— Most people go on a “diet” to lose weight, but research has found that certain diets confer special benefits beyond weight loss –the proper diet can go so far as to help treat diseases such as epilepsy, Alzheimer’s disease, and even brain cancer. Fasting has been used since ancient times to treat epilepsy. The ketogenic diet (KD), a low carbohydrate, high fat diet introduced in the early twentieth century, was developed as an alternative to fasting. The KD was subsequently found to induce weight loss, paving the way for the low-carb weight loss movement, e.g. the Atkins diet. Continue reading A Diet to Protect the Brain

— If it were possible for you to take a pill that would turn you into an Olympic champion but would kill you soon after, would you take it? This question may seem absurd to many people, but when elite athletes were asked a similar question, about 50% responded “yes.” Doping, or the use of banned performance-enhancing drugs, originated in ancient times, but the use of these substances has increased in recent decades [3]. Each year, more athletes are added to the list of those disgraced, imprisoned, and even killed due to the use of performance-enhancing drugs. Recently, the world-renowned cyclist Lance Armstrong added his name to the list, after more than a decade of denying allegations of doping. Continue reading The Doping Arms Race: Performance-enhancing drugs in sports and the challenges of detection