Life Changes
Healing Through Storytelling: Lessons from The Odyssey
The journey of Odysseus in Homer's 'The Odyssey' offers profound insights into healing...
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- Written by: Richard Faragher, University of Brighton
How long you live depends in part on the genes you inherit. For example, those suffering from Werner’s syndrome have inherited two defective copies of a gene coding for an enzyme that is involved in DNA replication and repair.
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- Written by: Andrew Smith, Drexel University
In case you’ve forgotten the section on the food web from high school biology, here’s a quick refresher. Plants make up the base of every food chain of the food web (also called the food cycle).
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- Written by: MacDonald Christie, University of Sydney
Whether a drug is prescribed by the doctor, bought over the counter or obtained illegally, we mostly take their mechanism of action for granted and trust they will do what they’re supposed to.
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- Written by: Allison Hydzik, University of Pittsburgh
"There's long been evidence suggesting that light and circadian rhythms profoundly influence our biology, and specifically the physiological response to stress," says Matthew R. Rosengart.
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- Written by: Saskia Angenent, University of York
"The principal interest of this piece of work is that it provides direct evidence for early dairying at high altitude in the Alps," says Kevin Walsh.
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- Written by: Matthew Swayne, Penn State
Older adults who strength trained at least twice a week had 46 percent lower odds of death for any reason, 41 percent lower odds of cardiac death, and 19 percent lower odds of dying from cancer.
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- Written by: Andy Henion, Michigan State University
Even after taking into account residents' wealth, age, sex, and other neighborhood factors, the study found that having a view of the ocean was associated with improved mental health.
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- Written by: Rod Pyle, Caltech
Beginning in infancy, people who have autism spectrum disorder observe and interpret images and social cues differently than others do. Researchers now have new insight into just how this occurs, which eventually may help doctors diagnose, and more effectively treat, the various forms of the disorder.
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- Written by: Cathy Wilde, University at Buffalo
The mice in the enriched environment, where they exercised more, lived anywhere from 16 to 22 percent longer than those in a deprived environment, depending on the level of gene expression.
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- Written by: AJ Earley
A good night’s sleep is a crucial aspect to overall health and well-being, yet so many Americans are lacking in that department. A 2013 Gallup poll found that 40% of American adults get less than the recommended amount of sleep.
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- Written by: Hayley Syrad, PhD candidate, UCL
The food and drink young children are consuming could be putting their health at risk. In a new study, published in the British Journal of Nutrition, we report that toddlers are consuming too much protein and too many calories for their age, putting them at risk of obesity in later life. We also found that
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- Written by: Diana Lutz, Washington University in St. Louis
"The idea that increased glucose uptake is a metabolic hallmark of cancer cells is deeply embedded in our thinking. It's the basis for how we diagnose cancer and manage its treatment in the clinic," says Gary Patti. Above: HeLa cells in culture.
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- Written by: Jennie Jackson, Lecturer in Human Nutrition and Dietetics, Glasgow Caledonian University
One British title chose to focus on a rather different story. “Walnuts prevent heart disease,” declared the Daily Express in a huge, front-page headline. It might have had retirees rushing to buy them by the sackful.
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- Written by: Katherine Gombay, McGill University
The researchers believe depression, metabolic symptoms, and the risk of developing diabetes interact in a number of ways. In some cases, a vicious cycle may emerge with depression and metabolic risk factors aggravating one another.
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- Written by: Don Campbell, University of Toronto
"It looks like acetaminophen makes it harder to recognize an error, which may have implications for cognitive control in daily life," says Dan Randles.
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- Written by: Mark Derewicz, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Can Long Lost Data Put Heart Healthy Oils To Rest?Randomized controlled trials—considered the gold standard for medical research—have never shown that linoleic acid-based dietary interventions reduce the risk of heart attacks or deaths.
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- Written by: Layne Cameron, Michigan State
"This is a global issue rather than one that's simply isolated in China; multidrug resistance is just a plane ride away," says James Tiedje.
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- Written by: Richard Steed, University of Copenhagen
"If an overweight person is able to maintain an initial weight loss—in this case for a year—the body will eventually 'accept' this new weight and thus not fight against it, as is otherwise normally the case when you are in a calorie-deficit state," says Signe Sørensen Torekov.
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- Written by: Sharron O'Neill, Researcher, International Governance and Performance (IGAP) Research Centre, Macquarie University
Lynch syndrome is a common, inherited condition that affects thousands of Australians and greatly increases the risk of developing cancer. Yet 95% of those who have it don’t know about it.
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- Written by: Havi Carel, Professor of Philosophy, University of Bristol
Serious illness is a great calamity. It is unwelcome, violent, frightening and painful. If it is life threatening, it requires the ill person and their loved ones to confront death. Illness causes pain, anxiety, incapacitation; it limits what the ill person can do. It can cut a life short, stop plans in their tracks, and detach people from life,
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- Written by: Andrew Lavender, Lecturer, Faculty of Health Sciences, Curtin University
Restless leg syndrome is a common affliction characterised by uncomfortable feelings in the legs accompanied by an irresistible urge to move the legs to relieve the sensations. People with restless leg syndrome often keep their legs moving by pacing or constantly moving their legs while sitting. The sensations commonly occur at
