Musical training might help autistic children to interpret other people's emotions. A study has revealed brain changes involved in playing a musical instrument that seem to enhance your ability to pick up subtle emotional cues in conversation.
"It seems that playing music can help you do all kinds of things better," says Nina Kraus from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. "Musical experience sharpens your hearing not just for music, but for other sounds too."
Earlier studies suggested that musicians are especially good at identifying emotions expressed in speech, such as anger or sadness. But it wasn't clear what kind of brain activity makes the difference.
A senior Indonesian health official has said four people have died of bird flu in the country since the start of the year, the Xinhua news agency said on Tuesday.
"Four deaths from bird flu have been confirmed in January and February," the head of Indonesia's National Committee for Bird Flu Control and Pandemic Preparedness, Bayu Krisnamurthi, was quoted as saying by Xinhua.
Compounds from the vegetables mixed with selenium, which is contained in Brazil nuts, have been shown to prevent the skin cancer and work better at attacking tumours than conventional treatment, researchers said.
They believe that mixing isothiocyanates, the substances that give the greens flavour, and selenium found in the nuts, may even be added to sun screen lotion in future.
Laboratory tests suggest that these compounds target tumours more safely and effectively than traditional methods.
Now work is under way to develop the first commercially available drugs made from a cocktail of compounds to fight skin cancer.
A government booklet offering advice to women on how to deal with recession-related domestic violence and discrimination from employers will be issued today, reflecting concern that women are to be worst hit by the economic crisis.
The 30 page document, Real Help Now for Women, published by the Government Equalities Office, is based on the premise that "women, especially those who are pregnant or work part-time, can feel particularly vulnerable during economic downturns". The document provides a summary of benefits already available, and details support groups women can call on if they feel their job or personal safety is threatened as a result of the recession.
The American Public Health Association's (APHA) new Fluoridation Position Statement is based on many documents that neither support nor evaluate fluoridation's safety and/or effectiveness as it claims. (1)
APHA asserts, "All of these reviews have found CWF [Community Water Fluoridation] to be safe and effective." Here's the truth about APHA's "supportive" references:
The estrogen-mimicking chemical BPA, already banished from baby bottles and frowned upon in water jugs, has now shown up in significant levels in soft drinks.
Tests by Health Canada scientists revealed the highest levels were in energy drinks, the often caffeine-loaded beverages that have become popular with teenagers seeking a buzz and athletes chasing a quick pick-me-up. But the study also found the controversial compound in a wide variety of ginger ales, diet colas, root beers and citrus-flavoured sodas.
Bisphenol A was detected in 96 per cent of soft drinks tested, in quantities below regulatory limits. But a growing body of science suggests the chemical may have harmful effects at levels far below those limits.
Health Canada did not disclose the brand names of the beverages it evaluated, but estimated that the survey covered at least 84 per cent of canned soft drinks sold in Canada.
A cheap ingredient used in ice cream, cosmetics and found in breast milk helps protect monkeys against infection with a virus similar to AIDS and might work to protect women against the virus, researchers reported on Wednesday.
The compound, called glycerol monolaurate, or GML, appears to stop inflammation and helps keep away the cells the AIDS virus usually infects, the researchers said.
While it does not provide 100 percent protection, it might greatly reduce a woman's risk of being infected, and she could use it privately and without hurting her chances of pregnancy, the researchers reported in the journal Nature.
In 2006, Americans were exposed to more than seven times as much ionizing radiation from medical procedures as was the case in the early 1980s, according to a new report on population exposure released March 3rd by the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP) at its annual meeting in Bethesda, Maryland. In 2006, medical exposure constituted nearly half of the total radiation exposure of the U.S. population from all sources.
The increase was primarily a result of the growth in the use of medical imaging procedures, explained Dr. Kenneth R. Kase, senior vice president of NCRP and chairman of the scientific committee that produced the report. "The increase was due mostly to the higher utilization of computed tomography (CT) and nuclear medicine.
These two imaging modalities alone contributed 36 percent of the total radiation exposure and 75 percent of the medical radiation exposure of the U.S. population."
Believing in God can help block anxiety and minimize stress, according to new University of Toronto research that shows distinct brain differences between believers and non-believers.
In two studies led by Assistant Psychology Professor Michael Inzlicht, participants performed a Stroop task - a well-known test of cognitive control - while hooked up to electrodes that measured their brain activity.
Compared to non-believers, the religious participants showed significantly less activity in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), a portion of the brain that helps modify behavior by signaling when attention and control are needed, usually as a result of some anxiety-producing event like making a mistake. The stronger their religious zeal and the more they believed in God, the less their ACC fired in response to their own errors, and the fewer errors they made.
Scientists in Italy are reporting development and successful use of a fast new method to identify food additives that act as so-called "xenoestrogens" - substances with estrogen-like effects that are stirring international health concerns.
They used the method in a large-scale screening of additives that discovered two additives with previously unrecognized xenoestrogen effects.
In the study, Pietro Cozzini and colleagues cite increasing concern about identifying these substances and about the possible health effects. Synthetic chemicals that mimic natural estrogens (called "xenoestrogens," literally, "foreign estrogens") have been linked to a range of human health effects. They range from reduced sperm counts in men to an increased risk of breast cancer in women.
Comment: More information on Bisphenol A:
Bisphenol A, Chemical Used to Make Plastic, Lingers in Body
Bisphenol A Linked to Metabolic Syndrome in Humans
Bisphenol A in infant formula at 'dangerous' levels, says group
Plastics chemical alters female brains - Research renews debate over the toxicity of bisphenol A, a plastics chemical found in humans.