Gleanings of the Week Ending December 24, 2016

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Skeleton Lake of Roopkund, India – The lake is in the Himalayas and covered with ice for most of the year. Researchers think that the 200 people were killed by a sudden hail storm – with hailstones up to 9 inches in circumference.

Heading off Headaches – I am fortunate to not have headaches very often. When I look at some of the preventative steps listed in the article…most of them are part of the way I live all the time.

Skeleton found in Clare cave reveal a tragic life story – The skeleton found in a cave was analyzed and found to be a boy 14-16 years old at time of his death in mid-1600s. He had endured near starvation conditions for all his life. The space he was found in was just large enough to crawl into…and I wondered if he intentionally went to the cave to be alone when he died.

The Chemistry of LED Lights – We are seeing so many LED lights in Christmas displays. Here’s the tech details behind the brilliance.

Skin proteins reveal how mummies died – Three mummies analyzed. Based on the proteins found, one might have died of tuberculosis and another from pancreatic cancer. The third one had been interred in a hollowed out log and exposed to the elements over time; the proteins had degraded and could not be identified for that one.

An Unlikely Renaissance of Appalachian Elk – Outside Grundy, VA – in a former surface coal mine, now grass covered…a place for reintroducing elk to the east coast. There are places in Kentucky and Great Smoky Mountains National Park too!

Raw foodies: Europe’s earliest humans did not use fire – An analysis of dental plaque from 1,2 million old skeletons shows they were eating meat and plants….raw. There was no indication of charred fibers or of microcharcoal.

Top Technical Advances 2016 – From The Scientist Magazine – so skewed to biological sciences.

3D Skeletal System: 5 Awesome Ligaments – I am digging into anatomy after finished the Osteoarcheology class…and starting “Anatomy of the Abdomen and Pelvis”

The Challenge of defining maturity when the brain never stops changing – “The age of 18 doesn’t have any biological magic to it.” The concept of maturity links to responsibility for actions…an important concept in our legal system.

Gleanings of the Week Ending September 24, 2016

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

World Heritage in the High Seas: The Time Has Come – From National Geographic – pictures and a map of some potential places on the high seas that merit World Heritage status.

Historical analysis examines sugar industry role in heart disease research – A bit of disturbing history….is dietary fat the main culprit when it comes to heart disease? What about sugar and heart disease?

Gentians: part 1, part 2, part 3 – Elizabeth’s series on a particular flower….and not just in Maryland.

Brain’s stunning genomic diversity revealed – Huge insertions and deletions in DNA…surprise.

Scientists Baffled as Hundreds of Dead Horseshoe Crabs Wash Ashore in Japan – Sad…and no definitive reason yet. Theories being investigated include: parasitic infection or disease or oxygen shortage due to higher sea water temperature.

Between a rock and a hard place: biologists unearth sandstone-excavating bees – Bees are amazingly diverse. These are from the west and southwest in the US: Utah, Colorado, California.

Eggs make a comeback – A general overview of eggs in our diet. There is also a link to an article about ‘how to buy eggs.’

How our brain slows down the effects of aging – Elderly people develop a particular selective attentiveness. I wondered if, as we get older, we realize that we are paying more attention to details?

A Newly Explored Undersea Volcano is Teeming with Alien Life Forms – On Earth but very different than what we normally see.

How much do perfumes pollute? – A study of the canals of Venice….looking at the perfumes that are part of products we use daily like soaps, detergents, shampoos and other personal hygiene products. It turns out that the perfumes are in every sample…persistent for the 9 months of sampling. But what impact do they have on the environment – that’s still to be determined.

Gleanings of the Week Ending July 30, 2016

We finally got some rain after a dry spell and I’m enjoying the flowers on my deck this morning.

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Human intelligence measured in the brain – A study that used resting-state MRI analysis on 1000s of people around the world…areas of the brain which are associated with learning and development show high levels of variability (i.e. they change their neural connections with other parts of the brain more frequently, over a matter of minutes of seconds). Further studies using the new technology may rapidly improve our understanding and diagnosis of debilitating human mental disorders such as schizophrenia and depression.

Common Foot Problems (and what to do about them) – Most of my foot problems went away when I stopped wearing high heels!

Postcards provide link to Edwardian social media – A different perspective of the early 20^th century. There is a searchable archive that is available here; I enjoyed doing searches with some family names and locations. The two most common topics that people wrote about were the weather and health!

Amazing spider silk continues to surprise scientists – Phonomic crystals – that’s new vocabulary for me this week. Evidently research on spider silk has shown the potential of new materials (to synthesize) to dampen sound or provide insulation.

Hundreds of years later, teeth tell the story of people who didn't get enough sunshine – Dentin layers formed during a time when a person did not get enough Vitamin D to fully mineralize the structures that form dentin (and bone) provide a window into that aspect of nutritional health long after the person dies…longer lasting that the bones. Dentin layers are also a better indicator because they are not constantly remodeled during life as bones are.

The key to conservation is not what you think – A thoughtful piece about the lack of diversity, equity, and inclusion in the environmental community.

NASA’s Kepler confirms 100+ exoplanets during its K2 mission – Lots of validated exoplanets to pick from for further study by NASA’s upcoming missions: Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite and James Webb Space Telescope!

The mystery of why you can’t remember being a baby – A summary of research on the topic….and we still don’t really know the answer.

How the body disposes of red blood cells, recycles iron – It happens in the liver, not in the spleen as previously thought…and requires bone-marrow-derived immune cells as the recycling cells.

Orangutan Imitates Human Speech – 500 vowel-like sounds…more vocal fold control that we previously thought could be exhibited by a non-human ape.

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 25, 2016

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

What the rising light pollution means for our health – Circadian disruption from ill-timed electrical lighting (particularly at night) may contribute to poor sleep, obesity, diabetes, certain cancers and mood disorders. The night time lights are shifting to LEDs in our cities which has the effect of shifting that lighting toward the blue wavelengths which are most disruptive to our circadian rhythms.

Vitamin D may not be the great solution to health problems – I remember when the testing for vitamin levels revealed that many people were low and doctors started recommending supplementation – sometimes megadoses of the vitamin. Now the results are being reviewed --- and it is obvious that it is not a panacea and may not be of very much benefit at all.

What if the coolest thing about a 21^st-century school wasn’t technology? – The results of a TED workshop on creating a new healthy school from scratch. What do you think of their ideas?

Lightning Strikes: How to Stay Safe – Hopefully most of these recommendations are familiar to you - we’ve been having a lot of thunderstorms recently so I took a look to refresh my knowledge.

Garlic mustard populations likely to decline – I hope this begins to happen soon in our area. Right now we seem to have a lot of this plant around our area of Maryland.

Ancient satellite busts massive gas storage leak, fracking could be next – I’ve always wondered how we could detect leaks more effectively – conserve our resources by reducing leakage – and maybe this is a solution! It’s another example of a NASA instrument (and satellite) working long after its original mission was complete.

Americans are getting heart-healthier: Coronary heart disease decreasing in the US – Hurray! The study compared 2001 and 2012. The prevalence of smoking decreased during that same time period although high blood pressure and abnormal cholesterol have not (although control rates have improved). Obesity and diabetes rates have increased significantly but overall control of glucose levels has improved significantly.

Meet an Artist with no Hands – A historical piece about Matthias Buchinger – but with discussion about how the brain accommodates physical challenges such as being born without hands and learning to use feet with exceptional skill.

Flow: What is it and how to find it – How much of your day is in “flow”? I think quite a lot of mine is. The key for me is realizing that I often have more choice in the way I want to be…the way I want to do everything.

Study offers explanation for why women leave engineering – I’m not surprised by the results of this study. I was at the peak of women graduating from computer science programs in the 1980s (mine was in a math department rather than engineering) and was surrounded by so many interesting projects early on that I didn’t get into a marginalized (or menial tasks) role until later when I was strong enough to recognize it and get out it on my own – back into a place I wanted to be.

Gleanings of the Week Ending May 28, 2016

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Hawai’I at the Energy Crossroads – A case study about the issues with how we produce electricity – now and into the future.

“Top tips for men juggling a successful career and fatherhood” hilariously nails how sexist the advice given to working women is – For anyone that doubts that gender bias is still quiet prevalent in the workplace.

Ancient tsunami evidence on Mars reveals life potential – Evidence of cold, salty oceans on Mars (the image of Mars was produced using Google Earth!)

Restoring an Ancient Nursery for Atlantic Sturgeon – These fish can reach 14 feet in length and weigh 800s pounds – a species that has been around since the dinosaurs. In the 1890s, caviar from Delaware River sturgeon was a thriving enterprise. Within a decade, the population of sturgeon fell to 1% of its historic numbers. Even with a moratorium on sturgeon fishing in the 1990s, the fish were not recovering due to ship strikes, channel dredging, and poor water quality. Now – with focus on dissolved oxygen, salinity, and flow conditions….and understanding the extent of spawning and nursery habitat in the freshwater portion of the river…slow recovery is beginning.

Antibiotics that kill gut bacteria also stop growth of new brain cells – Another reason antibiotics should not be overprescribed….and that we look for ways to resolve an infection that does not kill gut bacteria.

Wildlife is where you find it – A reminder that the natural world often survives even in a very man-made environment…and to be observant enough to notice it.

Bright light alters metabolism – Blue-enriched light in the evening seems to be problematic….will electronic devices of the future modify the type of light they emit based on time of day to help us stay healthy?

State of North America’s Birds Report Released to Commemorate Centennial of the First Migratory Bird Treaty – Birds connect our continent and some progress has been made. There is still a lot to be done. Individual actions like choosing sustainably created products, preventing bird collisions with windows of our houses and office buildings, and participating in bird related Citizen Science project (like eBird) make a difference.

10 Overlooked Wildlife Experiences in our National Parks – Sometimes small creatures that make their homes in National Parks are just as memorable as the scenery.

Toothpaste Tips and Myths – Toothpaste comes in lots of different formulations. Educate yourself about the good – and not so good – aspects of some of the benefit claims.