I’m still working on clearing out the news chum, now that I’ve done some cleaning of the house. Looking over the news chum, I think I can theme this bunch by relating them all to parts of the body:
- Your Head. Ever wonder if you’re depressed. Here are 7 common symptoms of depression. Remember that depression, if left untreated, can be devastating. If you exhibit symptoms, talk to someone — friends, your doctor, a trained psychologist. But don’t try to do it alone.
- Your Mouth (Part I). Have you ever wondered why dentistry is a separate specialty. This article explains why. Basically, blame your barber. Dentists were a trade. Doctors were a profession. At one time, the dentists tried to be considered medical. They approached the physicians at the college of medicine at the University of Maryland in Baltimore with the idea of adding dental instruction to the medical course there, because they really believed that dentistry was more than a mechanical challenge, that it deserved status as a profession, and a course of study, and licensing, and peer-reviewed scientific consideration. But the physicians, the story goes, rejected their proposal and said the subject of dentistry was of little consequence. As a result, dental insurance is often even harder to get than health insurance (which is not known for being a cakewalk), max out of pockets and payments are lower, and dental problems left untreated worsen, and sometimes kill.
- Your Mouth (Part II). Using your mouth — that is, asking person-to-person — is 34 times more effective than asking for something via email. For the new study published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, researchers Mahdi Roghanizad and Vanessa K. Bohns instructed 45 participants to each ask 10 strangers to fill out a survey. Half of the volunteers sent their requests over email while the other half found people to ask in person. Both groups used the exact same wording when reaching out to strangers. The experiment showed that the face-to-face requests were 34 times more likely to garner positive responses than cold emails alone. The results vastly differed from the participants’ expectations: Both groups guessed their methods would be equally effective, saying they’d find success about half the time.
- Your Nails. Here’s a neat infographic on the chemistry of nail polish. Polymerisation, thixotropic agents, solvents and thermochromism are all terms you might expect to hear more frequently in a lab than in a nail salon, but they can all crop up in relation to nail polish. When you read this, ask yourself: is using all these chemicals good for me?
- Your Heart. More precisely, Follow Your Heart, an ages-old natural food store in Canoga Park. They invented Vegenaise. Here’s their story. They started as a small store in 1973 (back when Lindberg Nutrition was the definition of health food). They would go on to become a global natural-foods brand, raking in $50 million in sales last year. Along the way, owners Bob Goldberg and Paul Lewin — hippies in the ’70s, like many founders of the movement — would help shape how Americans eat. Their effect is profound: Thanks to them and their compatriots, organic spinach is normal. Whole wheat bread isn’t a rare item.
- Your Gut. Those with a genetic predisposition to celiac disease don’t always suffer from it. Why? Some scientists believe that a virus or stress point may trigger it. Scientists have been looking at a reovirus. Researchers studying the virus began to suspect otherwise during a series of recent experiments on mice. The scientists had infected mice with two different strains of the virus. The mice given the first strain were fine, as was expected. Their immune systems switched on, but nothing went wrong. The second strain was different. Mice who had been infected with this reovirus—one that commonly infects people, too—began getting sick when they consumed gluten. Their immune systems had switched on, then freaked out.
- Your Feet. Scientists have discovered why shoe laces become untied. The answer, the study suggests, is that a double whammy of stomping and whipping forces acts like an invisible hand, loosening the knot and then tugging on the free ends of your laces until the whole thing unravels. A better understanding of knot mechanics is needed for sharper insight into how knotted structures fail under a variety of forces. Using a slow-motion camera and a series of experiments, the study shows that shoelace knot failure happens in a matter of seconds, triggered by a complex interaction of forces.
One of my fondest memories of my college days was an event the UCLA Computer Club organized (I have no idea how) when we brought