Marijuana Abuse Blunts the Brain’s Response to Dopamine Abusing marijuana blunts the brain’s ability to respond to dopamine, the neurotransmitter that’s responsible for our feelings of pleasure, motivation, and reward. The effects of that "high" might actually lead to depression and anxiety, according to a new study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences this week. Despite its prevalence, we know surprisingly little about the effects of marijuana abuse on the brain. Many abused substances stimulate brain dopamine signaling -- the mechanism underlying the rewarding effects of drugs, food, and sex. But while studies have shown that cocaine and alcohol, for example, increase dopamine release in the brain’s reward region, this relationship hasn’t been demonstrated consistently for marijuana. So, to investigate marijuana’s impact on the human brain, a team led by Nora Volkow from the U.S. Same amount of dopamine but weaker (or lack of) physical responses suggests the reward circuitry in their brains are damaged.
Tesla: Master of Lightning "In almost every step of progress in electrical engineering, as well as radio, we can trace the spark of thought back to Nikola Tesla" - Ernst F. W. Alexanderson Tesla with one of his famous "wireless" lamps. Few inventors contributed more to advances in science and engineering in the early 20th century than Nikola Tesla. As fate would have it, Tesla, one of the world's greatest inventors, died penniless and in obscurity. Today, there's quite a bit of resurgence in Tesla's popularity, which is helped in part by his mystique as a "mad scientist." Tesla Company letterhead. In their book, Tesla: Master of Lightning , authors Margaret Cheney and Robert Uth tell the story of the enigmatic genius from his birth in a little village in what is Croatia today, to his lonely death in a New York hotel room. On a personal note, it has taken me far longer than I expected to write this excerpt for Neatorama Spotlight. to anyone interested in learning more about the legendary Nikola Tesla.
Where Will We Be in 2050? – Scenario I: A World in Ruins Where Will We Be in 2050? Scenario I: A World in Ruins By Kevin D. Denee Problems of every kind plague society, prompting the question: what is in store for the world in 2050? Source: Maksym Filipchuk | Dreamstime.com What does the future hold? These are perhaps some of the biggest questions that confront humanity. Hollywood has its own predictions. What picture do current facts and trends paint for the future? What People Think In April 2010, the Pew Research Center and Smithsonian magazine polled a group of Americans for their perspective on what the world will be like in 2050. A majority of people polled believe that advanced scientific development is certain. In addition, most believe that an extinct animal will be brought back to life and mankind will find evidence of life somewhere else in the universe. As to the areas of energy and environment, a large majority believe that our energy will not come from coal, oil and gas in four decades. Population Changing Demographics Children in Need
Genetic Switch Starts Aging Clock We often think of aging as a slow decline of our bodies and internal organs. But a new study indicates that aging could happen much more quickly, perhaps the result of a switch being suddenly turned off that protects our cells from environmental stresses. Even stranger is that this switch turns off exactly at the time of peak sexual maturity. The experiments were done in a worm species called C. elegans that is often used as a model for humans. “The surprise is that aging is not just a continuum,” Morimoto said, “but is very much represented by a precise genetic switch that is thrown at an exact moment. Most Amazing Medical Breakthroughs Morimoto said knowing more about how the quality control system works in cells could help researchers one day figure out how to provide humans with a better cellular quality of life, and therefore delay degenerative diseases related to aging, such as neurodegenerative diseases. The World in 2025: 10 Scientific Breakthroughs “The study by Dr.
Lab In Berkeley Accidentally Discovers Solution To Fix Color Blindness CBS SF Bay (con't) Affordable Care Act Updates: CBSSanFrancisco.com/ACA Health News & Information: CBSSanFrancisco.com/Health BERKELEY (KPIX 5) – For millions of Americans, color blindness is a reality. A solution has been developed in a Bay Area lab, made by a researcher working on another problem. Marc Drucker sees the world differently. For Drucker, driving has always been a chore. Drucker has a type of color blindness where the red and green cones on his eyes overlap, a genetic defect that left him seeing muted, dull colors for 45 years, until he found Enchroma CX sunglasses. “I describe it like I’ve got a bit of a superpower now,” Drucker said. Ten million men suffer from color blindness. “The glasses work by selectively removing certain wavelengths between the red and green cones that allow them to be in essence pushed apart again,” said Don McPherson, EnChroma’s VP of products. Correcting color blindness wasn’t McPherson’s original experiment. “And he said, ‘Oh, I can see the cones!’”
Scientists Have Sequenced The First Octopus Genome The Ashley Madison hack comes just two months after the breach of Adult Friend Finder, and it’s only a matter of time before another dating site is cracked, according to cyber security experts. “From a cyber-security standpoint, all the dating sites are pretty sloppy,” says Rajesh Goel, a former Intel executive and tech analyst who has researched and written about the permeabilty of dating sites like Ashley Madison. Dating sites, he says, don’t have the regulatory requirements and standards that banking and healthcare companies have, and even with several extra layers of security and bureaucracy, those sites still get hacked, exposing personal and financial data. Some dating sites are not only unregulated—they gather both sensitive personal information and credit card numbers. The combination creates extra risk for users. “Every dating site can be hacked.” says Goel. That could make other dating sites an enticing target. Grindr Estimated number of users: 5 million Launched: 2009 3rndr Tinder
Are GMOs All Bad? The Truth about GMOs Wikipedia Commons. Golden Rice One of the hottest and most controversial issues in the world today is genetic engineering. The problem with polarized positions is they almost always miss the reality of the issue and avoid talking about the general facts. The first question we have to address, before we talk about the potential and danger of genetic modification, is what exactly is genetic modification? In the modern context we are talking about the introduction of foreign genetic material, almost always coding for a protein –which are molecular workhorses capable of doing everything from binding with other proteins to changing what DNA is activated or not (nuclear receptors), to themselves performing reactions and either creating or breaking down molecules-, which is introduced into the genome through a double-strand break and insertion (what I call “splice-in”), or through homologous DNA recombination (meaning it trades bases, or DNA, with a target strand inside the cell). See also:
Understanding Pain: The Pain Game Part 2 Clients suffering from chronic pain are confronted with a unique disorder—a personal experience unlike other physical problems such as a broken leg or an infection. Everyone knows that a broken leg can be confirmed by X-ray. An infection is detected using simple tests measuring white blood cell count. Regrettably, there is no universally reliable test to measure pain levels, causing many common musculoskeletal complaints to be mis-assessed, improperly treated, or simply ignored and ambiguously tossed into classifications such as acute, subacute, recurrent, and chronic. Acute pain serves the evolutionary function of warning for tissue damage, but chronic pain does little except to annoy and sometimes immobilize our ailing population. The Specificity Theory of Pain René Descartes of the “I think, therefore I am” fame, introduced one of the original pain theories in 1664. One of many findings that has led to the downfall of the specificity theory was that of phantom limb pain. Summary Notes