pathwayBuongiorno!!

This blog comes to you as I’m in Italy!

I’ve set my scheduler so that my devoted readers wouldn’t miss out on feeding your beautiful brains with knowledge.

Below is a summary of some of my favorite reads from scientific journals, blogs, newsletters, and articles.

 

Here they are by topic, the excerpts are below:

Health

  • Biological Aging and Looks
  • More Bad News For Mammography
  • Breastfeeding and Health Arteries
  • A New Genetic Fertility Test for Men
  • Blood Sugar Bad On Brain
  • Lifestyle and Drugs for Heart Failure- Both work?
  • Kindness Helps Anxiety
  • Gross Science Fact- Can Poop Cure an Illness?
  • Of Fish, Fatness, and Genes
  • Sitting and Cancer Risk in Females
  • Exercise and Weight Loss- More May Be Better for Fat Loss
  • Problems with Sleep, Maybe Good to Talk About It
  • Minerals, Migraines, and Metals!
  • US Top Hospitals for 2015
  • Choosing Wisely in Newborns- Avoiding the Unnecessary

Nutrigenomics

  • Why These Med Students Are Heading to the Kitchen (NPR, July 1 2015)
  • How Sugar Made Rodents Study-Microbiome Connection
  • Food as Medicine
  • GMO’s- A Formaldehyde Factory
  • Good News For the Hearts of Those Who Eat Veggies, Fruits, and Like Vitamin C

Medication Updates & Precautions

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HEALTH

Biological Aging and Looks

A study of 38-year-olds in New Zealand found their “biological age” — the state of their organs, immune system, heart health and chromosomes — ranged from as young as 30 to as old as 60. And the older their biological age, the older they looked, the researchers added. (Health Day, July 6, 2015)

 

More Bad News For Mammography

Regarding incidence, there is no question that we have seen a dramatic increase in the incidence of ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) since the introduction of screening mammography. In the study by Harding et al,1 a higher incidence of DCIS and invasive breast cancer was observed in areas in which mammography was more common. Furthermore, the investigators found that increased incidence of smaller tumors (?2 cm) in areas with more screening was not counterbalanced by a decline in the incidence of larger tumors. These findings, together with their nonsignificant mortality result, led the investigators to conclude that mammography screening is leading to overdiagnosis.

JAMA, July 6, 2015, invited commentary

Article link JAMA, July 6, 2015.

 

Breastfeeding and Healthy Arteries

WEDNESDAY, July 8, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Young women who breast-feed may have healthier-looking arteries years later, compared with those who bottle-feed their babies, a new study finds.

It has long been reported that breast-feeding is the healthiest option for babies. The study, published in the August issue of Obstetrics & Gynecology, hints at another potential health benefit from breast-feeding. But researchers also stressed that the findings do not prove cause-and-effect.

What the study did show: Of over 800 U.S. women who gave birth at least once, those who breast-fed for a longer period of time had less thickening in the carotid artery wall once they’d reached middle age.

 

A New Genetic Test for Infertility In Men

WEDNESDAY, July 8, 2015 (HealthDay News) — A new genetic test for sperm could help determine whether a couple should resort to in vitro fertilization to conceive a child, researchers say.

Men whose sperm lack critical RNA elements tend to have lower chances of naturally conceiving a child, according to study findings published July 8 in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

 

Blood Sugar Bad on Brain

WEDNESDAY, July 8, 2015 (HealthDay News) — In as little as two years, people with type 2 diabetes may develop problems with blood flow in the brain, which could lower their thinking and memory skills, a small study suggests.

“Our major finding is we have linked the acceleration of the cognitive decline to impaired blood flow regulation in the brain,” said senior study author Dr. Vera Novak, an associate professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School in Boston.

The problem the researchers found was with dilation of the blood vessels, which allows more blood to flow through the brain. Adequate amounts of blood are crucial for thinking skills and other activities.

 

Kindness Can Help Anxiety

The four-week study involved 115 undergraduate students with high levels of social anxiety. The students were randomly divided into three groups. The first group was told to perform acts of kindness, such as doing a roommate’s dishes, mowing a neighbor’s lawn, or donating to a charity. The second group was exposed social interactions, but instructed to not engage in good deeds. The third group recorded what happened daily but these participants were not give any specific instructions on how to interact with others. The study revealed the group that engaged in acts of kindness had the greatest reduction in their desire to avoid social interactions. This was especially true during the first part of the intervention, the study found. (Health Day, June 10, 2015)

 

Gross Science Fact

Binge-Eating Fish & Fat Humans

MONDAY, July 13, 2015 (HealthDay News) — A species of fat, binge-eating fish share a specific gene mutation with some obese people who are constantly hungry, a new study shows. The finding could improve understanding about the link between obesity and health, the researchers said. They discovered the mutation in the MC4R gene of Mexican cavefish, which have adapted to cycles of starvation and food abundance. The study, published online July 13 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, offers new insight into how vertebrates evolved to have different metabolisms from one another.

 

Sitting & Cancer Risk in Women

TUESDAY, July 14, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Lots of time spent sitting may increase a woman’s odds for cancer, but it does not seem to have a similar effect on men, a new study suggests.

“Longer leisure time spent sitting was associated with a higher risk of total cancer risk in women, and specifically with multiple myeloma, breast and ovarian cancers. But sitting time was not associated with cancer risk in men,” concluded a team led by Dr. Alpa Patel, who directs the Cancer Prevention Study-3 at the American Cancer Society.

 

Exercise and Weight Loss- More May Be Better for Women, Study

 In previously inactive postmenopausal women, a 1-year prescription of moderate to vigorous exercise for 300 min/wk was superior to 150 min/wk for reducing total fat and other adiposity measures, especially in obese women. These results suggest additional benefit of higher-volume aerobic exercise for adiposity outcomes and possibly a lower risk of postmenopausal breast cancer. (JAMA. July 16, 2015 doi:10.1001/jamaoncol.2015.2239)
Sleep Problems, Better Talk About It!

 

Minerals, metals, and migraines.…oh my!

Discovering the cause of a migraine can be tricky. Triggers are not only difficult to find but often lead nowhere. A new study finds that certain heavy metals are linked to migraines, along with deficiences in certain minerals.

 

US Top Hospitals 2015

Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston ranked number one in the annual honor roll of best hospitals published by US News & World Report after a 3-year absence from the top spot. The famous Boston hospital topped the list in 2012 and placed second in both 2013 and 2014. The Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, slipped from first place to second place in this year’s rating. Tied for third were Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, and UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles, California. (Medscape, July 21, 2015)

 

Choosing Wisely in Newborns- Avoiding the Unnecessary

 A total of 1648 candidate tests and 1222 treatments were suggested by 1047 survey respondents. After 3 Delphi rounds, the expert panel achieved consensus on the following top 5 items: (1) avoid routine use of antireflux medications for treatment of symptomatic gastroesophageal reflux disease or for treatment of apnea and desaturation in preterm infants, (2) avoid routine continuation of antibiotic therapy beyond 48 hours for initially asymptomatic infants without evidence of bacterial infection, (3) avoid routine use of pneumograms for predischarge assessment of ongoing and/or prolonged apnea of prematurity, (4) avoid routine daily chest radiographs without an indication for intubated infants, and (5) avoid routine screening term-equivalent or discharge brain MRIs in preterm infants.  (Pediatrics, July 20, 2015)

 

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NUTRIGENOMICS

Why These Med Students Are Heading to the Kitchen 

In a bustling kitchen at one of Chicago’s top cooking schools, a student cracks an egg into a wide, stainless steel bowl. But he’s not an aspiring chef. His name is Emmanuel Quaidoo, and he’s a first-year medical student. Quaidoo is working on a spinach and feta frittata, one of the healthy breakfast alternatives he has learned to make. Quaidoo and about a dozen of his University of Chicago classmates are here on a stormy spring night taking a culinary nutrition class they won’t even get credit for. (NPR, July 1 2015)

 

How Sugar Made Rodents Stupid- Will It Do the Same to Us?

  • High-sucrose diet altered more gut bacterial orders and genera than high fat.
  • High-sucrose diet impaired spatial memory and cognitive flexibility.
  • Increased gut Clostridiales was associated with decreased cognitive flexibility.
  • Decreased gut Bacteroidales was associated with decreased cognitive flexibility. (Neuroscience, August 2015)

 

Lifestyle or Drugs for Heart Failure (HF) Things that make you go hmmm…

FDA approves new drug for heart failure while new study says lifestyle is effective for healthy cardiovascular function? (Medscape, July 7 and July 9, 2015)

 

Food As Medicine

TUESDAY, July 14, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Eating a healthy diet was linked to lower death rates from heart disease, cancer and other diseases among low-income adults living in the southeastern United States, a new study reports.

 

Soy GMOs- a Formaldehyde, Glutathione Depleting Factory

Safety assessment of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) is a contentious topic. Proponents of GMOs assert that GMOs are safe since the FDA’s policy of substantial equivalence considers GMOs “equivalent” to their non-GMO counterparts, and argue that genetic modification (GM) is simply an extension of a “natural” process of plant breeding, a form of “genetic modification”, though done over longer time scales. Anti-GMO activists counter that GMOs are unsafe since substantial equivalence is unscientific and outdated since it originates in the 1970s to assess safety of medical devices, which are not comparable to the complexity of biological systems, and contend that targeted GM is not plant breeding. The heart of the debate appears to be on the methodology used to determine criteria for substantial equivalence. Systems biology, which aims to understand complexity of the whole organism, as a system, rather than just studying its parts in a reductionist manner, may provide a framework to determine appropriate criteria, as it recognizes that GM, small or large, may affect emergent properties of the whole system. Herein, a promising computational systems biology method couples known perturbations on five biomolecules caused by the CP4 EPSPS GM of Glycine max L. (soybean), with an integrative model of C1 metabolism and oxidative stress (two molecular systems critical to plant function). The results predict significant accumulation of formaldehyde and concomitant depletion of glutathione in the GMO, suggesting how a “small” and single GM creates “large” and systemic perturbations to molecular systems equilibria. Regulatory agencies, currently reviewing rules for GMO safety, may wish to adopt a systems biology approach using a combination of in silico, computational methods used herein, and subsequent targeted experimental in vitro and in vivo designs, to develop a systems understanding of “equivalence” using biomarkers, such as formaldehyde and glutathione, which predict metabolic disruptions, towards modernizing the safety assessment of GMOs.

Ayyadurai, V.A.S. and Deonikar, P. (2015) Do GMOs Accumulate Formaldehyde and Disrupt Molecular Systems Equilibria? Systems Biology May Provide Answers. Agricultural Sciences, 6, 630-662. doi: 10.4236/as.2015.67062.

 

Good News For the Hearts of Those Who Eat Veggies, Fruits, and Like Vitamin C

High intake of fruit and vegetables was associated with low risk of ischemic heart disease and all-cause mortality. Although the 95% CI for genetically high plasma vitamin C concentrations overlapped 1.0, which made certain statistical inferences difficult, effect sizes were comparable to those for fruit and vegetables intake. Thus, judging by the effect size, our data cannot exclude that a favorable effect of high intake of fruit and vegetables could in part be driven by high vitamin C concentrations. (Am J of Nut, May 2015)