Drink coffee and live longer

Dr. Adela Navarro, a cardiologist at Hospital de Navarra in Pamplona, Spain has conducted a study of 20,000 people which found that drinking coffee lowered your risk of death.  I think you would agree this is a good thing!

Those who drank 4 cups of coffee a day had a 64% lower risk of death than those who drank none.

"We found an inverse association between drinking coffee and the risk of all-cause mortality, particularly in people aged 45 years and above. This may be due to a stronger protective association among older participants," Navarro said.

The study was done on healthy people, who were mainly eating the Mediterranean diet, and their average age at the start of the study was 37 years of age. Factors that were considered were sex, age and whether participants stuck to the Mediterranean diet and discovered that age was a factor: coffee seemed to provide strong protection for people over 45 years of age.

 "Our findings suggest that drinking four cups of coffee each day can be part of a healthy diet in healthy people." Dr Adela Navarro concluded.

These findings were presented at the European Society of Cardiology Congress (ESC) in Barcelona in 2017.

So if you are a coffee drinker and over the age of 40, it would make sense to increase your coffee intake to four cups a day. For the rest of us this research should make us consider trying coffee don't you think?

MORE COFFEE RESEARCH. There has been so much research into coffee over the years so I thought it would be great to share some of it here.

Coffee and Parkinson's Disease: drinking coffee reduces the risk of developing Parkinson's disease by up to 30%. Most studies recommend three cups of coffee as beneficial. - Parkinson's News Today

Coffee and heart disease: according to 3 studies people who drank more coffee had a lower long-term risk of heart failure. - American Heart Association

Coffee and liver cancer: Nine studies showed that consumption of 2 cups of coffee per day was associated with a 43% reduced risk of liver cancer. - PubMed Report

Coffee and type 2 diabetes: A 2009 study of 40,000 participants noted that consumption of 3 cups of tea or coffee a day lead to a 40% lower risk of type 2 diabetes developing.

Coffee and kidney disease: In one study 4,863 U.S. chronic kidney disease patients were monitored for 11 years. Researchers found that greater caffeine intake was tied to greater life expectancy for people with chronic kidney disease. - WebMD

Coffee and multiple sclerosis (MS): The risk of MS is substantially reduced among those who reported a high consumption of coffee. - NCBI

Coffee and colorectal cancer: In a large group of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer, consumption of a few cups of coffee a day was associated with longer survival and a lower risk of the cancer worsening. - Harvard Health

Coffee and Alzheimer's disease (AD): A 21-year follow-up study found consumption of  3 to 5 cups of coffee daily, significantly reduces the risk of AD (62–64%) and dementia (65–70%) in the later lifetime. - NCBI

THE GOOD NEWS is that more and more research is showing us that coffee is not only not bad for us it is actually Good For Us.  A large body of evidence suggests that consumption of caffeinated coffee does not increase the risk of cardiovascular diseases and cancers. In fact, consumption of 3 to 5 standard cups of coffee daily has been consistently associated with a reduced risk of several chronic diseases. - Harvard Health

Of course talk to your medical professionals before about your specific situation before increasing your consumption of coffee. 

THE BAD NEWS - while this is a good news site I would be remiss to not mention some reports I have found while researching this article and especially as I have autoimmune diseases myself. You should avoid coffee, or more than one cup per day, if you have a diagnosis of autoimmune thyroid disease, celiac, rheumatoid arthritis, type I diabetes, GERD, peptic ulcer disease, gallbladder issues or Barrett’s Esophagitis. 

Brands of coffee that I recommend: there are 2 brands that I have come across that I can recommend because of  what they don't put in their products and how they are sourced and made: Purity Coffee which is made from the highest-grade organic green arabica coffee beans and Organo King Coffee which is an instant organic arabica coffee.

Living plants generate electricity

A new type of sustainable energy is now available. Living plants are creating clean, renewable, sustainable, efficient, bioenergy.

Bioenergy is renewable energy made available from materials derived from biological sources.

Plant-e is a company that develops and produces products in which living plants generate electricity. To find out more please watch this video.

Optimism affects heart health

Being happy is good for your heart.

Optimists are twice as likely to be in good cardiovascular health, according to a new study led by a professor of social work at the University of Illinois. 

“Individuals with the highest levels of optimism have twice the odds of being in ideal cardiovascular health compared to their more pessimistic counterparts,” said lead study author Rosalba Hernandez.

The optimists had better blood sugar and total cholesterol levels, were more physically active, with healthier body mass indexes and less likely to smoke.

It is thought to be the first study to consider the connection between optimism and cardiovascular health in a large, ethnically and racially diverse population.

SOURCE: Optimistic people have healthier hearts, study finds 1/8/2015 | Sharita Forrest, Social Work Editor  NEWS BUREAU | PUBLIC  AFFAIRS
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

Modern technology helping to keep remote communities connected

Many rural communities in AFRICA are separated by great distances from the urban centers, including the capital city of  Mali,  Bamako. Mali is the world's 24th-largest country, similar in size to South Africa. Most of the country lies in the southern Sahara, which is hot and dusty. Mali is mostly flat, rising to rolling northern plains covered by sand.



Image of children in Mali by Flickr: gao mali

Image of children in Mali by Flickr: gao mali

Communication tools such as internet blogging and affordable mobile phones are helping to strengthen the links between the residents of rural villages and the larger cities. This is especially important for many Malians who have left their communities for greater educational and economic opportunities in Bamako.

 

 

 

Read full story at Rising Voices which aims to extend the benefits and reach of citizen media by connecting online media activists around the world and supporting their best ideas.

Mali is in dark green and Libya in light green in Africa.

 

Pictures of cute animals actually improve our concentration

Looking at pictures of cute animals captures our attention and improves concentration as a result and mental dexterity. "For future applications, cute objects may be used as an emotion elicitor to induce careful behavioral tendencies in specific situations, such as driving and office work," wrote Hiroshi Nittono of Hiroshima University who with his colleagues researched cute animals.

A water bottle with edible packaging

Ooho is a spherical membrane for carrying water, which can be eaten after drinking the contents.

Rodrigo Garcia Gonzalez, Guillaume Couche and Pierre Paslier created the biodegradable packaging using a combination of brown algae and calcium chloride. To drink, you simply suck on the membrane and pour the water into your mouth. The packaging can then be either eaten or thrown away.

 In its earliest days, the concept was brought to life in a humble student kitchen, where each prototype was crafted by hand. The creators experimented tirelessly, refining their formulas and seeking honest feedback from anyone willing to taste—friends, family, even curious passersby. The name “Ooho” emerged organically, inspired by the delighted exclamations people made when encountering the quirky, edible spheres for the first time: a chorus of surprised “Oohooo!”s that captured the spirit of the invention perfectly.

Each Ooho bag costs  0.02 USD to make. Ooho could soon be the cheap, environmentally friendly alternative to the plastic bottle.

The video shows the invention in action.

The Solar Powered Air Plane

We are constantly looking for new sources of energy. It is evident that fossil fuels are a limited supply and that we are going to need to have an alternative source of energy to turn to in the future. There are many alternative energy sources, such as nuclear power, wind power, and hydro-power plants that all provide us with energy. However, there is one type of energy that seems to be on rise... solar energy. Solar energy is gathered from the sun and converted to electricity. The Solar Impulse, a completely solar powered plane is testament to the value of this energy. Swiss scientist and pilots have manufactured and tested a completely solar powered plane, and are hoping to release it to the public one day. Here is a brief look at how solar energy works.

How Solar Power Works
Solar power utilizes photovoltaic (PV) cells to manufacture power. These cells are bunched together in rows or sheets aimed to capture the sun's light. When the light has been captured it leverages a semiconductor, a unit that acts as a conduit for electrical flow, to energize the panels. As light from the sun hits the columns the semiconductor becomes saturated with light and molecular motion from that source. As soon as this light is harvested, the columns begin to influence the rays and extract it using PV cells to command a general direction of flow. This movement creates energy that is kinetic, which in turn is leveraged to generate electricity. Once the electrical current is generated it may be employed instantly, often by the use of a power inverter, or warehoused like a battery. That being said, the semiconductor is typically shiny and does not take in sunlight very well. To combat this, inventors treated the semiconductor using a material that reflects light, allowing it to harness a supreme level of light.

Solar Revolution
The idea of a solar revolution has been talked about for quite some time. It's the idea that we could one day take everything that used to be powered by either electricity, or fuel, or batteries, and simply power it by the sun. This is an outrageous prospect because on a sunny day, the sun gives off 1,000 watts of energy per square meter of the planet's surface. If we were able to control that energy and harness we could easily power all of our spaces for free.



Pathfinder, NASA's solar-powered, remotely-piloted aircraft
conducting a flight to highlight the aircraft's capabilities

Powering a Plane
The Swiss engineers have had at least ten successful take offs and are planning more in the future. The Solar Impulse relies solely on the sun to power the plane and batteries for reserve power. The plane only needs about 90 meters to take off due to its smaller size and huge wingspan. The plane is only powered by a small electric motor but can reach altitudes of thirty thousand feet. The ultimate goal of the Swiss Impulse is to travel around the clock. The Swiss scientists are hoping to show that people are lot less dependent on fossil fuels than they think. If they can power a plane for twenty-four hours this is probably an energy source worth looking into. Who knows, maybe in the future we'll all experience the Swiss Impulse.

 

About the author:

B. Harris conducts his writing in California where he also obtained his B.A. in Communications, supporting establishments like Don Rowe.

Discovery of the lesula

 

 

This amazing new species has recently been discovered in the Congo, Africa in the Lomami National Park which is being declared a protected area.

"The discovery of the lesula has extended our knowledge of the evolution and ecology of African monkeys, and in particular has confirmed the importance of a previously little-known region for primate diversity," Dr John Hart of the Lukuru Foundation, who led the project, told BBC Nature.
READ FULL STORY at BBC Nature News

Towards Nanocomputers

Good news for the semi conductor industry -
scientists have designed tiny wires with the electrical capacity of copper, in a major step towards smaller, more powerful computers. These tiny wires 10,000 times thinner than a human hair but could mean a new computer era.

This is an amazing advance in science and nanotechnology.