Gene Morphis ' View

The research team of Dr. Claire J. Steves, Dr. Ted Spector and others at Kings College in London are doing some amazing research on aging (and other important research as well). Much of that examines aging effects on the brain. One of the research studies involved exercise and cognitive decline. Here is a quote from that research : “ A striking protective relationship was found between muscle fitness (leg power) and both 10-year cognitive change… and subsequent total grey matter”. In other words, the women with better leg strength and fitness showed less cognitive decline as they aged. As we continue to note, the link between physical fitness, exercise and so on to maintaining a healthy brain is well known. And, we’ve seen studies where older adults improved cognition with dancing, which obviously requires use of leg muscles. (See Dance Your *** Off; Grow a Bigger Brain ). But this is the first I recall where leg muscles in particular were noted, and the first where a muscle gro...

What everyone ought to know about loneliness. If you maintain regular interaction with friends and family, everything in your life will be better. If you don’t, odds of bad things, such as cognitive decline and premature death, increase. Isolation and Loneliness Can Be Deadly From the UCLA Healthy Years Newsletter: Prolonged loneliness and isolation can have serious effects on your health. It can increase bouts of Depression and sadness, disrupt sleep, elevate blood pressure and raise levels of the stress hormone cortisol. Research has shown that extreme loneliness can increase your chances of early death by 14 percent. In fact, loneliness is put in the same risk category as smoking 15 cigarettes a day, and has twice the impact on premature death as does obesity. The University College London (UCL) and Manchester University have been conducting an ongoing multi-year study called ELSA -English Longitudinal Study of Aging. They reported this finding:  ...

If you maintain regular interaction with friends and family, everything in your life will be better. Angela Troyer, PhD and Professional Practice Chief of Psychology and the program director of neuropsychology and cognitive health at Baycrest Hospital in Toronto, Nicole Anderson PhD and Associate Professor of Psychiatry & Psychology at the University of Toronto and Kelly Murphy PhD, Clinical Neuropsychologist at Baycrest and Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of Toronto wrote Living with Mild Cognitive Impairment: A Guide to Maximizing Brain Health and Reducing Risk of Dementia . In synthesizing some of their work, Professor Troyer wrote this : “Did you know that connecting with friends may also boost your brain health and lower your risk of dementia?” She went on to make these four points about social interaction: you may live longer, you will enjoy better physical health; you will enjoy better mental health; and you may even lower your risk of dementia. ...

Our brains normally control our breathing automatically. At the base of the brain is the brain stem, which includes the medulla oblongata, which monitors things like carbon dioxide levels in the blood and signals the lungs to adjust as appropriate. According to Doctor Matthew MacKinno n, taking control of your breathing for a while can be relaxing and calming. Let’s give it a test. Beginning right now, sit up straight, relax your shoulders, put your hands in your lap. Exhale and empty your lungs. Take a slow deep breath. Try to count slowly up to four as you inhale. Hold your breath for a count of four, then slowly exhale counting 1 2 3 4.  Repeat ten times. Done? By the time you complete ten reps, you’ve probably cut your respiration rate from about fifteen breaths per minute to six. If you’ve followed along, you should be more relaxed and concentrating better. The Navy Seals call this technique four-box breathing and use it to calm down and focus. And they are ...

Just a week ago we summarized research lead by Neuroscientist Aga Burzynska, PhD that showed that dancing improved brain white matter, while other exercise and the control group didn’t. Now we have another related research study led by Dr. Kathrin Rehfeld that shows important brain improvement from dancing. The research was conducted at the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases and at the Otto von Geuricke University Medical Center.  Further, dancing achieved better results than an exercise program. Participants were divided into two groups. One group took dancing lessons. The dance steps and routines became more complex as the study continued. The second group did a combination of endurance training, strength training, flexibility and stretching. Both groups showed measurable improvement. However, the dancers showed more improvement in the part of the brain associated with balance. From the study: “Results reveal that higher cardiorespiratory fitness levels (VO2 M...

Lee Ann Womack had a giant hit in 2000 with a song called “I hope you dance” written by Mark Sanders and Tia Sellers. Lee Ann, Mark and Tia were on to something. There is ample research supporting the role exercise has in overall health. Further, there is substantial additional research that informs us that we can grow a bigger brain by learning new activities that involve concentration and fine motor skills, such as learning to play the guitar or woodcarving. Professor Agnieszka Burzynska and a team from the University of Illinois in Urbana performed a study on older adults to see if dancing had any effect on brain health. The test group, which consisted of older adults, was split into three groups. One group maintained their current activities; most of them were sedentary. The second group performed light stretching exercises, and the third group began to take dance lessons and dance. The good news is that the dancers showed real, measurable improvement in the area of the brain...

Author Peter Andrey Smith titled his  article  on the relationship of the brain to the intestines, and, in particular, the tiny creatures that live in our intestine beautifully: “ The tantalizing links between gut microbes and the brain ”. If the human brain is the frontier of medical science, the  microbiome , those tiny creatures that live in our intestinal tract, is Jupiter. The linkage between what goes on in the gut and the brain is indeed tantalizing, and the subject of research worldwide. There are over 1,000 different kinds of those things living inside us. There are hints that having the wrong mix of gut microbes, or the absence of any particular type, is linked to asthma, irritable bowel syndrome, allergies, depression, Alzheimer’s disease and more. Further, antibiotics, illnesses and other factors can deplete the population. Here are seven things we can do to help keep our little creatures happy and healthy. Eat the right stuff. There is evidence...

Today I was interviewed by noted podcaster Kelsay Yerian for her Cover the Topic podcast. In the second of a three-part interview series, we discussed investing in start-ups, a little about venture capitalists, e-commerce, retail winners and losers, and the beginnings of www.bigbrain.place. www.bigbrain.place offers a variety of games, puzzles, aromatherapy, books on meditation, gourmet coffee and sleep accoutrements- all grounded in research indicating that they are good for brain health. You can listen here or catch it on ITunes. http://coverthetopic.com/episode-38-interview-with-gene-morphis-part-2/

We previously wrote about the activities that you (that is your brain, which is reading this) does while you sleep. Those activities are critical to memory, overall health and more. If you consistently don’t get enough sleep, your normal every day performance suffers-not a surprise to individuals who find themselves rotating from morning to evening to overnight shifts. Fortunately, science has come up with some tips for a good night’s sleep: Get regular exercise. But stop exercising at least two hours before trying to sleep; you’ll be too jazzed up. Go to bed at the same time each night. Stop looking at your portable electronic devices like your smartphone and tablet, an hour before bedtime. Those devices emit light in the spectrum that stimulates our brains to wake up. If you are sensitive to caffeine, have your last cup of coffee, glass of soda, etc. in the early afternoon. Get into a nighttime ritual. Clean your face, brush you...

Have you ever heard some ersatz over-achiever say, “sleep is over-rated”? He was wrong. If anything, sleep is underrated. There is abundant research to prove it. Like a lot of other stuff, we’ve learned what lack of sleep can do the hard way by not getting enough of it. You’ll Get a Dirty Brain if You Don’t Sleep Enough Dr. Maiken Nedergaard and associates at the University of Rochester Medical Center discovered a system that drains waste from the brain. While we sleep of course. Surrounding our spinal column and brain is cerebrospinal fluid. This clear fluid flows through channels in the brain, and the channels are controlled by glial cells. While we sleep, the glial cells move the fluid around and, among other things, it seems to remove beta-amyloid from brain tissue. If “beta-amyloid” rings a bell, it’s because some researchers think it is involved in Alzheimer’s disease. We clearly want that to be removed. If we don’t get sufficient sleep, we are letting the sludge build up...

There is an explosion of research into brain health. One result is a growing knowledge base on steps one can take to maintain brain health and even improve focus, memory, and attention. These techniques are good at every stage of life from youth into older age.  Exercise is really good for brain health. Actually, one of the most important things you can do.  Mixing up the kinds of exercise that you do seems to be even better. Aerobic/cardio exercise helps keep strong healthy blood flow up into the brain. For some reason, resistance and weight-training may even be better for brain health than cardio. But, again, let’s assume that mixing up resistance and cardio is better than one or the other. Walking, running, jumping, dancing and the like are brain-healthy. Something to do with nerve connections from the sole of the feet to the brain. Or maybe it is just the cardio benefit. But, as the Nike folks say, “Just Do It”. Eating right ...

Have you ever watched, or been involved in, a business failure, where, despite the best efforts of hardworking people, the business doesn’t survive? Scott Sonenshein lived through it, as he describes in the Introduction to his engrossing book Stretch .  (In some books, the reader can skip the intro- not this one; the introduction is a must-read part of the book.) He was hired by start-up Vividence in Silicon Valley at the very apex of the tech boom.  Despite prestige VC backers, top-tier hires and $50 million, Vividence didn’t make it. As his career continued, that experience led to an interest in why some well-funded operations don’t succeed, while other, more resource constrained, do. Peter Senge wrote about reinforcing cycles as part of his book The Fifth Discipline , which I consider one of the finest business books ever penned. In it, Senge describes the downward cycle that some companies fall into, and why it is so difficult to reverse. Sonenshein explores those cycle...

Here’s our annual high-level comparison of Amazon vs. Walmart. From a growth perspective, Amazon wiped the floor with Walmart. AMZN added $18 billion in revenue for a 20.2% growth rate, while WMT shrank by $(3.5) billion or (0.7%).  WMT’s revenue was negatively affected by currency exchange rates moving against it, but even adjusting for that WMT’s revenue wasn’t in the realm of AMZN From a GAAP earnings perspective, WMT maintains its lead, although that is diminishing. WMT’s GAAP operating margin was 5.0%, which was a 0.6 PPT improvement, while AMZN delivered 2.1% operating margin. However, AMZN’s margin improved a whopping 1.9 PPT. WMT’s net income still dwarfs AMZN at $14.7 billion vs. $0.6 billion. But again, the change is informative: as WMT launched programs for higher associate pay and stronger e-commerce capability, its net income fell by 10.2% or $1.7 billion. Conversely, AMZN increased income by $0.8 billion from a prior year loss. While this is an annual com...

A savvy businessman once told me “it’s important to know what problem you are trying to solve”. Let’s ignore for the moment whether or not Treasury or the IRS had the power to change the rules on so-called tax inversions without Congressional action. (The power they said they didn’t have only a few months ago.) Rather, let’s focus on what problem we are trying to solve. That is, why is the greatest country on earth chasing companies away? Shouldn’t the U.S. be the place that companies want to locate their headquarters? Imagine this: the U.S. legal structure and tax regime was so attractive that Mercedes, Toyota, Astra Zeneca, Samsung, Total, Singapore Air, Banco Santander, Petrobras, Fujitsu, Nokia, SAP, Audi, Tata Group, Lenovo, Pirelli, Deutsche Bank, Honda, LG, Hyundai, Roche, Credit Suisse, Four Seasons, Siemens, Phillips, Bridgestone, Anglo-America, DeBeers, Volkswagen, Canon,  L’Oréal, Swatch, Armani, LVMH, Toshiba, H&M, Mahindra, Aldi, Kubota, Onex, Ducati, ...

The number of asset lite businesses is steadily increasing, as is the breadth of industries effected.  I first noticed them in the 1970’s, when Baron Hilton sold several flagship Hilton hotels while retaining management contracts that entitled Hilton Corporation to a share of revenue and earnings. Over the next two decades, Marriott Corp copied and then perfected the hotel management agreement business approach, coupling a Marriott franchise with a management agreement for any one of a growing stable of brands (Fairfield Inns, Courtyard by Marriott, Residence Inns, J.W. Marriott, etc. etc.), enabling absentee investor/owners.  It turns out, however, that asset lite business structures date back much earlier. Franchises and Dealers Early versions of asset lite businesses include franchise and dealer organizations. Soft drink and beer distributors, auto dealers and tire and repair franchises date to the early nineteen hundreds, as manufacturers needed mass distribution. T...

Why is there growing earnings gap between the highest earners and the rest of the U.S. workforce? While a number of hypotheses have been advanced, I think many miss important developments. In my view, the following culprits have materially affected the wages, salaries and income of the lowest ranks.   Both governmental and cultural destruction of the family. I’m not going to dwell on this, but, statistically, the fastest path to poverty is to be a single mom. Want to not be poor? Finish high school and get married before getting pregnant. Harsh perhaps, but statistically unarguable. The Federal Reserve continues to oppress lower earners. For most folks, building wealth starts with home ownership. Replacing rent payments with mortgage payments generally results in owning an asset (home). In some markets, that asset appreciates. When my wife and I were apartment dwellers, we saved for a home down payment. Our savings earned interest. Now, I won’t say that the interest was hug...

One of my cousins was recently admitted to the hospital with pneumonia, and went straight into the ICU. People tend to ignore pneumonia, or minimize its seriousness. You might have even heard people talking about “walking pneumonia”. That, in technical terms, is BS. Pneumonia is a badass illness. According to Centers for Disease Control, 53,000 people died of pneumonia last year. For those of us over 65, vaccinations are recommended, with the usual exceptions for certain conditions. And it is recommended for many under 65 with certain conditions. There are two different vaccines that cover different strains. You need both shots. Of course it isn’t foolproof. The vaccines aren’t 100% effective, and new strains emerge. Still, there is no reason to get seriously ill from a strain that a vax would have likely prevented. If you are over 65 and haven’t had the shots, go see your doc. Don’t screw around. And if you are younger, check with your parents, other relatives and friends to ma...

Stock buybacks are all the rage. There is even an investing newsletter called Total Yield that adds dividends and stock repurchases and uses that measure as a key criterion for investment decisions. Despite its widespread popularity, I’m not crazy about stock buybacks. In fact, they are increasingly signs of dumb, lazy or incompetent management. Here’s why: 1.        They are frequently used as a palliative to offset bad news.   About to issue an earnings release with a sales decline and a miss to analyst estimates? Throw in a stock buyback to see if it will relieve some investor pain, or even better, moderate a certain stock price decline. 2.        It doesn’t return money to shareholders; it gives money to people who no longer want to be shareholders. Real believers in a company’s story want to hold the stock. Who sells into a buyback? People who no longer believe. 3.        It raise...

As happens this time of year, publishers list their most important/influential/etc. youngsters.  As an example, the May issue of Wired has “20 Unsung Geniuses”.  We think mature adults deserve recognition just as much as 20-something billionaires.  Here is our Sixty Over Sixty list of the most influential, annoying, important or folks we just find interesting.  Here then, sorted by age, is The Sixty Most Important Leaders Over Sixty. Henry Kissinger.  Still the U.S. best thinker on foreign policy and diplomacy. His recently published book (at age 91) World Order is not only a best seller, it is extraorinary. Jimmy Carter.  Better as an ex-President than President.  His work for Habitat for Humanity is a lesson for all of us. T. Boone Pickens.  Oilman, energy expert.  Creator of The Pickens Plan for energy independence. Frank Gehry.  Showing the world what new materials and CAD design can do to architecture. Warren Bufett. B...