Stress really DOES make stress worse

Sci is at SciAm Blogs today, talking about a study about stress. It turns out, just basic acute stress can be fine, but SEVERE stress? Well that just makes it all worse. Head over and check it out!

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Friday Weird Science: Beer vs Liquor, which one makes you anger quicker?

I’m sure you all have heard “Beer before liquor, never sicker. Liquor before beer, everything clear”? Whether or not it’s true (and honestly, it’s not true), most people talk about differences in alcoholic drinks. Some people love wine, some people get horrible wine headaches. Some people are happy with beer, others find it makes them […]

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Knowing what I know now

I felt very inspired looking at the recent post from Jeremy Yoder, ‘Knowing what I know now‘. Well, first it reminded me of this: Though of course this is the BEST song of that title: But then it made me think of all the things that I WISH I’d known in grad school, the things […]

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Nematode lovin': nematocin

Or rather, not nematode “lovin’” but definitely nematode mating! Last week I talked about the new oxytocin analogue in C. elegans: nematocin, and its role in learning and memory. Today we have a paper from the very same issue of Science, looking at nematocin and its role in mating behavior. Because molecules this conserved in […]

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Friday Historical Science: Giant's Shoulders #53!

Instead of Friday Weird Science this week, Sci is playing host to the Giant’s Shoulders carnival, the carnival on the history of science. And there’s plenty of weird and wild science in there! Everything from flesh eating mammoths to corpse stealing! Head over and check it out.

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Love and Learn: "Nematocin", the nematode oxytocin

Oxytocin always makes a lot of press. It plays roles in reproduction and mating behavior, social bonding, behavior related to morality. To call it “the love hormone” as some people like to do, is to grossly oversimplify the things that it does, something which can even be dangerous. And it also, in my opinion, really […]

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Crowdfunding basic neuroscience!

As we all know, science funding these days is really hard to come by. Rejection rates for federal grants are up over 80{9f43b4361d9a125bc126dd2a2d1949be02545ec69880430bc4fed2272fd72da3}. Labs are more and more expensive to run as more high tech equipment is required just to get the funding in the first place. And that’s not even going into the money […]

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Repost: This is your brain on music

Sci is at SciAm Blogs today, this time with a repost from 2011, which looks at what happens in the brain when music gives you “chills”. Does music give you chills? Which kinds? And do you know what happens when it does? Head over and check it out.

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Sunday Funny: Low hanging fruit indeed.

Today’s Sunday Funny comes to you courtesy of Biochembelle. It’s not a bad paper at all, in fact it’s very useful, but the title is particularly well chosen. Sometimes you just gotta go for the low hanging fruit…

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