New year, new you—in three minutes.
Whether your 2023 ended with fireworks and festive beverages or earplugs and a white noise machine, we welcome you back to the Loop. If you’re aiming for improved health in 2024, consider adding just three minutes of vigorous exercise today. It’s been shown that just that much movement can lower your mortality and risk of cardiovascular disease. (Honestly, it’s going to take you longer to read this email. Although perhaps reading every Loop is your resolution, in which case, you are killing it! But we digress.) Health psychologist and exercise instructor Kelly McGonigal, a lecturer at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, suggests acting like an athlete. Her three-minute series includes pretending you are boxing, doing ballet, and more. “Don’t overthink it, just do it,” McGonigal, PhD ’04, told the New York Times. “You can’t do this wrong.”
If, on the other hand, you indulged a bit too much as the countdown to 2024 commenced, Brian Suffoletto, associate professor of emergency medicine, may want to slide into your DMs. He’s working on tools to help curb binge drinking using typical consumer devices. He and his team found that when a smartphone analyzes a person’s gait or speech, for example, it can detect inebriation 92 and 98 percent of the time, respectively. Through automated, timed text messages, a reveler can be reminded of their consumption limits and head off risky behavior.
Brain breakthrough.
An African shrub is the star of a possible new treatment for traumatic brain injury (TBI). The chemical compound ibogaine—which occurs naturally in the roots of the iboga shrub—has been used in spiritual and healing ceremonies for centuries, but as a psychedelic treatment in medical settings, its potential to cause fatal cardiac arrhythmias has prevented it from gaining traction.
Stanford researchers have shown that ibogaine, when combined with magnesium to protect the heart, can reduce PTSD, anxiety, and depression. Nolan Williams, an associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, worked with VETS, Inc., to assess 30 special operations veterans—all with a history of TBI and repeated blast exposures—before and after receiving one dose of ibogaine and magnesium legally at a clinic in Mexico. “The results are dramatic,” Williams told Stanford Medicine. “No other drug has ever been able to alleviate the functional and neuropsychiatric symptoms of traumatic brain injury.” Immediately following treatment, all of the participants reported significant improvement. One month after treatment, patients experienced average reductions of 88 percent in PTSD symptoms. There were similar outcomes for symptoms of depression and anxiety, as well as improvements in concentration, memory, and other elements of cognition. Though the drug is still strictly banned in the United States, Williams believes veterans should look at the study as “a message of hope.”
Best. Ever.
Photo: Scott Gould/ISI Photos
Women’s basketball coach Tara VanDerveer notched her 1,201st career win on January 12, putting her within spitting distance of former Duke men’s coach Mike Krzyzewski’s 2022 record of 1,202 wins. Number 1,203 could be reached as early as January 21 against Oregon State, making VanDerveer the winningest coach in all of college basketball.
The vegetable patch of youth.
If you want to turn back time, you might take a look at your dinner plate. In a Stanford Medicine-led study of 22 pairs of identical twins, researchers assigned one twin a healthy omnivore diet and the other a healthy vegan diet. At the end of the 8-week study, those on the vegan diet had lower insulin and LDL (bad) cholesterol levels and had lost an average of 4.2 more pounds than their chicken-eating twins. But Christopher Gardner, a professor of medicine at Stanford and the senior author of the study, insists that you don’t have to go full broccoli bro to enjoy the spoils of a greener diet. Cutting back on saturated fats, increasing dietary fiber, and losing weight can all improve cardiovascular health. The study is the focus of a four-part Netflix docuseries that is topping the charts this month.
When AI works for employees.
Three years before ChatGPT was writing biblical verses about sandwiches, nearly 5,200 software customer support agents tested a generative AI-based assistant. The tool, which offered employees real-time response suggestions and links to helpful internal documents, is the subject of the first study to analyze generative AI unleashed at scale in a real workplace. “For most of the past 30 years, computers and digital technologies have helped higher-skilled workers more than less-skilled workers,” said Erik Brynjolfsson, a senior fellow at the Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence. “This technology goes the other way around.” Those using the AI tool were 14 percent more productive, on average, measured by the number of issues resolved per hour. And the least skilled and least experienced workers improved by up to 35 percent. Those who used the tool were less likely to quit, and it improved customer satisfaction. It’s a sign that bringing AI to the workplace could be a win-win, according to Brynjolfsson. “If it’s helping less-skilled workers more, that can help reduce inequality,” he said. “More often than not, you’ll benefit by augmenting workers rather than trying to replace them.”
But wait, there’s more.
If giving constructive feedback makes you nervous, you’re far from alone. But David Dodson, ’83, MBA ’87, a lecturer in management at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, says that with a little preparation, giving feedback can be a positive experience for all parties.
Having trouble with that New Year’s resolution? Try setting a “good enough” goal. Stanford scholars offer five pieces of research-backed advice for the new year.
Stanford researchers have found that less than two minutes of electrical stimulation to the brain can make you temporarily more hypnotizable, potentially allowing more people to access the benefits of hypnosis-based therapy.
Mechanical engineer Catie Cuan danced all the way to her doctorate last year. In December, in collaboration with a UC Berkeley artist and engineering professor, she danced an eight-hour duet (aka a “durational performance”) with a giant robotic arm programmed to accompany her. (Stanford magazine featured Cuan’s work in a 2019 story)
Emmy-winning actor Andre Braugher, ’84, died in December. His work ranged from the Oscar-winning film Glory to the long-running comedy series Brooklyn Nine-Nine. Braugher’s love of acting was born in the acting courses he took at Stanford.
Nice try, Erin Brockovich, but wildfires are bringing back hexavalent chromium. The same cancer-causing chemical that infamously poisoned a small town has been discovered to form in some soils heated by wildfires. Inhaling airborne hexavalent chromium near and downwind of burn sites likely poses the biggest risk.
The university has announced changes to its undergraduate neighborhood housing system, including flexibility to switch neighborhoods after one’s frosh year and shifts to make the neighborhoods more geographically contiguous.
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