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Year: 2012 (page 8 of 55)

11.27.2012

does smoking damage the brain?

We all know smoking is bad for your heart and increases the risk of stroke and cardiovascular disease. A study from King’s College in the UK has also found a correlation between smoking and poor performance on a cognitive evaluation. Cognition was evaluated using memory tasks such as having participants learn new words or name as many animals as they could in a minute. Their cognitive ability was then reevaluated after 4 years and again after 8 years from the initial test. The Smokers did “significantly worse” than non smokers according to the researchers. Of course cognition declines somewhat as we age, but the decline was steeper for smokers. This study relates to what is known about smoking and increased risk for dementia. From BBC:

Dr Simon Ridley, from Alzheimer’s Research UK, said: “Research has repeatedly linked smoking and high blood pressure to a greater risk of cognitive decline and dementia, and this study adds further weight to that evidence.

“Cognitive decline as we age can develop into dementia, and unravelling the factors that are linked to this decline could be crucial for finding ways to prevent the condition.

The study appears in the journal Age and Ageing.

11.26.2012

can ivermectin save us from bed bugs?

Ivermectin

Ivermectin

Maybe, according to a new study that appears in Bloomberg news. A group of researchers at Eastern Virginia Medical School have found that feeding bed bugs ivermectin laced blood kills them and prevents them from laying fertile eggs. From Pop Sci:

Bloomberg recently reported on research from the Eastern Virginia Medical School which showed that ivermectin, an anti-parasite drug, was fatal to bed bugs (specifically, they used Merck’s brand Stromectol. Merck was not involved in the study). The researchers presented the work at the annual meeting of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, and it is under review for formal publication in a medical journal.

For now, here are the basics. The researchers ran three experiments on groups of bed bugs that included adults as well as young’uns in the third and fourth of the bugs’ five growth stages (third and fourth instar nymphs). Different groups of bugs were fed ivermectin-laced mouse blood through an artificial membrane, directly from mice that had been injected with ivermectin, and on four people that had taken the drug orally.

In all cases, to varying degrees, the drug killed most of the bed bugs. And, in both the mouse and the human studies, most of the instars that didn’t die weren’t able to molt, which they have to do in order to reach reproductive age. In the human trials, the mortality rate was 67 percent three hours after dosing, and fell to 42 percent after 54 hours.

It should be noted that some bed bugs already show resistance to ivermectin, so ivermectin as a long term solution is by no means guaranteed to work.

11.22.2012

how mint makes us feel fresh

Mint

Mint

Over at The Smart Set, Sara Davis explains how mint makes our mouth feel fresh.

That “fresh” sensation is a thermal illusion: the actual temperature of your mouth doesn’t change. Mouths contain particular cells that that activate in the presence of hot or cold: the condition of extreme temperature “turns on” the cell, which then sends a message to the brain that the mouth is rather hot or rather cold. But menthol also “turns on” these cells, which send their message to the brain as directed, and we experience a coolness in the mouth that isn’t there. By itself, mint doesn’t make the mouth a less suitable environment for germs; it’s the abrasives in toothpastes or the alcohols in mouthwashes that do the dirty work. But it’s easy to see how minty freshness became associated with cleanliness: the illusory change of temperature and the sharp, distinctive taste remind us more of cleaning agents than candy.

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