First Evidence that Mother’s Diet Influences Infant Sex
New research by the Universities of Exeter and Oxford provides the first evidence that a child’s sex is associated with the mother’s diet. Published today (23 April 2008), in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, the study shows a clear link between higher energy intake around the time of conception and the birth of sons. The findings may help explain the falling birth-rate of boys in industrialised countries, including the UK and US.
The study focused on 740 first-time pregnant mothers in the UK, who did not know the sex of their fetus. They were asked to provide records of their eating habits before and during the early stages of pregnancy. They were then split into three groups according to the number of calories consumed per day around the time they conceived. 56% of the women in the group with the highest energy intake at conception had sons, compared with 45% in the lowest group. As well as consuming more calories, women who had sons were more likely to have eaten a higher quantity and wider range of nutrients, including potassium, calcium and vitamins C, E and B12. There was also a strong correlation between women eating breakfast cereals and producing sons.
Popularity: 20% [?]
April 23, 2008 | Filed Under Health | Leave a CommentWhen Positive Thinking Leads to Financial Irresponsibility
Looking on the bright side can lead to irresponsible financial behavior, reveals a paper from the June 2008 issue of the Journal of Consumer Research. In a series of studies, Elizabeth Cowley (University of Sydney) examines repeat gambling in the face of loss. She finds that people often engage in too much positive thinking, selectively focusing on one win among hundreds of losses when they think back on the overall experience.
“When we want to justify engaging in an activity which could potentially be irresponsible – like gambling – we may need to distort our memory of the past to rationalize the decision,” Cowley explains. “People who have frequently spent more money than planned on gambling edit their memories of the past in order to justify gambling again.”
Popularity: 16% [?]
April 22, 2008 | Filed Under Humans | Leave a CommentHow Stereotypes Can Lead to Success
Stereotypes can boost as well as hinder our chances of success, according to psychologists from the University of Exeter and St Andrews University. Writing in the new edition of Scientific American Mind (out in the UK 22 April 2008), they argue that the power of stereotypes to affect our performance should not be underestimated.
Drawing on a large body of research, the authors argue that success or failure at work, at school or in sport cannot always be attributed solely to ability or incompetence. Studies suggesting that gender or race can play a part in performance have proved controversial. The researchers argue that the roots of such handicaps lie partly in the preconceptions that other people hold about these groups.
Popularity: 17% [?]
April 22, 2008 | Filed Under Humans | Leave a CommentWhy Teens Get Hooked on Cocaine More Easily than Adults
New drug research suggests that teens may get addicted and relapse more easily than adults because developing brains are more powerfully motivated by drug-related cues. This conclusion has been reached by researchers who found that adolescent rats given cocaine – a powerfully addicting stimulant – were more likely than adults to prefer the place where they got it. That learned association endured: Even after experimenters extinguished the drug-linked preference, a small reinstating dose of cocaine appeared to rekindle that preference – but only in the adolescent rats.
The research, performed at McLean Hospital, Harvard Medical School’s largest psychiatric facility, was reported in the April issue of Behavioral Neuroscience, published by the American Psychological Association.
Popularity: 17% [?]
April 22, 2008 | Filed Under Medical | Leave a CommentBrain Reacts to Fairness as it Does to Money and Chocolate
The human brain responds to being treated fairly the same way it responds to winning money and eating chocolate, UCLA scientists report. Being treated fairly turns on the brain’s reward circuitry.
“We may be hard-wired to treat fairness as a reward,” said study co-author Matthew D. Lieberman, UCLA associate professor of psychology and a founder of social cognitive neuroscience.
Popularity: 14% [?]
April 22, 2008 | Filed Under Humans | Leave a CommentGeometry Shapes Sound of Music
Through the ages, the sound of music in myriad incarnations has captivated human beings and made them sing along, and as scholars have suspected for centuries, the mysterious force that shapes the melodies that catch the ear and lead the voice is none other than math.
It’s geometry, to be more precise, and now, a trio of 21st-century music professors from Florida State University, Yale University and Princeton University have analyzed and categorized in brand-new ways the mathematics intrinsic to musical harmony. Their cutting-edge collaboration has produced a powerful tool they call “geometrical music theory,” which translates the language of music theory into that of contemporary geometry.
Popularity: 24% [?]
April 19, 2008 | Filed Under Mathematics | Leave a CommentSolar Flares Set the Sun Quaking
Data from the ESA/NASA spacecraft SOHO shows clearly that powerful starquakes ripple around the Sun in the wake of mighty solar flares that explode above its surface. The observations give solar physicists new insight into a long-running solar mystery and may even provide a way of studying other stars.
The outermost quarter of the Sun’s interior is a constantly churning maelstrom of hot gas. Turbulence in this region causes ripples that criss-cross the solar surface, making it heave up and down in a patchwork pattern of peaks and troughs.
Popularity: 22% [?]
April 19, 2008 | Filed Under Astronomy | Leave a CommentWork Hassles Hamper Sleep
Common hassles at work are more likely than long hours, night shifts or job insecurity to follow workers home and interfere with their sleep.That’s the conclusion of a University of Michigan study presented April 17 at the annual meeting of the Population Association of America.
The study analyzes two nationally representative surveys of approximately 2,300 U.S. adults that monitored the same workers for up to a decade. Over that time, roughly half the respondents said they had trouble sleeping.
Popularity: 24% [?]
April 18, 2008 | Filed Under Health | Leave a CommentGraphene Used to Create World’s Smallest Transistor
Researchers have used the world’s thinnest material to create the world’s smallest transistor, one atom thick and ten atoms wide.
Reporting their peer-reviewed findings in the latest issue of the journal Science, Dr Kostya Novoselov and Professor Andre Geim from The School of Physics and Astronomy at The University of Manchester show that graphene can be carved into tiny electronic circuits with individual transistors having a size not much larger than that of a molecule.
Popularity: 22% [?]
April 18, 2008 | Filed Under Technology | Leave a CommentAerodynamic Trailer Cuts Fuel and Emissions by Up to 15%
Creating an improved aerodynamic shape for truck trailers by mounting sideskirts can lead to a cut in fuel consumption and emissions of up to as much as 15%. Earlier promising predictions, based on mathematical models and wind tunnel tests by TU Delft, have been confirmed during road tests with an adapted trailer.
This means that PART (Platform for Aerodynamic Road Transport), the public-private partnership platform, has produced an application which can immediately be put into production.
Popularity: 21% [?]
April 18, 2008 | Filed Under Technology | Leave a Comment
