General science thread

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115 participants, which consisted of two separate clinical trials in healthy participants, who were randomly placed into groups to be given four interventions: a guided mindfulness meditation, a sham-mindfulness meditation that only consisted of deep breathing, a placebo cream (petroleum jelly) that participants were trained to believe reduces pain, and as a control, one group listened to an audiobook. The researchers applied a very painful but harmless heat stimulus to the back of the leg and scanned the participants' brains both before and after the interventions.

To analyze the participants' brain activity patterns, the researchers used a novel approach called multivariate pattern analysis (MVPA), which uses machine learning to disentangle the many complex neural mechanisms underlying the experience of pain, including those stemming from specific heat stimuli, negative emotions and pain responses that are driven by the placebo effect. The researchers were then able to identify whether mindfulness meditation and placebo engage similar and/or separate brain processes.

Although placebo cream and sham-mindfulness meditation lowered pain, the researchers found that mindfulness meditation was significantly more effective at reducing pain when compared to placebo cream, sham-mindfulness meditation and the controls.

They also found that mindfulness-based pain relief reduced synchronization between brain areas involved in introspection, self-awareness and emotional regulation. These parts of the brain together comprise the neural pain signal (NPS), a documented pattern of brain activity thought to be common to pain in different individuals and different types of pain. In contrast, the placebo cream and sham-mindfulness meditation did not show a significant change in the NPS when compared to controls. Instead, these other interventions engaged entirely separate brain mechanisms with little overlap.

"It has long been assumed that the placebo effect overlaps with brain mechanisms triggered by active treatments, but these results suggest that when it comes to pain, this may not be the case," said Zeidan. "Instead, these two brain responses are completely distinct, which supports the use of mindfulness meditation as a direct intervention for chronic pain rather than as a way to engage the placebo effect."

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Thanks to quantum effects, a particle of light can exit a cloud of extremely cold atoms before it even enters.

Quote: odiousgambit

quantum physics weirdness, cont.



https://www.newscientist.com/article/2448067-light-has-been-seen-leaving-an-atom-cloud-before-it-entered/

Quote: odiousgambit

a lot of uncertainty but ...

"'Sungrazer' Comet May Be as Bright as Venus and Visible in Daylight"

https://www.newsweek.com/new-comet-discovered-sungrazer-visible-day-1961453