Paleoartist — Viktor Deak
I recommend looking at the work of Viktor Deak. He works in yet another field that gracefully mixes the arts and science – paleoart. Deak has an impressive ability to work with remains of bones, and build, sculpt, model, and eventually digitally paint convincing likenesses of humanity’s most recent ancestors. Supporting this is a strong knowledge of anatomy and biology. Essentially, he dissects in reverse. For more information see a recent New York Times feature on Deak. Also see this Hall of Human Origins at the American Museum of Natural History website.
Engle, Stockart update
As an update to my most recent post about the recent Engle and Stockart fiasco, I’d like to call attention to the comment posted on said post, (also on Reddit), and a post on the Logo Factory. It’s impossible to know the real story, and who’s really at fault, but at least both sides are now being represented more fairly online. It’ll be interesting to see how this all plays out; this drama is not as black and white as it first appeared.
Tissue Dynamics: Tone Variation
Medium: conte crayon – unusual for medical illustrations, but I wanted to try it out. It’s less finicky than carbon pencil but still gives really rich blacks. My only wish is that conte came in greys as well– I haven’t seen them in the stores.
Intestinal Mesentery Dynamics: color variation
Inspirational Image Friday: fractal snow image
Check out this snowy terrain image – looks like what I saw flying from Minnesota to Atlanta a few weeks ago. This image was taken far away from the midwest, however.
Tibet from above, NASA/Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team, Goddard Space Flight Center
This image via Boston.com’s Big Picture feature.
More satellite images via NASA: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/category.php?cat_id=11
Omega-3, part 2 of 2
Regarding recommended intakes for omega-3 and omega-6 fats, research has focused on relative, not absolute, amounts. The reasons for this are historical; currently Americans are consuming an approximate ratio of 15:1 (omega-6 : omega-3). Generations and generations ago, our ancestors consumed a ratio much closer to 1:1 and a ratio of 4:1 is what is recommended today based on the latest research. The theory goes that we’re not feeding our bodies as evolution designed us to eat, and this is the reason the onslaught of many new health issues has arisen – type 2 diabetes, heart disease, asthma, and others. For a brief discussion and some data about this ratio, visit the Whole Health Source blog.
Not all researchers agree that relative amounts should be the only focus. Two Harvard papers, both written in part by WC Willett, concluded that the issue is more about raising omega-3’s, and that lowering omega-6’s showed no appreciable benefits. But still, even though there’s disagreement over the ratio, everyone seems to agree that omega-3’s have importance. Abstracts here and here.
So finally, what food sources contain which kinds of fats? These two PUFA’s come from a range of meats, vegetables, nuts, and their oils, often both in one kind of food. But still there are certain foods that are clearly dominated by one and not the other.
Good sources of Omega-3’s:
ALA: flaxseed and oil, walnuts and walnut oil, canola oil, leafy green vegetables like broccoli and spinach, grains
EPA/DHA: wild fish (especially salmon), grass fed beef, eggs. In general the more natural the animals eat, the better.
Good sources of Omega-6’s:
LA: safflower, sunflower seeds, vegetable oils, corn oil
AA: animal meats, farmed fish, eggs. In general, animals that have a heavily processed and corn derived diet have higher omega-6 to 3 ratios.
The bottom line behind all this research and nutrition hype seems to be that we should eat what evolution carved us out to eat. More omega-3’s, less omega-6’s. More real food, less processed and overly preserved.
Omega-3 fatty acids, 1 of 2
Research into omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids for a recent project has given me much more awareness about these molecules than recent health headlines and food package claims ever could.
Starting with basics, both omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids are essential polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA’s). The ‘essential’ term refers to the fact that even though our bodies need both these fats for healthy functioning (all cells are surrounded by lipid membranes), they can’t manufacture them on their own. There’s another PUFA – omega-9 – that isn’t nearly as well known, and is not an essential fatty acid.
Nothing in the body is simple; there are several types of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids, both involved in a lovely web of reactions, at times competing for the same enzymes. For a poorly designed but accurate diagram, go here.
The major types of omega-3 fatty acids are ALA (alpha linolenic acid), EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid), and DHA (docosahexaenoic acid). All of these are found in foods, but to a small extent ALA helps produce EPA and DHA.
Both EPA and DHA are antiarrythmic (keep the heart beating steadily), decrease triglycerides, decrease VLDL cholesterol, increase HDL cholesterol, and decrease cytokines (short messengers between or within cells, usually involved in inflammation). EPA also decreases platelet aggregation, vasoconstriction, and other inflammation mediators. DHA is also well known for its importance in brain functioning and development, making up a significant amount of infant brain mass.
Omega-6 has two well known stars: LA (linoleic acid) and AA (arachidonic acid). Like the Omega-3 acids, both of these are found in food sources, but to an extent the body also makes AA from LA. AA has been shown to lower LDL cholesterol. AA acts more strongly opposing the omega-3 EPA by increasing platelet aggregation, vasoconstriction, and inflammation.
All the actions listed above are healthy body responses, in certain situations. The issue is that you can have too much of a good thing. Inflammation, for instance, is how the body rightly deals with cuts and some foreign invaders. However, when kicked into overdrive, it is also a symptom and/or cause of many modern diseases – heart disease, arthritis, type 2 diabetes, some cancers, and asthma.
More on this topic to follow, including which fats are found in which foods, and reasons behind recommended intake amounts.
Some sources:
Dietary n-6 and n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids: From biochemistry to clinical implications in cardiovascular prevention.
Metabolic Pathways of Omega-3 and Omega-6 Fatty Acids
Inspirational Image Friday – Biological Hubble Image
I may be far too drawn to images, illustrations, designs, or photos that can be seen as both microscopic and nebula-sized. This week’s pick is just a single image, from a collection of Hubble Space Telescope Images at boston.com. Not knowing it was a nebula, I’d be just as likely to see it as a few glorified cells in a complex stage of mitosis.
The Cat's Eye Nebula, NASA, ESA, HEIC, and The Hubble Heritage Team - STScI/AURA
Historically Accurate Image of Jesus
If you celebrate Christmas, it’s easy to let your head get full of overly idealized imagery of a beautiful couple wearing halos in a cute little stable, with a fresh baby lying in clean and polished wooden manger, doubtless surrounded by loving and recently brushed lambs and donkeys and the like. All this is lovely to picture, but isn’t honest about the real conditions of that time and place. And like visions of a great big guy in the sky with a beard and a cute little red devil with a pitchfork, these visual pictures can shroud what this holiday and religion is really about.
Ergo, I’m posting the non-Caucasian image of Jesus that hit the covers of Popular Mechanics in December of 2002. The goal had been to establish the most historically accurate image of Jesus possible. Of note is that Richard Neave, a retired medical artist from the University of Manchester in England largely directed the project. The group used visualization techniques that were common for forensic and archeological projects.
Santa, the super organism
Merry Christmas to all -
I thought this article, which can be found nearly all over the web and has no clear author, was worth posting. When Science has it’s say, and if Santa is real, he’s much more impressive than any of us ever thought! Other extreme forms of life are really no match:
“There are about 2 billion children (people under 18 in the world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, or Jewish religions, this reduces the workload for Christmas Night to 15% of the total, or 378 million. At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, which comes to 108 million homes, presuming that there is at least one good child in each. Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical).
This works out to 967.7 visits per second. This is easy to say that for each Christian household with a good child, Santa has to jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left for him, get back up the chimney, jump into the sleigh, and get on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 108 million stops are evenly distributed around the earth (which of course we know to be false, but will accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.7 million miles,
not counting bathroom stops or breaks.
This means Santa’s sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second-3,000 times the speed of sound. For the purpose of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle moves at only 27.4 miles per second and a conventional reindeer can run (at best) at 15 miles per hour. The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element.
Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized Lego set (two pounds). The sleigh is carrying over 500 thousand tons, not counting Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that the “flying” reindeer could pull ten times the normal amount, the job couldn’t be done with eight or even nine of them Santa would need 360,000 of them. This increases the payload, not counting the weight, another 54,000 tons, or roughly 7 times of the Queen Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch).
600,000 tons travelling at 650 miles per second creates enormous airresistance-this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a spacecraft re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer would absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating deafening sonic booms in their wake. The reindeer team would be vaporized within 4.26 thousands of a second, or right about the time Santa reached his fifth house on his trip.
Not that that matters, however, since Santa, as a result of accelerating from a dead stop to 650 miles per second, in .001 seconds, would be subjected to forces of 17,500 g’s. A 250 lb Santa would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo.”