Quickies: December Briefs

Compiled by Isabella Chow

Researchers report in Nature (November 2, 1995) that a structure in the hypothalmus of the brain, where sexuality is thought to lie, differs significantly between ordinary men and transformed "man-to-woman" transsexuals. Researches at the Netherlands Institute for Brain Research, led by Dr. Dick F. Swaab, discovered that the lower region of the hypothalmus is 50 percent larger in men than in woman, and almost 60 percent larger in men than in male-to-female transsexuals.

A report in the Journal of American Medical Association (November 1995) says that sugar consumption does not significantly affect the way most children act or think. The conclusion was drawn from a review of studies involving more than 500 children. Led by Dr. Mark L. Wolraich, Vanderbilt University's Child Development Center, the report asserts that the myth originated from inconclusive studies in 1980 and 1986, in which it was impossible to tell whether sugar caused hyperactivity or hyperactivity led children to consume sugar. The research also notes that children tend to get excited at parties and on holidays, when large amounts of sugar are consumed. However, that variation in behavior may be related to the events themselves, not a chemical reaction to sugar.

Scientists from the University of California at Los Angeles have grown a tiny green shoot from a 1,288 year old lotus seed. The seed is believed to be the oldest ever to germinate, and it may offer information about the aging process, reported Dr. Jane Shen- Miller, a plant physiologist at U.C.L.A., in the November issue of the American Journal of Botany. The researchers attributed several factors to the seed's longevity, i.e., a thick protective shell, and the presence of L-isoaspartyl methyl-transferase enzyme (the first protein-repair enzyme), which "fends off all age-related damage." The seed was obtained from a dry lake bed that was once the site of a Buddhist-cultivated lotus lake.