Category: Health and Medicine

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Prosopagnosia

There is a disease, typically brought on by a minor stroke, called prosopagnosia, in which the victim can no longer recognize faces. These patients can tell they are seeing someone’s face, but they cannot tell whose it is, even if the person is a close friend or relative.

As many as one out of every 50 people have mild prosopagnosia, in which they have more trouble recognizing faces than everyone else. You may have it if you fail to recognize someone you know in a new hat, or having shaved off a beard.

If you have a new friend who fails to recognize you, don’t get mad, get even. Wait, that’s not right. Just realize that the person may have prosopagnosia.

 

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Rats, Pituitary Glands, and Longevity

A scientist, W. Donner Denckla, at the National Institute of Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse, removed the pituitary glands of rats and injected the necessary hormones for survival. These rats lived much longer and showed fewer signs of aging than ordinary rats. At 24 months of age, only two out of 125 control rats were still alive. This is a typical lifespan for rats. Of the 95 rats without the pituitaries, even though handicapped, at age 34 months, 20 were still alive. This is equivalent to humans at age 95, where only one percent of us are still alive.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

American Candy

If you filled trucks with all the candy American kids eat in one year, they would line up bumper to bumper from San Diego to San Francisco.

Sugar is highly addictive. Some have said it’s more addictive than cocaine. Sugar is also strongly implicated in numerous scientific studies covering a wide range of diseases from high blood pressure to cancer and especially diabetes.