by: Patrick Lin Many of us probably have experienced this scenario before: while pan-frying some leafy vegetables, a few seconds of inattention lead to sharp alarm beeps following billowing clouds of grey smoke erupting from the now-burnt food. You proceed to take the smoke detector off from the wall to turn it off. What you […]
16 Years Past Diagnosis: A Look on the Outcomes of Individuals with ADHD
by: Desiree Delavary Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, more commonly known as ADHD, is characterized by three different qualities: inattention, hyperactivity, also known as being overactive, and impulsivity, or acting without thinking. Often thought of as a childhood disorder that goes away with age, contrasting new evidence has suggested that ADHD is a lifelong disorder. Lily […]
Real-Life Chimeras: Scientists Create Human-Pig Hybrid
by: Caroline Zhou In ancient Egypt, the chimeric forms were associated with gods. Ra, the Sun God, for example, had a falcon head and a human body, and was a protector of mankind. The Chimera has, however, also been a central part of Greek mythology as an omen for disaster. With the front of a […]
Spatial Memory and Recognition: How You Know Where You Are
by: Ankita Singh The brain is a computer with hardware, which comes in the form of cells communicating through electrical signals, and software, which includes the complex thoughts and actions arising from these electrical signals. Like a computer, the brain stores all the information that is required for the proper functioning of an organism. Thus, […]
More than Water Vapor: A Method to Quantify the Products of E-Cigarette Vaping
by: Sasha Narain A study conducted by the CDC, surveying high school students between the years 2011 and 2015, reported a 6.5 percent decrease in cigarette smoking. According to TobaccoFreeKids.org, this decrease reflects an overall trend in cigarette smoking amongst teens since the late 1990s. In contrast, in 2015 16 percent of high school students […]
Bacterial Associations: How Your Gut May Define You
by: Quinn Spencer Did you know that there are more bacterial cells in your body than there are human cells? It has long been known that these bacterial associations play an important role on human health (probiotics anyone?), but the Eisen Lab at UC Berkeley has recently begun research that looks further into how these […]
Three Parent Babies: The Quest for a Healthier Population
by: Miranda Hurtado While rare, mitochondrial diseases can often be deadly for those who inherit them. Recent research has focused on finding ways to cure these diseases or to eliminate them altogether. One noteworthy milestone in this research is the birth of the world’s first “three parent baby” using MRT, mitochondrial replacement therapy. This “three […]
High-Throughput Toxicity and Phenotypic Screening of 3D Human Neural Progenitor Cell Cultures on a Microarray Chip Platform
by: Jianne Jung 19,500,000 animals die every year from animal experiments for various purposes, including effectiveness test for medicines, safety tests for cosmetics, and toxicity testing of commercial chemicals. One of the most significant purposes of animal testing is preclinical drug analysis. All over-the-counter pills, like Advil and Tylenol, were proven to be safe based […]
Decoding the Illusion of Speech: Scientists Investigate the Brain’s Mechanism for Understanding Sound
by: Chelsey Rodriguez In 1953, cognitive scientist Colin Cherry puzzled the world with what is known as the “Cocktail Party Effect.” This phenomenon questions how it is that we are able to focus on a particular sound in any given setting- such as a single conversation in a loud party. For at least a decade, […]
Dementia with Lewy Bodies: How Alpha-Synuclein Affects Patients with Visual Hallucinations
by: Brenda Martinez There comes a time when some people start forgetting their meaning in life. Not only are they affected by this problem, but the families are as well. In a study done in the American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, published in January 10, 2017, stated that “patients with dementia with Lewy bodies often […]