Enhancement of Meditation Analgesia by Opioid Antagonist in Experienced Meditators.

Objective: Studies have consistently shown that long-term meditation practice is associated with reduced pain, but the neural mechanisms by which long-term meditation practice reduces pain remain unclear. This study tested endogenous opioid involvement in meditation analgesia associated with long-term meditation practice.

Methods: Electrical pain was induced with randomized, double-blind, cross-over administration of the opioid antagonist naloxone (0.

Mindfulness-Meditation-Based Pain Relief Is Not Mediated by Endogenous Opioids.

Unlabelled: Mindfulness meditation, a cognitive practice premised on sustaining nonjudgmental awareness of arising sensory events, reliably attenuates pain. Mindfulness meditation activates multiple brain regions that contain a high expression of opioid receptors. However, it is unknown whether mindfulness-meditation-based analgesia is mediated by endogenous opioids.

Evidence for a fixed capacity limit in attending multiple locations.

A classic question concerns whether humans can attend multiple locations or objects at once. Although it is generally agreed that the answer to this question is "yes," the limits on this ability are subject to extensive debate. According to one view, attentional resources can be flexibly allocated to a variable number of locations, with an inverse relationship between the number of selected locations and the quality of information processing at each location.

The recommended role of exposure biomarkers for the surveillance of environmental and occupational chemical exposures in military deployments: policy considerations.

A lack of individual exposure information limited the evaluation of exposure-outcome relationships after the Gulf War. Exposure concerns during Operation Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom deployments have increased interest in individual environmental and occupational chemical exposure assessment. Currently, deployment assessments are conducted using intermittent ambient air monitoring, occasional focused evaluations based on these results, and postdeployment questionnaire documentation of exposure and/or health concerns.

Military deployment human exposure assessment: urine total and isotopic uranium sampling results.

Currently the Department of Defense (DoD) does not use exposure biomarkers to measure service members' exposure to environmental chemicals. Blood and urine exposure biomarkers for volatile organic compounds (VOC), selected heavy metals, depleted uranium (DU), and chemical warfare agents are currently available but have not been field tested or validated by the DoD in military deployments as a tool to document exposures. The Military Deployment Human Exposure Assessment Study, a prospective cohort of 46 soldiers deployed to Bosnia, was designed to field test blood and urine exposure biomarkers as a mechanism to document exposures to these chemicals during military deployments.

Derivation of risk based wipe surface screening levels for industrial scenarios.

The environmental characterization of building interiors and other surfaces has generally been performed with wipe-sampling because it is a non-destructive technique. There is no consensus, however, as to the interpretation of the results of wipe-sampling. Specifically, there is not a standardized method to determine if chemicals found at sampled levels pose a threat to human health.