News O’ Regina

Yes, it’s true.

THE MATING GAME

By Regina Nuzzo

Los Angeles Times - Health Section

August 18, 2008

Urology clinics have a saying: “Erections make erections.”

In other words, sex is not unlike sports. If you want to be a good tennis player, play lots of tennis; if you want to be a good lover, make lots of love.

This maxim springs more from anecdotal observations than from scientific studies: Men who have erection problems tend not to have much sex, urologists noticed. And those who don’t, have plenty. Then again, anyone with a passing knowledge of the birds and the bees might have guessed as much.

What happens after a few weeks of abstinence? Two studies shed light on how a body changes after a sexual dry spell.

THE MATING GAME

By Regina Nuzzo

Los Angeles Times - Health Section

August 18, 2008

Before a big day: A study of 46 men and women in Scotland looked at whether sex affects the body’s blood-pressure response to a stressful event — in this case, a nerve-racking combo of public speaking and verbal arithmetic.

The results, published in 2006 in the journal Biological Psychology, showed that people who’d had no sexual activity (no intercourse of any kind, no masturbation) in the two weeks before the stressful day had the worst blood-pressure responses.

Those with the best reactions? Folks who’d had penile-vaginal intercourse only. (Those who’d had other types of sexual activity with another person still fared worse than those who’d had vaginal intercourse; masturbation was barely an improvement over no sexual activity.)

Eager to connect with that elusive (some say mythical) ‘erotogenic zone’? Years after the hype began, finding it remains easier said than done. But that’s not stopping researchers from looking.

THE MATING GAME

By Regina Nuzzo

Special to The Times

July 21, 2008

Los Angeles Times - Health Section

When in 1950 Dr. Ernst Gräfenberg described finding a surprisingly sensitive spot inside the vagina near the urethra, he made the process seem so foolproof. A medical article detailed his effortless demonstrations of the existence of this “distinct erotogenic zone” — and the not-unexpected consequences of stimulating such a zone — in his own patients. Anyone with a vagina could surely do the same for herself.

Well, perhaps it was that easy for him. But outside his examining room, nothing about Gräfenberg’s spot has proven so simple.

Finding common biological traits — things like hair growth patterns, penis size, family makeup — might one day shed light on the origins of sexual orientation.

THE MATING GAME

By Regina Nuzzo

Special to The Times

Los Angeles Times - Health Section

June 16, 2008

Last month, Sen. John McCain dropped by “Saturday Night Live,” drawing laughs from his promise, if elected president, to fight expensive federal projects — such as, he spoofed, a Department of Defense device to “jam gaydar.”

That was a joke. But some scientists are, in a way, working on gaydar, the supposed ability to discern whether a person is homosexual by reading subtle cues from their appearance. Just don’t refer to it that way. The preferred term is “sexual orientation correlates.”

Scientists search the whole genome for clues to common diseases

By Regina Nuzzo

Science News
Vol.173 #19 / Feature

June 21st, 2008

Old-fashioned gene hunting wasn’t terribly efficient. Geneticists typically pursued one gene at a time, armed only with guesses—usually wrong—about which chunks of genetic code might be linked to human disease.

Geneticists managed to bag a few trophies anyway—genes for Huntington’s chorea and cystic fibrosis, for example—mostly in rare diseases caused by a problem in a single, high-powered gene. Unfortunately, most of the more common diseases, such as type II diabetes, are instead controlled by a whole crowd of gene variants, each playing a small and often subtle role in the path to disease.

They store and dispense energy, expanding and shrinking but never disappearing. A guide to their world.

By Regina Nuzzo

Special to The Times

Los Angeles Times - Health Section

June 2, 2008

FAR FROM being simply dumb, jumbo-size refrigerators of the cellular world, fat cells are now recognized by scientists as leading surprisingly active and influential lives.

They play a role in myriad bodily functions, research suggests, such as regulating hunger and fighting off infection. But under the wrong conditions, fat cells’ natural propensities can backfire — leading to increased risk for various modern lifestyle diseases, including heart disease, Type 2 diabetes and some cancers.

“Fat cells are surprisingly complicated,” says Dr. David Heber, professor of medicine at the UCLA Geffen School of Medicine and director of the UCLA Center for Human Nutrition. “They’re more than a bag of fat.”

For members who submit a saliva sample, dating website ScientificMatch.com plays matchmaker using DNA and smell.

THE MATING GAME

By Regina Nuzzo

Special to the Times

Los Angeles Times — Health Section

May 19, 2008

Swapping spit: The term takes on a more refined meaning at the new dating site ScientificMatch.com. A prerequisite for signing up — in addition to having a bit of cash to spare — involves swishing a cotton swab inside your cheek and mailing a juicy sample of skin cells and saliva.

What do you get in return for your DNA-laden drool? A chance at genetic and olfactory harmony. ScientificMatch.com — perhaps the first company to combine the commercial potential of genetic testing, dating and the Internet in one package — offers to find you a lover who smells good.

Breadless, meatless, sweetless. Today’s hottest offerings have an eating (or not) plan for everyone. We weigh in on whether they might work.

By Regina Nuzzo

Special to The Times

Los Angeles Times — Health Section

March 10, 2008

HERE’S the latest diet advice, hot off the presses: Eat less fat. No, eat more protein. And if your ring finger is longer than your index finger, you might also want to avoid tomatoes. Don’t forget to write in your journal every morning. And clean out your refrigerator every week. Oh, and you should drink flavorless oil every day between meals. Add ground-up plant roots to your food. Order the tacos instead of the burrito. Banish Ss from your eating (except on days that begin with S, of course). And never, ever trust the USDA.

To unlock the secrets of the climax researchers are looking behind the scenes and into the nervous system, where the true magic happens.

By Regina Nuzzo

Special to The Times

Los Angeles Times — Health Section

February 11, 2008

AS they seek to document and demystify one of life's great thrills, scientists have run across some real head-scratchers.

How, for example, can they explain the fact that some men and women who are paralyzed and numb below the waist are able to have orgasms?

How to explain the "orgasmic auras" that can descend at the onset of epileptic seizures — sensations so pleasurable they prompt some patients to refuse antiseizure medication?

And how on Earth to explain the case of the amputee who felt his orgasms centered in that missing foot?

Dr. Stuart Meloy stumbled upon an alternative — and pleasurable — use for an electrode stimulation device that treats pain.

By Regina Nuzzo
Special to The Times

Los Angeles Times — Health Section

February 11, 2008

Dr. Stuart Meloy never set out to study orgasms. It was an accident.

He was in the operating room one day in 1998, implanting electrodes into a patient’s spine to treat her chronic leg pain. (The electrodes are connected to a device that fires impulses to the brain to block pain signals.) But when he turned on the power, “the patient suddenly let out something between a shriek and moan,” says Meloy, an anesthesiologist and pain specialist in North Carolina.

Asked what was wrong, she replied, “You’ll have to teach my husband how to do that.”

‘C-V distance’ may be a factor in how easily a woman has an orgasm.

By Regina Nuzzo
Special to The Times

Los Angeles Times — Health Section

February 11, 2008

During intercourse, the female orgasm can be elusive. What frustrated woman hasn’t wondered: Am I simply, um, put together differently than other women?

Kim Wallen, professor of psychology and behavioral neuroendocrinology at Emory University, is busy doing the math to find out. And, yes, he says, simple physiology may have a lot to do with orgasm ease — specifically, how far a woman’s clitoris lies from her vagina.

That number might predict how easily a woman can experience orgasms from penile stimulation alone — without help from fingers, toys or tongue — during sexual intercourse.

By Regina Nuzzo
Special to The Times

Los Angeles Times — Health Section

February 11, 2008

Sure, orgasms can put a bounce in one’s step, but some studies hint they might also be good for one’s health.

* Heart: Lots of studies have looked at whether DHEA, a hormone released into the bloodstream during arousal and orgasm, helps keeps arteries clear and hearts strong. A 2001 study of 1,700 middle-age Massachusetts men found that those with the lowest levels of DHEA were about 60% more likely to develop heart disease than those with the highest. Orgasms aren’t the only way to get this hormone, though; your body produces some even without sexual stimulation.

Using Algorithms To Tackle Alzheimer’s Disease

by Regina Nuzzo, PhD
Biomedical Computation Review

Fall 2007
Feature Story

In 1906, at a small medical meeting in Tübingen, Germany, physician Alois Alzheimer gave a now-famous presentation about a puzzling patient. At age 51, Auguste D.’s memory was failing rapidly. Confused and helpless, she was growing inarticulate and fearful of her family, Alzheimer reported. Auguste died four years later.

During the autopsy Alzheimer found dramatic shrinkage in Auguste’s brain, with cells that were already dead and dying at the time of her death — plus two kinds of microscopic deposits that Alzheimer had never seen before. He summed it up in his presentation abstract: “All in all, we are faced obviously with a peculiar disease process.”