Latest news with #TimMcCoy
Yahoo
01-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
How a local doctor and a ‘life-changing' class are helping people lead healthy lives
DES MOINES, Iowa — Metabolic dysfunction may be the most serious condition you've never heard of, and one in three Americans have it. That's the bad news. The good news is preventing it is actually pretty simple. 'We have made it way too complicated,' says Dr. Andy Nish. 'And why is that? Because we're always trying to sell something, right?' Nish has been practicing medicine for nearly 40 years, but it wasn't until he was more than two decades into his career that he started studying nutrition, stress and sleep, all because of the alarming increase in cancer rates. Now, he's teaching a class called 'Aspire' in an effort to help people help themselves. 'It's not about just food. It's not just about movement. It's not just about, you know, what's in our food system,' he explains, 'It's about this concept called the exposome. And the exposome is everything we are exposed to from the time of birth till the time of death.' Annie McCormick was in the pilot class two years ago. 'I knew I needed it,' she says. 'I'm diabetic and at that point I was a bad diabetic and I needed help.' She's been to every class since. 'Well, you learn something new in every class, or it's said a little bit different than it was said in the first class. So, you're going, 'Oh, yeah.' You know, the light bulb will go off.' Dr. Nish explains what healthy aging is and how we can achieve it Tim McCoy loves seeing those light bulb moments. He's the reason the Aspire class exists. 'I thought, well, hey, could you come and be the medical director for this new thing? We didn't have a name at the time. Yeah. So that was two and a half, almost two and a half years ago. ' Heather Charlson has also been there from the beginning. 'Oh, I've learned that it's more than just what people think it is, whether it's just nutrition and exercise. There's so many more things that go into it, whether it's your sleep quality, dealing with stress management or relationships.' Big picture – that's called 'metabolic health' and many things can impact it. Metabolic dysfunction is when at least three of these symptoms are present — increased waist size, elevated blood triglycerides, low HDL cholesterol, high blood pressure, and elevated blood sugar. Those things increase the risk of having cardiovascular disease, diabetes, liver disease, kidney disease, and sleep apnea. Those conditions increase your risk of dying. That's why new participants start the class with specific screenings. 'And as I explain to people, that blood test is not the end all, be all. We're not trying to change a blood test,' explains Dr. Nish, 'we're trying to change how you feel. How do you feel emotionally? How's your energy level?' The blood test may not tell the whole story, but it's definitely part of it. Annie lowered her A1C from eleven down to five, just one indicator of better health. 'When people are suffering, it's just it's very rewarding to see,' says Tim McCoy, 'changing lives, that's what it's about.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
CBS News
27-02-2025
- Sport
- CBS News
As spring soccer season approaches, PA West Soccer still in need of officials
With the calendars changing from February to March, that means spring sports will arrive with the warmer, more spring-like weather. But while interest in playing youth sports in the spring remains high, the number of referees needed to officiate games is shrinking. PA West Soccer executive director Tim McCoy says his organization has roughly 44,000 youth soccer players spread out between 130 clubs in the Greater Pittsburgh area. McCoy says it was clear to identify when interest in officiating began to wane. "A couple of years before the pandemic, I think we started to notice that the numbers were sliding," Mc Coy said. "It was largely to do with the sideline behavior of coaches and spectators, adults with unrealistic expectations for what they were seeing on the field." McCoy says PA West Soccer passed rules a few years ago to make penalties harsher for suspensions, turning one game into two games. Also, the WPIAL and PIAA have been working to alter punishments for player celebrations as well, and the numbers have started to rebound. "We're currently at about 1,700 referees," McCoy said. "Coming out of the pandemic we were at 1,100 referees, so we've done a significant job of growing, but we really need – we think our floor is around 2,000 – to really fully be able to adequately – without over-burdening the referees we have. The growth is a good thing. We just need referees to grow a little faster, at a faster rate." As far as finding new officials, PA West Soccer says they are working with teams and the general public to find people who might be good candidates. And McCoy says, there are potential advantages that come with the job. "Being a referee is a great way to get out and get exercise and be around the game, particularly if you love the game," he said. "It can be a great part-time job because you're an independent contractor, so you decide when you want to do games and you don't want to do games. Generally, you can make a decent amount of money going out on a Saturday working 3 or 4 games." In order to become a certified official, applicants must pay a one-time registration fee of $65. After that, they must complete courses for certification and be approved for clearance. After that, an official can be certified to work games for youth leagues, high school, college, or even the professional or international ranks. A handful of former PA West referees have become certified by FIFA, soccer's international governing body. Two of them recently worked the recent Men's World Cup, and one of them also worked the recent Women's World Cup. "It takes a lot of work," says McCoy, whose son became an official as a teenager. "It requires you to be vigilant, but you can get there if you've got the skill and ability and you really want to do it. It could be an aspirational position as well as just a nice part-time job where you're going to make a little bit of money." Those interested in becoming a soccer official can log on to the PA West website, or they can inquire within their own local youth sports organization.
Gulf Today
31-01-2025
- Science
- Gulf Today
Asteroids may have planted life on Earth
Asteroid samples fetched by NASA hold not only the pristine building blocks for life but also the salty remains of an ancient water world, scientists reported on Wednesday. The findings provide the strongest evidence yet that asteroids may have planted the seeds of life on Earth and that these ingredients were mingling with water almost right from the start. 'That's the kind of environment that could have been essential to the steps that lead from elements to life,' said the Smithsonian Institution's Tim McCoy, one of the lead study authors. NASA's Osiris-Rex spacecraft returned 122 grammes (4 ounces) of dust and pebbles from the near-Earth asteroid Bennu, delivering the sample canister to the Utah desert in 2023 before swooping off after another space rock. It remains the biggest cosmic haul from beyond the moon. The two previous asteroid sample missions, by Japan, yielded considerably less material, according to the Associated Press. Small amounts of Bennu's precious black grains – leftovers from the solar system's formation 4.5 billion years ago – were doled out to the two separate research teams whose studies appeared in the journals Nature and Nature Astronomy. But it was more than enough to tease out the sodium-rich minerals and confirm the presence of amino acids, nitrogen in the form of ammonia and even parts of the genetic code. Some if not all of the delicate salts found at Bennu – similar to what's in the dry lakebeds of California's Mojave Desert and Africa's Sahara – would be stripped away if present in falling meteorites. 'This discovery was only possible by analysing samples that were collected directly from the asteroid then carefully preserved back on Earth,' the Institute of Science Tokyo's Yasuhito Sekine, who was not involved in the studies, said in an accompanying editorial. Combining the ingredients of life with an environment of sodium-rich salt water, or brines, 'that's really the pathway to life,' said McCoy, the National Museum of Natural History's curator of meteorites. 'These processes probably occurred much earlier and were much more widespread than we had thought before.' NASA's Daniel Glavin said one of the biggest surprises was the relatively high abundance of nitrogen, including ammonia. While all of the organic molecules found in the Bennu samples have been identified before in meteorites, Glavin said the ones from Bennu are valid – 'real extraterrestrial organic material formed in space and not a result of contamination from Earth.' Bennu – a rubble pile just one-third of a mile (one-half of a kilometre) across – was originally part of a much larger asteroid that got clobbered by other space rocks. The latest results suggest this parent body had an extensive underground network of lakes or even oceans, and that the water evaporated away, leaving behind the salty clues, the AP report adds. Sixty labs around the world are analysing bits of Bennu as part of initial studies, said the University of Arizona's Dante Lauretta, the mission's chief scientist who took part in both studies. Most of the $1 billion mission's cache has been set aside for future analysis. Scientists stress more testing is needed to better understand the Bennu samples, as well as more asteroid and comet sample returns. China plans to launch an asteroid sample return mission this year. Many are pushing for a mission to collect rocks and dirt from the potentially waterlogged dwarf planet Ceres in the main asteroid belt. Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Enceladus also beckon as enticing water worlds. Meanwhile, NASA has core samples awaiting pickup at Mars, but their delivery is on hold while the space agency studies the quickest and cheapest way to get them here. 'Are we alone?' McCoy said. 'That's one of the questions we're trying to answer.'
Express Tribune
31-01-2025
- Science
- Express Tribune
NASA Confirms 'Asteroid Bennu' Samples Contain Extraterrestrial Building Blocks of Life
NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission has delivered groundbreaking insights into the origins of life, thanks to pristine samples collected from the asteroid Bennu. The findings, published in Nature Astronomy and other journals, reveal that Bennu contains the essential building blocks of life, including amino acids and nucleobases—key components of proteins, DNA, and RNA. This discovery suggests that the conditions necessary for life may have been widespread across the early solar system, raising tantalizing questions about the potential for life beyond Earth. The mission, which returned 120 grams of material (about the weight of a banana) to Earth in 2023, marks the first time the U.S. has conducted such an in-depth analysis of extraterrestrial samples. Initial studies confirmed the presence of high-carbon content and water, but the latest research goes further. Scientists found that Bennu's parent asteroid once harbored liquid water, which evaporated and left behind a 'briny broth' of salts and minerals. These compounds, some never before seen in space samples, provide 'the raw ingredients of life,' according to Tim McCoy, curator of meteorites at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and co-lead author of one of the studies. The samples also contained 14 of the 20 amino acids used to create proteins on Earth, alongside ammonia and formaldehyde—chemicals that react to form amino acids. This suggests that complex organic molecules could have formed naturally in the early solar system. 'This is rewriting everything we know,' said Nicky Fox, head of NASA's Science Mission Directorate. The pristine nature of the Bennu samples is crucial. Daniel Glavin of NASA noted, 'The clues we're finding are incredibly fragile and could never survive Earth's contamination.' This ensures that the organic molecules detected are genuinely extraterrestrial, not contaminants from Earth. The findings also hint at Bennu's history as a 'water world,' with minerals like calcite, halite, and sylvite indicating the presence of liquid water during its formation 4.5 billion years ago. 'These processes probably occurred much earlier and were much more widespread than we had thought before,' McCoy added. This discovery fuels speculation about life elsewhere in the solar system. Could icy bodies like Europa or Enceladus, or even the dwarf planet Ceres, host similar briny environments? 'Even though asteroid Bennu has no life, the question is could other icy bodies harbor life?' said Nick Timms of Curtin University. While the findings don't confirm extraterrestrial life, they provide compelling evidence that the ingredients for life are not unique to Earth. As Sara Russell, a cosmic mineralogist at the Smithsonian, put it, the research has made 'huge progress in understanding how asteroids like Bennu evolved, and how they may have helped make the Earth habitable.' The age-old question remains: Are we alone in the universe? Bennu's secrets suggest the answer might be written in the stars.
Yahoo
30-01-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Asteroid Bennu holds secrets of water evaporated billions of years ago, study shocks
The answer to the origins of life on Earth may lie scattered across the solar system. That's why NASA launched a mission to the near-Earth asteroid Bennu in 2016. In 2020, the OSIRIS-REx mission made history by successfully collecting a sample from the asteroid. This was the first U.S. asteroid sample return, a feat not achieved in nearly 50 years since the Apollo missions. And in September 2023, that precious cargo returned. The space community eagerly awaited the chance to analyze these samples, hoping to unlock the secrets of Bennu and, perhaps, the beginnings of life. Now, the examination of these samples has provided new insights about life on Earth. Scientists have discovered a unique sequence of minerals that formed from evaporated water in samples from Bennu. These minerals date back to the early solar system and include compounds never before seen in extraterrestrial samples. Researchers from the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History conducted this study. 'We now know from Bennu that the raw ingredients of life were combining in really interesting and complex ways on Bennu's parent body. We have discovered that next step on a pathway to life,' said Tim McCoy, the museum's curator of meteorites and the co-lead author. Bennu's parent body formed 4.5 billion years ago and once contained pockets of liquid water. As the water evaporated, brines similar to Earth's salt flats remained. Bennu's near-Earth orbit and carbon-rich makeup have made it a target of scientific interest. It has been theorized that this asteroid contained water and organic molecules. Bennu and other similar asteroids may have been responsible for delivering these life-building materials to early Earth. For these reasons, NASA sent a mission to collect samples from this asteroid. Some of its samples were 'loaned' to researchers globally, including to the team at the Natural History Museum. Researchers used a powerful scanning electron microscope to examine extremely tiny features (less than a micrometer, or 1/100th the width of a human hair) on fragments of the Bennu asteroid. This brine contains compounds never before seen in other extraterrestrial samples, including water-bearing sodium carbonate compounds, commonly known as soda ash. Sodium carbonates are found naturally on Earth in evaporated lakes rich in sodium, like Searles Lake in the Mojave Desert. The unexpected discovery of sodium carbonate in the Bennu samples led researchers to investigate further. McCoy examined similar minerals in the museum's collection and consulted with colleagues studying other Bennu samples. This collaborative effort revealed a total of 11 minerals that likely formed in a brine environment on Bennu's parent asteroid. The mineral makeup of Bennu's brine is distinct from Earth's. Bennu's brines contain interesting minerals and elements, but it's unknown if they could form complex organic molecules. It's still unclear whether this environment was truly capable of creating life itself, but the discovery of these brines is a significant step forward. It suggests that similar conditions might exist on other celestial bodies, like the dwarf planet Ceres or Saturn's moon Enceladus. Interestingly, sodium carbonate has been detected on Ceres and Enceladus. 'We now know we have the basic building blocks to move along this pathway towards life, but we don't know how far along that pathway this environment could allow things to progress,' McCoy said in the press release. The findings were published in the journal Nature.
