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Have you ever felt a sharp pain in the frontal lobe of your brain, like a cold stabbing sensation, while enjoying delicious ice cream on a hot summer day or drinking cold water? If you’re reading this article, you probably have.
If so, don’t worry – you don’t need to see a doctor unless you experience this pain frequently or for extended periods. But don’t be concerned if you haven’t felt it either.
According to research, approximately 40% of the population experiences this pain, with it being more common among those who suffer from migraines; meaning the majority never experience this pain. Children are more prone to experiencing brain freeze as they may consume cold foods and drinks too quickly. The medical term for this sensation is Sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia, but as you might have noticed, “brain freeze” is a much simpler name.
The Cause of Brain Freeze
Brain freeze typically occurs when you consume things like ice cream, very cold drinks, ice cubes, or when you inhale freezing cold air. According to research conducted in 2012 on the cause of brain freeze, this phenomenon is entirely related to blood flow. When something cold is consumed rapidly, if it suddenly and continuously contacts the palate, it triggers the trigeminal nerve (which connects the brain and face) by constricting the blood vessels leading to the brain.
The brain, disturbed by the sudden temperature change, directs warm blood to these constricted vessels. The rush of blood to these cold-constricted vessels is ultimately perceived by the nerves as pain caused by cold – that is, “brain freeze.”
According to research, the width of the area touched by the cold, the number of points contacted simultaneously, and the speed of entry are more important for brain freeze than the temperature itself. This is why ice cream of the same temperature is more likely to cause brain freeze when eaten quickly or spread throughout the mouth. The same applies to iced water.
The Solution to Brain Freeze
The way to get rid of brain freeze is quite simple. All you need to do is eliminate the cause – the cold. Since brain freeze is a “referred pain,” meaning that data input at one point causes a pain signal at another point, changing the inputs directly affects the pain. Solutions for brain freeze include stopping the consumption of the cold food or drink, moving away from the cold environment, drinking warm water, or pressing your thumb against your palate for heat transfer. Taking aspirin or painkillers won’t be very effective in alleviating brain freeze because in 98% of people, this pain lasts less than 5 minutes. By the time the medication takes effect, the brain freeze will have already passed.
Brain Freeze and Other Headaches
Unlike some other headaches that cause stomach pain or sensitivity to light/noise, brain freeze has no effect other than a stabbing sensation in the brain. If you experience vision loss, dizziness, difficulty moving or speaking along with brain freeze, it is recommended to seek help immediately. Additionally, it was found that those who suffer from various headaches and/or children whose parents have experienced brain freeze are more prone to experiencing brain freeze. Other types of headaches experienced by parents were not related to the child experiencing brain freeze, but children of parents who never experience headaches were also less likely to experience brain freeze.
Additionally, brain freeze may not only be related to humans. For example, the reactions of cats after being fed ice cream (although not recommended) and their neuroanatomy similar to ours may indicate that cats can also experience brain freeze.
On the eve of what historiography has termed the “Age of Discovery,” the Christian West held a geographical worldview that blended Greek, religious, and empirical influences, tinged with a sense of mystery. This perspective was far removed from the transformative understanding of the world that would emerge from the explorations and conquests of the 16th and 17th centuries, which decisively altered how the world was perceived and ushered in modernity. The first explorers, such as Christopher Columbus, were still men of the Middle Ages.
“T-O” Mappa Mundi
The Hereford Mappa Mundi, about 1300, Hereford Cathedral, England. Credit: Public Domain
The “T-O” mappa mundi model is the primary representation of religious influence on medieval geography. Drawing inspiration from ancient scholars and biblical narratives, Church Fathers like Isidore of Seville (560-636) divided the world among the three sons of Noah: Asia to Shem, Europe to Japheth, and Africa to Ham.
This geographical vision depicted the Earth as flat, contributing to the misconception that medieval people were unaware of the planet’s roundness (despite this knowledge dating back to antiquity and being studied by medieval scholars familiar with Greek science). The East was placed at the top, symbolizing Eden, the Paradise.
The “T-O” model persisted until the end of the Middle Ages, with the three sons of Noah occasionally being replaced by the Three Magi, each symbolizing a “continent,” even though the term “continent” itself is more characteristic of the modern era.
The Role of Portolan Charts
Marine charts, which developed significantly from the 13th century onward, were crucial in understanding how Europeans viewed the world at the time. Originating from Italian thalassocracies (Pisa, Genoa, Venice), portolan charts were used for Mediterranean navigation as early as the 13th century. These charts, often drawn on parchment, featured coastlines, ports, and hazards, and incorporated the use of the compass.
A network of lines drawn on the sea allowed navigators to reach ports marked on the chart.
Initially created for practical navigation and based on precise observations, portolan charts quickly became collector’s items, often idealized representations that blended cartographic details with figurative iconography, displayed in studiolos and princely palaces. They were richly decorated with geometric and floral motifs, coats of arms, ships, animals, and other designs.
These charts essentially served as catalogs of ports, with names labeled in red or black according to their importance, but without indicating distances between them. Major rivers and sometimes topographical features were schematically represented, without accurate proportions.
The World Map Before 1492
The influence of Greek thought was central to the geographical understanding of the world. By the 15th century, the vision of Ptolemy, a 2nd-century Greek geographer, had become the most popular, gradually supplanting the flat, religious worldview of earlier centuries with the concept of a spherical Earth, as proposed by Eratosthenes. According to Ptolemy, the Indian Ocean was enclosed, a feature reflected in 15th-century maps, such as that of Nicolaus Germanus (1482).
In 1450, the monk Fra Mauro created a mappa mundi that synthesized various cartographic traditions, both Christian and Arab, incorporating empirical information from early explorations of the time. While influenced by Ptolemy, Fra Mauro rejected the idea of an enclosed Indian Ocean.
However, the most striking example of the 15th-century worldview, bridging the Middle Ages and the modern era, is undoubtedly the Behaim Globe. Inspired by Ptolemy, it integrated information from the travels of Marco Polo and John Mandeville, whose accounts would later guide Christopher Columbus himself.
The Behaim Globe depicted a narrowed Atlantic Ocean, which, if crossed, would lead directly to Cipango (Japan) and Asia. In the middle, it was missing just the New World, which would be “discovered” a few months later by the Genoese navigator…
Moms know it well: no one can sleep as deeply as a dad when a newborn cries at night. Now, a scientific study conducted on mice confirms that it’s not just dads who sleep better than moms, but men in general compared to women. Women, according to research published in Scientific Reports, tend to sleep fewer hours, wake up more frequently, and enjoy less restorative sleep compared to men.
The Study: The researchers analyzed the sleep patterns of 267 mice. Male mice slept approximately 670 minutes (more than 11 hours) in a 24-hour period—an hour more than female mice.
This extra hour of sleep might correspond to the non-REM (nREM) phase, during which the body “repairs” itself. In addition to being shorter and less deep, the females’ sleep was also more fragmented compared to the males, with shorter rest periods and frequent awakenings.
Survival of the species? What explains these differences between the sexes? According to Rachel Rowe, one of the study’s authors, biological factors play a crucial role. “Females are programmed to be more sensitive to their environment and to respond when necessary because they are typically the ones caring for the young,” explains Rowe, who jokingly adds, “If we women slept like men, wouldn’t our species go extinct?
Men and women (aren’t) the same: From a scientific perspective, it’s essential that the female sex be adequately represented in sleep studies—something that hasn’t been done until now. While we know that sleep deprivation can have highly negative effects on health, are these effects the same for men and women if their sleep is already different to begin with?
Throughout the history of medicine, important pharmaceutical discoveries have changed the course of healthcare and the human experience. So chemotherapy drugs, penicillin, insulin, ether, chlorpromazine, thalidomide, contraception, idoxuridine, and azidothymidine are not just chemical molecules. They are symbols of the revolutionary forces that changed medicine and society. The history of these drugs is a story of technological progress, moral dilemmas, and social transformation, beginning with the development of anesthesia and ending with the eradication of infectious diseases.
Ether
V0018140 The first use of ether in dental surgery, 1846. Oil painting.Credit: Wellcome Library, London
Ether is a volatile liquid that can produce anesthesia when inhaled. Ether was first discovered in the 13th century by a Spanish chemist named Raymundus Lullus (Ramon Llull). However, its use as an anesthetic began in the mid-19th century. Crawford Long, a physician from Georgia in the USA, used it as a surgical anesthetic for the first time in 1842. He removed a tumor from the neck of a patient who was under the influence of ether. However, he did not publish his results until 1848.
The first public demonstration of ether anesthesia was done by William Morton, a dentist from Boston, USA, in 1846 at the Massachusetts General Hospital.
Aspirin
Bayer’s aspirin commercial.
Aspirin is a drug that can relieve pain, inflammation, and fever. It is derived from salicylic acid, a compound found in the bark of willow trees and other plants. The use of salicylic acid as a medicine dates back to ancient times when people chewed willow bark or drank tea made from it to treat various ailments. In 1828, Johann Buchner, a German chemist, isolated salicin, a precursor of salicylic acid, from willow bark.
In 1897, Felix Hoffmann, a German chemist working for Bayer, synthesized acetylsalicylic acid, a more stable and less irritating form of salicylic acid, and named it aspirin. Bayer patented the drug in 1899 and marketed it as a painkiller.
Insulin
Front page of the Toronto Daily Star, March 1922.
Insulin is a hormone that regulates blood sugar levels. The pancreas, a gland located in the abdomen, is responsible for producing this hormone. In individuals with diabetes, insulin is either insufficient or ineffective, leading to elevated blood sugar levels and various complications. In 1889, German physiologists Oskar Minkowski and Joseph von Mering discovered that removing the pancreas from dogs caused them to develop diabetes. This suggested that the pancreas contained a substance that prevented diabetes.
In 1921, three Canadian researchers, Frederick Banting, Charles Best, and James Collip, working at the University of Toronto, isolated insulin from the pancreas of dogs. They successfully lowered blood sugar levels by injecting insulin into diabetic dogs. In 1922, they achieved a successful treatment by administering insulin injections to a 14-year-old child with type 1 diabetes.
Insulin became the first effective treatment for diabetes, saving millions of lives. Banting and the head of the Toronto laboratory, John Macleod, shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1923 for the discovery of insulin.
Penicillin
A sample of penicillium mould, gifted by Alexander Fleming to a colleague at St Marys Hospital, London, 1935. Image: Science Museum.
Penicillin is an antibiotic that can kill or inhibit the growth of certain bacteria. Penicillium is a type of mold that produces it. The discovery of penicillin is attributed to the Scottish bacteriologist Alexander Fleming, who worked at St. Mary’s Hospital in London.
In 1928, Fleming discovered that mold had contaminated a Staphylococcus bacterial culture he had left on his workbench, preventing the bacteria around the mold from growing. He identified the mold as Penicillium and named the antibacterial substance it produced penicillin. However, he struggled to purify and mass-produce penicillin, and his discovery went largely unnoticed.
In 1939, two biochemists from the University of Oxford, Howard Florey and Ernst Chain, revived Fleming’s work and developed a method to obtain and purify penicillin from mold cultures. They tested penicillin on mice and humans, demonstrating its effectiveness against various bacterial infections.
During World War II, with the assistance of the U.S. and British governments and pharmaceutical companies, penicillin entered mass production and became a lifesaving drug for wounded soldiers and civilians. Fleming, Florey, and Chain shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1945 for the discovery and development of penicillin.
Chemotherapy Drugs
Chemotherapy drugs are medications that can kill or halt the growth of cancer cells, which are abnormal cells that divide uncontrollably and invade other tissues. The first chemotherapy drug, nitrogen mustard, is a chemical warfare agent that damages DNA and inhibits cell division.
In 1942, pharmacologists Alfred Gilman and Louis Goodman from Yale University tested nitrogen mustard on mice with lymphoma, a cancer type affecting lymph nodes. They found that the drug reduced tumor size and prolonged the survival of the mice.
In 1943, they treated a non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma patient with nitrogen mustard, achieving temporary remission. Nitrogen mustard became the prototype of alkylating agents, a class of chemotherapy drugs that interfere with DNA synthesis and function. Dr. Sidney Farber’s work in the 1940s laid the foundation for modern cancer chemotherapy.
Later, new types of chemotherapy drugs were found or created. These include antimetabolites, which copy and damage the building blocks of DNA and RNA, vincristine and paclitaxel, which come from plants and stop cells from dividing, and cisplatin and carboplatin, which are made of platinum and stop DNA from replicating by creating cross-links in it.
Chemotherapy drugs are often used in combination to enhance efficacy and reduce side effects.
Chlorpromazine
Chlorpromazine is a drug that can reduce the symptoms of psychosis, such as hallucinations, delusions, and agitation. It belongs to a class of drugs called antipsychotics or neuroleptics, which affect the activity of certain brain chemicals called neurotransmitters. Paul Charpentier, a chemist at the French pharmaceutical company Rhône-Poulenc, created chlorpromazine for the first time in 1950. It was originally designed as an antihistamine, a drug that blocks the effects of histamine, a substance that causes allergic reactions.
In 1951, Henri Laborit, a French surgeon, tested chlorpromazine on surgical patients and found that it induced a state of calmness and indifference without causing a loss of consciousness. He suggested that the drug could be used to treat psychiatric disorders. In 1952, Jean Delay and Pierre Deniker, two psychiatrists at the Sainte-Anne Hospital in Paris, tried chlorpromazine on patients with schizophrenia, a severe mental disorder characterized by psychosis.
They observed that the drug reduced the intensity and frequency of psychotic symptoms, such as delusions, hallucinations, and disorganized speech and behavior. Chlorpromazine became the first drug to treat schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders and opened a new era of psychopharmacology. Chlorpromazine also inspired the development of other antipsychotic drugs, such as haloperidol, clozapine, and risperidone.
Thalidomide
Thalidomide is a drug that can treat certain inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, such as leprosy and multiple myeloma, a type of blood cancer. It also has sedative and anti-nausea effects. However, taking thalidomide while pregnant is well known to lead to severe birth defects. Wilhelm Kunz, a chemist at the German pharmaceutical company Chemie Grünenthal, created the first synthetic version of thalidomide in 1953. It was marketed as a safe and effective sedative and antiemetic, especially for pregnant women suffering from morning sickness.
However, in the late 1950s and early 1960s, thousands of babies were born with severe malformations, such as missing or shortened limbs, due to their mothers’ exposure to thalidomide during pregnancy. The drug was withdrawn from the market in 1961 after the link between thalidomide and birth defects was established by several researchers, including Frances Oldham Kelsey, a pharmacologist at the US Food and Drug Administration, who refused to approve thalidomide for sale in the US.
Thalidomide became one of the biggest medical disasters in history and led to stricter regulations and ethical standards for drug testing and approval. In the 1990s, thalidomide was rediscovered as a treatment for leprosy and multiple myeloma after researchers found that it had immunomodulatory and anti-angiogenic properties, meaning that it could modulate the immune system and inhibit the formation of new blood vessels.
Thalidomide was approved for these indications, under strict conditions and monitoring, in several countries, including the US. Thalidomide also served as a model for the development of other drugs with similar mechanisms of action, such as lenalidomide and pomalidomide.
Birth Control
Birth control is a term that refers to any method or device that can prevent pregnancy. Hormonal methods include birth control pills, patches, injections, implants, or intrauterine devices (IUDs), such as hormonal IUDs. Barrier methods include condoms, diaphragms, or cervical caps. Natural methods involve techniques like abstinence, withdrawal, or fertility awareness. Surgical options include vasectomy or tubal ligation.
The history of birth control dates back to ancient times, when people used various herbs, plants, animal products, or physical methods to prevent pregnancy or induce abortion. Among the earliest documented forms of birth control are the use of vaginal suppositories by the ancient Egyptians, the use of the plant silphium by the ancient Greeks and Romans due to its contraceptive and abortifacient properties, and the practice of coitus interruptus or withdrawal, in various cultures.
The development of modern birth control pills began in the 1950s, with key contributions from scientists such as Carl Djerassi, Gregory Pincus, and John Rock. The first oral contraceptive, Enovid, was approved for contraceptive use in 1960.
Idoxuridine
Idoxuridine is a drug that can treat herpes simplex keratitis, an eye infection caused by a virus. It is a nucleoside analogue, a modified form of deoxyuridine, that can block the replication of viral DNA. It was first synthesized by William Prusoff, a chemist at Yale University, in 1958. He initially developed it as an anticancer drug but later found that it had antiviral activity against the herpes simplex virus. In 1962, the US Food and Drug Administration approved it as the first antiviral agent.
Azidothymidine
Azidotimidin, also known as zidovudine or AZT, is a drug that can prevent and treat HIV/AIDS. It is also a nucleoside analogue, a modified form of thymidine, that can inhibit the enzyme reverse transcriptase that HIV uses to make DNA. Jerome Horwitz, a chemist at Wayne State University, created the first version of it in 1964. He intended it as a cancer therapy, but it proved ineffective and was shelved. In the 1980s, it was included in a screening program by the National Cancer Institute to identify drugs to treat HIV/AIDS. It showed promising results in laboratory and clinical trials, and it became the first drug to gain approval from the US Food and Drug Administration for treating AIDS in 1987.
Human fingernails and toenails begin to form by the 20th week of fetal development. They consist of several parts. What we see on the outside is the nail plate, made of keratin, a hardened protein that is also found in the epidermis, hair, horns, claws, and hooves of mammals. Beneath the nail plate is a layer of skin called the “nail bed.” At the base of the nail plate is the cuticle, and behind and around it are the nail folds, which protect the nail from injury and bacteria. The matrix, the hidden part of the nail located beneath the cuticle, is made up of living cells that produce keratin. Typically, fingernails grow about 3.5 mm per month, while toenails grow about 1.5 mm.
Humans inherited their nails from primate ancestors. Scientists believe that these skin appendages appeared 58–55 million years ago, evolving from claws. Their main function was to help primates adapt to life in the trees.
Nails supported the fingertips and toes, increasing the surface area for gripping when pressure was applied to the fingers. This allowed our ancestors to confidently maneuver between tree trunks, where they lived. Additionally, broad fingers with nails enabled them to grasp thin branches and collect and peel fruits.
After primates descended from the trees, finger dexterity and a strong grip became essential for making and using tools. Without nails, it would have been much harder to manipulate fingers and adapt to the new way of life. Modern humans, for example, might not be able to thread a needle or perform surgical procedures without them.
Of course, the function of nails isn’t limited to finger dexterity and gripping surfaces. Their primary role is to protect the sensitive tips of the fingers from injury.
Imagine if there were no nails on your pinky toes. Every bump against the corner of a table or the leg of a couch would feel much sharper. Actually, don’t imagine it—it’s the kind of pain that would stay with you for a long time.
Nails also help protect against infections. If the nail plate is damaged, harmful microorganisms can more easily penetrate the body and cause illness.
In some cases, by examining a patient’s nails, a doctor can hypothesize that the person may have a deficiency in certain micronutrients or a disease. For example, a concave nail plate can indicate an iron deficiency, yellowing may suggest lung issues, and small pits might be a sign of nail psoriasis. But again, only a doctor can make accurate diagnoses.
Nails can also assist investigators in solving crimes.
This material can be sent for DNA analysis, which can help identify the culprit among the suspects.
Perhaps we could get by without nails, but since they have accompanied us through millions of years of evolution, they certainly make our lives better and more comfortable. Remember this the next time you feel like biting your nail.
Beer is one of the oldest alcoholic beverages. It was invented around 13,000 years ago. For the Sumerians in 3000 BC, beer was very popular, but they consumed it in a very different way than we do today.
Usually, the drink was prepared at home and fermented under the floor in clay or stone vats. It was quite thick and resembled soured porridge—the liquid was only at the top.
When Sumerian aristocrats wanted a drink or to treat their friends, they took very long hollow sticks, dipped them into the cellar vats, and sipped the beer through them.
These straws were quite large—so much so that scientists initially thought the discovered specimens were scepters or poles to support canopies. The ends were fitted with gold or silver tips decorated with figurines of bulls. These tips filtered out the thick sludge, allowing only the liquid to be sipped.
The Oldest Beer Is Over 200 Years Old and You Can Drink It
The oldest drinkable beer was found off the coast of Finland in 2010 according to the Technical Research Centre of Finland in a statement on February 8, 2011. Image: UPI/VTT/Antonin Halas | License Photo
In 2011, Finnish divers retrieved five bottles of beer from a shipwreck in the Baltic Sea. The shipwreck occurred between 1800 and 1830, meaning the discovered beer was over 200 years old.
It might seem reckless to try a liquid that had spent two centuries on the sea floor, but some brave Finns did it.
People who tasted the beer for the Finnish Technical Research Center said the taste was “very old,” with notes of burnt wood. The beer was quite sour—apparently, some fermentation continued in the bottle.
Paulan Monks Drank Beer During Lent Because It Was “Liquid Bread”
Monks have always been remarkably inventive when it comes to finding ways to eat during Lent. They classified beavers as fish so they could eat their tails with horseradish, and they also ate capybaras. They even wrote an entire scientific treatise proving that birds grow on trees, meaning that eating goose was allowed since it wasn’t considered meat.
The Paulan monks from Neudeck ob der Au in Germany also employed various tricks to lighten their fasting and avoid angering the Lord. They came up with the idea of brewing incredibly strong and malty beer—so thick it could be scooped with a spoon.
This brew was called “liquid bread,” and as bread is allowed during Lent, so was the drink. The beer was so strong and caloric that the monks could actually sustain themselves on it.
According to legend, the abbot of the Paulan monastery, to be safe, decided to ask the Pope if their beer could be consumed during Lent and sent him a barrel for a taste.
During the journey, the beer soured, and when the Pope tried it, he almost threw up. He declared that drinking such filth required great humility before the Lord and allowed the monks to consume the beer during Lent.
By the way, the modern version of this beer—no longer thick but liquid and filtered—is now sold under the Paulaner Salvator brand.
Beer With 55% Alcohol Was Sold in a Stuffed Squirrel
Once, the brewers from the Scottish firm BrewDog came up with the idea of brewing the world’s strongest beer, and they created a drink with 55% alcohol content. Such a brew is made by repeatedly freezing it, removing the water, and leaving the maximum amount of alcohol.
But selling such beer in a simple bottle seemed boring to BrewDog, so they created special packaging for the first batch of 12 bottles.
The vessels were placed in… stuffed squirrels, weasels, and a hare. This was to make the $765 beer’s packaging more entertaining for buyers.
According to company representatives, no animals were harmed in the making of the packaging: the bodies of roadkill were specially collected from Scottish roads and then handed over to a taxidermist.
Beer Can Not Only Be Drunk but Also Spread on Bread
Image: birraspalmabile.com
If you really crave beer but can’t tolerate alcohol, you still have a chance to enjoy it—in the form of a spread.
The owner of an Italian chocolate shop, Pietro Napoleone, came up with a unique recipe: mix 40% craft beer, sugar, and glucose syrup and turn it into a thick paste that can be spread on a roll.
This creamy non-alcoholic drink pairs well with cured meats, game, roasts, fish dishes, salads, and desserts. It also goes well with crackers, fried sausage, cheese, bacon, and eggs—in short, it can be eaten with just about anything. The product is called Birra spalmabile.
Many people know what it’s like to dive headfirst into a captivating book. Sometimes fictional characters and emotions can feel completely real. But what happens in our brain when we devour page after page? How does this differ from its work during other moments of everyday life? And is there any difference at all?
These questions were partially answered by a team led by specialists from Carnegie Mellon University. They explored how we read literature using a machine learning algorithm.
How Scientists Study Brain Activity During Reading
The perception and comprehension of written text is an incredibly complex process. Early research tried to break it down into parts, focusing on each aspect separately. For instance, using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), they tracked which brain structures were involved in processing a single word or sentence.
However, these strictly controlled experiments barely resembled the actual process of reading. Sentences used as stimuli for brain activity were often out of context, crafted specifically for the research. While such studies provided useful information about certain aspects of text comprehension, they did not help form a complete picture.
Machine learning specialists took a different approach. Volunteers read a chapter from an engaging novel while scientists scanned their brains. The researchers then deconstructed the brain’s functioning process. According to the scientists, they created the first integrated model in the world that shows how our brain processes written words, grammatical structures, and stories.
The Study’s Process
Researchers gathered a group of eight volunteers and recorded their brain activity using an MRI scanner as participants spent 45 minutes reading a chapter from the book Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (specifically, the episode where the characters are learning to fly on broomsticks).
In the next stage, the scientists fed the data into a computer program they had written. Their algorithm looked for patterns of brain activity that occurred when participants read specific words, grammatical constructions, names of characters, and so on. There were 195 such “story elements” in total.
The program was able to determine which part of the chapter the participant was reading based solely on brain activity. To make these conclusions, the algorithm used models of brain activity that it had learned to associate with each story element. When researchers applied all these models at once, the program was able to identify which of two passages a person was reading with 74% accuracy, which is significantly higher than random guessing.
Finally, the scientists repeated the test for each type of story element in every brain region. This helped them discover connections between them and precisely determine which brain structures process different types of information. Some results aligned with the researchers’ expectations, while others were quite surprising.
Practical Implications of the Findings
As expected, the brain processes individual words through an initial stage in the visual cortex, which handles all visual information, and then through higher-level processing areas. These include gyri in the frontal and parietal lobes, which are involved in language, speech comprehension, interpretation of text, reflection, and more. But that’s not all.
When participants read descriptions of physical movements in the book, activity in the posterior temporal lobe and angular gyrus changed.
These brain regions are involved in perceiving real-life movements.
Different characters’ personalities correlated with neuron activity in the right posterior superior and middle temporal regions. These structures are important for speech perception, visual memory, and emotions.
Dialogues were linked to the right temporoparietal junction, a brain region critical for imagining the thoughts and goals of others.
Interestingly, some of the areas listed are not even considered part of the brain’s language system.
We use them daily when interacting with the real world, and now it turns out that they also engage when we imagine the perspectives of different characters in books.
This seems to confirm the existence of a phenomenon scientists call the “narrator perspective network.” In other words, it’s a network of brain areas that allows us to “become” the character of the story we’re reading.
If these hypotheses are correct, science could be on the path not only to creating a more accurate neural model of language processing but also to better understanding how and why this process can break down.
Scientists are interested in various ways that speech perception can be disrupted. With enough data, they may be able to understand how one brain, for example, that of a person with dyslexia, works differently from any other.
Researchers hope that such diagnostic tools will one day help create individualized neurological correction methods for dyslexia and other reading disorders. If these methods prove effective, many people may find it much easier to fully immerse themselves in a good book.
It has long been known that women before menopause are less “heart-endangered” compared to men. This changes around the time of menopause. According to a new US study, the cause is mainly due to an increase in “bad” LDL cholesterol in the blood, as discussed at the European Cardiology Congress in London (August 30 to September 2).
“During and after menopause, there is an increase in ‘bad’ low-density lipoprotein (LDL) particles and a decrease in ‘good’ high-density (HDL) blood fats,” study author Stephanie Moreno from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas was quoted on Tuesday in a statement from the European Society of Cardiology (ESC). “Taken together, these changes suggest that menopause is associated with a transition to a higher-risk lipoprotein profile that is more likely to cause cardiovascular diseases such as coronary heart disease.”
Most Common Cause of Death in Women
Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are the most common cause of death in women, although they are mistakenly considered a “man’s disease”. 40 percent of all deaths in women are due to cardiovascular diseases.
Women become ill about ten years later than men. The increase in risk occurs specifically after menopause.
The current study also included 1,346 men (reference group) with an average age of 43 years. They were compared to 1,246 women. Of the women, 440 (35 percent) were in premenopause (median age 34 years), 298 (24 percent) were in the time around menopause (perimenopause; median age 42 years), and 508 (41 percent) were in menopause (median age 54 years).
Two scientific studies, also presented at the annual congress of the European Society of Cardiology, additionally show that constant noise exposure also poses a heart risk for people.
High blood pressure, high blood lipid levels, lack of exercise, and diabetes are particularly important risk factors for the development of cardiovascular diseases. However, environmental factors also play a role. This apparently includes the environmental factor of noise.
“Our DECIBEL-MI study shows that young patients aged 50 or younger who had suffered a heart attack were exposed to higher noise levels than the general population. The study demonstrates that urban noise can significantly increase the risk of premature heart attack in young people with low traditional risk factors,” explained study leader Hatim Kerniss from the Health North hospital group in Bremen, Germany, on the occasion of the upcoming ESC annual congress.
In our brain, these forms of love evoke different signals — clearly distinguishable patterns, as revealed by a study. They can be recognized by differences in the activated brain regions and intensity. For example, love between partners and towards children elicits strong reactions in our reward system and social circuits. Love for strangers, pets, or nature, on the other hand, shows different patterns.
Love is one of our most intense emotions — and one of the most diverse: It shapes erotic and romantic relationships, connects parents with their children, and forms the basis of friendships. Depending on its manifestation, very different hormones and physical sensations are involved in these feelings of love. In addition, there are other forms of love, for example towards a pet, nature, or generally towards our fellow human beings or the world as a whole.
How Do Different Forms of Love Manifest in the Brain?
“But when we love, is it neurologically the same whether this love is directed towards our child or, for example, nature?” ask Pärttyli Rinne from Aalto University in Finland and his colleagues. What differences does our brain make in these various types of love? Until now, the “neural fingerprint” of love has been studied almost exclusively for classic romantic love and parental love. However, not for other types of interpersonal and non-personal love.
“We now provide a more comprehensive picture of the brain activity associated with different types of love than previous research,” says Rinne. For their study, 55 test subjects listened to short scenes and stories about six different types of love while their brain activity was recorded using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Immediately afterwards, the participants were asked to mentally recreate the respective form of love as intensely as possible.
In addition to the brain scans, all test subjects answered detailed questions. These included, for example, what feelings the stories about the six love variants evoked in them, how strongly they felt them, or how similar or different the reactions were. The six variants were love in relationships, parental love, love for friends, for strangers, for pets, or for nature.
Neural Fireworks for Parental Love and Partner Love
The result: Our brain generates very different neural “fingerprints” for the various forms of love. While all forms of this emotion are linked to parts of the reward system to some extent — like many pleasant experiences — which brain areas are involved and how intensely they fire varies greatly.
“The six different variants of love are linked to the reward centers and the centers for social cognition in different ways,” report Rinne and his team.
The brain reacts most intensely and extensively to love for a child and love for a partner. “When visualizing parental love, areas deep in the reward system of the striatum become active — we don’t see this with any other type of love,” reports Rinne. As with romantic love, areas in the brain stem, cerebellum, temporal lobes, and along the entire midline of the head are also active. “The subcortical areas of romantic and parental love include brain regions closely linked to reward, bonding, motivation, and reinforcement learning,” the team says.
Unique Patterns Also for Friendship Love and Love for Animals
Comparing these two closest and most intense forms of love to friendship love and love for strangers revealed that while all these interpersonal emotions are similar in terms of some brain areas — the regions responsible for social behavior and parts of the reward system are active in all — the activity is weaker in friendship love and even more so in empathetic love for strangers, and encompasses fewer areas of the brain, as Rinne and his colleagues determined.
In contrast, non-personal love for nature or pets activates the reward system but not the social areas of our brain — with one exception: People who own pets themselves react differently. In their case, thoughts about pets or stories about pets evoke similar reactions in the brain as love for fellow humans. “The activity of these brain areas linked to sociality therefore reveals whether a person has a pet or not,” says Rinne.
“Wonderful Complexity of Human Love”
According to the researchers, the neural fingerprints of love in our brain reflect the diversity of the feeling we summarize as love. “From the perspective of functional neuroarchitecture, we see how the wonderful complexity of human love arises,” state Rinne and his colleagues.
The protein in question, named DdrC, was discovered in a resistant bacterium called Deinococcus radiodurans, known for its ability to survive in extreme conditions. DdrC appears to be highly effective in detecting DNA damage, stopping it, and alerting the cell to begin the repair process.
The researchers behind this discovery, from Western University in Canada, found in an experiment that inserting the ddrC gene into an E. coli bacterium made it more resistant to damage caused by UV rays, increasing its resistance by more than 40 times. The results were published in the journal Nucleic Acids Research.
The Unique DNA Repair Mechanism of DdrC
The DdrC protein is distinguished by a unique ability to detect and repair DNA lesions, whether single or double. DNA repair by DdrC involves a complex process where the protein scans the DNA for lesions on one or two strands. When it finds a single or double break, it binds to it and looks for another break of the same type. Once two damage zones are found, DdrC immobilizes both, compacting the DNA segment.
These repairs not only prevent damage from worsening but also signal the cells responsible for DNA repair to come and repair the breaks. This action is important because it maintains the genetic integrity of cells, thus reducing the risk of mutations that could lead to cancer. “DdrC’s ability to recognize and repair DNA breaks is a true biochemical feat,” explains Dr. Robert Szabla, a biochemist at the Canadian Light Source laboratory and lead author of the study, in a statement from the University of Saskatchewan (Canada).
One of the most fascinating features of DdrC is its asymmetric structure, which allows it to trap DNA breaks particularly effectively. When it detects a lesion, the protein undergoes a conformational change that allows it to bind to a second break, forming a stable and reparative structure.
This complex mechanism not only prevents further damage but also facilitates repair by other cellular mechanisms. It’s as if DdrC acted as a security agent, patrolling the DNA to neutralize threats as soon as they appear.
Towards A Universal Cancer Vaccine?
The implications of this discovery for cancer treatment are vast. Currently, the first cancer vaccine candidates, some of which are already in clinical trials, face many challenges, including identifying antigens specific to cancer cells and stimulating an effective immune response. DdrC’s ability to directly repair DNA could allow for the development of true (preventive) vaccines, targeting the repair mechanisms of cancer cells and perhaps even a universal vaccine.
Experts are unanimous about the potential of this discovery. “The ability to rearrange, edit, and manipulate DNA in a specific way is the Holy Grail of biotechnology. What if you had a scanning system like DdrC that patrols your cells and neutralizes damage when it occurs? This could form the basis of a potential cancer vaccine,” said Szabla.
This discovery also fits into a context of recent advances in the field of genetic repair. For example, studies on PARP inhibitors have shown their effectiveness in treating certain types of cancers by blocking the DNA repair mechanisms of cancer cells. However, DdrC offers a different approach by directly repairing breaks, which could be complementary to existing therapies.
Szabla finally emphasizes that DdrC is just one of hundreds of potentially useful proteins in this bacterium, and that additional research could reveal other valuable tools for DNA repair. However, as with any major medical advance, the use of DdrC raises ethical questions. Genetic manipulation to repair DNA could also raise concerns about equitable access to treatments and long-term implications for public health. In the near future, researchers plan to further study the D. radiodurans bacterium to explore other potential mechanisms it uses to repair its own genome.
