Over at Wired Playbook, I wrote a piece about a group of researchers using ECG sensors, GPS, accelerometers, and a mobile phone to accurately monitor a patient with heart trouble, in real-time, during their prescribed exercise routine.
Read MoreSad statistics, laid out in a provoking article from The Atlantic.
Despite sitting on a trust fund that's worth over $1 billion in equity from a "purchase" of the Black Hills that the tribe never agreed to, the Sioux are suffering from chronic disease and have what's sure to be one of the lowest ethnic life expectancies in the United States:
Read MoreLittle known fact: The first diesel engine was able to run on peanut oil.
With petroleum putting the squeeze on the environment and our pocketbooks, the push to create sustainable biofuels with commodity crops is increasing.
Read MoreThat was the gist of a headline I read on The Atlantic this morning.
At first blush, I thought the commentary by Edward Tenner on a recent NYT report was overreaching a bit. How could helmets, which protect the head, make sports more hazardous. But as I read on, I saw the point he was trying to make.
Read MoreMy latest post for Wired Playbook reports on a new idea that two UK researchers have proposed for keeping tabs on which Olympic athletes are using performance-enhancing drugs.
Read MoreI have a new feature at Scientific American, describing recent research that shows how stress is linked to neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.
Read MoreI know that I've been slow on updates recently -- for lack of a better excuse, I'll blame it on the holiday season. But things are back in full swing now, and I'll have a number of new stories in the next few weeks, so stay tuned.
A few days ago, I wrote a piece for Slate's DoubleX blog, on a PLoS Medicine study where researchers created a prediction model that they say will accurately determine if someone will get pregnant with in vitro fertilization (IVF).
Read MoreOn a guest post for Mary Knudson's HeartSense blog, I talk about why I started running:
Read MoreBeing a sprinter, I had never done much long distance work. In the past, making it around the 400m track just once was an accomplishment for me. Plus, my closest friends from college are hard-core distance runners. And by that, I mean they are really, really fast. Like 2:30ish marathon fast. Top 50 in the Boston Marathon fast. Fast fast. You get the point. So getting into this road racing business was a bit intimidating. I didn’t even tell my best friends what I was doing until shortly before my first race.
Over at Wired Playbook, I have a new article highlighting a sports performance-enhancing technique where blood flow is temporarily reduced to a limb, in order to prime the muscle for future stress during exercise:
Read MoreMy latest story for Wired Playbook highlights new research that investigates whether the common asthma medication, salbutamol/albuterol, could enhance athletic performance when taken in extremely large doses.
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