Anatomy, Physiology and Neuroscience

I am a type 1 diabetic and have been one for about a year and a half now. I am able to keep pretty good control of my diabeties and have an average hypoglycimic a1c of about 5.7. Of course, intensive treatment cause many "lows" or hypoglycimic events. The lowest i have ever been is 38 and i have been to 40 about 4-5 times. Now my question is do repeated low blood sugars cause permeant brain damage. I have read that if you have exceeded the age of 8-9 you only have to worry about blood sugars of 1.5mmol/l and less(about 30mg/dl) for a prlonged period of time(but fail to give a quantive defintion of prolonged). Now i have never been that low but i have had repeated blo…

I know that the stomach is highly acidic, but the actual intestines themselves are somewhat neutral. So does anyone know the pH of the gastrointestinal tracts? (if i'm right, the place where the stomach and the intestines connect) also if possible list some bacteria that lives in the gastrointestinal tracts

this has bugged me for a long time! I`ve seen many documentaries about Eskimos and Inuit, and they all seem to eat very little other than meat and fat! there`s no ballanced diet at all, no fruit and veg, just seal and whale and fish in the main. now if you or I were to even try this diet for a month we`de end up quite ill! so how is it they can get away with it and we can`t? and yes I know NOW they do get stuff flown in that`s of the veg variety, but the Ancients certainly didn`t!

I don't know what it is that is causing me not to be able to sleep at normal times. I believe it might be a mental thing but i'm not sure. I want to go to sleep about 10pm but that does not happen. Last week, I had to take sleeping pills to fall asleep. I had to take 6 a night so i could finally fall asleep. I believe this started when I had to start waking up at 3 am for work, 2 weeks ago, so i would just stay up and then go to bed around 6 or 7 am. So here I am. I was able to go to sleep this past weekend around 2 am and I tried to correct my sleeping patterns and wake up 8 am or 9 but I just sleep right through it. Now I am wide awake 2am in the morning. I exercise dai…

I dont know about you guys, but when its late my muscles especially in the neck, tend to creak somwhat when i move them. It can be quite lound and annoying sometimes, anybody have the same problem or know why?

Hi, I made a post in a couple of buddhist forums and had some quite interesting answers. I would like to hear if scientists can explain it, or if it is even an issue in neuroscience. This was the post: Here is a link to the post in a buddhist forum to see some buddhist answers http://www.lioncity.net/buddhism/index.php?showtopic=10996 Is this sound known in nueroscience? Thanks for any info

Just a question, what do you think happens if the brain structure of a human reforms to an exactly same state as it was at the instant of death? Would the human live again, and feel "himself"? I think that he would. If we consider this for example: Suppose there's a man. The man has a heart attack. He effectively dies, his brain stops fuctioning. The man is brought to a hospital where his heart is made to pump again, so his brains get blood and start fuctioning again. So in a way he is "resurrected" from the dead. He feels being the same human he was before he "died" for a short instant. In my view a perfectly homological example is if a man gets blown to piece…

Yay for me! After several weeks of less night sleep than I actually need (6-7 hours really isn't enough, not for me at least), I've got myself a fever. I should have seen this coming... So, the question is, how seriously does lack of sleep affect the human immunity system? Any other consequences?

A month ago, in the duration of about 2 weeks, I have been very busy. They could be the busiest days of my life. I had my SAT preparation, my finals preparation, and a time and energy consuming assignment to be completed a week before SAT, which I took about 3 weeks ago.... There was once when i DID NOT sleep for 3 days, about 68 hours, I calculated. There were also 2 casses when I didn't sleep for 2 days. So, basically, I felt like I was going to die at that time. My mind hovered like I was high, my muscles seemed very weak, I could easilly drop a pencil when i was writing, speech didn't make much sense, and I muter a lot. It was a state of dyingness. I really felt l…

Cells die and are replaced, so over time owuld all the cells be replaced? Wouldn't the only original cells in an old person be brain cells, and all the others replaced?

I just read that it's possible for women to have 2 wombs. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3011241.stm And women with this condition (approx. 1 in every 55000 women) can also have 4 kidneys. It supposedly has something to do with the womb being formed in the 8th week of pregnancy, the same time the kidneys are formed. Although I have no clue what the connection between the two would be. Does anyone have more info on this??? correction: another site (i lost it) had the 55000 number. In the article which is linked at the top, says one in a 1000 women have this. It's even possible for these women to have to vagina's and two cervixes!!

Which body parts can be replaced by live ones and which ones can be replaced by mechanical ones. If you know them all then please list them, other wise list the exceptions that cant be transplanted or replaced.

Hi I am curious as to how the brain works under the influence of alcohol. I had several drinks the other night and found myself speaking with more meaning and knowledge in a way. Does alcohol make you able to think more clearly?

Stem Cell Research has been hailed as the saviour to many diseases and disorders of the human body but is possibly still very much understood. I am currently undertaking some research into public thoughts on therapeutic cloning and stem cell research for my MSc. I would be grateful to you if you would spare a few minutes and respond to my online questionnaire about the subject. All information you provide is confidential and non-identifable. The link is: http://www.urbansea.com/s802/ and will be available for a couple of weeks from the date of this message. If you have any specific comments, either relating to the questions or your views on therapeuti…

Hi there. I've got a question about quitting smoking and the resulting withdrawal. I was a smoker for about 5 years at a rate of close to a pack a day. (Sometimes more, sometimes less). About two weeks ago I finally decided to quit smoking. It's not worth the money to continue to smoke, and frankly I just sick of being 'owned' by the cigarette. Since quitting, I've gone through the typical withdrawal symptoms. I'm cranky, I'm irritable, and I'm fighting off cravings left and right. Nicotine gum is helping, but it's not a cigarette. To help myself go through the withdrawal, whenever I want a cigarette I force myself to do 50 situps or 50 'half' push-ups. (Where i…

I`ve completed 4 days hard work about 3 days ago. I was unable to grip anything between my thumb and index finger the next day, the day after it was even worse! today my one hand is much better but the other is still in pain, however there is a significant increase in muscle mass! I used to weight train many years ago (roughly 8 years ago) and not only are these muscles in my hands larger but in my arms too, almost as if it was just under 8 years ago! why would this be, and why is pain essential (seemingly) for the gain of muscle mass? secondly, what causes the pain?

....after last night on the piss. I had a bottle of red and 4 beers.... about 12 standard drinks..... what causes the headache in a hangover.... and don't just say "dehydration", how does dehyration cause pain? Oh, and where did I leave my glasses? (not the wine ones)

I keep hearing that cracking your knuckles does all sorts of bad things, but I really wonder about it. Does it really damage your knuckles, or is it just a parent too annoyed by little popping noises?

I'm wondering if anyone knows why sometimes when we fall asleep we have a sudden spasm that wakes us up. I know it's something to do with signals being sent between hemispheres of the brain, but I want a more in-depth explanation of this. Apparently I do it a lot, but don't remember because it happens when I've just fallen asleep and I don't wake myself up when I do it. It's also happened to me about 5-10 times in my life that I can personally remember, and it's usually associated with a falling feeling. I'm aware it's a very common thing, so I'm not asking for testimonials here just if anyone has any detailed information on what causes this, or even a link or two, it …

Is there any one key to ensuring good REM sleep every night? Could there be a switch or receptor that could be activated to ensure REM sleep? I love to have a good night's sleep, but lately Ive been missing a lot of sleep for homwork. However if I get about 5 hours of good REM sleep then I feel perfectly refreshed. Is there any way of ensuring a good nights sleep??

I know gilded had a topic a little like this, but i was wondering if there were any negative affects of staying up later in the night, and then waking up later?

Could people float across the Atlantic or Pacific Ocean and live?

I've taken a brain anatomy course in university and it sounds to me like neurologists have pretty much figured out how the brain works. Electrical signals enter the brain from the senses, travel along the axons of neurons, communicate with neighbouring neurons by releasing neurotransmitters across the synaptic gap which then get converted back to electric signals, and so on, until the brain transfers this signal to other bodily organs. It seems like a pretty deterministic and self-contained system that doesn't really leave any mysteries unresolved. I've also taken a few computer science courses (got my B.Sc in it) and the similarities between computer circuits and neurolo…

do you belive that sleep has got a role to play in our life. do you think sleep is a state of rest or do you thaink there more to it. does sleep help our lives more .........

I know that many new studies have been done recently regarding the relationship between the human eye and the brain and how we are able to create a seamless experience with them, but I am curious as to whether a study has ever been done to capture a moment of what the human brain receives from the eye. Specifically, I am curious as to whether anyone has ever captured, digitally or otherwise, what we see when our eyes are closed.