Wellness

Lactucin, the hypnotic component of lettuce, is put to the test in a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of lettuce seeds. “There is a perception that time spent asleep is time wasted,” but it’s widely recognized that insufficient sleep is linked to multiple acute and chronic conditions and increases the risks of death and disease. As […]

If you’re going to have something unhealthy, is there anything you can eat with it to help mitigate the damage it may cause? If you compare the artery function of vegetarians and meat-eaters, the healthy ability of arteries to dilate and let more blood flow is significantly better among those eating a vegetarian diet. And

There is a window of time in which sufficient physical activity can help mediate some of the damage caused by eating an unhealthy meal. I’ve previously discussed studies that show a single meal high in saturated fat can impair artery function in men, as measured in the arm, but what is more concerning is blood

What happens within hours of eating a high-fat meal? We are only as old as our arteries. What can we do to preserve arterial function as we age? A poor diet and sedentary behavior can lead to adverse aging processes, like impairment of the little power plants in our cells, which can result in free

The Squatty Potty is put to the test. Previously, I’ve talked about the potential efficacy of prunes and dried figs to keep us regular. What influence does body position have on defecation? While squatting continues to be the traditional position for people in Asia and Africa, Westerners have become accustomed to sitting on toilet seats.

What happened when ultra-processed foods were matched for calories, sugar, fat, and fiber content in the first randomized controlled trial? In the United States, “junk food” is often used to describe less-healthy foods, like candy, ice cream, and chips, but there isn’t a consistent definition, so nutrition researchers came up with the concept of ultra-processed.

What was the secret to the public health community’s triumph when past attempts to regulate the food industry failed? There are three broad approaches to mediating the ruin of risky choices: inform people (like using labeling), nudge people (for example, by offering financial incentives), or directly intervene to make the activity less harmful. Which do

Adding a healthy option can actually drive people to make even worse choices, thanks to a mind-blowing glitch of human psychology. In 2017, and to much fanfare, menu labeling for calorie counts began to be mandated in national chain restaurants. Consumers should have the information needed to make healthy food choices outside the home, right?

Which legumes are best at inhibiting the matrix metalloproteinase enzymes that allow cancer to become invasive? Although we’re spending billions of dollars on fancy new types of chemotherapy, the overflowing sink that is cancer treatment is expected to rise by about 70% over the next two decades because drugs are being used to merely mop

How can we avoid the breakdown products of pesticides that may increase the risk of Alzheimer’s disease as much as if you carried APOE e4, the so-called Alzheimer’s gene? Although there is a growing list of Alzheimer’s disease susceptibility genes, those genes account for less than half of all Alzheimer’s cases. Here is the “single