To: The Brain Uppermost Section, Human Body March 1, 2008 Dear Human Brain, How are you today? Here’s hoping my letter finds you well. I just have to say that you really are a remarkable entity and I admire you greatly. You’re very beautiful with your busy neurons and hard-working glial cells, and all those intricately placed connections… Oh, you’re probably wondering who I am! Please, allow me to introduce myself. My full name is 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine. I know, I know… a bit of a mouthful. But you can call me MDMA for short. I’ll also respond to the name Ecstasy,…
The Science Creative Quarterly
By pamelaparkinson
Pam really enjoys writing and her best subjects in school were English and French, so she often wonders how she came to be pursuing a graduate degree in Pathology at UBC. But she is quite content to be studying in Vancouver, with its beaches and mountains. When not teaching her Alzheimer’s mice to swim mazes, Pam likes being outdoors, dancing, seeing live music, making fancy desserts, using too many descriptive words, and writing about random things.
IS THERE A NEUROCHEMICAL BASIS FOR FALLING IN LOVE?
Introduction “Nearly everybody gets twitterpated in the springtime. For example: You’re walking along, minding your own business. You’re looking neither to the left, nor to the right, when all of a sudden you run smack into a pretty face. You begin to get weak in the knees. Your head’s in a whirl. And then you feel light as a feather, and before you know it, you’re walking on air. And then you know what? You’re knocked for a loop, and you completely lose your head!” In Disney’s Bambi, the wise old owl gives this memorable, and strikingly accurate, description of…