The light bulb has given us unprecedented control over our lives. We can work, eat and play at any hour of day or night. But all of this light may be having a detrimental effect on our lives. According to the article Turning Out The Lights from U.S. News and World Report, a study released last month found that breast cancer is about twice as common in brightly lit communities as in darker ones -- lending fuel to the argument that artificial light negatively impacts public health, wildlife and maybe even safety. Glare from lights inhibits night vision and endangers drivers, pedestrians and animals such as sea turtles, bats, and other nocturnal creatures. It can also disorient birds. Motivated by new evidence, more than two dozen cities worldwide will "go dim" on March 29th in an hour-long demonstration at 8pm.
GSB alum and instructor Ed Batista in his blog muses on journal writing. As part of his role as an instructor for 'Interpersonal Dynamics' at Stanford he requires students to keep a journal, and the time spent grading journals has convinced him of the value of the practice. To understand what makes this exercise meaningful, he has turned to neuroscientist Joseph Ledoux, and how journaling interacts with not only with emotional experiences but other experiences in life as well. Does journal writing have a transformative power to help us process and integrate memories ?
We are pleased to announce that GSB Alum Alvaro Fernandez recently donated some copies of the new SharpBrains research report The State of the Brain Fitness Software Market 2008 to Jackson Library. Fernandez is co-founder of SharpBrains, a research and advisory firm devoted to helping individuals, companies, and others understand and participate in the emerging field of brain fitness. You can check out the press release for the report, and also read a review of this new field from Reuters.
Scientists who study play in animals and humans are beginning to view it as an important part of neurological growth and development. They believe play can help children build "complex, skilled, responsive, socially adept and cognitively flexible brains." But what about the darker side of 'play'? Read Robin Marantz Henig's complete story of play and its importance in human development in the February 17th issue of the New York Times Magazine.
Were you struck by Cupid’s arrow, or does your prospective partner just smell right? Much like the rest of the animal kingdom, humans respond to olfactory cues. Pheromones and MHC tend to impact who we choose as a mate. And rejection may activate the regions of the brain that control addiction. Could this be the reason you can’t stop thinking about the lover that said adieu before you were ready to say goodbye? Read about the science behind the romance in the January 28th issue of Time magazine. Happy Valentine’s Day.
There's a new study out that says it costs more to care for healthy people who live years longer. "It was a small surprise," said Pieter van Baal, an economist at the Netherlands' National Institute for Public Health and the Environment, who led the study. "But it also makes sense. If you live longer, then you cost the health system more." So the moral of this story is to save money, eat all of those fattening burgers and smoke as much as you want, but then again you'll be dead and you won't be able to spend all the money you saved?
GSB MBA alum Alvaro Fernandez will speak at "The Emerging Brain Fitness Market: Building Better Brains", an event jointly presented by The MIT Club of Northern California, American Society on Aging, The Business Forum on Aging and SmartSilvers.
Fernandez, CEO of SharpBrains.com, will summarize the science, market segments, players and trends, based on the first Brain Fitness Software Market Report, which will be presented at this event, and will discuss the implications with neuro-technologists, gaming experts and investors. Joining him will be Zack Lynch (Neurotechnology Industry Organization) as Moderator, as well as panelists Andy Donner (Physic Ventures), Kunal Sarkar (CEO Lumos Labs), Alexander Doman (CEO Advanced Brain Technologies), Dan Michel (CEO Dakim). Opening remarks will be given by Susan Ayers Walker, SmartSilvers and AARP.org (Contributing Technology Journalist).
Date: 02/12/2008 Tuesday
Time: 6:00 p.m.
Venue: Wilson Sonsini (950 Page Mill Road, Palo Alto map)
Cost: $20 online, $25 walk-in
See more information and registration at SharpBrains.com.
GSB Alum Alvaro Fernandez has alerted us to a blog post on his SharpBrains site. Titled Grand Rounds: Briefing the Next U.S. President, the post is framed as a letter to the President, and offers 40 suggested questions in the areas of health care / science / ethics -- with links to the various blogs that have proposed them. Examples include 'A cocaine vaccination is no longer science fiction. Would you allow, enforce or prohibit it?', 'How will you increase price transparency of medical procedures and engage consumer forces?', and 'How will you reward, motivate and recognize medical innovators?' An interesting way to survey what is on the minds of bloggers as the 2008 election approaches.
No one escapes cookies, chocolate or any other types of sweets during the holidays. Many of us have gained a pound or two during that time. The January issue of WIRED has an article entitled Nutritional Values where they discuss the fact that most healthy foods such as dairy, fresh produce and meats are arranged along the walls of supermarkets while the aisles are populated with junk foods and other sundry foods high in fat and calories. The article also confirms that buying a piece of fruit can often be many times more expensive than a candy bar.
For those interested in alternative fuel vehicles and the $10 million Automotive X prize the cover article of this issue is The Race to Build the 100-MPG Car.
Gamers of Nintendo's Wii complained about "aching backs, sore shoulders, and Wii elbow." In Wii Sports, a game that comes with the console, users mimic the motions used in sports like bowling, tennis and baseball. Wii features digital sensors that let users virtually play the game. Since its debut in November of last year, 9.27 million units have been sold. In addition to turning Wii into a new form of exercise, it is also used in hospitals to treat physical therapy patients.
Active video games like the Wii can fight child obesity, according to a report published by the Mayo Clinic in the January 2006 issue of Pediatrics.
A research team at the University of Toronto is developing a "therapeutic video game" to treat children who suffer from hemiplegic cerebral palsy, a condition that can partially paralyze one side of the body. If the children regularly use their weaker side, their motor function can improve.
Read more on Nintendo Wii in Mindshare , Time, News@UofT
The Aspen Health Forum gathered an impressive group of over 200 people to discuss the most pressing issues in health and the medical sciences on October 3-6, 2007. Blogger and GSB alum Alvaro Fernandez reports "It was the first conference, by the way, where I have heard a speaker say: 'I resuscitated a woman yesterday'." Highlights? Global health problems require the attention of the GSB community, national scientific enthusiasm will be required to create the next sputnik-like breakthrough, there is a rising role of public-private partnerships, a growing impact of patient advocacy groups, and more. Read about it at Alvaro's SharpBrains website.
What happens to research that fails to produce desired results or a surprisingly rosy outcome? “It ends up stuffed in some lab drawer,” according to science writer-editor Thomas Goetz, whose article Mind the Gaps appears in this month’s issue of Wired magazine. But keeping so much dark (dissonant) data from seeing the light of day has negative repercussions for the sciences and the public at large. Tying up “a vast body of squandered knowledge … represents a waste of resources and [is] a drag on scientific progress.” Fortunately, the Public Library of Science, Creative Commons and other organizations have begun taking notice, working collectively to free up dark data as a resourceful means of stoking advances in genetics, neuroscience, and biotechnology (the idea being that dissonant results can nonetheless be of immense value to other research scientists). But potentially useful dark data isn't contained within the forgotten repositories of science alone. Get the full skinny online, or at the display rack in Jackson Library.
Ahh, the Twinkie, source of legends, fables ... and Polysorbate 60. So what is a Twinkie? Steve Ettlinger went on cross continental odyssey to find out. In his new opus Twinkie, Deconstructed: My Journey to Discover How the Ingredients Found in Processed Foods Are Grown, Mined (Yes, Mined), and Manipulated into What America Eats, Ettlinger answers the cosmic question: why does it take 39 ingredients to make a Twinkie, when you can bake a cake at home with six? The answer: shelf life. In order to safely hang out at 7-11 or Safeway the product cannot contain any dairy products, so what you take out must replaced with something else. So a tasty whipped cream filling is replaced with shortening, in the form of partially hydrogenated vegetable oil and/or beef fat (yummy!) The main ingredient, Polysorbate 60, a gooey substance that helps replace cream and eggs at a fraction of the cost and which is derived from corn, palm oil, petroleum and cellulose gum, gives the “cream” filling a smooth, slippery feel. For a little flavor, artificial vanillin is added, which is synthesized in petrochemical plants. The original recipe, concocted in 1930, included old fashioned ingredients like flour, eggs, milk and butter and banana cream filling. Hmmm, makes me wish for the good old days ...
The illusion is simply this: The "pure aqua" you think is in the bottle isn’t really there, comparatively speaking. Or so much seems to be the case based in part on a recent blind taste test where “75 percent of New Yorkers preferred city tap water (drawn from upstate reservoirs) to bottled varieties.” As for spring water, it’s subject to natural contaminants at the source or during bottling, and since FDA standards for bottled water are less stringent than the EPA’s for public water, “bottled water can sometimes have more impurities” than tap. Case Western Reserve University recently reported that of 39 bottled water samples tested “15 … had bacterial counts almost twice as high as Cleveland tap water.” And the explosive impact this marketing mirage is having on global warming, economics and waste management is enough to make even the most ardent Costco shopper see straight. Get the full eye-popping brief in the September 7 issue of The Week: The Best of the U.S. and International Media available at Jackson Library.
The founders of SharpBrains.com, Alvaro Fernandez (GSB MBA '01) and Dr Elkhonon Goldberg, recently published an article on aging and how to partially control it (in The Complete Lawyer, vol. 3, no. 4). The article appears in a legal publication, but has advice for all of us, regardless of profession.
They pointed out the following:
- Neuropsychology Indicates That We Can Control Our Aging
- Aging Means Lifelong Development, Not Automatic Decline
- Some Skills Improve With Age
- Some Skills Need To Be Continuously Nurtured And Trained
- Not All Instances Of Forgetting Are Of Equal Concern
- We Are In Control, To A Large Extent
- There Are Four “Pillars Of Brain Health”
- Cross-Training Our Brains Builds Up Cognitive Reserve
- Computer-Based Brain Exercise Programs Can Help
- Embrace “Good” Stress; Eliminate “Bad” Stress
- Retirement Is Overrated
Read the full article online.
An article in the May 6, 2007 New York Times Magazine features a conversation with two medical scientists about how the body ages, and the research presently in the works to extend a healthy life. They touch on one substance that shows special promise: resveratrol -- happily, found in red wine. Resveratrol seems to reverse the effects of a high fat diet in mice, increasing their life span. A longer life? Maybe. Regardless, lift your glass of red wine, and here's to health !
New research suggests that forgetting irrelevant memories may help the brain remember what is truly important. GSB Professor Bob Sutton ( The No Asshole Rule , Weird Ideas That Work ) notes on his blog how Stanford research is using fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) to evaluate this quirk of the human mind. An encouraging note for those of you who can recall detailed ideas discussed at an academic conference a year ago but couldn't find your car keys this morning.
GSB alum Alvaro Fernandez sends us word of the Mind & Life Institute, co-founded and chaired by fellow GSB alum Adam Engle (MBA '86). The Institute sponsors the 'Mind and Life Dialogues', started in 1987 as an experiment to determine whether a meaningful exchange could occur between modern science and Buddhism. MLI has now sponsored 14 dialogues between the Dalai Lama and neuroscientists over the last 20 years, with the result that the Institute has become a recognized world leader in the emerging scientific investigation of the effects of contemplative practices on brain and behavior. Inspired by the Institute, let us hope that the Oceanwide ( = Dalai ) Lama and his scientist friends can continue to navigate the vast seas of consciousness together.
From the Jackson popular book rack: Five Minds for the Future, by renowned author Howard Gardner. The famous creator of a theory of multiple intelligences, Gardner, the John H. and Elisabeth A. Hobbs Professor of Cognition and Education at Harvard, addresses the cognitive abilities that will command a premium in a future world of global interconnections and advanced technologies. These include 5 types of 'mind': the disciplinary mind, the synthesizing mind, the creating mind, the respectful mind, and the ethical mind. Armed with these, one should be able to cope successfully in a brave new world; without them, the individual will be overwhelmed. To quote the book jacket, "The world of the future will demand capacities that, until now, have been mere options. Have you begun to develop those capacities -- in yourself and others?" Check it out in Jackson Library.
Worried your brain is getting soft ... even flabby? Never fear, there are techniques to whip it into shape and get it back in the zone. The SharpBrains site offers FAQs on brain exercises, as well as other information to keep you sharp. Pick up some helpful tips on the care and feeding of this most critical organ.
This is a captivating title of a feature article in Feb. 5 issue of Fortune magazine. Cambridge-based start-up company 'Citris Pharmaceuticals' is working hard on implementing the second part of this headline. The company lead by its co-founder and a CEO, Christoph Westphal, is trying to produce a drug based on amazing qualities of resveratrol, the ingredient contained in red grapes skin and consequently in red wine. Resveratrol slows down an aging process, boosts metabolism at least on experimental level. To find out more about the research and its remarkable leader, read this interesting and, really, very encouraging article.
People desperately needing the organs transplants turn to online organ brokers, the intermediaries who for a hefty fee arrange for the organ transplant operations being performed in developing countries where the organ sources are not subjected to ethical or medical scrutiny. The article in Jan. 29, 2007 issue of Forbes, reveals the workings of the underground agents and filled with the real-life stories of those people who used the organ brokers services.
The November 20 - December 3 issue of Canadian Business targets 'The Stem Cell Revolution', its cover story on the future of stem cell research and its possible commercial impact. Embryonic stem-cell research has become a cause celebre -- and an ethical / political hot potato. But it holds tremendous financial potential. How big? Author Erin Pooley notes that that oral diabetic drug market alone was worth $7.5 billion in North America last year, and the stem cell therapy market in the U.S. could total as much as $30 billion by 2015. The stem-cell mobilizer drug Mozobil alone, now in trials, could command annual sales of nearly $300 million within 3 years of its launch.
You can read an online summary about this fascinating technology and its potential to change the political and economic landscape.
In 2003, the American Pharmacists Association estimated that in the United States, poor adherence to medication regimens was responsible for 11-20 percent of all hospitalizations and repeat visits to the doctor and for 125,000 deaths each year. A report by the National Pharmaceutical Council's Task Force for Compliance found that poor adherence adds $100 billion annually to US health care costs.
McKinsey recently conducted a survey of people with hypertension and suggests that "a better understanding of the attitudes of patients could improve programs designed to increase their adherence to treatment regimens ... Creating and implementing these programs will require the combined efforts of physicians, patients, pharmaceutical companies, payers, and other health care stakeholders." Read the McKinsey Quarterly article.
It was a year of old scourges and new drugs, from the first vaccine that prevents cancer to a bug that spoiled an entire crop of California spinach. Check out this Time magazine cover story: The Year in Medicine From A to Z.
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