Getting your “buzz” on … That’s a bee on a coffee flower. Normally, that wouldn’t be worth commenting about. It’s just another bee getting a snack. Except that coffee flowers and a handful of other plants might use caffeine-laced nectar in order to draw bees back like Starbucks-addicts. Plants produce chemicals like caffeine (along with nicotine, rubber, cocaine and a host of other chemicals) as self-defense mechanisms. If a bee mainlined the caffeine present in the normal plant tissues, it would be poisoned to death. But the low levels present in some nectar might be just enough to give it an addictive buzz and bring it back for more. Read more about the researchers who are studying this at The New York Times. More bee/flower goodness on YouTube here.
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Getting your “buzz” on …

That’s a bee on a coffee flower. Normally, that wouldn’t be worth commenting about. It’s just another bee getting a snack. Except that coffee flowers and a handful of other plants might use caffeine-laced nectar in order to draw bees back like Starbucks-addicts.

Plants produce chemicals like caffeine (along with nicotine, rubber, cocaine and a host of other chemicals) as self-defense mechanisms. If a bee mainlined the caffeine present in the normal plant tissues, it would be poisoned to death. But the low levels present in some nectar might be just enough to give it an addictive buzz and bring it back for more.

Read more about the researchers who are studying this at The New York Times. More bee/flower goodness on YouTube here.

Antikamnia Calendars and the Birth of Tylenol These mischievous little skeletons helped lead us to one of today’s most successful pain relievers.   The Antikamnia company marketed an analgesic (pain-relieving) powder to pharmacists and druggists of the late 19th and early 20th centuries using these rather morbid calendars. The name of the company actually means “opposed to pain”. Antikamnia Chemical Company was later shut down after failing to disclose the active ingredient of their pain-relieving products: Acetanilide. Not only was it illegal (as it is now) to fail to label drugs correctly, but acetanilide was known to impair red blood cells’ ability to release oxygen to tissues. That’s not the kind of drug you want on the market, obviously. But Anitkamnia was an effective pain reliever, even if you’d go blue after taking it. One thing many people don’t realize about pharmaceutical chemicals is that they are metabolized and modified by human biochmistry. For many of them, the compound in the pill is useless, and they require breakdown or modification to become active. It wasn’t until nearly half a century later that Nobel Prize-winning biochemist Julius Axelrod discovered that the primary metabolic product of acetanlilide is a compound called paracetamol. Of course, you may know paracetamol by its other chemical name, para-acetylaminophenol … or Tylenol. Check out the rest of the Antikamnia calendars at Retronaut.
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Antikamnia Calendars and the Birth of Tylenol

These mischievous little skeletons helped lead us to one of today’s most successful pain relievers.  

The Antikamnia company marketed an analgesic (pain-relieving) powder to pharmacists and druggists of the late 19th and early 20th centuries using these rather morbid calendars. The name of the company actually means “opposed to pain”.

Antikamnia Chemical Company was later shut down after failing to disclose the active ingredient of their pain-relieving products: Acetanilide. Not only was it illegal (as it is now) to fail to label drugs correctly, but acetanilide was known to impair red blood cells’ ability to release oxygen to tissues. That’s not the kind of drug you want on the market, obviously.

But Anitkamnia was an effective pain reliever, even if you’d go blue after taking it. One thing many people don’t realize about pharmaceutical chemicals is that they are metabolized and modified by human biochmistry. For many of them, the compound in the pill is useless, and they require breakdown or modification to become active. It wasn’t until nearly half a century later that Nobel Prize-winning biochemist Julius Axelrod discovered that the primary metabolic product of acetanlilide is a compound called paracetamol.

Of course, you may know paracetamol by its other chemical name, para-acetylaminophenol … or Tylenol.

Check out the rest of the Antikamnia calendars at Retronaut.

An Evening With Oliver Sacks: Live Webcast

Really excited to bring you this! The World Science Festival has brought together famed neurologist Oliver Sacks and journalist John Hockenberry to discuss Sacks’ latest book, which explores surreal world of hallucinations.

We’ll be treated to lots of history and contemporary science about the brain science behind hallucinatory experiences. I’m especially excited to hear about Sacks’ own experiences with hallucinations, which helped convince him to dedicate his life to neurology and the human mind.

The stream below should start about 7:30 PM Eastern and the event should begin at 8 PM. Enjoy!

A spider on the wall said hello to me. And for some reason it didn’t seem too surprising that a spider should say hello. We had a conversation about analytic philosophy, a rather technical conversation.
Neurologist Oliver Sacks discusses his experiences with hallucinogenic substances, and his study of how the brain sees what isn’t there. A fascinating conversation about his new book, from The Guardian.
A Network Map To Predict Drug Side Effects This is an infographic of 1,241 known and predicted side effects of 656 drugs currently on the market. It’s the result of this new analysis method by UCSF researchers and SeaChange Pharmaceuticals. Like Mark Wilson notes at FastCo, most drugs are more like shotguns than sniper rifles. They hit their target but often a lot more. Yellow dots are drugs, blue dots are their molecular targets, and red and gray lines are predicted and verified interactions, respectively. With greater power to predict side effects, the design and prescription of drugs will be made safer. Maybe those scary voiceovers in TV ads for drugs will get shorter? There’s good indications it will work, too. Of the predicted side effects found in this new study, the team was able to confirm 151 new interactions in the lab. Avoiding some of these could save pain, money and even lives. (via Co.Design)
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A Network Map To Predict Drug Side Effects

This is an infographic of 1,241 known and predicted side effects of 656 drugs currently on the market. It’s the result of this new analysis method by UCSF researchers and SeaChange Pharmaceuticals.

Like Mark Wilson notes at FastCo, most drugs are more like shotguns than sniper rifles. They hit their target but often a lot more. Yellow dots are drugs, blue dots are their molecular targets, and red and gray lines are predicted and verified interactions, respectively.

With greater power to predict side effects, the design and prescription of drugs will be made safer. Maybe those scary voiceovers in TV ads for drugs will get shorter?

There’s good indications it will work, too. Of the predicted side effects found in this new study, the team was able to confirm 151 new interactions in the lab. Avoiding some of these could save pain, money and even lives.

(via Co.Design)

Source: fastcodesign.com

Professor Brian Cox - Wonders of the Stoner Universe

Brian Cox is an amazing scientist and a remarkable science communicator. He is awesome. But I couldn’t resist posting this video remix of “mind-expanding” Cox-isms, because it’s just too funny. Even the greats among us need to be poked at from time to time, amiright?

If you’d like a more serious (less drug-related) look at Brian Cox, check out these previous posts.

(via Gavin Rothery)

Source: gavinrothery.com

Hold on a sec, there! nationalpost: Internet addiction has same effect as cocaine on brains: studyThis is your brain on the Internet: Messed up where there should be connections for making decisions and having normal emotions.Results of a new study suggest people who cannot control, cut back or stop their use of the Internet have abnormal white matter structure in the brain similar to what is seen in cocaine and crystal-meth addicts.According to the study’s authors, as the number of people logging onto cyberspace soars, “Internet addiction disorder” — which is poised to enter the official lexicon of psychiatric illnesses — “is becoming a serious mental-health issue around the world.”The disorder, as described in the study published this week in the journal PLoS One, is defined as “problematic” or pathological computer use that can cause “marked distress” and interfere with school, work, family and social relationships.For their study, led by Hao Lei of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Wuhan, researchers scanned the brains of 17 teens and young adults, aged 14 to 24, with Internet addiction and 16 healthy “controls” of similar age.People were classified as suffering from Internet addiction disorder, or IAD, based on a questionnaire that included the following: Do you feel preoccupied with the Internet? Do you stay online longer than originally intended? Do you feel restless, moody, depressed or irritable when attempting to cut down or stop Internet use? Yeah, yeah … internet addiction. I’ve got a significant problem with this claim, and this whole way of thinking, as do many others. It all boils down to this: “Internet use” is not just one thing, it is a mosaic of behaviors. How can we claim addiction if people use the internet in so many different ways? Sure, there’s certain specific behaviors and tendencies that are manifested online that share symptoms with traditional “addiction”, whatever that is. But everyone uses the tool in their own way. As neuro writer Vaughan Bell says: “internet addiction not possible because no single behaviour is associated with the internet. The concept is broken.” The internet is not heroin. It is not a specific chemical affecting a specific biological response and eliciting a specific molecular feedback loop of reward, tolerance and dependence. American and European psychiatrists do not recognize “internet addiction” as a real condition in their diagnostic manuals. Rather, I think we should wonder what is behind these curious claims, and treat that behavior. The internet is just an expression of a deeper neurological condition. More: The Guardian - Can You Really Be Addicted to the Internet? Slate - The Addiction Habit (Are We Obsessed With Addiction?) Meta-analysis of “internet addiction” studies shows inconsistent symptoms, definitions (h/t to Vaughan Bell on those links)
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Hold on a sec, there!

nationalpost:

Internet addiction has same effect as cocaine on brains: study
This is your brain on the Internet: Messed up where there should be connections for making decisions and having normal emotions.

Results of a new study suggest people who cannot control, cut back or stop their use of the Internet have abnormal white matter structure in the brain similar to what is seen in cocaine and crystal-meth addicts.

According to the study’s authors, as the number of people logging onto cyberspace soars, “Internet addiction disorder” — which is poised to enter the official lexicon of psychiatric illnesses — “is becoming a serious mental-health issue around the world.”

The disorder, as described in the study published this week in the journal PLoS One, is defined as “problematic” or pathological computer use that can cause “marked distress” and interfere with school, work, family and social relationships.

For their study, led by Hao Lei of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Wuhan, researchers scanned the brains of 17 teens and young adults, aged 14 to 24, with Internet addiction and 16 healthy “controls” of similar age.

People were classified as suffering from Internet addiction disorder, or IAD, based on a questionnaire that included the following: Do you feel preoccupied with the Internet? Do you stay online longer than originally intended? Do you feel restless, moody, depressed or irritable when attempting to cut down or stop Internet use?

Yeah, yeah … internet addiction. I’ve got a significant problem with this claim, and this whole way of thinking, as do many others.

It all boils down to this: “Internet use” is not just one thing, it is a mosaic of behaviors. How can we claim addiction if people use the internet in so many different ways? Sure, there’s certain specific behaviors and tendencies that are manifested online that share symptoms with traditional “addiction”, whatever that is. But everyone uses the tool in their own way. As neuro writer Vaughan Bell says:

“internet addiction not possible because no single behaviour is associated with the internet. The concept is broken.”

The internet is not heroin. It is not a specific chemical affecting a specific biological response and eliciting a specific molecular feedback loop of reward, tolerance and dependence. American and European psychiatrists do not recognize “internet addiction” as a real condition in their diagnostic manuals.

Rather, I think we should wonder what is behind these curious claims, and treat that behavior. The internet is just an expression of a deeper neurological condition.

More:

The Guardian - Can You Really Be Addicted to the Internet?

Slate - The Addiction Habit (Are We Obsessed With Addiction?)

Meta-analysis of “internet addiction” studies shows inconsistent symptoms, definitions

(h/t to Vaughan Bell on those links)

(via brooklynmutt)

Source: nationalpost