Moringa Oleifera Against CVD, Diabetes, Alzheimer’s & Arsenic?

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The Healthiest Drumstick

Moringa oleifera is a tree, whose leaves and pods have medicinal properties (as well as simply being very high in nutrients). It’s also called the drumstick tree in English, but equally often it’s referred to simply as Moringa. It has enjoyed use in traditional medicine for thousands of years, and its many benefits have caught scientists’ attention more recently. For an overview before we begin, see:

Medicinal utilization and nutritional properties of drumstick (Moringa oleifera)—A comprehensive review

Now, let’s break it down…

Anti-inflammatory

It is full of antioxidants, which we’ll come to shortly, and they have abundant anti-inflammatory effects. Research into these so far has mostly beennon-human animal studies or else in vitro, hence the guarded “potential” for now:

Potential anti-inflammatory phenolic glycosides from the medicinal plant Moringa oleifera fruits

Speaking of potential though, it has been found to also reduce neuroinflammation specifically, which is good, because not every anti-inflammatory agent does that:

In silico and pharmacokinetic studies of glucomoringin from Moringa oleifera root for Alzheimer’s disease like pathology

Antioxidant

It was hard to find studies that talked about its antioxidant powers that didn’t also add “and this, and this, and this” because of all its knock-on benefits, for example:

❝The results indicate that this plant possesses antioxidant, hypolipidaemic and antiatherosclerotic activities and has therapeutic potential for the prevention of cardiovascular diseases.

These effects were at degrees comparable to those of simvastatin.❞

~ Dr. Pilaipark Chumark et al.

Source: The in vitro and ex vivo antioxidant properties, hypolipidaemic and antiatherosclerotic activities of water extract of Moringa oleifera Lam. leaves

Likely a lot of its benefits in these regards come from the plant’s very high quercetin content, because quercetin does that too:

Quercetin reduces blood pressure in hypertensive subjects

For more about quercetin, you might like our previous main feature:

Fight Inflammation & Protect Your Brain, With Quercetin

Antidiabetic

It also has been found to lower fasting blood sugar levels by 13.5%:

Effect of supplementation of drumstick (Moringa oleifera) and amaranth (Amaranthus tricolor) leaves powder on antioxidant profile and oxidative status among postmenopausal women

Anti-arsenic?

We put a question mark there, because studies into this have only been done with non-human animals such as mice and rats so far, largely because there are not many human volunteers willing to sign up for arsenic poisoning (and no ethics board would pass it anyway).

However, as arsenic contamination in some foods (such as rice) is a big concern, this is very promising. Here are some example studies, with mice and rats respectively:

Is it safe?

A popular food product through parts of Africa and (especially) South & West Asia, it has a very good safety profile. Generally the only health-related criticism of it is that it contains some anti-nutrients (that hinder bioavailability of its nutrients), but the nutrients outweigh the antinutrients sufficiently to render this a trifling trivium.

In short: as ever, do check with your doctor/pharmacist to be sure, but in general terms, this is about as safe as most vegan whole foods; it just happens to also be something of a superfood, which puts it into the “nutraceutical” category. See also:

Review of the Safety and Efficacy of Moringa oleifera

Want to try some?

We don’t sell it, but here for your convenience is an example product on Amazon 😎

Enjoy!

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  • Kidney Beans vs Pinto Beans – Which is Healthier?

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    Our Verdict

    When comparing kidney beans to pinto beans, we picked the pinto.

    Why?

    Looking at the macros first, pinto beans have slightly more protein and carbs, and a lot more fiber, making them the all-round “more food per food” choice.

    In the vitamins category, kidney beans have more of vitamins B3, C, and K, while pinto beans have more of vitamins B1, B2, B6, B9, E, and choline; another win for pinto beans. In kidney beans’ defense though, with the exception of vitamin E (31x more in pinto beans) the margins of difference are small for the rest of these vitamins, making kidney beans a close runner-up. Still, at least a nominal win for pinto beans here, by the numbers.

    When it comes to minerals, kidney beans are not higher in any minerals, while pinto beans have more calcium, copper, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus, potassium, and selenium. In kidney beans’ defense, though, with the exception of selenium (5–6x more in pinto beans) the margins of difference are small for the rest of these minerals, making kidney beans a fine choice here too. Once again though, a winner is declarable here by the numbers, and it’s pinto beans.

    Adding up the three wins makes for one big win for pinto beans. Still, enjoy either or both, because kidney beans are great too, and so is diversity!

    Want to learn more?

    You might like to read:

    What’s Your Plant Diversity Score?

    Take care!

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  • Managing Sibling Relationships In Adult Life

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    Managing Sibling Relationships In Adult Life

    After our previous main feature on estrangement, a subscriber wrote to say:

    ❝Parent and adult child relationships are so important to maintain as you age, but what about sibling relationships? Adult choices to accept and move on with healthier boundaries is also key for maintaining familial ties.❞

    And, this is indeed critical for many of us, if we have siblings!

    Writer’s note: I don’t have siblings, but I do happen to have one of Canada’s top psychologists on speed-dial, and she has more knowledge about sibling relationships than I do, not to mention a lifetime of experience both personally and professionally. So, I sought her advice, and she gave me a lot to work with.

    Today I bring her ideas, distilled into my writing, for 10almonds’ signature super-digestible bitesize style.

    A foundation of support

    Starting at the beginning of a sibling story… Sibling relationships are generally beneficial from the get-go.

    This is for reasons of mutual support, and an “always there” social presence.

    Of course, how positive this experience is may depend on there being a lack of parental favoritism. And certainly, sibling rivalries and conflict can occur at any age, but the stakes are usually lower, early in life.

    Growing warmer or colder

    Generally speaking, as people age, sibling relationships likely get warmer and less conflictual.

    Why? Simply put, we mature and (hopefully!) get more emotionally stable as we go.

    However, two things can throw a wrench into the works:

    1. Long-term rivalries or jealousies (e.g., “who has done better in life”)
    2. Perceptions of unequal contribution to the family

    These can take various forms, but for example if one sibling earns (or otherwise has) much more or much less than another, that can cause resentment on either or both sides:

    • Resentment from the side of the sibling with less money: “I’d look after them if our situations were reversed; they can solve my problems easily; why do they resent that and/or ignore my plight?”
    • Resentment from the side of the sibling with more money: “I shouldn’t be having to look after my sibling at this age”

    It’s ugly and unpleasant. Same goes if the general job of caring for an elderly parent (or parents) falls mostly or entirely on one sibling. This can happen because of being geographically closer or having more time (well… having had more time. Now they don’t, it’s being used for care!).

    It can also happen because of being female—daughters are more commonly expected to provide familial support than sons.

    And of course, that only gets exacerbated as end-of-life decisions become relevant with regard to parents, and tough decisions may need to be made. And, that’s before looking at conflicts around inheritance.

    So, all that seems quite bleak, but it doesn’t have to be like that.

    Practical advice

    As siblings age, working on communication about feelings is key to keeping siblings close and not devolving into conflict.

    Those problems we talked about are far from unique to any set of siblings—they’re just more visible when it’s our own family, that’s all.

    So: nothing to be ashamed of, or feel bad about. Just, something to manage—together.

    Figure out what everyone involved wants/needs, put them all on the table, and figure out how to:

    • Make sure outright needs are met first
    • Try to address wants next, where possible

    Remember, that if you feel more is being asked of you than you can give (in terms of time, energy, money, whatever), then this discussion is a time to bring that up, and ask for support, e.g.:

    “In order to be able to do that, I would need… [description of support]; can you help with that?”

    (it might even sometimes be necessary to simply say “No, I can’t do that. Let’s look to see how else we can deal with this” and look for other solutions, brainstorming together)

    Some back-and-forth open discussion and even negotiation might be necessary, but it’s so much better than seething quietly from a distance.

    The goal here is an outcome where everyone’s needs are met—thus leveraging the biggest strength of having siblings in the first place:

    Mutual support, while still being one’s own person. Or, as this writer’s psychology professor friend put it:

    ❝Circling back to your original intention, this whole discussion adds up to: siblings can be very good or very bad for your life, depending on tons of things that we talked about, especially communication skills, emotional wellness of each person, and the complexity of challenges they face interdependently.❞

    Our previous main feature about good communication can help a lot:

    Save Time With Better Communication

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  • Strong Curves – by Bret Contreras & Kellie Davis

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    The title (and subtitle) is, of course, an appeal to vanity. However, the first-listed author is well-known as “The Glute Guy”, and he takes this very seriously, not just for aesthetic reasons but also for practical reasons.

    After all, when it comes to posture and stability, a lot rests on our hips, and hips, well, they rest on our butt and thighs. What’s more, the gluteus maximus is the largest muscle in the human body, so really, is it a good one to neglect? Probably not, and your lower back will definitely thank you for keeping your glutes in good order, too.

    That said, while it’s a focal point, it’s not the be-all-and-end-all, and this book does cover the whole body.

    The book takes the reader from “absolute beginner” to “could compete professionally”, with clearly-illustrated and well-described exercises. We also get a strong “crash course” in the relevant anatomy and physiology, and even a chapter on nutrition, which is a lot better than a lot of exercise books’ efforts in that regard.

    For those who like short courses, this book has several progressive 12-week workout plans that take the reader from a very clear starting point to a very clear goal point.

    Another strength of the book is that while a lot of exercises expect (and require) access to a gym, there are also whole sections of “at home / bodyweight” exercises, including 12-week workout plans for such, as described above.

    Bottom line: there’s really nothing bad that this reviewer can find to say about this one—highly recommendable to any woman who wants to get strong while keeping a feminine look.

    Click here to check out Strong Curves, and rebuild your body, your way!

    PS: at first glance, the cover art looks like an AI model; it’s not; that’s the co-author Kellie Davis, who also serves as the model through the book’s many photographic illustrations.

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  • Can You Get Addicted To MSG, Like With Sugar?

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Have a question or a request? We love to hear from you!

    In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!

    As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!

    So, no question/request too big or small 😎

    ❝Hello, I love your newsletter 🙂 Can I have a question? While browsing through your recepies, I realised many contained MSG. As someone based in Europe, I am not used to using MSG while cooking (of course I know that processed food bought in supermarket containes MSG). There is a stigma, that MSG is not particulary healthy, but rather it should be really bad and cause negative effects like headaches. Is this true? Also, can you get addicted to MSG, just like you get addicted to sugar? Thank you :)❞

    Thank you for the kind words, and the interesting questions!

    Short answer: no and no 🙂

    Longer answer: most of the negative reputation about MSG comes from a single piece of satire written in the US in the 1960s, which the popular press then misrepresented as a genuine concern, and the public then ran with, mostly due to racism/xenophobia/sinophobia specifically, given the US’s historically not fabulous relations with China, and the moniker of “Chinese restaurant syndrome”, notwithstanding that MSG was first isolated in Japan, not China, more than 100 years ago.

    The silver lining that comes out of this is that because of the above, MSG has been one of the most-studied food additives in recent decades, with many teams of scientists in many countries trying to determine its risks and not finding any (except insofar as anything in extreme quantities can kill you, including water or oxygen).

    You can read more about this and other* myths about MSG, here:

    Monosodium Glutamate: Sinless Flavor-Enhancer Or Terrible Health Risk?

    *such as pertaining to gluten sensitivity, which in reality MSG has no bearing on whatsoever as it does not contain gluten and is not even made of the same basic stuff; gluten being a protein made of (amongst other things) the amino acid glutamine, not a glutamate salt. Glutamate is as closely related to gluten as cyanocobalamin (vitamin B12) is to cyanide (the famous poison).

    PS: if you didn’t click the above link to read that article, then 1) we really do recommend it 2) we did some LD50 calculations there and looked at available research, and found that for someone of this writer’s (very medium) size, eating 1kg of MSG at once is sufficient to cause toxicity, and injecting >250g of MSG may cause heart problems. So we don’t recommend doing that.

    However, ½ tsp in a recipe that gives multiple portions is not going to get you anywhere close to the danger zone, unless you consume that entire meal by yourself hundreds of times per day. And if you do, the MSG is probably the least of your concerns.

    (2 tsp of cassia cinnamon, however, is enough to cause coumarin toxicity; for this reason we recommend Ceylon (or “True” or “Sweet”) cinnamon in our recipes, as it has almost undetectable levels of coumarin)

    With regard to your interesting question about addiction, first of all let’s speak briefly about sugar addiction:

    Sugar addiction is, by broad scientific consensus, agreed-upon as an extant thing that does exist, and contemporary research is more looking into the “hows” and “whys” and “whats” rather than the “whether”. It is a somewhat complicated topic, because it’s halfway between what science would usually consider a chemical addiction, and what science would usually consider a behavioral addiction:

    The Not-So-Sweet Science Of Sugar Addiction

    The reasonable prevailing hypothesis, therefore, is that sugar simply has two moderate mechanisms of addiction, rather than one strong one.

    The biochemical side of sugar addiction comes from the body’s metabolism of sugar, so this cannot be a thing for MSG, because there is nothing to metabolize in the same sense of the word (MSG being an inorganic compound with zero calories).

    People can crave salt, especially when deficient in it, and MSG does contain sodium (it’s what the “S” stands for), but it contains a little under ⅓ of the sodium that table salt does (sodium chloride in whatever form, be it sea salt, rock salt, or such):

    MSG vs. Salt: Sodium Comparison ← we do molecular calculations here!

    Sea Salt vs MSG – Which is Healthier? ← this one for a head-to-head

    However, even craving salt does not constitute an addiction; nobody is shamefully hiding their rock salt crystals under their bed and getting a fix when they feel low, and nor does withdrawal cause adverse side effects, except insofar as (once again) a person deficient in salt will crave salt.

    Finally, the only other way we know of that one might wonder if MSG could be addictive, is about glutamate and glutamate receptors. The glutamate in MSG is the same glutamate (down to the atoms) as the glutamate formed if one consumes tomatoes in the presence of salt, and triggers the same glutamate receptors in the same way. We have the same number of receptors either way, and uptake is exactly the same (because again, it’s exactly the same chemical) so there is a maximum to how strong this effect can be, and that maximum is the same whatever the source of the glutamate was.

    In this respect, if MSG is addictive, then so is a tomato salad with a pinch of salt: it’s not—it’s just tasty.

    We haven’t cited papers in today’s article, but it’s just because we cited them already in the articles we linked, and so we avoided doubling up. Most of them are in that first link we gave 🙂

    One final note

    Technically anyone can develop a sensitivity to anything, so in theory someone could develop a sensitivity to MSG, just like they could for any other ingredient. Our usual legal/medical disclaimer applies.

    However, it’s certainly not a common trigger, putting it well below common allergens like nuts (or less common allergens like, say, bananas), not even in the same league as common intolerances such as gluten, and less worthy of health risk warnings than, say, spinach (high in oxalates; fine for most people but best avoided if you have kidney problems).

    The reason we use it in the recipes we use it in, is simply because it’s a lower-sodium alternative to salt, and while it contains a (very) tiny bit less sodium than low-sodium salt (which itself has about ⅓ the sodium of regular salt), it has more of a flavor-enhancing effect, such that one can use half as much, for a more than sixfold total sodium reduction. Which for most of us in the industrialized world, is beneficial.

    Want to try some?

    If today’s article has inspired you to give MSG a try, here’s an example product on Amazon 😎

    Enjoy!

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  • Hungry? How To Beat Cravings

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    The Science of Hunger, And How To Sate It

    This is Dr. David Ludwig. That’s not a typo; he’s a doctor both ways—MD and PhD.

    Henceforth we’ll just say “Dr. Ludwig”, though! He’s a professor in the Department of Nutrition at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and director of the New Balance Foundation Obesity Prevention Center.

    His research focuses on the effects of diet on hormones, metabolism, and body weight, and he’s one of the foremost experts when it comes to carbohydrates, glycemic load, and obesity.

    Why are we putting on weight? What are we getting wrong?

    Contrary to popular belief, Dr. Ludwig says, weight gain is not caused by a lack of exercise. In fact, people tend to overestimate how many calories are burned by exercise.

    A spoonful of sugar may make the medicine go down, but it also contains 60 calories, and that’d take about 1,500 steps for the average person to burn off. Let’s put this another way:

    If you walk 10,000 steps per day, that will burn off 400 calories. Still think you can exercise away that ice cream sundae or plate of fries?

    Wait, this is interesting and all, but what does this have to do with hunger?

    Why we get hungry

    Two important things:

    • All that exercise makes us hungry, because the more we exercise, the more the body speeds up our metabolism accordingly.
    • Empty calories don’t just add weight themselves, they also make us hungrier

    What are empty calories, and why do they make us hungrier?

    Empty calories are calories that are relatively devoid of other nutrition. This especially means simple sugars (especially refined sugar), white flour and white flour products (quick-release starches), and processed seed oils (e.g. canola, sunflower, and friends).

    They zip straight into our bloodstream, and our body sends out an army of insulin to deal with the blood sugar spike. And… that backfires.

    Imagine a person whose house is a terrible mess, and they have a date coming over in half an hour.

    They’re going to zoom around tidying, but they’re going to stuff things out of sight as quickly and easily as possible, rather than, say, sit down and Marie Kondo the place.

    But superficially, they got the job done really quickly!

    Insulin does similarly when overwhelmed by a blood sugar spike like that.

    So, it stores everything as fat as quickly as possible, and whew, the pancreas needs a break now after all that exertion, and the blood is nice and free from blood sugars.

    Wait, the blood is what now?

    The body notices the low blood sugar levels, and it also knows you just stored fat so you must be preparing for starvation, and now the low blood sugar levels indicate starvation is upon us. Quick, we must find food if we want to survive! So it sends a hunger signal to make sure you don’t let the body starve.

    You make a quick snack, and the cycle repeats.

    Dr. Ludwig’s solution:

    First, we need to break out of that cycle, and that includes calming down our insulin response (and thus rebuilding our insulin sensitivity, as our bodies will have become desensitized, after the equivalent of an air-raid siren every 40 minutes or so).

    How to do that?

    First, cut out the really bad things that we mentioned above.

    Next: cut healthy carbs too—we’re talking unprocessed grains here, legumes as well, and also starchy vegetables (root vegetables etc). Don’t worry, this will be just for a short while.

    The trick here is that we are resensitizing our bodies to insulin.

    Keep this up for even just a week, and then gradually reintroduce the healthier carbs. Unprocessed grains are better than root vegetables, as are legumes.

    You’re not going to reintroduce the sugars, white flour, canola oil, etc. You don’t have to be a puritan, and if you go to a restaurant you won’t undo all your work if you have a small portion of fries. But it’s not going to be a part of your general diet.

    Other tips from Dr. Ludwig:

    • Get plenty of high-quality protein—it’s good for you and suppresses your appetite
    • Shop for success—make sure you keep your kitchen stocked with healthy easy snack food
    • Nuts, cacao nibs, and healthy seeds will be your best friends and allies here
    • Make things easy—buy pre-chopped vegetables, for example, so when you’re hungry, you don’t have to wait longer (and work more) to eat something healthy
    • Do what you can to reduce stress, and also eat mindfully (that means paying attention to each mouthful, rather than wolfing something down while multitasking)

    If you’d like to know more about Dr. Ludwig and his work, you can check out his website for coaching, recipes, meal plans, his blog, and other resources!

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  • What’s the difference between a heart attack and cardiac arrest? One’s about plumbing, the other wiring

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    In July 2023, rising US basketball star Bronny James collapsed on the court during practice and was sent to hospital. The 18-year-old athlete, son of famous LA Lakers’ veteran LeBron James, had experienced a cardiac arrest.

    Many media outlets incorrectly referred to the event as a “heart attack” or used the terms interchangeably.

    A cardiac arrest and a heart attack are distinct yet overlapping concepts associated with the heart.

    With some background in how the heart works, we can see how they differ and how they’re related.

    Explode/Shutterstock

    Understanding the heart

    The heart is a muscle that contracts to work as a pump. When it contracts it pushes blood – containing oxygen and nutrients – to all the tissues of our body.

    For the heart muscle to work effectively as a pump, it needs to be fed its own blood supply, delivered by the coronary arteries. If these arteries are blocked, the heart muscle doesn’t get the blood it needs.

    This can cause the heart muscle to become injured or die, and results in the heart not pumping properly.

    Heart attack or cardiac arrest?

    Simply put, a heart attack, technically known as a myocardial infarction, describes injury to, or death of, the heart muscle.

    A cardiac arrest, sometimes called a sudden cardiac arrest, is when the heart stops beating, or put another way, stops working as an effective pump.

    In other words, both relate to the heart not working as it should, but for different reasons. As we’ll see later, one can lead to the other.

    Why do they happen? Who’s at risk?

    Heart attacks typically result from blockages in the coronary arteries. Sometimes this is called coronary artery disease, but in Australia, we tend to refer to it as ischaemic heart disease.

    The underlying cause in about 75% of people is a process called atherosclerosis. This is where fatty and fibrous tissue build up in the walls of the coronary arteries, forming a plaque. The plaque can block the blood vessel or, in some instances, lead to the formation of a blood clot.

    Atherosclerosis is a long-term, stealthy process, with a number of risk factors that can sneak up on anyone. High blood pressure, high cholesterol, diet, diabetes, stress, and your genes have all been implicated in this plaque-building process.

    Other causes of heart attacks include spasms of the coronary arteries (causing them to constrict), chest trauma, or anything else that reduces blood flow to the heart muscle.

    Regardless of the cause, blocking or reducing the flow of blood through these pipes can result in the heart muscle not receiving enough oxygen and nutrients. So cells in the heart muscle can be injured or die.

    Heart attack vs cardiac arrest
    Here’s a simple way to remember the difference. Author provided

    But a cardiac arrest is the result of heartbeat irregularities, making it harder for the heart to pump blood effectively around the body. These heartbeat irregularities are generally due to electrical malfunctions in the heart. There are four distinct types:

    • ventricular tachycardia: a rapid and abnormal heart rhythm in which the heartbeat is more than 100 beats per minute (normal adult, resting heart rate is generally 60-90 beats per minute). This fast heart rate prevents the heart from filling with blood and thus pumping adequately
    • ventricular fibrillation: instead of regular beats, the heart quivers or “fibrillates”, resembling a bag of worms, resulting in an irregular heartbeat greater than 300 beats per minute
    • pulseless electrical activity: arises when the heart muscle fails to generate sufficient pumping force after electrical stimulation, resulting in no pulse
    • asystole: the classic flat-line heart rhythm you see in movies, indicating no electrical activity in the heart.
    Aystole heart rhythm showing no electrical activity
    Remember this flat-line rhythm from the movies? It’s asystole, when there’s no electrical activity in the heart. Kateryna Kon/Shutterstock

    Cardiac arrest can arise from numerous underlying conditions, both heart-related and not, such as drowning, trauma, asphyxia, electrical shock and drug overdose. James’ cardiac arrest was attributed to a congenital heart defect, a heart condition he was born with.

    But among the many causes of a cardiac arrest, ischaemic heart disease, such as a heart attack, stands out as the most common cause, accounting for 70% of all cases.

    So how can a heart attack cause a cardiac arrest? You’ll remember that during a heart attack, heart muscle can be damaged or parts of it may die. This damaged or dead tissue can disrupt the heart’s ability to conduct electrical signals, increasing the risk of developing arrhythmias, possibly causing a cardiac arrest.

    So while a heart attack is a common cause of cardiac arrest, a cardiac arrest generally does not cause a heart attack.

    What do they look like?

    Because a cardiac arrest results in the sudden loss of effective heart pumping, the most common signs and symptoms are a sudden loss of consciousness, absence of pulse or heartbeat, stopping of breathing, and pale or blue-tinged skin.

    But the common signs and symptoms of a heart attack include chest pain or discomfort, which can show up in other regions of the body such as the arms, back, neck, jaw, or stomach. Also frequent are shortness of breath, nausea, light-headedness, looking pale, and sweating.

    What’s the take-home message?

    While both heart attack and cardiac arrest are disorders related to the heart, they differ in their mechanisms and outcomes.

    A heart attack is like a blockage in the plumbing supplying water to a house. But a cardiac arrest is like an electrical malfunction in the house’s wiring.

    Despite their different nature both conditions can have severe consequences and require immediate medical attention.

    Michael Todorovic, Associate Professor of Medicine, Bond University and Matthew Barton, Senior lecturer, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Griffith University

    This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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