Academic Studies

This morning, I was taking a course with the department of continuing studies "Italian for Travellers", we are getting closer to going and that trip. Work and family health issues have been factors causing us to delay this wonderful expedition. After the class, I had to stop at the shelf which held the usual array of university newspapers. According to some people,I am an info-maniac . I love reading about what is going and about events that I might attend.

Today the research topics were fascinating. Apparently, Memory loss is linked to limb length.
" A new study has found that a person's risk of memory loss may be related to the length of their limbs. 'Body measures such as knee height and arm span are often used as biological indicators of early life deficits, such as a lack of nutrients,' said study leader Tina Huang of Tufts University. Huang and her researchers recorded arm span and knee height measurements for 2,798 people over a span of five years. Also findings relayed that Alzheimer's disease and dementia were 50 per cent more likely to afflict women with shorter arm spans. Women were less likely to develop dementia if their knee to floor measurements were longer than average. Only shorter arm span was correlated with increased possibility of dementia in men. 'Our findings with knee height and arm span are consistent with previous reports and suggest early life environment may play an important role in the determination of future dementia risk' the researchers wrote."

Who would have thought that these parts of the anatomy would have this effect on our future brain function? Who would have thought that someone would try to correlate these aspects of the anatomy?

Another topic was "Emotion: enemy of science or friend of reason?" Food for thought!