Lent 2021
By Blake (Ly)
By Arthur (Bn)
BaCoN Lent 2021
From the medicine in our cupboard to the wonders of light, the basic applications of science are often overlooked. In this edition of BaCON magazine, we have collectively tried to unmask fundamental sciences that people come across every day. Each article looks at a different aspect of science that we interact with and the following is a brief summary of each. Tess McIntyre looks at effect of social media on mental health in particular the need it creates to always be your best. It also looks at the changes in the brain that can be caused by an addiction to social media. Blake Keijsers discusses the varying methods of domesticating wolves. It asks the question of whether domestication occurred because a food source promoted a common environment or whether humans noticed an advantage in having domesticated wolves by their side. During lockdown we have all being spending more
time at home. This has led to an increased carbon footprint produced by houses. Arthur Johnson looks at how this carbon footprint can be reduced. Amelie Peach and Jake Graham look at Medicines used at home. Paracetamol is the go to painkiller but many people know much about it. Or other essential store cupboard medicines. Ever wondered how you see colour on a screen? Mr Light tries to make sense of the complex coding behind this technology. Light itself is an extraordinary occurrence that has many exciting properties. Adam Reed views its behaviour through polarizing filters. Lastly, we are all familiar with the way a light bulb works, but do we know about the incredible journey this invention has undergone. This article explores the history of the light bulb and different types of light
Contents: 4-5
Life in Lockdown by Tess
6-7
Domesticating Wolves by Blake
8-9
How Polluting is Your Home by Arthur
10-11 Paracetamol by Amelie
12-13 Coding for Colour by Mr Light 14-15 The 3 Polarizers Problems by Adam 16-17 Medicine Cabinet Essentials by Jake 18-19 The Light Bulb by Annabel
Tess (O)
D
uring the global Covid-19 pandemic, face to face social interaction has been at an all-time low. Fortunately, recent technological advancements have enabled us to continue to interact with one another, with social media being at the forefront of this. Although this has been highly beneficial for combatting loneliness, it also important to consider the negative psychological effect that spending hours on social media can cause. Addiction is defined as a pathological love between the person and the addictive object/event. It can cause people to seek out acceptance, positive feedback or a sense of calm leading them becoming reliant on that feeling that they get related to specific action. Just like a gambling or drug addiction, social media is an addiction that has become increasing more common with the average person spending 135 minutes on social media daily. However, it is an addiction that is not commonly addressed as the consequences of it are not as visible as those that occur with other addictions, such as smoking or recreational drug use. Neuroscientists say that the positive interactions from notifications, and the self-affirmation gained, triggers the same neural activity and chemical reaction as drugs and gambling. We become easily addicted to social media because, when one has low self-esteem, we feel the need for attention and a confirmation from others that we are liked. When a notification lights up our phones, the brain’s reward system is activated and triggers the release of the neurotransmitter dopamine. As it is a ‘feel good’ chemical, the brain produces
a sense of reward and acceptance for checking the phone, and as notifications appear fairly randomly, and checking for them is very easy on smart phones, the dopamine triggering behaviour becomes a habit, which is called positive reinforcement. To consider that around 50% of the world use social media daily, it is not surprising that this addiction is so common, especially as smart phones light up, vibrate or sound whenever a notification of any kind appears, making it challenging to not check for rewards on social media, unless we turn them off.
Social media can also promote comparison and fear of missing out, which can drive us to shut down and cause mental disorders that both affect the brain and our behaviour. This is predominantly through the public nature of social media, allowing us to view and follow whomever we wish, whether that be an acquaintance or a celebrity. It can often be used to look people up, or find out what someone looks like, and
with this comes the pressure of trying to present oneself in the best way possible, meaning we only see the highlights of people’s lives or their most attractive photos. For example, continuously viewing celebrity photos we are often seeing photos of people who, without many considering, have people around them constantly helping them to keep up their appearance. These factors can lead people to edit their photos to improve their appearance so that the public will find them more attractive. Seeing these posts can make us believe that is the ‘beauty standard’ that is normal, and subconsciously compare ourselves to online photos that are essentially fake. This is an example of when comparison can severely affect one’s mental state, causing many variations of mental disorders that can directly cause physical damage to cortical functioning in the brain. An example of this is Anorexia which causes one to severely reduce their food intake in order to lose weight, becoming habit until the thought of eating food makes them ill. Recently, advances in neuroimaging have enabled us to understand the physical effect Anorexia has on the brain. Studies have been done on people with anorexia where MRI and fMRI scans show that there is significant increased activation in the cingulate cortex, a region in the prefrontal cortex involved in pain processing and perception, and altered activation in the amygdala. This suggests that the brain must constantly fight the way they perceive food and process the pain of starvation the body is under. The amygdala is at the centre of the brain and its role is to process signs of danger and translate that into fear, acting like an alarm system; the amygdala stores senses (e.g., specific smells) that relate to something threatening. When danger is detected, chemical signals are sent through neural networks to the prefrontal cortex where the
‘fight or flight’ decision is made. This is particularly interesting as it suggests that anorexia has altered what the amygdala senses as danger, because food would normally never be feared, and yet has become something that stimulates the amygdala. The MRI scans showed clear degradation of grey and white matter in cortical areas, specifically those areas involved in decision making, emotion and attention. White matter is subcortical; it relates to the structure of nerve cells. Action potentials run down the axon of a neuron to the end terminal to fire neurotransmitters that bind to the next neuron. White matter is the fatty layer called the myelinated sheath that surrounds the axon, which improves the transmission of these electrical nerve signals by speeding up the action potential. Therefore, degradation in white matter means the neural networks in the brain work much slower than they should. Clearly, this is a very severe example, but many victims of anorexia have made it evident that the constant use of social media was what drove them to this extent because of the level of comparison they felt. Overall, any moderate addiction to social media will increase our tendency to compare ourselves to others online, and therefore particularly during a global pandemic, where mental well-being is generally very low anyway, reducing your daily screen time and using social media to benefit your mental health, by genuinely connecting with others over FaceTime or Zoom, is extremely important to note.
Blake (Ly)
I
was originally going to discuss the evolutionary history of many pets: dogs, cats, hamsters, goldfish, etc. However, once I began looking into “mans best friend,” and our relationship with them (one that predates agriculture), I knew they deserved a whole article. The story of dogs comes in three parts: wolves, domestication, and modern dogs. Firstly, I will explore how the traits of wolves, although having evolved quite independently of man’s, were a perfect fit to begin our coexistence. Without the foundation wolves laid down, and chance bringing us together, our relationship, arguably the most beneficial inter-species relationship on earth, may never have happened. It is a testament to evolution and its “throw ‘em up against a wall and see which ones stick” nature. Because, yes, if you have enough different things to throw then some will stick and of the ones that stick, some will be able to use each other for support.
Scientists believe the ancestors of dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) and grey wolves (Canis lupus) diverged around 40,000 to 27,000 years ago. Although grey wolves have been subject to some changes, Canis lupus are the direct predecessors of modern dogs (the clue’s in the name: Canis lupus – wolf, familiaris – familiar, friendly). The wolves split off from coyotes roughly 380,000 years ago, and during the last glacial maximum (the “ice age”) a massive ecosystem called the Mammoth steppe formed. The Mammoth steppe existed about 120,000 years ago, lasting until around 12,000 years ago and spanned from Spain across Eurasia to Alaska and Canada, it was made up of large, glaciated areas with some grassland and evergreen forest. Alongside the massive continent-spanning habitat now formed, new massive herbivores evolved because the freezing temperatures prioritised a large mass for warmth. Animals like woolly mammoths, Irish elk (gigantic deer), aurochs (big cattle) and woolly rhinoceroses all weighing between 600 and 6000 kg. These conditions – abundant food and a large continuous area, as well as the
wolves ability to act as top predators or scavengers caused an explosion in wolf populations across Eurasia around 100,000 years ago. To aid their expansion, wolves had a key ability that very few other ice age predators had: their social hierarchy. Wolves hunt and live in packs which gives them a number of benefits: the weak are supported by the strong, the stronger wolves are able to hunt larger prey, and all members had protection due to the size of packs especially in protecting the vulnerable young. These benefits were only yielded because of wolves’ sociability, their brains are wired to maintain complex interactions with other pack members. For example, they have a social structure that is observed by all members of the pack and they do things like care for their sick, defend their fellow pack-members from danger and even morn their dead. These traits clearly display wolves’ capacity for social interaction. In an anthropocentric way one could say they have very “human-like” charactersitics, and that is what led them to begin interacting with us just as much as we interacted with them.
Domestication, there are a number of interesting theories on the transition from wolves to dogs. The first thing to note is that the process of domestication happened very suddenly which makes the exact times and places hard to pin down with very little paleontological evidence. The second thing to note is that this process predates agriculture, which makes it incredibly special; the process occurred before we had tried taming any other species, before we could fence an animal in and force them to breed better offspring. The process was entirely natural and spontaneous. Now, 40,000 to 27,000 years ago, theory 1, the human campfire theory. Humans as social hunter-gatherers would hunt down large prey like mammoths, this led early humans to set up camp near the carcass, cook its meat and feast upon it. The smell of cooking meat will have attracted wolves to the human’s campfires, these wolves would eat the unwanted scraps of meat and bones. This is known as the commensal pathway meaning one species gains from another whilst the other neither benefits nor is harmed. Over time the
wolves will have learnt what the humans were like and would begin to follow these hunters around, knowing a meal would soon arise, similar to how foxes sometimes linger around bins. The wolves then maintained the same territory as the humans, they would protect it from other predators and bark to alert humans to the presence of intruders. Therefore, the wolves proved themselves to have benefits to the humans and the two species began to interact more closely. Furthermore, the wolves attracted to the huntergatherer groups preferred or were forced into scavenging so likely the less aggressive, less dominant, and more sociable wolves, hence better candidates for domestication. Theory 2: the migratory wolves theory. Both wolves and humans during the ice age were large predatory animals and both would rely on their social groups to take down much larger prey. Humans, however, may have learnt from wolves, leading to their domestication: wolves would follow herds of large herbivores like Reindeer along their migratory routes, almost like shepherds watching a flock. When it was time to hunt, they picked off the elderly, sick or young and then afterwards continued to follow the herd. Some hunter-gatherers may have observed this and decided to do the same following massive herds of reindeer and engaged in the same practice. Over time the humans and wolves would be following the same herds and hunt almost in unison which will have led to the first proto-dogs working with humans.
Theory 3, which personally I believe supplements the other theories rather than being one in its own right, is the food partitioning theory. During the ice age humans acted mainly as large predators, however, due to our evolution from primates we are omnivores so protein cannot sustain us by itself and in colder climates fats, lipids are actually more useful. Therefore, wolves/proto-dogs and humans could fill the same niche together hunting megafauna since dogs could eat more of the meat of kills and humans could eat more of the fat. This allowed the two to coexist. Once proto-dogs had been integrated, the relationship didn’t stop there. Dogs have changed genetically in comparison to their wolf counterparts. For instance, dogs’ diets are slightly different to wolves, they have better lipid digestion abilities than wolves likely due to scavenging the scraps of human kills. More recently when humans, 10,000 years ago, began settling down for agriculture dogs’ diets changed again. In areas where humans had lost their nomadic lifestyle it was found that the dog populations had increased production of enzymes to break down starchy foods. This is likely due to humans feeding them less meat and more of the products of agriculture, they had grown themselves.
Behaviourally is where the real changes happened, dogs have a greater synaptic plasticity than wolves which means their brains are more shape-able (i.e. trainable) and therefore more useful to humans. They have also developed genes for “hypersociability,” which affect their oxytocin receptors. This means interacting with other dogs and humans is more highly rewarded with hormones. Moreover, they have developed a weaker fight or flight response than wolves making them less aggressive, less fearful, and more tame. Amazingly, dogs have physically adapted to be “cuter” to humans too, dogs have better eyebrow control to make the classic puppy dog eyes, face this allows them to get more attention from humans meaning they are usually better fed and cared for. Their tails have got waggier too because this allows them to communicate more easily with people when showing happiness or fear.
Modern dogs are equipped with all of these adaptions and even further traits exaggerated by the past 150 years of selective breeding, used to create some very distinctive “pure breeds” like the pug or dachshund – hardly even a shadow of their wolf ancestors. Nonetheless, despite the many dog breeds and their unmistakable features, they can all interbreed to produce fertile offspring. This goes one step further because grey wolves and dogs can also interbreed to produce fertile offspring. This highlights just how closely related wolves and dogs are and therefore the domestication of wolves was not a human controlled event but a mutual event. With cattle or sheep humans used selective breeding for centuries to make docile, high yielding animals. However, the initial domestication of dogs was unlikely by design, instead formed by a mutualistic relationship between two top predators. It was by chance that wolves were so well adapted to join us and it was by chance again that we got into a position where our interactions became regular enough to begin domestication. I believe this is why we hold dogs in higher regard than other pets and livestock, because we first came to know them as equals, not as subordinates.
Arthur (Bn)
HOW POLLUTING IS YOUR HOME ?
...AND WHAT CAN YOU DO ABOUT IT?
C
limate change looks to be one of the greatest challenges mankind has ever faced, with global temperatures and sea levels rising at unprecedented rates. Every year the average temperature has been increase 0.18 degrees and scientists say that anything above 1.5 degrees warming will result in irreversible changes. A world in which temperatures surpass +4 degrees would be one with alarming heatwaves, droughts and extensive natural disasters. At the rate we are going the world as we know it will be a completely different place within the next 15 years, so it is imperative as individuals we take action immediate.
these number are much higher. Although these number are smaller than those in previous years and are on the decline, it simply isn’t happening at the rate in which we need it. These emissions are produced from various areas of the house, but the most prominent ones being, the boiler, energy usage, rubbish and the individuals vehicle.
So what can you do about it? Our homes significantly contribute to the global C02 level more than we might know off. In the UK alone, the average household produces 20.2 tonnes of emissions which contribute to roughly 25% of the total emissions in the country. However, these numbers are averages, and being we are at a public school and house sizes being generally bigger, we can assume
When attempting to reduce our own emissions, we can break it down into two categories, short term and long term. The short term involves methods such as making sure lights are switched off at night and reducing the number of plastic thrown away, but the long term changes are the ones that will really make the difference. These include the use of more renewable
sources of energy, converting to electric vehicles and recycling more. Presently the most impactful solution is to switch to renewable energy, such as the use of solar panels on the roof. Gas and electricity in a home produces roughly 40% of the households emissions, therefore by converting to more renewable sources of power you can greatly reduce your carbon footprint. On average solar panels cost £6000, which might seem expensive, but if you actually do the maths its cheaper in the longer run. Solar panels are said to last 40-50 years and often have a warranty for half of the time, with the average electricity bill costing £700 per year.
Secondly, recycling more will make a huge difference to the total emissions produced. Currently, most rubbish from household ends up in landfills or in the ocean, by recycling you can ensure that doesn’t happen and that your rubbish is properly sorted and redistributed.
Lastly, look at investing in an electric vehicle for you first car. A lot of people at Wellington are going to get their first car in the next few years making it the perfect time to go electric. Albeit, they are expensive in comparison to their diesel siblings but when you take into consider the environmental benefits they enormously outweigh the costs. With plans to ban the production of diesel vehicles by 2020 and electric vehicles
Amelie (O)
P
aracetamol as we know it is one of the most
How paracetamol works isn’t something that is often
widely used medicines worldwide, but what real-
thought about, and despite being a commonly used
ly is it? How does it work? And is it as safe as we all
medicine for over 100 years, it is a question that scien-
assume?
tists don’t fully know the answer to. To understand how it is believed to work, we have to know what
Acetaminophen is another name for Paracetamol, a molecule with the molecular formula C8H9NO2, which looks like this:
prostaglandins are. They are a family of tissue hormones which are produced as a response to injury or a few certain diseases. The most important function in this context is that they sensitize nerve endings so that when they are stimulated, we feel pain. The reason for this is it prevents us from doing further damage to this area. In order to reduce pain, paracetamol inhibits and therefore reduces these prostaglandins in the spinal cord, effectively increasing our pain tolerance so that we feel less pain. Similarly, to calm a fever, paracetamol affects the chemical messengers in the area of the brain which controls body temperature, the hypothalamic heat regulating centre.
The drug synthesized and tested before paracetamol It is commonly used to treat mild to moderate pain and fever, and is used by both adults and children, but interestingly the evidence for its use to treat children is actually mixed. Some of its medical uses include fever, pain, headaches and osteoarthritis.
was Acetanilide, the first medicine to have both analgesic (painkilling) and antipyretic (fever-reducing) effects, but it never hit the market due to its unacceptable toxic effects. Despite this, however, it prompted a search for a safer alternative drug with these same analgesic and antipyretic effects. Harmon Northrop Morse had
in fact already synthesized a paracetamol at John Hop-
ed. In the UK specifically, it has gained in popularity
kins University, but it wasn’t until 1887 that it was test-
massively since being added to the British Pharmaco-
ed on humans by Joseph von Mering.
poeia in 1963 as an analgesic agent with few side effects.
The image below shows Julius Axelrod, who along with Bernard Brodie, showed and explained that both Acet-
Although Paracetamol is an over-the-counter medicine,
anilide and Phenacetin (another painkiller introduced in
there are 3 main risks and side effects involved with it,
1887 which was then removed from the market in the
liver damage, skin reactions and asthma, and the pres-
late 1960’s due to its association with renal diseases
ence of only 3 side effects makes Paracetamol a rela-
and cancers in the upper urinary tract) are metabolized
tively safe drug to be using, as long as it is taken in the
to paracetamol (meaning when digested by the body,
correct doses.
they are left as and used in this form), a drug with the same positive effects on the body but is better tolerated by the body, and therefore doesn’t have any of the same adverse side effects.
The most severe of these adverse effects is liver failure, which is generally only related to consuming an amount over the suggested dose. In 2013, the U.S. FDA (food and drug administration warned that acetaminophen may be linked to some very rare, but equally severe skin conditions such as acute generalised exanthematous pustulosis, an illness which occurs mostly in elderly people with significant comorbidities (the presence of multiple medical conditions). Finally, there is a casual relationship between paracetamol and the worsening of asthmatic symptoms, but the strength of this relationship is still a topic of debate today.
So while this drug is one used widely across the world, there is a surprising amount that we still don’t know about it, and following on from this, a general lack of understanding about what paracetamol is, what it does and its history, which is an important part of treating First produced in 1887, paracetamol was first clinically used in 1893, again by von Mering and then initially marketed in 1950 in the USA and 1956 in Australia and the UK under the name Panadol. However, when it was first marketed in the United States, it was sold as a mix of paracetamol, caffeine and aspirin called Triagesic. This was then removed from the market after, in 1951, three of its users were diagnosed with a blood disease called agranulocytosis, and it took several years to prove that the two were in fact completely unrelat-
illness. Hopefully, awareness can be raised about paracetamol which can lead to its more effective use and the reduction of adverse effects or consequences which come alongside paracetamol’s many uses and benefits. Finally, I do think that paracetamol is as safe as we assume because the side effects are so rare I do believe that they are outweighed by the advantages.
NDL (Staff)
LIGHTING UP YOUR SCREENS
H
DTV, laptops, mobile phones, game systems. These windows bring us news, entertainment and our friends, not least during lockdown. The average young adult now spends over 4 hours a day on their phone alone, with these other forms of technology adding to that considerably. Computers in the 1970s were monochromatic. This was perfectly good enough for business needs at the time with computers heavily used in industries such a banking, insurance, military and meterology. The first games were invented around the same time, including Pong on the Atari, (shown to the right). However this had limited popular appeal and computers were mostly used at work, taking up whole rooms of office buildings. Until games could be displayed in the best way possible, there was no market for consumers and the most creative individuals worked in film, music and art rather than gaming. This all changed thanks to IBM Chief Engineer Mark Dean and his team. Vital inventions which were necessary to make computers accessible at home, included the ‘Industry Standard Architecture’ systems bus, a slot that was almost an early day USB. This allowed personal computers to be modified with additions including memory drives, printers and monitors which could be adapted
with new purchases. This created significant benefits in their ease of use. No longer would you need your own engineer as office computers required and technology could be seamlessly upgraded by the early adopters as new developments took place.
His next big invention, the colour graphics adapter was the first to enable the colour screen and has become the standard for later technology. This is integrated into the central processing unit and converts data and information into RGBI colour instructions for the screen to display. In the lowest resolution format, this allowed for a choice of 16 colours as shown in the image of Pakuman – the forerunner of Pac-Man. Each colour is given a 4 bit code, with the first three referring to red, green and blue components, and the final bit intensifying the brightness (for instance to go from light blue to blue or dark grey to black). The monitor
then converts the four bit value to a range of voltages between 0 and 1 with each impulse triggering the specified colour to that part of the screen.
first Colour Graphics Adapter.
The function of the screen at this time was that this voltage was fired as electron beams fired from the back of the monitor towards each pixel simultaneously. The pixels would contain quantities of phosphors, which are chemicals that can fluoresce when exposed to radiation. Their electrons are excited to a higher energy state and as they return, the energy is emitted as a wavelength of visible colour. By each pixel on the back of the screen having three different phosphors, with each emitting a different characteristic wavelength of light from the red, green or blue sections of the visible light spectrum, it became possible to produce colour images from a digital input on a home computer for the first time.
A significant proportion of the way we spend our time is, for better and worse, glued to these screens, building on the invention of the 1980s. Though mostly domestic in use, it has clearly been revolutionary for the way so many of us now live.
Without the invention of the colour graphics adapter and the colour monitor, it is not possible to see the development of so many new technologies. It was no surprise that the computer game industry exploded in the 1980s, both in arcade machines and the first gaming creations by Nintendo and Sega. The rise of personal computers and the 90s dominance of Microsoft and the return of Apple could be driven by screens. These have become portable in the form of laptops, tablets and mobile phones, whilst into the last decade, it is probably televisions that has seen the greatest innovation with flat screens, LCD and 8k TVs offering up to 67 Mega pixels of resolution – 4000 times the detail of that available from Mark Dean’s
Mark demonstrated the benefits of curiosity and creativity in his own practice, trying to build things and make things work even from a young age. This included building a tractor with his father whilst still a child. He also advocated for the benefits of a diverse workforce. The tech industry is highly homogenous. Only 5% of google’s workforce being black or Hispanic when these populations make up 43% of the population of California, the base for its HQ. Mark advocated that there are a huge number of benefits through having a broader awareness of social norms, more innovative thinking and understanding a range of markets both by country and by groups in society.
Adam (Bn)
Jake Graham (B Jake Graham (Bn
Brief introduction
dicular to it. On the other side of the second fil-
S
ter, the light intensity is reduced to 0%. This is al-
cience experiments that you can do at home are often very simple, or at least have simple
explanations. The ‘signature’ do-at-home science
experiment would be mixing bicarbonate of soda
so as expected. The reason for this as is follows. Here is a sketch of unpolarised light passing through 2 polarising filters:
and vinegar which results in lots of bubbles being formed. The concept of two things reacting to form a new product is simple, and the chemistry behind said reaction is not too hard either. However, there is an experiment which delves past the simple observations of the human eye, an experiment that baffled the top scientists for years. All it takes is 3 polarizing filters and a source of light.
The explanation (sort of!) The experiment.
Light is a wave made of oscillating electronic and magnetic radiation. Of course, the direction of os-
Let me set up the experiment: a ray of light is
cillation can change. As shown in the diagram, the
shone through a single polarising filter. On the
first polarizing filter only allows light of a specific
other side, the intensity of the light is reduced by
direction of oscillation to pass through. The sec-
50%. This is expected, as roughly half of the light is
ond polarizing filter’s “angle of polarization” (i.e.
filtered out by the polarising filter. A second polar-
whatever direction of oscillation is allowed to pass
ising filter is placed behind the first filter, perpen-
through) is perpendicular to the first one.
The first one has filtered out anything that is not
45 degrees between it and a vertical filter.
in a specific direction so when it meets the second filter none of the light from the first one is able to get through, as shown in the picture below.
Further explanation The explanation for this experiment goes beyond the realms of classical mechanics and takes a dive into quantum mechanics. The reason for this, is that photons or particles of light, are so small that they do not act how we expect particles to act. They act in strange ways never thought possible. This experiment showcases one of the weird ways these particles behave.
However, quantum physics is not simple. The majority of concepts in quantum physics do not have This makes logical sense, as all of the light is
any sort of real-world analogues or analogies. It is
“pointing” in one direction after the first filter, and
so different from classical mechanics that an en-
the second filter only lets light through that is
tirely different mathematical alphabet was created
pointing in the complete opposite direction. The
to just attempt to describe the mysteries of the
real mystery is revealed when we add in a third
quantum world. So, instead of trying to explain it
filter, in between the two original filters at a 45
in the last few words of this article, I will simply
degree angle. Most people would think that this
leave it here. If you do wish to learn more about
filter doesn’t change anything, and that no light
this, I recommend first learning about bra-ket no-
would get through in the end. However, upon
tation before reading more about this subject.
performing the test, we find that this is not the case. Instead, we find out that instead of all of the
light being filtered out, we find that roughly 75% of the light is filtered out, as shown below.
With a classical understanding of physics, this would be impossible. The filter does not physically change the properties of light, and thus adding a third filter at a different angle should not change anything. There is no way that the third filter
could “know” whether or not there is a filter at
Jake (Bn)
Y
ou’re likely familiar with the mountain of tablets and capsules, creams and lotions, syrups, drops, inhalers and other medications that dwell in your medicine cabinet. But what makes these ‘medicine cabinet essentials’, essential? What makes painkillers easy treatments for fever or toothache, and—while they won’t cure regret—how can they help you cope with a hangover? Antihistamines, indigestion treatments, and anti-diarrhoea tablets are also hallmarks of a wellstocked medicine cabinet, but how do they work? Here are a few such medications and their modes of action, which will offer some insight into the most popular medicine cabinet essentials.
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ness, warmth, and painful swelling as fluids leak into surrounding tissues. Therefore, the therapeutic, pain-relieving effects of NSAIDs are attributed to the lack of these signalling molecules. Indeed, the ability to tackle headaches caused by inflammations make these useful hangover cures.
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Starting with the medicine cabinet powerhouses, NSAIDs include ibuprofen, aspirin, and naproxen, among many others. They are anti-inflammatories which work by inhibiting the activity of cyclooxygenase (COX) enzymes responsible for converting a compound called arachidonic acid (found naturally in the body) into a number of signalling molecules which play a “house-keeping” role in regulating many physiological processes, including causing inflammation (on the diagram, these molecules are shown as PGE2, TXA2, and PGI2) Inflammation occurs due to a high amount of blood flow into areas of injury or infection, resulting in red-
NSAIDs also prevent blood clotting by the same mechanism; one of these signalling molecules, called thromboxane (TXA2 on the diagram), promotes the adhesion of platelets (one of the key components involved in blood clotting). When COX enzymes are inhibited by NSAIDs, they are unable to synthesise thromboxane; thus, many NSAIDs have anti-coagulant properties,
useful for reducing the incidence of heart attacks for those who are at risk. The importance of NSAIDs is enormous. Aspirin and ibuprofen have earned a spot on the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines, among other medications considered to be the most safe and effective in meeting the most important needs of any health system.
Summer is almost universally something that people look forward to. For those with pollen allergies, however, summer usually means the start of the hay fever season. Allergies occur when the body reacts to a compound as if it were harmful, initiating an unnecessary immune response. Pollen is just one allergy of many, but allergic reactions all work in a similar way; they involve the release of a huge amount of histamine. Histamine is a compound responsible for many symptoms of an allergic reaction. They attract white blood cells to the area of perceived ‘infection’, and cause inflammation by triggering capillaries to widen and fluid to leak into surround tissue, leading to swelling, tenderness, and redness. Treating allergic symptoms, therefore, becomes a case of simply blocking the activity of histamine. Antihistamines counteract the downstream effects of histamine by blocking H (histamine) receptors, so that any histamine released cannot reach its target area, reducing the severity of allergic symptoms. Antihistamines are not a cure to allergies, but they are useful in treating them. It is worth noting, however, that the development and use of antihistamines is changing. First generation antihistamines have a prominent seda-
tive effect, and for this reasons they are now are far less favoured as a means of treating allergies. Recently, they have been superseded by a newer, second generation of antihistamines which are designed to be as effective as before, but less sedating.
Whether or not caffeine qualifies as a ‘medicine cabinet essential’ may depend on who you ask, but considering that 90% of adults worldwide consume caffeine in some form, it is worth discussing here. First, consider a molecule called adenosine. It is one of the fundamental building blocks of DNA and RNA— essential for all life that we know of—and regulates a huge array of physiological processes. Adenosine helps in cellular energy transfer by forming molecules like adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and adenosine diphosphate (ADP). It also plays a role in various reaction pathways in the brain by forming signalling molecules like cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP). It is adenosine’s role in promoting sleep, however, that is most affected by caffeine. In the brain, adenosine is an inhibitory neurotransmitter which suppresses nerve cell activity and causes drowsiness. Levels of adenosine gradually rise when we are awake such that we feel sleepy toward the end of the day before it is broken down over night and the cycle repeats. Caffeine is similar in chemical structure to adenosine and is therefore able to occupy the same receptors in the synapse that adenosine can. However, while adenosine activates these receptors (making it an agonist), caffeine does not (making it an antagonist). Thus, when caffeine is blocking these receptors, adenosine is temporarily unable to bind to and activate them, leading to feelings of alertness.
Annabel (O)
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any of you have heard of Thomas Edison as he is often credited as being the inventor behind the incandescent light bulb, but did you know that before him British inventors were demonstrating the capabilities of electric light through their arc lamps (types of electrical lamps). The first constant electric light was demonstrated in 1835 and for years after it scientists worked with incandescent lamps , changing the filament (the part of the bulb that produces light) and the bulbs atmosphere (whether the lamp has a vacuum or if it is filled with another gas). But there was a problem with these bulbs. They were extremely inefficient, expensive to produce and used too much energy. So, more thinking was required before they could be of any use.
These problems seemed to be answered by a bulb created by Toman Edison who often credited with the invention of the light bulb. He patented his first sucessful bulb in 1879 which had a bamboo filament. This bulb was able to last 1,200 hours and seemed to solve many of the issues that occurred with previous light bulbs. Because of this the bamboo filament because the standard filament for all his lightbulbs produced in the next 10
years. Edison is also rightfully credited with creating the standard screw fitting all our current light bulbs have. Not only did he improve the light bulb, but he also developed a whole range of inventions that helped make the use of light bulbs practical. He demonstrated that electricity could be distributed from a centrally located generator though conduits (channels that electricity can pass through) and wires. He also developed the first commercial power unit and an electric meter so customers could see how much electricity they were using. Artificial lighting had now gone from something that could only be produced in a lab to something that was commercially viable.
As demand grew so did researchers desire to see if they could create anything better and more efficient. The next big breakthrough was in the 20th century when European researchers were doing experiments with neon tubes coated with phosphors (a material that absorbs ultraviolet light and converts it into visible light). These experiments lead to multiple fluorescent light breakthroughs. The need for energy-efficient lighting in American war plants led to the rapid production and use of fluorescents which were able to last longer and were 3 times more efficient then incandescent bulbs. Because of the 1973 oil crisis, lighting engineers developed a fluorescent bulb that could be used residentially as before this point fluorescent lights could not be used in the house. In 1976 Edward Hammer found a way to bend the fluorescent tube into a spiral shape creating the first compact fluorescent light, which is still used in many households today.
The final historical milestone that the light bulb underwent is the development of LEDS. LED stands for light-emitting diode and works by using a semiconductor to covert electricity into light. LEDS are useful as they can emit light in a specific direction, reducing the need for reflectors and diffusers that can trap light. These bulbs are also the most efficient lights around with the ability to produce 85 lumens (measure of light) per watt. By comparing this to an incandescent bulb which emits light at 15 lumens per watt you can see just how much better LED lights are.
Like all great inventions the light bulb we know today was not created by one inventor but was rather a series of small discoveries that together allow us to see in the night. This process of gradual improvements on the ideas of previous inventors is common in the world of creation and is the main reason the world is the way it is today.
EDITORS Arthur Tess Blake Jake Amelie Adam Annabel
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