breasts that are much larger than any other primate’s, and much larger than needed to feed offspring.

Likewise, the penis’ size, girth, and flexibility are related to female sexual choice. Compared to the phallic fixations of other primates, it appears that ancestral women preferred sexual stimulation with a flexible, thick, long penis; some scientists believe it was more conducive to women’s orgasm. To wit, the average erect human male penis is 5.21 inches long, one inch thick, and comparatively flexible and bendable, allowing for an entire Kama Sutra of sexual positions. Compare that to the average male gorilla, endowed with a pencil-width dick just under two inches long in length; or our closest genetic relative, the chimpanzee, which sports a 3-incher with a skinny, inflexible bone.

Today, some evolutionary theorists believe that by selectively preferring larger, thicker, and more flexible penises than other primate females did, human women physically sculpted human men. Theoretically, over many thousands of generations, men who had a pleasing pecker were the genetic winners, casting their own genes forward through their sons~while less lucky guys produced fewer or no offspring. Hence, the sons have the equipment their successful, sexy dads had. And so today’s men have the longest, thickest, most flexible penises in the primate family.

Might women have preferred men with slightly curved penises, too? I think so; curvature relates to flexibility, if not overdone. Consider the humble dildo: primarily used to please women, it is often curved in much the same way as a real live pecker. If women disliked your curve, would it be selling so well in sex shops?

Worried about your size now? Don’t be. In recent studies, nearly 9 in 10 women rate themselves as extremely satisfied with their partner’s penile dimensions. Ancestral women’s preferences ensured that today, you are very likely equipped just the way we like it.

Upshot?  If your bend doesn’t hurt, it’s probably helping. Sport it with pride, touch it in private, and work all the angles with a partner.

Duana C. Welch, Ph.D., is the author of Love Factually: 10 Proven Steps from I Wish to I Do (available now). For more information, or to get a free chapter, visit http://www.lovefactually.co.

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Feature Image: Thinkstock

Brontosaurus is back, baby!

Written By: Brett Smith
Christopher Pilny

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – @ParkstBrett

Remember when you learned about Brontosaurus as a kid? And then some egg-head scientists had to go and start calling it ‘Apatosaurus’? Childhood ruined.

Well, just like TMNT and GI Joe, Brontosaurus is back, baby!

Through an exhaustive taxonomic analysis, an international team of researchers has determined that Brontosaurus and Apatosaurus are in fact two different species.

Paleontologists have considered Brontosaurus as falling under the umbrella of Apatosaurus since 1903. However, the distinctness of Brontosaurus took a real hit in the 1970s, when scientists revealed that Apatosaurus was closely linked to Diplodocus. Because Diplodocus had a slim, horse-like skull, Apatosaurus, and therefore also “Brontosaurus,” must have had a skull comparable to Diplodocus, creating the myth of “Brontosaurus” being an Apatosaurus with the incorrect head.

A classic example of how science works

In the new study, published in the journal PeerJ, a team of European scientists have shown that Brontosaurus was a distinct species after all.

“Our research would not have been possible at this level of detail 15 or more years ago,” explained study author Emanuel Tschopp, a paleontologist at Universidade Nova de Lisboa in Portugal. “In fact, until very recently, the claim that Brontosaurus was the same as Apatosaurus was completely reasonable, based on the knowledge we had.”

To reach their conclusion, the team applied statistical methods to calculate the variations among various species and genera of diplodocid dinosaurs.

“We tried to be as objective as possible whenever making a decision which would differentiate between species and genus,” Tschopp said.

“The differences we found between Brontosaurus and Apatosaurus were at least as numerous as the ones between other closely related genera, and much more than what you normally find between species,” said co-author Roger Benson, a paleontologist from the University of Oxford.

“It’s the classic example of how science works,” said the study’s third author Octávio Mateus, a paleontologist from the Universidade Nova de Lisboa in Portugal. “Especially when hypotheses are based on fragmentary fossils, it is possible for new finds to overthrow years of research.”

The study not only brings back Brontosaurus as a unique species, it also serves as a reminder that science is always moving forward, even if that means taking a single step back.

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Cell division study could provide new cancer, human development insights

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

A newly-discovered process used by the dividing cells in worms to make sure that the processes of gene expression is properly coupled to cell division to ensure that the organism can develop as expected – a finding that could also have implications for cancer research in humans.

Writing in the journal Current Biology, biologists from the University of Iowa explain that the same mechanism that they observed in the worm may be taking place in people, ensuring proper development. It involves a part of the cell known as the centrosome, which functions like a sort of “internal timekeeper,” and a crucial protein that is in charge of gene expression.

How the centrosome oversees beta-catenin distribution

UI integrated biology doctoral candidate and first author Setu Vora and his colleagues compare the centrosome to a train conductor and the protein, beta-catenin, to a hitchhiker that boards the cellular train and ensures that cells grow like they should. In this process, timing is everything, as the right processes need to take place at the right time for a person to be healthy.

Beta-catenin attaches itself to the centrosome to ensure that it can be properly regulated as well as divided out to newly-forming cells in just the right amounts. Since most tumors tend to have severe centrosome abnormalities, Vora explained, similar mechanisms involving the centosome could also be relevant in cancer and other human illnesses.

The centosome acts like the captain of the cell division process, the UI researchers said, and is responsible for ensuring that new cells are given equal portions of DNA when they are originally created. The new research reveals that it serves as the timekeeper of cell division processes, such as those involving beta-catenin, the protein responsible for controlling gene expression.

“The inspiration for this research is, in a nutshell, understanding how gene expression works specifically through the regulation of an important protein called beta-catenin,” Dr. Bryan Phillips, assistant professor of biology at the university and corresponding author of the study, explained to redOrbit via email. “Beta-catenin controls gene expression in all animals and has important roles instructing cells during human development and even in adults.”

“We study beta-catenin regulation in a experimentally amenable genetic model system, the nematode C. elegans,” he added. “We find that beta-catenin levels build up on a cellular structure called the centrosome just before a cell divides. Because of this localization pattern, beta-catenin is degraded. As the centrosome grows and matures during the cell cycle, it accumulates and destroys more and more beta-catenin. This novel mechanism means beta-catenin levels are kept low in both daughter cells after division.”

The importance of limiting beta-catenin amounts

Beta-catenin is present in cell division, but begins to degrade during the process, limiting the amount of itself is passed on to its daughter cells. The amount of beta-catenin given to each one is dependent upon the type of cell that it is. The UI team found that the protein only knows how much of itself to distribute to forming cell because it attaches to the centrosome.

Those timekeepers grow and mature inside of cells just as those cells begin dividing, and while it might seem unorthodox for an essential part of a cell to activate just before it starts dividing, the study authors explain that this allows a mature centrosome to act like an internal alarm alerting the body when a cell is about to divide. At that very moment, the  beta-catenin becomes attached to the centosome, and they begin to work together to ensure the process goes smoothly.

Typically, the two newly forming daughter cells only inherit a little beta-catenin, but when Vora and his colleagues blocked the protein’s ability to hitchhike on the centrosome, those daughter cells ended up receiving too much of the substance, which caused some of those cells to wind up converting into completely different types of tissue.

“When beta-catenin levels are too high, birth defects or cancer can occur. For instance over 90 percent of colorectal cancers have high, unregulated levels of beta-catenin. So there is a great deal of interest in answering the following questions: How beta-catenin is regulated? How are its levels kept in check?” Dr. Phillips told redOrbit via email.

“The implications for cancer is that this centrosomal localization pattern is also seen in mammals,” he added. “Our finding therefore suggest that the centrosomal regulation mechanism might also be well-conserved. Further, cancer cells often exhibit aberrant centrosomes (both the number and shape of the centrosomes are unusual). Could the centrosome-associated mechanism that regulates beta-catenin levels also be aberrant in these tumor cells? Only further study will tell us.”

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Fibromyalgia

The Role of Sensory Perception in Fibromyalgia

Written By: Fibromyalgia Treating
John

Fibromyalgia is a chronic condition that is characterized by severe pain in the body.  We have known about fibromyalgia since the 1970s, but despite the massive advancements that have been made in scientific and medical technology, scientific researchers still have very limited knowledge on what causes fibromyalgia, what all of the symptoms are and how it can be cured.

However, recent research has revealed one interesting aspect of fibromyalgia: that there is a definitive link between fibromyalgia and the central nervous system.

Scientific Study

The University of Michigan conducted a study where they examined thirty participants to find out if any issues in the central nervous system would impact fibromyalgia sufferers. This study was conducted because they realized that no studies had previously been done to show if there was a relationship between the two.  In addition to finding the relation between fibromyalgia and the central nervous system, the researchers also looked into how fibromyalgia sufferers react to pain from the disease.

Sound Perception

It was discovered that the participants in the program had a heightened perception to auditory tones, claiming that they were experiencing sensitivity in sounds that they heard in their everyday lives. This revealed that the sensitiveness to acute sounds in fibromyalgia patients could have been caused by a physiological mechanism.

When describing the intensity of the auditory sounds they heard, the patients with fibromyalgia did report much greater intensity than the healthy control group…and the sounds were the exact same in intensity. This was persuasive enough to convince the researchers that the link between fibromyalgia and sensory perception was stronger than previously thought.

All in all, the researchers concluded that a deficit in sensory processes in the central nervous system is linked to an increased level of fibromyalgia in a patient. However, more research will need to be conducted in the future before the medical researchers can flesh out all of the details, such as the mechanism of how fibromyalgia patients respond to sound and touch when compared to otherwise healthy individuals.  What we do know is that fibromyalgia is a stress disorder because of the onset of pain symptoms, which could make a patient more susceptible to sound and touch.

Brain Disorder?

However, just because a person with fibromyalgia is more sensitive to sounds and touch does not mean that they are suffering from a brain disorder. In fact, scientific studies and analysis suggest the exact opposite.

This is because there is no established scientific link between chemical activity in the brain (also known as neurotransmitters) and sensory perception.  However, fibromyalgia could still result from stress and pain on the central nervous system, which means that the sensitivity to touch and sound would be a brain circuitry rather than a brain disorder.  These findings have been supported by brain imaging studies that reveal to us disturbances in the central nervous system.

The Nervous System

Brian neurotransmitters are a very fascinating subject, mostly because each individual transmitter can perform a great diversity of different functions. While they obviously interact with each other in the brain, they have the ability to create another neurotransmitter by using another.

A chemical messenger that’s found in the brain’s nervous system, called serotonin, plays a very large role in the pain and fatigue levels of people. An individual who has lower levels of serotonin will be susceptible to fibromyalgia, among other disorders.  While it hasn’t been found that simply having lower levels of serotonin will automatically result in the patient being afflicted with fibromyalgia or another disorder, it can lead to increased fatigue, more sensitivity to pain and touch, and more stress in the fibromyalgia patients who do have it.

Pain

Therefore, the reason why patients with fibromyalgia are more sensitive to touch and sounds could be because they experience pain. People who have fibromyalgia will feel pain in a different manner than people who don’t have fibromyalgia, just like the case we saw where patients with fibromyalgia react very differently to touch and sounds.  So why do patients with fibromyalgia feel pain differently than people who don’t have it?

Well, abnormalities that exist in fibromyalgia patients’ brains are visible in scans at hospitals and medical clinics, revealing that the patients have three times the level of substance P that they should have. Substance P is a chemical messenger dealing with pain perception.  What’s more is that these findings have been discovered to occur in areas of the brain that determine how intense the pain is to the person.  When more blood flow occurs, the patient feels more pain.  When less blood flow occurs, they may feel less physical pain, but they’ll still feel stressed out and anxious.

Oversensitivity

In short, patients with fibromyalgia feel and react to touch and sound differently than other people due to the physical and mental aspect of pain sensations. When a patient feels physical pain, they hurt!  And even when they don’t feel physical pain, that doesn’t eliminate the mental aspect of fibromyalgia, such as fatigue, anxiety and even depression.

Since fibromyalgia patients are oversensitive to pain, they are much more aware of even the smallest pain problems in the body, such as limited movement due to an aching pain in the leg. They also have less tolerance of the pain; to give you an idea, people with fibromyalgia and people without it were both used in a light study.

The people without fibromyalgia were put in a room where there was an average amount of light; the fibromyalgia patients were placed in a room that was more dimmed.  Despite this, the fibromyalgia patients still reported the same intensity levels in the dimmed room as the people in the slightly more lighted room reported.

Since we know that people with fibromyalgia suffer from a greater pain response due to disturbances in the central nervous system, this greatly aids in medical researchers working to understand fibromyalgia and treat it with the proper medications.

Further reading:

Fibromyalgia and Sensory Perception: http://www.fibromyalgia-symptoms.org/heightened-sensory-perception-fibro.html

Sensory Perception and Fibromyalgia: http://www.fibromyalgia-symptoms.org/sensory-perception-and-fibromyalgia.html

Fibromyalgia – Causes:  http://www.healthcentral.com/ency/408/guides/000076_2_3.html

Scientists planning to take core samples from crater left by dino-killing asteroid

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

For the first time, scientists plan to conduct an expedition to collect and analyze core samples from the 125-mile-wide Chicxulub impact site in Mexico, a crater believed to have been caused by the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs more than 65 million years ago.

The expedition, which is scheduled to begin in spring 2016, will drill at depths of nearly 5,000 feet below the seabed from an offshore platform, collecting the first complete samples from the rock layers from near the center of the crater. Once the core is extracted, it will be split in two, with half of it undergoing immediate analysis and the other half being stored for later use.

Chicxulub crater

The Chicxulub crater has been filled in by sediments over the millions of years since impact. Using a gravity map, the crater’s topological features can be visualized. The red and yellow are gravity highs, and green and blue are gravity lows. The white dots indicate a network of sinkholes called “cenotes,”which were formed as a result of the impact. (Credit: NASA)

Examining the crater’s peak ring for the first time

Dr. Sean Gulick, a researcher at The University of Texas at Austin Institute for Geophysics (UTIG), and Joanna Morgan of Imperial College London will co-lead the expedition, overseeing a team of scientists from the US, UK and Mexico as they sample the Chicxulub crater’s “peak ring” (an enigmatic ring of topographically elevated rocks surrounding its center).

The peak ring rises above the floor and has been buried by other sediments throughout the past 65.5 million years, the researchers explained in a statement. The expedition is scheduled to last two months, and afterwards, half of the core sample will be sent to Germany for analysis by an international team while the rest will be kept at a core repository at Texas A&M University.

“Fundamentally we wish to understand the way large impacts change the surfaces and crust of planets,” Dr. Gulick told redOrbit via email. “Peak rings are a ring of mountains that surround the center of every large impact and yet we do not know how they are formed. Models suggest these mountains are emplaced as deeply source crustal rocks that rise up from the impact site and then splash outward, however no one has ever recovered a rock from a peak ring.”

“Therefore we hope to test how deep the rocks came from in the Earth’s crust at the Chicxulub impact crater and by what mechanism these rocks were weakened to be able to flow upwards and outwards during the impact,” he continued, adding that even though the expedition was a year away, he and his colleagues were “very excited” about its potential.

Studying impact mechanisms and seeking signs of life

The apocalyptic events that saw a nine-mile-wide asteroid collide with the Earth, ending the 135 million year reign of the dinosaurs, allowed mammals and ultimately humans to assume control of the planet. However, precious few geologic samples have been recovered from that impact site – something that Dr. Gulick and his colleagues are hoping to change with their research.

By sampling and studying samples from the peak ring, they hope to provide new insight into the mechanisms of large impact on Earth and other rocky planets. They are also hoping to examine traces of life that may have been present within the peak ring’s rock, which density readings note are likely broken and porous, features indicative of a preserved post-impact lifeforms.

“We are interested in the hydrothermal system that like existed within the peak ring after the impact and what kind of exotic life may have populated such an environment,” Dr. Gulick told redOrbit. “These extremophiles (extreme condition loving organisms) might be similar to where some life may have started on early Earth when impacts were much more common.”

“We are confident we will recover the layers of rocks above the impact crater that show how life recovered from the extinction event,” he added. “If you truly want to understand evolution its information to examine a place where life took a significant step back and then evolved to fill the ecosystem niches that were vacated due to the mass extinction.”

“Tune back in a year when we can report some of our early results from the expedition,” the UT researcher concluded, noting that the expedition members are also  “a series of outreach and education activities,” including “models of the cores” that are “being created for use in museums and educational modules created in English and Spanish for use in science classes.”

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Could plasma rocket technology get us to Mars in six weeks?

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

A rocket capable of sending astronauts to Mars in just six weeks rather than six months sounds impossible, but that’s exactly what one Texas company is working on – and they just received a NASA grant to continue working on the advanced propulsion technology.

The rocket is being built by the Ad Astra Rocket Company, and according to the Huffington Post it uses plasma and magnets to propel spacecraft that are already in orbit over greater distance and at higher speeds than is currently possible. In ideal conditions, it could reach Mars in 39 days.

Developing a plasma-based propulsion system

The technology is known as the Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket (VASMIR), and according to Ad Astra, it operates using the electrically-charged gas known as plasma, which can be heated to extreme temperatures by radio waves and guided using strong magnetic fields.

vasimr engine

The magnetic field also insulates nearby structures in order to keep exhaust temperatures under the melting point of materials, they added. In rocket propulsion, the velocity and fuel efficiency of rockets increase along with the temperature of the exhaust gases, but a plasma rocket is said to outperform its chemical-based counterparts in both categories, the company claims.

Despite NASA’s support, is the VASMIR project feasible?

Ad Astra was one of three companies to receive grants under NASA’s Next Space Technologies for Exploration Partnerships (NextSTEP) program to continue the development of the VASMIR rocket technology. They were awarded $10 million over a three-year period to advance a current prototype to Level 5 Technology Readiness Level, bringing it closer to being space-ready.

“We are thrilled by this announcement and proud to be joining forces with NASA in the final steps of the technology maturation,” former NASA astronaut/current Ad Astra CEO Dr. Franklin Chang-Díaz, a veteran of seven shuttle missions, said in a statement. “We look forward to a very successful partnership as we jointly advance the technology to flight readiness.”

VASIMR

A solar powered lunar tug concept using two VASIMR® engines. (Credit: Ad Astra Rocket)

However, the company could be facing an uphill battle. They plan to build a prototype that could operate at high power for a minimum of 100 hours, but thus far the engine has only been used for less than one minute at a time, and critics doubt that the VASMIR concept is realistic.

In fact, last year, Mars Society president Robert Zubrin said that Ad Astra’s rocket would require “nuclear electric power systems with 10,000 times the power and 1/100th the mass per unit power as any that have ever been built,” according to the Huffington Post. He also sent an open letter to Dr. Chang-Diaz challenging him to a debate over Mars-related travel technology.

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Near-death brain activity may speed up heart failure

Written By: Chuck Bednar
John

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Commonly held theories about the moments just before death suggest that a person’s systems begin to slow down as the heart stops beating, ending blood flow to the body, but a new study from researchers at the University of Michigan Medical School suggests otherwise.

Instead, senior author Dr. Jimo Borjigin, an associate professor of neurology and molecular and integrative physiology, and her colleagues write that there is a sudden storm of brain activity that takes place as the heart deteriorates that may play a key role in the demise of heart function – in fact, they believe that brain signaling at near-death could even speed up the process.

Discovering the brain-heart connection in rat studies

Dr. Borjigin’s team, who published their findings in this week’s edition of PNAS Early Edition, included experts with background in cardiology, neuroscience, physiology, pharmacology and chemistry, all of whom analyzed the mechanisms through which the heart of a healthy individual suddenly ceases to function mere minutes after it no longer received oxygen.

Using rats as the subject of their research, they simultaneously examined both the heart and brain during experimental asphyxiation, witnessing the release of over a dozen neurochemicals as well as the activation of brain-heart connectivity processes. As the heart rate sharply fell, brain signals strongly synchronized with heart rhythm, according to new electrocardiomatrix technology.

Blocking signals from the brain during a heart attack

Blocking the brain’s activity led to a significant delay in ventricular fibrillation, the most serious type of cardiac rhythm disturbance and a condition in which the heart’s lower chambers begin to quiver, preventing blood from pumping. The results suggest that blocking the brain’s electrical connections to the heart during cardiac arrest could improve a patient’s chances of survival.

“Despite the loss of consciousness and absence of signs of life, internally the brain exhibits sustained, organized activity and increased communication with the heart, which one may guess is an effort to save the heart,” Dr. Jimo Borjigin said, adding that a “pharmacological blockade” of brain-to-heart communication could potentially keep a heart attack from becoming fatal.

In previous research, he and his colleagues reportedly demonstrated significant and organized activation of brain functions in animals during cardiac arrest. They note that their new research provides “a neurochemical foundation” for the increase in brain activity, as well as a brain-to-heart link that could effectively be targeted in order to prolong detectable brain activity.

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