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Tooth tartar could uncover the drug habits of ancient people

Want to know whether an ancient Sogdian smoked cannabis or a Viking got high on henbane? A new method, which analyzes drug residue in the tartar of teeth, may soon be able to tell. The method, which found drug traces on 19th century skeletons—and more substances than standard blood tests in 10 recently deceased individuals—could trace humanity’s drug habits back hundreds of thousands of years.

Shannon Tushingham.
Tushingham

It’s a “new frontier,” says archaeologist Shannon Tushingham of Washington State University, Pullman, who investigates ancient tobacco use in North America, but was not involved in the new work.

To study the history of medicines and drugs, most scientists scour smoking pipes and drinking vessels for lingering psychoactive molecules. But analysis of drug-coated artifacts often misses substances like hallucinogenic mushrooms that didn’t need containers. And the artifacts don’t reveal who got buzzed.

Because tartar seems to keep a long-term record of drug intake, it could be used in place of hair samples when criminal investigators need to test for substance use after drugs leave the bloodstream. And it could help rewrite the history of drug use, Tushingham says.

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Science Magazine

Fallen Cougars Project: Preserving a nearly⁠ lost legacy

Samantha Edgerton.
Edgerton
Ray Sun
Sun
Kathy Aiken.
Kathy

Kathy Aiken carried the clipping with her when she attended a talk about the Fallen Cougars Project at the Pullman Depot Heritage Center last Veterans Day. After the presentation, she showed it to the speaker, Samantha “Sam” Edgerton (’17, ’19 MA History), a doctoral student, and Raymond “Ray” Sun, the WSU associate history professor who started the project.

“Samantha and Ray looked at it, and said, ‘We don’t have this guy in our project.’ And it started us on this odyssey,” says Aiken.

After the November 2019 presentation, Aiken visited one of Sun’s classes, then wrote to her siblings about the project, asking what they thought about redirecting monies from the WSU fellowship in their father’s name to help fund the research. They all agreed. “Those students are doing great work,” Aiken says, noting the Fallen Cougars Project is “ a really nice, hands-on history project.”

The William D. Aiken Memorial Scholarship is generally given to undergraduate or graduate students in support of scholarly activities and travel relevant to the study of history. His family set up the scholarship in his honor after his death.

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Washington State Magazine

WSU announces Visiting Writers Schedule for spring 2021

Washington State University announces the spring virtual Visiting Writers Series, a collaboration of WSU’s campuses in Pullman and Vancouver.

The first online event takes place Jan. 27 at 6:00 p.m. via ZOOM with a reading and talk by Ryka Aoki, an L.A.-based poet, composer, teacher, and author of Seasonal Velocities, He Mele A Hilo (A Hilo Song), Why Dust Shall Never Settle Upon This Soul and The Great Space Adventure.

A Japanese American and transgender woman, Aoki has been praised by the California State Senate as having an “extraordinary commitment to the visibility and well-being of Transgender people.” She is a two-time Lambda Award finalist, and winner of the Eli Coppola Chapbook Contest, the Corson-Bishop Poetry Prize, and a University Award from the Academy of American Poets.

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Mirage News
WSU Insider

 

 

Experts on U.S. Capitol riots: We’ve never seen this, either

Historians and legal experts in the Inland Northwest described the events in the nation’s capital Wednesday as unprecedented.

Cornell Clayton.
Clayton

“There’s never been anything like it,” said Cornell Clayton, director of the Thomas S. Foley Institute of Public Policy and Public Service at Washington State University.

“They never breached the Capitol like this,” Clayton said, as images of protesters marching through the Capitol’s Statuary Hall or climbing on the balconies showed on television screens.

“As a matter of Constitutional law, it’s not a contested election,” he said. Congress’ role at this point is merely to make sure the reports of the Electoral College votes are opened and read. “They have no role to judge them.”

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The Spokesman-Review

Cannabis use blunts stress reactivity in female rats

Female rats that inhaled vaporized cannabis daily for a month developed a blunted physiological response to stress, according to a new study by Washington State University researchers.

The WSU scientists’ work also establishes a direct, experimental relationship between chronic cannabis use and dampened stress reactivity.

Carrie Cuttler.
Cuttler

“We were able to show pretty conclusively that chronic cannabis use can, in fact, significantly dampen stress reactivity in female rats,” said Carrie Cuttler, an assistant professor of psychology at WSU and co-author of the study.  “Until now, no one has been able to establish whether this blunted stress response is the cause or the consequence of cannabis use.”

After the 30-day self-administration period, only the female rats that had access to the medium potency cannabis demonstrated a significantly muted physiological response. The rats that were given access to the medium potency cannabis also tended to respond more for the substance and had higher concentrations of the drug in their blood after the experiment which may explain why this group specifically demonstrated the blunted stress response.

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Medicalxpress
WSU Insider
News Medical
Daily News
Culture Magazine