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Home > UC Science Today > The weekly recap - Jan 13th
Podcast: UC Science Today
Episode:

The weekly recap - Jan 13th
Category: Science & Medicine
Duration: 00:02:26
Publish Date: 2017-01-14 11:03:15
Description: This week on Science Today, we talked about how children who suffer from emotional or physical abuse are at higher risk of developing health problems. Psychiatrist Nicole Bush of the University of California, San Francisco says scientists are unclear about how to reverse the harmful effects, so she is focusing on this in a study. "One of our goals was to look across a variety of systems to see, for example, whether we can improve immune functioning, cortisol stress hormone level, telomere length, DNA methylation profiles." DNA methylation is essential for normal development– if the process goes awry, it can be linked to health issues like cancer or cardiovascular disease. So Bush his hoping to improve this and other functions like immune functioning and telomere length using psychotherapy, which studies have proven have been effective for mental and physical health. On the subject of health, we hope you're starting a healthy and happy New Year. This time of year there’s a higher risk of what’s called ‘holiday heart syndrome’. Cardiologist Gregory Marcus, also at UCSF, tells us that it’s basically a link between excessive alcohol consumption and atrial fibrillation. "Those who drank more alcohol tended to have larger left atritum, those with large atrium this has long been known, are more prone to atrial fibrillation – the most common abnormal heart rhythm that we see. And it is very important because of stroke." So while occasional drinking can lift your holiday spirit and do no harm, Marcus warns that excessive alcohol consumption is never good for anyone. And finally, we stuck around UCSF to better understand the origins or asthma and allergies. Susan Lynch, a gastroenterologist there, may have narrowed it down to one molecule. She and her collaborators at the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit found a metabolite, which is a product of metabolism, can trigger these diseases. "There was a specific lipid called 12, 13 diHome and this really stood out to us because this specific lipid is an established biomarker for asthma in adults and we are finding it in the heightened concentration in neonates who go on to develop asthma in childhood." Lynch explains that it actually suppresses the T-cells that are necessary to dampen down allergic inflammation. To hear about more University of California research – and not just at our San Francisco campus - subscribe to Science Today on iTunes. You can also follow us on Facebook or Soundcloud. Thanks for tuning in, until next time, I’m Larissa Branin. Subscribe to Science Today: iTunes: apple.co/1TQBewD Stitcher: www.stitcher.com/podcast/science-today Follow us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/ucsciencetoday Stories mentioned in this roundup: https://soundcloud.com/sciencetoday/abuse_health https://soundcloud.com/sciencetoday/post_holidays https://soundcloud.com/sciencetoday/asthma_molecule
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