RSV

Respiratory infection] Healthy but not RSV-infected lung epithelial cells profoundly inhibit T cell activation
by Wang, H, Su, Z, Schwarze, J
Background:
Respiratory viruses, including respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), can cause asthma exacerbations and bronchiolitis. Both conditions are associated with enhanced cognate immune responses and inflammation and reduced immune regulation. Lung epithelial cells (LECs) can contribute to antiviral and allergic immune responses while gut epithelial cells can inhibit effector T cell responses. A study was performed to determine whether healthy LECs regulate antigen-specific T cell responses and if this regulation is lost during RSV infection.



//////////////////known association between genetic variants on chromosome 17q21 and the development of asthma.



////////////////ELISpot as a predictor for development of TB in children with TB contact


///////////////////Longer duration of TV viewing in children with no symptoms of wheeze at 3.5 years of age was associated with the development of asthma in later childhood.



///////////////////WST=MORE CONVENIENT,LESS WARMTH


///////////////TO SAVE A MOCKING BIRD


/////////////////Peter Ubel: Irrationality is responsible for the economic mess we find ourselves in
right now—irrationality plus greed, of course, and a sub stan tial dose of ignorance. Let us start with ignorance. I am sad to say that many Americans have a difficult time with even simple math—around a third of American adults cannot calculate 10 percent of 1,000. People who struggle with concepts such as percents have an extremely difficult time with more complicated ideas, such as compounding of savings and, very relevant to our cur rent crisis, adjustable-rate mortgages.

To make matters worse, most of us are hardwired for optimism. Ask us how we rate as drivers, and the vast majority of us are convinced we are above average—even those of us who have gotten into multiple car accidents. As a result of our unrealistic optimism, we are convinced that our incomes will rise fast enough to keep up with our outsized mortgage, or that our adjustable rate will not rise, or that our house’s value will indefinitely outpace inflation. We are social beings, too, and frequently judge our own decisions by seeing what other people are doing. If my neighbor added on a new kitchen with a home equity loan, I might assume that is a good idea for me, even if a more rational weighing of my finances would suggest otherwise. Even savvy financiers can get caught up in irrational impulses. If a competitor’s firm makes huge profits on risky loans, it is easy for me to push aside my fears about such risks: if he took those risks and was rewarded, maybe I overestimated the risks!



/////////////////POST WF DTH-LNLY LF



///////////////////////////The article ends with Vanity Fair astrologer Michael Lutin saying that he will consider the newcomers, but remains skeptical of their influence over our daily affairs due to their location at the outer reaches of the solar system: "UB313 is never going to tell you whether Wednesday is good for romance." Actually, neither will anything else in the sky, unless it's an asteroid headed toward Earth, scheduled to hit on Wednesday.

Please tell your children to stay in school.


Neil DeGrasse Tyson



//////////////////SCIAM=A magician tosses a ball into the air once, twice, three times. Suddenly, the ball vanishes in mid-flight. What happened?

Don’t worry, the laws of physics haven’t been broken. Magicians do not have supernatural powers; rather, they are masters of exploiting nuances of human perception, attention, and awareness. In light of this, a recent Nature Reviews Neuroscience paper, coauthored by a combination of neuroscientists (Stephen L. Macknik, Susana Martinez-Conde, both at the Barrows Neurological Institute) and magicians (Mac King, James Randi, Apollo Robbins, Teller, John Thompson), describes various ways magicians manipulate our perceptions, and proposes that these methods should inform and aid the neuroscientific study of attention and awareness.



//////////////////Distorted Body Images: A Quick and Easy Way to Reduce Pain
The body image is a mental representation of one's physical appearance, constructed by the brain from past experiences and present sensations. It is an essential component of self-identity, which, when altered, can have dramatic effects on how one perceives oneself. For example, a small proportion of migraine sufferers experience visual hallucinations just before the onset of a headache, in which the body parts appear larger or smaller than they actually are. Lewis Carroll, who is known to have suffered from migraines, documented such hallucinations in Alice in Wonderland.

These body image distortions can have bizarre consequences. Otherwise healthy people report that they have always percived a part of their body as feeling "wrong," and opt to have it removed by amputation; some brain-damaged or psychiatric patients experience alien hand syndrome, in which they deny ownership of a limb, and insist that it is under the control of external forces.


//////////////////SORROW NOT DEPRESSION


////////////////////FUZZINESS OF MEMORY



////////////////Why Calories Taste Delicious: Eating and the Brain
The obesity epidemic has led to increased scientific interest in how the brain controls human feeding behavior. Why do we get hungry? What biological mechanisms tell us what to eat and when to stop eating?

It’s long been assumed that two neurobiological mechanisms largely govern food intake: one that controls the need to eat and one that controls the desire to eat. The hypothalamus in the brain regulates the homeostatic control of food intake by receiving, coordinating and responding to metabolic cues and signals from the digestive system. By integrating these metabolic signals, the hypothalamus tells us when we need to eat to maintain a body weight “set point,” much like a thermostat set on a specific temperature. It is clear, however, that higher brain centers that control the desire to eat also substantially influence our food consumption. The dopamine reward system is one such brain center. (When you covet a bowl of chocolate ice cream after dinner, a food that you don’t need to eat for hunger but want to eat, it is your dopamine reward system that gets excited.) In many situations, this desire to eat can override the need to eat, leading people to consume tasty foods even when they’re not hungry. Our inability to forego these rewarding aspects of food intake override long-term homeostatic control, contributing to obesity.



DOPAMINE REWARD SYSTEM FOR THAT EXTRA ICE CREAM



////////////////// that those tiny drips from faucets could amount to like one trillion gallons of water wasted each year in US homes alone



////////////////Blattella germanica and Periplaneta americana are cockroaches. They aren't the only cockroach species. In fact there are an estimated 4000 different kinds of cockroach, many of them living in fields, forests or jungles


//////////////////DOWNS OR IITENGR CHLD-AWAY FRM PRNT


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