The cacao tree, which grows the fruit that turns into chocolate, is one of the oldest cultivated trees on the planet. Over 3,000 years ago, the Mayans domesticated what is thought to be the highest quality variety, Theobroma cacao.
—MARK HORTON, director of the California Department of Public Health (CDPH), introducing the state's new anti-smoking campaign. Quit-smoking messages in California have been successful, according to CDPH: while 20.6% of American adults report smoking cigarettes, the rate in California is 13.1%. [via Los Angeles Sentinel]
While scientists have long recognized a link between intelligence and longevity, new research on a species not always known for its intellectual wattage — the honeybee — has helped explain exactly why smarter people tend to live longer, fuller lives. The answer isn’t as surprising as you might think.
Physicians have long believed that some form of deception is essential to the placebo effect: after all, if you tell people that you’re giving them a fake drug, why would they respond by getting better?
Imagine if you bequeathed your children not just your genetic material, but also the consequences of your own eating habits. A study published on Dec. 23 in the journal Cell demonstrates that your diet can indeed make a difference in the next generation’s genetic code.
Spas offer treatments for just about every body part these days, so it isn’t terribly surprising that the Tikkun Holistic Spa in Santa Monica is now offering a $50 V-Steam — literally a steam bath for their female clients’ genitalia. What is of interest is the treatment’s history.
Age at which our ability to recognize faces peaks — much later than scientists thought — according to a Harvard University study of 44,000 people from 10 to 70 years old [via The Boston Globe]
“Mama,” my young son informed me yesterday, “I know how you can sneak an explosive onto an airplane.”
Teens aren’t always the best listeners but a new study shows that their hearing may not be to blame.
In the fall of 2002, I visited Christopher Reeve in his New York home. The star best known for the Superman movies had broken his neck in a riding accident seven years earlier and had barely moved a muscle below his neck since. He had, as it turned out, just two more years to live.
