Letters Remain

Tag: health

  • Longevity FAQ and Longevity 101: Your Beginner’s Guides

    I find the concept of longevity and longevity research fascinating, from both a scientific and philosophical perspective: it’s cool to read about how researchers have effectively reversed the ageing of some mice, and I find it endlessly curious how large swathes of society want to ‘solve’ ageing (or, maybe more accurately, the other things that…

  • The Scientific 7-Minute Bodyweight Workout

    Back in 2013, Scientists from the Human Performance Institute published an article in the American College of Sports Medicine’s Health & Fitness Journal titled, High-intensity circuit training using body weight. To address the limitations of traditional exercise protocols, … one of the exercise strategies we use is high-intensity circuit training (HICT) using body weight as…

  • Stretch 15: Daily Dose of Stretching Exercises

    Stretch 15 is a straight-forward web app designed to get you stretching more. You just indicate whether you’re in the office or at home, and it gives you a timer and indicates which stretches to do, when. The site tracks your total stretch time and your daily stretch ‘streak’, if you’re into that type of…

  • Misunderstood Salt: The Facts About Limiting Intake

    For decades we have been told, with certainty, to limit our salt intake or risk heart disease and high blood pressure—but is this advice based on sound scientific findings? The short answer is No. The evidence is inconsistent, inconclusive and contradictory, says prominent cardiologist Jeremiah Stamler (who used to be an advocate for the eat-less-salt…

  • Illness Susceptibility and Sleep Quality

    I’ve been ill for a few weeks and I was fairly sure (in my amateur opinion) that it was related to a significant lack of sleep over the last couple of months. Upon returning to full health I decided to do some quick research on my favourite topic: sleep. In one recent study looking at…

  • The Brain on Food: Everyday Chemicals

    Regarding all the foods that we consume as a drugs is a wondrous way to examine and comprehend the complex interactions and subtle forces behind how everything we put in our mouths affects “how our neurons behave and, subsequently, how we think and feel”. In a compelling article that suggests our shared evolutionary history with the plants…

  • Drinking Levels and Mortality Rates

    Despite the various and severe health risks that come with drinking, abstaining from alcohol appears to increase your risk of dying prematurely. The reasons for this are not clearly known, but it is thought to be because drinkers are more likely to belong to a community (albeit one that drinks), and a feeling of community is…

  • Food-Based Body Clock the Key to Jet Lag

    The primary cause of jet lag (or desynchronosis as it’s correctly known) is the disruption of our circadian rhythms based on the daily light–dark cycles we experience. However this is only the case when food is in plentiful supply, with new research suggesting that circadian rhythms based on food availability are able to override those of the light-dark cycle. This…

  • Sedentary Lifestyle? Exercise Isn’t Helping

    A somewhat sedentary lifestyle combined with regular exercise is turning us into what physiologists are calling ‘active couch potatoes’–and that exercise, no matter how vigourous, doesn’t appear to be counteracting the negative effects of that sedentary lifestyle. In rats, this lifestyle was found to produce “unhealthy cellular changes in their muscles” and increase insulin resistance…

  • Sweetness and the Problem with Diet Sodas

    The link between the sweetness of a food and its caloric content may be a trait that our bodies have evolved to recognise. By disrupting what could be a “fundamental homeostatic, physiological process” by using artificial sweeteners, we could be promoting obesity. That’s the conclusion Jonah Lehrer draws from a study that looks at how…