Salon.com > Lauran Neergaard

Speaking 2 languages may delay getting Alzheimer’s

Fri, 18 Feb 2011 20:33:00 +0000

Mastering a second language can pump up your brain in ways that seem to delay getting Alzheimer's disease later on, scientists said Friday.

Never learned to habla or parlez? While the new research focuses mostly on the truly long-term bilingual, scientists say even people who tackle a new language later in life stand to gain.

The more proficient you become, the better, but "every little bit helps," said Ellen Bialystok, a psychology professor at York University in Toronto.

Much of the study of bilingualism has centered on babies, as scientists wondered why simply speaking to infants in two languages allows them to learn both in the time it takes most babies to learn one. Their brains seem to become more flexible, better able to multitask. As they grow up, their brains show better "executive control," a system key to higher functioning -- as Bialystok puts it, "the most important part of your mind."

But does that mental juggling while you're young translate into protection against cognitive decline when you're old?

Bialystok studied 450 Alzheimer's patients, all of whom showed the same degree of impairment at the time of diagnosis. Half are bilingual -- they've spoken two languages regularly for most of their lives. The rest are monolingual.

Doctors: Giffords’ brain damage hard to predict

Mon, 10 Jan 2011 20:52:00 +0000

Recovering from a gunshot wound to the head depends on the bullet's path, and while doctors Sunday are optimistic about Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' odds, it can take weeks to months to tell the damage.

Doctors say the bullet traveled the length of the left side of the Arizona congresswoman's brain, entering the back of the skull and exiting the front.

Fortunately, it stayed on one side of her brain, not hitting the so-called "eloquent areas" in the brain's center where such wounds almost always prove fatal.

Importantly, Giffords was responding nonverbally to simple commands in the emergency room -- things like "squeeze my hand."

That implies "a very high level of functioning in the brain," said Dr. Michael Lemole of Tucson's University Medical Center, Giffords' neurosurgeon.

Now, her biggest threat is brain swelling. Surgeons removed half of her skull to give the tissues room to expand without additional bruising, Lemole said.

That bone is being preserved and can be reimplanted once the swelling abates, a technique the military uses with war injuries, added his colleague and trauma surgeon Dr. Peter Rhee.

Doctors: Testing Giffords’ brain

Sun, 09 Jan 2011 19:30:00 +0000

Doctors say they are optimistic about Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' odds. But it can take weeks to months to learn the level of brain damage she might suffer from the gunshot blast to the head on Saturday.

Dr. Peter Rhee, a trauma surgeon in Tucson where she was shot, said the bullet traveled the length of the left side of the Arizona congresswoman's brain, from back to front. That offers a better outlook than if it had entered the brain's center or both sides of the brain.

She is also responding nonverbally to commands from doctors, another good sign. Dr. Michael Lemole, her neurosurgeon, said that implies "a very high level of functioning." For now, Giffords is in a medically induced coma and on a ventilator so she cannot speak.

Science confirms: Women’s crying is a turnoff for men

Fri, 07 Jan 2011 16:25:00 +0000

If a crying woman's red nose isn't a big enough turnoff to a man, a surprising experiment found another reason: Tears of sadness may temporarily lower his testosterone level. Those tears send a chemical signal as the man gets close enough to sniff them -- even though there's no discernible odor, say researchers from Israel's Weizmann Institute of Science.

It's the first such signal to be found in tears, and it's probably not unique to women's. Theirs just were the first to be studied.

"It's hard to get men to volunteer to cry" in a lab, noted Weizmann neurobiologist Noam Sobel, senior author of the study appearing in Friday's edition of the journal Science.

Emotional tears are chemically different from the reflex tears that form when you get dust in your eye. But biologists have long puzzled over the true function of emotional tears: Are they merely cathartic, or do they have some other physiological role?

Mice can produce a sort of tear that contains a pheromone, an odorless molecule that triggers basic instincts in many animals. So Sobel's team tested whether human tears similarly can convey subliminal chemical signals through the nose. After all, we tend to hug a crying loved one, putting our nose near their tears.

Latest attempt to block HIV: Stronger vaginal gels

Wed, 19 May 2010 20:50:00 +0000

Try after try to make vaginal creams that could repel the AIDS virus have failed. Now researchers are testing if a drug used to treat HIV infection finally might give women a tool to prevent it -- by infusing the medicine into vaginal gels and contraceptive-style rings.

Even quick-dissolving anti-HIV films are being created, the same style now used for breath-fresheners or allergy medicines but made for fingertip application in the vagina.

Called microbicides, this kind of woman-controlled protection is considered key to battling the HIV epidemic -- especially in developing countries where the virus is at its worst and women too often can't get their partners to use a condom.

For two decades, scientists tried less powerful medications in disappointing microbicide attempts. Results from the first study to see if this new strategy works -- South African women tested a gel made of the AIDS drug tenofovir -- aren't due until July.

But researchers gathering for the biennial International Microbicides Conference in Pittsburgh next weekend express cautious optimism.

FDA panel backs lifting breast implant ban

Thu, 14 Apr 2005 12:34:00 +0000

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Silicone-gel breast implants, virtually banned for 13 years, would return to the market if the government heeds a surprising recommendation from its scientific advisers.

After three days of wrenchingly emotional debate, advisers to the Food and Drug Administration said Mentor Corp. should be able to sell its gel implants -- but only if it meets strict conditions.

Topping that list: ensuring women understand the devices may silently break inside their bodies; recommending that they get regular, and expensive, MRI exams to check for those breaks; limiting implant insertion to specially trained plastic surgeons; and new studies to prove how long implants last.

Just a day earlier, the advisers narrowly rejected sale of rival manufacturer Inamed Corp.'s silicone implants, citing lingering questions about how long they last and what happens when silicone oozes into the breast, or beyond.

By a 7-2 vote, the FDA advisers said Mentor's research was more compelling than its competitors' that it was time to lift restrictions that, because of health concerns, limited gel implants to special research studies since 1992.

FDA to reconsider breast implant ban

Thu, 07 Apr 2005 12:43:00 +0000

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The government is considering lifting a ban on most silicone-gel breast implants, but federal scientists question whether there's enough evidence indicating how long the devices will last inside a woman's body -- or what health risks may result if they break.

The Food and Drug Administration will consider the issue in a three-day meeting with its scientific advisers next week. The meeting is a key hurdle in determining whether the implants can re-enter the market. Since 1992, they have been available only to women enrolled in strictly controlled research studies because of fears they could cause major health problems.

The implants have been largely exonerated of causing such serious illnesses as cancer or lupus. But painful scar tissue that can form around the implants, breaks that require surgery to remove or replace implants, and other complications remain contentious. Just 15 months ago, the FDA told manufacturers that it wouldn't lift restrictions on the implants' sale until questions about breakage in particular are settled.

The FDA posted documents on the controversy on its Web site Wednesday.