Sightings

The accumulation of age-associated changes in a biochemical process that helps control genes may be responsible for some of the increased risk of cancer seen in older people, according to a National Institutes of Health study. "On your 50th birthday, you would have 50 of these sites that have acquired methyl groups in each cell," Xu said. "The longer you live, the more methylation you will have." more »

Henri Matisse was 60 years old when he began to create original illustrations for livres d’artiste (artists' books). By the time of his death, 25 years later, he had produced designs for 14 fully illustrated books, several of which are considered 20th-century masterpieces of the genre. more »

As the Tuebingen researchers in a new study note, it is impossible to tell if the mind’s information processing capacities do in fact decline with age if you don’t measure the information the mind processes, or how it changes over time. In every one of the cognitive tests in which the team measured this information, no evidence of any change in our minds’ processing capacities was found. The researchers simply found that the tests required older adults to make more effort as they sorted through the larger stores of knowledge they had acquired from experience. more »

Susan Milligan writes: Female workers don't need to be told what numerous studies have concluded: Women, on average, are paid less than men, even when they are doing the same job. But where workers live also makes a difference. Female workers in Wyoming earn just 65.5 percent of what men earn, worst of any state. In the nation’s capital, women fared best and are nearly at parity, making 94.8 cents on the male-earned dollar. more »