Transgender Bathroom Policy, Science Of Addiction, Food Friday

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We talk to a WPR reporter about the number of policy level changes regarding transgender bathroom use, and hear from those directly affected. New research out of UW-Madison looks at how addiction works in the human brain. We find out what it could mean for treating a variety of behaviors. On today’s edition of Food Friday, we learn how to reduce waste in our kitchens, with delicious results.

Featured in this Show

  • Transgender Students And The Political Debate On Bathrooms

    We talk to a WPR reporter about the number of policy level changes regarding transgender bathroom use, and hear from those directly affected.

  • Research On Prefrontal Cortex Provides New Theory On Addiction

    New research from the University of Wisconsin-Madison found opioid addiction is related to the brain’s prefrontal cortex, the part responsible for self-control and planning.

    The prefrontal cortex could be a sensitive hot spot for opioid actions, and a key to understanding impulsive and reward-seeking behavior, according to a recent study by Brian A. Baldo, a UW-Madison professor of psychiatry.

    An excess of opioids released into the prefrontal cortex disrupted the test subject’s self-control and caused them to act in a way that was disadvantageous to them, Baldo said.

    “An undergirding idea in addiction biology is that these rewards systems evolved to direct us to healthy things like eating, reproduction and so on,” Baldo said. “Drugs of abuse get in there and sort of hijack the system by chemically acting on the same substrates that underlie the function of our natural reward systems.”

    Further study found that blocking opioid systems in the prefrontal cortex restored self-control within test subjects, he said.

    “Implying that if there is an excess of opioid action there, it actually can be one of the important substrates that drives food impulsivity and perhaps by extension, impulsivity in pursuing other rewards maladaptively as well – such as drugs,” he said.

    Baldo said he hopes further study of this area of the brain could provide new understanding of the whole network function, allowing doctors to attack the problem from many different angles, and even destigmatize the problem of addiction, too.

    “The brain is an organ like any other,” he said. “If we look at it from a biological perspective, we realize these disorders emerge from the dysregulated functioning of an organ just like any other disease.”

  • Food Friday: How To Cut Down On Food Waste

    The average American throws away $30 each month in the form of uneaten food–something that went bad, or uneaten lefovers, or only using part of the food. Food Friday regular Lori Skelton tackles food waste and tests recipes from “The Waste Free Kitchen Handbook.”

  • The Prefrontal Cortex And A New Theory On Addiction

    A new study on addiction finds that the prefrontal cortex — the brain’s planning and decision making center — might be a hotspot for understanding how opiates interact with our brains. The theory comes after recent expirements at UW-Madison, where the rats with a higher amount of a substance similar to opiate drugs were found to exhibit binge eating and excessive reward seeking behavior.

Episode Credits

  • Judith Siers-Poisson Host
  • Veronica Rueckert Host
  • KP Whaley Producer
  • Haleema Shah Producer
  • Amanda Magnus Producer
  • Laurel White Guest
  • Brian A Baldo Guest
  • Lori Skelton Guest

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