WORLDS THAT NEVER WERE

I missed a significant event this year. I was asleep when the sun appeared to cross celestial equator at 5:51 am, on September 23. As happens only twice a year, the length of day and night were approximately equal over most of the planet. But, summer’s death went unnoticed as I snuggled with Harry, enjoying the luxury of sleeping in on Sunday morning.

The autumnal equinox proclaims the eminent darkness of winter in an event that has been celebrated worldwide for centuries. The autumnal equinox coincides with the last harvest of the year, a time of celebrating the harvest, hunt, and memory of the dead, demonstrating the diversity of religious belief within our common humanity.

Even if, like me, you slept through the autumnal equinox, you may have noticed a tang in the air from the scent of wood fires, goldenrod, and autumn leaves.

Hal Borland wrote, “… some of the rarest days of the year come in September, days when it is comfortably cool but pulsing with life … Days when the sky is clear and clean, when the air is crisp, when the wind is free of dust and not yet full of leaves … we should all be able to go out onto the hills on such days and know that life is fundamentally good … ” (Borland, 1983).

What is so different now, from when Hal Borland wrote so vividly about the seasons in 1940? Global climate changes aside, nature is similar to that of 75 years ago. Yet, we no longer celebrate, or even notice the beauty, strength, and hospitality of the clear, crisp, sunny September days (except to note the lower electric bills in the interim between the operation of the air-conditioner and the furnace).

While the very tilt of our planet dictates the cycles of summer and winter, we work nine to five, complete tasks geared toward success in life, plan parties and fly to places near and far. We are unaware that Earth is orbiting the sun elliptically, spinning on an axis tilted 23.5 degrees in its orbit, leaving the hemispheres at different angles to the sun at different times of the year. Because the sun is our source of light, energy, and heat, the changing intensity and concentration of its rays give rise to the seasons of winter, spring, summer, and fall.

While the Earth spins on its tilted axis and circles the sun, rotating like a gyroscope, it points in a fixed direction continuously — towards a point in space near the North Star — daylight hours become shorter. The morning chorus of finches, wrens, and song sparrows fade. The chirps of cardinals and calls of the nuthatches dwindle, until crickets carry the squeaky melody alone. Hummingbirds make their way to the Outer Banks or Mexico for the winter.

As children prepare costumes for Halloween and parents sip hard cider, the cool nights trigger trees to withdraw vital sap into their trunk and roots, cutting off circulation to leaves. With no new chlorophyll in the leaves, photosynthesis will stop. The old chlorophyll will disintegrate and yellow pigments will color the leaves of sugar maples and birches. Sugars left in the leaves of dogwoods and oaks will oxidize in the sunlight of autumn days, coloring the trees in the reds, blues, and purples of fall.

As the Earth continues its journey around the sun, its energy will be spread over greater areas, finally dispersing into the nakedness of winter. Only the pines and cedars will wear the green of summer. The maples may still flash a few red eaves, but most of their branches will be bare. A few yellow leaves may cling to the rebellious ash and popular.

As Santa Claus visits children around the world, and snow blankets the fallen leaves on the ground, “We should … stand in the open and see bold horizons of faith, stubborn hills of strength, and horizon-wide span of enduring purposes.” (Borland, 1983)

References

Borland, H. (1983). Rare September Days. In B. D. Borland (Ed.), Hal Borland’s Twelve Moons of the Year. New York: Alfred A. Knoph, Inc.

Fall Equinox Celebrations: The First Day of Autumn; September 20 to 23. http://www.religioustolerance.org/fall_equinox.htm

Celebrating the Autumnal Equinox.
http://www.equinox-and-solstice.com/html/autumnal_equinox.html

It’s been awhile since I had time to post an entry to this blog. I’ve managed to start work on a short story loosely based on the events of the past month, but otherwise I’m in survival mode — see previous blog entry. Life happens. Parents — who you thought would live forever — pass away unexpectedly. Furnaces need to be replaced. Cars get banged and need fixing. Doctors want to be paid.

So I decided to write an entry on the effects of stress on the mind, behavior, and the body, including its effects on the immune system and cancer. I learned that tumors grow faster in experimental animals subjected to stress than they do in unstressed control animals. But soon after I started researching the effects of stress, I realized that there were so many that I’d better wait until I had time to write a coherent blog entry on why I’ve been existing in an zombie state.

So I did what I always do to take a break, I started surfing the Net. I decided to post some of the stuff that I found interesting in my brief excursion into current science.

I read that global warming will hit the poorest the hardest. So developing countries that don’t burn fossil fuels or create the environmental crisis will suffer the most. Even global warming is discriminating against the poor. But then I read that total destruction of forests may cool Earth. So maybe global warming is not a problem. What, global warming could make Earth spin faster. My head is spinning faster.

Then I read new thinking about the death of sunlike stars and how old stars could be masquerading as youngsters. I feel old. So I take a break from astronomy and decide to do some reading about health.

I learn that smokers take more sick time than nonsmokers. Well, duh! Who wouldn’t guess that. But then I read about this study that shows that cigarettes may protect against Parkinson’s disease. Should I take up smoking? Might help with my recent stress.

So I surf on and read that attempts to cleanse illicit drugs from one’s body by taking large doses of niacin can cause life-threatening reactions. Bad news for all those marijuana smokers out there. I guess I better not try to use drugs either, to counteract my stress. Perhaps I’ll try food instead. Yes, I found a recipe for healthier pizza. Who knew that cooking pizza longer and hotter could increase the antioxidant activity in the pizza ? Now I’m hungry and I’m no where near an oven. Oh well, back to work.

Effects of climate change tallied up
Increased drought, flood and disease ‘will hit poorest hardest’.

Climate change is having an impact now on our planet and its life, according to the latest installment of a report published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). And the future problems caused by rising seas, growing deserts and more frequent droughts, all look set to affect the developing world more than rich countries, they add.

Total destruction of forests predicted to cool Earth
Large-scale deforestation — long fingered as a contributing factor in climate change — could cool Earth, say the researchers behind one of the first attempts to model the phenomenon at a global scale.

Global warming will make Earth spin faster
Of all the possible ways in which climate change could affect our planet, this is the most bizarre: as the oceans warm up, Earth will start rotating a wee bit faster, reducing the length of a day.

New thinking on the death of sunlike stars
Chemical reactions during formation of stardust could help solve mystery
When stars like our sun die, they bloat to become red giants and then eject gigantic clouds of gas and dust into space. Increasingly, however, scientists found themselves at a profound loss to explain how exactly dying stars could blow away these clouds.

Galaxy’s ‘wunderkind’ stars may actually be old pro’s
‘Young’ stars that seem to have formed impossibly close to our galaxy’s supermassive black hole could in fact be ancient interlopers merely masquerading as youngsters, a new study claims.

Patterns: Smokers Take More Sick Time Than Nonsmokers, Study Says
Smokers take more than a week more annual sick leave than nonsmokers, a new study suggests.

Do coffee and cigarettes protect against Parkinson’s?
People with Parkinson’s disease are less likely to be smokers and coffee drinkers than their healthy siblings, according to a study of family members. The finding adds to a growing body of evidence that some substance in tobacco might protect the brain against this devastating neurological disorder and sheds new light on coffee’s effects on the disease.
Researchers say the study provides new evidence that the causes of Parkinson’s vary. They also stress that the negative health effects of smoking far outweigh any protective effect the substance might have against this neurodegenerative disease.

Not-So-Artful Dodgers: Countering drug tests with niacin proves dangerous
Attempts to hide illicit drug use by taking niacin have landed four people in Philadelphia hospitals over the past 2 years, two with life-threatening reactions to high doses of the nutrient, doctors report.

Niacin, also known as vitamin B3, plays roles in digestion, hormone production, skin upkeep, and nervous system maintenance. Because the vitamin promotes fat metabolism, doctors sometimes give niacin in large doses to people with high concentrations of cholesterol and triglycerides. That property has led some people to believe that niacin can also cleanse the body of illicit drugs, particularly marijuana.

Crusty Chemistry
Want to make a piece of pizza healthier? Try using whole-wheat dough. Give it a full 2 days to rise, and then cook the tomato pie a little longer and hotter than usual. That was the recipe shared last week by researchers at the American Chemical Society meeting in Chicago.

Viagra has evolved from a drug for treating hypertension to a treatment for heart attacks. In 1998, the US Food and Drug Administration approved a new drug for treating male erectile dysfunction, Viagra®, scientifically known as sildenafil citrate. But Viagra began its life as a potential treatment for hypertension, and then angina. When a 10-day high dose study turned up an unusual side effect, Viagra suddenly became a household word. The blue pill provided millions of frustrated men with an alternative to available treatments - injections, implants, and pumps. Unlike other therapies, Viagra has no effect in producing erections in the absence of sexual stimulation.

On March 2, Virginia Commonwealth University researchers reported another positive effect of the little blue pill. Viagra, and Levitra®, generically known as vardenafil, may be better than nitroglycerin in protecting the heart from damage before and after a severe heart attack.

Rakesh C. Kukreja, Ph.D., professor of medicine and Eric Lipman Chair of Cardiology at VCU, and colleagues compared nitroglycerin with two erectile dysfunction drugs – Viagra and Levitra — to determine the effectiveness of each for heart protection following a heart attack. Nitroglycerin is a drug used to treat angina, or chest pain. It is a vasodilator and opens blood vessels in order to improve the flow of blood to a patient’s heart.

The research team reported that in an animal model, sildenafil and vardenafil reduce damage in the heart muscle when given after a severe heart attack. In contrast, nitroglycerin failed to reduce the damage in the heart when administered under similar conditions. Read entire story.

It is important to note that the research team’s report was on an animal model, not humans, although the report does seem promising. On the other hand, Viagra is approved to treat erectile dysfunction, so should it be used by men with heart disease? Men who already have heart disease can risk further heart damage when they have sex. In 2004 the government ordered Pfizer Inc. to pull television ads that promised better sex for men taking Viagra because the TV ads failed to inform viewers of known risks associated with the drug.

Viagra has two actions that may be of consequence in patients with heart disease. First, it can lower the blood pressure. Second, it interacts with nitrates.

Viagra is a vasodilator, and consequently it lowers the systolic blood pressure (the “top” number in blood pressure measurements). In the majority of patients with heart disease, including most of those being treated with antihypertensive drugs, this is not a problem. Patients taking drugs that contain nitrates have been warned not to take Viagra because of sudden, unsafe drops in blood pressure.

The American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association concur that Viagra is safe for men with stable coronary artery disease who are not taking nitrates, but should never be used in patients who are taking nitrates. There are other groups of heart patients for whom Viagra may be potentially dangerous. These include patients with heart failure accompanied by borderline low blood pressure, some patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and possibly, patients on complicated drug regimens for hypertension.

So is Viagra a safe treatment to prevent and reduce damage to the heart muscle? And what new uses for magic blue may we expect in the future?

Information for this blog entry was modified from:
http://www.news.vcu.edu/news.aspx?v=detail&nid=1967
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6495250/
http://heartdisease.about.com/cs/coronarydisease/a/viagraheart.htm
http://www.chemsoc.org/chembytes/ezine/1999/viagra.htm
http://pubs.acs.org/hotartcl/mdd/98/novdec/viagra.html

Over our lifetime, we will put more water into our body than any other kind of food or drink, making the water we drink a major contender in the battle for good health. Even so, we may not know for years whether the water we drink is good or bad for us.

My husband and I have a difference of opinion about the source of the water we drink. He buys his water in bottles and resists drinking out of the tap. I, on the other hand, prefer not to pay anything extra for my water and drink right from the tap. After the umpteenth discussion about our water preferences, I decided to do a little research on the subject and must now swallow my pride and admit that bottled water seems to have a slight safety edge over tap.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulates bottled water because it’s considered a food, although it is important to note that the FDA requires only that the label identify the source of the water, not what’s in it. Conversely, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and state governments regulate tap water. So in choosing bottled over tap, the question becomes would you rather have the FDA or your individual state or local government test your water?

If like me, after a hard workout at the gym, you refresh yourself with cold water from the drinking fountain, you feel fine afterward. Yet, unbeknownst to you, contaminants from the water may be damaging your cells little by little — it could take decades for tests to find cancer or organs to fail.

Drinking water, including bottled water, may contain at least small amounts of some contaminants that may or may not pose a health risk to you. As water across the United States — sources for both tap water and bottled water — travels over the surface of the land or through the ground, it dissolves naturally occurring minerals and, in some cases, radioactive material, and can pick up substances resulting from the presence of animals or from human activity.

The source of Raleigh drinking water is Falls Lake, a man-made lake created by a dam on the Neuse River, located northwest of the City of Raleigh. Falls Lake provides Raleigh with up to 100 million gallons of water a day. In addition, an average of 47 million gallons per day of wastewater begins its journey from kitchen sinks, bathtubs, toilets, washing machines, and dishwashers in the homes and businesses serviced by the City of Raleigh’s wastewater collection and treatment systems.

Upon arrival at the Neuse River Wastewater Treatment Plant, wastewater passes through screens and grit collectors where debris and sand is removed. Next heavy organic solids and grease are removed. Dissolved substances or lighter solids cannot be removed by settling them out, so those substances are converted to solids by microorganisms cultured within aeration basins. The resulting solids are next filtered through sand and coal and the water is disinfected by ultraviolet radiation before being returned to the Neuse River.

I’m not sure I’ll ever drink tap water again.

The Safe Drinking Water Act, passed in 1974 and amended in 1996 with more rigorous standards, requires the EPA to set allowable levels of contaminants in municipal water supplies and to monitor compliance with these standards. Let me say that again — allowable levels of contaminants — including pesticides, radioactive materials, chemicals and bacteria.

Here is what the Safe Drinking Water Act cannot control:

• Many municipal water purification plants are too old or too poor to totally comply with EPA standards.
• There may be contaminants that enter the water supply that are not on the EPA’s hit list, and thus they escape detection.
• Current testing and purification technology may miss some contaminants, which get past filtering systems and enter the water supply.
• Some germs may be resistant to current disinfecting methods. Other germs, such as E.coli and Giardia, are tiny enough to slip through some filtration systems.
• The long-term effects of drinking a gallon of chlorinated water every day for seventy years have not been determined

In the debate of bottled versus tap water, consider the source. If the bottle doesn’t list a source, the contents are probably municipal water. You can always call the 800-number listed on the bottle and ask what the source is.

Consider the tester. Bottled water is regulated by the FDA because it’s considered a food. The International Bottled Water Association includes 85 percent of bottled water processors, and the organization claims to have a stricter code than EPA regulations. A significant factor in nearly all bottled waters is that the water is chlorine-free. Bottled, distilled water is the cleanest water you can buy. For general information about bottled water, call the International Bottled Water Association (800-WATER-11).

The information in this blog was modified from:
Waste Water System Report
Water quality report
AskDrSears.com

CDC Tracks Salmonella to Batch of Peanut Butter

I scanned and then quickly deleted the e-mail that a friend sent me about peanut butters being recalled for possible Salmonella bacteria, thinking she was overreacting to what was probably a hoax. But when I went downstairs to put milk in my coffee, I couldn’t help glancing at our jar of Peter Pan peanut butter in the refrigerator. There couldn’t be any Salmonella bacteria in it, could there? We had eaten 3/4 of the jar.

Then I listened to NPR’s Morning Edition in the car on my way to work, “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has linked peanut butter to a salmonella outbreak that’s sickened almost 300 people since August. No one has died — but dozens of people have been hospitalized … investigators narrowed the outbreak to jars of Peter Pan and Great Value brands of peanut butter made at a processing facility in Georgia. The plant is owned by ConAgra foods, which has now recalled all jars of peanut butter that are labeled with a product code number that begins with 2111.” Read entire story.

What was so surprising to me is that I don’t associate Salmonella with peanut butter. Rather I think of cases like the healthy five-month-old girl who died suddenly after contacting a pet iguana infected with Salmonella or people becoming ill after eating raw eggs. Salmonella in peanut butter sounds too much like an urban legend. Tainted canned goods, poultry, meats, raw eggs, and unprocessed milk, those foods bring the deadly bacteria to mind. Plus, peanuts are roasted in the process of making peanut butter, which would normally kill bacteria. However in the ConAgra plant, it seems some Salmonella cells survived. And it doesn’t take much to cause sickness — one cell of Salmonella could make someone ill. In this new outbreak, it’s unclear whether the peanuts were tainted. Another possibility is that the Salmonella came through cross-contamination in the plant or dirty containers. The FDA has just begun its investigation.

Consumers can get a refund by sending lids and their names and addresses to ConAgra Foods. The address is in the MSNBC.com article, “Massive amounts of peanut butter suspect; salmonella in 39 states.”

Why is the metric system so hard to learn for many American’s? Because the customary inch-pound (I-P) system of measurement is winning the duel for supremacy.

Imagine that you have just completed a 5 K (kilometer) run and decide to drive to the grocery store to buy a sports drink. You’ll clock your speed in miles per hour, not kilometers per hour. Once at the store, you will be able to choose a 12-ounce can, or the next largest size, a 1/2 liter bottle or maybe a 2 liter bottle. If you decided to treat yourself to fast food instead, you could order a quarter-pound burger and a 32 ounce drink. The customary inch-pound measurement system wins this round. We buy our gasoline in the customary unit of gallons and we measure our houses in the same system’s unit of square feet. Yet we measure the fat and carbohydrates in our food in metric grams, while we order steak in restaurants in customary ounces.

Metric or customary? If you want to buy some alcohol to drink while you contemplate the confusion, you can no longer buy a fifth of Jack Daniels (or any other alcohol) in that unit. A fifth was a unit representing 1/5 of a gallon, or 4/5 of a quart. Now a bottle approximately the same size as the fifth is a 750-milliliter bottle. In the conversion to metric, consumers lost 0.2 ounces because a fifth equals 25.6 oz and 750 mL equals only 25.4 oz.

So, it should have been no surprise to me as a middle school science teacher, to learn that standardized tests scores in the area of measurement were low in my school across grades six to eight — it wasn’t just in North Carolina. Across the nation, measurement continues to be a challenging concept to teach.

Yet, I was shocked. As a science teacher, I think in metric. Measuring with meters, grams and milliliters are second nature to me. What could be easier to learn or more fun? Metric works by powers of tens. There are no clunky conversions that inches to feet or ounces to pounds require. Yet, when I looked at the content that middle school students were required to learn about measurement, compounded by the reality of their daily life, I realized why their scores were low.

Students must learn two measurement systems: the customary and the International System of Units (SI), the international name for the metric system. And they never know which to choose and when. So, I began implementing fun activities to help my students assimilate the information. One of my lessons, The SI System on the Basketball Court, is currently in the February issue of Science Scope, the National Science Teachers Association’s (NSTA) journal for middle school teachers.

You must be a member of NSTA to read the lesson, but the corresponding Background Activity Slide Show on the SI system can be downloaded as a pdf, free for use in classrooms. Click on the link or go to my site to download the slide show: http://www.trinaallen.com/SISystem_basketballcourt.pdf.

Why teach the metric system?
The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics has this on their Web site, “In today’s global environment, metric measurements are prominent in workplaces, consumer products, and news reports. Almost every other country in the world uses the metric system of measurement. The European Union, Japan, and Korea have passed legislation limiting international commerce to products measured in metric units. If the United States is to continue to play a leading role in international business, using metric measurement is imperative and U.S. workers at all levels must be knowledgeable about the Système Internationale (SI), the international name for the metric system.”

By 1900 a total of 35 nations, including the major nations of continental Europe and most of South America, had officially accepted the metric system. If we want to communicate with scientists and engineers around the world, the US will have to learn the metric system of measurement, now called the International System of Units, that was created by the French.

Seven units comprise the metric system: the meter (length), the kilogram (mass), the second (time), the ampere (electric current), the kelvin (temperature), the mole (amount of substance), and the candela (luminous intensity).

There was a strong movement toward the use of the metric system in the US during the 1970-1980. Since then, the SI system has been losing its duel for supremacy over the inch-pound system. Congress has not pushed for a law making the metric system the sole measurement system in the US. However, since the SI system is the sole measurement language of most of the world, the US will have to become a metric nation to measure up in the global arena.

“Wake up and smell the caffeine doughnut” was a recent headline in Raleigh’s News and Observer , with similar stories published nationwide.

Robert Bohannon, a Durham molecular scientist, has developed a way to add caffeine to baked goods without the bitter taste of caffeine. Each piece of pastry is the equivalent of about two cups of coffee. Read entire story.

Do we think caffeinated pastries are a good idea? If not, why are we giving Dr. Bohannon kudos for using his intellect to invent such a harmful product?

“We don’t need caffeine, but it’s become the most widely used drug in the world,” says Jim Lane, a professor of medical psychology at Duke University. As a former middle school teacher, my first thought after learning about caffeinated pastries was concern not only for children that could be exposed unnecessarily to this most widely used drug, but for their teachers. I do not believe that any advocate for children would condone such a product.

I cannot think of a worse idea than exposing our children to a caffeine-sugar buzz. Sugar by itself can cause changes in activity because it enters the bloodstream quickly, producing rapid fluctuations in blood glucose levels leading to increased activity followed by decreased activity. Adding caffeine to such pastries is a prescription for disaster. (Let’s ignore, for now, the fact that high-sugar foods are also foods low in nutrition that lead to obesity).

Imagine you are teaching a class of 30 sixth grade students, who each bring with them their own social and parental pressures. (Remember sixth grade when every social event was a crises). Now, picture several of these walking hormones have each consumed a high-sugar pastry. Their energy level will be high, until it drops about mid morning when you need them to pay attention. Then, further imagine those same students have also consumed the equivalent of two cups of coffee. You won’t be able to capture their attention with any amount of effort. Science equipment and any lesson plan you may have carefully constructed will erupt into chaos. And when their caffeine-sugar buzz wears off, your listless students will have no energy or desire to learn a little science.

It is hard enough to teach. Children already come to class with a variety of different needs and abilities. They have enough insecurities and distractions without adding more. Let’s not add exposure to caffeine to the challenges facing our teachers.

Dr. Bohannon, there is no market for your caffeinated treats that will ever be acceptable in the eyes of this former teacher.

Now that the holidays are over, many of us are left with extra pounds gained from the beef Wellington, crème brulee, eggnogs and other holiday treats that we indulged upon during the holiday season. What do we do to compensate? We diet when we should be eating. Cutting our caloric intake only triggers our body to slow down its metabolic rate and store dietary Calories as fat, not the result we had hoped for. In fact, many people who try to lose weight fail because they do not eat enough.

Let’s examine the science behind this. A Calorie is a unit used to measure the energy in food and scientifically refers to 1000 calories, or a kilocalorie, abbreviated kcal. One kcal (Calorie) is the amount of energy needed to increase the temperature of 1 kg (about 2.2 pounds) of water by 1 °C.

Our body needs a minimum amount of energy (1500 to 2200 Calories a day) to perform the metabolic functions of digestion, respiration and circulating the blood. If we consume less than the 1500 - 2200 Calories needed for metabolism, our body goes into starvation mode, slowing down all its functions to conserve energy. The brain and central nervous system slow down and the rates of digestion, circulation, and breathing decrease. By reducing our caloric intake during a diet, we trick our body into storing Calories as fat, and gain the lost weight as soon as we stop dieting because our body continues to store Calories anticipating that the famine will continue.

We do not need to starve ourselves. Instead, we need to make sure that we eat enough to speed up our metabolism without eating excess Calories that will be stored as fat. The key — burn more calories than we eat.

Remote controls, hand free phones, ear buds. Technology is single-handedly eliminating almost every reason to move our muscles. Yet exercise can build muscle mass, which in turn increases overall metabolic rate, forcing your body to burn more Calories while you rest.

The body uses energy (Calories) for three purposes:
1. basal metabolism
2. physical activity
3. thermal effect of food

Basal metabolism
Basal metabolism is the minimal energy expended to keep a body that is resting awake and alive. Your basal metabolic rate, or BMR, is the rate at which your body burns calories to perform its normal functions of digestion, breathing, keeping the heart beating, and temperature control. For sedentary people, this requires about 60-70 percent of total energy use by the body. The main reason people are overweight is because their basal metabolic rate is lower than it should be, causing them to burn fewer calories. A low BMR means muscle, liver, brain and kidneys have low energy needs, causing food Calories to be stored as fat.

The good news is that you can speed up your metabolism. The BMR is generally higher in people with greater amounts of lean body mass than in those with large proportions of fat. Here are some tips to speed up your metabolism from: http://www.weight-loss-center.net/speed_up_your_metablism.html

• Do not skip meals. Always eat breakfast. Skipping breakfast sends the message to your body that you are starving because you haven’t had food in 18 hours or more (dinner the night before to lunch the following day). As a protective mechanism, your metabolism slows down.
• Do some type of aerobic exercise (walking, jogging, swimming, stationary cycling, aerobics, etc.) on a daily basis.
• Tone your muscles with weight training. Toned muscles supercharge your metabolism. This can be accomplished at a gym or at home with a few sets of dumbbells.
• Look for ways to be active. Park as far from the store as you can rather than looking for the closest parking spot. Use the stairs rather than the elevator, etc. Look for the “hard” way to do things!

Energy for physical activity
An excess of 3,500 Calories of energy consumed by our body will be converted into one pound of stored fat. Our body must burn that same 3500 Calories of energy in order to lose one pound of fat. Without exercise, we can only metabolize about 2,000 Calories per day, the same 2,000 Calories consumed, so burning fat is a slow process.

This is why moving your muscles is so important. Physical activity increases energy expended above basal energy needs by as much as 25 to 40 percent. We can easily burn and extra 200 to 300 Calories per of energy per day with exercise. This means that if we expend 250 extra Calories per day above and beyond normal daily activity, while controlling energy intake, we can easily lose ½ pound of adipose tissue per week, accumulating to 25 pounds per year. And all without dieting.

I am burning 118 Calories per hour while I write this blog. Add up 29 ½ hours of typing on this keyboard and I will have lost 1 pound of ugly adipose tissue doing something that I love. We can choose various forms of exercise to fit our lifestyle. Playing basketball can burn 680 Calories per hour, bicycling 659, running 897, and walking 299. You can burn117 Calories an hour simply by driving your car. There are many activities to choose from: football, bowling, skiing and tennis. Anything that gets our muscles moving will increase energy expended. If we can find something that we consider fun enough to keep doing it, it will become a habit. Even a small start of 15 minutes of walking 2 to 3 days a week will burn excess Calories.

Results take time. A pound at first will hardly be noticeable — a thickness the width of a piece of paper lost from your body.

Thermal effect of food (TEF)The thermal effect of food is the energy the body uses digest, absorb and process food nutrients. Your body uses about 5 to 10 percent of the total energy that you eat to metabolize food. As a result, in order to supply the body with 2000 Calories for basal metabolism and physical activity, we must eat between 2100 and 2200 Calories.

We can raise the TEF, and thereby lower the Calories our body stores as fat, by eating more protein and carbohydrates and less fat. Because protein is less efficiently digested and absorbed, our body must burn more energy to consume protein than carbohydrate or fats. In fact, we use 20 to 30 percent of the Calories consumed from protein just to metabolizing the amino acids. Our body uses only 5 to 10 percent of carbohydrates Calories and 0 to 5 percent of fat Calories for metabolization. Complex carbohydrates (fruits, vegetables, beans, lentils, bread, rice, pasta, and potatoes) contain about half the calories by weight of fat. And, it is more work for the body to convert carbohydrates to body fat.

What type of diet loses body fat best is a question asked by millions worldwide. Experts suggest consuming less fat (especially saturated fat and tans fat), while others suggest consuming less carbohydrate, especially refined carbohydrate sources. Both have triggered diets specifically tailored to that line of thought, like the Atkins and South Beach diets.

Doctors Yao and Roberts from Tufts University reviewed 25 scientific studies than dealt with diet and weight loss: http://healthfitness.com.au/research/nutrition/low-fat-high-fiber.htm. They found that in studies longer than 6 months, consuming low fat and high fiber was associated with 3 times the weight loss compared to those that consumed low fat only. Therefore, the best foods to eat to lose weight seem to be those that are low in fat and high in fiber. This is quite different to the average western diet comprised of foods high in fat and low in fiber, which are usually meats and low fiber baked goods. This is the same reason why those in western societies such as Australia and the US, often suffer from obesity. Replacing some of the fat in our diet with protein such as chicken breast or tuna in water may help to reduce fat.

Alcohol is a concentrated calorie source and contains few nutrients. It actually reduces the body’s ability to burn fat.

In summary:
• Do not get caught in the yo-yo diet cycle of starvation followed by gaining back the lost weight.
• Energy in should equal or be less than energy out.
• Eat. Do not skip meals. Make sure that you consume enough energy to speed up your metabolism.
• Be a food connoisseur. Read nutrition labels and eat high-fiber, low-fat meals.
• Exercise to build lean body mass and increase energy output. Toned muscles supercharge your metabolism.

References:
6 Reasons why diets fail: http://www.vitamix.com/household/health/fail6.html

Few Drawbacks to Following a Low-Fat, High-Fiber Diet: http://weightloss.about.com/od/healthyeatingnews/a/aa090305a.htm

High Protein - Low Carb Diets: Why these Diets Fail: http://www.myfooddiary.com/resources/articles/why_low_carb_diets_fail.asp

Lose Weight: http://unr.edu/homepage/shubinsk/wtloss.html

Low cost high fiber recipes for a healthy diet: http://www.seekwellness.com/nutrition/low_cost_high_fiber.htm

Low fat eating may still not be enough to lose weight. Eat high fiber also: http://healthfitness.com.au/research/nutrition/low-fat-high-fiber.htm

Perspectives in Nutrition, 6th edition. Wardlaw, Hampl, DiSilvestro. McGraw-Hill: New York. 2004.

Speed Up Your Metabolism: http://www.weight-loss-center.net/speed_up_your_metablism.html

Several weeks ago I got a flu shot. Having rolled up my sleeve in the hope of preventing the flu, I was dismayed to awake with my throat so swollen that the simple tasks of swallowing or talking brought pain. I went to work and muddled miserably through the day. Once home, I tried to escape the curse of the microscopic rascal by drinking brandy — erroneously thinking the alcohol would kill the virus infecting my throat — and swallowing antihistamine and Tylenol. But alas, I awoke with my sinuses full and my concentration off. I struggled through an e-mail to coworkers announcing that I was home sick and faced the prospect of Dr. Phil and daytime television.

After running through endless tissues, cold medications and orange juice, I decided to write about the virus that triggered the immune system reaction that is partly responsible for the recent silence of this blog.

More than 200 viruses are known to cause the symptoms of the common cold, the most common infectious disease in the United States and the number-one reason children visit the doctor. The cold virus is responsible for keeping more people out of work and school than any other illness. Most adults will have two to four colds a year and children may have as many as eight to ten.

When I returned to work my coworkers asked me if I had the flu. I had to say that I had a common head cold. I should have said that I had a contagious case of rhinorrheaI, or a runny nose because although I felt tired and my head ached, the illness was centered in my nose.

Once infected with a cold, nasal secretions are teeming with cold viruses. We catch a cold by breathing in virus particles that are spread through the air by an infected person’s sneezes or coughs. Virus particles can travel up to 12 feet (3.7 meters) through the air when someone with a cold coughs or sneezes. Cold viruses are also spread when we touch our nose, eyes, or mouth after touching something contaminated by infected nasal secretions. Small doses of virus (1-30 particles) are sufficient to produce infection.

The cold virus is deposited into the front of nasal passages and then transported to the back of the nose where it attaches to a cell. Much smaller than the cell, the virus injects its genetic material into the cell and tricks it into producing virus. The infected nasal cell ruptures and dies, releasing newly made cold virus to infect other cells in the nose and start the process over again.

From the time a cold virus enters the nose, it takes 8-12 hours for the viral reproductive cycle to be completed and for new cold virus to be released in nasal secretions. Cold symptoms can begin shortly after virus is first produced in the nose. Colds are most contagious during the first 2 to 4 days after symptoms appear, and may be contagious for up to 3 weeks. Usually irritation in the nose or a scratchy feeling in the throat is the first sign of a cold, followed within hours by sneezing and a watery nasal discharge.

Many people use the term ‘flu’ to describe any kind of respiratory or winter illness they get, which is understandable because cold and flu share similar symptoms, and both come during cold and flu season. Although influenza viruses can cause symptoms of the common cold, flu is a more aggressive virus. You may hear a coworker say, I had the flu, but I came to work anyway. It is unlikely that person has influenza, because it is highly unlikely he or she would have been able to come to work. Chances are they really have a contagious case of rhinorrheaI, not the flu.

The symptoms we get during a viral illness are the body’s attempt to get rid of the virus. Sneezing ejects the virus from the nose, cough from the lungs and throat, vomiting from the stomach, and diarrhea from the intestines. Fever makes it difficult for the virus to reproduce.

The common cold is centered in the nose. Rhinoviruses, which mean “nose viruses”, are the most common cause of colds. Rhinoviruses grow best at temperatures of about 91 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature inside the human nose. More than 110 different rhinovirus types can infiltrate the protective lining of the nose and throat causing headache, cough, postnasal drip, burning eyes, muscle aches, or a decreased appetite. The most prominent symptoms are in the nose.

With the flu, we are sick all over. A single family of viruses — the influenza viruses — cause the flu. Typically, the flu begins abruptly, with a fever in the 102 to 106 degree range (with adults on the lower end of the spectrum), chills, lack of energy, body aches and sometimes dizziness or vomiting. The fever usually lasts for a day or two, but can last five days.
Somewhere between day 2 and day 4 of the illness, the “whole body” symptoms begin to subside, and respiratory symptoms begin to increase. The virus can settle anywhere in the respiratory tract, producing symptoms of a cold, croup, sore throat, bronchiolitis, ear infection, and/or pneumonia. Sometimes there is a second wave of fever. The cough and tiredness usually lasts for weeks after the rest of the illness is over.

The 1918 worldwide flu epidemic infected over 500 million people, and killed 50 million. In the United States, more than 500,000 died. The 1918 flu epidemic killed more people in less time than any disease in modern history. It ranks with the Black Death of the 14th Century as one of the few events in recorded history to reduce the population of the earth by as much as one percent. Even today, more than 36,000 people in the United States die from the flu each year — primarily those who are weak from advanced age or a major illness.

The flu is preventable. In any given year, two or three different strains of influenza virus cause most of the flu around the world. Scientists gather extensive global data and formulate a vaccine for the strains anticipated to be the major problems in the coming winter. While the prediction is usually accurate, sometimes new, unanticipated strains arise.

Three strains including Influenza A H1N1 and H3N2 and Influenza B have been reported in 2006-2007. The names reflect the areas where the viruses were first identified. For example, a virus identified by the Baylor Flu Center in October 1991 was named A/Texas

While vaccines have progressed in flu prevention, the closest we’ve seen to a cure for the common cold is chicken soup and the love and hugs of family and friends.

Air that’s dry - indoors or out - can lower our resistance to infection by the viruses that cause colds. And so can smoking cigarettes or being around someone who’s smoking. There is no evidence that you can get a cold from exposure to cold weather or from getting chilled or overheated. There is also no evidence that your chances of getting a cold are related to factors such as exercise, diet, or enlarged tonsils or adenoids. Conversely, research suggests that psychological stress and allergic diseases affecting your nose or throat may have an impact on your chances of getting infected by cold viruses because with reduced immunity, dormant infections are more likely to develop into full-blown colds.

In the words of Atul Gawande, “So what does work for colds? Drinking plenty of liquids keeps mucus flowing out of the body and carrying viruses with it. Trials show that over-the-counter combination decongestant/antihistamines do help relieve nasal congestion and post-nasal drip. And when suffering from a bout of miracle-cure claims, try a healthy dose of skepticism.”

References:

Cold and Flu Differences: http://www.drgreene.com/21_577.html
Chicken soup is medicine, U.S. scientists confirm. CNN.com: http://archives.cnn.com/2000/HEALTH/diet.fitness/10/17/chicken.soup.reut/
Common Cold. http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/library/DS/00056.html
Common cold Index. National Institute of Allergy and Infection Diseases (2006): http://www3.niaid.nih.gov/healthscience/healthtopics/colds/default.htm
The Flu Goes to Work http://health.msn.com/guides/coldandflu/articlepage.aspx?cp-documentid=100118517
Flu FAQ 2006-2007 from Baylor college of Medicine (November 8, 2006) https://www.bcm.edu/news/item.cfm?NewsID=745
How Cold Virus Infection Occurs: http://www.commoncold.org/undrstn3.htm
Is it a Cold or the Flu? http://www.niaid.nih.gov/publications/cold/sick.pdf
Zinc may help your sniffles–but only because you really believe it will. Slate. Atul Gawande (1997): http://www.slate.com/id/2670/

On Monday, Rush Limbaugh became the unwitting spokesperson for stem cell research with his criticism of Michael J. Fox’s unsteady appearance. Instead of banning Limbaugh from the human race, perhaps we should thank him, not for his criticism of Fox, who is obviously suffering, but for the attention that Limbaugh inadvertently gave to the controversial issue of stem cell research.

No matter what you think of Rush Limbaugh, his syndicated radio program has a weekly audience of about 10 million. People listen to his show. In fact, when Limbaugh reacted negatively on the air to Michael J. Fox’s campaign ads, Limbaugh instantly gave Fox a 10 million-listener voice. Many of Limbaugh’s listeners probably followed up his program by doing what I did. I watched videos of Fox’s compelling ads urging voters in Missouri to support candidates who back stem cell research.

Michael J. Fox’s head bobbed from side to side, almost leaving the video frame as he urged voters to elect candidates who support research that could lead to a cure for the disease that has debilitated him. I found it difficult to watch Fox’s restless torso weave and writhe, jerking and swaying uncontrollably from seemingly advanced symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. I thank Rush Limbaugh for bringing Fox’s condition to my attention.

Michael J. Fox’s campaign ad:
http://projects.washingtonpost.com/politicalads/163/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9WB_PXjTBo

Michael J. Fox has lent his name, passion and drive toward the development of a cure for Parkinson’s disease, a cure which includes promoting stem cell research, by establishing the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research in May 2000.

Another actor also used his voice to back stem cell research. Christopher Reeve believed that embryonic stem cell research would allow him to walk again one day. Reeve lent his name to the organization, which became known as The Christopher Reeve Foundation, dedicated to curing spinal cord injury by funding innovative research. Reeve believed his damaged spinal cord cells might be repaired by tissue generated by stem cells. Unfortunately for Reeve, stem cell research was still too young to help him.

In 2002, Reeve said that the stem cell issue was not about ethics, “… you’re actually saving lives by using cells that are going to the garbage …I just don’t see how that’s immoral or unethical. I really don’t.”

Before you point out the fallacies of Reeve’s statement, or support him empathically on the benefits of stem cell research, please read the current methods for and results from current research. I am weary of reading both pro-life and scientific opinion essays full of outdated and erroneous science.

Stem cell technology is advancing so rapidly that what Reeve stated might have been true in 2002, but is not true in 2006. In 2002, most embryos used for stem cell research were fertilized eggs that parents had decided not to use for pregnancy, so otherwise would have been discarded. Scientists had not yet begun creating embryos specifically for stem cell research.

Most cells within an animal fulfill a single function, like skin, heart or blood. Stem cells are unique and important cells that are not specialized — cells that retain the ability to become many or all of the different types of cell types in the body — making them useful to produce large amounts of one cell type to test new drugs for effectiveness, regenerate injured tissue or even grow organs for transplant.

If medical personnel could use an adult ear cell, for example, as a blank stem cell that could be stimulated to grow damaged tissue, then the controversy of 2006 might be eliminated. But the sources of stem cells to be used for research, as listed from the 2003 Report for Congress, force a heated dispute that may have no immediate resolution.

Sources of Stem Cells for Research
• 1-week-old embryos created via IVF for the treatment of infertility
• 5-to-9 week-old embryos or fetuses obtained through elective abortion
• embryos created via IVF for research purposes
• embryos created via SCNT (somatic cell nuclear transfer), which is cloning
• adult tissues (bone marrow, umbilical cord blood)

An August 9, 2001, President Bush announced that for the first time federal funds could be used to support research on human embryonic stem cells, but funding would be limited to “existing stem cell lines where the life and death decision has already been made.”

Even with the limitations set by Bush for funding, stem cell research has made many advances. It is my hope that Michael J. Fox’s and Christopher Reeve’s voices will help to ensure that stem cell research can be used to help cure the debilitating diseases that exist today. The following are a few recent news updates found on the Stem Cell Research Foundation Web site:

Fat Stem Cells Being Studied As Option For Breast Reconstruction 10/26/2006
Adapted from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center

Breast cancer survivors might one day avoid the prospect of invasive breast reconstruction surgery, opting instead for an approach that would involve using stem cells derived from their own fat to regenerating new breast tissue.

Insulin-Producing Pancreatic Cells Are Created From Human Embryonic Stem Cells 10/20/2006
Adapted from Novocell, Inc.

Novocell, Inc. announced the development of a process that efficiently converts human embryonic stem cells into insulin-producing pancreatic endocrine cells. The findings are reported in an article appearing on-line, in advance of print publication, in the journal Nature Biotechnology.

Stem Cells Extend Life Of Rats With Animal Model Of Lou Gehrig’s Disease 10/17/2006
Adapted from the following source: Neuralstem, Inc.

Human neural stem cells developed by Neuralstem, Inc. significantly extended the life of rats with a genetic mutation that gives them a disease analogous to Lou Gehrig’s Disease, also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), and delayed disease onset, according to a paper published in the October 2006 issue of the journal Transplantation.

Will Embryonic Stem Cells Help Treat Macular Degeneration? 9/21/2006
Adapted from the following source: Advanced Cell Technology
Advanced Cell Technology, Inc. announced that company scientists and their collaborators rescued visual function in rats through implantation of retinal pigment epithelial (RPE)* cells derived from human embryonic stem cells.

Researchers Grow Nerve, Bone and Blood Vessel Cells From Adult Pig Stem Cells 9/19/2006
Adapted from the following source: University of Missouri-Columbia

A University of Missouri (UM) researcher has isolated adult stem cells from blood that can be directed to turn into five types of cells, including bone, blood vessel and nerve cells. The study is the cover article in the August edition of Stem Cells and Development

Scientists Develop Technique That May Generate Human Embryonic Stem Cells Without Harming The Embryo 8/23/2006
Adapted from the following source: Advanced Cell Technology

Advanced Cell Technology, Inc. (ACT) reported that they have developed a technique that may successfully generate human embryonic stem cells using an approach that does not harm embryos. The technique is reported in an article appearing online in the journal Nature. ACT’s approach could generate human embryonic stem cells from a single cell obtained from an 8-cell-stage embryo and does not destroy the embryo’s developmental potential.

Sources:
“Report for Congress,” on The United States Department of State Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/tech/biotech/stemcellresearch.pdf.

Stem Cell Research Foundation: http://www.stemcellresearchfoundation.org/

“Reeve: Fund embryonic stem cell research,” on CNN.com: http://archives.cnn.com/2001/HEALTH/07/24/reeve.stemcell.focus/