Although my research is primarily focused on viruses and cancer, I think that neuroscience is perhaps one of the most interesting fields of science today. While scientific advances have greatly expanded our understanding of the natural world, how our own brains function remains largely a mystery. In particular, I’m always amazed by our brains’ power to translate social and stimuli into biological responses. Renee’s chalk talk was a fascinating exploration of one way our social experiences might directly impact our physical health.
While it seems logical that animals at the bottom of social hierarchies would experience more stress, it’s interesting that this was actually reflected in long-term changes of mitochondrial DNA. However, I am curious how this level of stress compares to other potential factors such as food scarcity.
Given that monkeys are relatively close to us, I think that a logical follow-up would be to see if the same sort of pattern can be observed in humans. Assuming that something similar can be found in humans, this sort of research could potentially introduce something new to discussion of poverty, inequality, and public health. It would certainly be interesting to compare levels of social stress in an egalitarian nation such as Sweden to someplace with more inequality such as the US.
