In 2011, Jacques Ravel and other scientists of the Institute for Genome Sciences in Baltimore, investigated vaginal microbial communities of healthy, asymptomatic participants in four ethnic groups (Asian, Black, Hispanic, and white). The study uncovered that, while the definitive causes of variation among vaginal microbiomes (the microbe ecosystem) are unknown, the causes of differences between ethnicities could include differences in immune systems and substances present in the vagina. The report also stipulates that health practices, personal hygiene, birth control, and sexual behaviour have all been shown to affect the microbial makeup of vaginas.

Differences in immune systems, health practices, personal hygiene, birth control, and sexual behaviour have all been shown to affect the makeup of vaginas.

The study revealed that although 73 per cent of participants had Lactobacillus-predominant vaginas, the remaining 27 per cent had higher proportions of anaerobic bacteria, which grow without oxygen, but like Lactobacillus, also produce lactic acid. They also found that vaginal pH is higher among Hispanic (pH 5.0) and Black (pH 4.7) participants, relative to Asian (pH 4.4) and white (pH 4.2) participants. Consistently, about 80 per cent of Asian and white people have Lactobacillus-predominant vaginas, whereas only 60 per cent of Hispanic and Black people do. BV was overrepresented in Hispanic and Black people, but all participants studied were asymptomatic, leading the authors to caution that non-Lactobacillus-predominant vaginas should not be viewed as “unhealthy.” According to the authors, vaginal ecosystems are dynamic and complex, varying between and within individuals and across their lifespan; there is no single “normal” vaginal microbiome.

Incidentally, it is known that vaginal douching – washing out the vagina using water or other fluids – destabilizes the vaginal microbiome and increases vulnerability to infections.

The research of primates
Süleyman Yildirim and fellow reserachers at the Institute for Genomic Biology in Illinois, found in a study that increased vaginal length and volume, multiple partners, and genital swelling, result in increased exposure to microbes in the case of primates. Accordingly, the authors reported that primate vaginal microbial communities vary as a function of these traits, as well as the geographic origin of each primate species.

In humans, vaginal biodiversity decreases in puberty, during which period certain bacterial communities become predominant in the vagina, a development thought to maximize fertility and protection against pathogens. Stability of vaginal microbiomes has been reported to decrease during menstruation and increase during the follicular phase (higher hormone count) of the menstrual cycle.

Mayu Uchihashi and fellow researchers at the University of Michigan decided to study baboon vaginas, seeking to establish a relationship in baboon vaginal microbiome composition with age and reproductive cycle. The biodiversity and pH of non-human primate vaginas is significantly greater than among those of humans. There is a relative scarcity of Lactobacillus in non-human primates. Although microbial diversity in baboons did not vary with reproductive cycling or menstruation, it did reduce during puberty, presumably to optimize bacterial composition for each baboon’s health with the introduction of sexual activity.

As baboons have a relative scarcity of Lactobacillus, Uchihashi and colleagues proposed that the high microbial diversity of baboons leads to greater competition for limited niches (specialized environments for survival), which inhibit colonization (invasion)of infectious bacteria. However, this would suggest that bacterial diversity ought to increase in baboons during puberty, whereas the study found a decrease. The authors proposed that maintaining high bacterial diversity requires high amounts of energy, but that the fewer species represent a wider variation in function, and thus effectively compete with pathogens for limited niches. Thus, pruning of vaginal bacterial communities during puberty may select out functionally-redundant bacteria. Surprisingly, bacteria associated with BV and considered pathogenic in humans, such as Prevotella, Sneathia, and Mobiluncus, were found in healthy, asymptomatic baboons.

Vaginal ecosystems are dynamic and complex […] There is no “normal” vaginal microbiome.

These findings reiterate that the vaginal microbiome is an unpredictable and incredibly complex ecosystem. Some scientists such as Ravel have proposed computational models as a solution to this complexity, so these microbiomes cannot be reduced to ratios of bacterial communities. Understanding the vaginal microbiome in humans and other primates has implications for vaginal health such as BV, STIs, and fertility, as well as appreciation of vaginal ecology, brimming with life forms whose dynamics are essential to vaginal health.

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Scientists, armed with the empirical eyes of astrophysics, are scanning the universe in search of extraterrestrials, but are yet to uncover any cosmic cousins. Meanwhile, despite the absence of any tangible evidence, belief in extraterrestrial visitations and reported sightings are rampant. Legendary physicist Richard Feynman, when asked whether or not he believes in flying saucer visitations, responded,“I think it is much more likely that the reports of flying saucers are the result of the known, irrational characteristics of terrestrial intelligence rather than the unknown, rational characteristics of extraterrestrial intelligence.” However, the vastness of the cosmos, home to about one hundred billion galaxies, each populated by about one hundred billion suns, led the inimitable astronomer Carl Sagan to believe that the likelihood of extraterrestrials existing exceeds the likelihood of Earth being the only planet from which life arose.

Professor Jim Bell, a visiting scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, spoke at the event about NASA’s exploration of Mars by launching rovers to explore the habitability of the red planet. The rovers comprise Spirit and Opportunity, which launched in 2003, and Curiosity, which launched in 2011. These rovers differ from the unmanned NASA probes, such as Viking, in terms of enhanced mobility and navigation. The ‘robot geologist’ rovers include mechanical arms, microscopic imagers, and scientific instrumentation to analyze soil and rock composition, meteorology, hydrogen content, and chemical isotopes. Bell explained that, although Mars is a cold and dry planet with a thin atmosphere, the rovers have accumulated evidence of ancient river valley networks and mineral pattern formations that plausibly required water. If the cosmic clock could be turned back, it’s possible that Mars was previously Earth-like.

Nickell also argued that many alien abduction reports are attributable to sleep paralysis, in which the body is paralyzed and the individual experiences intensely fearful hallucinations, characterized by a presence culturally interpreted as an alien, witch, or ghost.

Jill Tarter, famously portrayed by Jodie Foster in the film Contact, holds the Bernard M. Oliver Chair for SETI (search for extraterrestrial intelligence) Research at the SETI Institute. Using optical and radio telescopes, SETI searches for evidence of technological signals, which are treated as a proxy for intelligent life. Tarter, stating that “it takes a cosmos to make a human,” explained that the elements required for life, such as the iron found in haemoglobin, were cooked inside of stars that exploded. “We are stardust.” SETI’s telescope technology is increasing exponentially, in accordance with Moore’s Law, and telescope assemblies are growing from the present 42-telescope array to much larger projected 350-telescope arrays. Tarter explained that evidence of extraterrestrials may give humans hope that we can survive our technological adolescence without destroying ourselves. The mission of SETI, according to Tarter, is to “discover what the rest of the stardust in our universe has turned into.”

Professor Sara Seager is a planetary scientist, astrophysicist and 2013 MacArthur fellow. She is searching for planets orbiting stars other than our sun, dubbed exoplanets, earning the title of “astronomical Indiana Jones.” Fascinatingly, the search for exoplanets suggests that each star should have at least one orbiting planet. Seager is probing the universe for exoplanets in the “goldilocks zone,” that are not too hot or too cold but just right for sustaining life. She explained the difficulty in detecting exoplanets, analogous to trying to see a firefly in the glare of a searchlight. However, the brightness of a star dims as a planet transits in front of it, and if this dimming is regular and predictable, we can determine the planetary period. Given the enormity of space, Seager explained that we cannot yet visit any exoplanets. To illustrate, the space probe Voyager travels at 20 km/second, requiring 70,000 years to reach the nearest star. Although we cannot yet visit, we can detect traces of gases in an exoplanet atmosphere that might be attributable to life. As a planet transits in front of a star, starlight beams through its atmosphere, allowing astrophysicists to identify elements such as water vapour, sodium, and potassium gas. Detecting oxygen in an exoplanet atmosphere would be exciting, as Earth’s atmospheric oxygen is produced by plants and photosynthetic bacteria. One day, Seager wishes to point to the sky and say “that star has a planet like Earth.”

Joe Nickell, Senior Research Fellow of the Committee for the Skeptical Inquiry, addressed the mythology of UFOs. Nickell explained that he’s not a “dismissive, arm-chair, put-downer” debunker, but rather, an investigator who does fieldwork and searches for evidence of purported claims. Nickell presented the history and variety of two modern mythologies: Big Foot and extraterrestrials. He proposed that extraterrestrials represent projections of our future selves, with oversized brains and vestigial bodies. He also presented images of crop circles that he physically produced, identical to those supposedly created by aliens. Nickell also argued that many alien abduction reports are attributable to sleep paralysis, in which the body is paralyzed and the individual experiences intensely fearful hallucinations, characterized by a presence culturally interpreted as an alien, witch, or ghost.

The four incredibly entertaining speakers illuminated the imagination and curiosity of the audience, without sensationalizing the science. Although there is, as of yet, no evidence of technological whispers from other worlds, scientists are actively listening, scanning, and exploring with equally open and skeptical minds.

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Physicists have uncovered evidence of a chunk of the universe that does not interact with electromagnetic energy whatsoever. No human or instrument will ever see or touch it. This substance is known as dark matter. Dark matter neither emits nor reflects light. It freely passes through objects and is eight times more abundant than ‘ordinary’ matter. Extraordinary claims about these ghost-like particles demand extraordinary evidence. Gil Holder, professor of cosmology and astrophysics at McGill, recently gave a Public Astro Night lecture entitled “Does This Dark Matter Make My Galaxy Look Fat?”

In his lecture, Holder first explained that observable mass (stars, gas, and dust) is concentrated at the centre of galaxies. More mass is associated with greater gravitational fields, and consequently, faster rotational velocities – the speed at which stars and gas clouds orbit around a galaxy’s centre. Based on this observation, cosmologists predicted that rotational velocity of celestial bodies would decrease as the distance from the center of the galaxy increases. This means that the farther an object is away from the centre of the galaxy, the slower it would rotate; however, to scientists’ surprise, measurements obtained by astronomer Vera Rubin revealed that rotational velocities remained approximately the same.

Mysteriously, there is not nearly enough observable mass at the outskirts of galaxies to account for the observation that rotational velocities stayed relatively the same. In fact, eight times more mass than that which is observable would be required to explain this discrepancy. This either means that there is an invisible source of mass or physicists profoundly misunderstand gravity. Hence, even though Einstein’s general relativity theory of gravity is consistent with every scientific observation to date, some physicists believe that gravity needs to be reconceptualized.

Large masses such as galaxies and clusters of galaxies have large gravitational fields that bend the fabric of space-time, bending the paths of light. When two galaxies align, one in the foreground and one in the background, astrophysicists can determine the mass of the closer galaxy by measuring the mass-induced distortion of light. Curiously, the number eight appears again – eight times more mass than the observable mass is required to produce the light distortions observed by scientists.

In a follow-up interview, The Daily asked Holder if it’s possible that dark matter has an extremely tiny, but thus far undetectable interaction with light. While admitting the possibility, he explained, “The problem is that light interacts far more strongly with ordinary matter than any other force. If there were some interaction, it would be hard to understand why it would be so weak compared to any other particle in the universe.”

Dark matter is hypothesized to interact via the weak force, one of the fundamental forces of nature. The weak force “[accounts for] all the things that dark matter does,” Holder stated; however, he admitted that this is only a plausible hypothesis and more evidence is required. It is only hypothesized that dark matter interacts via the weak force, and there is only indirect evidence of its gravitational interaction. Further, he explained that if dark matter only interacts with the force of gravity, then it would never be detected. He speculated that there may be “interesting interactions of dark matter that have no coupling with our world except through gravity.”

In order to detect dark matter, cosmologists have conducted underground experiments to shield their instruments from cosmic rays (sources of noise). The hope is to find evidence of dark matter interacting via the weak force; so far, however, dark matter has not been directly detected.

Cosmologists estimate that the universe is made of 4.9 per cent observable matter, 26.8 per cent dark matter, and 68.3 per cent of another strange entity called dark energy. It’s believed that dark energy is responsible for the accelerating expansion of our universe.

As cosmologists and astrophysicists continue their efforts to render dark matter scientifically measurable, we can appreciate the astounding fact of how little we perceive (or understand) of the universe. Historically, humans declared themselves as masters of a planet they believed to be the centre of the universe. Scientists have revealed that our tiny world orbits an ordinary star among hundreds of billions in an ordinary galaxy among hundreds of billions. Further discouraging our irrational self-importance, cosmologists have revealed that all the ingredients for making staplers, humans, and galaxies constitute only a tiny fraction of reality; however, I would rather be an insignificant inhabitant of a vastly more interesting cosmos than the delusional ruler of a boring world.

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Historically, the question of freedom has been at the forefront of academic and political conversation. Legal systems in most parts of the world are based on the assumption that human beings have the ability to act in accordance with their intentions; however, scientific evidence reveals that this story is not so black and white. Neuroscientific experiments conducted during the 1980s and 1990s revealed controversial results which challenged the commonly-held conception of free will.

One of these experiments was carried out by Benjamin Libet, a former researcher at the University of California San Francisco. He asked participants to perform a simple decision-making task which involved pressing a button while observing a clock. They were asked to report the clock’s position at the moment the decision was made. Concurrently, the brain activity of the participants was measured using electroencephalographic recordings (a technique that records electrical activity in the brain with electrodes attached to the scalp). The researcher found that there was significant brain activity in the SMA (supplementary motor area), a neural region responsible for initiating motor action, 350 milliseconds prior to the time when subjects reported being aware of their own choices.

If the brain is a physical entity, embedded in a physical universe, governed by causal relationships, is there space for free will?

More recently, in 2007, John-Dylan Haynes and colleagues conducted a study using functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI), a method that assesses neural activity by measuring blood flow and oxygenation in the brain. They tried to more closely assess what was happening in the brain prior to a decision while looking at a decision with two alternatives rather than one. Participants had to press one of two buttons with either their right or left index fingers. At the same time, they were looking at a series of changing random letters, and were asked to recall the letter they observed when the decision was made. The analysis of the results showed an increase in metabolic activity of two motor areas of the brain up to five seconds before the conscious decision.

The findings of these experiments were interpreted by some determinists – who believe that all events are caused by prior events – as evidence that free will is an illusion and that our decisions are predetermined by unconscious brain processes. This controversial position initiated the ongoing discourse between philosophers and neuroscientists, regarding the existence of free will.

These concepts were addressed in IRCM’s most recent Café Scientifique, “It’s Not My Fault, My Brain Made Me Do It!” During this event, three perspectives were presented to the general public, including those of Daniel Weinstock, a law professor at McGill; Lesley Fellows, neurologist and neuroscientist at the Montreal Neurological Institute; and Veljko Dubljevic, neuroethicist at the Institut De Recherche Clinique De Montreal (IRCM).

Weinstock started by reviewing the main ideas on the relationship between the brain and mind. He introduced the concept of dualism, which views the physical brain and subjective mind as separate entities. The more prevalent position among scientists is monism, the belief that the mind and brain are a single entity.

“There is an irrational exuberance on the expectations of what neuroscience can tell us. Other levels of description are needed to understand human beings.”

Daniel Weinstock, Law professor at McGill

If the brain is a physical entity, embedded in a physical universe, governed by causal relationships, is there space for free will? Although he is a monist, Weinstock considers that human beings are sensitive to reason (we can rationalize and explain our decisions), and that this fact must be integrated with our understanding of decision-making. Further, he also emphasized the mistaken conception that neuroscience will explain all aspects of human nature. “There is an irrational exuberance on the expectations of what neuroscience can tell us. Other levels of description are needed to understand human beings,” said Weinstock.

Fellows began by addressing the link between human behaviour and brain processes. She affirmed that all human behaviour can be explained by neural activity; however, she considers that the neurological basis of our actions does not threaten free will. Fellows spoke up against the misinterpretation and exaggeration of scientific findings. When talking about the Libet and fMRI experiments, she explained that, “Being able to predict behaviour doesn’t mean it’s determined.” She also believes that only simple systems in our brain are predictable, whereas higher order decisions (e.g., deciding on which school to apply to) are governed by complex circuits and random events. She concluded that none of the neuroscientific evidence removes responsibility for our actions.

The final speaker, Dubljevic, began by stating that misconceptions exist on both sides of the argument: among neurologists and neuroscientists, but also among philosophers and ethicists. In order to integrate the scientific findings and the philosophical concepts, a new discipline has emerged: neuroethics. From his point of view, “free will” is a metaphysical concept and therefore it can’t be explained nor refuted by physical findings. He believes it should thus be reframed as “self-control” and “autonomy,” which are more compatible with the scientific approach to the problem. According to him, there is a meaningful difference between a patient with frontal lobe damage who cannot exercise self-control, and a person without brain damage who can. He then described liberty as the capacity to exercise choices in the absence of coercion or compulsion. Dubljevic believes in the importance of practical applications rather than philosophical debates.

This fascinating multidisciplinary dialogue illustrates the challenges in rationally or empirically validating an elusive concept like free will. Despite the variety of perspectives, the three speakers agreed that there is no neuroscientific annulment of free will. Nevertheless, the evidence derived from recent experiments has opened the door to debate the source of our choices. These discussions not only enrich our understanding of human nature, but also helps to answer the difficult question of whether society considers individuals responsible for their own actions.

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Imagine a miniaturized version of yourself clinging to the head of a bullet as you travel through space, while hopelessly struggling to observe the world around you. At any given moment, our visual systems are being flooded with information from the world around us. Amid this stampede of stimuli, our brains have evolved to attend to significant incoming data and ignore irrelevant distractions. For instance, one is more likely to pay attention to a sexual partner than a cardboard box, because one poses a far greater evolutionary advantage than the other. Because we never see the world exactly as it is, our memories will also reflect these biases, revealing that our perceptions and recollections of reality are distorted.

These inherent limitations of our species have given rise to lifelogging technologies, first-person video recorders mounted on the user’s body that  intend to capture the entirety of a person’s life. The LifeLogger camera records high-definition video and is coupled to a cloud-based online database, which serves to process and organize the mountains of data. The device, positioned to the side of one’s face, has a GPS, is motion-sensitive, and is able to live-stream events from your perspective to anyone in the world. Further, the GPS permits one to know exactly where they were and in which direction they were facing during these recordings. It is even possible to search for a sound recording and extract other moments when this sound was heard. The device is not only capable of face-detection, but stores every instance of every face ever observed, and permits one to search and replay their moments with this particular person.

It is not difficult to imagine the implications of this technology on social media. If individuals begin to share their video-logged data, rather than scrolling through photos of a friend on Facebook, we will be able to search through every instance of their life; perhaps searching for our own face in their LifeLog, and experiencing ourselves from their perspective. Another lifelogging device known as Memento is marketed as a “searchable and shareable photographic memory.” It may become normative to upload one’s entire life for public viewing.

In addition to visual and auditory stimuli, it is possible that future lifelogging will include information about smell, touch, and spatial location, allowing one to fully experience another person’s life. Although this may appear unrealistic, consider the oPhone, a device that records and shares smells, which was developed by Le Laboratoire in Paris in collaboration with students at Harvard University.

Despite undeniable privacy concerns, the benefits of such a technological social revolution are limitless. These technologies may be implemented to overcome the inherent limitations of subjective reporting and anecdotal evidence. The benefits to psychologists, epidemiologists, historians, and other scholars would be stupendous. Lifelogging devices may also be used to assist those with untreatable neurological conditions. For instance, researcher Lorena Arcega and her colleagues at San Jorge University, published an article in the open-access journal Sensors to advocate the use of Lifelogging to combat the fallibility and deterioration of memories, particularly with regard to Alzheimer’s disease. Further, those with prosopagnosia, a neurological condition that renders the patient unable to recognize faces, would be greatly assisted by the face-detection enabled by LifeLoggers. More generally, those with visual agnosia, a neurological condition where a person  can see but not recognize objects, would be assisted by pattern-detection algorithms that identify objects in one’s environment.

Though the possibilities are fascinating, there are potential hazards to remembering everything. One person who is naturally endowed with this ability, Jill Price, describes her inability to forget as a curse. Her affliction is known as hyperthymestic syndrome, and the overwhelming information she stores affects her ability to relax and compromises her capacity to sleep. Nonetheless, it is unfair to equate innate photographic memory with an external LifeLogger. Whereas Price felt internally overwhelmed, one who lifelogs is not obliged to rewatch difficult experiences in their lives and is free to delete these recordings.

Lifelogging will revolutionize the way in which we perceive the world, our own lives, and the lives of others. In addition to quantifying our bodies by sequencing our genomes, our species is likely to continue the quantification of our subjective lives. Though subjectivity is an inherent property of an individual, lifelogging may assist in erasing the barriers that separate our subjective selves.

The article previously stated the iPhone is a device that records and shares smells. In fact, it is the oPhone. The Daily regrets the error.

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