News Author Ann Constantino
The Pain in Spain Stays Mainly in Your Brain
Photo by Andrew Neel from Pexels Suppose your beloved but clumsy dance partner steps on your foot and you immediately feel pain, identified by your brain as clearly being in the crushed appendage, but what exactly is that sensation and where does it…
May Be Habit Forming
Photo by Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash Around this time of year, the end of one and beginning of another, many people are inclined to make some changes. Spurred by the sense of renewal that turning over the December page can…
The Deep End of the Gene Pool
Photo by CDC on Unsplash The old scientific debate of nature vs. nurture has taken on some promising new directions since the field of epigenetics has been developing over the past few decades. Every living thing carries a genetically coded…
Whatever Happens in Vagus, Stays in Vagus
Photo by Kelvin Valerio from Pexels There is a nerve in the human body that regulates heart function, influences digestion, informs you when it’s safe to relax, and promotes efficient swallowing and speaking. This longest cranial nerve (originating in the brain) also receives…
Don’t Cramp My Style
Photo by Imani Bahati on Unsplash What happens when the nerves within your muscle tissue become abnormally excitable or confused? That muscle will involuntarily contract, tense and shorten, resulting in what is called either a spasm or a cramp, or any number…
It’s a Stretch
Photo by Anupam Mahapatra Can you touch your toes without bending your knees? Can you scratch that itch in the center of your back? How about doing the splits the way you could when you were on the Cheer team…
Fascia-natin’ Rhythm
Photo by Geert Pieters on Unsplash Around the exercise and movement world, connective tissue known as fascia was once scraped aside as unimportant by anatomists studying the more self-explanatory tissues such as muscle and bone. These days fascia is being…
Being in the Zone
Photo by S Migaj on Unsplash Last time we talked about neuroplasticity and how the brain can change itself based on what is demanded of it and how it is used. Among the various restructurings that have been studied are…
Your Brain on Plastic
Photo by Rebe Pascual on Unsplash Not long ago neuroscientists believed that the human brain developed along a predictable timeline and that windows for certain types of growth closed at some point, creating a kind of final draft of the…
Finding the Balance
Photo by Pixabay from Pexels Balance is such an important factor in health that the human body evolved several distinct systems to keep itself upright in all kinds of shaky situations. When one or another is compromised, the others kick in more efficiently…