Offhand Hypothesis

Cataloging librarians have autoimmune OCD.
Public librarians, especially childrens librarians, have toxoplasmosis induced OCD.  They all have cats.

There are lots of volatile aromatics emanating from the old buildings.
And you won't ever find a better archive of respiratory pathogens than in the stacks.

Mmmmm.... every patron's germs ever...

Exquisite Pile Management

Meet the man who almost invented cyberspace

Freakin librarians...
Behold the power of dopamine.

Love love love the cataloging scheme. It's Universal. Ha.
(that's hilarious if you're an indexer.)

Testing Testing 1,2,3

Facebook conducted secret psychology experiment on users' emotions 

Users of the social media platform consented to be experimented on by developers and researchers when they signed the Terms and Conditions necessary to open a Facebook account.

Yeah, I knew they were evil.  The Social Manipulation Network.
.
I've got enough random shit silently skewing my emotional inputs, I don't need fcking Facebook to pile on.

Yes, it is

Too hot to exercise? New research links obesity to temperature and humidity,

It's scorching here.  Trying to re-build the pool, but can barely work outside during the day...


other maps

Make my Day

Fruits, veggies not a magic bullet for weight loss, study finds

Kill that Zombie Meme!

This is Why

Secrets of the Creative Brain

So far, this study which has examined 13 creative geniuses and 13 controls—has borne out a link between mental illness and creativity similar to the one I found in my Writers’ Workshop study. The creative subjects and their relatives have a higher rate of mental illness than the controls and their relatives do (though not as high a rate as I found in the first study), with the frequency being fairly even across the artists and the scientists. The most-common diagnoses include bipolar disorder, depression, anxiety or panic disorder, and alcoholism.

Because we are the people we have been looking for.
We are the people who can think us out of this.    If we could just wake up...

(bonus fact:  John Nash had terrible teeth.)

Article Roundup

Busy lately, may add on to this later.
Things that caught my eye-

Young women with polycystic ovary syndrome are 5 times more likely to develop type 2 diabetes

China’s cure for teenage internet addiction is worse than the supposed disease

It is time to abandon obesity myths, experts say
And they don't cover that "Low Fat Myth" at all.
Maybe that's the real problem, not confirmation bias.

Among weight loss methods, surgery and drugs achieve highest patient satisfaction
Yeah, um..... that's because your diets DON'T WORK!

See the Horizon

Blame Your Brain: The Fault Lies Somewhere Within

In at the journal Psychological Science, psychologists Azim Shariff, Joshua Greene and six of their colleagues bring these heady issues down to earth by considering whether learning about neuroscience can influence judgments in a real-world situation: deciding how someone who commits a crime should be punished.
The motivating intuition is this: to hold someone responsible for her actions, she must have acted with free will.
But if her actions were the result of brute, mechanical processes that fully determined their effects — a view that a neuroscientific understanding of the mind might engender — then she didn't have free will, so she shouldn't be held morally responsible or punished too harshly. (More precisely, she shouldn't be punished merely for , or to receive her "just deserts." It might still make sense to support punishment for other reasons, such as deterring others from acting similarly in the future.)

See the spectres.

Teach your children well

Bulletproof blanket seeks to shield kids during school shootings

With ritalin and body armor for all.

This is Why

Because all my father thinks about is candy and beer.
And all he talks about is his suicide plans.

It's a freaking nightmare.

Zombie Bots

Xbox One ad is switching on Microsoft consoles

Xbox One owners are complaining that a new TV advert is switching their consoles on without their permission.  The ad - featuring Breaking Bad's Aaron Paul - has the actor say "Xbox On" near its start.
The instruction appears to trigger the machine's Kinect voice/motion sensor, activating the console.

And so it begins. Testing, testing, 1,2,3...

So funny

Shocker: Lawsuit Says Fat-Fighting Caffeine Panties Don't Work

The Fountain of Youth

Trust hormone' oxytocin helps old muscle work like new

This hormone is produced after sex.  Have a nice weekend.

Correlation Games

Iraq  is burning. SSDD.

Jazz must be jizzing

Rescue of Alzheimer's memory deficit achieved by reducing 'excessive inhibition'

"We recently discovered an abnormally high concentration of one inhibitory neurotransmitter in the brains of deceased Alzheimer's patients," Chen said. He and his research team found the neurotransmitter, called GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid), in deformed cells called "reactive astrocytes" in a structure in the core of the brain called the dentate gyrus. This structure is the gateway to hippocampus, an area of the brain that is critical for learning and memory.

Chen's team found that the GABA neurotransmitter was drastically increased in the deformed versions of the normally large, star-shaped "astrocyte" cells which, in a healthy individual, surround and support individual neurons in the brain. "Our research shows that the excessively high concentration of the GABA neurotransmitter in these reactive astrocytes is a novel biomarker that we hope can be targeted in further research as a tool for the diagnosis and treatment of Alzheimer's disease," Chen said.

Holy I can't remember what, Batman..  A huge new collection of Zombies to sell Xyrem to.
Frikkin frakkin Matrix may get us all yet...
Have some fruits and grains and don't think about it.

Abstract

The Gut bone is connected to the Bone bone

Proteins causing daytime sleepiness tied to bone formation, target for osteoporosis

UT Southwestern researchers, working with colleagues in Japan, now have found that mice lacking orexins also have very thin and fragile bones that break easily because they have fewer cells called osteoblasts, which are responsible for building bones.
Orexins seem to play a dual role in the process: they both promote and block bone formation. On the bones themselves, orexins interact with another protein, orexin receptor 1 (OX1R), which decreases the levels of the hunger hormone ghrelin. This slows down the production of new osteoblasts and, therefore, blocks bone formation locally. At the same time, orexins interact with orexin receptor 2 (OX2R) in the brain. In this case, the interaction reduces the circulating levels of leptin, a hormone known to decrease bone mass, and thereby promotes bone formation. Therefore, osteoporosis prevention and treatment may be achieved by either inhibiting OX1R or activating OX2R.
"We were very intrigued by this yin-yang-style dual regulation," said Dr. Wan, a member of the Cecil H. and Ida Green Center for Reproductive Biology Sciences and UT Southwestern's Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center. "It is remarkable that orexins manage to regulate bone formation by using two different receptors located in two different tissues."

Oh yeah, that explains a whole lot of periodontitis and arterial calcification now doesn't it....

abstract 
(update-  if increasing orexin levels is the goal, then reducing carb intake is the solution.  I'm taking the "no way in hell they will advocate that" bet.)

The lens through which they look

Recession Linked to More Than 10,000 Suicides in North America, Europe

And the academics are obsessing over which ones were "unavoidable'.
They are talking about us.   Sheesh.

The Time is Now

And. They. Know. It.

Oral-systemic health: The time is now!

The research is exploding. Just over the last year, research has found:
It appears up to 50% of heart attacks are triggered by oral pathogens.
Addressing visual and microbial periodontal disease slows if not reverses CIMT progression.  (cardiac thickening)
Six oral spirochetes appear to be causal of Alzheimer's.
P. gingivalis, an oral bacterium, raises risk for a heart attack by 13.6 times when present -- that's twice the risk of a heavy smoker!
Periodontal disease is as big a risk as high blood pressure for strokes.

Read the whole thing.  

(actually... the fact that the mouth affects systemic health has been known since the dawn of civilization, a lot of these specifics have been documented for a hundred years, but don't think about that- the time really is now...)

Yo Doctors

U.S. diabetes cases jump to 29 million: CDC

The number of Americans with diabetes rose from 26 million in 2010 to 29 million—9 percent of the population—in 2012, a new federal government study finds.
One in every four people with diabetes does not even realize it, according to the report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Another 86 million American adults—more than one-third of adults—have what doctors call "prediabetes. " This means their blood sugar levels are higher than normal but not yet high enough to be classified as type 2 diabetes, the CDC said.

As much as you try to blame us..... this is on You.  All your fault.   100%

Good News, Bad News

You can't fool the human body when it comes to carbs

A new study by Dr Nick Gant's team from the Centre for Brain Research at the University of Auckland provides yet more evidence that the brain knows far more about the foods we ingest that previously thought.
"Liquid solutions used in our study were sweetened artificially but when carbohydrate was present, we saw increased activation in the brain that we don't see when only sweetness is present," he says. "This helps explain the 'kick' people complain is absent in diet beverages or products.
"We may be able to use the experimental platform in this study to help develop functional foods and artificial sweeteners that are as hedonistically rewarding as the real thing."

Good News:  It's not your imagination.
Bad News:  This receptor is probably the switch that turns on insulin production.   If you stimulate it using other molecules you will produce fat just like sugar.

As I Said

Depression in the elderly linked to Alzheimer's risk

"Our results clearly indicate that mild cognitively impaired subjects with depressive symptoms suffer from elevated amyloid-levels when compared with non-depressed individuals," said the study's principal scientist Axel Rominger, MD, from the department of nuclear medicine at the University of Munich in Germany. "The combination of elevated amyloid-levels and coexisting depressive symptoms constitute a patient population with a high risk for faster progression to Alzheimer's disease."

I am the luckiest person in the world.

Told Ya So

Uh huh Uh huh Uh huh.    Brain Saving Information of the Year.  

Bacteria help explain why stress, fear trigger heart attacks

Scientists believe they have an explanation for the axiom that stress, emotional shock, or overexertion may trigger heart attacks in vulnerable people. Hormones released during these events appear to cause bacterial biofilms on arterial walls to disperse, allowing plaque deposits to rupture into the bloodstream, according to research published in published today in mBio, the online open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology.
...
To their knowledge, this is the first direct observation of biofilm bacteria within a carotid arterial plaque deposit, says Davies. This research suggests that bacteria should be considered to be part of the overall pathology of atherosclerosis and management of bacteria within an arterial plaque lesion may be as important as managing cholesterol.

Well, managing cholesterol probably isn't important at all, but nobody wants to rock that big boat of bullshit, huh?    One step at a time...
 
Excellent data.  Thanks.

Things that make me want to vomit

I quit drinking, then I got addicted to food

Sleep and Memory

I was going to write about the new study, but Christina already has.

Yo Netherlands

I LOVE YOU GUYS!!!!!!  

Glucose and Fat Metabolism in Narcolepsy and the Effect of Sodium Oxybate: A Hyperinsulinemic-Euglycemic Clamp Study.

INTRODUCTION:
Narcolepsy is associated with obesity though it is uncertain whether this is caused by changes in glucose and fat metabolism. Therefore, we performed a detailed analysis of systemic energy homeostasis in narcolepsy patients, and additionally, investigated whether it was affected by three months of sodium oxybate (SXB) treatment.
METHODS:
Nine hypocretin deficient patients with narcolepsy-cataplexy, and nine healthy sex, age, and BMI matched controls were enrolled. A hyperinsulinemic-euglycemic clamp combined with stable isotopes ([6,6-2H2]-glucose and [2H5]- glycerol) was performed at baseline. In seven patients a second study was performed after three months of SXB treatment.
RESULTS:
Glucose disposal rate (GDR) per unit serum insulin was significantly higher in narcolepsy patients compared to matched controls (1.6 ± 0.2 vs. 1.1 ± 0.3 μmol/kgFFM/min/mU×L; P = 0.024), whereas β-cell function was similar (P = 0.50). Basal steady state glycerol appearance rate tended to be lower in narcolepsy patients (5.2 ± 0.4 vs. 7.5 ± 1.3 μmol/kgFM/min; P = 0.058), suggesting a lower rate of lipolysis. SXB treatment induced a trend in reduction of the GDR (1.4 ± 0.1 vs. 1.1 ± 0.2 μmol/kgFFM/min/mU×L; P = 0.063) and a reduction in endogenous glucose production (0.24 ± 0.03 vs. 0.16 ± 0.03 μmol/kgFFM/min/mU×L: P = 0.028) per unit serum insulin. After SXB treatment lipolysis increased (4.9 ± 0.4 vs. 6.5 ± 0.6 μmol/kgFM/min; P = 0.018), and body weight decreased in narcolepsy patients (99.2 ± 6.0 vs. 94.0 ± 5.4 kg; P = 0.044).
CONCLUSION:
We show that narcolepsy patients are more insulin sensitive and may have a lower rate of lipolysis than matched controls. SXB stimulated lipolysis in narcolepsy patients, possibly accounting for the weight loss after treatment. While sodium oxybate tended to decrease systemic insulin sensitivity, it increased hepatic insulin sensitivity, suggesting tissue-specific effects.

I would like to thank the authors from the very bottom of my liver.
Although it looks like I may have the specific mechanism wrong (altering insulin sensitivity rather than amount), this study shows that narcoleptics do have altered glucose metabolism, retain more fat,  and that Xyrem affects that pathway.
Cha Ching!

Zombies with Benefits

Alcohol may protect trauma patients from later complications

Injured patients who have alcohol in their blood have a reduced risk for developing cardiac and renal complications, according to a study from the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health. Among patients who did develop complications, those with alcohol in their blood were less likely to die.
"After an injury, if you are intoxicated there seems to be a substantial protective effect," says UIC injury epidemiologist Lee Friedman, author of the study. "But we don't fully understand why this occurs."

Although there are a lot of possible mechanisms this could be-  glucose metabolism, stress response, antimicrobial effects or any number of things...
It does go a long way in explaining how the Alcoholism trait has endured.

Nonetheless-  No drinking and driving.  Or power tools.
Have a nice weekend.

Fascinating

Fasting 'revives immune system'

Fasting for at least two days regenerates immune systems damaged by ageing or cancer treatment, research has shown.
The finding, demonstrated both in mice and cancer patients, has dramatic implications for human health, say scientists.
It shows for the first time that a simple natural intervention can trigger the stem cell-based repair of vital systems in the body. Fasting had the effect of culling old and damaged immune system cells and replacing them with fresh and more effective new ones. US lead scientist Professor Valter Longo, director of the University of Southern California's Longevity Institute, said: "We could not predict that prolonged fasting would have such a remarkable effect in promoting stem cell-based regeneration.

abstract 

The implications of these results are staggering.

Excessive Daytime Sleepiness Saved the World

Did a power nap cost Adolf Hitler victory in World War II? 

Staff were too scared to wake him on D-Day.

Crash and burn, control freak.

Another Content Free Mantra

Passing on Breakfast OK for Weight Loss

Observational studies have shown an association between eating breakfast and having a lower body weight, and clinicians have long recommended eating breakfast as a major piece of the weight-loss puzzle.
But no randomized controlled studies have been done. So Dhurandhar and colleagues studied 309 overweight and obese patients over a 16-week period. Patients were assigned to one of three arms: an intervention group told to eat breakfast, an intervention group told to skip breakfast, or a control group that wasn't given any specific information about breakfast. The control group could eat or skip breakfast as they pleased.
Overall, the researchers saw no differences between groups in terms of weight loss, despite good compliance in all arms.

Everything Old is New Again

Autoimmune Diseases Could be Treated With Medical Marijuana

Interesting. Basically the same experiment was run thirty years ago...

Zombie Shopping

Man pushing shopping cart full of meat is arrested

Police say the sight of a man pushing a shopping cart full of meat down a south Seattle street in the middle of the night drew an officer’s attention.
Under questioning, the man said he was taking the cart full of steak and ribs to a friend’s house.
When a second officer checked with a nearby grocery store, staff there said a man had just left without paying for his 13 packages of meat.

I love medical history

How We Got Red Meat Wrong
Early American diets weren't as plant-based as we think.

Fun facts in there.

Yo Psychs

Suicide watch prison sensor keeps an eye on inmates

A new device that can detect a prisoner's vital signs from a wall or ceiling metres away could be used to tackle steep suicide rates in the penal system.
The sensor, which was funded by the US Department of Justice, monitors inmates' heartbeat, breathing and movements for signs of self-harm.
Suicide is a big problem among inmates in the US, accounting for 35 per cent of deaths in local jails and 5.5 per cent of deaths in state-run facilities in 2011. Inmates who appear to be at risk can be assigned extra personnel to check on them several times every hour, but this is expensive and invasive. Sensors would be cheaper and intrude less, while still alerting prison officers when they need to intervene.

Behold the spectrum of consequences of your incompetence.