The brains of newly born children require 87 percent of those children's metabolic energy. In five-year-olds the figure is still 44 percent and even in adults the brain - a mere two percent of the body's weight - consumes about a quarter of the body's energy. Any competition for this energy is likely to damage the brain's development, and parasites and pathogens compete for it in several ways.
Taken from The Economist, July 3-9 2010 pp. 71
No comments:
Post a Comment