Science discoveries related to Health and Fitness

Arts & Sciences Science & Nature
1

[quote]The new therapy developed by the team from Yonsei University uses a genetically-engineered form of the adenovirus, which normally causes colds.

The adenovirus was implanted with a human gene that is related to the production of relaxin, a hormone associated with pregnancy.

When injected into cancerous tumors, the virus quickly multiplies in the cancer cells and kills them, the team said.

The new adenovirus can target only cancer cells and does not harm normal cells, the team said.
[/quote]

seedmagazine.com/news/2006/1 … medium=rss

2

nytimes.com/2006/10/17/healt … nd&emc=rss

[quote]Since microwave ovens often use less heat than conventional methods and involve shorter cooking times, they generally have the least destructive effects. The most heat-sensitive nutrients are water-soluble vitamins, like folic acid and vitamins B and C, which are common in vegetables.

In studies at Cornell University, scientists looked at the effects of cooking on water-soluble vitamins in vegetables and found that spinach retained nearly all its folate when cooked in a microwave, but lost about 77 percent when cooked on a stove. They also found that bacon cooked by microwave has significantly lower levels of cancer-causing nitrosamines than conventionally cooked bacon.
[/quote]

3

This could be very exciting news indeed.

4

fair enough,but get yourself 2 bacon butty

1 made from grilling,1 made from microwaving…

need i say more?

5

An interesting bit of good news on the cognitive-therapy front.

[quote=“Dilbert author: Scott Adams”]As regular readers of my blog know, I lost my voice about 18 months ago. Permanently. It’s something exotic called Spasmodic Dysphonia. Essentially a part of the brain that controls speech just shuts down in some people, usually after you strain your voice during a bout with allergies (in my case) or some other sort of normal laryngitis. It happens to people in my age bracket.

I asked my doctor – a specialist for this condition – how many people have ever gotten better. Answer: zero. While there’s no cure, painful Botox injections through the front of the neck and into the vocal cords can stop the spasms for a few months. That weakens the muscles that otherwise spasm, but your voice is breathy and weak.

The weirdest part of this phenomenon is that speech is processed in different parts of the brain depending on the context. So people with this problem can often sing but they can’t talk. In my case I could do my normal professional speaking to large crowds but I could barely whisper and grunt off stage. And most people with this condition report they have the most trouble talking on the telephone or when there is background noise. I can speak normally alone, but not around others. That makes it sound like a social anxiety problem, but it’s really just a different context, because I could easily sing to those same people.

[…]

The day before yesterday, while helping on a homework assignment, I noticed I could speak perfectly in rhyme. Rhyme was a context I hadn’t considered. A poem isn’t singing and it isn’t regular talking. But for some reason the context is just different enough from normal speech that my brain handled it fine.

Jack be nimble, Jack be quick.
Jack jumped over the candlestick.

I repeated it dozens of times, partly because I could. It was effortless, even though it was similar to regular speech. I enjoyed repeating it, hearing the sound of my own voice working almost flawlessly. I longed for that sound, and the memory of normal speech. Perhaps the rhyme took me back to my own childhood too. Or maybe it’s just plain catchy. I enjoyed repeating it more than I should have. Then something happened.

My brain remapped.

My speech returned.

Not 100%, but close, like a car starting up on a cold winter night. And so I talked that night. A lot. And all the next day. A few times I felt my voice slipping away, so I repeated the nursery rhyme and tuned it back in. By the following night my voice was almost completely normal.[/quote]

For other reasons, I find the different brain areas being used to process language in different situations bit particularly interesting.

6

Thanks for this post.

I don’t know how yet, but I know this is going to be VERY important to me later.

7

Yeah, interesting story about Scott Adams/Dilbert - thanks for posting it. Folks who have strokes often have something termed aphasia - which means the ability to understand or speak or write language has been impaired. Scott Adams story reminds me of this for some reason. The brain is an amazing organ [I know, that sounds kinda stupid, huh?]. I’m now going to go look up more on spasmodic dysphonia - I believe Diane Rehm, a broadcaster on NPR, has this condition as well. She has been able to keep working, but her voice is affected noticably.

[quote]Rehm started in radio in 1973 [2] as a volunteer for WAMU’s The Home Show. In 1979, she took over as host of WAMU’s morning talk show, Kaleidoscope, which was renamed The Diane Rehm Show in 1984.

In its current incarnation, Rehm has interviewed high-profile political and cultural figures including Bill Clinton, John McCain, Madeleine Albright, Sandra Day O’Connor, Ralph Nader, Arlo Guthrie, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Maurice Sendak and Maya Angelou. Of all of her interviews, Rehm has said that her most touching interview was that with Fred Rogers of the PBS program Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood done just prior to Rogers’ death. [2]

In 1998, Rehm’s voice gained a distinctive warble due to her developing neurological disorder spasmodic dysphonia (SD). [3]

She has written two autobiographical books. The first, Finding My Voice, published by Alfred A. Knopf, New York, dealt with her traditional upbringing in a Christian Arab household, her brief first marriage and divorce, her 42 year marriage to John Rehm, the raising of her children, and the first 20 years of her radio career, including her battles with depression and SD.[4] With her second husband, she later co-wrote a book, Toward Commitment: A Dialogue about Marriage, published by Knopf in 2002. This latter book discusses the skills needed to create and maintain a strong, long-lived marriage.[/quote]

Bodo