In modern times, nitrous oxide is a pollutant or a way to make an old custom Nissan go really fast, but it was once common as an anesthetic in medicine and dentistry and that is how it got its common name - laughing gas.

In a small pilot study, it was shown to have another modern use - as a treatment for depression.
In 20 patients who had treatment-resistant clinical depression, the researchers found that two-thirds experienced an improvement in symptoms after receiving nitrous oxide. In comparison, one-third of the same patients reported improved symptoms after treatment with a placebo. The patients were evaluated on the day of and day after each treatment.

Though humans did not exist 400,000 years ago, human ancestors did - and they left behind engravings on a fossilized shell from Java, establishing a new benchmark for the earliest known example of ancient humans deliberately creating pattern.

The newly discovered engravings resemble the previously oldest-known engravings, which are associated with either Neanderthals or modern humans from around 100,000 years ago.  The zig-zag pattern engravings were only recently discovered on the fossilized mussel shells, which had been collected 100 years ago. There is no way to know if the pattern was intended as art or served some practical purpose.  

Epigenetics has gotten new life 200 years after it was first postulated - it is temporary biochemical changes in the genome, caused by various forms of environmental impact that can be permanent and even passed down to future generations, basically an update on Jean Baptiste Lamarck's inheritance of acquired characteristics. 

One type of epigenetic change is methylation, where a methyl group is added to or removed from a base in the DNA molecule without affecting the original DNA sequence. Epigenetic researchers liken it to computers: If genes are considered the hardware of cells, then epigenetics can be seen as their software. 

A small study

A Parkinson's disease vaccine developed by the Austrian biotech company AFFiRiS AG is going into a Phase I trial clinical trial.

The vaccine,  called AFFITOPE® PD03A , targets a protein called alpha-Synuclein. The protein plays a key role in the onset and progression of Parkinson's as well as multiple system atrophy (MSA), an orphan disease. This vaccine has the potential to modify disease progression, rather than only symptomatic improvements available with current treatment strategies.

How do drug prices get picked? Some of it is simple economics. If you develop 20 drugs and 19 of them fail at various stages and one succeeds after a billion dollars in costs and bureaucracy, you are going to price it to make back all that lost money before generic companies are allowed to come along and sell your product without doing any work at all.

An analysis of U.C. Berkeley students has concluded that inflated or deflated feelings of self-worth are linked to afflictions like bipolar disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, anxiety and depression - more evidence that the widening gulf between rich and poor can be bad for your health, say the psychologists who conducted the survey.