Senior Women Web

“A key motivation for this study is that sex plays a crucial role in human brain development, in aging, and in the manifestation of psychiatric and neurological disorders,” said Vinod Menon, PhD, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and director of the Stanford Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience Laboratory. “Identifying consistent and replicable sex differences in the healthy adult brain is a critical step toward a deeper understanding of sex-specific vulnerabilities in psychiatric and neurological disorders.” more »

"Questions about President Joe Biden’s cognitive health are drawing attention to ageism in politics — as well as in American life, with fewer people taking precautions against the covid-19 virus even as it remains a serious threat to vulnerable people, especially the elderly. The mental fitness of the nation’s leaders is a valid, relevant question for many voters, though the questions are also fueled by frustration with a political system in which many offices are held by older people who have been around a long time." "The Alabama Supreme Court’s groundbreaking ruling last week that frozen embryos have legal rights as people has touched off a national debate about the potential fallout of the “personhood” movement. Already the University of Alabama-Birmingham has paused its in vitro fertilization program while it determines the ongoing legality of a process that has become increasingly common for those wishing to start a family." more »

Ferida Wolff Writes: There was a slight rise in temperature and the snow started melting off the tree branches, splashing down like heavy rain. What was fluffy became squishy, thick and wet. It was very dramatic but shifted what started as an snowstorm into something new – it seemed to be raining snow! As our communities become more urbanized, the natural features around us tend to get pushed into the background and often go unnoticed." more »

“People with ME/CFS have very real and disabling symptoms, but uncovering their biological basis has been extremely difficult,” said Walter Koroshetz, M.D., (seen right) director of NIH’s National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS). “This in-depth study of a small group of people found a number of factors that likely contribute to their ME/CFS. Now researchers can test whether these findings apply to a larger patient group and move towards identifying treatments that target core drivers of the disease.” Immune testing revealed that the ME/CFS group had higher levels of naive B cells and lower levels of switched memory B cells — cells that help the immune system fight off pathogens — in blood compared to healthy controls. more »