Interesting Links 6

This was incredible to see: a UK hospital has opened their first intensive care ward on the roof.

How beautiful, indeed. This is actually the first news in a while that really shocked me.

Nutrients that seem to matter for anti-aging: according to a new study, the micronutrients that seemed to slow aging most were vitamin E, magnesium, zinc, and the flavonoids apigenin and daidzein. The best sources of apigenin are parsley, artichokes, and chamomile. The best source of daidzein is natto, the fermented soybean dish that’s also very high in vitamin K2. Zinc? Red meat and oysters.

Less red meat, more industrial chicken, more toxic runoff: A push to lower red meat consumption for “environmental” reasons has led to an increase in chicken consumption (because people still need animal protein, no matter what the experts tell you). This means industrial chicken production has exploded, causing huge amounts or toxic runoff into waterways. Classic.

Creatine has no effect on inflammation: Neither acute nor long term supplementation of creatine appear to have any significant effect on inflammation in people.

Sex differences in response to nitrates for training: In female mice, taking sodium nitrate seems to inhibit the training adaptations they’d normally get from endurance exercise. No effect in males. This could mean that beet supplements are better for men than women.

Fast food is getting better: Steak ‘n’ Shake just announced they’re moving to 100% grass fed and grass-finished beef for all their burgers. Their fries are already cooked in tallow. I’m not saying it’s health food, but it’s amazing how much has changed.

Healthy sleep duration appears to follow a U-shaped curve in middle and old age: Both short (under 6 hours) and long (over 8 hours) duration sleep were associated with worse health outcomes, greater brain aging, and higher “ageing clocks” (a kind of marker of “biological age” in various organ and other physiological systems). Still, reverse causality can never be completely accounted for in these papers.

B12 supplementation restores muscle mitochondrial function in aged mice: This may be why meat intake is so helpful for older people.

The dumb jock myth needs to die: Acute exercise (both aerobic and resistance) improves cognitive function in older adults (and kids, and young adults, and teens and, and, and…).

The rise of AI music: About half of new music on Spotify and Apple Music is created by AI.

Synthetic customers for market research: Companies are using AI to generate synthetic buyers to shape their marketing plans and product design.

On the Future of Human Writing: Alex Berenson on what it means to write in the age of AI.

Smartphones as “infertility accelerators”: Why the smartphone may not have caused the fertility collapse, but probably did accelerate it.

The youngest Americans have the most AI skepticism: Interesting results.

Great podcast on peptides: Dr. Abud Bakri went on Huberman to talk peptides. Nice overview for anyone who’s been wondering about them.