RSS Feed
Facebook
MySpace
Stimulating Science
0 Comments 
Remember all the noise about the bad economy and how Congress was passing a “Stimulus Act” to help? The name of this bill is the “American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA)”. The idea is to give stimulus money to government agencies, who can then send it out around the country to save jobs or create new ones.
As a government agency, NIDA got more than $260 million through ARRA to support more research projects on drug abuse and addiction. Some of that money has already been used to support students who are working this summer in science labs around the country. Here are some other projects that ARRA money is helping with:
In Cincinnati, 250 teenage girls will participate in a study that looks at how stress, depression, and smoking could affect bone health. Results could help educate girls about how smoking affects their bones, so that fewer girls will start.
In New York, scientists will use NIDA’s ARRA money to see if parents can be trained with online programs to help them communicate better with their teens.
In Seattle, Washington, researchers will use ARRA money to figure out better ways to help college students hooked on marijuana to stop using the drug and focus on a healthy lifestyle instead.
And in Augusta, Georgia, scientists like Dr. Beth NeSmith (see photo) will be looking at liver damage caused by cocaine use.
These are just a few examples of thousands of projects that NIDA will support around the country using ARRA money. Since NIDA is just one of the 27 Institutes and Offices at the National Institutes of Health, you can imagine how many people in the U.S. are benefiting–both people working in the labs, and patients who will hopefully end up a little closer to a cure. The Sara Bellum Blog thinks that’s a really “stimulating” idea.
Dr. Beth NeSmith, assistant professor at the Medical College of Georgia School of Nursing, is among the first in the nation to receive NIDA's stimulus funding and will study kidney damage in local cocaine users.
A Day at the Movies
Hollywood is exciting, glamorous, dramatic, funny, and can make just about anything seem cool—including drug abuse, and especially the use of marijuana. But films don’t tell you the whole story. Did you know there are over 400 different chemicals in marijuana smoke? Did you know that marijuana smoke really does hurt your memory, judgment and perception? And yes—you can get addicted to marijuana!
In this video, NIDA scientist Dr. Joe Frascella explains why marijuana is not all its “glammed” up to be. Dr. Frascella runs the division of NIDA that deals with clinical neuroscience, human development, and behavioral treatment for drug abuse and addiction—so he knows a little more about the science of marijuana than your average film director. Watch the video and see how much of this you already know—and how good you think Hollywood is at telling the real story.
Meth Dead Don’t Get Eaten
That’s what 17 year old Daniel Jeffrey Martin from Desert Vista High School heard from his mom one day while driving near a piece of the desert near his home town of Phoenix, Arizona. “Huh?” he asked. His mom, a forensic scientist (think: CSI), explained to him that when dead bodies are found in the desert by animals like coyotes, bobcats, and wolves, these scavengers will usually eat them—except for the bodies of methamphetamine users (proven by an autopsy).
Daniel thought this would be a perfect science fair project so he studied the records from the local county coroner’s office. And sure enough—he learned that even scavenging animals don’t want to go near the nasty chemicals left in the body by meth. YUK!
These photos from Daniel's science fair poster show the type of marks left by animal scavengers on bones. In his study, Daniel learned that the coroner found fewer scavenging marks on bodies that contained traces of methamphetamines.
The science project was so well done that Daniel won a Second Place Addiction Science Award from NIDA at the 2009 Intel International Science and Engineering Fair 
. You can read more about his project at NIDA’s website.
Winner Daniel Jeffrey Martin with NIDA science fair judges at the 2009 Intel International Science and Engineering Fair.
A Summer at NIDA!
This is a guest SBB post from NIDA intern Giselle.
Hello all! My name is Giselle and I’m from the enchanting island of Puerto Rico. This summer I’m doing an internship at the Office of Science Policy and Communications, National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)—yeah, acronyms are big here. I will not have pristine beaches to visit, but while I’m here at the Neuroscience Center in Rockville, Maryland, I’m looking forward to learning about the science behind the brain, drug abuse, my body, and a lot more! I’m hoping to write a couple of blog posts about this so stay tuned. And by the way, cool scientists are blogging too!
Have you already visited all the sections of the NIDA website? If not, you should! It feels great when you know how your body works. Start learning!
Steroids: More than Meets the Eye
Regardless of whether or not teens should care about body image or physical appearances, the truth is that we do care, a lot. And working out is a healthy way to look and feel better. The trouble comes when people sacrifice their health to look buff—like by taking steroids.
While not that many teens try steroids even once, according to NIDA surveys (about 3 in 100), those who do use steroids are getting a lot more than just larger muscles. Steroids can cause acne and make your hair fall out. They can also damage your heart and change your hormone levels so that girls might grow facial hair, and boys could develop breasts. Seriously.
NIDA scientist Dr. Baler reveals more about what steroids can do in the video to the left.
