Category: General

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Biological Sciences General Issues in Science Science in the News

After the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster- The Effect of Radiation on Human Health

 

  There was Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster on March 15th 2011 which released radioactive materials due to equipment failures and nuclear meltdown. Concern remains over the potential effect on human health from radiation leaks at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.

 

What is radiation? 

Thinkstock: radiation sign

  Radiation is a process in which energetic particles or waves travel through a medium or space. The energy comes from a source and travels through space and may penetrate various materials. Iodine and cesium are examples of radioactive elements. There are two types: ionizing, and non-ionizing. Both types can be harmful to organisms while ionizing radiation is more harmful as it can cause DNA damage.

   We are all naturally exposed to background radiation from radon (Rn), colourless, odorless chemical gas found in soil, water and air.  We are also exposed to unnatural sources such as X-rays which deliver about 10days’ worth of naturally occurring radiation.

 

  Symptoms

 Symptoms of radiation sickness occur when the body is damaged by a very large dose of radiation over a short period of time. The more radiation a person absorbs, the sicker one will get. The best way to prevent harm is to prevent exposure. The strength of the radiation itself and distance from it are key factors in the severity of radiation sickness. 

 Nausea and vomiting often begin within hours of exposure, followed by diarrhea, headaches and fever. Since radiation destroys infection-fighting white blood cells, the greatest short-term risk after exposure is infection and the spread of infectious diseases.

 

 Human impacts 

abcnews: radiation and the body

 Ionizing radiation damages the body’s internal chemistry. Our bodies are able to repair effects of radiation on tissues, but too much radiation can cause DNA damage that the body can’t repair, leading to cancer. 

Vulnerable areas include:

  • -Thyroid gland
  • -Bone marrow
  • -Cells lining the intestine and stomach

  Babies and young children are more sensitive to radiation exposure because their cells typically divide faster than adults; increasing their risk of developing a radiation-related cancer later in life.

 

 

 Treatment

  Drugs can stimulate the growth of white blood cells and help people fight off infections. Exposed individuals can also be given capsules containing a dye that binds to thallium and cesium and helps the body get rid of these radioactive elements.

 Potassium iodide tablets are often given out to people at risk of contamination. The compound prevents or reduces absorption of radioactive iodine, through the thyroid gland, which uses iodine to produce thyroid hormones. But potassium iodide cannot prevent radioactive iodine from entering elsewhere in the body and does not affect the absorption of other radioactive elements, such as cesium, which stays in organs, tissue and the environment much longer than iodine.

  We must watch out our nuclear plant cells since one disaster may cause series of problems. There are many nuclear plants that can potentially become  problems and we should find ways to minimize or avoid further disasters.

Categories
Biological Sciences General Public Engagement

What Are You Doing Right Now? Get To Sleep!

Everyone has adjusted their watches, clocks, phones and laptops an hour earlier on November 6th. It may be that we all got “25” hours on the day, but let’s face it and allow me to ask, what have we done with the extra hour? With all the assignments and projects from different courses, social events with friends, schedules working times, most of us probably were not in our bed, sleeping.

Sleep-deprived individuals are usually associated with 10 out of 11 health risk behaviours, including smoking, drinking alcohol, lower physical activities, sexually active, feeling sad or helpless, suicidal thoughts, etc. Dr. Lisa Shives mentions “Chronic, partial sleep deprivation affects our ability to think straight, make good decisions, and impacts our behavior”, and that is the reason why we were always told to get a good night’s sleep before a test or exam.

In fact, researches had proved that lack of sufficient sleep means we are prone to increase our risk of high blood pressure, explained Dr. Susan Redline, Professor of Sleep Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center at Harvard Medical School in Boston. When we have inadequate amount of sleep, especially with the lack of deep sleep, we tend to be tired during the day and wake up frequently during our sleep. Not getting enough sleep, i.e. at least six to eight hours of sleep every day, could also reduce our efforts in losing weight, even if we are on a diet and exercising regularly and properly.

Now, we might just assume that if we sleep-in on a weekend, we would make everything up during the week. However, Banks et. al. (2010) proves to be not enough to recover the effects of sleep loss. Just because we sleep 12 hours on a Saturday, it does not make up for the sleep debt accumulated during the weekdays.

So the next time you plan to stay up for whatever reason, have a second thought about it, because what is lost is lost, and there is no way to recover that.

For those of your who wish to improve your quality of sleep, please refer to this blog post by Dr. Lisa Shives. (http://nssleep.com/blog/sleep-disorders/insufficient-sleep-makes-losing-and-keeping-weight-off-more-difficult/)

References:

http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2011/09/27/sleep-deprived-teens-take-more-risks/
http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2011/08/29/study-lack-of-deep-sleep-raises-blood-pressure/
http://www.aasmnet.org/articles.aspx?id=2332
http://www.aasmnet.org/articles.aspx?id=1817
http://www.journalsleep.org/ViewAbstract.aspx?pid=27855

Categories
General

Blame Education

For my blog, I wanted to share with you some of Ken Robinson’s views on how education kills children’s creativity. 

We all know how important it is to get an education. After all, we are raised to believe that we will not obtain a job without one. Our every step seems to be already planned out: first, go to school and then begin a career. But we do not know what the future will bring. Then why should we plan for the next 40+ years of our lives when realistically we do not know how the world will look in five years?

 

   Schools are teaching children to meet the future by what they did in the past. Mathematics, languages, and humanities were considered more important than the arts. However, this method is not practical anymore, for the world has drastically changed. The arts such as music, theatre, and dance now rival the once important subjects. Also, in the past kids went to school because they knew they would get a job afterwards. But nowadays, kids do not believe that they will secure a job once they finish high school or university. This is largely due to the struggling economy and thus observing how unemployment rates have sky rocketed. Therefore, what is the point of going to school if the probability of getting a job is not very high?

 

Robinson defines creativity as the original ideas that have value. What happened to adults’ creativity? The saying “making mistakes helps you learn” seems to be lost in adults. This is because today’s society penalizes people’s mistakes so harshly that adults are afraid to be wrong. And as a result their pure sense of creativity is lost. On the other hand, have you noticed what a child does when they are uncertain the answer? They will say something, anything that they believe to be correct. They are not afraid to take chances.

 

At birth, every parent has big dreams for their child. For example, they may want their child to achieve the highest academic standing in school. However, they fail to realize that children are naturally very creative and innovative. If a child is struggling in school, many parents think that they have a medical problem. For example, many of these children are diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Often times, they are required to take potentially harmful medications like Adderall and Ritalin to help them focus and calm down. But is this the solution? Is it their fault for being so distracted? Probably not. Children are surrounded by a flood of exciting things to do, like watching TV, going on the computer, or playing with iPhones; as such, to them, the subjects they learn at school are boring and pointless. And yet society is still penalizing children for getting distracted during school. Instead they should be reworking how the curriculum is taught. These medications deaden children’s senses, making them unable to fully be themselves; thus their creativity is being killed.

 

In addition, the structure of the education system restricts the potential of some children. For example, children learn in a variety of ways. Younger children may be smarter than older children, yet they are strictly placed into grades based on their age. Also, some children learn better at night than in the morning, and some children learn better on their own as opposed to working in groups. Our education system requires a strong level of conformity from children. Furthermore, children spend ten years in school programmed to think that there is just one answer to a problem. They steadily lose the ability to think outside the box.

 

Whether it is trying to find a quick fix for a distraction problem or the basic structure of how schools are run, children are not getting the individual attention they require. Robinson says that it is time for us to “…[see] our creative capacities for the richness they are and [see] our children for the hope that they are.”

 

 

You Tube Video:

How Can We Nurture Creativity In Educational Contexts?

 

Reference:

Robinson, K. (2006). Do schools kill creativity? Retrieved November 2, 2011, from

 

Categories
Fun! General Science Communication

Do dinosaurs go RAWR?

Chris Cook of NovusTV interviews Iain Fraser, Science Facilitator at Science World about Extreme Dinosaurs. Source: Youtube Channel (NovusTV)

Not everyone can truthfully say that they work amongst a collection of giant robotic dinosaurs. However, I actually can live up to that claim, as I work part-time as a Science Facilitator at Science World during the weekend.

The Extreme Dinosaurs exhibition currently at Science World hosts 18 species of dinosaurs in animatronic form (essentially robots that look and move in a very lifelike fashion), most of which are life-sized. All of these dinosaurs have strange characteristics that were used to help them survive during the Mesozoic Era; these range from horns, plates, and crests to even feathery down, bony tail clubs, and thick skulls.

Pachycephalosaurus skeleton on display at the Royal Ontario Museum. Source: Wikimedia Commons

The actual purpose of some of these adaptations is still up for debate. For example, some scientists hypothesize that Pachycephalosaurus may have butted heads like rams to show dominance while looking for mates due to their thick skulls. Others think that the skulls were too fragile for the dinosaurs to butt heads, and aimed for the side of their competitors’ bodies instead.

Even with fossil evidence, there are still many adaptations that paleontologists have not been able to come to a consensus as to what their purposes were. There are some characteristics that can’t be verified from the fossil record, like the colour of dinosaurs and the sounds that they make. These still remain a mystery, and the best that scientists can do is to make an educated guess.

With many new species of dinosaurs being discovered within the past few years, the scientific method of making and testing hypotheses is alive and well in the field of paleontology.

Categories
Biological Sciences Fun! General Science Communication Science in the News

“Go” health benefits of “Bananas”

Bananas are common fruits that one can fine in grocery stores. Many people dislike banana for its taste, its texture, or other reasons. I am a person who do not eat banana for its taste until I came across this video: Dole Banana Nutrition Facts. It makes me think twice about it. Is it the taste of banana much important than the health benefits that it provides?

Here are some nutritional facts of bananas:

  • Bananas have resistant starch that aides the digestion of fat. Including bananas in diet helps weight loss.
  • Stroke is a leading cause of death in Canada, and bananas prevent stroke because the ratio between the content of potassium and the content of sodium in banana is ideal.
  • Potassium also helps the body regulate hear rate and water balance.
  • The high content of iron content in bananas can prevent anemia, a low level of red blood cells in blood.
  • Vitamin B6 that are present in bananas helps to repair DNA and prevent cancer.
  • Eating bananas in prenatal stage can decrease the chance of baby’s being born with leukemia.
  • Consumption of bananas can help children build a good immune system.
  • Tryptophan, an amino acid, in bananas decreases the chance of getting depression.

It is said “do not judge a book by its cover”, and I think it is true that I cannot dislike banana for its taste, because it has a lot of health benefits.

With these information in mind, be sure to consider including bananas in your diet!

Sources:

Banana Nutrition Facts, Health Benefits of Bananas, Banana Nutrients

Dole Banana Nutrition Facts

WHFoods: Bananas

 

Categories
General Public Engagement

Supermarket Psychology: Are you a Shopaholic?

Oniomania, or more commonly known as “shopaholism”, is defined as “an abnormal impulse for buying things”.

Often time consumers do not realize that they have swiped their credit card to purchase items that were unnecessary, only until the day the bill comes in do they realize their monthly budget had been overspent.

Not only do the discounts and sales the stores put up intrigue customers, there is a science behind that magnets them for purchases. These experts put this science fully into use to juggle with their customers’ mind into purchasing more of their products. This science is called, marketing psychology.

One of the major contributors to attract customers is the general layout of the store. As a customer enters the market, he/she is most likely to encounter the fresh food section. A portion full of fresh fruits and vegetables makes the entire area a more relaxing and clean environment, which would in return create a sense of emotional involvement in the shopping experience. The vivid colors of the fresh food appeals to most consumers and induces them into a “shopping mode”, where they would unconsciously spend more than then would have if the fresh food section was located elsewhere. To enhance the effects of vegetables and fruits, most markets would spray water on these fresh foods consistently, to build an illusion such that the products are only recently delivered from the nearest farms. Imagine if the first sight upon entry to the market is a shelf of canned, pre-prepared, frozen, or boxed food, the desire of shopping in such a market would be greatly reduced, as it would not provide a sense of freshness as vegetables and fruits would.

watch?feature=player_embedded&v=yzRDEKyqIJs

The location of products proved to be pivotal in drawing the customers’ shopping desire. Most consumers do not walk up and down the aisles to shop as it would be too time consuming. The major products (i.e. vegetables, fruits, meat, dairy products, etc.) are located around the market since these major products provide the largest profit margin to the market owners (Harrison, 2008). For other products, in order to gain maximum exposure to the customers, they are placed at the ends of the aisles, where people would pay attention to while shopping for the major products. As for the center of the aisles, the varieties of products are decreased as they are less frequently visited by the consumers. However, in order to intrigue customers to the center of the aisles, products at the end of the aisles are more familiar brands, or products on sale, which serves as a directional road sign to the shoppers.

watch?v=RmEI3_NhZj4&feature=player_embedded

Now knowing what is tricking us into purchasing large amount of unnecessary goods, hopefully we, as customers, could be able to control ourselves. Next time we see our monthly bills, maybe it would not be as high as it used to be.

 

Further Reading:

Harrison, P. 2008. Supermarket Psychology. Supermarket psychology | tribalinsight [online]. Available from http://tribalinsight.wordpress.com/2008/08/19/supermarket-psychology/

Mandhachitara, R., Shannon, R. 2008. Casual path modeling of grocery shopping in hypermarkets. Journal of Product & Brand Management. 17 (5): 327-340.

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