Category: public posts
The select public posts from syn·op·sis, written and reviewed by iSci students at McMaster University. Each post is interdisciplinary in nature, and a wide variety of subject matter is covered. So sit back, relax, and start learning.
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The Emergence of Allergic Diseases in Immigrants: A Probiotic Solution
First-generation immigrants face numerous challenges when adapting to new cultures: language barriers, discrimination, invalid credential recognition, and growing mental health concerns. While some of these challenges may be temporary, a long-term issue that remains unresolved within the immigrant population is the growing prevalence of allergic diseases (Lombardi, Passalaqua, and Walter Canonica 2009). Surprisingly, a potential…
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The Umbrella Assassination: An Unsolved Mystery
On September 7th of 1978, Georgi Markov, a Bulgarian journalist, was allegedly pricked by an umbrella on Waterloo Bridge in London (Nehring 2017). A tiny metal pellet that released ricin, a deadly protein poison, was found in his leg following his death. The murder weapon nor the killer were ever identified. This case can be…
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The Bitter Side of Grapefruit and Medication
Imagine it’s a hot summer day and your air conditioning stops working. Seeking relief, you quickly buy your favourite freshly squeezed grapefruit juice from the store. Although initially refreshed, you soon feel nauseous with an elevated heart rate. You later find out that grapefruit juice contains furanocoumarins, compounds that interfere with the metabolism of your…
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License to Kill: The Impact of Insect Road Mortality
Spotted across the large stretch of highway it can’t be missed, each of your five eyes in utter disbelief as a lush field speckled with wildflowers fills your vision. Stumbling forwards you catch whiffs of lavender and milkweed as you gesture to the swarm around you towards the prospect of sugary delight. According to traditional…
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Environmentally Induced Neuroplasticity
Adaptation is one of the most biologically relevant principles acting as the primary mechanism for evolution, resiliency, and change. Speaking from a human-centred perspective, adaptations allow humans to grow, learn, and increase their functional efficiency. This process of constant refinement results from an ingrained mechanism in the nervous system called neuroplasticity (Mishra et al. 2021).…
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Barbarity of Public Executions: A Hanging Is Not a Spectacle
Public executions, considered unjust by most countries, are still practiced in some regions. There have been 27 public executions from 2006-2008 in North Korea and 157 during 2015 in Saudi Arabia (Gilbert 2017; Database Center for North Korean Human Rights 2009). To understand the unjust nature of public executions, particularly hangings, increased biological, psychological, and…
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Tuning Into the Language of Music
Language is a uniquely human invention that allows us to communicate and differentiates us from any other species. It is a hierarchical system, with smaller units making up larger parts (Pino et al. 2023). This is analogous to another human system: music. Although they are often considered separate systems, they share substantial overlap, so much…
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Your Chemistry Teacher Lied to You
Throughout an individual’s chemistry education, it is typically taught that we see one, two, or three bonds between atoms, also known as a bond order of one, two, and three respectively. It is instilled in students that elements can not have more than four bonds, but that is not entirely true. Certain properties of transition…
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CAGE in Transdermal Drug Delivery
Ionic liquids (ILs) and deep eutectic solvents (DESs) are unique classes of liquids with remarkable properties. Traditionally they have been used in industrial settings and as green solvents, however, their use in drug delivery has been a topic of recent interest (Mitragotri 2024; Shukla et al. 2023). While very similar, ILs and DESs are separate…
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Crimes Against Humanity: The Uyghur Genocide
Genocide is not history, it is still happening today. The Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang China are subjected to forced sterilizations, surveillance in re-education camps, and sexual abuse (The Associated Press 2020; Maizland 2022). While science perturbates genocide, from the psychology driving the perpetrators to the scientific advancement that help them with their oppression, it can…