Be Fit. Be Strong. Be Healthy.

First GMO Apple Slices To Go On Sale In Midwest

The first genetically modified apples to be sold in the U.S. will debut in select Midwestern stores next month. A small amount of Arctic brand sliced and packaged Golden Delicious, produced by Okanagan Specialty Fruits of Summerland, B.C., will be in 10 stores this fall, said Neal Carter, the company’s founder and president. He would not identify the retailers, saying that’s up to them.“We’re very optimistic with respect to this product because people love it at trade shows,” Carter said. “It’s a great product and the eating quality is excellent.”

Carter reduced the enzyme polyphenol oxidase to prevent browning when apples are sliced, bitten or bruised. The apples match the industry norm of not browning for three weeks after slicing but without using flavor-altering, chemical additives that the rest of the fresh-sliced apple industry uses.Golden Delicious, Granny Smith and Fuji varieties have been approved by the USDA and Canada. An Arctic Gala could be approved in 2018. Only Goldens and Granny Smiths have been planted long enough to produce fruit in commercial quantities by next fall.

Midwestern retailers were chosen for the first sales this winter because they seemed like a good fit demographically and in presence and size, Carter said. Asked if Midwest consumers may be more accepting of genetically modified apples than those on the East or West coasts, Carter said consumer research didn’t indicate that and that it wasn’t a consideration.

“We don’t want to skew our test marketing results by choosing stores that may be more friendly to genetic engineering,” he said.About 500, 40-pound boxes of sliced apples will be sold in grab-and-go pouch bags, he said. The company expects to offer 6,000 boxes of apple slices from the 2017 fall crop.

A QR computer scan code on the packaging enables consumers to get information, including that the apple slices are genetically modified, but nothing directly on the packing identifies it. Okanagan Specialty Fruits will adhere to the new genetically engineered foods labeling act but it’s not clear what that requires, Carter said.“We are selling it under the Arctic brand and we’ve had a lot of press and attention, so I assume most people will know what it is,” he said.

The company has reworked its logo, making a snowflake inside an apple outline more visible.The first commercial test marketing will provide the company with consumer preferences on packaging and price and other information including purchase motivations. Survey data will be used to help the company decide its fall 2017 commercial launch strategy.

The company has orchards in British Columbia and 85,000 trees at an undisclosed location in Washington state. More than 300,000 trees will be planted this spring and 500,000 are being budded for planting in 2018. Those numbers may increase, as the company wants enough volume to compete nationally in the sliced apple business, Carter said.

The goal is 800 to 1,000 acres planted in the Northwest and nearly the same acreage in the eastern U.S. in addition to 600 to 800 acres in Canada by 2021, he has said. It will be a mix of company orchards and contract growers.

While supportive of the science, the Washington apple industry opposed approval of GMO apples because it believes negative public perception could damage apple sales. While expressing concerns about market disruption before USDA approval, the U.S. Apple Association is now neutral and stresses that all apples are safe, healthy and nutritious.

SOURCE…www.capitalpress.com

Doubt Over Everest’s True Height Spurs Fresh Expedition

If I were to ask you what the worlds tallest mountain peak was what would you guess? ” What is Mt. Everest for 500″ (Jeopardy adage ). Well you’d be correct with that statement. But what if I told you that the exact height of this mammoth mount was in ques ion following the mega quake that recently took place in Nepal ?India’s top surveyor Nepal scientist to measure Everest’s true height . This team of scientists would be sent to neighboring Nepal to measure Everest in the hope of putting to rest a debate about the true height of the towering mountain.A deadly 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck Nepal in 2015, killing thousands and altering the landscape across the Himalayan nation.

Satellite data at the time suggested the impact of the quake reduced Everest’s peak—which officially stands at 8,848 meters (29,029 feet) above sea level—by anywhere between a few millimeters and an inch.But lingering doubt among the scientific community has prompted a fresh expedition to size up the peak, said India’s surveyor general Swarna Subba Rao.”We will remeasure it,” Rao was quoted as saying by the Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency, adding the team would set off in two months.”Two years have passed since the major Nepal earthquake and there’s doubt in the scientific community that it did in fact shrink.”

The exercise will require a month for observation and roughly another fortnight for the data to be officially declared.Another official told AFP that a five-member team would depart for the expedition at winter’s end, and would take measurements using instruments on the ground to gauge the peak’s real height. The earthquake, Nepal’s deadliest disaster in more than 80 years, is also believed to have shifted the earth beneath the capital Kathmandu several meters to the south. With the scientific expedition set to take place at the very top of the world, perhaps one day they

SOURCE…m.phys.org

Shock!!! Scientists Claim To Have Proof Of God

The debate of whether science trumps intelligent design or God exist, has been the subject of heated debate. After all There is a deep meaning of life …right?? Or maybe we were a cosmic accident created from the primordial ooze all by a lucky long shot ? Well finally science has added fuel to the fire as s cientists Claim To Have Proof Of God.

The Science

Two computer scientists say they proved that there is a holy supreme force after confirming the equations. In 1978, mathematician Kurt Gödel died and left behind a long and complex theory based on modal logic. Dr Gödel’s model uses extremely complicated mathematical equations . In essence it states is that no greater power than God can be conceived. If God is believed as a concept then he or she can exist in reality.

Dr Gödel equations:

“Ax. 1. {P(φ)∧◻∀x[φ(x)→ψ(x)]} →P(ψ)Ax. 2.P(¬φ)↔¬P(φ)Th. 1.P(φ)→◊∃x[φ(x)]Df. 1.G(x)⟺∀φ[P(φ)→φ(x)]Ax. 3.P(G)Th.

2.◊∃xG(x)Df. 2.φ ess x⟺φ(x)∧∀ψ{ψ(x)→◻∀y[φ(y)→ψ(y)]}Ax. 4.P(φ)→◻P(φ)Th.

3.G(x)→G ess xDf. 3.E(x)⟺∀φ[φ ess x→◻∃yφ(y)]Ax. 5.P(E)Th.

4.◻∃xG(x)”.

You get it, right? Two computer scientists have used computers to run such complicated equations which they say confirms that the equation does indeed add up. The point of the researchers’ argument was that they were not directly trying to prove the existence of God. The experiment was done to showcase the power of computers.

Christoph Benzmüller of Berlin’s Free University, told Spiegel Online: “It’s amazing that from this argument led by Gödel, all these things can be proven automatically in a few seconds or even less on a standard notebook. “I didn’t know it would create such a huge public interest but [Gödel’s ontological proof] was definitely a better example than something inaccessible in mathematics or artificial intelligence… “It’s a very small, crisp thing, we are just dealing with six axioms in a little theorem.“There might be other things that use similar logic.”

SOURCE…www.express.co.uk

Scientists Want To Bring Back Extinct Caspian Tiger

Science to the rescue

Now I know A lot of us have seen the iconic blockbuster movie “Jurassic Park”. You know? The movie where these scientist extract the DNA from an ancient gigantic dinosaur from a mosquito trapped in the 65 million year old fossilized tree sap ? Well scientists are trying to recreate the same thing with attempting to bring back the Caspian tiger. Which was once one of the world’s largest tigers…

Caspian tigers

Until recently, the tigers roamed Central Asia, from the Caspian Sea to north-west China, before struggles that included loss of habitat robbed them of their prey.Ever since Caspian tigers disappeared, biologists and conservationists have tried to come up with a strategy to bring tigers back to Central Asia. It’s not clear exactly when the Caspian tiger died out. Some reports suggest it was last seen in the 1950s, while others date its extinction to the 1970s. Another tiger subspecies known as the Amur tiger is genetically very similar to the Caspian tiger and could potentially survive in Central Asia.

The Future

Between 2010 and 2012, scientists conducted studies that showed that Caspian and Amur tigers were almost identical in their genetic structure. Scientists now want to reintroduce tigers in Central Asia using Amur tigers from the Russian Far East. Researchers from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and State University of New York (SUNY) say they have found two spots in Kazakhstan to reintroduce the extinct enormous cat. Experts have been discussing the plans for nearly 10 years. Scientists say the project has some major hurdles before it could be undertaken.The potential tiger habitat needs to be protected. The species would also need hooved-animals to prey upon and numbers of these in the area are still low. This is predicted to take at least 15 years.

SOURCE…www.bbc.co.uk

The Newest Workout Trend… Beer Yoga

Totally on board with the whole “New Year, New Me” vibe? What about the thought of healthy beer yoga workout if we’re being realistic, changing my current habits is proving to be a lot harder than I previously thought. We want to be healthy… In comes this beer yoga workout. The transformation involved in spending time laying in bed and consuming food and beverages. Clogging arteries and destroying kidneys to becoming a green juice-drinking yogini . Rising with the sun for hours of meditation and cardio is impractical .

W“healthy” is a journey that one needs to ease their selves into slowly. Say hello to the newest workout trend sweeping the globe – beer yoga .The Germans have come up with the best way to combine working on and gaining transcendence without giving up happy hour. Bier Yoga, is exactly what it sounds like – downing a brew while maintaining Warrior 3. This trend is unsurprisingly so popular that it’s spread to Australia, as well.

Beer yoga becoming an international trend will almost certainly work in our favor. Now, it’s only a matter of time that a BierYoga will open up in Williamsburg. Apart from being an amazing new way to get people to engage in physical activity. The founders of BierYoga claim that drinking beer during the workout actually ups your yoga game in a major way. As you search for enlightenment during your 50-minute workout, adding in a beer you enjoy drinking and its calming effects on the mind can help .

Of course, drinking beer in certain positions will prove tricky – hello, downward-facing dog ! You’ll be able to focus more on your stability and core strengthening through balancing the bottles on your head and other various motions that integrate the bottle as a key component of your workout. I’m already on board, but until Beer Yoga makes its way to the good ol’ U. S. of A., I may just give this a try on my own by replacing my water bottle with a growler and earning myself a nice, long shavasana.
SOURCE…postgradproblems.com

scientists warn likely impacts solar flares sun storm1

Limitless Clean Energy For The World

In a world struggling to kick its addiction to fossil fuels and feed its growing appetite for energy, there’s one technology which is a true energy revolution in development that almost sounds too good to be true: nuclear fusion.

If it works, fusion power offers vast amounts of clean energy with a near limitless fuel source and virtually zero carbon emissions. That’s if it works. In February last year a new chapter of fusion energy research commenced with the formal opening of Wendelstein 7-X. This is an experimental €1 billion (A$1.4bn) fusion reactor built in Greifswald, Germany, to test a reactor design called a stellarator.It is planned that by around 2021 it will be able to operate for up to 30 minutes duration. Which would be a record for a fusion reactor. This is an important step en-route to demonstrating an essential feature of a future fusion power plant: continuous operation.

But the W-7X isn’t the only fusion game in town. In southern France a $US20 billion (A$26.7bn) experimental fusion reactor ITER is being built. This machine uses a different design called a tokamak. However, even though the W-7X and ITER employ different designs. The two projects complement each other, and innovations in one are likely to translate to an eventual working nuclear fusion power plant.

Twists and turns

Fusion energy seeks to replicate the reaction that powers our Sun. The resulting fused atom ends up slightly lighter than the original two atoms. The difference in mass is then converted to energy according to Einstein’s formula E=mc². The difficulty comes in encouraging the two atoms to fuse, requiring them to be heated to millions of degrees Celsius. What makes the W-7X particularly interesting is its stellarator design. It comprises a vacuum chamber embedded in a magnetic bottle created by a system of 70 superconducting magnet coils. In these experiments a strong toroidal (or ring) magnetic field creates a magnetic bottle to confine the plasma.

However, in order for the plasma to have good confinement in the doughnut-shaped chamber, the magnetic field needs to have a twist. In a tokamak, such as in the ITER reactor, a large current flows in the plasma to generate the required twisted path. However, the large current can drive “kink” instabilities. In a stellarator, the twist in the magnetic field is obtained by twisting the entire machine itself. This removes the large toroidal current, and makes the plasma intrinsically more stable. The cost comes in the engineering complexity of the field coils and reduced confinement thus the plasma is less easily contained within the magnetic bubble.

Come together

While the W7-X and ITER use different approaches, most of the underlying technology is identical. They are both toroidal superconducting machines, and both use external heating systems such as radio frequency and neutral beam injection to heat the plasma, and much of the plasma diagnostic technology is in common. In a power plant, heavy isotopes of hydrogen (deuterium and tritium) fuse to form helium along with an energetic neutron. The neutron is has a neutral electric charge, and shoots off into the “blanket” surrounding the plasma. The helium generates electricity.

A common feature across fusion power is the need to develop materials that can withstand y the fusion reaction. The first wall of a fusion reactor has to withstand a massive bombardment from high energy particles throughout its lifetime. At this stage, it’s too early to tell whether the tokamak design used by ITER or the stellarator used by W-7X will be better suited for a commercial fusion power plant. But the commencement of research operation of W-7X will not only help decide which technology might be best to pursue. Without a doubt will contribute valuable knowledge to any future fusion experiments, and perhaps one day a true energy revolution.

SOURCE…http://www.ibtimes.co.uk

« Previous 1 … 16 17 18 19 20 … 53 Next »