Crystals And Catalysts

Today’s post isn’t going to be a “pro-veganism” rant or anything like that. I’m aiming to provide a balanced overview on meat-eating. This post is going to be looking at meats, their pro’s and con’s and the recent research spreading around them and also veganism and I’ll leave the decision to which option could potentially be the best for your health, to you, the reader. Pros. Meat is a good source of protein, vitamins and minerals, including iron , zinc and B vitamins . It is also one of the main sources of vitamin B12. It’s recommended that we try to eat lean cuts of meat and skinless poultry whenever possible to cut down on fat and also always cook meat thoroughly. Proteins are complex substances, made up of chains of amino acids. Amino acids are building blocks that combine in different formations to make up the proteins in your body. There are 20 amino acids in total – your body can create some of these itself, but there are nine essential amino acids that you can only ...

Eating sweet foods causes the brain to form a memory of a meal, according to researchers at Georgia State University, Georgia Regents University and Charlie Norwood VA Medical Centre. The research published in the journal Hippocampus found that neurons in the dorsal hippocampus, which is the part of the brain that is critical for episodic memory (the memory of autobiographical events experienced at a particular time and place), are activated by consuming sweets. The experiment consisted of feeding a meal including a sweetened solution, either sucrose or saccharin to rats. They found that this significantly increased the expression of the synaptic plasticity marker called activity-regulated cytoskeleton-associated protein (Arc) in their dorsal hippocampal neurons. Synaptic plasticity is a process that is necessary for making memories. Forming memories are essential for a healthy diet. Researchers have found that people with amnesia will repeatedly eat if presented with food, even if...

Cataracts are primarily a disease of ageing. Instead of an operating to remove them, researchers are trying to make a cataract-dissolving-eye drops which can break down cataracts and restore transparency of the lens and vision.  Cataracts can be successfully removed with surgery, but this method is costly, and most individuals blinded by severe cataracts in developing countries go untreated. A characteristic of the condition is the mis-folding and clumping together of crucial proteins known as crystallins. So that our lenses are able to function well, crystallins (which we are born and live our whole lives with) must maintain both the transparency of fibre cells and their flexibility as the eyes' muscles constantly stretch and relax the lens to allow us to focus on objects at different distances.  Scientists at the University of California San Francisco exploited a key difference between correctly folded crystallins and their amyloid forms; finding that amyloids are much ha...

There’s actually no difference between the male and female minds.  A new research study, published in the journal Neuroimage , is disproving the myth that states that the hippocampus (a crucial part of the brain that consolidates new memories and helps connect emotions to the senses) is larger in females than in males. Leading a team of students at the Rosalind Franklin Medical School, Lise Elliot, Ph.D., conducted a meta-analysis of structural MRI volumes that found no significant difference in hippocampal size between men and women. A meta-analysis is a statistical technique that allows researchers to combine the findings from many independent studies into a comprehensive review. The team examined findings from 76 published papers, involving more than 6,000 healthy individuals. Hippocampi are located on both sides of the brain, under the cerebral cortex. The team's findings test the familiar argument that a disproportionately larger hippocampus explains females' tendenc...