Archive | February 2011
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Preventing the Preseason Injury
As the call for pitchers and catchers to report goes out in Arizona and Florida, amateur athletes are also getting the itch for warm weather and outdoor activity. Whether you’re dusting off your baseball glove, your tennis racket, or your golf clubs, it’s not too early to start thinking about avoiding a sports injury that […]
Linkage 2/25: AAASing From Afar, NOVA Venom, Magnetic Turtles
I’ve said it before, but the AAAS Meeting is my favorite scientific conference, a cross-disciplinary feast of research that’s perfect for omnivores of science. As I wait for the meeting to return to Chicago (2014!), I spent the week attending from afar through the many online recaps. Depending on your preferences, you can get your […]
The Disparity in the Doctor’s Office
In a famous 1999 study, 700 physicians were given a simple case-study task. Each watched a video of a patient-actor describing chest pain and were given basic test results for that patient. Each doctor was then asked whether they would recommend the patient for cardiac catheterization, an additional diagnostic procedure. The patient cases varied in […]
Our Pilot Podcast: SMAHC, Sex, and Celiac
We are pleased to announce a new way to keep up with research news from the University of Chicago Medical Center, in the form of a regular audio podcast. Because we are all about evolution at ScienceLife, we will start by posting the pilot episode – Episode #0, if you will – and asking for […]
Tricking Touch with Plaids
Imagine yourself at a street corner, watching cars go by and waiting for your turn to cross. When the eye tracks a moving object like a car, it inspires fireworks of activity in the visual systems of the brain. Initially, the information is pixelated into independent scraps, as primary visual neurons respond to their preferred […]
Sweeping Out Selective Sweeps
The ultimate genetic detective story is solving the mystery of human evolution. Since it became possible to look at genetic sequences in humans and their primate relatives, geneticists have hunted for the footprints of how humans evolved. But finding the most significant places in the genome that changed since humans and chimpanzees split off from […]
Mapping Out the Starting Point
When health disparities in urban populations are discussed at the University of Chicago Medical Center, it’s not an abstract, far-away concept. Only a few blocks west and south of the hospital campus are some of the poorest neighborhoods in Chicago, where nearly every health statistic one finds is shocking. Pick any measure – diabetes, heart […]
Ending the Immune War on Wheat
The immune system is designed to protect the body against foreign invaders, neutralizing disease and infection. But organisms are all too happy to invite invasions several times a day through a seemingly innocuous act: eating. When food enters the digestive system, it has to be dealt with by the immune system just like everything else […]
Sex and the Female Cancer Survivor
By Dianna Douglas If your oncologist is worried about your sex life, you’re probably a man. Stacy Lindau, associate professor of obstetrics/gynecology and geriatrics, has been researching how often women get help for sexual problems after surviving cancer, and the data are grim. Almost none of the women in her study got treatment, and half […]
