Stay Positive


"In the midst of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer."

- Alert Camus








Saturday, June 29, 2013

'Reverse vaccine' for Type 1 diabetes

'Reverse vaccine' for Type 1 diabetes seems to pass human test
In the first trial with human subjects, it reduced the number of immune system 'killer' cells that attack crucial insulin-producing cells, study shows.
June 28, 2013, 10:34 p.m.

A "reverse vaccine" that allows people with Type 1 diabetesto produce their own insulin has passed its first test with human subjects, according to a new study. The success points to a potential new strategy for treating those in the early stages of the disease, experts said.


The therapy is designed to protect cells in the pancreas that make insulin, a hormone the body needs to convert sugars and starches into energy. In people with Type 1 diabetes, the immune system goes haywire and attacks those crucial insulin-producing cells for reasons that medical researchers don't understand.

Researchers dubbed the treatment a reverse vaccine because it suppresses the immune system instead of stimulating it. As hoped, the experimental vaccine reduced the number of immune system "killer" cells that went on the attack.

"We're trying to turn off one specific immune response," said Dr. Lawrence Steinman, an immunologist at Stanford University and senior author of the study published Wednesday in Science Translational Medicine.

About 1.25 million Americans have Type 1 diabetes. For nearly 100 years, the standard treatment has been insulin replacement therapy, in which insulin is injected in amounts that correspond with blood-sugar levels.

Attempts at new treatments and cures have focused on suppressing large portions of the immune system — sometimes using powerful drugs developed for other conditions, such as the blood cancer lymphoma. Steinman called this the "big hammer" approach.

"We're trying to do something different," he said. "We want to eliminate just the immune cells that attack the insulin-producing cells in the pancreas."

Steinman and his team designed a molecule that contained the gene for making proinsulin, the precursor to insulin. The molecule also included instructions for triggering the killer cells' response and then shutting it down.

If everything went as planned, the DNA molecule would suppress the killer cells and allow the pancreatic cells to function properly, producing insulin.

After successful trials with diabetic mice, the team prepared to test its vaccine on humans. They selected 80 volunteers ages 18 to 40 who had been diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes within the last five years. After that time, many Type 1 sufferers have already lost all of their insulin-producing cells, Steinman said. (Although many people with Type 1 diabetes are diagnosed as children, the researchers avoided testing their reverse vaccine on kids because of safety concerns.)

Two-thirds of the study volunteers received the reverse vaccine in one of four doses ranging from 0.3 to 6.0 milligrams. The rest of the volunteers got a placebo. Injections were made once a week for 12 weeks.

Throughout the study, both the experimental and placebo groups also received insulin replacement therapy. All subjects were monitored for up to two years after the initial treatment to watch for any side effects.

To see whether the vaccine was working, the team measured two key components of the volunteers' blood: killer cells and C-peptide, a protein involved with making insulin.

Compared with patients who got the placebo, those who received the vaccine in 1.0 and 3.0 mg doses saw beneficial improvements in their levels of C-peptide during and after treatment. But three months after the treatment stopped, C-peptide levels declined, indicating the vaccine had worn off, the team wrote.

Patients in the vaccine group, no matter the dosage, saw the number of killer cells fall and the amount of proinsulin rise over 15 weeks without affecting the rest of their immune system cells. The changes were much more modest in patients who got the placebo.

No significant side effects or safety concerns arose during the study, the team reported.

Dr. Hertzel Gerstein, an endocrinologist at McMaster University in Ontario who treats Type 1 diabetes patients, called the research encouraging, and said he was looking forward to further studies with many more patients.

"It's a small study with preliminary findings," he said. "It could or could not translate into anything clinically relevant. But certainly this holds some promise."

Dr. Peter Butler, director of the Larry L. Hillblom Islet Research Center at UCLA, said a reverse vaccine was a promising approach, but he was concerned that the benefits lasted only a few weeks. It might be impractical to keep the killer cells at bay with such a narrowly targeted vaccine, he said.

Steinman said his team was planning further tests with longer treatment periods.

"This is only a first step," he said. "But there is potential for protecting people from the ravages of this disease in the long run."

The study was funded by Bayhill Therapeutics, a start-up founded by Steinman and three of the study's co-authors. The company, now known as Tolerion Inc., aims to bring the vaccine to market.

brad.balukjian@latimes.com







Absence of Gene Leads to Earlier, More Severe Case of Multiple Sclerosis






Absence of Gene Leads to Earlier, More Severe Case of Multiple Sclerosis


UCSF Finding in Animal Study May Lead to Biomarker that Predicts Course of Disease in Humans
Share this story:


By Jennifer O'Brien on June 24, 2013



A UC San Francisco-led research team has identified the likely genetic mechanism that causes some patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) to progress more quickly than others to a debilitating stage of the disease. This finding could lead to the development of a test to help physicians tailor treatments for MS patients.

Researchers found that the absence of the gene Tob1 in CD4+ T cells, a type of immune cell, was the key to early onset of more serious disease in an animal model of MS.




Sergio Baranzini, PhD

Senior author Sergio Baranzini, PhD, a UCSF associate professor of neurology, said the potential development of a test for the gene could predict the course of MS in individual patients.

The study, done in collaboration with UCSF neurology researchers Scott Zamvil, MD, and Jorge Oksenberg, PhD, was published on June 24 in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.

MS is an inflammatory disease in which the protective myelin sheathing that coats nerve fibers in the brain and spinal cord is damaged and ultimately stripped away – a process known as demyelination. During the highly variable course of the disease, a wide range of cognitive, debilitating and painful neurological symptoms can result.

In previously published work, Baranzini and his research team found that patients at an early stage of MS, known as clinically isolated syndrome, who expressed low amounts of Tob1 were more likely to exhibit further signs of disease activity – a condition known as relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis – earlier than those who expressed normal levels of the gene.

The current study, according to Baranzini, had two goals: to recapitulate in an animal model what the researchers had observed in humans, and uncover the potential mechanism by which it occurs.




Scott Zamvil, MD




Jorge Oksenberg, PhD

The authors were successful on both counts. They found that when an MS-like disease was induced in mice genetically engineered to be deficient in Tob1, the mice had significantly earlier onset compared with wild-type mice, and developed a more aggressive form of the disease.

Subsequent experiments revealed the probable cause: the absence of Tob1 in just CD4+ T cells. The scientists demonstrated this by transferring T cells lacking the Tob1 gene into mice that had no immune systems but had normal Tob1 in all other cells. They found that the mice developed earlier and more severe disease than mice that had normal Tob1 expression in all cells including CD4+.

“This shows that Tob1 only needs to be absent in this one type of immune cell in order to reproduce our initial observations in mice lacking Tob1 in all of their cells,” said Baranzini.
Personalized Treatments for MS Patients

The researchers also found the likely mechanism of disease progression in the Tob1-deficient mice: higher levels of Th1 and Th17 cells, which cause an inflammatory response against myelin, and lower levels of Treg cells, which normally regulate inflammatory responses. The inflammation results in demyelination.

The research is significant for humans, said Baranzini, because the presence or absence of Tob1 in CD4+ cells could eventually serve as a prognostic biomarker that could help clinicians predict the course and severity of MS in individual patients. “This would be useful and important,” he said, “because physicians could decide to switch or modify therapies if they know whether the patient is likely to have an aggressive course of disease, or a more benign course.”

Ultimately, predicted Baranzini, “This may become an example of personalized medicine. When the patient comes to the clinic, we will be able to tailor the therapy based on what the tests tell us. We’re now laying the groundwork for this to happen.”


When the patient comes to the clinic, we will be able to tailor the therapy based on what the tests tell us. We’re now laying the groundwork for this to happen.

Sergio Baranzini, PhD

Co-authors of the study areUlf Schulze-Topphoff, PhD, of UCSF; Simona Casazza, PhD, of UCSF at the time of the study; Michel Varrin-Doyer, PhD; and Kara Pekarek of UCSF; Raymond A. Sobel, MD, of Stanford University School of Medicine, and Stephen L. Hauser, MD, of UCSF.

The study was supported by funds from the National Institutes of Health (R01 grants NS26799, NS049477, AI073737, AI059709 and NS063008), the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, the Robert Tillman Family Fund, the Guthy-Jackson Charitable Foundation and the Maisin Foundation.



Source: http://www.ucsf.edu/news/2013/06/106986/absence-gene-leads-earlier-more-severe-case-multiple-sclerosis


Most-Read News


Alcohol Addiction Relapse Might Be Thwarted By Turning Off Brain Trigger
 

Painkiller diclofenac risky, should be removed from market, researchers say






Painkiller diclofenac risky, should be removed from market, researchers say
CARLY WEEKS

The Globe and Mail


Published Tuesday, Feb. 12 2013, 5:00 PM EST



Diclofenac, a popular painkiller sold as Voltaren and other brand names, is as risky as Vioxx and should be taken off the market, Canadian researchers warn.

However, in the absence of action from Health Canada, researchers are taking the unusual step of asking patients to stop taking the drug and turn to safer alternatives, such as naproxen.



mindfulness


Insight is a by-product of growth or change rather than a precursor or a cause of growth or change. ~Carl Whitaker



Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate. ~C.G. Jung




Fortunately analysis is not the only way to resolve inner conflicts. Life itself still remains a very effective therapist. ~Karen Horney


The client shows a tendency to move away, hesitantly and fearfully, from a self he is not. ~Carl Rogers



sgbrownlow22h

You can’t truly love someone unless you’re willing to set limits on their misconduct.



Bringing your attention back to present when it has wandered is one of the most important skills you can nurture. 
 
 
When converged on by numerous thoughts, take stock, let them be, and then do one thing at a time 


Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That's why it is called the present." - Alice Morse Earle 
 

Live a life of wonder.


"Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value."
 Albert Einstein





Breaking Bad Habits


 

Breaking Bad Habits: Interview with Dan Goleman and Tara Bennett-Goleman

By ELISHA GOLDSTEIN, PH.D.


We all have habits that we want to break and that is why I’m thrilled to bring to you today Daniel Goleman and Tara Bennett-Goleman. Daniel Goleman is an internationally known psychologist who lectures around the world and has many classic books including Emotional Intelligence which has over 5,000,000 copies in print. Tara is author of The New York Times bestseller Emotional Alchemyand her new book Mind Whispering: A New Map to Freedom from Self-Defeating Emotional Habits that can help us transform our emotions, improve our relationships and connect us to the inner wisdom that has always been there.

Note: On Saturday June 1st, come spend a day with Dan and Tara as they speak to us live in Los Angeles, California at UCLA about how to break free from the self-defeating habits that don’t serve us.

In this interview Dan and Tara will take us through some neuroscience of habit formation, how Mind Whispering can help us break free from our self-defeating habits, the importance of entering positive mind states, and some final words to help us along the way.

Elisha: We all have habits we’d like to break. Can you give us a brief background into the neuroscience of habit change.

Dan: As we form a habitual routine – like riding a bike or avoiding the anxiety of an intense emotion – the brain shifts its operation from the zone of awareness to an unconscious zone, from the top part of the brain to the basal ganglia near the very bottom. Once stored there, these routines operate automatically and for the most part without our fully noticing them. We can only change them by once again bringing them into awareness.

Elisha: A fundamental source of human suffering is our self-defeating habits. What is Mind Whispering and how can it help us shift out of this default mode?

Tara: Mind Whispering draws together practices and principles from several sources – the neuroscience of habit change, Eastern and Western psychology, and even horse whispering. One main method is what I call “mindful habit change.” The first step is recognizing that we are in the grip of an unhealthy emotional habit once again. That’s where mindfulness begins to help. Once we surface the self-defeating habitual routines, like anxious clinging or emotional avoidance in a relationship, we can challenge and change them. And the more often we repeat that, the more the new habits can become a more healthy default mode.

Elisha: In your book you talk about entering positive modes as a path toward healing. Give us a bit more background on this and how we might apply it.

Tara: The big divide in the mode spectrum lies between our insecure, distorted, negative modes and the healthy range where we feel secure and confident, effective and flexible, positive. Emotional habits are on a spectrum. Some of them can change through awareness and intentional shifts. But others are harder to see – and they may have served some purpose for coping with a difficult situation. For this range its important to acknowledge their symbolic reality with a sensitive attunement and understanding. In Mind Whispering there are many ways to shift to the healthy mode range. Each mode has its own best steps to take. If the modes are not too intense, sometimes a gentle priming – like thinking of people you love, or talking with one of them, can make the shift.

Elisha: If you were sitting across the table from someone who was stuck in their self-defeating mind, what advice might you have for them?

Tara and Dan: Sometimes it’s not helpful to offer advice – especially if the person is not looking for it. Better to empathize and attune to them. You may have more of a sense of what their actual needs are. It’s better not to project what we think is best for the person. If you are in your secure mode, you can be kind, sensitive and empathic – a good listener. See if you can tune in to what they need in that moment, and what you can give. For example, think of something they might appreciate but not have to ask you for – a caring gesture, going out of your way to be helpful to them. Even giving your full attention can be comforting to someone who is in an insecure mode.

Elisha: Thank you Dan and Tara for sharing your thoughts and wisdom with us.

As always, please share your thoughts, stories and questions below. Your interaction creates a living wisdom for us all to benefit from.










Elisha Goldstein, Ph.D. is author of The Now Effect, co-author of A Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Workbook, Foreword by Jon Kabat-Zinn, author of Mindfulness Meditations for the Anxious Traveler: Quick Exercises to Calm Your Mind, the Mindful Solutions audio series, and the Mindfulness at Work™ program currently being adopted in multiple multinational corporations. Join The Now Effect Community for free Daily Now Moments, Weekly Updates and tips and free access to a Live Monthly Online Event with Elisha Goldstein, PhD. He is a clinical psychologist in private practice in West Los Angeles.


Catch up on other posts by Elisha Goldstein, Ph.D. (or subscribe to their feed).
  


Latest Articles on Psych Central
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OCD and the Need for Reassurance
Is Liking Your Therapist Enough?





APA Reference
Goldstein, E. (2013). Breaking Bad Habits: Interview with Dan Goleman and Tara Bennett-Goleman. Psych Central. Retrieved on June 29, 2013, from http://blogs.psychcentral.com/mindfulness/2013/05/breaking-bad-habits-interview-with-dan-goleman-and-tara-bennett-goleman/





Mindfulness & Psychotherapy

About
Elisha Goldstein, Ph.D.

Mindful Solutions for Stress, Anxiety, and Depression
Mindful Solutions for Addiction and Relapse Prevention
Mindfulness, Anxiety, and Stress
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Books and CDs by Dr. Elisha Goldstein:








Meditation


A thought is sometimes like a wasp, if you force it away it can react aggressively, but if you let it be it will gently fly away.
- anon.

 
Bring your attention to your body and not to concepts of your body if you want to engage with who you really are 


RethinkMentalIllness ‏@Rethink_27 Jun

"One in three absences at work due to anxiety and stress" http://ow.ly/mqK65 via @telegraph



If you won’t let yourself feel it, then you’ll never understand it.

"the seed of hope blooms into something beautiful"

THERE IS HOPE AND WHERE THERE IS HOPE THERE IS STRENGTH



Mindfulness - Prof Mark Williams Lecture


Published on Apr 3, 2012


Science Oxford Live March 2012. Professor Mark Williams from Oxford University delivers a lecture to the public about the science of mindfulness. Find Science Oxford here: www.scienceoxford.com www.twitter.com/scienceoxford


Category - Education

License - Creative Commons Attribution license (reuse allowed)

 LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAy_3Ssyqqg



 OxfordMindfulness·https://www.youtube.com/user/OxfordMindfulness/videos

Website:
http://www.oxfordmindfulness.org/

Friday, June 28, 2013

Mindfulness is changing the face of health and humanity.


Called a “social phenomenon” by its leading advocate, Jon Kabat-Zinnmindfulness is changing the face of health and humanity.

The audience who had gathered to hear Jon Kabat-Zinn speak were stilled to a meditative silence: eyes shut, minds open, eager to know more about the power of the here and now and how it could change their lives for the better, forever.

The 68-year-old, who founded the famous Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Programme in the US, appeared at the Friends Meeting House, Euston, London for an event organised by the Action for Happiness movement.

“You’re part of a community, a community which is growing at a momentous ...” he says.

Kabat-Zinn’s journey began in 1965 when he discovered Zen Buddhism. 

He does not call himself a Buddhist, however. “Not even Buddha called himself a Buddhist,” he says. 

Now he is at the forefront of spreading meditation across the western world.

“It is what distinguishes us from other animals — being aware of being aware.

We are, after all, human beings, not human doings”



Wholeheartedly promoting mindfulness’s achievements in science, and acting as one of the leaders of the dialogue between science and Buddhism – in which the Dalai Lama has been an enthusiastic participant – Kabat-Zinn says: 

“We have much leverage on the physical effects on the body, right down to the DNA – much more than you could imagine.” 

He noted the work of Elizabeth Blackburn, the Australian who has won a Nobel Prize in Biology for her work on the correlations between the Telomerase enzyme and mindfulness, which suggests practicing mindfulness could also be the answer to anti-ageing.

“[Mindfulness is] stress-busting, increasing positive states and decreasing stress conditions which may in turn slow the rate of cellular ageing, 

reads Blackburn’s paper on the research, titled To Age or Not to Age.

Kabat-Zinn has also been collaborating with psychologists in the UK who have adapted his work for Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy, which has won recognition from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence as a treatment for depression.

How do you practice mindfulness?

“Let’s take a little minute to tap into being here,” says Kabat-Zinn. 

“Awareness, awareness, and awareness, minute by minute by minute and breath by breath by breath as you sit here in the present-to-present-to-

present without trying to get anywhere, just simply being with your experience as it’s unfolding.”

Kabat-Zinn passed his own mindfulness tips on to the audience: 

“Every morning, breathe in the day, and do what you need to do: sit down with your mind and body. How long will it be before your first thought?

“When you’re showering, check you’re in the shower, or are you allowing your work to come into the shower with you? Before you know it, everyone at work is in the shower with you." 

"Be aware and rest in your own awareness; put a welcome mat out for things just as they are.”


by Naomi Tolley reports from London


........................................................


Dr. Elizabeth H. Blackburn, Morris Herzstein Professor in Biology and Physiology in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of California, San Francisco, is a leader in the area of telomere and telomerase research.

She discovered the molecular nature of telomeres - the ends of eukaryotic chromosomes that serve as protective caps essential for preserving the genetic information - and the ribonucleoprotein enzyme, telomerase. Blackburn and her research team at the University of California, San Francisco are working with various cells including human cells, with the goal of understanding telomerase and telomere biology.

Blackburn earned her B.Sc. (1970) and M.Sc. (1972) degrees from the University of Melbourne in Australia, and her Ph.D. (1975) from the University of Cambridge in England. She did her postdoctoral work in Molecular and Cellular Biology from 1975 to 1977 at Yale.

In 1978, Blackburn joined the faculty at the University of California at Berkeley in the Department of Molecular Biology. In 1990, she joined the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at UC San Francisco, where she served as Department Chair from 1993 to 1999.

Blackburn is currently a faculty member in Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at UCSF. She is also a Non-Resident Fellow of the Salk Institute.


Overview

Telomerase,
 a specialized ribonucleprotein reverse transcriptase, is important for long-term eukaryotic cell proliferation and genomic stability, because it replenishes the DNA at telomeres. Thus depending on cell type telomerase partially or completely (depending on cell type) counteracts the progressive shortening of telomeres that otherwise occurs.

Telomerase is highly active in many human malignancies, and a potential target for anti-cancer approaches.

Furthermore, recent collaborative studies have shown the relationship between accelerated telomere shortening and life stress and that low telomerase levels are associated with six prominent risk factors for cardiovascular disease.




Chromosome Ends and Diseases of Aging



Uploaded on Jul 18, 2008



UCSF Professor Elizabeth Blackburn explores the effects of aging on a cellular level.
Series: Osher Lifelong Learning Presents [7/2008] [Health and Medicine] [Show ID: 14535]

Professor Blackburn just won the 2009 Nobel Prize in medicine (along with Carol Greider (of Johns Hopkins) and Jack Szostak (of Harvard University Medical School).

Category - Education

License - Standard YouTube License

Link: http://youtu.be/b70Hh6Hk4gc
...............................................................

Source:  http://positivenews.org.uk/2013/wellbeing/12051/mindfulness-sweeping-western-world-at-momentous-rate-pioneer/



Dr. Elizabeth H. Blackburn:
http://biochemistry.ucsf.edu/labs/blackburn/index.php?Itemid=3



Mindfulness Meditation Body Scan 15 minutes

Uploaded on Apr 24, 2011


This is a mindfulness meditation body scan. This is a great place to start your meditation practice. It is also a good exercise if you feel your thoughts are spinning or if you are having trouble sleeping. 

For more information on the benefits of meditation, go to trainyourbrainmeditation.com email me, Lara Patriquin, at larapatriquin@gmail.com.


Category - Education

License - Standard YouTube License






Thursday, June 27, 2013

Zebrafish Offer Potential To Identify New Genes And Drugs For Multiple Sclerosis



Myelin, the fatty coating that protects neurons in the brain and spinal cord, is destroyed in diseases such as multiple sclerosis

Researchers have been striving to determine whether oligodendrocytes, the cells that produce myelin, can be stimulated to make new myelin. 

Using live imaging in zebrafish to track oligodendrocytes in real time, researchers reporting in the Cell Press journal Developmental Cell discovered that individual oligodendrocytes coat neurons with myelin for only five hours after they are born. If the findings hold true in humans, they could lead to new treatment strategies for multiple sclerosis.

"The study could help improve our understanding of the triggers needed to encourage cells to produce myelin," says senior author Dr. David Lyons, of the University of Edinburgh, UK. For example, if scientists could determine what is blocking the cells from making myelin after five hours, they might be able to remove that blockage. Alternatively, treatments could focus on creating more new oligodendrocytes rather than trying to stimulate existing oligodendrocytes.

Dr. Lyons and his team used zebrafish to study the formation of myelin sheaths by oligodendrocytes because this laboratory animal is transparent at early stages of its development, which allows investigators to directly observe cells within the organism. It is also known that zebrafish and humans have very similar genes, and these similarities extend to more than 80% of the genes associated with human disease. Zebrafish therefore respond in very similar ways to most drugs used for therapeutic purposes in humans.

"In the future, zebrafish will be used to identify new genes and drugs that can influence myelin formation and myelin repair," says Dr. Lyons.


Additional
Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release. Click 'references' tab above for source.
Visit our multiple sclerosis section for the latest news on this subject.
Developmental Cell, Czopka et al.: "Individual oligodendrocytes have only a few hours in which to generate new myelin sheaths in vivo."
Citations
MLA
Press, Cell. "Zebrafish Offer Potential To Identify New Genes And Drugs For Multiple Sclerosis."Medical News Today. MediLexicon, Intl., 26 Jun. 2013. Web.
26 Jun. 2013.


Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release. Click 'references' tab above for source.

Saturday, June 22, 2013

Brain Freeze



Why do we get Brain Freeze? [Sphenopalatine Ganglioneuralgia]


Have you ever wondered why you get “brain freeze” when you eat something cold such as ice cream or a milkshake? That sudden pain in your forehead is known in medicine as sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia.

It is caused by having something cold touch the roof of the mouth (palate), or the total immersion in water that is generally below 15°C (or 10°C or even 5°C for some acclimated open water swimmers). It is believed to result from a nerve response causing rapid constriction and swelling of blood vessels or a “referring” of pain from the roof of the mouth to the head.


An ice cream headache is the direct result of the rapid cooling and rewarming of the capillaries in the sinuses. 
A similar but painless blood vessel response causes the face to appear “flushed” after being outside on a cold day. In both instances, the cold temperature causes the capillaries in the sinuses to constrict and then experience extreme rebound dilation as they warm up again.
In the palate, this dilation is sensed by nearby pain receptors, which then send signals back to the brain via the trigeminal nerve, one of the major nerves of the facial area. This nerve also senses facial pain, so as the neural signals are conducted the brain interprets the pain as coming from the forehead—the same “referred pain” phenomenon seen in heart attacks. 

Brain-freeze pain may last from a few seconds to a few minutes. Research suggests that the same vascular mechanism and nerve implicated in “brain freeze” cause the aura (sensory disturbance) and pulsatile (throbbing pain) phases of migraines.

How do we stop brain freeze? WikiHow explains.
Find more interesting stories on the official Neuroscience Facebook page

How do we stop brain freeze? WikiHow explains.

Find more interesting stories on the official Neuroscience Facebook page


Source:  http://wisciblog.com/2012/05/29/why-do-we-get-brain-freeze-sphenopalatine-ganglioneuralgia/

..................................................

Levity never hurts a person thus, this funny article is included here for your enjoyment.


Always laugh when you can. It is cheap medicine. 

— Lord Byron


Green tea boosts brain cell production to aid memory



Brainy beverage: Study explains how green tea boosts brain cell production to aid memory 

http://goo.gl/dBlr8









Source:  https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=357017187713434&set=a.159591030789385.40195.139688176113004&type=1&permPage=1








Friday, June 21, 2013

Insanity Explained







Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Albert Einstein


Insanity is relative. It depends on who has who locked in what cage. 
 Ray Bradbury






Guillaume Duchenne de Boulogne performing facial electrostimulus experiments.jpg

Duchenne de Boulogne (1801 - 1875)  
category:medecine

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/File:Guillaume_Duchenne_de_Boulogne_performing_facial_electrostimulus_experiments.jpg



Quotes




We're born alone, we live alone, we die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we're not alone.
Orson Welles


Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.
Albert Einstein


The distinction between the past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.
Albert Einstein



The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.
George Bernard Shaw


Illusion is the first of all pleasures.
Oscar Wilde


Is not this whole world an illusion? And yet it fools everybody.
Angela Carter


A system of morality which is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true.
Socrates



There are as many pillows of illusion as flakes in a snow-storm. We wake from one dream into another dream.
Ralph Waldo Emerson



There is an optical illusion about every person we meet.
Ralph Waldo Emerson


Limits, like fear, are often an illusion.
Michael Jordan


Do not be misled by what you see around you, or be influenced by what you see. You live in a world which is a playground of illusion, full of false paths, false values and false ideals. But you are not part of that world.
Sai Baba


Love matches, so called, have illusion for their father and need for their mother.
Friedrich Nietzsche


A house must be built on solid foundations if it is to last. The same principle applies to man, otherwise he too will sink back into the soft ground and becomes swallowed up by the world of illusion.
Sai Baba


There can be no greater error than to expect, or calculate, upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.
George Washington

We cast away priceless time in dreams, born of imagination, fed upon illusion, and put to death by reality.
Judy Garland


Everything's fine today, that is our illusion.
Voltaire


Illusion is the first of all pleasures.Voltaire


What if everything is an illusion and nothing exists? In that case, I definitely overpaid for my carpet.
Woody Allen


The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge.
Daniel J. Boorstin


Religion is an illusion and it derives its strength from the fact that it falls in with our instinctual desires.
Sigmund Freud


Decorate your home. It gives the illusion that your life is more interesting than it really is.
Charles M. Schulz


Tradition is the illusion of permanance.
Woody Allen


If we choose, we can live in a world of comforting illusion.
Noam Chomsky


Truly it is an evil to be full of faults; but it is a still greater evil to be full of them and to be unwilling to recognize them, since that is to add the further fault of a voluntary illusion.
Blaise Pascal


Illusion is needed to disguise the emptiness within.
Arthur Erickson


Who knows what true loneliness is - not the conventional word but the naked terror? To the lonely themselves it wears a mask. The most miserable outcast hugs some memory or some illusion.
Joseph Conrad


Much violence is based on the illusion that life is a property to be defended and not to be shared.
Henri Nouwen


Romantic love is an illusion. Most of us discover this truth at the end of a love affair or else when the sweet emotions of love lead us into marriage and then turn down their flames.
Thomas Moore


A man's wife is his compromise with the illusion of his first sweetheart.
George Jean Nathan


In our natural state, we are glorious beings. In the world of illusion, we are lost and imprisoned, slaves to our appetites and our will to false power.
Marianne Williamson


The writer must believe that what he is doing is the most important thing in the world. And he must hold to this illusion even when he knows it is not true.
John Steinbeck


It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it.
W. Somerset Maugham


a curve is an optical illusion, a screwball can be a pitch or a person, stealing is legal and you can spit anywhere you like except in the umpire's eye or on the ball.James Patrick Murray



We were talking about the space between us all and the people who hide themselves behind a wall of illusion. Never glimpse the truth - then it's far too late when they pass away.
George Harrison


Whatever happens in the world is real, what one thinks should have happened is projection. We suffer more from our fictitious illusion and expectations of reality.
Jacque Fresco


What is life? A madness. What is life? An illusion, a shadow, a story. And the greatest good is little enough; for all life is a dream, and dreams themselves are only dreams.
Pedro Calderon de la Barca


Lost Illusion is the undisclosed title of every novel.
Andre Maurois


If you can talk brilliantly about a problem, it can create the consoling illusion that it has been mastered.
Stanley Kubrick


I think I meant that, given the circumstances of my childhood, I had the illusion that it's easier to be alone. To have your relationships be casual and also to pose as a solitary person, because it was more romantic. You know, I was raised on the idea of the ramblin' man and the loner.
Steve Martin


Art has a double face, of expression and illusion, just like science has a double face: the reality of error and the phantom of truth.
Publilius Syrus


Now I believe I can hear the philosophers protesting that it can only be misery to live in folly, illusion, deception and ignorance, but it isn't -it's human.
Desiderius Erasmus


If you understand hallucination and illusion, you don't blindly follow any leader. You must know if the person is sane or insane, over the abyss.
Marguerite Young


If time is not real, then the dividing line between this world and eternity, between suffering and bliss, between good and evil, is also an illusion.
Herman Hesse


Perhaps I am doomed to retrace my steps under the illusion that I am exploring, doomed to try and learn what I should simply recognize, learning a mere fraction of what I have forgotten.
Andre Breton

Painting is an illusion, a piece of magic, so what you see is not what you see.
Philip Guston


The secret to film is that it's an illusion.
George Lucas


The House of Lords, an illusion to which I have never been able to subscribe - responsibility without power, the prerogative of the eunuch throughout the ages.
Tom Stoppard

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Baby Dinosaurs ~ Great Egret Chicks






e EcoInteractive 24 May
Baby Dinosaurs ~ Great Egret Chicks ~ pic.twitter.com/55asFsPKIu


 

Quotes




We're born alone, we live alone, we die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we're not alone.
Orson Welles


Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.
Albert Einstein


The distinction between the past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.
Albert Einstein



The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.
George Bernard Shaw


Illusion is the first of all pleasures.
Oscar Wilde


Is not this whole world an illusion? And yet it fools everybody.
Angela Carter


A system of morality which is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true.
Socrates



There are as many pillows of illusion as flakes in a snow-storm. We wake from one dream into another dream.
Ralph Waldo Emerson



There is an optical illusion about every person we meet.
Ralph Waldo Emerson


Limits, like fear, are often an illusion.
Michael Jordan


Do not be misled by what you see around you, or be influenced by what you see. You live in a world which is a playground of illusion, full of false paths, false values and false ideals. But you are not part of that world.
Sai Baba


Love matches, so called, have illusion for their father and need for their mother.
Friedrich Nietzsche


A house must be built on solid foundations if it is to last. The same principle applies to man, otherwise he too will sink back into the soft ground and becomes swallowed up by the world of illusion.
Sai Baba


There can be no greater error than to expect, or calculate, upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.
George Washington

We cast away priceless time in dreams, born of imagination, fed upon illusion, and put to death by reality.
Judy Garland


Everything's fine today, that is our illusion.
Voltaire


Illusion is the first of all pleasures.Voltaire


What if everything is an illusion and nothing exists? In that case, I definitely overpaid for my carpet.
Woody Allen


The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge.
Daniel J. Boorstin


Religion is an illusion and it derives its strength from the fact that it falls in with our instinctual desires.
Sigmund Freud


Decorate your home. It gives the illusion that your life is more interesting than it really is.
Charles M. Schulz


Tradition is the illusion of permanance.
Woody Allen


If we choose, we can live in a world of comforting illusion.
Noam Chomsky


Truly it is an evil to be full of faults; but it is a still greater evil to be full of them and to be unwilling to recognize them, since that is to add the further fault of a voluntary illusion.
Blaise Pascal


Illusion is needed to disguise the emptiness within.
Arthur Erickson


Who knows what true loneliness is - not the conventional word but the naked terror? To the lonely themselves it wears a mask. The most miserable outcast hugs some memory or some illusion.
Joseph Conrad


Much violence is based on the illusion that life is a property to be defended and not to be shared.
Henri Nouwen


Romantic love is an illusion. Most of us discover this truth at the end of a love affair or else when the sweet emotions of love lead us into marriage and then turn down their flames.
Thomas Moore


A man's wife is his compromise with the illusion of his first sweetheart.
George Jean Nathan


In our natural state, we are glorious beings. In the world of illusion, we are lost and imprisoned, slaves to our appetites and our will to false power.
Marianne Williamson


The writer must believe that what he is doing is the most important thing in the world. And he must hold to this illusion even when he knows it is not true.
John Steinbeck


It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it.
W. Somerset Maugham


a curve is an optical illusion, a screwball can be a pitch or a person, stealing is legal and you can spit anywhere you like except in the umpire's eye or on the ball.James Patrick Murray



We were talking about the space between us all and the people who hide themselves behind a wall of illusion. Never glimpse the truth - then it's far too late when they pass away.
George Harrison


Whatever happens in the world is real, what one thinks should have happened is projection. We suffer more from our fictitious illusion and expectations of reality.
Jacque Fresco


What is life? A madness. What is life? An illusion, a shadow, a story. And the greatest good is little enough; for all life is a dream, and dreams themselves are only dreams.
Pedro Calderon de la Barca


Lost Illusion is the undisclosed title of every novel.
Andre Maurois


If you can talk brilliantly about a problem, it can create the consoling illusion that it has been mastered.
Stanley Kubrick


I think I meant that, given the circumstances of my childhood, I had the illusion that it's easier to be alone. To have your relationships be casual and also to pose as a solitary person, because it was more romantic. You know, I was raised on the idea of the ramblin' man and the loner.
Steve Martin


Art has a double face, of expression and illusion, just like science has a double face: the reality of error and the phantom of truth.
Publilius Syrus


Now I believe I can hear the philosophers protesting that it can only be misery to live in folly, illusion, deception and ignorance, but it isn't -it's human.
Desiderius Erasmus


If you understand hallucination and illusion, you don't blindly follow any leader. You must know if the person is sane or insane, over the abyss.
Marguerite Young


If time is not real, then the dividing line between this world and eternity, between suffering and bliss, between good and evil, is also an illusion.
Herman Hesse


Perhaps I am doomed to retrace my steps under the illusion that I am exploring, doomed to try and learn what I should simply recognize, learning a mere fraction of what I have forgotten.
Andre Breton

Painting is an illusion, a piece of magic, so what you see is not what you see.
Philip Guston


The secret to film is that it's an illusion.
George Lucas


The House of Lords, an illusion to which I have never been able to subscribe - responsibility without power, the prerogative of the eunuch throughout the ages.
Tom Stoppard

Burning Desire






Move over Mediterranean—a vegetarian diet is equally good for health






When you think of the Mediterranean these days, the region’s azure waters, rich history, and lively cultures may not come to mind. Instead, you may first think of the Mediterranean diet. This heart- and brain-healthy diet includes olive oil, fruits, vegetables, nuts and fish; occasional red meat; and a moderate amount of cheese and wine. Most doctors and nutrition experts I interview for the Harvard Health Letter tell me that the evidence points to a Mediterranean diet as the very best for our health. But there’s another diet that appears to be equally good: a vegetarian diet.

A study published this week in JAMA Internal Medicine found that people who ate a vegetarian diet were 12% less likely to have died over the course of the five-year study than nonvegetarians. The researchers, from Loma Linda University in California, noted that the benefits of a vegetarian diet were especially good for men, who had a significant reduction in heart disease. Keep in mind that the study couldn’t prove that a vegetarian diet caused good health—it’s possible that it was something else that vegetarians did and nonvegetarians didn’t do that made the difference.

The fact that vegetarian diets are good for you isn’t new. They have long been linked to reduced risk for hypertension, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, and heart disease. This one underscores the idea that meat consumption influences long-term health. “A diet with meat in it raises the risk of heart disease and cancer, when compared with a vegetarian diet,” says cardiologist Dr. Deepak Bhatt, a Harvard Medical School professor. Red meat and processed meats appear to be the worst offenders as far as boosting the risk of cardiovascular disease or cancer.

Dr. Bhatt told me that he is a vegetarian—meaning that he doesn’t eat meat—and he personally feels that a vegetarian diet is the way to go for environmental and ethical reasons. He also feels it’s a healthy way to eat.
A personal decision

Should you consider forgetting the Mediterranean diet and becoming a vegetarian instead? There isn’t much high-quality data from comparing different types of healthy diets against each other. There is good evidence that following either a Mediterranean diet or a vegetarian diet—which share many common features—can lower cardiovascular risk. “The bottom line is that either type of diet is healthier than the typical American diet,” says Dr. Bhatt. So it’s really a matter of personal choice.

It’s also a matter of determining what kind of vegetarian you want to be. A vegetarian diet can take a number of forms. A vegan diet excludes all animal products (no meat, poultry, fish, eggs, dairy or gelatin). Other more liberal interpretations include a pesco-vegetariandiet, which includes seafood; a lacto-ovo-vegetarian diet, which includes dairy and egg products; a lacto-vegetarian diet, which includes dairy products; and an ovo-vegetariandiet, which includes eggs.

With all of that variety, you’ll need to assess your eating style and determine which fits in best with your lifestyle and personal beliefs.

It’s also important to consider your nutritional needs, warns Dr. Bhatt. Vegetarian diets that include only raw fruits and vegetables can lead to nutrient deficiencies. Without meat or dairy, you may run the risk of not getting enough protein, calcium or vitamin B12. You can get all the protein you need from plant sources, such as peas, beans, lentils, chickpeas, seeds, nuts, soy products, and whole grains such as wheat, oats, barley, and brown rice. You can get calcium from plant sources, such as bok choy, broccoli, Chinese cabbage, collards, and kale. And you can get vitamin B12 from soy and rice drinks, and fortified breakfast cereals.

It’s also important to remember that even with a vegetarian diet, calories still matter and consuming too many—even if they are meat-free—is bad for health.

Becoming a vegetarian will require you to pay more attention to your nutrition, which is a good thing. But it’s also a bit of work, so don’t hesitate to get some advice from your doctor or a dietitian before proceeding. If you want to go with a Mediterranean diet, that’s a good thing, too, and probably easier for many people. Again, it’s a personal choice.

Future research on vegetarian, Mediterranean, and other beneficial diets should examine what is it about these diets that makes them good for us. As Dr. Robert Baron, professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco wrote in an editorialaccompanying the Loma Linda study, “Our debates about the superiority of one diet over another have not served the public well. It is time to acknowledge the common features of diets associated with good clinical outcomes.”