Archive for August, 2011
Sex and Aging: The Social Stigma
Many people find the idea of older people having sex disgusting to the point of absurdity. Older people’s sexuality is often exploited for laughs on television or casually mocked. While it is true that sex often becomes more difficult as one gets older, and the level of desire for sex often changes, the need for [...]
Chemzymes, Challenging Nature: How Artificial Enzymes Are Becoming Nature’s Counterparts
Enzymes were discovered as early as the nineteenth century, [15] when Eduard Buchner extracted the enzyme responsible for the fermentation of sugars from yeast into alcohol. Besides earning him the Nobel Prize, Buchner’s work began the process of elucidating the diverse functions of enzymes, thousands of which have since been identified [12]. They allow us [...]
Bombay/Mumbai: Formalizing the Informal?
Stanford biologist Paul Ehrlich’s account of a hot night in Delhi embodies a sense of oppression felt only in Indian cities: “People eating, people washing, people arguing and screaming. People thrusting their hands through the taxi window. People defecating and urinating. People clinging to buses. People herding animals. People. People. People.”[1] Bombay faces a variety [...]
Methods for Educating Special-Needs Students
Special needs students are often the most challenging to teach yet also the most neglected by politicians and government educational policymakers. The number of students in special education has skyrocketed since the 1980s and only stabilized in the last few years. During the 2008–2009 academic school year, about 6.5 million students aged 3 through 21 [...]
Effects of Nuclear Power on Public Health: From Three Mile Island to Fukushima
Three Mile Island. Chernobyl. Fukushima. Since the beginning of the Atomic Age, the use of nuclear energy technologies has been accompanied by numerous crises and persistent public health concerns. Currently, nuclear power has become an indispensable part in the ongoing search for alternative energy sources. By January 2011, 442 nuclear power plants operated globally to [...]
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