Archive for the 'Health' Category
“…a familiar line spouted by Americans these days is, ‘Why should the US curb energy consumption, when India and China are guzzling petrol and polluting the whole globe?’…”
California consumes more petrol than India!
Amazing Stat: California Uses More Gas than China
The brain consolidates learned experiences and harden up weak memories which otherwise might fade in time. “People complain about sleep deprivation, but now with the 24/7 society and information overload we need our sleep more than ever.”
Sleeping soundly ‘boosts memory’
People who are bicultural and speak two languages may unconsciously change their personality when they switch languages, according to a U.S. study.
Switching languages can also switch personality: study
Cancer patient’s tumours vanished within two months after being injected with billions of his own cloned immune cells.
Cloned immune cells cleared patient’s cancer
Scientists are beginning to uncover evidence that meditation has a tangible effect on the brain — there is evidence that meditation changes brain structures.
Scientists probe meditation secrets
With the right kit and a little know-how, it is possible to hack into a pacemaker and take control.
Scientists Demonstrate Deadly WiFi Pacemaker Hack (research paper)
‘Mike Hall has taught himself to stretch time. He uses his powers to make him a better squash player. “It’s hard to describe, but it’s a feeling of stillness, like I’m not trapped in sequential time any more,” he says. “The ball still darts around, but it moves around the court at different speeds depending [...]
Chemicals, contaminants, pollution, price: new reasons to rethink what you drink and beware of bottled water.
Bottled Water Vs. Tap Water
The best places to be…
The World’s Happiest Countries
Best Places to Raise Your Kids
The Best and Worst Housing Markets 2007
The Biggest Metro Areas with the Lowest Rents
A ninety minute daytime nap helps speed up the process of long term memory consolidation, a recent study conducted by Prof. Avi Karni and Dr. Maria Korman of the Center for Brain and Behavior Research at the University of Haifa found. The research was published in the scientific journal Nature Neuroscience. “We still don’t know [...]
IF, it seems impossible to do basic work you know you’re capable of, you find it hard to relax, everything seems gray and pointless, what was once fun and challenging feel stupid and annoying or perhaps the things that used to motivate or move you don’t resonate at all, you might be suffering a ‘creative [...]
“India has emerged the most popular destination for British patients wanting to undergo surgery for ailments that would otherwise take months to treat in the National Health Service (NHS).”
“Several websites based in India and Britain act as a single-window facility to arrange treatment for British nationals. Many of them return home, singing praises to the [...]
Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) have designed a 71-story, 2.2-million-square-foot net-zero-energy-skyscraper called Pearl River Tower as the headquarters of CNTC Guangdong Tobacco Company in new city of Guangzhou, China. The high-tech design employs four ways to make it environmentally friendly: reduction, reclamation, absorption and generation. Check the link for pictures. - [via BD4D]
SOM’s Pearl River [...]
“Workers face a potential health threat from office laser printers that emit large amounts of tiny particles into the air, an Australian research team has found.
Potential effects range from respiratory irritation to effects on the cardiovascular system and cancer, says author Professor Lidia Morawska from the Queensland University of Technology.” - Discovery News
Laser Printers a [...]
“The design, unveiled at the Offsite 2007 exhibition in Watford, meets rules to be applied in 2016 that aim to make UK homes more energy-efficient.”
“The home generates all its own energy - and when you’re away on holiday can send electricity back to the National Grid. The company says its annual energy bill would be [...]
A study in the New England Journal of Medicine shows that more than a half-million people a year who have chest pain are getting unnecessary or premature angioplasty to unclog their arteries. The study says angioplasty, which uses a balloon to pry open a blocked artery and a stent to hold it open, is no [...]
“we present the 10 technologies we find most exciting — and most likely to alter industries, fields of research, and even the way we live.”
10 Emerging Technologies 2007 (2006)
Simplification and availability of information enables us to do bigger/better things. “(Scientists should) take their scientific studies, market them better and make them readily accessible to the world. That way, the world might have a better chance at solving problems like energy consumption, poverty and global climate change.”
Google’s Page urges scientists to market themselves
Researchers at University of California have developed retinal implants creating a bionic eye, enabling the blind people to retore their visual capabilities. The resolution is poor due to early days, but has great potential.
Bionic eye implants look ahead
An interesting survey of 54,240 students applying to British universities; popular opinions amongst the students or our future leaders are:
thinks of itself as more materialistic, more affected by crime and less healthy than its parents’ generation, and more worried about what the future holds;
thinks the effects of climate change will be hitting hard by 2031;
and [...]
Would you believe me if I said the livestock sector generates more emissions than from all of the world’s transportation combined!? “Producing a calorie of meat protein means burning more than ten times as much fossil fuels.”
Vegetarian is the New Prius
In much of the world, buying and selling organs is a crime. So what does someone in need of an organ do? The demand for transplants can’t be met by altruistic organ banks, so Internet brokers are stepping in the breach. Its not a pretty picture. Richard C. Morais at Forbes makes an interesting point.
Desperate [...]
A lot of controversy surrounds Swami Ramdev, but there is no doubt that he has re-invented Yoga and Pranayam by bringing it to masses - no less than several million people! Personally, I fully concur with his critical views on soft drinks, in particular ones that contain aspartame, which can lead to several fatal diseases.
Re-inventing [...]
No prizes for guessing the top entry, it’s proof for Poincaré Conjecture. The runners-up are thus more interesting. Original link via BBC.
Breakthrough of the year: The Runners-up
Seeking to assess the effect of third-party prayer on patient outcomes, investigators found no evidence for divine intervention. They did, however, detect a possible proof for the power of negative thinking. Patients who were prayed for and knew it experienced a higher rate of postsurgical heart arrhythmias (59 versus 52 percent of unaware subjects).
American Heart [...]
