pesticides and depression, purpose of life, foam rollers, autoimmune, microbiome, antibiotics and obesity
“Due to being made up of cells, virtually all “ancestral foods” have markedly lower carbohydrate densities than flour- and sugar-containing foods, a property quite independent of glycemic index… The present hypothesis suggests that in parallel with the bacterial effects of sugars on dental and periodontal health, acellular flours, sugars, and processed foods produce an inflammatory microbiota via the upper gastrointestinal tract, with fat able to effect a “double hit” by increasing systemic absorption of lipopolysaccharide. This model is consistent with a broad spectrum of reported dietary phenomena.”
“After weighting for potential confounders, missing covariate data, and dropout, ever-use of two pesticide classes, fumigants and organochlorine insecticides, and seven individual pesticides… were all positively associated with depression in each case group, with ORs between 1.1 and 1.9.”
Purpose in life and use of preventive health care services (2014)
“Purpose in life has been linked with better health (mental and physical) and health behaviors, but its link with patterns of health care use are understudied… Participants (n = 7,168) were drawn from the Health and Retirement Study, a nationally representative panel study of American adults over the age of 50, and tracked for 6 y. After adjusting for sociodemographic factors, each unit increase in purpose (on a six-point scale) was associated with a higher likelihood that people would obtain a cholesterol test… or colonoscopy… Furthermore, females were more likely to receive a mammogram/X-ray… or pap smear…, and males were more likely to receive a prostate examination… Each unit increase in purpose was also associated with 17% fewer nights spent in the hospital…”
Retrospective study on the efficacy of a low-carbohydrate diet for impaired glucose tolerance
“The LCD is effective for normalizing blood glucose and preventing progression to type 2 diabetes in patients with IGT.”
Acute Effects of Self-Myofascial Release Using a Foam Roller on Arterial Function (2014)
“Many individuals involved in sport, exercise, and/or fitness perform self-myofascial release (SMR) using a foam roller, which restores muscles, tendons, ligaments, fascia, and/or soft-tissue extensibility… Ten healthy young adults performed SMR and control (CON) trials on separate days in a randomized controlled crossover fashion… The participants performed SMR of the adductor, hamstrings, quadriceps, iliotibial band, and trapezius… These results indicate that SMR using a foam roller reduces arterial stiffness and improves vascular endothelial function.”
Association of Antibiotics in Infancy With Early Childhood Obesity (2014)
“Sixty-nine percent of children were exposed to antibiotics before age 24 months, with a mean (SD) of 2.3 (1.5) episodes per child. Cumulative exposure to antibiotics was associated with later obesity…; this effect was stronger for broad-spectrum antibiotics… Early exposure to broad-spectrum antibiotics was also associated with obesity… but narrow-spectrum drugs were not at any age or frequency.”
Dynamics of Gut Microbiota in Autoimmune Lupus (2014)
“In young, female lupus-prone mice resembling women at childbearing age, a population with the highest risk for lupus, we found marked depletion of lactobacilli, and increases in Lachnospiraceae and overall diversity compared to age-matched healthy controls… our results demonstrate the dynamics of gut microbiota in murine lupus and provide evidence to suggest the use of probiotic lactobacilli and retinoic acid as dietary supplements to relieve inflammatory flares in lupus patients.”
Homological scaffolds of brain functional networks (2014)
“we apply these tools to compare resting-state functional brain activity in 15 healthy volunteers after intravenous infusion of placebo and psilocybin—the main psychoactive component of magic mushrooms. The results show that the homological structure of the brain’s functional patterns undergoes a dramatic change post-psilocybin, characterized by the appearance of many transient structures of low stability and of a small number of persistent ones that are not observed in the case of placebo.”