Stress May Promote Aging of Cells
[29 November 2004 - Reuters] A new finding may explain how stress could ultimately lead to premature aging. Chronic psychological stress is associated with accelerated shortening of the caps, called telomeres, on the ends of chromosomes in white blood cells -- and thus hasten their demise -- according to a report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Telomeres promote chromosome stability, Dr. Elissa S. Epel at the University of California, San Francisco, and her colleagues explain. Telomeres shorten with each replication of the cell, and cells cease dividing when telomeres shorten sufficiently. ...

Scientists track footprints of thoughts
[29 November 2004 - ABC News Online] Australian scientists have discovered a way to track the electronic footpath of a single thought travelling through the human brain. The discovery has implications for everything from education to planning the safest way to undertake brain surgery. The latest developments in scanning techniques allow brain experts to track responses in the brain from particular movements and thoughts, in real time. "If we ask them to read a sentence we can actually look at them processing a single sentence. In other words we can look at the footprint of a single thought," Professor Keith Thulborn, from Chicago's Centre for Magnetic Resonance Imaging, said. ...

Ageing just a career move
[29 November 2004 - News Interactive] JANE Doe is 33 years old. She's just entered the workforce for the first time because it has taken her about 10 years of university degrees and training to become qualified for a job. Then again, there's no hurry � most people work well into their 80s. After all, it's the year 2050 and the average life expectancy is 93 for men and a bit longer for women. Jane's teenage years � which extended to the age of about 32 � were spent getting educated, having fun with friends and, later, travelling and living overseas. ...