Trick-or-Treating: What Do You Hand Out On Halloween?

Halloween is almost here. And you know what that means: Candy! It’s one of those Halloween traditions that I just never seem to have grown out of. Those little chocolate bars are seriously dangerous to my waistline. Remember how much Halloween candy you ate when you were a kid? Were you one of those kids who gorged on all that sugary goodness, or were you the type to parse it out and make it last? I was a Trader, that kid that made deals to trade all her bad candy for the good stuff. Anyway, the topic of Halloween candy got me to searching through the scholarly journals in search of an article for today’s post. I came across a paper that asks if children really need all of that candy on Halloween. My first instinct was “Of course they do! It’s Halloween!” But, well, read on…

It seems that being a fat American isn't just limited to adults, childhood obesity has been on the rise over the last 3 to 4 decades. Access to unhealthy foods and the poor nutritional quality of their diets is much to blame for this. The promotion and glorification of high sugar, high fat foods on Halloween is simply a good example. It probably comes as no surprise that research has shown that when children are given free access to tasty food that they eat it, especially if it’s sweet, even when they are not hungry. But is there a good alternative that kids will like? A slightly older paper published in Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior investigated the option and value of nonfood treats as substitutes for candy on Halloween.

To do this, the researchers gave 284 trick-or-treating children a choice of a toy or candy. The toys included stretch pumpkin men, large glow-in-the-dark insects, Halloween theme stickers, and Halloween theme pencils. The candy choices were recognizable name brand lollipops, fruit-flavored chewy candies, fruit-flavored crunchy wafers, and “sweet and tart” hard candies. All of these toy and candy options ranged between 5 and 10 cents per item. When a trick-or-treating child arrived at a door, they were asked for their age, gender and a description of their Halloween costume (pretty typical…except maybe the gender question). Then they were presented with 2 identical plates: 1 with 4 different types of toys and the other with 4 different types of candy, alternating by site/household which on side the plates were located. Only children between 3 and 14 were included. And, if the child asked for both toy and candy, they were allowed to take both but were excluded from the study, but only 1 little girl did that.

The results of the study showed that children chose toys as often as they chose candy. This suggests that children may forego candy more readily than adults expect. The authors cite Social Cognitive Theory as providing a way for candy alternatives to become more commonplace. According to this Theory, when parents see that children are accepting the candy alternatives they are more likely to continue the new toy giving behavior. Factor in the other fun Halloween activities – dressing up, walking around the neighborhood at night, etc. – and these toy treats become positively associated with the fun and the holiday.

Okay, so what about the Halloween-only-comes-once-a-year argument. I’ll admit it is a good one and it something that the authors spend time to address. They point out that Halloween isn’t the only holiday where food and candy are advertised. Well, isn’t that the truth. They even make a nice list of other food laden holidays and events: weddings, new babies, graduation, back-to-school, birthdays, Christmas, Hanukkah, Valentine’s Day, Easter, St. Patrick’s Day, Cinco de Mayo, Earth Day (wait…you get food on Earth Day?), Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, and Independence Day. What they don’t add in are all of the other food-filled events that come seasonally (picnics, cook-outs, etc.) and socially (happy hours, get-togethers, etc.). Put together, that’s a lot of bad food choices all year long.

Ultimately, what the authors are getting at is promoting healthy choices throughout the year. Part of this is giving children healthier options and traditions. It is almost more of a change for adults than it is for children. Breaking those food habits and associations isn’t easy, y’all. Food isn’t love, no matter how many Hershey’s Kisses you give someone. Wow did that ever sound shrinky!

But I’ll throw in a last little note that I think almost every child on the planet would agree with: Don’t be that house than hands out toothbrushes.


Schwartz, M., Chen, E., & Brownell, K. (2003). Trick, Treat, or Toy: Children Are Just as Likely to Choose Toys as Candy on Halloween Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, 35 (4), 207-209 DOI: 10.1016/S1499-4046(06)60335-7


(image and product via epicurious)

Let it Go, Med School

Apparently med school students just love to film parodies. A lot.

Here are a couple of good ones using songs from Frozen.

Slather On That Sunscreen!

Inform yourself about skin cancer:





(via Four Points Dermatology)

No Death for Death Panels

On Halloween 2009, my costume was a Death Panel. No kidding. And no, I won't show you a picture. As with most political themed costumes, it was funny at the time but was one of those things I thought would melt into the annals of popular culture. I mean, I can't exactly pull that off this year in the way I did then. However, the term "death panel" is one that seems to have perpetuated in the social landscape.

"Death panel" is a political term that originated in an August 2009 debate about federal health care legislation in the U.S. The former Republican Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, used it to describe how the new health care law would lead to the rationing of medical care such that decisions about whether the elderly and special needs children would be "worthy of care" would be decided by a death panel of bureaucrats. Palin took a lot of chaff for this remark and later specified that she was referring to Section 1233 of bill HR 3200 which would have paid physicians to provide voluntary counseling to Medicare patients about living wills, advance directives, and end-of-life care options. Take special note of the words "voluntary" and "counseling" in that statement, the fact-checking portion of the media certainly did, reporting Palin's claim as false. The statement was criticized by the mainstream news media, academics, physicians, Democrats, and some Republicans. However, other prominent and outspoken Republicans took it and ran such that it blew up in ways no one could have predicted. It seems that everyone had an opinion, and public opinion often plays an important roll in the success or failure of many policies, like health care.

Public opinion is frequently influenced by misinformation. The media's failure to counter the misinformation about health policy has resulted in a persistence of this misinformation more than two years after the enactment of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), known colloquially as ObamaCare. Unfortunately, it is difficult to overcome "motivated reasoning," people's biases toward their preexisting attitudes and beliefs, which makes them more likely to accept unsupported claims because those claims are consistent with their partisan or ideological views. It certainly doesn't help that the media isn't exactly aggressive about debunking misinformation and even perpetuates it to some degree.

A new study, published online in the journal Medical Care, takes a look at how media corrections might reduce misperceptions about death panels and if these corrections would reduce opposition to health care reform. To do this, the researchers recruited from the SurveySpot opt-in panel, validating their sample by comparing control group responses to poll results. Participants were randomly assigned to versions of a realistic article on the Palin claim modeled on the original Associated Press article but attributed to the fictional "Breakingnews.com." One version included corrective information and the other omitted it. This corrective information was a paragraph at the end of the article explaining why "nonpartisan health care experts have concluded that Palin is wrong." They also collected some additional information about the participants that they thought might influence the effect of the correction on their beliefs and opinions. First, they asked the participants to rate their feelings of Sarah Palin on a 0-100 feeling thermometer (a standard measure in the political science world) where higher values equal warmer feelings. Second, they wanted to assess how knowledgeable or sophisticated their participants were as this can affect how someone resists unwelcome information and hold on to certain misconceptions. So they asked the participants to answer a 5-item political knowledge scale, limiting them to 30 seconds per question to limit their ability to look up the answers online (sneaky, sneaky!).

The researchers found that corrective information can reduce health policy misinformation for some groups. They found that Palin feelings and knowledge moderated the correction's effect, those who felt more warmly about Palin were more likely to believe in death panels. The results also showed "decreased misperceptions about death panels and increased approval of ACA among low-knowledge respondents who viewed Palin favorably." This suggests that fact-checking may improve understanding of policy controversies in these groups. Alternatively, "the correction backfired among high-knowledge respondents who viewed Palin unfavorably, increasing misperceptions about death panels and strong disapproval of ACA." In this case, the motivated reasoning steps in, it is easier for people to believe things they want to be true and disbelieve things they don't want to be true.  So what does all of this mean? Well, it means that public perception about health care is entrenched, and corrective information alone is not enough to overcome motivated reasoning among the more knowledgeable public.

I'm going to end with note to the passionate, the activists (on both sides), and the Internet trolls (who probably won't care regardless): If you've read this far then you also know that I'm not likely to change your opinion of death panels themselves, and I'm not going to try. If you have read this far then you will also have noticed that this post is about a study of public opinion on the matter of death panels rather than death panels themselves (although I describe their origin above and give factual for-your-information links below). As such, if you comment please save us both some time and comment about the study and not about your personal beliefs on whether or not the government wants to kill all of us and our grandmothers. Thanks!

Nyhan, B., Reifler, J., & Ubel, P. (2013). The Hazards of Correcting Myths About Health Care Reform Medical Care, 51 (2), 127-132 DOI: 10.1097/MLR.0b013e318279486b


More on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) at HealthCare.gov. You can read the full law, look through key features of the law, learn how it affects you, and find a timeline of what's changing and when.

Press release from Duke University's Fuqua School of Business "New Research Shows 'Death Panel' Myth Hard to Correct"

Some articles about death panels:
U.S. News "The Truth Behind Obamacare's 'Death Panels'"
The Daily Beast "The Reality of Death Panels"
FactCheck.org's "Palin vs. Obama: Death Panels"
PolitiFact's "Lie of the Year: 'Death Panels'" 
Snopes "Seniors Beware" and "Euthanasia Counseling"

(image via HowStuffWorks.com)

Z-Day: Are You Prepared?

I was catching up on some NPR Wait Wait Don't Tell Me and heard about this story. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has released a new emergency guide on their Preparedness and Response webpage and in their Public Health Matters Blog. The guide is called Social Media: Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse. The idea here being that if you are prepared for a zombie apocalypse then you are prepared for any emergency. Genius.

After a brief history of zombies the entry goes into general safety for when zombies (or hurricanes, pandemics, etc.) rise up. First, have an emergency kit in the house containing water (1 gal per person per day), food (non-perishables), medications, tools and supplies (utility knife, duct tape, battery powered radio, etc.), sanitation and hygiene products (bleach, soap, towels, etc.), clothing and bedding, important documents (driver's license, passport, birth certificate, etc.), and first aid supplies. Although, with that last one, you're a goner if a zombie bites you, but if you, let's say, cut yourself while boarding up your house against zombies then you'll be all set. Next, you should have an emergency plan. Identify all of the types of emergencies possible, besides and/or including zombie attacks. Know where to go and who to call when the zombies start lumbering down your street. Pick a rendezvous point (one close, one far) and identify emergency contacts. Plan your evacuation route. Despite being mostly brain dead, zombies are rather clever and definitely relentless when going after prey (you) and so you should not only know where to go but multiple, safe ways to get there. And finally, the CDC ends their post with a plea (well, I'm calling it a plea) for you to trust them to track the outbreak of the zombie infection and provide assistance. That is if they are not all zombies themselves.

Now that we're prepared how do we go about realistically (yeah, someones modeled it!)getting rid of the zombie plague? Go back to the short but informative Mmm...Brains! post from April of last year to find out.

Read the entire entry here:
http://www.bt.cdc.gov/socialmedia/zombies_blog.asp and http://blogs.cdc.gov/publichealthmatters/2011/05/preparedness-101-zombie-apocalypse/
and grab your own buttons, badges and widgets here: http://emergency.cdc.gov/socialmedia/zombies.asp

Also...
http://www.latimes.com/health/boostershots/la-heb-cdc-zombie-apocalypse-20110519,0,6704265.story
http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/05/19/zombie.warning/index.html
http://www.naturalnews.com/032454_zombie_apocalypse_CDC.html
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=136500576

Get Your Study On

This one is for all of you med students and doctors who remember their med school days.

I Wear a Coat

We were talking in the lab today about Lonely Island's I'm on a Boat and all the parody's that had been made. I mentioned the I'm in a Pond post from a while back and a labmate told me about I Wear a Coat, a med school parody.

Beer and Wiesn



'Tis the season of beer. Last week I went over to an Oktoberfest event to celebrate with some sweet treats and bitter libations. The fact that there was a German band singing American cover songs in German just made it all that much more enjoyable. So I decided to type the search term "oktoberfest" into both PubMed and Web of Science to see what popped up. The first return was something dealing with the pancreas -- nah. The second, however, was just the kind of thing I was looking for.

Web of Science returned an article from the Archives of Toxicology titled "Munich Oktoberfest experience: remarkable impact of sex and age in ethanol intoxication." Bingo!

Oktoberfest traditionally starts in the third weekend in September and ends the first Sunday of October. So today is the last day to celebrate, make it a good one. According to Munich's Oktoberfest History Page, when Crown Prince Ludwig (later King Ludwig I) married Princess Therese of Saxony-Hildburghausen on October 12, 1810 the citizens of Munich were invited to attend the festivities. These festivities were held on the fields in front of the city gates, fields that were later renamed Theresienwiese, or "Theres'a Fields," (now just called "Wiesn") to honor the princess. The royal family attended horse races at the close of the event, and the decision to repeat the races annually gave rise to the tradition of Oktoberfest. In subsequent years other attractions and activities were added such as an agricultural show, carosels and swings, and beer stands. Today Oktoberfest is the largest celebration in the world!

According to the article, approximately 6 million individuals visited Oktoberfest in Munich in 2004. About 5,000 of these individuals had to undergo medical treatment for various reasons. Intoxication, as you probably surmised, is one of the biggest concerns when a patient seeks medical attention. This study took a look at the large number of individuals suffering from alcohol intoxication with the goal to identify risk factors and optimize patient management.

The researchers collected data on 405 intoxicated individuals (with no other trauma or complications). Such data included age, gender, and a medical examination. The Glasgow Coma Score (GCS) was used both at check-in and check-out to assess level of consciousness. Then patients received an intravenous (IV) infusion of either 500 ml Ringer-Lactate solution (a fluid and electrolyte replenisher) or 10% glucose solution depending on the results of a blood glucose test. Then blood pressure (mean, systolic, and diastolic), heart rate, body temperature, respiratory rate, blood glucose, oxygen saturation, and acid-base balance were monitored.

The results showed that the higher the GCS level the more likely the patient was to be hospitalized. Not all that surprising since the higher the GCS the lower the consciousness. They also found a that men have a strongly increased risk of hospitalization when compared to women. Age was also a factor with individuals between 20-29 years old having a higher risk than all other age groups. The researchers called these results surprising, but, well, I've been in enough bars to call them rather unrevealing.

However, there was one point in their paper that I found rather interesting. Although the 20-29 male age group were found to be at the highest risk they actually showed lower blood ethanol concentrations when compared to men aged 30-39 years and 40-49 years. The 20-29 year old men's blood ethanol concentratrions also did not differ significantly from that of 20-29 year old women. Why? Its hard to say. The researchers were unable to exclude higher biological susceptibility to alcohol toxicity from their study, although this particular age group is known for their "general robustness" (*snigger*). The authors conclude that "a plausible explanation might be that young individuals, especially young men, tend to ignore their individual critical limits of ethanol intoxication. Peer pressure and lack of experience may be responsible for this behaviour." I probably didn't need a scientific study to tell me that.

Here's the paper:
Binner, C., et al. (2008) Munich Oktoberfest experience: remarkable impact of sex and age in ethanol intoxication. Archives of Toxicology: 82, 933-939. (DOI: 10.1007/s00204-008-0373-z)

Hope you had a great Oktoberfest!

(image from holdmybeer.com)

Shortsighted

I found this great story through work about nearsightedness and so went on to the American Optometric Association's website to get a little bit more info first.

Nearsightedness is medically termed myopia. It is a vision condition where close objects appear clear but far away objects look blurred. Anatomically, the eyeball is too long or the cornea has too much curvature. Regardless of which one it is the extra length of the eye means that light isn't focused correctly onto the retina. As a condition, myopia is actually pretty common, affecting nearly 30% of the U.S. population. Usually, it first exhibits itself in school-age children, and as the eye grows during childhood until age 20 the condition progresses. Eyeglasses or contact lenses are prescribed to correct nearsighted by bending the incoming light to the eyes. Another option is orthokeratology, or corneal refractive therapy, a non-surgical procedure where a person wears a series of specially designed rigid contact lenses to gradually reshape the curvature of the cornea. Yet another option is laser procedures that reshape the cornea by removing a small amount of eye tissue with a highly focused laser beam.

If you scroll through the advanced online publication of Nature Genetics you will notice an article about the myopia gene. The study conducted a genome-wide association study for refractive error in 4,270 individuals. Basically, they were looking for the gene that causes nearsightedness. The researchers identified SNPs (single nucleotide polymorphisms which occur when a single nucleotide in the genome differs between members of a species or individuals) on 15q25 associated with refractive error. So they replicated the association in six adult cohorts of European ancestry with a total of 13,414 individuals. Actually, these 'individuals' numbers are twins. They found that the locus overlapped a transcription initiation site called RASGRF1. This particular gene is highly expressed in neurons and in the retina and as such is crucial to retinal function and visual memory. Additionally, the scientists found that found a different gene, called CTNDD2, is related to myopia in Chinese and Japanese populations. To be thorough, the researchers also created mice that were missing the gene. These mice showed changes in their eye lenses, adding further evidence to the findings.

Check out the paper:
Hysi, Pirro G., et al. (2010) A genome-wide association study for myopia and refractive error identifies a susceptibility locus at 15q25. Nature Genetics: published online (DOI: 10.1038/ng.664)

Here's a report through Duke Medicine (one of the teams on the paper):
http://www.dukehealth.org/health_library/news/gene_discovery_could_yield_treatments_for_nearsightedness?utm_source=dukehealth.org&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS_news

The Australians were also on the team, read an article from there here:
http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2010/09/13/3009820.htm

(image from healthtree.com)

Be Flexible

Engineers have published in Nature Materials about artifical electronic skins that may help robots and/or prosthetic limbs to feel. These skins can detect the gentlest of touches by sensing pressure changes. How gentle? You may ask. Less than a kilopascal, about the pressure you use when typing for picking up a pen.

There is actually more than one paper published on this topic this week. The papers describe similar devices that work in different ways. One of the devices uses six square centimeters of an elastic polymer called ppolydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) that has pyramid-shaped chunks cut out of it at regular intervals. When the material is compressed the chunks, which were previously filled with air, become filled with PDMS and change the material's ability to hold an electric charge. Put this little square onto an organic transistor (reads differences as a change in current) and you can track pressure changes across the material. This little device can detect pressure changes as light as a fly or butterfly landing on it.

The other skin uses semiconductor nanowires pulled into the shape of a 7-centimeter-square grid using a method called contact printing. They then put this grid on a flexible pressure-sensitive rubber. The nanowires operate using low voltages while the rubber changes its electrical resistance under pressure. Because of the rubber this device is much bendier than the first one, allowing it to shape around various objects.

You look at these together and you see that they each have their pluses. The first detects very very small pressure differences while the second is very flexible. Obviously there is much more research to be done to get these skins working like actual skin. But it is definately a step, or a touch, closer.

Read the papers for more:
Mannsfeld, Stefan C. B., et al. (2010) Highly sensitive flexible pressure sensors with microstructured rubber dielectric layers. Nature Materials: published online. (DOI: 10.1038/nmat2834)

Takei, Kuniharu. (2010) Nanowire active-matrix circuitry for low-voltage macroscale artificial skin. Nature Materials: published online. (DOI: 10.1038/nmat2835)

Boland, John J. (2010) Flexible electronics: Within touch of artificial skin. Nature Materials: published online. (DOI: 10.1038/nmat2861)

Story Links:
http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100912/full/news.2010.463.html
http://www.pcworld.com/article/205323/artificial_eskin_may_soon_help_robots_feel

(image credit Linda Cicero, Stanford University News Report)

Pale is Pretty

Let's see, how to make South Beach scientific....hmmmm...

You know I found a paper. It has a pretty amazing title too: "Bronze is beautiful but pale can be pretty: The effects of appearance standards and mortality salience on sun-tanning outcomes." *Grin* See I told ya.

Ok, seriously. A huge number of people expose themselves to harmful amounts of ultraviolet (UV) radiation in an effort to tan their skin. Such exposure can heighten the risk of skin cancer. Why do this? I think we all know. Tanned skin is perceived as physically attractive. I, for one, have been exposed to enough UV radiation and the resulting sunburns (including earlier this summer) to last me a lifetime. This trip, though, the three of us went through three bottles of sunscreen in four days. Sun and skin conscious? Oh yeah.

The introduction of this paper introduces terror management theory (TMT) which argues that "individuals are motivated to live up to culturally derived standards because doing so confers self-esteem, which helps manage the potential for anxiety inherent in the awareness of personal mortality." Translated: People do things they know are not necessarily good or safe in order to live up to society's standards and in doing so it makes them feel better about themselves. Also, there is the terror management health model (TMHM) which "posits that when thoughts of mortality are accessible in the context of health decisions, outcomes should reflect motives oriented toward self-esteem rather than health protection." Translated: Decisions are influenced by how people perceive the behavior to be attractive. Now let's relate that to sun-tanning.

The paper actually consists of two studies:

Study 1 tested whether telling people that a tan is more attractive would increase tanning intentions and whether telling people that "pale is pretty" would reduce tanning intentions. First, they "reminded" 101 female (because they are more likely to report investing self-esteem in their appearance than males are) psychology students of their mortality  Did you pick up on the same bit I did? The reminded of their mortality part? How exactly do you do that anyway? The researchers here used the "Fear of Death Scale" where participants responded either "true" or "false" to 15 items about the extent to which they fear death. Lovely. Next, they had the participants read articles ostensibly taken from a fashion magazine reporting on the appeal of tanned or pale skin. These articles came in three varieties: "Bronze is Beautiful,"  "Style: The Fair-Skinned, Natural Look Is In," and "Style: The Simple Natural Look Is In" (the control group). They featured headshot photographs of tan and fair-skinned celebrities, respectively, along with text on the subject. Afterwards, the participants were asked to complete a five-item assessment of sun-tanning intentions. Study 1 concluded that the effect of mortality salience varied as a function of the article. Women reading articles about how bronze is beautiful showed an increase in their tanning intentions. Similar results occurred with the pale is pretty group. It appears that awareness of what society considers to be attractive greatly influences people's behavior even as it relates to their health, positively or negatively.

Study 2 was conducted on a public beach and tested whether mortality reminders and the "pale is pretty" would increase the desire for sunscreen with a higher SPF and the intention to use it. This study was designed to test Study 1 in a real world setting. The test was conducted at a public beach in South Florida during Spring Break. They recruited 53 Caucasian women to fill out a short survey consisting of a packet of questionnaires containing similar questions to those in Study 1 including the fashion articles. After reading an article the participants were given a questionnaire divided by a line. Above the line was a set of instructions explaining that as a token of appreciation they were to be given a sun product of their choosing upon filling out the below-line portion. After tearing off and handing in the top half they were to fill out the below-line portion which asked them to check a box next to 1 of 10 different skin products characterized by their SPF (50, 45, 30, 15, 10) and whether they were described as sun block or tanning lotion. The participants' sunscreen intentions were also measured by questionnaire. Study 2 concluded that reminders of death increased the level of SPF chosen, and the association between attractiveness and fair skin increased the level of SPF chosen. Also, after people were primed to associate fair skin with attractiveness the reminders of death increased sunscreen use intentions and intentions to use it in the future.

Alright, so how should we start out the letter to the fashion magazines? "Dear Promoters of Skin Cancer..." Well, perhaps we should work on that one.

Cox, C., Cooper, D., Vess, M., Arndt, J., Goldenberg, J., & Routledge, C. (2009). Bronze is beautiful but pale can be pretty: The effects of appearance standards and mortality salience on sun-tanning outcomes. Health Psychology, 28 (6), 746-752 DOI: 10.1037/a0016388

(image from goddesspraytanning.com.au)

Old Genes

This story I heard on The Naked Scientists podcast, a science show out of Cambridge University (if you like podcasts then I highly recommend subscribing to this one in iTunes or your RSS feed). I'm just going to quote the story from their site and suggest you listen to the podcast for additional discussion on it.

"Scientists have identified a series of genetic markers capable of predicting, with 77% certainty, who will live to more than 100.

The study, by Boston University researcher Paola Sabastiani and her colleagues and published in Science, looked at DNA from over 1055 centenarians (who survived beyond the ages of 95-119) and 1267 controls (amongst whom the average age of death was 75).

By comparing the patterns of genetic markers called SNPs - single nucleotide polymorphisms - that are common to the members of each group, the researchers identified 150 such SNPs that strongly co-segregated with longevity.

Applying these markers as a screen to other samples showed that they could predict, with high accuracy, those equipped genetically to live to a very old age. Moreover, these SNPs can now also be used to spotlight genes that confer these abilities, informing our understanding of the genetic basis of ageing, its effects, and perhaps how to better control it."

http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/content/news/news/1999/

Sushi Love

A recent study in the journal Nature suggests that genes from a marine microbe have been transferred to human gut bacteria. This is the first clear case of gut microbes taking genes from ingested bacteria, allowing them to exploit a new niche. These genes encode for algae-digesting enzymes which break down carbohydrates, carbohydrates that are found in the red algae of the genus Porphyra, known to sushi lovers as nori. What makes this story important? It the clear-cut nature of the transfer, a pretty rare event.

Get more information about the encoded enzymes and their actions here: http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100407/full/news.2010.169.html
The Nature article: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v464/n7290/full/nature08937.html (DOI: 10.1038/nature08937)

(image from weblogs.fox40.com)

Ghost Ball

After reading the Down Low story a friend of mine sent me this link. Its a blurb in a journal that you have to see to believe. It is titled "The case of the haunted scrotum."

“A 45-year-old man was referred for investigation of an undescended right testis by computed tomography (CT). An ultra-sound scan showed a normal testis and epididymis on the left side. The right testis was not visualized in the scrotal sac or in the right inguinal region. On CT scanning of the abdomen and pelvis, the right testis was not identified but the left side of the scrotum seemed to be occupied by a screaming ghost-like apparition (Figure 1). By chance, the distribution of normal anatomical structures within the left side of the scrotum had combined to produce this image. What of the undescended right testis? None was found. If you were a right testis, would you want to share the scrotum with that?”

Check it out: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1295986/?page=1

The Memory of a Fly

I'm making an effort to write about more molecular stories, even though I have to read them several times to really get it, and so when I came across this one I thought it was just the ticket. While 'flipping through' PNAS recently I came across an article titled "PI3 kinase signaling is involved in Aβ-induced memory loss in Drosophila." Admittedly, I usually flip right past an article like this and go for one about ecosystem function, a new species find, or some new theory about food chains or something. But, remembering my new effort, I decided to read the abstract and then the article. Good thing I did because this is actually a pretty interesting story, once you get past all the genetics and molecular jargon.

The authors of the study conducted an experiment using fruit flies who suffered from brain issues similar to those seen in Alzheimer's patients. PI3 kinase is thought to protect an organism against the disease, and β-amyloid peptides are known to alter signaling proteins like PI3. The flies in the experiment were engineered to produce human β-amyloid which, in turn, caused them to develop Alzheimer's symptoms (memory loss, neurodegeneration, plaque accumulation). In their experiment, the researchers blocked the signaling pathway associated with these components.

A condition called long-term depression (LTD), where nerve signals get repressed for long periods of time, is known to be enhanced when β-amyloid is in the brain. The researchers found that this condition is worsened in flies that produce β-amyloid because of the related increase in PI3. Injections of PI3 kinase blocking drugs or by switching off the PI3 kinase gene restored nerve signals. The results suggest that this signal blockage lessened memory loss and decreased plaque buildup. That is a very short summary to say the least and so if you have access to the article (reference link below) I suggest taking a read.

So, once again, hooray for the fruit fly. Perhaps someone should send the article to Sarah Palin.

The study can be found here: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/03/17/0909314107 (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0909314107)

(image from academictree.org)

Aahhhh...Kelly Clarkson!!!!

Swearing is everywhere. People use it in everyday speech, when someone %#@$%*^ ticks them off, or when they drop the @#$%*^& hammer on their toe. When we are in pain, especially, we tend to utter those naughty words and phrases. Why do we do it? I mean, we could say virtually anything but we choose to bleep. Does it alter our perception of the pain? Possibly. In a wonderful, if slightly dated, article I stumbled across in NeuroReport, suggests that swearing increases pain tolerance.

Originally, author Richard Stephens and his colleagues set out to prove the opposite, that swearing decreases pain tolerance and increases pain perception (as per the accepted hypotheses at the time).

The scientists recruited 67 undergraduate volunteers for their experiment (I'm sure money or free pizza was promised). They sat the students down individually and asked them to make two lists. List #1 consisted of words they might use after they had hit themselves on the thumb with a hammer. List #2 consisted of words they might use to describe a table. Next they needed a baseline or starting point, so they put one of the student's hands into room temperature water for 3 minutes. After that the hand went into cold water. The student was asked to keep their hand in the cold water for as long as they could. In some instances the student was asked to repeat a swear word from List #1, and in others they were asked to repeat a table word from List #2. All the while, the student's heart rate was recorded and they were asked to rate the amount of pain they felt.

Unexpectedly, the researchers found that the students who sweared while in the cold water had increased heart rates, reported less pain, and kept their hands in the water longer. And apparently swearing worked better for females than for males. Yeah!

What the study doesn't clear up is why swearing has such an effect. The authors suggest that it induces negative emotions and triggers fight or flight responses.

I don't know, maybe it just feels good to be bad.

p.s. Anyone a little disappointed they didn't ask the students to actually hit their thumbs with hammers? Seems like a more realistic response to me. Guess they would have had to promise more free food for that one.

Heartbroken

The zebrafish (Danio rerio) belongs to the minnow family (Cyprinidae) and is an important model organism in scientific research, particularly in the areas of vertebrate development and gene function. More information can be found at the Zebrafish Information Network (ZFIN) which is an online database of housing genetic, genomic, developmental information, and data sets.

Did you know? Zebrafish have an incredible ability - you can chop of a chunk of their heart and they not only stay alive but they have only a few days of slow swimming before they once again appear completely normal. Crazy!

A paper published in the most recent issue of Nature contained a study in which researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and the Center of Regenerative Medicine in Barcelona (CMRB) identified the heart cell populations that allow the fish to have this amazing healing ability. My first thought was that it must be stem cell related. Not so. Rather it is cardiomyocytes a.k.a. muscle cells that contract the heart.

So how did they figure out that it was cardiomyocytes and not stem cells that accomplished the deed? First they inserted a tracer gene into all of the heart cells that made the cells glow green. Next they "injured" the heart by excising 20% of each ventricle (Basic Anatomy 101...those are the bottom chambers of the heart). Then they waited for a few weeks, waiting for the regeneration to complete, and then they took a look at the fish hearts again. Because only cardiomyocytes were made to glow green, if the whole heart was green then they were the ones to heal the injury, if not then something else was responsible.

The result: A glowing green fish heart. Neat.

How did the cells do it? The cardiomyocytes produced proteins associated with cell proliferation (factors you only see in immature progenitors). These proteins regressed the cells to a "youthfull" state, then they started dividing to fill in the missing area, and once again matured into new heart muscle.

They're fish, so why is this study important? Human heart muscle cannot regenerate after it is damaged (as with a heart attack), instead it produces un-contractable scar tissue. However, they do have the ability to enter a "hibernation" stage where they stop contracting in order to survive. This hibernation is similar to what the researchers saw in the regenerating zebrafish hearts. Forcing certain cell cycle regulators in mammalian cardiomyocytes to make these cells hibernate and regress could be the next direction to go in in heart regeneration research. What are these regulators? The search is on!

The Nature article is here: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v464/n7288/full/nature08899.html
and here's a write-up: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100324141957.htm

(image from www.mbl.edu)

Casual Facebooking

In another piece of strange science news: Facebook is being linked to a rise in syphilis cases, especially among young women. Brings an entirely new meaning to poking your friends doesn't it?

Apparently cases of syphilis in Durham, Sunderland, and Teesside, all areas of Britain where the social networking site is the most popular, have increased fourfold.

Syphilis is caused by the bacteria Treponema pallidum which is usually spread by sexual contact. The disease can be very serious, starting in the genital area, mouth, or other body parts, and can lead to major damage in the heart and brain and can even result in death. Having this disease can also make people more vulnerable to HIV. However, if caught early, it can be cured with antibiotics.

So why is the Internet and social media in particular to blame? Social networking sites, as their name suggests, make it easier for people to meet up for casual sex.

As the linked Telegraph article reports, a Facebook spokesman said: “The assertion that Facebook is responsible for the transmission of syphilis is ridiculous. Facebook is no more responsible for STD transmission than newspapers responsible for bad vision. Today’s reports exaggerate the comments made by the professor, and ignore the difference between correlation and causation. As Facebook’s more than 400 million users know, our website is not a place to meet people for casual sex – it’s a place for friends, family and co-workers to connect and share.”

In my opinion, the Facebook guy kinda has a point. I mean, there is a huge difference between correlation and causation. Does social media make it easier to meet people? Sure. But those who are looking for casual sex are still going to find a partner regardless of their Internet connectivity right?

Here's the story link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/facebook/7508945/Facebook-linked-to-rise-in-syphilis.html

(image from embryology.med.unsw.edu.au)

Zipped In

So what happens when your Mini-Me experiences a Something About Mary moment? There's an app for that! Ok not really, but there is an article because it can be "a painful predicament that can be made worse by overzealous intervention." Apparently mineral oil can be your best friend, fellas. Failing that there are 2 different zipper cutting methods. The fastest of which is the "cutting the closed teeth of the zipper" method, which will save you approximately 65.3 seconds of pain.

I love science :-)

Here's the journal article: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2373840

and since you can't read much of it at all, here's the summary: http://www.ncemi.org/cse/cse1113.htm

Here's the abstract of the study comparing 2 methods: http://www.journals.elsevierhealth.com/periodicals/yajem/article/PIIS0735675705000719/abstract

vin de perte de poids

A new study by U.S. experts at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston concluded that women who drink a couple of glasses of red wine per day gain less weight than those who do not (compared with water and sodas). Of course, not all spirits are created equal. Beer and alcohol are much less forgiving to the waistline than wine. The authors speculated that the beneficial effects of regularly consuming red wine are manifested in the liver which develops an alternative method of breaking down the alcohol. Rather than turning the alcohol into fat it is instead converted to heat.

There are also more well-known health benefits of drinking red wine such as increasing 'good cholesterol' (HDL) levels, preventing the formation of blood clots, lowering the risk of heart disease, and even extending life expectancy. Other studies have found that people score better on mensoakedtal arithmetic tests, have wider blood vessels, and show better blood flow to the brain after being given resveratrol, an ingredient in red wine.

Bottoms up!!


Here's the story link: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1256133/Forget-salad-WINE-makes-women-slimmer.html