Science could save your life—and we aren't just talking about innovative technology and health care.
Beyond regular exercise and a healthy lifestyle, science can increase your life expectancy in ways you might not expect.
Newsweek spoke to mathematician Hannah Fry and comedian Dara Ó Briain—hosts of the podcast Curious Cases—to find out their top science tips for a longer, healthier life.
1. Get a job you enjoy
As it turns out, you can actually die of boredom (over an extended period of time.)
"I presumed you might be able to die of excitement, like on a roller coaster," Ó Briain told Newsweek. "But it turns out that if you have a really, really boring job your life expectancy goes down."
A study in 2010 from University College London analyzed data from 7,524 civil servants based in London during the 1980s, between the ages of 35 and 55. The participants were asked to complete a questionnaire about how bored they had been at work over the last four weeks. Nearly 30 years later, the researchers assessed how many of this original cohort had died, excluding those who had prevalent cardiovascular disease at the start of the study.
What they found was that those who were particularly bored in their jobs were more likely to die during the follow up period.
"For the civil servants who really didn't enjoy their jobs very much, it turned out to have a tangible impact on their life expectancy," Fry told Newsweek.
2. Listen to your body, in ways you might not expect
Your body can tell when storm is coming, without you needing to look at the weather forecast.
"If you happen to be in a place where your hair starts to stand on end, then you know that lightning is about to strike," Fry said.
Lightning occurs when opposite charges on the ground and in the atmosphere build up during a thunderstorm. Negative charges buildup in the brewing storm clouds, repelling electrons in the ground (and people) beneath it. As a result, your hair strands become slightly positively charged, repelling each other and standing up on end.
"What you need to do is really quickly get into your car," Fry said.
But how is your car going to protect you from a storm?
Cars are made of metal, which is a much better conductor of electricity than your body. Therefore, when lightning strikes, it acts as a protective cage—known as a Faraday Cage. The lightning charge travels around the outside of the vehicle and into the ground, rather than traveling through your body!
There are, of course, some exceptions. Cars with convertible roofs do not provide this level of protection, nor do cars with fiberglass bodies, which do not conduct electricity.
"What you also don't want to do is time it badly so that you're touching the outside of the car when the lightning strikes," Fry said. "So, when in doubt, just get down low."
3. Learn how to store your leftovers
Rice is one of the most widely eaten foods in the world. However, it can also be a key source of food poisoning.
"Rice is worse than most foods in terms of how it can turn dangerously bad," Ó Briain said. "I used to think you needed to let it cool down before putting it in the fridge, but no. You've got to slam it into the fridge as quickly as possible."
Uncooked rice often contains the spores of a bacterium called Bacillus cereus, a bacterium that can cause life-threatening infections. The spores of this bacteria are dormant when you first cook the rice, but they are resistant to heat so can survive most cooking methods. If the rice is not cooled quickly enough—i.e. slammed in the fridge—these spores can rapidly grow and produce a dangerous toxin that can cause gastrointestinal illness.
While most cases clear up on their own, this toxin can be deadly, especially in more vulnerable individuals.
These are just a few examples of the quirky questions Fry and Ó Briain cover in the latest season of Curious Cases, a podcast which takes your far-fetched musings and solves them with the power of science. New episodes will be broadcast weekly on BBC Radio 4 as of October 5, and the full series can be found on BBC Sounds, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Do you have a tip on a science story that Newsweek should be covering? Do you have a question about the U.S. population? Let us know via science@newsweek.com.
References
Britton, A., & Shipley, M. J. (2010). Bored to death? International Journal of Epidemiology, 39(2), 370—371. https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyp404
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