Monday, February 16, 2015

3 Hours Chi Activation Music - Extremely Powerful Brainwave Binaural - Focus Concentration Music

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This music is a short clip of 30 minutes depression treatment binaural beats. You are advised to use stereo headphones for maximum efficiency. Listening at least once a day for a month is recommended to realise the full potential of this music. This music should help people with depression, bipolar disorder or anxiety disorder.

For more information on this, please check: http://braineditor.com/

Saturday, April 20, 2013

How flower power paved the way for our evolution - New Scientist

We wouldn't be here if the first primates hadn't evolved some special features – to discover why it happened we have to go out on a limb

BRING me his head. That was the job given to graduate student Jonathan Bloch 20 years ago. His supervisor, Philip Gingerich, had collected some large fossil-rich limestone blocks from the Bighorn basin in Wyoming and brought them back to the museum at the University of Michigan.

"The rocks had bone in them, but what exactly was a mystery. It was my task to reduce the rock using acid to see what I could find," says Bloch. "When I asked Philip what I should be looking for, he said something like, 'how about a skull?'" Bloch said OK and set to work. At the time, he didn't realise how incredibly rare it is to find mammal skulls from the time after the death of the dinosaurs 66 million years ago, when the limestone had formed. "Within the first few days of work out popped the skull. I thought, well that is good, I found what I was supposed to. Philip was very surprised. He had the experience to recognise how big of a deal it was," Bloch recalls.

The skull was not just that of any old mammal, but of a much sought-after "missing link" in the primate fossil record. Fierce debate still rages over its significance, but many see it as a crucial piece of evidence in the story of how humans came to be – one that suggests flowers played a key role in our evolution.

Take a look at your hands and you'll see they have evolved for grasping things, with opposable digits and flat nails instead of claws. We also have forward-facing eyes, and bigger brains than most other mammals. We tend to think of these traits as human, but almost all primates share them too. So what made the ancestors of primates evolve them in the first place, paving the way for our evolution?

We know roughly when it happened. The first steps in primate evolution were probably taken around 60 million years ago, when the ancestor of all primates – thought to be a small, nocturnal creature – took to the trees. The big question is why its descendants evolved in the way they did.

The explanation might seem obvious: when you take to the trees, you need grasping hands for clinging to branches and forward-facing eyes for judging distance. But in the 1970s, anthropologist Matt Cartmill pointed out that it can't be that simple. Many mammals have opted for a life in trees and thrived without ever evolving these features. Squirrels have sideways-facing eyes and claws instead of nails, for instance, but they're perfectly at home leaping from branch to branch. So there must be more to our eyes and hands than that.

The extra factor, Cartmill suggested, was catching insects. He pointed out that in living tree dwellers, grasping hands and feet are usually found in animals that forage on young branches too thin for claws to get a grip. Forward-facing eyes, meanwhile, are common in predators, such as cats and owls, that rely on vision to catch their prey. In particular, he argued, the big overlap in the fields of vision of primate eyes is best for judging short distances – whether an insect is within arm's length rather than whether a branch is within leaping range.

So the key traits of our early primate ancestors evolved, Cartmill proposed, because they were hunting insects on fine branches. "It's a logical argument," says Robert Sussman, who studies primate evolution at Washington University in St Louis. But, he adds, it depends largely on comparisons with living animals rather than the fossil record.

Fossil teeth suggest that insects were not the only food of early primates. Their flat, round molars were better suited to grinding fruit and plant material than they were to eating bugs, Sussman argues. And if the ancestors of primates were adapted to insect eating, wouldn't they have lots of insect-eating descendants? In fact, the vast majority of living primates eat a mixed diet including insects and plants. The few specialist insect eaters that do exist, like the tarsier, tend to use sound rather than vision to catch their prey.

So Sussman came up with another idea. Inspired by his studies of modern Madagascan lemurs that regularly tap nectar-rich flowers for food, Sussman and palaeobotanist Peter Raven proposed that primates evolved in tandem with flowering plants.

The first flowering plants, angiosperms, which appeared around 135 million years ago, were small insect-pollinated shrubs and herbs. But by around 55 million years ago, when the first true primates turn up, flowering plants had evolved into many families of trees, and dominated the forests that covered much of the world. In these forests, there would have been a treasure trove of leaf buds, flowers, fruits and insects at the end of slender new branches – a whole new feeding niche, and a powerful draw for animals like primates, bats and birds, which evolved rapidly at this time (see diagram).

The plants evolved nectar-rich flowers and bigger, fleshier fruit that attracted animals like primates, and these animals in turn pollinated their flowers, ate the fruits and spread the seeds. The primates evolved grabbing hands and feet, and digits with nails and sensitive pads that helped them to move around these fine branches and manipulate the food there.

This angiosperm evolution hypothesis not only explains why primates evolved some of their key traits, but also the timing. "The timing is one of the best bits of supporting evidence we have for this theory," says Magdalena Muchlinski, who studies primate evolution at the University of Kentucky in Lexington.

Another piece of supporting evidence comes from a 2012 study comparing the diets and ecology of hundreds of living and extinct primates. José Gómez and Miguel Verd of the University of Granada, Spain, found that helping flowering plants was a recipe for success. Fruit-eating primates that spread the seeds of the plants they fed on were less likely to go extinct, had larger ranges and gave rise to more new species. "It suggests that fruit eating and seed dispersal helped fuel primate evolution and diversification," says Gómez.

All this evidence is circumstantial, though. It doesn't prove that flowers rather than insects drove early primate evolution. On paper, both theories have their merits. "Cartmill's theory makes perfectly good sense," says Tab Rasmussen who also studies primate evolution at Washington University, "but so does Sussman's."

What was needed was hard evidence, but there were hardly any fossils from the period in question. The primate fossils that had been found all dated from 55 million years onwards. These early primates looked a bit like modern-day lorises or tarsiers. From the size of a mouse to the size of a cat, they fed on insects and fruit. Crucially, though, they all already possessed key primate traits such as forward-facing eyes, dextrous nailed fingers and grasping hands.

This means these key characteristics evolved earlier, probably in the time between the dinosaurs' demise 66 million years ago and the appearance of the first true primates around 55 million years ago. Unfortunately, the fossil record from this time is patchy, scarce and equivocal, made up largely of jaws and teeth. So when Gingerich asked Bloch to find a skull in a block of 56-million-old limestone, he was really hoping to find one of the "missing links" in the primate record – a transitional fossil with a mix of primitive and modern features. And that may be exactly what Bloch found.

Etching the rock away from fossils is a slow process. It was several years after the discovery of the skull before Bloch, working with Doug Boyer of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, found that much of the animal's skeleton was hiding within. "It was remarkable in many ways," says Bloch, who is now a palaeontologist at the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville.

Arboreal acrobat

The fossil belonged to a species that was new to science, Carpolestes simpsoni. In life it was rat-sized, with a long tail. It had huge serrated premolars, probably used to saw open fibre-rich fruits and nuts. It may have eaten the odd insect, but its eyes were sideways facing. What it did have, though, was grasping hands and feet, with nails on its big toes only. With claws on its other digits, Carpolestes would have easily scrabbled up and down bigger branches, much like a squirrel. The full details of the fossil were published in 2003 (Science, vol 298, p 1564).

"It was an extraordinary specimen," says primatologist Mary Silcox of the University of Toronto, Scarborough. "It was very influential in people's thinking." And the fossil doesn't fit with Cartmill's visual predation theory as it was originally proposed, according to which grasping hands and forward-facing eyes should have evolved at the same time.

Instead, Carpolestes points to a scenario first proposed by Rasmussen back in 1990 after he spent many nights studying the woolly opossum. This arboreal acrobat, found in the rainforests of Costa Rica, is not related to the primates, but has evolved similar characteristics, including forward-facing eyes and the ability to grasp. Rasmussen thinks the marsupial evolved these traits because it behaves like the early primates. It picks fruit on thin branches, clinging with its hands and feet as the branches shake and pitch violently under its weight. But the woolly opossum is an adept visual predator too, snatching moths and other insects.

Rasmussen suggested our early primate ancestors evolved grasping hands and feet as they climbed on slender branches in search of fruits, flowers and insects, much as Sussman had suggested. Later they evolved enhanced vision to catch more insects, as Cartmill had suggested. So both ideas could be right.

Carpolestes fits nicely with this flowers first, insects later scenario. But in 2008, theoretical neurobiologist Mark Changizi at 2AI Labs in Boise, Idaho, threw a spanner in the works by suggesting that the whole rationale behind the insect predation was wrong. Animals, including predators, didn't evolve forward-facing eyes to judge distances, he argued – it helps but there are other ways that the brain can do this. Instead, its primary advantage is to help animals see in environments cluttered with leaves and branches.

Hold a finger in front of you and look at what's behind it. With both eyes open, you can effectively see through your finger. Close either eye, though, and part of the background disappears. "Our eyes give us X-ray vision," says Changizi.

This "X-ray vision", however, only works for objects narrower than the width between our eyes. So large animals with far-apart eyes will be able to see through most branches and leaves. If they live in a leafy environment, they will get the best view of their world if both eyes face forwards – the increased view ahead more than compensates for lost vision behind. Small animals like mice don't benefit from this effect because most leaves are wider than the distance between their eyes. They are better off with sideways-facing eyes.

If this theory is right, Changizi realised, the degree of overlap in the visual fields of the eyes of animals should depend on two things: their body size (which largely determines the distance between the eyes) and whether they live in a leafy environment. In a study of 319 diverse mammals, he showed that there was a correlation between body size and overlap in mammals living in forests, but not in uncluttered environments. So once primates took to the trees, a relatively large ancestral primate may have evolved forward-facing eyes to see better in forest canopies.

This fits well with the flower idea, but would rule out the insect-hunting hypothesis. Cartmill, now at Boston University, dismisses Changizi's challenge, pointing out that Thomson's gazelles and cheetahs both live in grasslands, but only the predator has eyes facing forwards. "Optic orientation in mammals doesn't correlate with clutter," he says.

Changizi, however, says that stalking cheetahs will be trying to see through grasses and bushes, whereas gazelles' views will be largely uncluttered when they stand tall to check for predators. Small predators like weasels also tend to have sideway-facing eyes, he points out, which can be explained by his X-ray vision hypothesis but not by the idea that stereoscopic vision is the more important of these factors.

Put Changizi's study and the fossil of Carpolestes together, and the flower idea looks like the clear winner. But there is another twist to the tale. Many primatologists, including Bloch and Sussman, think that the group Carpolestes belongs to, the Plesiadapiformes, were close cousins of the early primates and thus very similar to them.

Others think their features are so un-primate-like that they must have been much more distant relatives "If you put skin on them and had them run around a zoo, you wouldn't think they look like primates," says primatologist Dan Gebo of Northern Illinois University. If so, Carpolestes does not tell us what early primates were like after all. "The fossil is irrelevant," says Cartmill.

So who is right? The only way to settle the issue will be to find more fossils from that vital period that are undoubtedly those of the direct ancestors of primates. Fossil hunters are looking, but it could take a long time and an exceptionally patient, keen pair of eyes to spot them. "They're going to be tiny," says Gebo. "We're more likely to find teeth and jaws than entire skeletons, and a jaw might only be a few millimetres long."

And, in keeping with their divided opinions, primatologists can't decide where to look. Some, like Gebo, favour sites in China, Europe and North America as this is where later primates have been found. Others think the absence of early primates in these areas suggest they originated elsewhere, so prefer to hunt in India and Africa.

Surely, though the evidence is out there, if we can only find it. Perhaps even as you read this, the rock containing that vital missing link is being painstakingly etched away by another graduate student. In the meantime, the next time you look at a flower, remember that blossoms may have made us what we are today.

This article appeared in print under the headline "Flower child"

Helen Pilcher is a freelance writer based in the UK. Follow her on @HelenPilcher1

Tuesday, December 25, 2012

Liquid Minds IX: Lullaby

Liquid Mind IX: Lullaby is slow music at its best... Soothing, melodic, heartfelt, and comforting, this new album from Liquid Mind® composer Chuck Wild continues a fifteen year tradition of deeply calming music for relaxation.
Appealing to the softer side of the musical spectrum, Liquid Mind IX: Lullaby is filled with gentle extended soundscapes that create a welcome relief to those of us searching for a break from our high stress, high energy world. Liquid Mind's albums have for many years been popular with music therapists and other healthcare practitioners, and are frequently used in massage, anxiety management, meditation, sleep therapy, surgical recovery, Yoga, Reiki, Pilates, maternity and many other healing settings.
While we think of lullabies as being primarily for children, you will find the peaceful compositions on Liquid Mind IX: Lullaby are perfect for both grownups and kids.

Reference:
http://www.liquidmindmusic.com/lullaby/index.html

Sunday, December 23, 2012

10 Veggies to get more stamina

In today’s fast paced world it is not very uncommon to feel depletion in energy levels as the day progresses. So it’s very important for everyone, whether you have an athletic or normal build, to enhance body stamina without increasing body bulk.
Eating a well balanced diet and taking proper sleep are natural ways for boosting energy. Following is a list of stamina increasing, healthy and nutritious vegetables whose regular intake yield long term benefits for athletes, aspiring sportsperson, and people of all genre alike.

1. Beet juice

A recent study by the University of Exeter found out that juice of the red beet can increase your physical output up to 16%. The cause of this major improvement are nitrates. They decrease blood pressure, the need of the muscles for oxygen and lead to improved performance in high intensity exercises

2. Quinoa

Declared as a sacred grain by the Incas, and fed to their warriors.
This small, high-energy grain, can be cooked like rice in only 10 minutes making it an ideal pre-run ingredient.
It contains all eight essential amino acids, a bunch of vitamins and minerals plus fiber. On top of that, it’s gluten-free and easy to digest. Mix it with honey, almonds or berries for some extra flavour.

3. Corn

Corn is filled with Carbohydrates which are burnt by your body while doing easy and long exercises.
While the workout intensity gradually increases, the body switches to burning glycogen (which is a fast-paced energy-reserve, stored in the liver and muscles). Glycogen makes it easier for your body to maintain the effort. That is why it is important for runners to maintain a high level of glycogen. As per The Putney School, glycogen like component has been extracted from corn.
(Actually, corn is a grain, but we’re including that in this list too)

4. Spinach

Spinach is one of the natural healers and a must in everyone’s diet to obtain great health. Spinach contains vitamins which help in increasing stamina, like Vitamin A and C. Spinach is a natural nutritious powerhouse and helps in strengthening bones thereby preventing various bone relates disorders.
Best part about spinach is that you can eat in both raw and processed form. However it looses some of the vital nutrients during cooking.

5. Green Cabbage

Studies show green cabbage is a muscle builder, blood cleansener and eye strengthener. It contains phytonutrients which works to protect body from free radicals and helps preventing cell membranes.
Also, juice of raw cabbage is proven to heal stomach ulcers. Green cabbage is a best deal when comes to increasing body strength as its heavy on advantages and less on pocket.

6. Watercress

Watercress is mother nature’s perfect multi vitamin vegetable, body cleansing detoxicant and tastes yummy. Probably among the oldest known leafy vegetables, watercress contains iron, Vitamin A, Vitamin C, Vitamin B, magnesium, & calcium in balanced quantities.
Thus watercress is one of the most recommended vegetables to strengthen bones. Watercress also increases immunity because of its multi-vitamins capabilities.

7. Lettuce

Another study at University of Exeter showed vegetable rich in nitrate helps in enhancing one’s stamina and build immune system. Lettuce, which is commonly used in daily salad, is enriched with same advantages less known to people.
Adding to the above results, Barts, the London School of Medicine & Dentistry and the Peninsula Medical School stated that lettuce also helps in lowering blood pressure and is useful not only for athletes but all genres. Diets rich of vegetables with high nitrate content, like Lettuce, could help people suffering from high blood pressure and are potentially helpful if one would aim to increase stamina.

8. Pumpkin

If you always thought pumpkin is best utilized in Halloween, then you must know it is one of the best vegetables to increase your stamina.
Available almost throughout the year in majority of countries, it is also a natural depression cure. Not only pumpkin but its seeds, also called “pepitas”, are loaded with minerals. They seem to have an anti-inflammatory effect, and may even help protect against prostate cancer and osteoporosis.

9. Eggplant

Eggplant is probably one of the unique vegetables containing an important antioxidant ingredient phytonutrients, besides minerals, vitamins and proteins.
Phytonutrients have certain phenolic compounds, such as chlorogenic acid, and flavonoids, like nasunin. Intake of eggplants help maintain a balance in salt intake; thus maintaining a nice level of hydration which is very important while doing the athletic workout building stamina.

10. Asparagus

Stamina is built if your entire body is fit. Eating asparagus can help you get rid of warts. If you switch to low-glycemic foods like asparagus, the energy release is gradual and long lasting which is ideal for sport. Since you do not tax your pancreas, you feel better and your stamina and performance improves.
Asparagus also helps prevent the formation of cancerous tumors since it has anti-cancer agents.

Friday, October 5, 2012

Vitamins for Eye Floaters and Eye Flashes

Many people experience small particles or tiny strands slowly moving in their line of vision; these are called eye floaters. Most eye floaters don’t have treatment as it is believed that they eventually disappear while one continues to ignore it. But the fact is that there may be some developed treatment through correct approach in diet and lifestyle. There are also supplements and vitamins for eye flashes that you can try so that eye floaters can no longer remain as your visual issue.

Here are some of the important vitamins and nutrients needed for prevention and healing of eye floaters:

One of the essential vitamins for eye floaters is vitamin C. Vitreous, lens, and retina contain high concentrations of vitamin C. This is the reason why vitamin C is important to eyesight. Vitamin C protects our eyes and maintains the consistency and clarity of the vitreous gel.
Our eyes need vitamin A to support the cells in the retina to function properly during the night and day vision. Blindness is one serious problem that emerges due to vitamin A deficiency.
Essential fatty acids are necessary for the components (particularly the vitreous, retina, and the lens) of the eye to function properly.
Other supplements for eye floaters are lutein and zeaxanthin, which are found extensively in the retinal region of the eye.

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Oils and Fat

Prefer products with low in saturated fats, rather that just low fat

It's not just the quantity of fat in your diet - the type of fat in your diet can make big difference to your health. Its important to include good fats, and cut back on foods high in saturated fat and trans fatty acids. Focus on mono-saturated and omega-3 fats.

Eat plenty of nuts, seeds, olives and avocados to gain unsaturated fats. Other fats, called essential fatty acids cannot be made by the body, so have to be obtained through diet. The best of these healthy fats are from seafood, poly-unsaturated oils, linseed, mustard seed oil and canola oil.

Minimize saturated fats and oils including: Fatty meets, sausages, salami, full-fat dairy products, potato chips, cakes, cookies, pastries, pizza and deep-fried foods such as French Fries and Fried Chickens. Look out for products low in saturated fat, rather than just low fat.

What is a saturated fat?

Saturated fats, which are usually soilds at room temperature, are simply fats that contain saturated fatty acids (SFA). SFA are a long-chain carboxylic acid, which usually has beteween 12 to 24 carbon atoms that has no double bonds. Thus, saturated fatty acids are saturated with hydrogen, since double bonds reduce the number of hydrogen on each carbon

What food contain saturated fat?

Saturated fatty acids are found mainly in animal fats, including dairy products. Fatty meats, such as bacon, salami, and sausage, are primary sources of saturated fat. Cheeses, full fat milk, butter, and cream are good sources of saturated fat. Only two vegetable fats are saturated, which are palm oil and coconut oil. We typically get our greatest proportion of saturated fats from prepared or processed foods. This includes sweets and snacks such as cookies, cakes, pastries, crisps, and chocolate.

The American Heart Association recommends limiting the amount of saturated fats you eat to less than 7 percent of your total daily calories.

Risk of products with saturated fats

Saturated fatty acids are a major risk factor for heart attacks and strokes. Diets high in saturated fatty acids increase the production of acetate fragments in the body which, in turn, leads to an increase in the production of cholesterol. When consumed, saturated fats tend to clump together and form deposits in the body, along with protein and cholesterol. They get lodged in blood cells and organs, leading to many health problems, including obesity, heart diseases, and cancers of the breast and colon. The build-up in the arteries can cause a narrowing of the arteries, called atherosclerosis, which consequently can lead to major heart problems.

Obesity

The saturated fat that is consumed are put into storage cells called adipose cells. These storage cells can hold up to 1000 times its own size, therefore it is used to store up a large amount of fats. Saturated fats, which are flat, build up easily in these cells causing obesity. A host of other health problems typically accompanies obesity in those comsuming a diet rich in Saturated Fatty Acids.

Saturated Fats - Not All Bad
Saturated fats have been shown to improve liver health, promote healthy lungs, promote healthy brain functioning, positively influence proper nerve signaling, improve bone strength, and support the body's immune system. However, unsaturated fats also accomplish many of these benefits in the body with less harmful side effects. A diet void of fat should be avoided; however, smart diet decisions should be made instead.

Healthy Diet
In order to avoid a diet rich in saturated fatty acids, a modest total intake of fats should be followed. This would be around 25 percent of your total daily calories. Also, normal amounts of omega-3 fat, which is healthy fat, should be included in the diet. Intake of saturated fat should be reduced in the diet to a maximum of 1/3 of your total fat intake. The American Heart Association recommends limiting the amount of saturated fats eaten to less than 7 percent of the total daily calories. Choose lean meat, fish, and skinless poultry. Grill meat instead of frying in fattening oil or lard. Also, trim the fat off of meat before cooking it. Consume fewer pastries, biscuits and sweets.

Useful URLs:
http://www.fitday.com/fitness-articles/nutrition/fats/why-saturated-fatty-acids-are-harmful.html#b

http://www.lowcarbdietworks.com/carbsinfat.php

http://lowfatcooking.about.com/od/lowfatbasics/a/fats1004.htm

http://www.cdrfoodlab.com/food-analyzers/foodlabfat/?gclid=CNz94MnJw7ICFQV76wodzgwAzw