Season 3, Episode 6: Phantoms
IS IT POSSIBLE FOR POLLUTANTS TO BE TRAPPED IN GLACIERS?
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A computer image illustrates pollutants trapped in a glacier. |
What causes mercury pollution and where does it go?
Mercury is a highly toxic element known to cause damage to the human brain, kidneys and liver. It can also lead to developmental problems in the brain – sometimes called mental retardation – and deformities in children exposed to it during fetal development. Mercury is released into the air through the burning of fossil fuels, volcanic eruptions and forest fires. Mercury never really goes away; instead, it gets recycled from the air into waterways, into animals and eventually back into fossil fuels.
When mercury enters water and aquatic ecosystems, certain microbes metabolize it into methylmercury, the form of mercury most easily absorbed by living organisms. Methylmercury is difficult to get rid of once ingested, so it builds up – or “bioaccumulates” – in exposed organisms. This leads to what’s known as mercury “bioamplification” in aquatic food chains. Because organisms higher on the food chain may eat many lower organisms that contain mercury, highest-level predators can contain one million times the amount of mercury found in the surrounding water. Fish, like tuna, that eat other fish generally contain more mercury than plant-eating fish like trout.
How are glaciers formed?
Glaciers are huge blocks of ice that stay around for a long time. They form from snowfall that gets compacted by the weight of newer layers of snow. Years of increasing weight and pressure cause the snow to become a dense layer of glacial ice.
Glaciers make up the Earth’s largest reservoir of freshwater. Just as rainfall can bring air pollutants back to the ground, snowfall can bring pollutants found in the air down to glaciers.
So…
Yes, pollutants like mercury can be trapped in glaciers. In fact, it’s possible to measure changes in pollution levels through the years by studying core samples of glaciers.
IS IT PROBABLE TO CURE PHANTOM LIMB PAIN BY USING HYPNOSIS?
What is phantom limb pain?
“Phantom limb” is a feeling that a missing limb is still part of the body. Many amputees experience phantom limb and feel pain where the limb used to be. It once was thought that feelings of phantom limb were caused by severed nerve endings resulting from amputation. Now, phantom limb is thought to result from post-amputational re-wiring of nerves in the part of the brain that controls the sense of touch called the somatosensory cortex. Instead of connecting to the limb, the severed nerves make connections to other neighboring nerves that are connected to parts of the body close to the amputation site. Rewiring can cause phantom limb pain. But it also can cause the body to feel that the amputated limb is still there.
There are a number of different ways to treat phantom limb pain, including acupuncture, antidepressant drug treatment, electric therapy, hypnosis, or mirror box therapy.
 Image provided courtesy of Shaftesbury Films. |
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Mayko and her therapist try mirror box therapy to treat her phantom limb pain. |
What is mirror box therapy?
Mirror box therapy was developed in the early 1990’s by neurologist V.S. “Rama” Ramachandran and colleagues. The therapy relies on a mirror to reflect the image of a real limb in place of a missing limb. The person undergoing treatment then looks at the mirror in such a way that it appears they are looking at a real limb where their amputated limb once was. This so-called artificial visual feedback allows the patient to move the real limb, but use the mirror image to fool their brain into thinking they are moving the phantom limb. Repetitive training to move the phantom limb and release it from painful positions has been reported to improve and even eliminate phantom limb pain. Mirror box therapy does not involve hypnosis.
So…
Hypnosis has not been proven effective at long-term treatment for phantom limb. However, mirror box therapy, a non-hypnotic re-training of the brain has worked to reduce pain from phantom limbs.
- by Audrey M. Huang, Ph.D.
Want to read and learn more?
To learn more about mercury and methylmercury, visit:
http://www.ec.gc.ca/MERCURY/EH/EN/eh-hc.cfm
http://toxics.usgs.gov/definitions/methylmercury.html
To learn more about glaciers, visit:
http://www.ec.gc.ca/water/en/nature/snow/e_glacr.htm
http://nsidc.org/glaciers/
To learn more about V.S. Ramachandran and the mirror box, visit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilayanur_S._Ramachandran
