I Don't Need Heroin, Running Is My High

Running is one of those things that I never understood. Maybe it's because running makes me want to strangle myself with my shoelaces. Maybe because I'm never late. Maybe it's because I don't believe in a running unless something is chasing you (bears, dogs, cops). So I have never had a runner's high.

However, research has shown the existence of a "runner's high" which can also become addictive. Using rats, scientists have shown that a release of endorphins during running is comparable to opiate use. It is speculated that running can be used as therapy for heroin and morphine addicts.

During long runs, glycogen (which are sources of energy) stores become emptied and glands in the brain release endorphins that allow the person to keep going.

The experiment had 44 male and 40 female rats divided into 4 groups:

• rats with a wheel and food availability 24hrs a day
• rats with no wheel and food availability 24hrs a day
• rats with a wheel and food availability for 1 hr
• rats with no wheel and food availability for 1hr

The rats where subjected to these conditions for several weeks then given a drug used to treat opiate addicts and causes withdrawl symptoms. The theory is that the more endorphins or "high" from exercising would produce more intense withdrawls. Active rats had more withdrawl symptoms than their inactive counterparts. Rats given food for an 1 hr exercised much more and had even a more significant symptoms.

How to Kill Vampires (Mosquitoes)

We all know the itchy and annoying bite of a mosquitoes. Personally, I think they are the scourge of the world has THEY DON'T DO ANYTHING but spread malaria and be obnoxious. Mosquitoes are the Jimmy Fallons of the insect world.

But what's the best way to kill them?

Clap them.

Mosquitoes are very light, so swatting at them with your hand causes an air column which can push them around your hand of death. When you attempt to clap them, each hand is pushing a column of air together causing the insect to become trapped.

Another way is to just smack it against a surface, where again there is no wind flow to carry it away from certain death.

User hints have also recommended wetting your hand and swatting at them so they will stick to you ("Mosquitoes have a high surface area to weight ratio and they are easily trapped on a wet surface. ") or WD-40 and a flame torch.

Big People, Little Brains

A new finding at UCLA has found a link between obesity and brain tissue.

Obese people had 8% lesser brain tissue and appeared 16yrs older than people of normal weights.

Overweight people seem to have half the effects, with 4% lesser brains an appeared to have aged 8 years older.

"Obese people had lost brain tissue in the frontal and temporal lobes, areas of the brain critical for planning and memory, and in the anterior cingulate gyrus (attention and executive functions), hippocampus (long-term memory) and basal ganglia (movement), the researchers said in a statement today. Overweight people showed brain loss in the basal ganglia, the corona radiata, white matter comprised of axons, and the parietal lobe (sensory lobe). "

This means that other than taking a toll on your body, extra weight and fat can deplete your brain making you more susceptible to diseases such as Alzheimer's.

Plutophiles UNITE!

From CNN.com: What's a planet? Debate rages on.

It's been almost three years that the International Astronomical Union declared Pluto a "dwarf planet" causing a ringing heard around the world from people's heads exploding.

Pluto? NOT A PLANET? How am I supposed to finish the saying 'My Eager Mother Just Baked Us Nine'...whats?? (For those of you who didn't the luck of learning this, its to remember the planets in order.)

Although most of us grudgingly accepted this fate, (I mean who are we to argue with the IAU?!) there are people who demand Pluto be recognized to its full potential. Examples include Illinois' senate "adopted a resolution" saying that the celestial body was "unfairly downgraded" and declared March 13th Pluto Day. Why do they care? Because an Illinoian (Illinoisian? Illinoist?) discovered it back in the day.

New Mexico also seems equally distraught, with it's House of Reps calling February 18th 2009 "Pluto is a Planet in New Mexico Day." (The Illinoian discoverer had worked in New Mexico for a long time).

In general Americans seem quite pissed about the IAU's decision with 90% of its criticisms coming from us. A theory on why that is from one astrophysicist is basically that we like icy balls.

"Disney's dog Pluto was sketched the same year the cosmic object was discovered. And Pluto was discovered by an American. So here you have a recipe for Americans falling in love with a planet that really is just a tiny ice ball," Tyson told Time magazine.


There still is debate on the IAU's classification of a planet (must orbit the sun, must be crushed into almost spherical shape by gravity due to its size and must not have anything orbiting its space) and if/how Pluto can be better defined.

Lost? Then You Probably Are Going In Circles

The Circular Reasoning can be found on ScienceNews.org

From the Max Planck Institute in Germany, scientists have found that people tend to walk in circles in unfamiliar terrain. It is hypothesized this is because when people have no clue to direction, they rely on their own body to tell them which way they are going.

This includes "rotational shifts and joint movements" which tell the person where straight this. Since this isn't accurate at all, error makes the person eventually drift to a side.

“You may think that you’re walking in a straight line, but in fact the direction you’re walking in is drifting more and more away from straight ahead, making you walk in circles,” Souman says.

Researchers have found that people start to lose their sense of straight after walking the length of a football field. In one experiment, 3 men were put in the Sahara desert and were told to walk straight. Two walked during the day and one at night with a full moon. It turned out the day-walkers "veered off course but did not go in circles." However, the night man seemed to make several turns, almost walking backwards when the moon hid the clouds.

In another study, 6 college students walked in a German forest which gave no clues to direction. Four walked on a cloudy day and all 4 walked in circles; only 3 of them realized they were doing so. The remaining two walked on a sunny day and went straight only wavering when the sun was hid by the clouds.

In a third study, 15 students were blindfolded and had to walk straight down a field. All but three walked in circles no more than 20m wide.

However, this new research proves to be useful to someone in a horror movie:

In emergency situations, cinematic monster hunters and others may become so panicked that they disregard external heading cues and unintentionally end up back where they started, Souman suggests.

Survival of the fittest?

Let's pretend this is science related:

1. When his 38 caliber revolver failed to fire at his intended victim during a hold-up in Long Beach , California would-be robber James Elliot did something that can only inspire wonder. He peered down the barrel and tried the trigger again. This time it worked...

2. The chef at a hotel in Switzerland lost a finger in a meat cutting machine and after a little shopping around, submitted a claim to his insurance company. The company expecting negligence sent out one of its men to have a look for himself. He tried the machine and he also lost a finger. The chef's claim was approved.

3. A man who shoveled snow for an hour to clear a space for his car during a blizzard in Chicago returned with his vehicle to find a woman had taken the space. Understandably, he shot her.

4. After stopping for drinks at an illegal bar, a Zimbabwean bus driver found that the 20 mental patients he was supposed to be transporting from Harare to Bulawayo had escaped. Not wanting to admit his incompetence, the driver went to a nearby bus stop and offered everyone waiting there a free ride. He then delivered the passengers to the mental hospital, telling the staff that the patients were very excitable and prone to bizarre fantasies... The deception wasn't discovered for 3 days.

5. An American teenager was in the hospital recovering from serious head wounds received from an oncoming train. When asked how he received the injuries, the lad told police that he was simply trying to see how close he could get his head to a moving train before he was hit.

 

6. A man walked into a Louisiana Circle-K, put a $20 bill on the counter, and asked for change. When the clerk opened the cash drawer, the man pulled a gun and asked for all the cash in the register, which the clerk promptly provided. The man took the cash from the clerk and fled, leaving the $20 bill on the counter. The total amount of cash he got from the drawer... $15. [If someone points a gun at you and gives you money, is a crime committed?]

7. Seems an Arkansas guy wanted some beer pretty badly. He decided that he'd just throw a cinder block through a liquor store window, grab some booze, and run. So he lifted the cinder block and heaved it over his head at the window. The cinder block bounced back and hit the would-be thief on the head, knocking him unconscious. The liquor store window was made of Plexiglas. The whole event was caught on videotape.

 

8. As a female shopper exited a New York convenience store, a man grabbed her purse and ran. The clerk called 911 immediately, and the woman was able to give them a detailed description of the snatcher... Within minutes, the police apprehended the snatcher. They put him in the car and drove back to the store. The thief was then taken out of the car and told to stand there for a positive ID. To which he replied, "Yes, officer, that's her. That's the lady I stole the purse from."

9. The Ann Arbor News crime column reported that a man walked into a Burger King in Ypsilanti , Michigan at 5 A.M., flashed a gun, and demanded cash. The clerk turned him down because he said he couldn't open the cash register without a food order. When the man ordered onion rings, the clerk said they weren't available for breakfast. The man, frustrated, walked away.  

10. When a man attempted to siphon gasoline from a motor home parked on a Seattle street, he got much more than he bargained for. Police arrived at the scene to find a very sick man curled up next to a motor home near spilled sewage. A police spokesman said that the man admitted to trying to steal gasoline, but he plugged his siphon hose into the motor home's sewage tank by mistake. The owner of the vehicle declined to press charges saying that it was the best laugh he'd ever had.

We Can Totally Solve Global Warming With Space Mirrors

From TIME.com-Can geoengineering help slow global warming?

Global warming is happening.

And scientists are trying to think of ways to combat it before we all suffocate to death. One way is geoengineering which is basically we are going to cool the earth... somehow. Most of the ideas revolve around controlling the solar radiation coming at us.

Method 1: Shooting sulfur particles into the atmosphere with "artillery" (giant cannons??) or airplanes that will thicken the air, therefore blocking some of the sun
Downside: Must be done continuously. Particles eventually will either disseminate or fall out of the sky. Acid rain-We won't be hot, but we also won't have skin. Change in precipitation patterns.

Method 2:Shoot seawater mists at low clouds to reflect the sun. "Relatively" cheap--about $9billion to combat a "century's worth of global warming"
Downside: Salty clouds? Raining fish?

Method 3: Giant space mirrors. No, seriously.
Downside: Unaligned rogue mirror may laser us in half. But at least it would be less hot right?

As you can see, scientists are....getting there. They have yet to have a definitive answer, but at least we are getting creative.