Tuesday, July 03, 2007
Fat Sack
We are, if you believe the hype, in the midst of a great and terrifying obesity epidemic. Hell, even if you don't believe the hype, a trip to your local shopping mall (especially if you live in the South or Midwest) will provide all the evidence you need. The question then is: why is it happening, and what can we do about it?
Understanding the why can lead to the what-to-do. On top of my list, besides our increasingly-sedentary society, is fructose sweeteners. In the US especially (due to ridiculous sugar tariffs designed to guarantee votes from Cubans in Florida), almost any food you buy is laced with high fructose corn syrup.
Besides being a source of boundless empty calories, new research further confirms that this crap is actively bad for you: compared to glucose-sweetened drinks, volunteers drinking fructose-sweetened ones had increased LDL ('bad') cholesterol, triglycerides, and other measures of atherosclerosis risk. This is why I read labels and avoid the stuff.
What else makes people fat? Stress! Georgetown researchers confirmed that chronically stressed mice got fatter, and put the fat in more unhealthy places (around the abdomen) than did non-stressed mice, and that Neuropeptide Y appears to be a major culprit in this pathway. Blocking NPY made fat cells shrink and excess fat 'melt' away. Ignoring the likely side-effects, where's my anti-NPY?!!
So, if you wanna lose weight: stop eating fructose-sweetened food, be less stressed, and, oh yeah, GET SOME EXERCISE!!!!
On a tangentially-related note, it turns out that those 'probiotic' yogurt thingeys, containing Lactobacillus casei, L bulgaricus, and Streptococcus thermophilus, really do reduce your risk of getting diarrhea after antibiotic treatment. Cool!
Understanding the why can lead to the what-to-do. On top of my list, besides our increasingly-sedentary society, is fructose sweeteners. In the US especially (due to ridiculous sugar tariffs designed to guarantee votes from Cubans in Florida), almost any food you buy is laced with high fructose corn syrup.
Besides being a source of boundless empty calories, new research further confirms that this crap is actively bad for you: compared to glucose-sweetened drinks, volunteers drinking fructose-sweetened ones had increased LDL ('bad') cholesterol, triglycerides, and other measures of atherosclerosis risk. This is why I read labels and avoid the stuff.
What else makes people fat? Stress! Georgetown researchers confirmed that chronically stressed mice got fatter, and put the fat in more unhealthy places (around the abdomen) than did non-stressed mice, and that Neuropeptide Y appears to be a major culprit in this pathway. Blocking NPY made fat cells shrink and excess fat 'melt' away. Ignoring the likely side-effects, where's my anti-NPY?!!
So, if you wanna lose weight: stop eating fructose-sweetened food, be less stressed, and, oh yeah, GET SOME EXERCISE!!!!
On a tangentially-related note, it turns out that those 'probiotic' yogurt thingeys, containing Lactobacillus casei, L bulgaricus, and Streptococcus thermophilus, really do reduce your risk of getting diarrhea after antibiotic treatment. Cool!
Labels: antibiotics, cholesterol, diet, endocrinology, fat, health, NPY, obesity, science, stress
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Permanent Damage
We learned last week that stress seems to be especially bad for kids - this week suggests another reason why. Illinois researchers found that when young rats were severely stressed, new brain cells they generated die off more than expected. This could lead to any number of problems later on, but may point at some kind of interventions for people after severely traumatic experiences.
Speaking of traumatizing: it appears that snowboarders, aside from being annoying what with their constant extreme this and extreme that, are stressing out alpine wildlife, and putting them at risk. I wonder if snowboarders' frequently enviro-hippie nature will persuade them to take more care, or if this just makes them feel more EXTREME.
Brain damage is, of course, a really stressful event. A French case study suggests that some help may come to the severely brain-damaged from a surprising source: the drug zolpidem (Ambien). A woman who had had severe hypoxic brain damage, leaving her unable to move, speak, or care for herself at all, was able to move and feed herself, and communicate on some levels, when treated with the drug. Trials are underway, but the presumed mechanism is zolpidem's agonism of the GABA system. This is really cool.
Finally, some really good news (maybe) comers from Manchester. Researchers there have found a possible key to TB's toughness: it contains many more P450 genes than are expected from bacteria. The upshot of this is that a class of antifungal drugs, the azoles, can kill TB by inhibiting this molecule. This is potentially a MAJOR step in finally getting rid of TB, which kills millions of (mostly poor) people each year.
UPDATE: Men stare at people and animal's crotches when watching TV, women look at faces. Yeah, this pretty much sums up gender theory. (via BoingBoing)
Speaking of traumatizing: it appears that snowboarders, aside from being annoying what with their constant extreme this and extreme that, are stressing out alpine wildlife, and putting them at risk. I wonder if snowboarders' frequently enviro-hippie nature will persuade them to take more care, or if this just makes them feel more EXTREME.
Brain damage is, of course, a really stressful event. A French case study suggests that some help may come to the severely brain-damaged from a surprising source: the drug zolpidem (Ambien). A woman who had had severe hypoxic brain damage, leaving her unable to move, speak, or care for herself at all, was able to move and feed herself, and communicate on some levels, when treated with the drug. Trials are underway, but the presumed mechanism is zolpidem's agonism of the GABA system. This is really cool.
Finally, some really good news (maybe) comers from Manchester. Researchers there have found a possible key to TB's toughness: it contains many more P450 genes than are expected from bacteria. The upshot of this is that a class of antifungal drugs, the azoles, can kill TB by inhibiting this molecule. This is potentially a MAJOR step in finally getting rid of TB, which kills millions of (mostly poor) people each year.
UPDATE: Men stare at people and animal's crotches when watching TV, women look at faces. Yeah, this pretty much sums up gender theory. (via BoingBoing)
Labels: Ambien, azole, brain damage, crotch-shots, extreme sport, GABA, gender, men, neurogenesis, P450, sex, snowboarding, stress, TB, trauma, wildlife, women, zolpidem
Monday, March 05, 2007
Good for Kids, Bad for Kids
Nobody wanted to be the fat kid. Well, ok, there was that one boy who stole all the cupcakes every day, but he probably wasn't clever enough to make the connection anyways. But parents - another reason not to let your kids get too fat: it seems that obese girls tend to hit puberty significantly earlier than do thinner ones. This is troublesome for any number of reasons*.
Being obese is also a risk factor for more injuries, which cause pain. A Canadian study suggests that ibuprofen (what's in Advil, Motrin, etc.) is more effective at treating kids' pain than acetaminophen (Tylenol) and even codeine in emergency department trials. The trial of 300 kids might be a little small though, considering the wide age range (6-17 years) and general variability of kids. Still, an interesting find.
Speaking of causing children pain (because really, it's so much fun to do**), Stanford researchers have found that kids may be more susceptible to brain damage due to stress. The famous HPA-axis, which forms a loop controlling stress and stress hormones, among other things, can be a person's own worst enemy.
If one suffers too much stress, the axis can 'overload,' and release too much cortisol, which can damage the brain. Specifically, the hippocampus, which not only then further fails to regulate cortisol, but also can't do its other jobs like making memories or processing information. Kids, whose brains are still developing, are logically thought to be more susceptible to this effect. I had some PTSD as a kid, so I'm now blaming that for all my troubles. Yay new scapegoats!
And speaking of how the brain works, European researchers think that they've figured out how the brain's excitatory-inhibitory balance is maintained. Or, at least part of how. Looking at neocortical pyramidal cells,
the team found that Martinotti cells seem to act as a sort of 'circuit breaker' or fusebox, inhibiting transmission when other excitatory signaling goes above a certain frequency. This is some cool stuff!
* I have to admit that I nearly spewed coffee out my nose when I read that obesity lead to earlier breast development. I mean...don't fat people...have...breasts...anyways!?!?!**
** Yes, I'm going straight to hell. See ya'll there. :-)
Being obese is also a risk factor for more injuries, which cause pain. A Canadian study suggests that ibuprofen (what's in Advil, Motrin, etc.) is more effective at treating kids' pain than acetaminophen (Tylenol) and even codeine in emergency department trials. The trial of 300 kids might be a little small though, considering the wide age range (6-17 years) and general variability of kids. Still, an interesting find.
Speaking of causing children pain (because really, it's so much fun to do**), Stanford researchers have found that kids may be more susceptible to brain damage due to stress. The famous HPA-axis, which forms a loop controlling stress and stress hormones, among other things, can be a person's own worst enemy.
If one suffers too much stress, the axis can 'overload,' and release too much cortisol, which can damage the brain. Specifically, the hippocampus, which not only then further fails to regulate cortisol, but also can't do its other jobs like making memories or processing information. Kids, whose brains are still developing, are logically thought to be more susceptible to this effect. I had some PTSD as a kid, so I'm now blaming that for all my troubles. Yay new scapegoats!
And speaking of how the brain works, European researchers think that they've figured out how the brain's excitatory-inhibitory balance is maintained. Or, at least part of how. Looking at neocortical pyramidal cells,
the team found that Martinotti cells seem to act as a sort of 'circuit breaker' or fusebox, inhibiting transmission when other excitatory signaling goes above a certain frequency. This is some cool stuff!
* I have to admit that I nearly spewed coffee out my nose when I read that obesity lead to earlier breast development. I mean...don't fat people...have...breasts...anyways!?!?!**
** Yes, I'm going straight to hell. See ya'll there. :-)
Labels: Advil, brains, breasts, cortisol, development, HPA, ibuprofen, kids, Martinotti cells, memory, neuroscience, obesity, PTSD, puberty, stress, Tylenol
Friday, January 26, 2007
Good for You: Arsenic, Carbon Monoxide, Brain Damage
But stress is still bad: women who were more stressed out while pregnant have kids who are more likely to develop ADHD, lower IQ, and other developmental/behavioral problems. The effect seems to be modulated by amniotic cortisol, and so it could be possible to block it, even if the moms won't chill.
Lots of good news for what's bad for you today. Mice with a model condition for Multiple Sclerosis showed a significant reduction in symptoms when exposed to carbon monoxide. It's not clear if the researchers tested for side effects here (there must have been a few!), and certainly the method used in mice would be lethal to humans, but it's an interesting step. It seems to work by blocking free radical production, but I wonder why then high doses of, say, vitamin C isn't effective as well. Hmm.
Patients with an rare, deadly form of cancer - acute promyelocytic leukemia - seem to do very well on a combination of radiation and chemo with arsenic trioxide. I wonder if old lace helps?
And finally, a new way to quit smoking: brain damage!!! Neuroscientists found that many patients with damage to the insula spontaneously lose the urge to smoke. The thing is that not all of them do, and it's not clear why. Also, discussion of surgical smoking-cessation techniques is frankly a bit scary: yes, smoking is amazingly bad for you, and yes it's hard to quit, but the risks (not to mention the costs!) of any kind of brain surgery is way too much to even consider, I think.
Lots of good news for what's bad for you today. Mice with a model condition for Multiple Sclerosis showed a significant reduction in symptoms when exposed to carbon monoxide. It's not clear if the researchers tested for side effects here (there must have been a few!), and certainly the method used in mice would be lethal to humans, but it's an interesting step. It seems to work by blocking free radical production, but I wonder why then high doses of, say, vitamin C isn't effective as well. Hmm.
Patients with an rare, deadly form of cancer - acute promyelocytic leukemia - seem to do very well on a combination of radiation and chemo with arsenic trioxide. I wonder if old lace helps?
And finally, a new way to quit smoking: brain damage!!! Neuroscientists found that many patients with damage to the insula spontaneously lose the urge to smoke. The thing is that not all of them do, and it's not clear why. Also, discussion of surgical smoking-cessation techniques is frankly a bit scary: yes, smoking is amazingly bad for you, and yes it's hard to quit, but the risks (not to mention the costs!) of any kind of brain surgery is way too much to even consider, I think.
Labels: ADHD, arsenic, brain damage, cancer, carbon monoxide, cigarettes, development, health, leukemia, mice, MS, pregnancy, smoking, stress
