Life Lines by Dr. Dolittle

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Archive for December 2018

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Importance and dangers of oxygen for air-breathing animals

Although oxygen is essential for air-breathing species and allowed for the evolution of multicellular organisms, it is also a dangerous molecule that can lead to cellular toxicity through the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS). However, it is important to point out that cellular ROS also play several physiological roles in the body. I just read an interesting review article published in Physiological Reviews that explored natural oxygen delivery and availability […]

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Porcine adaptation to heat stress

  A new study published in American Journal of Physiology – Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology explored the effects of modest heat stress (35°C, 95°F) on the physiology of pigs. The found that pigs exposed to heat stress ate less than those exposed to ambient temperatures. I understand. I eat less when it is hot outside too. Since skeletal muscle is such a large metabolically active tissue, things that alter muscle metabolism […]

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How sheep are helping human pregnancies

    The growth and development of a human fetus is difficult to study, both practically and ethically, as I am sure you can imagine. A new review article published in the American Journal of Physiology – Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology explored how sheep have helped solve this problem as fetal sheep share similar brain, lung and cardiac development and placental physiology with humans, many aspects of which differ from […]

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