Methane Bubbles In Arctic Worrisome

Giant plumes of methane bubbling to surface of Arctic Ocean2011 12 17
From: UpdatedNews.ca
Russian scientists have discovered hundreds of plumes of methane gas, some 1,000 meters in diameter, bubbling to the surface of the Arctic Ocean. Scientists are concerned that as the Arctic Shelf recedes, the unprecedented levels of gas released could greatly accelerate global climate change.

Image: Source

Igor Semiletov of the Russian Academy of Sciences tells the UK’s Independent that the plumes of methane, a gas 20 times as harmful as carbon dioxide, have shocked scientists who have been studying the region for decades. “Earlier we found torch-like structures like this but they were only tens of meters in diameter,” he said. “This is the first time that we’ve found continuous, powerful and impressive seeping structures, more than 1,000 metres in diameter. It’s amazing.”

Semiletov said that while his research team has discovered more than 100 plumes, they estimate there to be “thousands” over the wider area, extending from the Russian mainland to the East Siberian Arctic Shelf.
“In a very small area, less than 10,000 square miles, we have counted more than 100 fountains, or torch-like structures, bubbling through the water column and injected directly into the atmosphere from the seabed,”
Semiletov said.
“We carried out checks at about 115 stationary points and discovered methane fields of a fantastic scale — I think on a scale not seen before. Some plumes were a kilometer or more wide and the emissions went directly into the atmosphere — the concentration was a hundred times higher than normal.”


Article from: updatednews.ca

Arctic Region Is Permanently Warmer

Arctic has taken a turn for the warmer

Scientists see pervasive and permanent changes in the last five years

By Janet Raloff

Web edition : Friday, December 2nd, 2011

  Text Size

ENLARGE

UNFROZEN NORTHMelt ponds form on the frozen surface of the Chukchi Sea northwest of Alaska in July 2010. These ponds can increase light transmission up to tenfold compared with bare ice, new data show.K. Frey, Clark Univ.

The northern polar region’s climate has materially changed over the past five years, a team of 121 scientists from 14 nations concludes in a December 1 Arctic report card. Compared with 2006 and earlier, they note, the Arctic is warmer and less icy.
Sufficient observational data now exist “to indicate a shift in the Arctic Ocean system since 2006,” says Jacqueline Richter-Menge of the U.S. Army’s Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory in Hanover, N.H., a coeditor of the new analysis. “This shift is characterized by the persistent decline in the thickness and summer extent of sea-ice cover and by a warmer, less salty upper ocean.”
Triggering that turning point, Richter-Menge says, were unusually warm Arctic temperatures in 2006 together with a persistent weather pattern that pushed ice across the Arctic and into the North Atlantic through the Fram Strait east of Greenland: “We like to call it the perfect storm of the Arctic.”
Once extreme events foster the loss of old, multi-year ice, “we seldom go back to where we were before,” says James Overland of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle.
“We’ve got a new normal,” concludes Don Perovich of CRREL.
Sea-ice loss in 2011 was the second most severe in the 32-year satellite record of Arctic monitoring. “The past five years have had the five smallest September ice extents,” Perovich says, “showing that Arctic sea ice has not recovered from the large decrease observed in 2007.”
Regional warming and melting of land ice cover have also continued at a record pace, the new report finds. For instance, satellite data show that the loss of ice from Greenland during 2010 to 2011 was the largest since monitoring began in 2002. In the Canadian Arctic, the duration of 2011 lake-ice cover was shorter by four to five weeks compared to what had been the average between 1997 and 2010.
For a decade, monitoring systems have detected continuous warming at Arctic sites near the coast, accompanied by a greening of the landscape as reduced snow cover has allowed small shrubs to grow bigger and seeds of trees and other plants to germinate in formerly frozen soils.
This year, new record highs were witnessed at 20 meters depth at every permafrost observatory on the North Slope of Alaska, where measurements began more than three decades ago. The most recent data suggest this warming “has begun to propagate south towards the northern foothills of the Brooks Range, where a noticeable warming in the upper 20 meters of permafrost has become evident since 2008,” the report says.
The wholesale melting has substantially darkened the sea and landscape, making both better absorbers of solar energy and accelerating the region’s warming.
“In an environment that is inherently icy, you have to ask yourself: Once it begins to melt and we get these feedbacks, like the darkening, how would it be possible to actually recover?” says Richter-Menge. “It’s hard to come up with a scenario where that would happen.”
Some regional darkening has nothing to do with melting, says Jason Box of Ohio State University in Columbus. Albedo is the reflectivity of a surface, which is ordinarily highest on ice and new snow. He points out “that we’re seeing a significant albedo reduction over the upper elevations of Greenland, where there is rarely melting.” He attributes it to a change in the shape — the rounding — of ice crystals in response to warmth.
And although Greenland’s ice sheets used to get new blankets of snow year-round, Box reports “there’s been little summertime snowfall over the ice sheets since about 2006.”
With the Arctic a potent driver of climate across the globe, change at the top of the world will have repercussions elsewhere. Altered wind patterns appear to be one of the earliest symptoms, Richter-Menge says.
Over the past several winters, she notes, “we’ve seen where the cold Arctic air isn’t staying in the Arctic any more, but breaking out to head south” into temperate regions. Meanwhile, the more southerly air it’s displacing has been drawn northward, leading to unusually warm Arctic winters.
The report’s big take-home message, she says: “These changes represent a persistent condition” — with consequences far beyond the Arctic.

Sleep Affects Mental Illness and Fights Stress

During REM Sleep Stress Chemicals Shut Down And The Brain Processes Emotional Experiences

Article Date: 27 Nov 2011 - 0:00 PST

They say time heals all wounds, and new research from the University of California, Berkeley, indicates that time spent in dream sleep can help. 

UC Berkeley researchers have found that during the dream phase of sleep, also known as REM sleep, our stress chemistry shuts down and the brain processes emotional experiences and takes the painful edge off difficult memories. 

The findings offer a compelling explanation for why people with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), such as war veterans, have a hard time recovering from painful experiences and suffer reoccurring nightmares.They also offer clues into why we dream. 

"The dream stage of sleep, based on its unique neurochemical composition, provides us with a form of overnight therapy, a soothing balm that removes the sharp edges from the prior day's emotional experiences," said Matthew Walker, associate professor of psychology and neuroscience at UC Berkeley and senior author of the study published in the journal Current Biology. 

For people with PTSD, Walker said, this overnight therapy may not be working effectively, so when a "flashback is triggered by, say, a car backfiring, they relive the whole visceral experience once again because the emotion has not been properly stripped away from the memory during sleep." 

The results offer some of the first insights into the emotional function of Rapid Eye Movement (REM) sleep, which typically takes up 20 percent of a healthy human's sleeping hours. Previous brain studies indicate that sleep patterns are disrupted in people with mood disorders such as PTSD and depression. 

While humans spend one-third of their lives sleeping, there is no scientific consensus on the function of sleep. However, Walker and his research team have unlocked many of these mysteries linking sleep to learning, memory and mood regulation. The latest study shows the importance of the REM dream state. 

"During REM sleep, memories are being reactivated, put in perspective and connected and integrated, but in a state where stress neurochemicals are beneficially suppressed," said Els van der Helm, a doctoral student in psychology at UC Berkeley and lead author of the study. 

Thirty-five healthy young adults participated in the study. They were divided into two groups, each of whose members viewed 150 emotional images, twice and 12 hours apart, while an MRI scanner measured their brain activity. 

Half of the participants viewed the images in the morning and again in the evening, staying awake between the two viewings. The remaining half viewed the images in the evening and again the next morning after a full night of sleep. 

Those who slept in between image viewings reported a significant decrease in their emotional reaction to the images. In addition, MRI scans showed a dramatic reduction in reactivity in the amygdala, a part of the brain that processes emotions, allowing the brain's "rational" prefrontal cortex to regain control of the participants' emotional reactions. 

In addition, the researchers recorded the electrical brain activity of the participants while they slept, using electroencephalograms. They found that during REM dream sleep, certain electrical activity patterns decreased, showing that reduced levels of stress neurochemicals in the brain soothed emotional reactions to the previous day's experiences. 

"We know that during REM sleep there is a sharp decrease in levels of norepinephrine, a brain chemical associated with stress," Walker said. "By reprocessing previous emotional experiences in this neuro-chemically safe environment of low norepinephrine during REM sleep, we wake up the next day, and those experiences have been softened in their emotional strength. We feel better about them, we feel we can cope." 

Walker said he was tipped off to the possible beneficial effects of REM sleep on PTSD patients when a physician at a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs hospital in the Seattle area told him of a blood pressure drug that was inadvertently preventing reoccurring nightmares in PTSD patients. 

It turns out that the generic blood pressure drug had a side effect of suppressing norepinephrine in the brain, thereby creating a more stress-free brain during REM, reducing nightmares and promoting a better quality of sleep. This suggested a link between PTSD and REM sleep, Walker said. 

"This study can help explain the mysteries of why these medications help some PTSD patients and their symptoms as well as their sleep," Walker said. "It may also unlock new treatment avenues regarding sleep and mental illness." 

Nice People Finish Last

Nice Guys Earn Less Money

Big Think Editors on December 4, 2011, 6:06 PM

What's the Latest Development?

A new study shows that 'agreeableness' correlates negatively with how much money men earn. According to Notre Dame researchers, 'agreeableness' is a combination of trust, straightforwardness, compliance, altruism, modesty and tender-mindedness. Men who were found less agreeable were not sociopaths or maniacs but they were willing to aggressively advocate for their position during conflicts. The difference in pay was stunning: agreeable men earned an average of $7,000 less than their bristly peers.

What's the Big Idea?

Why do we allow nice guys to finish last? What is it about aggressive personalities that we find worthy of financial reward? "Although agreeable people are less likely to get fired, and are just as likely to supervise others, they appear far less effective at negotiating pay increases, thus suggesting that the main financial benefit of disagreeableness is a willingness to stubbornly fight for what’s wanted, even if it makes others uncomfortable." When it comes to romance, however, studies show kindness is the most important trait.

Read it at Frontal Cortex

Angel of Clarity for December

Inspirational Message

Clear your perceptions free of confusion.

Focus on intent and straightforward expression. See the world as it is without your projections, judgments and assumptions.

Clarity is a process not a singular event and once reached tends to mark progress not arrival. The love of truth clears the attachments that result in mis-conceptions and false conclusions and makes it possible to align with our essential presence. As we learn to attune ourselves to our true nature, it informs our consciousness of the right attitudes, directions, and actions - free of assumptions and judgments.

So what do we do to encourage clarity to emerge? We engage in dynamic exploration into ourselves; asking, what is the source of my being? Why am I acting this way or that way? What do I need to heal? Through self-inquiry, we invite our inner being to disclose its richness and mysteries and reveal its possibilities.

The world as we perceive it is made up of our thoughts, images, emotions, and impressions. They are important only as points of orientation, not as conclusive evidence of reality. We need to be willing to allow our dreams, our current self-images, our very identities to completely change in kind and quality.

Clear the confusion and preconception that covers your deepest and most cherished inner sensations and be completely yourself. 

May the Angel of Clarity animate your inner being and bring new and fresh ways of viewing yourself and the world throughout the coming month.

Fukushima Nightmare Continues And Is In Early Stages Of China Syndrom

Fukushima ‘China syndrome,’ hydrovolcanic explosion possible

November 30, 2011 by Editor

The molten core of several Fukushima Daiichi reactors is sinking through the Earth’s crust and appears to be in early stages of a “China Syndrome,” according to Uehara Haruo, architect of Fukushima Daiichi’s Reactor No. 3 and former president of Saga University, Fukushima Diary reports.

If fuel has reached an underground water vein, it will cause contamination of underground water, soil, and sea, he said. “Moreover, if the underground water vein keeps being heated for long time, a massive hydrovolcanic explosion will be caused.”

Renewable Energy Technology Is Becoming Increasingly Cost Competitive

Renewable Energy Becoming Cost Competitive, IEA Says

Posted 11/23/2011 9:41 AM by Henning Gloystein from International Business Times in Investing, Commodities

(REUTERS) -- Renewable energy technology is becoming increasingly cost competitive and growth rates are in line to meet levels required of a sustainable energy future, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said in a report on Wednesday.

The report also said subsidies in green energy technologies that were not yet competitive are justified in order to give an incentive to investing into technologies with clear environmental and energy security benefits.

The renewable electricity sector has grown rapidly in the past five years and now provides nearly 20 percent of the world's power generation, the IEA said during the presentation of the report titled Deploying Renewables 2011.

The IEA's report disagreed with claims that renewable energy technologies are only viable through costly subsidies and not able to produce energy reliably to meet demand.

"A portfolio of renewable energy ( RE ) technologies is becoming cost-competitive in an increasingly broad range of circumstances, in some cases providing investment opportunities without the need for specific economic support," the IEA said, and added that "cost reductions in critical technologies, such as wind and solar, are set to continue."

"The portfolio of RE technologies, which includes established hydro power, geothermal and bioenergy technologies is now, therefore, cost-competitive in an increasingly broad range of circumstances, providing investment opportunities without the need for specific economic support."

But the IEA also defended subsidies in renewable energy technology as a necessary means to create a clean and independent energy supply system.

In the past, the IEA has been criticized by environmental groups for underplaying the role of renewable energy technologies in favor of nuclear and fossil-fuels.

"Where technologies are not yet competitive, economic support for a limited amount of time may be justified by the need to attach a price signal to the environmental and energy security benefits of RE deployment," the report said.

The majority of renewable energy growth is taking place in OECD countries and in major emerging markets like China, India and Brazil .

The report said "the OECD was the only region where the deployment of less mature technologies (such as solar PV, offshore wind) reached a significant scale, with capacities in the order of GWs."

Most OECD countries have large-scale subsidies in place in order to develop renewable energy technologies.

RAPID GROWTH

The IEA the renewable energy sector had grown by nearly 18 percent between 2005 and 2009, and this growth was evidence it could deliver the intended policy benefits of improved energy security, greenhouse gas reductions and other environmental benefits, as well as economic development opportunities.

"Each of the sectors has been growing strongly, at rates broadly in line with those required to meet the levels required in IEA projections of a sustainable energy future."

Of all renewable energy technologies, the report said hydro power remained the major source of renewable electricity, at 84 percent of renewable generation, which corresponded to about 16 percent of total generation in 2009.

Other renewable electricity technologies have grown by nearly 74 percent between 2005 and 2009, it said.

"Wind has grown most rapidly in absolute terms and has overtaken bioenergy. Solar has grown at a growth rate of 50.2 percent (CAGR), and installed capacity reached about 40 gigawatt ( GW ) by the end of 2010," the report said.

(Editing by James Jukwey )

The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc.

Harnessing Renewable Geothermal Energy Could Cause Quakes

Geothermal Energy’s Promise and Problems

Google-funded research shows U.S. potential is huge, but extraction could cause quakes

By DAVE LEVITAN  /  DECEMBER 2011

Image: SMU Geothermal Lab

8 November 2011—Geothermal energy is touted as one of the few renewable resources that could be used for base-load (round-the-clock) power generation: Earth’s heat is always on, and it’s not dependent on the vagaries of wind or sun. New research from Southern Methodist University—sponsored by Google’s philanthropic arm—suggests massive potential for geothermal power in the United States. But exploiting that resource will be slowed by the cost of the technology—and the fact that it can cause small earthquakes.

Researchers led by David Blackwell at SMU’s Geothermal Laboratory set out to update existing maps of the heat beneath our feet, maps that Blackwell says had significant gaps. The researchers doubled the number of locations measured from previous efforts, and by sampling more than 35 000 sites, they found a "technical potential" of almost 3 million megawatts.

"The technical potential is our best estimate of what actually might be extracted," says Blackwell. He says that depths greater than 6.5 kilometers are impractical to access, so his calculation does not take into account a supply of power that’s more than 10 times as much at depths up to 10 km.

To put this in perspective, there are only about 3000 MW of installed geothermal capacity in the United States today, and no other country has more. The total installed electricity capacity from all energy sources in the country is right around 1 million megawatts. So if all that geothermal energy were harnessed, it could power the country three times over.

According to Colin Williams, a scientist with the U.S. Geological Survey who has worked on similar geothermal resource estimates, the SMU work is less about new discoveries than about technological optimism. "It’s not like they discovered more thermal energy down there, but they’re pushing the scenario that you could get more of it out," he says. His own calculations from a 2008 study showed that even the most easily developed geothermal resources could bring 6500 MW online and that more "unconventional" resources represented more than half a million megawatts of potential. That assessment differed from the SMU work in several ways, including stopping at a depth of 6 km instead of 6.5, as well as focusing almost entirely on the western United States.

Blackwell also says the most notable improvements over previous estimates are in the East—especially under coal-rich West Virginia. The energy is there, he says, but "the question is, Do we have the will to go ahead and try to really develop it?"

The answer to that question is still up in the air and depends on some ongoing debates about the cost and risk associated with geothermal technology. Most existing geothermal projects come from hydrothermal reservoirs where hot water is brought up from below the surface to produce electricity. And such projects have been multiplying: Geothermal power was present in only four U.S. states little more than five years ago; now it is in nine, with plans or projects in another half dozen. But the new 3 million MW would almost all require what is known as enhanced geothermal systems (EGS). That technique allows the use of lower-temperature areas by fracturing the rock with high-pressure water, similar to the controversial "fracking" process in the natural gas industry. However, it’s worth noting that at this point, EGS uses only water and none of the toxic chemicals that have raised water-quality and health issues with natural-gas fracking. There is ample evidence, though, that EGS produces small earthquakes.

"We know that creating these EGS reservoirs involves making earthquakes. That’s just going to happen," Williams says. "The question then becomes, Are we going to be able to control the process of generating the microseismicity so that we don’t generate earthquakes that are magnitude 3.5 or 4.0 or something like that?" There will likely need to be geographic restrictions on development so that such a potential quake doesn’t occur near a large fault and possibly cause an even bigger quake. The U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering have launched an investigation, looking across many energy technologies; their report is expected in 2012.

After EGS was blamed for a 3.4-magnitude earthquake in Basel, Switzerland, projects in Europe and the United States have struggled to get off the ground. Karl Gawell, the executive director of an industry group called the Geothermal Energy Association, says that the scrutiny now placed on the issue suggests that projects won’t move forward without strong indications of safety. "You won’t see another Basel, Switzerland, at least not in the United States," he says.

For the moment, cost is also a primary barrier to widespread adoption. USGS’s Williams says traditional geothermal electricity is "in the ballpark" in terms of cost with other electricity sources. A 2009 report by the investment bank Credit Suisse quoted a conventional geothermal cost of 3.6 U.S. cents per kilowatt-hour, below the 5.5 cents for coal. EGS is costlier. A 2007 report by consulting firm GeothermEx estimated the best possible cost for EGS systems in the future at 5.4 cents per kilowatt-hour and suggested that the technology won’t be truly cost competitive until 2050. "Until EGS is developed on a wide scale, initially it probably wouldn’t be competitive," Williams says. "Right now we’re looking at sort of slow but steady development."

A version of this article appeared in the December 2011 print edition of IEEE Spectrum.

Kite Surfer Cherie Down Beach November 27, 2011

I took this quick video of a kite surfer while enjoying the beach on November 27, 2011. The Thanksgiving weekend was winding down and it was a relaxing way to end a long weekend and recharge before going back to the grind.

Trying To Keep Track Of Meds

I noticed on the last post that I said that I started taking Effexor on November 20th, which is what I thought too. Last night, I couldn't remember if I had taken my pill so I went through and did the math by counting pills. Here is what I had in my notes:

That I took 1 pill per day of Pristiq at 50 mg through November 17, 2011 when I had my appointment with Dr. K. I agree that I started taking 2 pills per day of the Pristiq at 50 mg for a total of 100 mg per day on November 18th.
I had 22 tablets left in the bottle. The packages that he gave me had 7 in it so it had to be 21, or 28. Since 28 makes since with 22 tabs left, that would mean that I took 2 pills on the 18th, 19th and 20th.

Which means that I started the Effexor on November 21, 2011 and not on November 20th. This also worked out with my pills in the Effexor bottle. I had 23 pills left in the bottle which meant that I took 7 pills. So, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27 makes 7 days and I was pretty sure that I hadn't taken my pill when I got home so I took one last night. I didn't feel any different so I'm pretty sure that this math is right.

Pristiq 50 mg thru 11/7
Pristiq 100 mg 11/18 thru 11/20
Effexor 75 mg starting 11/21

Happiness Is A Choice

From The Secret Daily Teachings

Happiness is a state of being, and comes from the inside of you. By the law of attraction you must become on the inside what you want on the outside.

You are either choosing to be happy now, or you are making up excuses for not choosing to be happy. But there are no excuses for the law!

Mostly Medical Update November 23, 2011

I went back to the doctor on November 18, 2011 for a follow up. I was on Pristiq and it was working well. I was planning to go back and ask for a generic type of the drug because I couldn't afford to pay for the Pristiq at $50 a month. But the last three days before the appointment, I was feeling extra anxious and keyed up.

I had been having some other symptoms as well such as decreased urine output, constipation and for the two days prior to my appointment very dry mouth.

Dr. Kinsella said that I likely was feeling anxious because I needed a higher dose. He did write me a prescription for Venlafaxine which is generic Effexor. He gave me a trial of two weeks of the Pristiq at 100 mg instead of the 50 that he wanted me to try first. I told him that I'd try it but that I just couldn't afford $50 a month.

I went ahead and got my prescription filled that day...$7 bucks. Now that I can afford.

I took the Pristiq at 100 mg for two days...Friday the 18th and Saturday the 19th. I did notice an improvement in my anxiety, but I had really back chest pains (that might have been from intestinal distress), terrible gas and even worse constipation. At night when I went to bed I had a really bad headache as well. I was like screw this. Before I get too used to a high dose lets switch over to the Effexor (I'm going to call it that because I can remember it and it is easier to spell.)

I took Effexor for the first time on Sunday, November 20. I noticed some negative thinking or suspicions creeping back in. Especially on Monday, November 21 when I heard Divya call her friend and greeted her with what sounded like a flirtatious tone to me.

But what I've realized is that I have a lot of stuff that I need to get through and layers to peal back. If this goes all the way back to an event that happened when I was four then I have to make myself the priority. I don't have time to be worried about what Divya is or isn't going to do with her "friend." So I had to fight through those suspicions with my other tools such as relaxation techniques (which right now consists pretty much of deep breathing) and changing the focus of my thoughts.

I think that I am going to have to ask for a stronger dose when I go back on December 8th because of the reasons listed above as well as that I have this burning sensation that I get in the back of my neck when I feel like I've done something wrong or something bad is about to happen. I hate that feeling.

I'm reading my book and have some other techniques that I will try too so that it is not all relying on drugs.

The good news is that I don't have the anxious feelings at night, like jittery, I don't have headaches or chest pains, I am not constipated like I was and I have less gas. At first I was not hungry either but I think that may be going away.

I am sleepy in the afternoons so I may need to turn it around and take it at night instead.

I go back to the doctor on December 8th and to the counselor today, November 23rd.

Understanding The Drugs That Fight Depression and Anxiety

How Does Prozac Work?

• By Jonah Lehrer  
• November 17, 2011  |  
• 11:01 am 

• What’s the point of neuroscience? Why do we spend billions of dollars investigating those three pounds of flesh inside the head? Sure, human nature is interesting, and self-knowledge is a virtuous pursuit, but let’s be honest: we study the brain because we don’t want to die. Because we want cures for awful afflictions. Because we’re desperate to avoid depression and addiction and dementia. The only way to justify the terrific expense of biomedical research is medicine.
  Here’s the bad news: I think neuroscience has yet to deliver on its therapeutical potential. We’ve learned an astonishing amount about the brain in recent years – a ten year old textbook is totally obsolete – but all this shiny new knowledge has yet to heal us. As a result, we’re still stuck with pills and treatments that are frustratingly ineffective.
  Consider depression. Every year, approximately 7 percent of us will be afflicted to some degree by the awful mental state that William Styron described as a “gray drizzle of horror . . . a storm of murk.” This is a big societal problem, which is why 24.4 million prescriptions were filled for fluoxetine (the generic version of Prozac) in 2010 in America.
  The first thing to say about fluoxetine is that it’s an old drug, having been introduced in the early 1970s. (Like many medical treatments, it was discovered largely by accident, when researchers realized that a common anti-histamine had anti-depressant properties.) Until recently, scientists assumed they knew how fluoxetine/Prozac worked. The story was simple: depression results from a neurotransmitter imbalance in the brain, in which patients suffer from a shortage of chemical happiness. The little blue pills cheer us up because they give the brain what it has been missing – a dose of serotonin.
  There’s only one problem with this theory of anti-depressants: it’s almost certainly wrong, or at the very least woefully incomplete. Experiments have since shown that lowering people’s serotonin levels does not make them depressed, nor does it worsen their symptoms if they are already depressed. And then there’s the “Prozac lag”: although anti-depressants increase the amount of serotonin in the brain within hours, their beneficial effects are not usually felt for weeks.
  Despite our causal ignorance, anti-depressants remain an essential balm for millions of people, allowing them to escape from that recursive loop of woe. And yet, it’s also clear that anti-depressants are
  often disturbingly ineffective and, in many clinical trials, appear little better than a placebo. (See Irving Kirsch for a partiuclarly critical take.)
  Furthermore, even when the drugs prove effective, their efficacy remains mysterious. Although there are some exciting new hypotheses about the power of Prozac – I’m particularly interested in theneurogenesis story – we still don’t understand why this category of drugs is the best we’ve got, even after forty years of well funded R&D. (Of course, this mystery hasn’t interfered with the popularity of the pills: As Schopenhauer once noted, people tend to treat causes “like a hired cab that one dismisses when one reaches the destination.” All we really care about is the health benefit – the causal story is just a sales ploy, a way to reassure patients that our success isn’t dumb luck, even when it is.)
  And this returns us to the current state of neuroscientific research into depression. Last week, the field recieved a jolt of bad news: a hyped new compound from Glaxo (GSK372475) proved utterly useless. In two well done clinical trials, the drug failed to make people feel better.
  Why is this news? Drugs fail all the time. (According to one recent analysis, more than 40 percent of drugs fail Phase III clinical trials. The odds are even worse for brain pills.) What makes the dismissal of GSK372475 noteworthy is that it looked so good on paper. The molecule is a potent triple reuptake inhibitor (TRI), blocking the breakdown of serotonin, noradrenaline and dopamine. While Prozac only alters serotonin, other successful anti-depressants, such as venlafaxine, block the reuptake of serotonin and noradrenaline. So it seemed like a good idea to also interfere with the reuptake of dopamine, especially since decades of research have suggested that more dopamine in the synapse is reliably associated with feelings of pleasure and reward. (Why do you think cocaine feels nice?) Although we still don’t understand how blocking the reuptake of various neurotransmitters cheers us up, we have yet to improve on that mechanism of action, which is why drug companies are still investing in expensive clinical trials for reuptake inhibitors.
  But that logic didn’t pan out. Not only did depressed patients on GSK372475 get better more slowly than those on placebo, they were also hit with a bevy of side-effects, including insomnia and nausea.
  Pharmaceutical failures like this are a sobering reminder that the brain and its afflictions remain deeply mysterious. Despite the billions of dollars poured into depression research, we still don’t understand the causal mechanisms of the illness, which means we don’t even know which drug actions to screen for. We can’t even imitate our past successes.
  Given such struggles, it’s not surprising that drug companies are dramatically scaling back research into the brain. (Most recently, four leading drug firms, including Merck and GlaxoSmithKline, announced that they were cutting neuroscience R&D. They cited the disconnect between scientific funding and pharmaceutical sucess.) The organ is simply too complicated, too full of networks and pathways we don’t comprehend.
  I don’t want to overdo the pessimism – betting against science is a losing game. But I think we need to be honest about the payoff of basic research, at least so far. We’ve learned so much, but we have yet to learn what really matters, whether it’s the neural underpinnings of depression or the triggers of Alzheimer’s or the genetic snippets behind, well, everything. The brain isn’t just complicated – it seems to be more complicated than we can imagine.
  So how does Prozac work? The sad answer is that we’re still not sure. And that means we don’t know how to come up with something better.
  PS. The Neuroskeptic has a typically great post on the failed trial.