Clipmarks | nhorn's clips

Use of Hormones as Treatment for Schizophrenia?

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 00:06:30 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Aug. 4, 2008 -- Schizophrenic women who get an estrogen patch along with their regular antipsychotic medications have fewer symptoms than women who get inactive placebo patches.

Kulkarni took notice. She and her colleagues have now completed a series of small studies showing that estrogen can be very effective in reducing symptoms such as delusions, hallucinations, and disordered thinking.

Kulkarni is quick to add that one patient's experience does not prove the treatment will work for others. But she's seen rapid improvement in other women who were resistant to standard treatment, particularly those who developed schizophrenia just after having a child.

The female sex hormone estrogen has important effects on chemical signals in the brain. These signals go haywire in schizophrenia.

Women's first episodes of schizophrenia occur later in life than men's, suggesting a protective role for estrogen.

Tags: healthcare, health, mental health

World's Smallest Snake

Mon, 04 Aug 2008 04:22:26 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - A U.S. scientist said Sunday he has discovered the globe's tiniest species of snake in the easternmost Caribbean island of Barbados, with full-grown adults typically stretching less than 4 inches (10 centimeters) long.

"New and interesting species are still being discovered on Caribbean islands, despite the very small amount of natural forests remaining," said Hedges, who christened the miniature brown snake "Leptotyphlops carlae" after his herpetologist wife, Carla Ann Hass.

The Barbadian snake apparently eats termites and insect larvae, but nothing is yet known of its ecology and behavior. Genetic tests identified the snake as a new species, according to Hedges. It is not venomous.

McDiarmid said the Barbados creature is a type of thread snake, also called worm snake, which are mostly found in the tropics. "We really know very little about these things," he said in a Sunday telephone interview from his Virginia home.

Tags: snakes, animals

Missing DNA tied to Schizophrenia

Thu, 31 Jul 2008 01:21:31 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.msnbc.msn.com

Two huge international studies show that people who lack certain chunks of DNA run a dramatically higher risk of getting schizophrenia, a finding that could help open new doors to understanding and diagnosing the disease.

These deletions are rare, each found in less than 1 percent of schizophrenia patients. But each one boosts the risk of disease by as much as 15-fold, by one estimate.

Scientists said studying such abnormalities may help them find new medications by shedding light on what causes the disease. And if enough rare aberrations can be found eventually, they may be combined into a test to help in diagnosis, said Kari Stefansson, chief executive officer of deCode Genetics of Reykjavik, Iceland, and an author of one of the studies.

Tags: health

Frogs With Claws

Tue, 24 Jun 2008 21:39:04 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.msnbc.msn.com

'X-Men' frogs sprout claws on demand

WASHINGTON - At least 11 species of African frogs carry a built-in concealed weapon — they can sprout claws on demand to fight off attackers, U.S. researchers reported on Monday.

When threatened, the frogs can puncture their own skin with sharp bones in their toes that they then use to claw their attackers, David Blackburn and colleagues at Harvard University reported.

"The fact that those claws work by cutting through the skin of the frogs' feet is even more astonishing. These are the only vertebrate claws known to pierce their way to functionality."

Tags: animals, frogs

"The 13 Most Awful American Fears"

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 23:23:56 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.somethingawful.com

The 13 Most Awful American Fears

Our spooky Halloween odyssey through fear begins with 13 on our list and an old favorite of American and British mass hysteria: the menace of backmasking. Recording backwards audio messages has been around for as long as creepy magicians have been able to speak "natas liah" into a Dictaphone.

Whether or not American foreign policy is right or wrong is irrelevant. You can be outraged and post all the horrible photos of three-eyed Iraqi babies you can find on your website. You can complain about Gulf War Syndrome for hours. Those things won't change the fact that depleted uranium is one of the least likely contributing factors to Iraqi babies having extra eyes or Gulf War vets being sick.

Clip Source: www.somethingawful.com

Clip Source: www.shutterfly.com

Clip Source: www.somethingawful.com

Tags: america

"High Fat Diet Linked to Poor Sleep"

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 20:09:24 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: healthmanager.webmd.com

Brazilian researchers have found that the more fat you consume each day, the less likely you are to get a good night's sleep.

Studies in the sleep lab showed that overall, the more fat they ate each day:

The more times they woke up, tossing and turning, throughout the night.

The greater the chance of abnormal breathing while sleeping.

The less time spent in REM (rapid eye movement) sleep each night. REM sleep is the sleep state during which dreaming occurs.

Research has shown that the more REM sleep you get, the more energetic you will feel the next day, says American Academy of Sleep Medicine spokesman Ron Kramer, MD.

Tags: health, healthcare

Guitar Pentatonic Scales

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 19:38:27 GMT

clipped by: nhorn
clipper's remarks: found these helpful when I was learning the pentatonic scales

Clip Source: www.guitar-dreams.com

Pentatonic mode 1 - Pentatonic Minor

Pentatonic mode 2

Pentatonic mode 3

Pentatonic mode 4

Pentatonic mode 5 - Pentatonic Major

Tags: guitar, music

Addicted to Soda?

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 19:35:21 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.webmd.com

Catherine Gregorczyk says she's an addict -- a soda addict, that is.

Still, soft drink lovers will testify that it can be awfully hard to give up the fizzy stuff. One reason is that when we consume something sweet, the taste triggers our brains to release chemicals called opioids -- which make us crave more pleasurable tastes, says Politi.

Research presented at an American Diabetes Association gathering showed that women who went from drinking less than one, non-diet soda a day to one or more daily sodas were nearly twice as likely to develop type 2 diabetes over a four-year period as women who drank less than one soft drink a day. (The women who drank more soda also gained more weight over the same period.)

A study published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism suggested that fructose, a sweetener found naturally in fruit juice and typically used in concentrated amounts in soft drinks, may induce a hormonal response in the body that promotes weight gain.

Tags: health

High Fructose Corn Syrup Isn't to Blame For Obesity

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 16:58:03 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.webmd.com

June 18, 2008 -- High fructose corn syrup, a sweetener used in many products, including soft drinks, is getting some guarded support from an unlikely source -- the American Medical Association (AMA).

At a meeting in Chicago, AMA delegates backed a resolution that argues that there's no scientific proof that high fructose corn syrup deserves the blame for obesity more than sugar or other caloric sweeteners. The resolution also nixes putting warning labels on products containing high fructose corn syrup.

But the AMA also points out that people also consumed more calories and became less active during that time and that the body processes high fructose corn syrup much like sugar.

The AMA says it isn't thrilled with the level of research on high fructose corn syrup, partly because there isn't a lot of research on the health effects of high fructose corn syrup and also because of industry funding for much of that work.

Tags: medicine, healthcare

Dino Mummy

Mon, 16 Jun 2008 21:04:12 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.msnbc.msn.com

The Edmontosaurus named Dakota, a duckbilled dinosaur covered by fossilized skin, lay beneath the western North Dakota soil for about 67 million years before being unearthed between 2004 and 2006. It is among just a few mummified dinosaurs in the world, and researchers working on it say it might be the best in terms of quality and quantity of preserved skin.

Animal tissue typically decomposes quickly after death and most dinosaur fossils are only bone. Researchers say Dakota must have been buried rapidly and in just the right environment for its skin and soft tissues to be replaced by minerals and preserved.

Tags: science

Functionalist Theory of Crime

Mon, 16 Jun 2008 19:49:47 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.crimetheory.com

Strange as it may seem at first, functionalist theorists argue just this point! Just like many other institutionalized behaviors, crime has an important function in society. For example, both Émile Durkheim and G. H. Mead argue that crime allows the members of a society, who are otherwise quite different, to join together in condemning the criminal, a commonly perceived enemy. By coming together, allowing people to see what they have in common and defining themselves against what they are not, individuals acquire a "collective cohesion."

Clip Source: www.crimetheory.com

crime is required for social progress. Thus Durkheim argues that a society must not be overly repressive: it must provide enough freedom of action for the criminal to behave in ways that hurt it, in order to give enough space for the "genius" to act in ways that benefit it. One step ahead of the rest of us, the genius develops new and progressive ways of living; thus a society lacking tolerance of such behavior will be a stagnant one.

Tags: sociology, crime

Gay men and straight women have similar brains

Mon, 16 Jun 2008 19:24:12 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

LONDON (Reuters) - Gay men and straight women share some characteristics in the area of the brain responsible for emotion, mood and anxiety, researchers said on Monday in a study highlighting the potential biological underpinning of sexuality.

Brain scans also showed the same symmetry among lesbians and straight men, the researchers wrote in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Brain scans of 90 volunteers showed that the brains of heterosexual men and homosexual women were slightly asymmetric with the right hemisphere slightly larger than the left, Ivanka Savic and Pers Lindstrom wrote. The brains of gay men and heterosexual women were not.

Then they measured blood flow to the amygdala -- the area key for the "fight-or-flight" response -- and found it was wired in a similar fashion in gay men and heterosexual women as well as lesbians and heterosexual men.

Tags: brain, medicine

100 Best Novels- Voted by the Modern Library

Sun, 15 Jun 2008 22:56:54 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.randomhouse.com

ULYSSES by James Joyce

THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald

A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN

LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov

BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley

THE SOUND AND THE FURY by William Faulkner

CATCH-22

DARKNESS AT NOON by Arthur Koestler

SONS AND LOVERS by D.H. Lawrence

THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck

UNDER THE VOLCANO by Malcolm Lowry

THE WAY OF ALL FLESH by Samuel Butler

1984 by George Orwell

I, CLAUDIUS by Robert Graves

TO THE LIGHTHOUSE by Virginia Woolf

AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY by Theodore Dreiser

THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER by Carson McCullers

SLAUGHTERHOUSE-FIVE by Kurt Vonnegut

INVISIBLE MAN by Ralph Ellison

NATIVE SON by Richard Wright

HENDERSON THE RAIN KING by Saul Bellow

APPOINTMENT IN SAMARRA by John O'Hara

U.S.A. (trilogy) by John Dos Passos

WINESBURG, OHIO by Sherwood Anderson

A PASSAGE TO INDIA by E.M. Forster

THE WINGS OF THE DOVE by Henry James

THE AMBASSADORS by Henry James

TENDER IS THE NIGHT by F. Scott Fitzgerald

THE STUDS LONIGAN TRILOGY by James T. Farrell

Tags: books

100 Best Novels- By Readers

Sun, 15 Jun 2008 22:55:11 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.randomhouse.com

ATLAS SHRUGGED by Ayn Rand

THE FOUNTAINHEAD by Ayn Rand

BATTLEFIELD EARTH by L. Ron Hubbard

THE LORD OF THE RINGS by J.R.R. Tolkien

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee

1984 by George Orwell

ANTHEM by Ayn Rand

WE THE LIVING by Ayn Rand

MISSION EARTH by L. Ron Hubbard

FEAR by L. Ron Hubbard

ULYSSES by James Joyce

CATCH-22 by Joseph Heller

THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald

DUNE by Frank Herbert

THE MOON IS A HARSH MISTRESS by Robert Heinlein

STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND by Robert Heinlein

A TOWN LIKE ALICE by Nevil Shute

BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley

THE CATCHER IN THE RYE by J.D. Salinger

ANIMAL FARM by George Orwell

GRAVITY'S RAINBOW by Thomas Pynchon

THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck

SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE by Kurt Vonnegut

GONE WITH THE WIND by Margaret Mitchell

LORD OF THE FLIES by William Golding

SHANE by Jack Schaefer

TRUSTEE FROM THE TOOLROOM by Nevil Shute

A PRAYER FOR OWEN MEANY by John Irving

THE STAND by Stephen King

THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN by John Fowles

BELOVED by Toni Morrison

Tags: books

Durkheim and Merton-Anomie

Sun, 15 Jun 2008 22:34:30 GMT

clipped by: nhorn

Clip Source: www.cas.sc.edu

Merton's concept of anomie thus refers to a demoralization, a de-institutionalization of means, resulting out of a dissociation between cultural goals and institutional norms.

Summing up, Durkheim's concept of anomie in Suicide refers to: (a) the acute ineffectiveness of society's regulative power, due to painful or beneficial, but always abrupt, transitions, and (b) the chronic lack of social rules limiting man's needs in the world of trade and industry. Durkheim employed the concept to explain differences in (anomic) suicide rates. First, the variations in suicide rates that occur whenever there is an abrupt disturbance in society (e.g. financial crises or divorce) are explained by the acute form of anomie. Second, chronic anomie in the world of trade and industry explains the prevalence of (anomic) suicide as a regular, constant factor in society.

Tags: sociology