Communicating Science (14w212)

Adderall: The Study Drug

Posted on February 23, 2015 by Rajpreet Gill | 5 comments

The Drug Enforcement Agency classifies Adderall as a Schedule II Stimulant. Drugs under this classification serve medical purposes but also have a strong potential to be abused. This is an appropriate classification for Adderall as multiple studies, discussed below, have acknowledged its abuse among university and college students. A question to consider is, are the reasons behind abusing Adderall worth the potential consequences?

Adderall
Source: Flickr Commons
Credit to: hipsxxhearts

Amphetamine, the active medical ingredient in Adderall, is used to treat Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) by increasing the impaired level of two neurotransmitters: norepinephrine and dopamine. In doing this, individuals with ADHD are able to function better throughout the day.

Post-secondary students, however, are using Adderall for non-medical purposes. One study used Twitter posts to confirm the use of Adderall as a study aid among college students. Another study acknowledged the ease with which students could obtain Adderall and demonstrated that students use this drug to improve focus in hopes to improve their grades. Furthermore, a more recent study looked at usage patterns by inspecting metabolites, the product remaining after a drug is broken down, from Adderall in campus wastewater samples. The study found that during high stress periods, such as midterms and final exams, the concentration of these metabolites increased.

Study Aid
Source: Flickr Commons
Credit to: Quinn Dombrowski

One other study talked about how prescription stimulant abuse has increased, and illustrates the various consequences of abusing Adderall. These consequences may include a psychological dependence for the drug once users believe they cannot perform well without it, insomnia, increased blood pressure, irritability, personality changes and tolerance, which may lead to users increasing the dosage. The same study found that Adderall abusers are 20 times more likely to use cocaine and heroine once they had developed a tolerance to Adderall. Additionally, users who develop a physical dependence on the drug may experience withdrawal symptoms such as extreme fatigue, violent mood swings, panic attacks, depression and uncontrollable cravings.

Given the wide range of possible consequences, you might be wondering if taking Adderall when it is not prescribed for you is worth the risk. A recent study found no consistent improvement on measures of cognition when comparing the experimental condition, taking Adderall, to the control condition, taking a placebo. This study examined 13 different aspects of cognitive ability including intelligence, working and episodic memory. Although participants believed their performance was enhanced while taking the drug, the study concluded that generally no enhancement was observed. As Adderall does not cause a significant improvement in cognition, it is unlikely to improve students’ grades.

This video by Health Animated does a great job summarizing the information surrounding Adderall:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24dPuIkwU4Q

Personally, I do not condone using Adderall without an appropriate prescription, nor do I think it’s ethical to abuse Adderall in an attempt to enhance one’s abilities. Additionally, I do not think it is smart to put oneself at risk for a potentially insignificant improvement in cognition.

– Rajpreet Gill

5 Comments

Posted in Biological Sciences, Issues in Science, Public Engagement

Tagged Adderall, ADHD, attention, college, drug abuse, health, prescription drugs, students, university

4D Printing: It’s One ‘D’ Better.

Posted on February 23, 2015 by seungwon lee | Leave a comment

I am pretty sure most of you have heard of 3D printing technology. Knowing that you can print anything you want, 3D printers have opened up unlimited opportunities for us to print toys, tools in our living room and household appliances as well. However, all of these great products have one thing in common – rigidity. That means they will maintain their shape once we print them, avoiding the hassle of putting pieces together to obtain a complete product.

Lego pieces that need to be assembled (Source: Free Art & Technology)

So why 4D if 3D does the job?

Skylar Tibbits, an MIT researcher who came up with this new concept of 4D printing has announced “It’s called 4D printing. The idea behind 4D printing is that you take multi-material 3D printing — so you can deposit multiple materials — and you add a new capability, which is transformation,that right off the bed, the parts can transform from one shape to another shape by passive energy — so heat, shaking, pneumatics, gravity, magnetics.”

So what does that really mean? Well, it means printing objects that can change after they are printed—basically printing a raw material that folds into the shape of the final object like a long chain of polypeptides in cells that self-folds into a functional protein.

4D Printing: Self-Folding Strand into “MIT” (Source: The New York Times)

For example, this MIT string works by printing a long strand of plastic that’s made two different polymers that react differently to water; one expands and one contracts, and by intelligently mixing the two based on blueprints, the strands fold themselves into the shape of the final object. Although 4D technology remains premature, such concept has the potential to extend to greater innovations that will allow 4D production of pipes that can actually expand and contract in response to water demand. Or imagine a self-assembling furniture. Print out a flat board and add water; next thing you know it curls up into a rocking chair.

Written by Seungwon Lee

Be Happy! Your Dog Knows When You Aren’t.

Posted on February 22, 2015 by Surekha Gangar | 6 comments

Humans and dogs have had long-lasting relationships since cavemen existed. Because of these long-lasting relationships, dogs are probably one of the most domesticated species and it shouldn’t be a surprise that they are able to distinguish between different human emotions.

When exposed to photographs of human facial expressions, adult dogs were able to recognize different emotions. Dogs’ reactions to facial expressions were evaluated compared to a neutral expression photograph. When joy was displayed, both adult dogs and puppies reacted more to the expression, as compared to the neutral photograph. However, only adult dogs reacted to anger, avoiding the photograph, and to fear, paying more attention to it. This research suggests that emotions that are more difficult to interpret, like anger, may take dogs longer periods of time to recognize.

Happiness: Flickr Commons (Nithi Anand)

Anger: Flickr Commons (englishme community)

Fear: Flickr Commons (Portland Center Stage)

You may be wondering, are dogs better able to recognize their owners’ emotions? In fact, dogs are able to distinguish emotions just as well for strangers of the same sex as their owner. For example, when shown photographs of their owners’ smiling face versus the owners’ blank face, the dogs selected, using their noses, the owners’ smiling face significantly more often. The results were the same for a stranger of the same sex as the owner. It isn’t clear why the results weren’t similar for those of the opposite sex, but it may be because of facial feature differences between genders. Although gender had an impact, the portion of the face displayed didn’t seem to impact recognition. Dogs were able to recognize emotions even when only the eyes were displayed.

Happiness: Flickr Commons (Shannon Phillips)

Anger: Flickr Commons (maidin_rua)

Fear: Flickr Commons (Leonardo Moyano)

Humans’ emotions are not only presented through visual cues (facial expressions) they are also displayed through verbal and behavioral cues. When all these aspects of emotional display were considered and dogs were asked to retrieve objects in a recent study, the dogs still demonstrated that they recognized emotion. Dogs were given a choice between two objects, one their owner acted disgusted towards and another their owner acted happily towards. Regardless of their interest when they approached the two different objects, dogs retrieved the object their owner displayed more positive emotions towards.

How can dogs interpret emotions? Researchers have done MRI scans on dogs and found that dogs’ brains actually function similarly when processing human emotions. The following video, by Reuters, briefly summarizes this research.

My first thought before I read about dogs recognizing human emotions was, “that explains why they get sad when the owners do and why they seem to comfort the sad owner.” However, the current research contains nothing related to sadness, so can we say that dogs could potentially recognize all human emotions? Maybe more research needs to be done to make such a bold statement.

– Surekha Gangar

6 Comments

Posted in Public Engagement, Science in the News

Tagged dogs, emotions, facial expressions, processing emotions

New Species Discovered in Antarctica?

Posted on February 22, 2015 by mtakhi | 1 comment

Planning on travelling to another continent as a vacation? Why not book a flight to Antarctica? Antarctica may have long winters and short day-light hours but new species are still being discovered till this day. Thousands of scientists travel during the summer hoping to make astonishing discoveries and get a better understanding of this bitter-cold and isolated world.

A recent discovery has been made on fishes living beneath Antarctica by drilling holes through the ice and feeding a camera through it. These are not your ordinary fishes but rather a worm-like fish that live beneath a 740 m thick ice. Ross Powell, who led the team to this project, mentions that it is incredible how these species have managed to thrive with little to no sunlight and be isolated from rest of the world. These cameras usually pick up lifeless mud environment with at most microbe activities. However, the discovery of these fishes has definitely intrigued many scientists.

Fish found below Antarctica ice Credit: Reed Scherer (NIU) Source: Scientific American

Furthermore, even though there are a few species thriving in Antarctica, how were their ancestors able to survive for thousands of years? An international team has discovered that steam and heat from the volcanoes have helped many species to survive in ice ages. In addition, a team lead by Ceridwen Frazer has collected data for many decades and pinpointed a common trend. His team found that there were more species living near the volcanoes compared to other places. Frazer explains that these large volcanoes melted large ice caves that are warmer than outside. This has allowed species to survive during cold ice ages.

Antartica Credit: Vincent Van Zeijst Source: Wikimedia Commons

Antarctica Credit: Vincent Van Zeijst Source: Wikimedia Commons

Moreover, the environment of Antarctica has sustained life for thousands of years. However, there is a growing concern of large volumes of ice melting causing a rise in sea level and destroying ecosystems. Scientists are using computer software to run simulations of possible outcomes in the next few years. For example, they looked in East Antarctica’s Wilkes Basin. Currently a thick rim of ice at the coast is holding this basin in place. If this rim of ice were to melt, the basin can cause a rise of 300-400 cm in sea level.

Credit: Newsy Science from Youtube

Lastly, action has been taken to prevent the destruction of Antarctica due to global warming. Changes in sea level have devastated the food web by flooding its environment. Commission for the Conservation of Antarctica Marine Living Resources’ (CCAMLR) are making an effort to protect waters around Antarctica.

Taking a step back, Antarctica has provided homes to many species. Scientists are still discovering new species in little to no sunlight areas. Now there is a growing concern with sea level rise due to melting ice sheets, and we must do our research to find ways to prevent this deep concern. If you love the cold, then make sure to stop by Antarctica on your next flight.

-Manpreet Takhi

1 Comment

Posted in Biological Sciences, Issues in Science, Science Communication

Tagged Antarctica, Antarctica Fish, global warming, sea level rise

Tattoo removal might be easier than you think

Posted on February 20, 2015 by Ian Villamin | 4 comments

Do you have a tattoo that you regret getting? Maybe your tattoo is not appropriate for your future career or you made a spontaneous decision to get one. For whatever reason, one in six people who have tattoos hate them so much that they want them surgically removed.

Woman has to get tattoo removed due to her job because the U.S. Marine Corps does not authorize any hand tattoos. Source: Slick-o-bot Wikimedia Commons

Luckily, surgery may not be needed because Alec Falkenham, a Ph.D. student from Dalhousie University, is developing a tattoo removal cream as a painless alternative. This topical cream promises to eventually make any tattoo fade away.

Using a tattoo needle. Source: James Gray-King Flickr

To make a tattoo, tattoo needles are used to go through the epidermis, the outer layer of the skin, and send dyes into the dermis, the deepest layer of the skin, causing an inflammatory response. This would then signal the immune system to send a type of cell called macrophages to the wounded site. As a result, the macrophages eat up the dye and show up as the desired colour which is visible through the skin. In order to remove the tattoo, Falkenham’s cream allows new macrophages to consume the macrophages with dye and then migrate to the lymph node, essentially removing all of the tattoo’s dye.

Below is a video by TED-Ed which goes into further detail of the science behind tattoos:

This tattoo removal cream would challenge current methods such as surgery or laser removal. Surgery requires the excision of the skin containing the tattoo and then stitching it back together, and laser removal uses a highly concentrated light to break the dyes apart so that the immune system can clear them away.

An article states that surgery is better for smaller tattoos but would still leave a scar, while laser removal is a long and painful procedure, and does not promise full removal of the tattoo. Moreover, the price of surgery could range from $500-$1000 and laser removal could be $200-$350 per session with a suggested 4-5 sessions. Alternatively, the tattoo removal cream would not cause any pain or scarring, and it would cost 4.5 cents per square centimetre for each treatment.

Falkenham’s cream has the potential to be a popular choice for many people regretting their tattoos because it would be a cheaper and painless alternative. It could even promote more people to get tattoos knowing they could remove them with a simple cream. The idea of this cream is enticing, but some things still need be known such as the amount of applications in order to see a noticeable change, whether the cream permanently removes the tattoo or just fades most of it, or the side effects while using the cream. Although Falkenham’s cream is still in its research stages, it would be interesting to see the results of his tests and if successful, a finalized product for commercial use.

-Ian Villamin

4 Comments

Posted in Issues in Science, Science in the News

Tagged cream, laser, surgery, tattoo removal, tattoos

Getting a Little Touchy-Feely

Posted on February 19, 2015 by Uttara | 3 comments

Haptic technology in action.

Touch screens are sooo 2000-and-late. You know what’s fresh? Being able to feel the texture of what’s on your screen. Just imagine feeling the cold, hard steel of the weapon your character is holding in Call of Duty; or the soft, silky material of that perfect dress you’re buying online. Does this seem far-fetched to you? Well, this kind of magic is called haptic technology.

What is haptic technology? In short, it is a feedback-technology that simulates the sense of touch by vibration, motion and force through interactions with the user. It is easier to replicate visual and auditory cues from the user, but much more difficult to work on tactile cues. Nonetheless, researchers are actively looking at how to efficiently convert these signals to a sense of touch.

Okay, so why so much fuss about this – what will it bring to you, blog- reader? In many applications, the sense of touch is vital to convey information about the object from the fingertips to the brain. When this sense is combined with the other 4, it dramatically increases the amount of information the brain receives about the object. This reduces the amount of time and error involved in completing a certain task. This is especially important in professional training, such as when doctors and astronauts practice on virtual objects.

A device that provides haptic feedback through a user’s hand.

The video below is a TedEd talk by a professor at UPenn. It summarizes haptic technology and provides some important implications for this applied science. For example, medical students can practice their profession on virtual patients, such as finding cavities on a set of teeth. In fact, cavities can more precisely be found on real teeth with this technology as well! Online shopping can also be enhanced – the shopper can feel the texture of the item before they make the purchase – making it a more convenient experience for all. Gamers will also be more involved in the game as they can feel the ground underneath the character’s feet, and can accurately simulate the driving of a vehicle.

Maybe in the next few years, when you shop for your favourite kind of jeans at hm.com, you will be able to feel that familiar denim texture right from your device at home.

-Uttara

3 Comments

Posted in Public Engagement, Science Communication, Science in the News

Tagged brain, digital, haptic technology, online, technology, touch, virtual

Academic Procrastination

Posted on February 18, 2015 by harrimal cheema | 2 comments

Academic Procrastination also known as Student Syndrome is when students put off things to a later date for other pleasurable activities thus, increasing their time pressure and stress levels.

According to Professor Clarry Lay, procrastination occurs when there is a temporal gap between intended and enacted behaviour.

Many of us take time for granted. When our professor announces that we have few weeks to complete an assignment, we all procrastinate and leave it for last minute. The night before, we cram and stress ourselves out and by doing this, even if we get the assignment done on time, the results are poor. While many take this as a learning lesson and improve their time-management skills, there are still students who tend to repeat this activity and make it a part of their life. They continuously leave work to last minute and stress themselves out. They lack time management skills and have trouble setting priorities in life.

According to research, fear of failure leads to procrastination. Many students don’t start their assignments on time because they underestimate themselves and lack confidence. They think that they won’t be able to do well on their assignment so, they keep pushing it off to a later day, which indeed is not the right approach to take. They should have faith in themselves and perform tasks to the best of their ability. Procrastination only gives us short-term success and for long- term achievements in life we have to learn to use our time wisely and set our priorities and goals accordingly.

What most university students struggle with is, completing their tasks on time? They are not able to decide whether attending a party or finishing a term paper is more important. The video below shows what students do to procrastinate. They tend to follow the crowd without realizing what the consequences will be. Studies show that this behaviour of theirs, leads to stress, anxiety, cramming, all-nighter and intake of large amounts of caffeine and other energy drinks. All these activities pose a threat to their health thus, leading to poor grades and low self-esteem.

As a result, to avoid procrastination as mentioned in the video below, students should set small goals and priorities in life. They should adopt smart study skills and eliminate the word ‘perfection’ from their dictionary.

So, for better performance students should have their day planned out and have short reminders set up for upcoming assignments. Breaking tasks into smaller ones also reduces stress and allows on time completion of tasks. If motivation is what they lack than by inserting small rewards after completion of small tasks can increase concentration and make work more entertaining. Therefore, managing time wisely grants students the privilege of grasping more opportunities in life.

– Harrimal Cheema

2 Comments

Posted in Biological Sciences, Issues in Science, Public Engagement, Science Communication

Tagged anxiety, confidence, enacted behaviour, intended behaviour, low self-esteem, stress, student syndrome, temporal gap

Parental violence and affects on children

Posted on February 11, 2015 by harrimal cheema | 3 comments

Violence is everywhere, but it is not always observed because it occurs behind closed doors in the homes of many. You might have wondered why certain children behave differently and are not able to cooperate and express themselves while others are extraordinary and have exceptional communication skills. Well studies show that a child’s behaviour reflects that kind of environment they are raised in.

Parental violence is a common occurrence in various families no matter what religion or race and is reflected in their child’s behaviour.

Children Witnessing Parental Violence. (Image Source: English Articles)

Children who grow up seeing their parents fight are more likely to portray aggressive behaviour in the future. They don’t develop social skills and tend to spend time alone. They get aggressive easily and pick up fights at school. Their performance at school is very poor and they are not able to build relationships in life.

Along with aggression, we see in the video below, parental violence also affects children’s mental growth and health and leaves them in trauma thus, weakening them emotionally. Children develop a fear in their mind when they see their parents fight and this stays with them throughout their life. Parental violence damages children emotionally. Instead of developing with the love and care of their parents, they grow up seeing violence and distance away from their parents. This stays in their mind and affects their ability to think and perform cognitive tasks properly. Children who grow up in such an environment are more likely to experience mood anxiety and personality disorder. They are neglected and left alone at the time of their life when they need their parent’s support and care the most. Even as adults, they experience loneliness and are not able to stand up for themselves.

Credits: Youtube and The Children of Domestic Violence

This is the link, to the story of the little girl in this video. It shows how she was affected by parental violence and struggled to live a happy and confident life as an adult.

Furthermore, a researcher at Cardiff University, states that parents fighting and slamming doors and disagreeing over certain issues in front of their children affects a child mental health and weakens them emotionally.

As a result, to cope up in life these children need extra attention and counselling. Parents need to be careful of what kind of relationship they share in front of their children. Children need to be given love and affection and need to grow in a happy environment in order to mature into healthy adults. Children should be free of any emotional or mental stress that interferes with their healthy growth and causes them to drift away from their families leading to stress and loneliness in life.

Therefore, parental violence is discouraged especially in front of children as it affects their mental stability along with their ability to perform cognitive tasks in life.

– Harrimal Cheema

3 Comments

Posted in Public Engagement, Science Communication, Science in the News

Tagged aggressive, behaviour, environment, mood anxiety, personality disorder

Are frozen fruits nutritious?

Posted on February 9, 2015 by Monica Ko | 3 comments

picture credit to Google Advanced Search

Today in grocery stores you will be able to find a mix of fresh fruit and frozen fruit. At first I believed that fresh fruits must be the healthier and more nutritious option between the two. However after researching I found out that frozen fruits holds qualities that allow it to be just as nutritious as fresh fruit.

Below is a youtube video by Dole frozen that describes how frozen fruit is made.

Frozen fruit and fresh fruit share a similar growing process as they both grow on land the part where the process starts to differentiate is when the fruit is picked for processing. Fresh fruit is picked before it has even ripened so that its deterioration during processing and shipping is limited. On the other hand frozen fruit is picked once it has fully ripened, this is allowed as the process of freezing the fruit acts as a preservative that limits the amount of deterioration that occurs. Freezing fruits dramatically slows down deterioration rates, as a result nutrients such as vitamins and antioxidant levels stay relatively similar to the time when it was frozen. This is good as fruit begins to lose its nutrients right after it has been picked thus it is beneficial to eat a fruit right after it has been picked. As most of us do not have access to fruit that has just been picked we have to go for the next option, which may be frozen fruit.

Still fresh fruit has its benefits in particular frozen fruits often contain higher sugar levels. This is because fruit companies may choose to add sugars to enhance the taste of frozen fruit. By doing so these fruit companies increase the sugar content people intake when they are eating fruits. While adding sugar to frozen fruits may cause some people to enjoy eating fruits more it comes at the cost of increasing the amount of sugar intake per fruit which ultimately increases the amount of calories being eaten.

However there has been a steady increase in popularity for frozen fruit this may be attributed to its ease in preparation compared to fresh fruit. Unlike fresh fruit that has to be washed and sliced frozen fruit comes ready to serve and use. For those of us that want to spend less amount of time preparing meals frozen fruit is the more convenient option.

Below is a youtube video by AsapSCIENCE that compares frozen fruit to fresh fruit

Regardless I think that both fresh fruit and frozen fruit has its benefits and downfalls but the most important idea to keep in mind is to be actively trying to incorporate fruits into diets.

– Monica Ko

3 Comments

Posted in Issues in Science, Public Engagement, Science Communication, Science in the News

Tagged benefits, fresh fruit, frozen fruit, health, preservatives

Chewing Gum or Not Chewing Gum: that is the Question

Posted on February 9, 2015 by Amirhossein Tashakor | 2 comments

Sad boy by Aruna Ganesh

Chewing gum, Source

Have you ever been told by your parents to not chew gum since it is bad for your health or teeth? As a kid, we all used to ask for a piece of gum more often. Even as an adult, you might chew gum to cure your bad breathe in the mornings or between your meals, but is it true that chewing gum is only harmful for us? Recent studies show that chewing gum has some benefits beside its drawbacks. So, it could actually be somehow good for you. Here is the science behind the advantages and disadvantages of chewing gum.

Advantages of chewing gum

In a very recent study, Stefan Wessel and a team of researchers at the University of Groningen have confirmed their hypothesis that chewing gum would be as effective as flossing in fighting against bacteria and removing germs from your oral cavity. In the study, the researchers examined the volunteers’ gums, that were given to them, of 5 individuals after a few minutes, they found out that the gums trapped around a hundred million bacteria, the bacteria that would otherwise cause infections and tooth decay.

The video below by DNews highlights the importance of chewing gum.

Another advantage of chewing gum, which was discovered by Kate Morgan, is that it increases a person’s concentration and awareness. When you chew a gum, the flow of blood that reaches to part of your brain called the Temporal Lobes increases, so it causes you to have a better perception and visual memory task.

Disadvantages of chewing gum

According to a research in 2013, the scientists revealed that chewing gum causes a disorder in individuals’ diets. The study found out that those who chew gum before their meals tend to eat more. Besides, they would have fewer daily meals than people who do not chew gum before their meals.

Moreover, in a study by Nathan Watemberg, the researcher found out that chewing gum and headaches are related. He discovered that those individuals who chew gum too much have more headaches symptoms. This is because of the pressure inserted into Temporomandibular Joint in the jaw when we chew a gum.

Check out this video below by LVI TV, talking about drawbacks of chewing gum and how it causes headaches:

Should we chew gum or not?

Well, now we all know that chewing gum has both advantages and disadvantages for our health, but that does not mean we should not chew gum. We can take advantage of chewing gum by not consuming it excessively while getting its benefits.

-Amirhossein Tashakor

2 Comments

Posted in Biological Sciences, Issues in Science, Public Engagement

Tagged Chewing gum, Concentration, Flossing, Headaches, Oral health, Teeth

Adderall: The Study Drug

4D Printing: It’s One ‘D’ Better.

Be Happy! Your Dog Knows When You Aren’t.

New Species Discovered in Antarctica?

Tattoo removal might be easier than you think

Getting a Little Touchy-Feely

Academic Procrastination

Parental violence and affects on children

Are frozen fruits nutritious?

Chewing Gum or Not Chewing Gum: that is the Question

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