THE RELEVANCE OF THE EVOLUTIONARY APPROACH FOR UNDERSTANDING HEALTH AND DISEASE OF THE HUMAN BODY AND MIND.

Ultimate and proximate levels of analysis offer synergistic explanations can improve the search for causes of disease and their cures. Here we review how several principles of evolutionary biology such as historical contingencies, mismatches, trade-offs, sexual selection and genomic conflict are applied to problems in medicine and psychiatry. The application of evolutionary principles to many other domains of medicine, among them mental disorders, have not received the same reception from preclinical and clinical researchers.

Insights into pubertal development: a narrative review on the role of epigenetics.

Purpose: Puberty is a key phase of growth and development, characterized by psychophysical transformations. It is driven by a combination of genetic, hormonal, and environmental variables. Epigenetic mechanisms, including histone post-translational modifications and chromatin remodeling, microRNAs, and DNA methylation, play important roles in orchestrating the developmental processes.

The Conflict between Regulatory Agencies over the 20,000-Fold Lowering of the Tolerable Daily Intake (TDI) for Bisphenol A (BPA) by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA).

Background: The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) recommended lowering their estimated tolerable daily intake (TDI) for bisphenol A (BPA) 20,000-fold to . BPA is an extensively studied high production volume endocrine disrupting chemical (EDC) associated with a vast array of diseases. Prior risk assessments of BPA by EFSA as well as the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have relied on industry-funded studies conducted under good laboratory practice protocols (GLP) requiring guideline end points and detailed record keeping, while also claiming to examine (but rejecting) thousands of published findings by academic scientists.