its-kostya a minute ago

In addition to exhaust and brake and environment fumes, the off-gassing of a new car (new car smell) has lots of VOCs and flame retardants and you basically hot box yourself when you drive. Big ouch

a1371 17 minutes ago

This is my cue to come and say that if you want to purify your home air, please look at the science first. Do NOT just go buy a HEPA. Chances are you'll waste your money and get little clean air.

Look for MERV and CADR ratings for filters. Then spend an afternoon building yourself a CR box with a box fan, or a narrower one with some computer fans. It'll work better than most commercial purifiers.

  • Night_Thastus 6 minutes ago

    Yep, MERV13 or MERV14 is more than enough if all you're worried about is dust, pollen and smoke.

    Because it's not as fine of a filter, far less air pressure is required to filter the air. This results in much, much quieter purifiers.

    The endgame of this sort of goal is PC case fans. They've been optimized for decades now to squeeze every last bit of airflow for less and less noise, and they last for a couple decades or more.

tmaly 17 minutes ago

I am surprised they did not mention tetraethyl lead that use to be a gasoline additive eventually phased out in the mid 70s.

cahaya 2 hours ago

Is it me or is the link only opening as JSON?

{ "@context": [ "https://www.w3.org/ns/activitystreams", { "Hashtag": "as:Hashtag", "sensitive": "as:sensitive", "dcterms": "http://purl.org/dc/terms/" } ], "id": "https://neurofrontiers.blog/?p=11319", "type": "Note", "attachment": [ { "type": "Image", "url": "https://i0.wp.com/neurofrontiers.blog/wp-content/uploads/202...", "mediaType": "image/jpeg", "name": "A cartoon depicting a traffic jam of identical black cars, each driven by a brain. Thick clouds of exhaust rise and gather above the stalled vehicles." } ], "attributedTo": "https://neurofrontiers.blog/author/neuronerdb/", "audience": "https://neurofrontiers.blog/?author=0", "content": "<h2>How does air pollution

  • SweetSoftPillow 2 hours ago

    Same on first visit, but loaded fine after reload.

whyandgrowth an hour ago

Could the impact of polluted air on children's brain development be one of the reasons why today's children are losing motivation to learn?

  • eurekin an hour ago

    I'm personally betting, that they simply have easier access to more information, comparing to me at the same age.

    When I started Uni, the "A diploma will guarantee you great job opportunities" mantra was unshakeable.

    Now I think, the pendulum swung so hard in the other direction, that kids of same age have tons of refuttals at their disposal. It must take a lot more work, from parents, to instill and motivate what was once seen as a good career starter.

    • wtbdbrrr an hour ago

      It's not enough to explain the problem, IMO. And it's a problem that is worse in some population segments than others. Even in poor countries.

      The mechanisms that separate more from less affected segments go back one and more generations, which is why it's not harder for parents to keep their kids on track despite "more stuff" but a lot of parents have it harder because their own brains/organisms are more affected than those of others.

      And "some take more care of themselves than others" loops right back into my argument, which is so damn annoying.

      It's taken me a great big freaking while to "rewire what fires together", including motivation and attention and I've looked at so many angles, while so many more and important ones require a bio-chem lab, an fMRI and PhD level knowledge in Molecular Bio-Tech.

      Anyone wanna sponsor some of it :D? I'm serious, but among the elderly (37).

  • wtbdbrrr an hour ago

    look at any connections to the thyroid gland, down and upstream.

    Poor breathing = less NO, less oxygen → potential stress on thyroid metabolism (and almost any other metabolism).

    NO is nitric oxide: the paranasal sinuses are a major source of NO gas.

    And NO gas has antimicrobial effects (helps sterilize inhaled air), acts as a vasodilator (helps regulate blood flow and oxygen delivery), and enhances oxygen uptake in the lungs.

tensorlibb 34 minutes ago

When I lived in New York it was jarring to see how clogged my hepa filter would be with black particulate every three months.

No way it's good to be inhaling any of that - break dust and all.

cassepipe 3 hours ago

By this logic... shouldn't I have lost a IQ point to smoking ?!

  • 11235813213455 2 hours ago

    not just brain is badly impacted by smoking, but everything else: skin, teeth, lungs, heart, vision, hormones, sleep, immunity, longevity, ..

  • wtbdbrrr an hour ago

    Nope. Not necessarily.

    a) fuck IQ. But since you are using it as a benchmark (here, at least). What is your IQ? How did you gain most of it?

    b) How much are you smoking? Are you getting sub-level espresso effects from nicotine? (If you don't drink coffee, got anything to compare it with?)

    c) How's your breathing? How often are you sick(ly)?

    d) Where do you see yourself under the Bell curve? Professionally and or any other way you might believe is relevant.

    Just think high frequency, max amplitude bell curves under bell curves. And then ... yeah, who says you didn't?