Grapes may help lower blood pressure

October 29, 2008 – 4:25pm
 grapes
Grapes helped lower blood pressure and improve heart function in lab rats fed an otherwise salty diet, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday.

The findings, published in the Journal of Gerontology: Biological Sciences, may help people with high blood pressure, they said.

"These findings support our theory that something within the grapes themselves has a direct impact on cardiovascular risk, beyond the simple blood pressure-lowering impact that we already know can come from a diet rich in fruits and vegetables," Mitchell Seymour of the Cardioprotection Research Laboratory at the University of Michigan said in a statement.

In a study sponsored in part by California grape producers, Seymour and colleagues examined the effects of ordinary grapes on rats that develop high blood pressure when fed a salty diet.

Some of the rats ate a diet containing a powder from red, green and purple table grapes and a high-salt diet. Others were fed the grape powder and a low-salt diet. The powder, which contained the same nutrients in fresh grapes, allowed the scientists to measure the rats’ intake carefully.

After 18 weeks, the rats that ate the grape-enriched diet had lower blood pressure, better heart function, reduced inflammation throughout their bodies, and fewer signs of heart muscle damage than rats that ate a salty diet but no grapes.

"The inevitable downhill sequence to hypertension and heart failure was changed by the addition of grape powder to a high-salt diet," Dr. Steven Bolling of the University of Michigan, who heads up the lab, said in a statement.

Bolling said he thinks flavonoids, beneficial chemicals found in grapes, green tea, cocoa and tomatoes, could be having an effect on blood pressure. Flavonoids have been shown in other studies to have heart-health benefits.

Food producers are keen to show the health benefits of their products. Studies sponsored by chocolate makers, almond and walnut producers have shown various heart benefits, including reducing inflammation in blood vessels and lowering the risk of heart attacks and stroke.

Grape powder comprised about three percent of the rats’ diet. For humans, that would be about nine servings of grapes a day. One serving is about 15 grapes.

The California Table Grape Commission provided financial support for the study and supplied the grape powder. Other sponsors included the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health.

High blood pressure, also known as hypertension, can lead to heart attack, heart failure, stroke and kidney failure.


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Youth warned against listening to loud MP3 players

October 14, 2008 – 3:20pm
Millions of youngsters across Europe could suffer permanent hearing loss after five years if they listen to MP3 players at too high a volume for more than five hours a week, EU scientists warned Monday.

The scientists’ study, requested by the European Commission, attacked the concept of "leisure noise," saying children and teenagers should be protected from increasingly high sound levels — with loud mobile phones also coming in for criticism.

"There has been increasing concern about exposure from the new generation of personal music players which can reproduce sounds at very high volumes without loss of quality," the Commission, the EU’s executive arm, said in a statement.

"Risk for hearing damage depends on sound level and exposure time," it said. More and more young people were exposed to the significant threat that leisure noise posed to hearing, it said.

Commission experts estimate that between 50 and 100 million people listen to portable music players on a daily basis.

If they listened for only five hours a week at more than 89 decibels, they would already exceed EU limits for noise allowed in the workplace, they said. But if they listened for longer periods, they risked permanent hearing loss after five years.

The scientists calculated the number of people in that risk category at between five and 10 percent of listeners, meaning up to 10 million people in the European Union.

Sales of personal music players have soared in EU countries in recent years, particularly of MP3 players.

Commission experts estimate unit sales between 184 and 246 million for all portable audio devices just over the last four years, of which MP3 players range between 124 and 165 million.

Mobile phones used at excessive volume also came under fire from Meglena Kuneva, the EU’s consumer affairs commissioner.

"I am concerned that so many young people … who are frequent users of personal music players and mobile phones at high acoustic levels, may be unknowingly damaging their hearing irrevocably," she said in the statement.


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how to be rich

October 14, 2008 – 12:58pm

                There are lots of factor that a person needs to have in order to become rich or be successful in the specific field that he/she belongs, patience, perseverance and a lot guts could help every individual to become Nouveau Riche, they say that when you grab opportunities that  come your way could lead to become nobody to somebody, another is when you unleash your wildest imagination to create big vision from the ideas you have come up like the one who conceptualize the idea of hotmail.com wherein he got rich by the idea he had, and transforming it into win-win scenarios or making sure that your idea would make it big in the market by evaluating the pro’s and con’s of the idea that you have come up .  Most of the successful Nouveau Riche people conceive their ideas prior to their experience, business association or affiliation in terms of becoming a brilliant business minded person, hobby or personal interest like what the inventor of the world renowned facebook.com, or those people who have the ability to analyze and research the potential market he/she might dwell in, or just serendipity that you are destined to become rich in ways you never see.

                The achievement of an individual will measure of what kind of person he/ she is, because sometimes being rich doesn’t give you the ultimate happiness in life, but in reality having lots of money would make a person happy, but then I salute those people who experience a tough life in terms of financial reasons and turn into a Nouveau Riche person, because only in that kind of experience an individual can  taste how sweet life can be because he/she worked hard to become somebody he’d never imagine to be.


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Apple is about to unveil its updated laptops on October 14

October 10, 2008 – 12:55pm
               Apple Inc will unveil its updated laptops on October 14 and they may cost less, but analysts say the company’s drooping stock has already taken any change into account. "I think it’s already factored into the stock. People have been expecting this announcement for well over a month," said Andy Hargreaves of Pacific Crest Securities in Oregon. The company’s stock was up 1 percent at $90.64 in midday trading, but closed down 1 percent at $88.74 and, overall, it has lost about 56 percent of its value since closing at a year high of $202.96 on December 27, 2007. Apple enters the fourth quarter against a background of continuing headlines about falling stocks and failing banks, and a September in which retail sales dived beyond expectations. At minimum, Apple will use the event at its Cupertino, California, headquarters to refresh its laptop line by updating to the latest chips and it may also offer new designs. The Apple invitation said only: "The spotlight turns to notebooks." Occasionally, Apple unveils revolutionary new approaches at such events, but analysts shrugged when asked about the possibility. "You won’t know that until the day of the event," said Tim Bajarin of Creative Strategies in Campbell, California. Analysts also raised the possibility of a drop in the sticker price for laptops that now start at $1,099, more than twice the cost of the cheapest of the Window-based laptops.
                 Apple chief financial officer Peter Oppenheimer opened the door to speculation as long ago as July 21 during a discussion of the company’s computer line. The executive said the company introduces "new products that initially cost more because they deliver an entirely new level of value to the customer. Then we ride the cost curves down with value engineering and volume manufacturing, leaving us far ahead of our competitors." Bajarin was cautious and stopped short of forecasting price cuts. "It’s a possibility. We don’t know that for sure," he said. He said Apple emphasizes design and functionality, "but clearly they have become more price conscious as they have become more competitive."

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Dazzling ceremony reveals China’s world dream

October 9, 2008 – 4:56pm
Resurgent China opened the Olympics on Friday with volleys of fireworks at a spectacular ceremony that wove ancient Chinese history with modern wizardry and aimed to draw a line under months of political controversy.

Drums thundered, firecrackers exploded and 14,000 performers poured through the Bird’s Nest stadium in a dazzling extravaganza that offered up a vision of global harmony echoing the Games’ motto "One World One Dream."

Around 80 world leaders watched the show which celebrated the achievements of imperial China, totally ignoring the fraught 20th century, when civil war, the Japanese invasion and hardline Communist rule left the nation mired in poverty.

"Friends have come from afar, how happy we are," an army of 2,008 drummers chanted, quoting the celebrated sage Confucius.

Friday’s ceremony caps seven years of work that has reshaped Beijing and sets the seal on an industrial boom that has turned the country into the world’s fourth largest economy.

However, the Olympic spotlight has also cast a harsh glare on the vast Asian nation, bringing the unrest in its Tibetan region to a wide audience and showing that China’s leadership is not ready to brook any internal dissent.

Pounding drums launched Friday’s ceremony on a hot and humid evening before giant fireworks in the form of footsteps blasted above the heart of the capital, crossing Tiananmen Square as they progressed to the steel-latticed Bird’s Nest.

The authorities opened the vast square, scene of a doomed student uprising in 1989, to let people watch the pyrotechnics, prompting thousands of delighted Beijing residents to rush into the esplanade screaming "Go China!."

Record cost

The Games carry a $43 billion price tag, dwarfing the $15 billion splashed out by Athens in 2004, and run until August 24, with 10,500 athletes from a record 204 nations chasing 302 gold medals in 28 sports.

Chinese President Hu Jintao declared the Games open.

Befittingly for the world’s most populous nation, Friday’s show unleashed wave upon wave of humanity into the arena, reveling in past glories, like the invention of gunpowder, but also more modern triumphs, like putting astronauts into space.

The careful choreography of the ceremony extended well beyond the stadium and 100,000 police fanned out to prevent attacks and protests, while dissidents have been kept out of sight.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon issued an appeal at the ceremony calling on warring nations to honor a traditional truce during the Games, but his message went unheeded with fierce fighting in Georgia during the day involving Russian forces.

Further denting the Olympic ideal of harmony, the two Koreas failed to agree to march at the opening as a unified team even though they managed that in 2004 and 2000.

The 91,000-strong crowd saved its largest roar of the evening for the entry of the Chinese team, which is confidently expected to top the medals table for the first time and was headed onto the field by basketball player Yao Ming.

Yao was accompanied by a young boy who survived an earthquake in the southwest of the country in May which killed some 70,000.

"For a long time, China has dreamed of opening its doors and inviting the world’s athletes to Beijing for the Olympic Games," Jacques Rogge, head of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), said. "Tonight that dream comes true. Congratulations, Beijing!"


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