Word: mao
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...WHEN MAO ZEDONG'S COMMUnist forces pushed Chiang Kai-shek's regime off mainland China and drove it to Taiwan, few expected the resource-poor province to thrive. Nevertheless, in its new home, the Republic of China has become one of East Asia's "economic miracles," with a per capita GNP today of $12,500. Even that transformation, though, is less startling than Taiwan's political revolution, culminating last Saturday in the presidential election. Voters ignored missile rattling from the mainland and gave current President Lee Teng-hui a strong mandate. He won 54% of the vote, more than twice...
...research, published in the journal Nature, scientists ran brain scans on smokers and abstainers and found that smokers had 40% less of a brain enzyme known as monoamine oxidase B, or MAO B. The enzyme breaks down dopamine, a chemical messenger in the brain associated with feelings of pleasure. Because of its exquisitely satisfying effects, says Joanna Fowler, a chemist at Brookhaven National Laboratory and one of the study's authors, "dopamine is crucially important in reinforcing and motivating behavior...
Thus smoking appears to create a self-perpetuating cycle: less MAO B leads to more dopamine, leads to more pleasure, leads to more smoking, leads to less MAO...
Scientists have not yet identified what factor in smoke lowers levels of MAO B, but Fowler speculates that it may be working synergistically with nicotine to boost dopamine levels. Earlier research showed that nicotine also increases dopamine levels by gripping like Velcro to receptors clustered in the forebrain...
From Haiku to Buddhism, Confucius to Mao Tse-Tung, East Asian Studies encompasses a great wealth of information. The department studies the history, literature, politics, philosophy and economics of China, Japan, Korea and Vietnam, making it one of the most comprehensive departments at Harvard. The requirements are almost as sweeping...