Scientists have measured the catastrophic genetic damage caused by smoking in different organs of the body and identified several different mechanisms by which tobacco smoking causes mutations in DNA. The researchers found that smokers accumulated an average of 150 extra mutations in every lung cell for each year of smoking one pack of cigarettes a day.
In rare cases, someone who is thin could still end up with type 2 diabetes while an obese person may be surprisingly healthy. Some Asian countries have a higher diabetes rate than the United States even though the obesity rate is relatively low. New research points toward an answer to the riddle of the obesity paradox: An accumulation of a toxic class of fat metabolites, known as ceramides, may increase the risk for type 2 diabetes.
Among patients in Singapore receiving gastric bypass surgery, ceramide levels predicted who had diabetes better than obesity did. Even though all of the patients were obese, those who did not have type 2 diabetes had less ceramide in their adipose tissue than those who were diagnosed with the condition.
The first director of the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), Dr. John Higginson, is a personal hero of mine because with his leadership they would put an end to environmental claims based on weak observational anecdotes, like Rachel Carson claiming that she knew people who sprayed DDT in their basement and died
(1) or that cranberries were going to poison everyone.
Yet in recent years they have become complicit in just that.
We power humanity mostly by burning fossil fuels, thereby turning chemical energy into heat that ultimately gets radiated into space. In doing so we achieve some results deemed useful: we cook food, we keep our homes and offices at comfortable temperatures, we watch television, listen to music, take hot showers, generate light during dark hours, and move from A to B and back.
Evolutionary biology long ago solved the philosophical conundrum 'what came first, the chicken or the egg?' by showing that eggs came long before chickens.
But more relevant to evolution is the 'mother' molecule that led to the formation of life. What is it and how did it replicate itself?
RNA may be the answer to the first question, because it has more flexibility in how it recognizes itself than previously believed. The finding might change how we picture the first chemical steps towards replication and life.
Evidence-based medicine is a sensitive topic for naturopaths. They love to claim that naturopathic medicine is safe and effective.
With the aid of a new immunosuppressive agent known as PIF (preimplantation factor), researchers at the World Health Organisation (WHO) Institute of Primate Research in Nairobi, Kenya, have successfully transplanted an ovary from one individual to another, even managing to restore a monthly cycle.
Approximately 11 percent of women worldwide suffer from premature ovarian failure. This can have many different causes: chemotherapy administered for a malignant disease might irreversibly damage the ovaries and, because of the advances in modern cancer therapy, the number of young women surviving cancer is on the increase. The women, some of whom are still very young, prematurely enter menopause. Genetic diseases can also trigger early menopause.
What is the reason for the steep decay of average intelligence in Germany? Is it the current immigration? What is the brain-drain’s contribution? It is none of these! But why not and what is the reason?
I admit that as an antifascist for three decades, I have not foreseen that the fall of the West would start with the race issue. As a progressive mind, race is not on the radar when pondering the future, even although I knew the relevant science. I just did not attend to the connections that race keeps real despite of our denial. I expected bad times to arrive with ideological revolutions, some religion old or novel, or due to ecological disaster. Not race!
It would seem obvious that a diluted nicotine vapor is much less harmful than toxic chemicals in cigarette smoke - yet groups like the Centers for Disease Control and Tobacco Free Kids have instead adopted a 'quit or die' mentality about smoking.
Yet we engage in harm reduction when it comes to needle exchanges and, strangely, the political party that was against those is for e-cigarettes, while the party that is on the other side wants any smoking cessation or harm reduction tool not controlled by pharmaceutical companies to be penalized.
"What area on Mars is the most interesting for us?". My answer to this question isn’t an impressive geological feature like Olympus Mons or Valles Marineres. For me, it’s a rather unremarkable seeming crater, Richardson crater near the south pole. Let me explain why.
First this shows where it is. It is close to the south pole - this is an elevation map and I’ve trimmed it down to the southern hemisphere. You can see Olympus Mons as the obvious large mountain just right of middle, and Hellas Basin as the big depression middle left. Richardson crater is about half way between them and much further south.
