Since the dawn of time, humans have depended on the light of day and the darkness of night to regulate sleep cycles and keep our circadian rhythms in check. But now with the advent of electrical lighting as well as screen time, we have to tend to unnatural lighting and the impact it has on our sleep cycles.Humans have robust rhythms that regulate nearly every aspect of our lives, from our cognition to memory to things like liver function and how the pancreas secretes insulin in response to a mea ...read more
Every season has its own unique sights, sounds and other sensations. In this episode of the SciStarter podcast, we look at fireflies, listen to cicadas, feel the ocean waves and extend our senses beyond the bounds of our planet.Sensations of Summer Audio PodcastSensations of Summer Video PodcastPodcast TranscriptSciStarter S5E6 Sensations of SummerBob Hirshon Welcome to Citizen Science: Stories of Science We Can Do Together, also known as the SciStarter podcast. In this episode a summer sensory ...read more
You have to wonder how people originally figured out how to eat some foods that are beloved today. The cassava plant is toxic if not carefully processed through multiple steps. Yogurt is basically old milk that’s been around for a while and contaminated with bacteria. And who discovered that popcorn could be a toasty, tasty treat?These kinds of food mysteries are pretty hard to solve. Archaeology depends on solid remains to figure out what happened in the past, especially for people who didn†...read more
Medical professionals often see patients exhibiting symptoms of more than one mental condition at a time, which are called comorbidities. However, the causes of these comorbidities involve delving into the complexity of the human brain and the myriad reasons why mental health conditions arise in the first place. “Comorbidities are, unfortunately, common and a serious problem,” says Kristin Scaplen, an assistant neuroscience professor at Bryant University. “Research shows that the presence ...read more
The Bronze Age saw the creation of complex societies and complex warfare, and served as the setting of some of the world’s most famous myths. In fact, the Aegean Bronze Age was the time of Achilles and Odysseus — of the legendary Trojan Horse and Trojan War — memorialized in the works of Homer. Not so mythical were the cultures that arose around the Aegean throughout the Greek Bronze Age, between 3000 B.C.E. and 1000 B.C.E., including the Minoan civilization on Crete and the Mycenaean civi ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine