People who work erratic hours will probably get their best rest if they try going to sleep in the morning rather than in the late afternoon or early evening, new research suggests.
The research, published in the journal Sleep, focused on eight women between the ages of 18 and 34 who were studied intensively for two weeks at Stockholm’s Karolinska Institute. The brainwaves, body temperature and other attributes of the women were measured as they followed prescribed patterns of being awake and trying to sleep.
The women rested best when they tried to sleep at 9 a.m. after having been up for 18 hours, the researchers found. They slept most poorly in the late afternoon and when they hadn’t been up very long before going back to bed.
NEW LASER TECHNIQUE IMPROVES TATTOO REMOVAL
Tattoos are generally considered to be permanent skin adornments. Although they can be removed, the techniques-acid, sanding, cutting, burning-are painful and leave scars.
But a recently approved laser can eliminate tattoos with only a small amount of pain and no scarring, according to dermatologist Dr. Claude Burton of the Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C.
Unlike older lasers, which burn skin cells, the new laser, called Tatulazr, penetrates the skin and shatters the pigment that makes up the tattoo. The tiny pieces of pigment are then collected by white blood cells and eliminated from the body, he explained.
The new treatment, which costs between $275 and several thousand dollars, depending on the size of the tattoo, feels like a rubber band snapping against the skin, Burton said. A mild burning or stinging sensation is felt for about 45 minutes after treatment, he added.
DRILLING WITHOUT DISTURBING THE VIEW
New technology that enables crews to bore holes underground without disturbing the surface proved successful in installing an electrical transmission line through a scenic Georgia valley and site of a Cherokee burial ground.
The technology, developed by the Electric Power Research Institute of Palo Alto, Calif., includes an advanced guidance system that uses magnetic field information and onboard computers to keep boring drill heads on the right course.
The demonstration project in Georgia’s Nacoochee Valley was sponsored by Georgia Power Company and included rocky terrain and shallow water in the path of the underground power line.
“The Nacoochee Valley represents the most difficult and challenging terrain and obstacles that any drilling crew would likely encounter,” said Tom Rodenbaugh, EPRI project manager.
RESEARCHERS WORK TO IMPROVE SPERMICIDE
Barrier birth control devices such as the diaphragm and sponge, which are combined with a spermicide to prevent contraception, can cause vaginal irritation and infection if spermicide levels are high enough to be effective.
Now researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago and Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center are striving to overcome this problem. They’re experimenting with a material that releases more spermicide just when it’s needed.
The material is sensitive to changes in the acidity of its environment, and scientists have found that semen changes acidity significantly as it enters a woman’s body. This change causes the new material to release 8 to 10 times more spermicide than it does at normal acidic levels.
CAN TUCSON RETURN TO ITS NATURAL STATE?
The desert air of Tucson was once a mecca for allergy sufferers because it was virtually pollen-free, but that changed radically as people moved to Arizona and started planting non-native species.
In the last 40 years, pollen levels have increased 20-fold, Dr. Jacob L. Pinnas of Tucson reported to the recent annual meeting in Atlanta of the American College of Allergy & Immunology.
Local laws against the sale and planting of olive and mulberry trees as well as a public education campaign have been mounted in an effort to reverse this trend, Pinnas said. The long-term success of efforts to return Tucson to its natural state is in doubt.
“Deliberate planting of known allergenic trees raises ethical questions related to responsibility on the part of civic leaders and developers,” Pinnas said. “Recently, a local movement to plant 500,000 new trees in the Tucson basin, as part of a national movement `to improve air quality,’ may pose new hazards in Tucson and elsewhere,” he said.
METEORS CAN HAVE DEVASTATING IMPACT
Meteors explode with atom bomb magnitude as they hit the Earth’s upper atmosphere several times each year, information from military satellites indicates.
The information, published in Sky & Telescope, suggests that on average, eight huge explosions occur some 20 miles above the Earth’s surface each year.
Scientists estimate that about every 10 million years our planet is hit by a meteor with enough impact to devastate much of the life on Earth.
BRAIN SIMILARITIES SURPRISE RESEARCHERS
Women’s brains are more active than men’s, an Iowa City researcher has found.
Dr. Nancy Andreasen, a psychiatry professor at the University of Iowa, used positron emission tomography to study brain activity in 41 men and 31 women and found that more blood flows through female brains than through male brains. This might mean that women think harder than men or, perhaps, that female brains are less efficient.
“Though such studies will help understand which gender diffrences are built-in and which are due to social factors,” Andreasen said, “I feel the similarities were more surprising than the differences. Brain structure and physiology of men and women appear quite similar.”
EARTH HAS SOMETHING IN COMMON WITH MARS
Basalt, a common rock on Earth, is also common on the moon and now appears to be found on Mars as well, researchers from Cornell University report. Using a special infrared spectrometer-camera they mounted on the 200-inch Hale telescope atop Palomar Mountain in California, the Cornell astronomers obtained strong evidence for Martian basalt, a finding that was previously strongly suspected.
