Science is So Sexy is 5!

My Dear Sexy Readers,

My little Sexy blog is 5 today!

I started this blog after going to a talk by a lady from Sense about Science about Standing Up for Science! I was inspired to create my own platform where I could lay down answers to my Science questions and my friends/readers' Science questions.

It has grown into this beautiful blog and inspired me to make a career in healthcare communication!

I was a Research Scientist 5 years ago, I am now a Senior Medical Writer, and it's all thanks to the experience I've gained writing for you guys.

Recently, someone asked me to write a little bit about myself and my love for Science as part of her blog series Ladies Who Lab (if you'd like to read it, it's here)
The response has been amazing!!

Science is So Sexy also made me discover the extraordinary life of our gut flora and their impact on our health, mental and physical.
Since January, I've been blogging weekly on My Bugs And I and have been reposting some of them over here as well.

I hope you can follow me over there too, so...

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

Pre-launch party for My Bugs and I

My Dear Sexy Readers,

My Bugs and I will be live in less than a month and I wanted to share with you a little bit more information about this new venture in the form of a Giveaway!!!

A fantastic Kindle Fire tablet is to be won, and I know for a fact it is a fantastic little gem as I have purchased one for myself... Hmmm for my son, I mean... so I could download Hollyoaks during my daily commute... Hmmm I mean so I could download cartoons and games for my 3 year old for him to play while daddy and I are having lunch in a quiet restaurant... Yes, you've guessed it, possibilities are endless with this little device, I luuuurve it!!!

Go over HERE for a chance to win this beautiful Fire

Anyoooh, for a chance to win it, please go over to my new blog www.MyBugsAndI.com where you'll be able to enter the giveaway with your FB or email log in details. Alternatively, you can click on the Giveaway tab right here on Science is So Sexy ;)

Good luck and see you soon for more Sexy Science,

Shelf Life - a Collection for Curious Minds

My Dear Sexy Readers,

I was contacted a few weeks ago by Roberto from the Department of Marketing at the American Museum of Natural History. He was telling me about their new original series called Shelf Life which is on the history and importance of scientific collections. Curious as I am, I clicked, clicked clicked and discovered these videos, watched them with big wide eyes the same way my son discovers new episodes of Peter Rabbit!

Shelf Life is a collection for curious minds—opening doors, pulling out drawers, and taking the lids off some of the incredible, rarely-seen items in the American Museum of Natural History - Tweet This

Shelf Life is a monthly feature and 3 episodes have been published so far.
Here is their first one:



What I found interesting in this first instalment is the fact that they have 200 scientists, working on 33 million items classified in anthropology, paleontology, vertebrate or invertebrates, rocks and gems but they also have a massive collection of frozen DNA-containing tissue available to scientists all over the world. More surprisingly, they have 12 meteorites from mars!!!! But also, the astrophycisists are amassing massive digital data from the skies.
It truly is a 21st Century Museum Collection!

In the second episode, my highlight was "The wonder part of these collections is not so much in the object but in the relationship in what they tell us in a sophisticated way."

Their next episode is premiering on February the 17th. If you are interested in getting updates, you can subscribe to their Youtube channel. I can't wait to discover what they have in their drawers :)

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

Website
amnh.org/shelflife

Talk Nerdy to me

My Dear Sexy Readers,

Today, I would like to share with you this TED video:

Melissa Marshall brings a message to all scientists (from non-scientists): We're fascinated by what you're doing. So tell us about it — in a way we can understand. In just 4 minutes, she shares powerful tips on presenting complex scientific ideas to a general audience.

"Make sure that we can see that your Science is Sexy"  

Click to Tweet

The Scientist...

My Dear Sexy Readers,

Today's post is not about Science facts but Science itself!
As a medical copywriter, I get to work on diverse creative pieces of communications as well as for our company's blog SoreThumbThinking! For that platform, I get to explore my inner thoughts on creativity and advertising. Recently, I wrote a piece on Science as a mean for influential creativity.
I thought, well I'm sure my Sexy Readers would be interested to read something different :)
So here it is:

What is Stress?

My Dear Sexy Readers,

First of all, I would like to thank Mica from Science Koekje for her blog lovin' and mentioning Science So Sexy in her latest blog article. If you don't know her yet, she's a beauty blogger from Germany based in Belgium (and I shall add "for Love"). You, my Sexy readers, might be interested in her review on her first Belgian BirchBox.

Trick or Treat - A UNICEF Halloween initiative

My Dear Sexy Readers,

I'm sure I don't need to remind you that today is Halloween!!!

If you are in the US, this is a great alternative to the unhealthy trick or treat tradition:

Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF began in 1950 as a way to help kids who need more than candy. Since then, children all over America have gone door-to-door on Halloween with UNICEF collection boxes, calling out, "Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF!" They have raised more than $170 million for the U.S. Fund for UNICEF since 1950.

Trick or Treat for UNICEF

Now, this is not the usual science topic I treat you to ;) But as you can see on the image above, one the thing you can help raise money for is Vaccination kits for children.

This gives me a fantastic opportunity to let you know or remind you if you've seen it before that Seran's infographic on children immunisation programme is up.

This is another thing you can do this Halloween, you can share it, you can tweet it, you can +'s it - Help dismiss some of the claims anti-vaxxers make to rally hesitant parents.

It's becoming a cruel fact that we cannot rely on our herd immunity anymore so our children need our help to build it back up so all of them, vaccinated or not (for medical reasons or others) are protected!

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

SiSS introduces Seran

My Dear Sexy Readers,

As promised, let me introduce to you Sexy Seran who will be posting her very first SiSS article very soon.
To know her a little better, I sent her a questionnaire about her interest for Science - which BTW you can all fill :) - and here are her answers:

When or why did you first think about pursuing your interest for Science?
When I was in school, I really enjoyed Biology lessons and I had brilliant biology teachers throughout secondary school. When I had to choose subjects to study at A-level, I chose to study Biology, Chemistry, Psychology, English and Critical Thinking. I was one of the few in my class who didn't know at this point what career I wanted, but I knew that I enjoyed these subjects so it made sense to continue to  study them.

What did you do about it?
A-levels, Degree, Master

How did you find it?
Challenging

If you are happy you academically pursued your interest in Science, what was the best bit?
That rare moment when an experiment with a really long protocol actually generates useful results. (Also a big perk was knowing that I don't have to work in front of a computer doing a 9-5pm job near Old Street station wearing office clothes by the end of it).

What is your current career path or what will your next career move be?
Right now it could be anything from carrying out a PhD, to working at a science editorial position to a hospital lab.

Is there anything you would have done differently?
Being completely honest, I know I could have worked a lot harder during my undergraduate degree.

How important do you think Science is?

If you had to choose an adjective for Science, what would it be?
An acquired taste.

That is a very good adjective Seran, one that I'm sure many of our Sexy readers will agree with. Thank you for answering SiSS questionnaire on your interest for Science, we are all looking forward to reading your article,

See you Soon for Seran's Sexy Science,

Science is So Sexy - the launching pad

My Dear Sexy Readers,

Fantastic and exciting news coming up very soon on Science is So Sexy!!!!

First of all, I'd like to apologise for not updating you on all things amazing and Sciencey for the past 2 months!!!! The reason is I have found a job in medical communications and with a little monster approaching the Terrible Twos, life is a bit hectic!!!

But fear not, Science is So Sexy will keep on living: I will try to keep up with your requests and MOST IMPORTANTLY, Science is So Sexy is welcoming new writers!!!!

I'm very excited about creating a launching pad for scientists who dream about engaging with the public and who would like to make a living off science communication.

As you all know, and as in any field, you are more likely to get a job if you have some experience, but you can't get experience without a job!!! Terrible and frustrating! And the eternal question is How do you gain experience?
I was in this situation not a long time ago and because I myself used this platform to launch my career in medical writing, I thought I could extend it to keen and passionate Science graduates who desperately need this thought-after experience.

So, with that in mind, I'd like to invite everyone to forward/share/pin/tweet this post with someone they think might be interested. There are loads of topics to cover so any scientific/medical background is appropriate.

My only condition is the writers to be of minimum at degree level because I want to make sure the level of Science is maintained and all information can be appropriately and accurately referenced. I think that is why people come back to this blog, because they know there's no crap and sensational BS going on, what is written is proven and tested Science, there's no suppositions nor extrapolations, yet it's interesting and accessible by everyone.

The recruitment process has already begun and I'm happy to announce that we have a couple of new writers who are super excited about embarking on this Sexy Science journey.

I will introduce them to you very soon, but you can already see their names in the right sidebar. I can't wait for you to read what they have been preparing, it's amazingly interesting!!!

So, See you Soon for Some Sexy Science,

"I am not the Cancer" Art Installation

My Dear Sexy Readers,

I feel privileged to have been invited to the "I am not the Cancer" Art installation in Central London part of the Metastatic Breast Cancer Awareness Campaign commissioned by Novartis.
I used to go to scientific conferences all over, sporting a badge with my name and my research lab on it. But this time, I was invited as a Science Writer! How exciting to be recognized for your work!

I was contacted through LinkedIn by a member of the Breast Cancer Care. This charity raises awareness and funds for the care of women affected by Breast Cancer whose disease has become metastatic.
Before being taken through to the art installation, we were welcomed in a reception area where we were presented with the results of the Here and Now campaign.

The Here and Now campaigns are surveys commissioned by Novartis Oncology. In the UK, with 60 respondents living with advanced breast cancer and distributed in April and May 2014, the objectives are to understand the challenges experienced by the patients at each stage of their journey and understand the barriers to improved patient outcomes.

Breast Cancer
Breast Cancer is the most common cancer in women worldwide, and accounts for a third of all new cancers diagnosed in women in UK!
A third of women with early breast cancer (EBC) go on to develop Advanced Breast Cancer (ABC).
ABC is uncurable and affects an estimated 30,000 women in the UK each year.
Average life expectancy after ABC diagnosis remains at 2 to 4 years, compared to 10 years for early breast cancer.

Here and Now Survey Results
The results of the HERE and Now UK survey were presented to us by Honey Langcaster-James, a lecturer in Psychology from the university of Hull. The results show that women with ABC often feel like many areas of their lives are negatively affected, such as their emotional health, the relationships with friends, family and partner.  Up to one in 3 women with ABC feel they do not receive enough support from their friends or parents.

Patients with ABC require a high degree of social and psychological support. 2 out of 3 women feel like no one understands what they are going through and that it's hard to find support groups for ABC. They feel isolated from other support groups that focus on Early Breast Cancer (EBC). With time, the support they received from friends and family when first diagnosed has faded.

Although, the majority of patients said they received enough support from nurses and their oncologists, they want more time to discuss their wider needs and get help to arrange for these such as emotional and financial support.

Regarding treatments, more work is needed to ensure greater access to new treatments for ABC patients. Almost half of the patients surveyed would like to know more about new treatments but are unsure of who to talk to, some of them don't even feel empowered to make their own decisions.

"These results call for Action... Health Care professionals (HCP) need to understand they can do more... Payers, regulators, commissioners need to work to improve the landscape... We need patient support groups... The Public needs to be aware." said Honey Langcaster-James

Leading UK experts
Gill Donovan, Breast Oncology Nurse specialist and Research Fellow at Cardiff University, also shared her experience with us. She explained that treatment options are not the same depending on your geographical location, the access to new treatments is limited because of costs. Although, she explained, nurses need to balance optimism and realities, one important role to play is the need to give hope, to concentrate on the living and not on the dying.

" We need a service to be redesigned on how to deal with the variety of tasks such as explain treatments, refer to appropriate services, talk to patients, manage their anxiety, manage emotional and physical effects" she says.

Diana Jupp, Director of Services at Breast Cancer Care, says the charity continues to campaign to improve the standards of care for people living with this complex disease. In the UK, we had 5 specialist nurses; this number increased to 32 recently. But it's 32 in the whole of UK! There's a lot of work to be done, collecting data in England, network with Wales and Scotland, sharing good practice, installing policies. A sentiment shared by Baroness Morgan of Drefelin who also came to talk to us about her continuous work to influence politics into opening up to ABC awareness.

The art installation
Then, we were led to the art installation itself: It consisted of 6 TV screens showing face and back of the head of 3 silent patients suffering from advanced breast cancer. Opposite each TV screen was a comfortable armchair; and above each armchair was a speaker from which you could hear their devastating story. So to hear their story, you had no choice but to sit in this armchair and look in the eyes of this silent patient on the TV screen (not a comfortable thing to do). The point of this art installation was to make you realize that, however uncomfortable it is, that’s how we should support friends and family as opposed to using escapism as a coping method. This art installation was created to make you feel differently, to question yourself in order to make you behave differently.


Are you affected by advanced breast cancer? Through a friend, family member, yourself? Were you aware of the lack of support for these patients? As usual, let me know in the comments box,

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

Further reading
http://www.novartis.co.uk/news/featured-news/20140430-here-and-now.shtml

What is Sarcoma?

My Dear Sexy Readers,

I stumbled upon this while working on a writing test for a job application (! I know, totally random!): this week 23-29 June 2014 - yeahhhh I'm not too late - is Sarcoma Awareness week!! I'm glad I found this because, although I knew the name, I didn't really know much about Sarcomas. And you know me, I love learning about new things and sharing it all with you.
This year's campaign is about Getting People "On the ball" for sarcoma. What is it? It's simple, you just download a Poster from their web page and order your "On the Ball" pack to bring to your GP to make him/her more aware of symptoms, signs, etc... I couldn't find any # to go with the campaign but if you type Sarcoma on the ball on Twitter, you get some results!

You can download this poster yourself from HERE and bring to your GP, along with an info pack

Sarcoma Fact Sheet (borrowed from the Sarcoma website)
Sarcoma is a group of rare-ish cancers that develop in the muscle, bone, nerves, cartilage, tendons, blood vessels and the fatty and fibrous tissues.

There are around 100 different sub-types of sarcoma

There are around 3,800 new cases of sarcoma diagnosed each year in the UK

There are 13,000 people living with sarcoma in the UK

Sarcomas make up 15% of all childhood cancers (0-14 years) and 11% of all cancer diagnoses in teenagers and young people (15-24 years)

Sarcomas make up 1% of all cancer diagnoses in the UK

If you are interested or just want to know more about Sarcomas, check the charity's designated web page over HERE


Did you know about Sarcoma? Do you feel we should get more involved in the awareness campaign to get GPs to recognise signs and symptoms? Feel free to share your experience in the comments box, thank you for dropping and...

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

Further Reading
http://www.sarcoma.org.uk/

What is Diabetes?

My Dear Sexy Readers,

I've been working on the second installment of #MyBodyDoesWhat series which will be a new infographic on Pancreas (Previous ScienceSoSexy infographics)! Little did I know that beginning of June was Diabetes week. How timely am I? - Well, I'm 2 weeks too late, but it could be worse, right?! (If you don't know what Pancreas and Diabetes have in common, keep reading ;)

8th - 14th June was the week chosen to raise awareness to this common life-long health condition. This year, using the different social media platforms, the word was #ican! An initiative to show help and support to anyone with diabetes by gathering examples of things that this condition will never let you stop from doing. Check out their live story stream over HERE.

3.2 million people are diagnosed with diabetes in the UK and an estimated 630,000 people have the condition, but don’t know it. In the world, the diabetic population stands at 365 million people, representing around 8.5% of the global population.

Diabetes is when our body either doesn't make enough insulin (produced by our pancreas) or cannot use its own insulin properly to help get the sugar (coming from food or our liver) to move from our blood into the cells of our body, causing build up of that sugar in our bloodstream.

The Insulin binds to its Receptor and makes the Glucose transporter move to the cell surface where it can open up a passage to let the Glucose come inside the cell. If there's no insulin or the receptor doesn't recognize or respond to it, the Glucose is stuck in the blood and accumulates = Diabetes

There are 2 types of diabetes
Type 1 is when the body doesn't produce insulin. It requires insulin to treat, is typically developed as a child or young adult, and is a disease that destroys pancreatic cells meaning no insulin production is possible.

Type 2 is when the body doesn't produce enough insulin or the insulin produced is not working properly. It is considerably more common and typically affects people over the age of 45, who are also overweight.

If you have followed my first #MyBodyDoesWhat infographic, you know that I'm going to use this series to explore what our body does because seriously it is freakishly genius. I think I should know more about it so I thought I would share with my Sexy Readers whatever info I gather! My second installment on Pancreas is basically "in the making" stage.

In the meantime, if you would like to share your own experience with fellow readers, feel free to hit the comments box, so

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

Further reading
http://www.diabetes.org.uk/
http://www.diabetes.co.uk/

The Real Big Bang Theory #Pint2014 Review by Phil

My Dear Sexy Readers,

During the Pint of Science festival, I was lucky enough to go to the very popular and sold out talk by Prof John Ellis entitled 'Blowing up the Universe'. What a treat, I felt so privileged to see that eminent scientist explain the Big Bang Theory to us in the amazing surrounding of a central London pub! Very surreal! I got home, super psyched and shaking from adrenaline!

If you don't know who Prof John Ellis is, let me tell you he's one of those people who will be mentioned in Physics book in at least the next 200 years for his involvement in understanding our Universe and of course the extraordinary CERN's Large Hadron Collider. 

So, my Sexy Readers, let me introduce to you Sexy Scientist Phil who was there with me that night, and knowing his larger memory capacity, I thought it would only be fair to Prof John Ellis to ask a brighter mind to summarize our evening! Here is his review:

Prof John Ellis

In ‘Blowing Up The Universe’ Prof John Ellis took us on a journey through the ever expanding Universe. 

It turns out that the Universe has been expanding ever since it came into being with a great Big Bang, and that we are in a period of exceptionally rapid inflation right now. 
Curiously, all the exciting stuff in the Universe seems to have happened in the very first few fractions of a second, even before most particles let alone atoms ever existed. 

The problem is that 13.8 billion years later, it’s not entirely trivial to work out what exactly did happen back then. Clever people like John Ellis give it a go anyway; they come up with theories for which they amazingly sometimes even find evidence in the here and now. 

BICEP2 telescope in the South Pole from HERE

For example, a good chunk of the white noise you get with a badly tuned TV set is caused by cosmic background radiation which originated at the time of the Big Bang. 
As if this was not proof enough, the aptly named BICEP2 experiments (basically a huge telescope at the South Pole) has recently measured this in a slightly more sophisticated fashion than a 60s TV set and now found definite proof for the ultra-rapid expansion of the early Universe – unless of course the measurements were contaminated by galactic dust (star dust’s ugly sibling) which apparently is a real possibility. 

John Ellis was a very engaging and entertaining speaker and I really enjoyed the talk, although I won’t claim for a second that I understood even half of what he said. 

To answer the question why the Universe only ever expands and never contracts, he produced my favourite analogy: the Universe is a bank you can withdraw money from that you never have to pay back. 
Now that is my sort of bank!

"A" Big Bang Theory - by

Thank you Sexy Phil for your review. I hope you, my Sexy Readers, found it interesting and that you wouldn't want to miss talks down the pub by such eminent Scientists!!

I have to mention that the evening then turned into a Physics stand up comedy with the very funny and of course Sexy, Lieven Scheire who explained some Physics to us using humour! Very entertaining indeed, and I hope to see my fellow Belgian again very soon,

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

Designer babies #Pint2014 Review by Debbie

My Dear Sexy Readers,

I'm sure you are all sexilly aware by now of Pint Of Science festival that happened this year all over the world between the 19th and 21st of May (my review on the liver talk, my review on the probiotics talk). You can also look up #pint2014 on here or on your favourite platform.

Because so many talks were happening at the same type all across my city - London - it was impossible to be everywhere, so I asked a few friends to report to me on what they learnt down their local pub ;)

May I introduce to you Sexy Debbie who went to the Imperial College Union Bar to a talk entitled 'Creating Life: Test Tubes and Ethics'. Here is her review, and don't forget to leave your thoughts in the comments box:

"When does life begin? Who has the right to decide on the fate of an embryo? Is genetic enhancement necessarily a bad thing? These are hotly debated issues surrounded by controversies and impassioned views. They are not easy questions and they have no easy answers, yet they are just some of the many contentious issues faced by the field of medical ethics and reproductive science.

At a sold-out Pint of Science event I was lucky enough to be in the audience for Mr Stuart Lavery and Professor Raanan Gillon’s talks on ‘Creating life: test tubes and ethics’, in the unlikely surroundings of the pub. Mr Stuart Lavery is the director of IVF Hammersmith, one of the world’s largest IVF units, and Professor Raanan Gillon is Emeritus Professor in Medical Ethics at Imperial College London. Together they are two of the world’s foremost professors in the field of medical ethics and reproductive science.

IVF Hammersmith has pioneered the reproductive technology of preimplantation genetic diagnosis, whereby couples undergoing IVF can have their embryos screened for genetic diseases so that only embryos free from the genetic mutations will be implanted. On a scientific level, the procedure is ground-breaking. By removing just one cell from an 8-cell stage embryo, enough DNA can be extracted for genetic screening and the embryo will continue to develop unharmed. At IVF Hammersmith, every member of lab staff has been genetically screened so that if any of their cells accidentally fall into the vials they are working with their DNA will be detected and not confused with that of the embryo.

'All parents hope for a healthy baby'

All parents hope for a healthy baby and will do what they can to help minimise any risks, giving up smoking, alcohol and caffeine for example. Selecting an embryo that is not predisposed to a genetic disease is another means of increasing the chance of having a healthy baby. The concerns and objections tend to arise based on the fate of the embryos that do have genetic mutations and when the possibilities of what the technology is capable of are considered.





Preimplantation genetic diagnosis currently screens for specific serious genetic diseases. This isn’t because that is all that the science is capable of, this is because that is all that is legal in the UK. It is possible to screen embryos for risk factors for particular diseases, such as the risk gene for breast cancer. Would it be right to select against embryos that may get a disease when they equally may not get it? Likewise, it is possible to select for a female or male embryo, to screen for eye colour or hair colour, and even to genetically modify the DNA of the embryo and develop so-called designer babies. As more genes are identified, personality traits could also be screened for. What is the line? Who should decide where to draw it? Should legislation be the same across different countries? Should legislation be in place at all, should public committees be used to make ethical decisions or should parents have the right to decide?

As much as the right of the parents is respected, this was over-ridden in the case of a deaf couple who requested for their IVF embryos to be screened for the deaf gene. They felt they could raise a deaf child better than a hearing child, but it was decided that this did not value the welfare of the child and so the request was rejected. The process of reaching ethical verdicts such as this was explained by Professor Raanan Gillon, who described four principles that provide a moral framework within which to make ethical decisions.

This was a fascinating evening full of discussion and debate. I came away with many more questions than I started with. Clearly the development of reproductive technologies has increased the options for couples at risk of having a child with a serious genetic disorder. However, the use of techniques such as preimplantation genetic diagnosis is expanding, creating new ethical and legal dilemmas in need of regulation and legal frameworks.

How often do you get to discuss such hot topics in the pub with two world experts?! Thanks Pint of Science, I will definitely be back again next year!"

Useful links/further reading 
Preimplantation genetic diagnosis
A guide to preimplantation genetic diagnosis
IVF Hammersmith
Pint of Science
Professor Raanan Gillon Imperial College profile

I hope you all Sexy Readers enjoyed Debbie's review on this super hot topic and let me know what you think in the comments :)

Stay tuned for Sexy Phil and his review on the Big Bang Theory talk by none other than Prof John Ellis, one of the most famous theoretical physicist of our time (a real - slightly older - Sheldon if you like ;))!

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

Difference between Correlation and Causation

My Dear Sexy Readers,

Maybe you've seen this blog on Correlations on Facebook like I have, it was posted through a group called "I -Blipping- Hate PseudoScience" . Now, you might wonder why the Sexy Hell I would talk about Correlations!!! Well, this is kind of a fun explanation on the difference between Correlation and Causation. So I thought I would apply the concept to something I wrote previously and which I know you guys are very interested in.
You might recall this previous Sexy article on Parabens and the bit about Breast Cancer:

"It has been suggested that the use of Parabens in cosmetics and especially in deodorants and anti-perspirants might contribute to the high incidence of this type of cancer. Parabens were detected in tissue samples from human breast tumors........ It has to be noted that in that famous study (Darbre, 2004) that sparked the whole controversy on Parabens, there were no control tissues to demonstrate specificity of association between Parabens and breast cancer, ie. normal healthy tissues could still contain Parabens and be harmless, the presence of Parabens not being the cause of cancer but merely an innocent spectator. To date, no other study has repeated this 2004 study with the appropriate controls. There were however two epidemiological studies (by questioning patients, no lab testing involved) attempting to address the link between breast cancer and deodorant/antiperspirants. One reported no difference of use between cancer patients and non cancer people. The second one reported an earlier onset of the breast cancer with the use of  underarms cosmetics. But again, both studies lacked appropriate controls and certainly lab experiments to attest the presence of Parabens."

 Now, this is an example of graph you can find on this extraordinary blog:

Correlation between Divorce rate in Maine and Consumption of margarine per capita. From HERE

This graphs shows that Divorce rate in Maine CORRELATES with consumption of margarine (per capita) in the US - However it doesn't mean that if you eat margarine and you live in Maine, it will CAUSE you to get divorced or that if you eat margarine, people in Maine will have an increased chance of getting a divorce.

Correlation between the age of Miss America and the number of murders by steam, hot vapours and hot objects. From HERE

This graphs shows that the Age of Miss America CORRELATES with the number of Murders by steam, hot vapours and hot objects - However, it doesn't mean that if Miss America is 23 years old, it will CAUSE 7 murders due to steam, hot vapours and hot objects.

So, of course these examples are dramatic but I think they illustrate quite well the difference between Correlation and Causation, and they make me laugh so much, I thought I would share it with you, Sexy Reader!
Now... Coming back to the above correlation about Parabens and Breast cancer:

If you find Parabens in nanograms in breast cancer tissue, it doesn't mean that it was the CAUSE of breast cancer, nor doesn't it mean that if you use anti-perspirant, it will cause you to be more likely to develop breast cancer.

This infamous 10 year old study has never seen its sequel, maybe simply because there is NO causation.

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

Disclaimer: I haven't come across any new study on this but I can't keep up to date with everything, so apologies if the causative link has been scientifically proven and I'll be happy to amend my articles.

What are Probiotics? #Pint2014

My Dear Sexy Readers,

We are all so conscious about what we ingest, what we put on and in our body, but still... Liver diseases, Obesity and Type II diabetes are on the increase!

Last week I went to a pub talk on Probiotics. That's right, I went down to the pub, and I listened to a scientist talk about her research using Probiotics to relieve liver disease. 

If you have followed my recent posts (HERE and HERE), you know that #Pint2014 was in full swing 19th-21st May all over the world! An international Science festival happening over 3 nights in the UK, Ireland, France, Switzerland, Australia and in the US! 

I already covered the first pub talk I went to, which was on the liver. 
That same evening, Dr Jane Macnaughtan was sharing with us the latest results on her research sponsored by Yakult (Oh yes, but before you say anything, Yakult didn't commission the research, the research lab contacted Yakult for advice and funding). 

Why is this important? Because more and more, I see scientific articles claiming that this or that disease is controlled by the bugs residing in our gut linings, that they are the real brain in our body. 

So I'll start with some basic info, and I will include Dr Jane talk in "quotes".

Our gut bacteria

Humans are now thought as super-organisms on the basis of the genetic potential encoded within our resident microbial populations in addition to our own genome. 

"If our body is composed of about 10 trillion cells, we also contain 100 trillion bacteria!"

There are varying levels of bacteria living all over and in our bodies - mostly in our intestines.
They are known as commensal bacteria, which under normal circumstances cause no harm. 

It has been noted that although there is a great inter-individual variation in the composition of the gut microbiota, there are conserved set of encoded functions shared between individuals referred to as the core gut microbiome.  

Functions of this microbiome are thought to confer the greatest benefit to the host and are probably essential for the correct functioning of the gut.

Benefits:

• Modulation of the host immune system  from early life
• Protection against potential pathogens by depriving polluting and dangerous bacteria of food and inhibiting their growth.
• Production of essential vitamins and hormones
• Digestion of sugars and regulation of fat storage

Other functions include:
They facilitate the process by which food and wastes move through the system to avoid constipation, they look after the mucus membranes by stimulating the production of proteins that lubricate and protect our 'inside' skin, they secrete nutrients that are used for tissue repair, they improve the balance of friendly flora to reduce the risk of bladder or vaginal infections. 

However, our natural prebiotic levels are easily damaged by factors such as poor diet, stress, alcohol, hormonal fluctuations, cigarettes, surgery and drugs. 

"'All Diseases begin at the gut' - Hippocrates"

Many diseases have been associated with a dysfunctional microbiota: Obesity; Type II Diabetes; Cardio Vascular Diseases; infection with Clostrodium difficile; Crohn's disease, Ulcerative Colitis and Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) (bowel diseases), Asthma, Eczema, Liver disease, Colorectal Cancer.

"Bacterial DNA fragments can be found in the blood of patients suffering from cirrhosis and are representative of its severity."

"The role of gut bacteria in liver disease include the metabolic breakdown of alcohol into acetaldehyde which damages the gut and liver, and the bacterial migration from the gut to other organs."

"Different strategies exist to modulate the Gut-Liver axis: Antibiotics but the whole resistance problem arises, or Probiotics which have shown to reduce inflammation."

It is evident that the gut microbiota plays a large role in intestinal health and disease and therefore manipulation or modulation is a clinical option. According to a review by Walsh in 2014, this modulation of the gut microbiota could be achieved by:

1. Diet: the amount, type and balance of proteins, carbohydrates and fat have a profound impact on the gut microbiota.



From Walsh et al 2014. Beneficial Modulation of the gut microbiota.

2. Antimicrobials: research is ongoing as to choose the best characteristic of antibiotics and avoid strain resistance.
3. Probiotics
4. Faecal microbiota transplantation: 'It does what it says on the tin' - most commonly used to treat recurrent C.difficile infection but could be extended to IBD, IBS, obesity,..

What are Probiotics?

They are living microscopic organisms, also called micro-organisms. Most often they are bacteria (friendly bacteria), but they may also be other organisms such as yeasts. The World Health Organization (WHO) defines probiotics as "live micro-organisms which when administered in adequate amounts confer a health benefit on the host".

Each group of bacteria has different species and each species has different strains. This is important because different strains have different benefits for different parts of your body. For a list of these, please visit this website for info (no affiliation/sponsor, your clicks from there are your responsability and the subsequent info does not necessarily represent my views.)

"Strains of probiotics work differently and could be interchanged but we don't know if it would work because not all combinations have been tested scientifically so we generally stick to what the trial results have shown."

The most common probiotic bacteria come from two groups, sometimes mixed together: Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium. Lactobacillus Casei Shirota is what's in Yakult.The name of the strain "Shirota" comes from Dr Shirota (Yakult's founder) who isolated this strain.

Note = Did you Know that Yakult is the universal language Esperanto translation of Yoghurt?

4 flavours of Yakult

For a probiotic to successfully exert its benefit on the host's gut microbiota it should be able to remain viable during storage and also be capable of surviving, and potentially colonizing the host's intestinal environment.

Studies on special mice have shown so far that a diet supplemented with probiotics are beneficial to treat/prevent obesity, type II Diabetes, liver damage, IBS, IBD, C. difficile infection.

"We tested a diet supplemented with 3 bottles of Yakult/day on 8 human patients who had severe liver damage with activated innate immunity response ie. abnormal levels of neutrophils (serve as a biomarker). After 4 weeks of supplemented diet, no patient experienced side effects and all showed normal blood levels of neutrophils... A new study is underway to see how long this effect lasts (on 92 patients; randomized, double blind, 6-months study)."

As a conclusion, I think it was quite extraordinary to learn about the amazing effects of these probiotics.
Now, of course, I'm not saying you should rush to the shop and buy Danone bifidus or Yakult.

What we know is that with our Western diet, our gut is highly susceptible to imbalance, and it wouldn't be stupid to take some probiotics once in a while, especially after a good night out ;).

If you are suffering from bowel disease or Diabetes, please do not take this as a medical advice, I am not "medically" trained, I'm just a scientist, so please do see your GP.

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

References and further reading 
Pint Of Science - Dr Jane Macnaughtan
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Probiotics

American Gastroenterological Association
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24681100 - Kindly provided by future Dr Nirmesh Patel

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20920376 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24583612

Become a Liver Lover! #Pint2014

My Dear Sexy Readers,

What wonderful treats we got this week with 3 beautiful nights at the pub, filled with exciting and interesting facts from "real" Scientists!
For recap', Pint of Science is a Science festival for everyone - especially non scientists - covering anything and everything in these 4 categories: Matters of the Mind, Understanding our Bodies, Physics and Chemistry, and Planet Earth!
I was lucky to be able to take 2 nights off from mummy's duties to go down the pub and listen to amazing talks, funny at times, and full of info easy to remember.

Pint of Science coasters - I would like to apologise to the organisers for 'stealing' these

On Tuesday 20th May, I went to the Oneill's in Earl's Court to listen to Dr Nathan Davies's talk entitled "Loving your liver, why we should all become hepatophiles", followed by Dr Jane Macnaughtan and her talk on "Better bacteria for a better you" (future post coming up - Now Ready HERE).
I chose these 2 talks because, bizarrely, I've been preparing blog posts on these exact same 2 subjects, so I thought "Well, well, well, my source of relevant literature can't be better than this!". I've already added some of the info on my first #MyBodyDoesWhat? infographic on the Liver which focuses on the liver's functions (not covered in this article). Also don't forget to check out #DYK 10 about Jaundice!

Loving your Liver - Why we should all become hepatophiles (= liver lovers)
Nathan was a very enthusiastic and lively Pint Of Science speaker. From his first power point slide, he got us all interested in wanting to know more about the amazing liver! Here are a few facts that he shared with us:

The Liver is an amazing organ and the most active in our entire body. Its filtering and detoxifying cycle occur up to 20 times per hour! It can function at only 20% of its capacity, and most amazingly, it is capable of regenerating itself in a matter of weeks, sometimes days.
Unfortunately, when a person suffers from a liver disease, he often cannot recognize the signs that are often dismissed as benign, such as tiredness and flu-like symptoms, until it's too late!
Nathan was telling us about those street check ups they performed on volunteers (e.g. blood test). Surprisingly, a quarter of this tested population had alarming state of liver damage and required immediate further check ups. It would seem as though we are not taking very good care of our liver!
In fact, liver disease is the only killer disease with rising numbers.
The number one cause of liver disease death is, would you believe it, obesity!!! The second and third causes are undiagnosed Hepatitis viral infection and alcoholism, respectively.

Units for typical drinks

• Obesity: What I didn't know is that, under a microscope, the damage that fat and alcohol do to a liver tissue is identical!

• Astonishingly, 90% of the Hepatitis-infected European population doesn't know it is infected by the Hepatitis virus. One in 3 person is exposed at one time or another to the Hepatitis B virus, of course not everyone will get infected as encounter doesn't mean infection.

• Dr Nathan Davies also approached the subject of alcoholism and binge drinking, which is worse? It is quite clear that constant and regular drinking is not making it easy on the liver to regenerate itself if it is constantly under "attack". And it's not very clever to binge drink, even if it's occasional, your gut bacteria hate it. As a consequence, they can leak out of your gut, provoking inflammatory responses and causing damage. So beware, don't count too much on your liver's regeneration power!!

As a conclusion, let's treat our liver right by doing these 3 simple things:

1. A Healthy BMI. This is so easy to check if you are in the right range
2. In case of doubt, get checked for Hepatitis infection. There are vaccination programmes!
3. Limit your alcohol intake: Here are the NHS recommendations on your unit allowance:

• Men should not regularly drink more than 3-4 units of alcohol a day
• Women should not regularly drink more than 2-3 units a day

I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed going to the pub to get these facts for you ;) If you are interested in coming to this Science festival next year, do bookmark the Pint Of Science website, I will, of course, update you in time with their #Pint2015 programme.


I'll do a recap on Dr Jane's talk very soon, in the meantime you can check out this Twitter Storify for pictures from these 124 pub events happening all over the world - almost - at the same time over 3 nights!

 See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

#MyBodyDoesWhat? - The Liver Chapter

My Dear Sexy Readers,

As promised, I'm starting this brand new Sexy mini-series 'My Body Does What?' - Don't forget to say 'What?' on a higher pitch ;) with the amazing Liver! Because it's kind of boring stuff to read, I decided to make it into an infographic so you can Pin it, Tweet it, tumblr it for future reference ;). If you are a student, this won't make up for the studying you're supposed to do, but I think it's a nice basic help you can pin on your wall, and I really do mean print and pin it with a pin on a cemented wall, but Facebook wall is cool too ;)
I also would like to mention that last night, a few weeks after preparing the first version of this infographic, I went down the pub for the Pint Of Science festival! The event that I attended was in 2 parts. The first one by Dr Nathan Davies focused on the amazing roles and functions of the liver, what happens when it goes wrong, what should we do to avoid it. The second one by Dr Jane Macnaughtan focused on probiotics and their potential to heal the liver (future Sexy post coming up - Now ready HERE).
Yes, that's right, you can drink a pint and learn about what it does to your body - Enlightening ;).

For recap, I went to the +PintOfScience website, chose my city - London, my topic - Understanding our Bodies, and off I went to the pub to learn about the liver and probiotics. It was that easy, and if you missed your chance, there's always next year ;) I CAN'T WAIT to see what the organisers are going to prepare for us!! Watch this space! 

Alright, here it is the #Pint2014-modified version of our Sexy first #MyBodyDoesWhat? infographic:

#MyBodyDoesWhat? The Liver Chapter

BTW, I've just created a new Pinterest board for our Sexy Infographics, so feel free to connect with me.

Of course, let me know what you think, and what would you like me to cover next? I'm thinking more obscure but vital organs such as Spleen and Pancreas, what do you think?

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,

References
Wikipedia
National Liver foundation
SkepticRD
Dr Nathan Davies - Pint Of Science talk 20th May 2014

Wanna be an honorary Scientist? Crowdfunding and Citizen Science

My Dear Sexy Readers,

From HERE

If there is something that the majority of the public doesn't know is that it's difficult to find a long term job as a research scientist, let alone a lab job - as a matter of fact at the moment - any job!!! Most people are surprised when I tell them this. Choosing a career in research is actually very very short term for most scientists, simply because they are governed by grants and these can be anything between 6 months and 5 years, with an ideal length of 3 years. Unfortunately, at the moment due to budget cuts and the sheer amount of competition, finding a grant on your subject is very very difficult. I'm glad those days are over for me, I definitely hang my labcoat up, and am now happily focusing on scientific and medical communication.
However, if a doctoral candidate chooses to stay in academia, it is understood that he can only do a maximum of 3 postdocs after which he'd better have good publications to his name and a solid research plan+funds to establish himself as a PI (Principal Investigator).
A lot of researchers have turned to the internet and the generosity of the general public to gather the essential money required to achieve an experiment (the "last" one needed for publication) or a project:
Crowdfunding is not new and didn't start with the Sciences, according to Sexy Wiki: "Crowdfunding is the collection of finance from backers—the "crowd"—to fund an initiative and usually occurs on Internet platforms. The initiative could be a nonprofit campaign (e.g. to raise funds for a school or social service organization), a political campaign (to support a candidate or political party), a charitable campaign (e.g. emergency funds for an ill person or to fund a critical operation), a commercial campaign (e.g. to create and sell a new product) or a financing campaign for a startup company.

Whenever you see this logo, it means that you get to be a Scientist ;)

Crowdfunding - Researchers in need of extra funds
What I did here is I gathered a list of crowdfunding spaces where you can browse categories and projects. There are a lot of projects out there, all over the world. If you hesitate, think about the fact that researchers usually get their money from the governement, among other sources of course such as charities. The governement decides the budget, representatives (scientists most likely) decide on behalf of the governement what project to fund. But where do you think the governement get their money from? That's right, you! Since it cannot fund everything, why not choose your own project to fund then?

From Experiment crowdfunding space

Go ahead, take your pick:
Experiment.com is a platform for enabling new scientific discoveries in Biology, Medicine, Engineering, Chemistry, Computer Science, Physics, Paleontology, Ecology, Education, Psychology and Economics

Petridish focuses in Animal Behaviour, Archeology, Astronomy, Biology, Conservation, Ecology, Genetics, Geology, Health, History, Marine Biology, Paleontology and Social Science.

RocketHub is a platform for the Arts, Sciences, Social and Business that helped fund project sin 1500 cities in 100 countries

Consano is a platform that enables you to donate any amount (small or large!) directly to a medical research project that matters to you.

The SciFund Challenge is about the massive gap between science and society. SciFund Challenge exists to do something about this problem, by helping to close this gap in three distinct ways. We train and encourage researchers in their science outreach activities. We also help connect the public directly to science and scientists. Lastly, we run science crowdfunding drives to help fund research.

SciFlies's popular projects are on Alzheimer's, Aquatics, Brain disorders, Climate, Compulsive Behaviour, Deforestation, Fish, Humans, Oceans, Physics and Stars.

Go get funding is a platform for any crowdfunding with a section on medical and healing subjects.

Endeavorist is another platform focusing on biology, medical projects, physics, etc..

Crowdsourcing - Researchers in need of extra help
Also, most scientists spend about 80% of their time analysing results. Sometimes, some of these are just observational and could well be done by anyone. This sparked the idea of crowdsourcing and Citizen Science. If you are curious about this, why not check out https://twitter.com/CitizenScience_ They are tweeting all sorts of info from crowdsourcing help to initiatives.
The first time I heard about Citizen Science is when I was looking through the Cancer Research website and found that I could help scientists analyse their data. It gives a straight insight into the not so glamourous life of a cancer researcher and shows you a side of their job which is very different from mixing two tubes of coloured liquids!:

Be a CRUK citizen science at http://www.clicktocure.net/

But there are other initiatives you can give a hand to:
Crowdcrafting is an online assistance in performing tasks that require human cognition, knowledge or intelligence such as image classification, transcription, geocoding and more!

Zooniverse is home to the internet's largest, most popular and most successful citizen science projects ranging from individual, serendipitous discoveries to those using classifications that depend on the input of everyone who's visited the site.

Sci Starter is a platform where you can help by recording the growth of your plants, the bees flights, etc...

Xperimental tribe is a web platform for gaming and social computation. It helps researchers to realize web games/experiments and it let people join, while enjoying, the scientific research.

Project Noah is a tool to explore and document wildlife and a platform to harness the power of citizen scientists everywhere.

Project Noah

So, what do you think my Sexy Readers? Would you help funding an academic science project? Or be a citizen science?

See you Soon for more Sexy Science,