By Xingran Weng, DrPH This article is based on the dissertation of Dr. Xingran Weng who defended his thesis at PSCOM on February 22, 2022. Let’s think about a tough situation Imagine an older individual has been diagnosed with cancer and moderate to severe Alzheimer’s disease (AD) (roughly 20% older persons with cancer diagnosed with … Continue reading How Aggressive and Costly is End-of-Life Care for Cancer Patients with Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Dementias?
Mental March Madness: How To Train Your Brain
By Victoria Vernail What is the difference between a graduate student and Michael Jordan? MJ likely has superior physical features – he’s bigger, stronger, and faster. But what you are not be able to see is that his brain, and the brains of many competitive athletes, exhibit unique features. Changes in the brain such as … Continue reading Mental March Madness: How To Train Your Brain
Predicting Alzheimer’s Disease: The Rise of Novel Biomarkers
By Rebecca Fleeman Why are some diseases easy to diagnose and others aren’t? For instance, we can get a COVID rapid test and have a result in hours, whereas a disease like Alzheimer’s requires numerous tests over several months to make a diagnosis. Simply put, COVID is an infectious disease, caused by one single known … Continue reading Predicting Alzheimer’s Disease: The Rise of Novel Biomarkers
Is Your Research Killing The Planet While Saving Human Lives?
By Savannah Marshall As researchers, we set out to improve human health. However, laboratory research in the US emits over 21 million metric tons of carbon dioxide every year.1,2 The relationship between carbon emissions and harm to humanity is difficult to quantify, however, researchers at Columbia University reported in Nature Communications that every million metric … Continue reading Is Your Research Killing The Planet While Saving Human Lives?
COVID-19 Causes Lingering Brain Fog: How Can We Combat The Effects?
By Laura Budurlean Are you a victim of “brain fog”? You can blame the pandemic. Individuals previously infected with SARS-CoV-2, resulting in COVID-19, sometimes experience lingering brain fog, one of the symptoms of post-acute COVID-19 syndrome (PACS or “long-COVID”). Brain fog is characterized by a general confusion, an inability to focus, and decreased mental clarity … Continue reading COVID-19 Causes Lingering Brain Fog: How Can We Combat The Effects?
Stuff To Tick You Off
By Greg Kincheloe As the winter finally draws to an end (albeit a long and drawn-out end), it is time to start looking forward to warmer weather, sunshine, and leaves on the trees once again. Accompanying this warmer weather are more opportunities to reconnect with nature and the great outdoors. Soon, trails and parks will … Continue reading Stuff To Tick You Off
Getting to the Heart of the Problem: The Penn State Heart Legacy
By Victoria Silvis Since the first successful kidney transplant in 1954, organ transplantation has become an increasingly common procedure with over 39,000 occurring in the United States in 2020.1,2 While the pancreas, heart, and liver were the next organs to be transplanted in the 1960’s, organ procurement was a challenge, as the United Network for … Continue reading Getting to the Heart of the Problem: The Penn State Heart Legacy
Penicillin: One Of The First Antibiotics
By Hannah Johnson Figure 1: Structure of penicillin (Getty Images, 2022). Some of the first antibiotics found to treat bacterial infections were discovered in the late 1800s and early 1900s by Paul Ehrlich and Alexander Fleming, starting the antibiotic era. Ehrlich is credited for the idea of a chemical compound capable of selectively targeting microbes … Continue reading Penicillin: One Of The First Antibiotics
The Pandora’s Box of Scientific Publishing
By Rebecca Fleeman You, a critical thinker and curious person, hear about a recent scientific discovery or therapeutic that you want to learn more about. Rather than becoming an armchair expert by watching the latest unqualified YouTube video on the topic or queueing up a biased celebrity's podcast, you intelligently seek out peer-reviewed scientific studies … Continue reading The Pandora’s Box of Scientific Publishing
Navigating Conversations with Vaccine-Hesitant Family and Friends
By Julia Simpson One year into the COVID-19 pandemic, members of my extended family began reaching out to me with questions about the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines that the FDA had approved under Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) just a month prior1, 2. Anti-vaccine rhetoric rang through their social circles and media, and they hoped that, … Continue reading Navigating Conversations with Vaccine-Hesitant Family and Friends
Lions Talk Science 