Q. Next week is my 84th birthday. When did I get so old? Every time I turn around, it's Friday. Time seems to go by so quickly the older I get. Is there a reason for that? Thank you. DL

Many would agree with you. We often hear people ask, “Where has the time gone? It seems like yesterday.”

Can you remember sitting through a boring lecture? Five minutes could have felt like an hour. Or how a few boring sermon? That hour could have felt like an eternity. Compare that sense of time to a celebration. Time flies once you're having fun, working on something you like, and having recent experiences.

We know that point doesn’t pass more slowly, but that it’s our perception of it. This is just not recent concept. The psychologist William James wrote concerning the phenomenon Perception of time in his Principles of Psychology in 1890.

Here are some theories that influence our perception of time:

Theory No. 1: The years are relatively shorter. As we become older, every year takes up a smaller portion of our time. For a 10-year-old, this birthday represents 1/10 of life, which is an enormous chunk. For an 80-year-old, Cindy Lustig, a psychology professor on the University of Michigan, said the Huffington Postthis birthday is 1/80 of life, so a smaller part, which contributes to the sensation that it has passed quickly. Each yr feels shorter in comparison with the whole time we now have lived and due to this fact seems to pass more quickly.

Theory No. 2: Theory of the First. Bonce we are young, Diana Raab wrote in an article in Psychology Todaywe experience many “firsts”. It may very well be our first kiss, our past love, our first automobile or our first day in school. It may very well be learning to swim or falling off our bike. We listen to the main points of our unique and unforgettable experiences. The more details we will remember, the higher we remember them. As we become older, we experience similar experiences over and yet again, and time seems to pass more quickly.

Theory #3: Brain function. This helps explain the idea of the primary. Our brains cluster time when days or perhaps weeks are similar. For an 80-year-old who could also be doing the identical or similar things every single day, time blurs within the mind, making it feel prefer it passed quickly. What seems recent and exciting in a single day makes a day or month seem different, slowing down our sense of time. (Note: Many 80-year-olds also experience recent and familiar experiences every day.)

Theory No. 3a: More about brain function. Adrian Bejan, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Duke University, has a theory related to neuronal signal processing. With age, he notices the The speed at which we process visual information slows down, contributing to the sensation that point is passing faster. In other words, “time isn't passing faster, we're just passing slower, cognitively speaking,” as a 2024 Huffington Post article put it.

So how will you live a life where time passes more slowly?

• Fill your time with recent experiences. It is one option to counteract routine. A research study published within the Journal of Experimental Psychology found that the perception of time is shorter during routine activities. So tackle challenges, learn recent skills and ask questions. break out of the norm.
• Make meaningful progress. Time passes quickly once we should not doing anything. Increasing productivity and making progress on projects and goals slows down the perception of time and increases motivation.
• Practice mindfulness. This means specializing in the current moment and being aware of what you might be doing and where you might be. It's about taking note of the main points of an experience, using your whole senses. And make sure to take just a few deep breaths.
• Go out into nature. Taking time to look at the trees and clouds within the sky, listening to the birds, and watching the dolphins and waves within the ocean will magically decelerate time and have a relaxing effect. writes Raab in “Psychology Today.”
• Take time to think. Consider keeping a journal. This may very well be memories out of your youth, a gratitude list, or events from a vacation or simply a day. You may remember details of experiences and share them with others through conversations, photos, or writing.

Yes, as we become older, time seems to pass quickly. But that may change if we fill our lives with recent activities, learn something recent, reflect, enjoy nature and do something that makes us feel useful and productive. Then we won’t just undergo life, but enjoy our moments, days and months with satisfaction and joy.

Thank you, DL, completely satisfied birthday and thanks on your good query. Time is our gift. Let us use it well. And allow us to all make kindness the norm.

Helen Dennis is a nationally recognized leader on aging and recent retirement issues with academic, corporate, and nonprofit experience. Contact Helen along with your questions and comments at Helendenn@gmail.comVisit Helen at HelenMdennis.com and follow her on facebook.com/SuccessfulAgingCommunity

Racism steals time from people’s lives – possibly due to the space it takes up of their minds. In a brand new study published within the journal JAMA Network Open, our team showed that the Effects of racism on the brain have been linked to advanced agingobserved on the cellular level.

Black women who were more incessantly exposed to racism showed stronger connections in brain networks related to rumination and application. We found that this, in turn, was related to accelerated biological aging.

We are neuroscientists WHO use quite a lot of approachesincluding self-report and biological measures akin to brain scans to reply our questions on the consequences of stressors on the brain and body. We also use this data to develop interventions to assist people deal with that stress.

Why it will be important

Aging is a natural process. Stress can speed up the biological clockMake people more at risk of age-related diseasesfrom cardiovascular diseases to diabetes and dementia.

Epidemiological studies repeatedly show that black people have these age-related health problems at an earlier age than whites. New studies also show focal effects of aging on the brain, suggesting Differences in brain aging between black and white populations.

Racial stress aspects, including Racial discriminationinfluence the Rate at which individuals age on a biological levelThese experiences activate the stress response system and are related to increased activity in brain regions that process incoming threatsHowever, until now, researchers in our field haven’t understood how brain changes related to racism contribute to accelerated aging.

Racial discrimination is a pervasive stressor that usually goes unnoticed. It is usually a doctor questioning the intensity of a black patient's pain and never prescribing pain medication, or a teacher calling a black child a “bully.” It is a relentless stressor that black people face from a young age.

Rumination – to experience and analyse an event many times – and alertnessBeing alert to future threats are possible coping responses to those stressors. But rumination and vigilance cost energy, and this increased energy expenditure has a biological cost.

In our study of black women, we found that higher rates of racial discrimination were related to greater connectivity between two key regions. One of those is the Locus coeruleusis a deep brain region that prompts the stress response and promotes arousal and application. The other is the precuneusa central hub of a brain network that’s activated after we reflect on our experiences and internalize – or suppress – our emotions.

These changes within the brain were in turn related to accelerated cell aging, which was measured using an epigenetic “clock.” Epigenetics refers to changes that occur to our DNA because of the environment. Epigenetic clocks measure how the environment affects our aging on the molecular level.

Higher clock readings indicate that an individual's biological age is higher than their chronological age. In other words, the space that racist experiences occupy in people's memories comes at a price that may shorten life spans.

What will not be yet known

Although we found links between racism, changes in brain connectivity, and accelerated aging, we didn’t measure coping responses akin to rumination and vigilance in real time, while people were experiencing them.

We also don’t understand how other aspects akin to Neighbourhood drawbackGender and sexuality together influence accelerated ageing and related health inequalities.

What's next

Our next steps are to make use of real-time measurements of on a regular basis racism along with physiological measures and imaging to look at these research questions in additional detail.

We need to understand how various kinds of racial discrimination and coping styles affect brain and body responses. A greater understanding of those issues can focus more attention on prevention, akin to Programs targeting implicit bias doctors and teachers. It may inform interventions akin to Neuromodulationwhich uses external or internal devices to stimulate or inhibit brain activity. Neuromodulation could be used as a therapy aid to scale back stress.

The Research Brief is a summary of interesting scientific papers.

Today the atmosphere of our neighboring planet Venus is as hot as a… Pizza oven and drier than that driest desert on earth – but that wasn’t all the time the case.

Billions of years ago, Venus had as much water as Earth has today. If this water was ever liquid, Venus may once have been habitable.

Over time, this water has been almost completely lost. It helps to learn how, when and why Venus lost its water Planetary scientists like me Understand what makes a planet habitable – or what could cause a habitable planet to show into an uninhabitable world.

Scientists have theories that designate why many of the water has disappeared, but more water has disappeared than they predicted.

In a May 2024 studymy colleagues and I actually have revealed a brand new water removal process that went unnoticed for a long time but may explain this water loss mystery.

Energy balance and early water loss

The solar system has one habitable zone – a narrow ring across the sun wherein planets can have liquid water on their surface. Earth is in the center, Mars is out on the too cold side, and Venus is out on the too hot side. Where a planet sits on this habitability spectrum will depend on how much energy the planet receives from the Sun and the way much energy the planet radiates.

The theory as to how most of Venus's water loss occurred is said to this energy balance. On early Venus, sunlight split the water in its atmosphere into hydrogen and oxygen. Atmospheric hydrogen heats up a planet – like having too many blankets in your bed in summer.

When the planet gets too hot, it throws off the quilt: the hydrogen escapes into space in a stream, a so-called process hydrodynamic escape. Through this process, Venus was deprived of one among the foremost components of water. It is unknown Exactly When This process occurred, but probably inside the first billion years or so.

After many of the hydrogen was removed, hydrodynamic escape stopped, but some hydrogen remained. It's like pouring out a water bottle – there’ll all the time be a number of drops left at the underside. These leftover drops cannot escape in the identical way. There should be one other process occurring on Venus that continues to remove hydrogen.

Small reactions could make a giant difference

Our New study shows that an ignored chemical response in Venus' atmosphere may produce enough escaping hydrogen to shut the gap between expected and observed water loss.

This is how it really works. In the atmosphere, gaseous HCO⁺ molecules, which consist of 1 atom each of hydrogen, carbon and oxygen and are positively charged, mix with negatively charged electrons because opposites attract.

But when the HCO⁺ and electrons react, the HCO⁺ breaks down right into a neutral carbon monoxide molecule, CO, and a hydrogen atom, H. This process prompts the hydrogen atom, which might then exceed the planet's escape velocity and escape into space. The entire response is known as HCO⁺ dissociative recombination, but we prefer to call it DR for brief.

Water is the unique source of hydrogen on Venus, so DR effectively dries out the planet. DR has likely existed throughout Venus' history, and our work shows that it likely continues into the current. This doubles the quantity of hydrogen escaping previously calculated by planetary scientists who’re turning our understanding of today's hydrogen leaks on Venus the other way up.

Understanding Venus with data, models and Mars

To study DR on Venus, we used each computer modeling and data evaluation.

The modeling actually began as a Mars project. My Ph.D. The research involved studying the conditions that make planets habitable for all times. There was once water on Mars tooalthough lower than Venus, and likewise lost most of it to space.

To understand hydrogen escape on Mars, I developed one Computational model of the Martian atmosphere that simulates the atmospheric chemistry of Mars. Although Mars and Venus are very different planets, they really have similar upper atmospheres, so my colleagues and I were in a position to extend the model to Venus.

We found that dissociative recombination of HCO⁺ within the atmospheres of each planets produces a whole lot of escaping hydrogen, consistent with the planet's measurements Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN or MAVEN missiona satellite orbiting Mars.

It can be invaluable to gather data in Venus' atmosphere to support the model, but previous missions to Venus didn’t measure HCO⁺ – not since it wasn't there, but because they weren't designed to detect it. However, they measured the reactants that produce HCO⁺ in Venus' atmosphere.

By analyzing measurements prepared by Pioneer Venusa combined orbiter and probe mission that studied Venus from 1978 to 1992, and using our knowledge of chemistry, we’ve got shown that HCO⁺ must be present within the atmosphere in quantities much like those in our model.

Follow the water

Our work has solved a part of the mystery of how water is lost from planets, which affects how habitable a planet is for all times. We learned that water loss doesn't just occur , but over time through a mix of methods.

Today's faster lack of hydrogen from DR implies that overall it’s going to take less time to remove the remaining water from Venus. This implies that if oceans were ever present on early Venus, they could have been present longer than scientists thought before water loss through hydrodynamic escape and the DR began. This would give more time for possible life to emerge. However, our results don’t mean that there have been definitely oceans or life – answering this query would require far more science for a few years to return.

There can also be a necessity for brand new Venus missions and observations. Future Venus Missions will provide some atmospheric measurements, but they may not give attention to the upper atmosphere, where most HCO⁺ dissociative recombination occurs. A future Venus upper atmosphere mission, much like the MAVEN mission on Mars, could significantly expand everyone's knowledge of how the atmospheres of terrestrial planets form and evolve over time.

With technological advances in recent a long time and a growing latest interest in Venus, now is a wonderful time to show our attention to Earth's sister planet.

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Why are some people faster than others? – Jon, age 14, Macon, Georgia

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Usain Bolt, the fastest person on this planetHe ran a 100-meter sprint at a speed of 23.35 miles per hour (37.57 kilometers per hour).

That's incredibly fast for a human. It's concerning the same speed as driving a automobile across the neighborhood or through a faculty campus. It won’t seem so fast in a automobile, but for a human? Few runners on this planet may even come close.

There are several the explanation why some people can run very fast while others are inclined to run slower. Genetics – the traits you inherit out of your parents – play a jobbut in addition your decisions and experiences.

As pediatric Exercise scientistWe create and evaluate programs that help children be healthy. The exciting news is that when you don't have control over your genetics, you possibly can train to enhance your speed.

Fast twitch, slow twitch

An vital factor that affects your ability to run fast is the structure of your body, including how your muscles work.

The human body has greater than 600 muscles that work together and assist you to move in several directions and at different speeds. These muscles are made up of groups of fibers. There are two fundamental types: fast twitch and slow twitch.

Muscles have different mixes of those fiber types. For example, the calf is made up of two muscles: One is predominantly fast-twitch – that is the gastrocnemius, which is used for sprinting and jumping. The other muscle is usually slow twitch – that is the soleus, which is used for walking and jogging.

Fast-twitch muscle fibers are larger and help your body move quickly and generate significant force. Sprinters are inclined to have an abundance of them fast-twitch muscle fibers. However, such a muscle fiber also tires quickly, which limits the duration of top-speed running to relatively short distances.

Slowly twitching muscle fibers are smaller and assist you to run slower but with more endurance. Long-distance runners and competitive cyclists are inclined to have a lot of these muscles.

How much you could have of every muscle fiber type – fast-twitch and slow-twitch – is largely determined by your genesSo you could have to work together with your innate muscle types. But Exercises will help train these muscles.

Your brain plays a giant role

Physical performance just isn’t nearly muscles. Your brain also plays a very important role.

Your skeletal muscles are controlled by your brain – You take into consideration your actions after which perform the movements. For example you can control how long is your step, how your arms movehow your feet touch the bottom and even the techniques you employ to breathe.

You can teach your body to make use of the most effective running techniques. This includes correct postureso your body stands upright, and an economic stepin order that your feet land underneath you and never too far forward where they’ll slow you down.

You can even improve your running form by utilizing your entire body by pumping your arms against your legs, running in your tiptoes, and maximizing the time you spend within the flight phase by keeping each feet off the bottom. Proper running techniques help muscles produce more force and work together, helping you run faster.

The more you practice an activity, the higher you’ll change into. As your ability to run fast increases, challenge yourself to run even faster.

How to Train to Run Faster – Myth Dispelling!

You could have heard your folks talking about ways to extend your speed, or you will have searched the Internet for tips about easy methods to get faster. It's time to dispel a few of these myths.

Myth 1: You must run as fast as you possibly can to get faster. That's unsuitable!

You don't must run as fast as you possibly can to get faster, and it actually helps to take short rest breaks between activities where you sprint.

Myth 2: To get faster you could have to lift heavy weights. INCORRECT!

Functional strength training involves performing exercises that assist you to perform certain movements higher. Either medium weights or simply the resistance of your individual body weight are used. Do planks, Lunges, Increases or Jump squats are great examples. These activities give attention to the muscles that play an important role in running.

Myth 3: To change into a quick runner, you could have to concentrate on running early in life. INCORRECT!

Focusing on one activity early in life can actually limit your ability to become a quick runner. Various physical activities can assist you to Develop recent skills that can improve your running. For example, the movements and endurance utilized in soccer can result in the flexibility to run faster.

Myth 4: Training is not any fun. INCORRECT!

Training programs can take many shapes and forms. You can play running games with your folks, work on quick footwork using an agility ladder, or create obstacle courses. There's nothing like a small, healthy competition to motivate your training.

It is very important to enjoy training and often take part in activities that promote running speed.

Whether you must change into the following Usain Bolt or simply win a race against your friend, do not forget that with a little bit genetic luck and exertions, it could be entirely possible.

“Incrementally positive”

Despite many efforts to search out higher and simpler ways to treat cancer, it stays one commonest reason for death from disease amongst children within the USA

Cancer patients are also getting younger. The variety of cancer diagnoses amongst those under 50 has increased by 10% about 80% worldwide within the last 30 years. As of 2023, that is cancer second commonest reason for death Both within the USA and around the globe. While cancer mortality rates have declined in recent a long time, about one in three patients within the USA And 1 in 2 patients worldwide still dying of cancer.

Despite advances in standard cancer treatments, many cancer patients still face uncertain outcomes when these treatments prove ineffective. Depending on the stage and placement of the cancer, in addition to the patient's medical history, most cancers are treated with a mixture of radiation, surgery and medicine. However, when these standard treatments fail, patients and doctors are caught in a maze of trial and error where it becomes difficult to predict effective treatments because there is restricted information concerning the patient's cancer.

My mission as Cancer researcher is to create a customized guide to essentially the most effective medications for every cancer patient. My team and I do that by testing different drugs on a patient's cancer cells before treatment, thereby developing tailored therapies which might be most definitely to selectively kill tumors while minimizing toxic effects.

Our newly published results from the primary clinical trial to mix drug sensitivity testing with DNA testing to discover effective treatments in children with cancer provide one approach Functional precision medicinewe found this approach may also help bring patients together with more FDA-approved treatment options and significantly improved outcomes.

What is functional precision medicine?

Even if two individuals with the identical cancer receive the identical drug, the outcomes will be very different. Because each patient's tumor is exclusive, it might probably be difficult to know which treatment will work best.

To solve this problem, doctors analyze DNA mutations within the patient's tumor, blood or saliva to tailor cancer drugs to the patient. This approach is known as Precision medicine. However, the connection between cancer DNA and the effectiveness of medication against it is vitally complex. Assigning drugs to patients based on a single mutation overlooks other genetic and nongenetic mechanisms that influence how cells reply to drugs.

How to best tailor drugs to patients using DNA continues to be a significant challenge. In total, only 10% of cancer patients experience clinical profit of treatments tailored to tumor DNA mutations.

Functional precision medicine takes a unique approach to personalizing treatments. My team and I take a biopsy sample of a patient's cancer cells, grow the cells within the lab, and expose them to over 100 Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs. In this process is known as Drug sensitivity testingWe are in search of drugs that kill the cancer cells.

New results from clinical studies

Providing functional precision medicine for cancer patients in real life may be very difficult. Off-label drug use and financial constraints are key barriers. Cancer patients' health may deteriorate quickly, and doctors could also be reluctant to try recent methods.

But that’s starting to vary. Two teams in Europe recently demonstrated that functional precision medicine can compete with effective treatments about 55% of them adult patients with blood cancers equivalent to leukemia and lymphoma that didn’t respond to plain treatments.

Lastly, my team's clinical study The focus is on childhood cancer patients whose cancer got here back or didn’t reply to treatment. We applied our functional precision medicine approach to 25 patients with various varieties of cancer.

Our study showed that we are able to provide treatment options to just about all patients in lower than two weeks. my colleague Arlet Maria Acanda de la Rocha was instrumental in making drug sensitivity data available to patients as quickly as possible. We were in a position to provide test results inside 10 days of receiving a sample, in comparison with the roughly 30 days it typically takes to process standard genomic test results, which give attention to identifying specific cancer mutations.

Most importantly, our study showed this 83% of cancer patients Treatments following our approach had clinical profit, including improved response and survival.

Expansion into the true world

Functional precision medicine opens recent avenues for understanding how cancer drugs will be higher tailored to patients. Although doctors can now read any patient's DNA, it’s far more difficult to interpret the outcomes to grasp how a patient is responding to cancer treatment. Combining drug sensitivity testing and DNA evaluation may also help personalize cancer treatments for every patient.

Me, along with a colleague Noah E Berlow, have begun adding artificial intelligence to our functional precision medicine program. AI allows us to research each patient’s data to higher tailor treatments and drug combos. AI also allows us to grasp the complex relationships between DNA mutations inside tumors and the way different treatments affect them.

My team and I actually have began two clinical trials to expand on the outcomes of our previous studies to offer treatment recommendations through functional precision medicine. We are recruiting a bigger cohort of adults and youngsters with cancers which have recurred or are proof against treatment.

The more data we now have, the better it can be to grasp how best to treat cancer, ultimately giving more patients access to personalized cancer treatments.