Month: February 2022

HAMILTON, Ontario — The human body is very much the sum of its parts. If one bodily area is out of whack, it’s very likely that other organs and processes will have a problem as well. Case in point, researchers from McMaster University report higher levels of body fat are a risk factor for cognitive decline, slower thought processing speed, and memory issues. Even after the research team accounted for cardiovascular risk factors, like diabetes or hypertension, and vascular brain injuries, the result stayed consistent. There was an undeniable association between body fat and lower cognitive scores. This strongly indicates there are additional, but still unclear pathways connecting excessive fat buildup to cognitive decline. Preserving cognitive function is vital for avoiding dementi...

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There is perhaps no better way to see the absolute pinnacle of human athletic abilities than by watching the Olympics. But at the Winter Games this year – and at almost all professional sporting events – you rarely see a competitor over 40 years old and almost never see a single athlete over 50. This is because with every additional year spent on Earth, bodies age and muscles don’t respond to exercise the same as they used to. I lead a team of scientists who study the health benefits of exercise, strength training and diet in older people. We investigate how older people respond to exercise and try to understand the underlying biological mechanisms that cause muscles to increase in size and strength after resistance or strength training. Old and young people build muscle in t...

After the CD8 cells did their job, they remained in the blood but, unexpectedly, they turned into CD4 cells. And when the Penn investigators removed CD4 cells from the blood of Mr. Ludwig and Mr. Olson, they saw that those cells could kill B cells in the laboratory. The CD4 cells had turned into assassins or, Dr. DiPersio noted, “at least guardians that can keep the tumor cells at bay and undetectable in the patient for years.” Could the CD4 cells remain in the blood with no cancer cells to kill? Or were they there because the leukemia was not really gone but instead kept trying to return, only to be attacked by CD4 cells? “We can’t find any leukemia cells in Doug,” Dr. June said. But, he added, perhaps they are still there in tiny quantities and emerging, only to be knocked back by CD4 c...

People are using twice as much melatonin as they used to, sometimes at dangerously high levels, a study shows. (Tero Vesalainen, Shutterstock) Estimated read time: 6-7 minutes WASHINGTON — More and more adults are taking over-the-counter melatonin to get to sleep, and some of them may be using it at dangerously high levels, a new study has found. While overall use among the United States adult population is still "relatively low," the study does "document a significant many-fold increase in melatonin use in the past few years," said sleep specialist Rebecca Robbins, an instructor in the division of sleep medicine for Harvard Medical School, who was not ...