Posts Tagged ‘ nutrition ’

 
Sunday, March 14th, 2010

Most people know that it is important to get enough minerals in their diet. They go out of their way to get plenty of calcium and iron. However, many other minerals are needed to stay healthy and few people know of their many benefits. Magnesium is one mineral that many people neglect. Unfortunately, 61% of American adults do not get adequate magnesium to satisfy the US RDA. Using a magnesium supplement would provide a number of benefits to these adults.

Magnesium is especially important for building strong bones. It works with calcium to make bones more dense less prone to breakage. This ability of magnesium to improve the usage of calcium makes it excellent at preventing and even reversing osteoporosis. A serious medical condition, osteoporosis causes the bones to become very weak and easily broken. Magnesium works to bring calcium to the areas of the body where it is needed. This is good since unused calcium can form painful kidney stones or create muscle pains and cramps. Offsetting calcium intake with twice the magnesium can prevent these issues.

Magnesium also plays a role in the regulation of blood pressure and may help prevent hypertension. Doctors believe this is because magnesium relaxes the smooth muscle tissue responsible for dilating the arteries. By relaxing this muscle, magnesium may help prevent high blood pressure. It also seems to work alongside potassium in regulating the blood pressure.

Magnesium is also active in the balancing our blood sugar. It is needed to metabolize carbohydrates. Too little magnesium can cause insulin, the enzyme that control the levels of blood sugar, to stop working. Insulin resistance is the term that describes this condition. Insulin resistance is usually a first step towards the development of type 2 diabetes. Type 2 diabetes is another name for adult-onset diabetes. As insulin becomes less effective, it takes more and more of it to create the same drop in blood sugar. Eventually full-blown diabetes develops. Getting the recommended amount of magnesium will improve the ability of the body to control blood sugar and hopefully prevent diabetes from developing in later life.

Magnesium is also important to cardiovascular health. This only seems natural since magnesium is involved in the prevention of diabetes and hypertension, two conditions that can lead to poor cardiovascular health. Magnesium helps regulate the heart’s rhythm. Too little magnesium can also lead to abnormal blood clotting in the heart, a dangerous condition that can lead to heart attack. Doctors have also found that magnesium can greatly speed recovery from strokes. It’s also quite likely that magnesium can prevent heart disease and stroke.

Many of us do not get adequate amounts of magnesium in our diet. Magnesium is a crucial mineral that affects a number of important functions. A magnesium supplement is a great way to ensure that you get enough magnesium to maintain optimum health. It is generally recommended to take twice as much magnesium as calcium. A liquid supplement will also be beneficial because liquid minerals are more readily absorbed from the digestive tract. This makes more the magnesium available to the body. Don’t be part of the 61% who are deficient in magnesium. Use a magnesium supplement to protect your precious health.

To learn more about the powers of magnesium supplementsas well as other important mineral supplements, visit us online and download your FREE audio Minerals: What your body needs and why. Neil Butterfield is the owner of Mineralife and is also their mineral supplement expert, Mineralife is known countrywide for its excellence mineral supplements.

 
 
Friday, March 12th, 2010

Mycelium Running by Paul Stamets has been the perpetual best-seller on popular mycology since published in 2005. It’s an indispensible reference book for anybody working the land, especially foresters, farmers and environmental cleanup contractors. It’s also a great book for anyone interested in growing their own food mushrooms.

Mycelium Running is filled to the brim with useful tips on things such as using mushrooms to improve soils and boost productivity in forestry and farming (gardening) with decreased use of expensive fertilizers and pesticides; filtering waste-water (mycofiltration); and clean up toxic waste from the land (mycoremediation).

A detailed description of Mycofiltration, the use of mushrooms to filter waste water, is given in one section of the book. It lists recommended mushroom species and materials to use in creating the mycofiltration bed, as well as dimensions, depth, layers, etc. Mycofiltration beds like this can be effectively used for both industrial waste water and farm runoff.

Added perks when using mycofiltration is that the beds also yield crops of scrumptious food mushrooms, and every 2-3 years, as the bedding material needs to be replaced, the old material can be spread on the farm fields as a rich fertilizer.

Another piece of useful information for farmers and gardeners found in Mycelium Running concerns the no-till farming method as opposed to the conventional method of plowing the fields after harvest. No-till farming helps promote saprophytic fungi (decomposing fungi), which break down organic material at a pace better suited to plant-life than the rapid and heat producing breakdown by anaerobic bacteria, which are the primary decomposers when stubble is plowed under. The mycelium of saprophytic fungi also binds the soil to prevent erosion and loss of valuable nutrients.

For forestry, not only do saprophytic fungi help break down and recycle organic matter. They also help combat many parasitic fungi (blights) that may kill large numbers of trees. Stamets gives useful suggestions on how to seed beneficial saprophytic fungi in blight infested forests as a natural “fungicide,” fighting fire with fire, so to speak.

Mycorrhizal mushrooms can also be seeded to support the forest, or they may simply be encouraged to grow naturally by using more enlightened methods of forest management.

Most plants form symbiotic relationships with mushrooms. The mushroom mycelium more effectively absorbs water and nutrients, exchanged with trees for sugars, making the trees healthier and more drought resistant. Mycorrhizal fungi also provide trees with natural antibiotics against pathogens.

Mushroom mycelium can also be utilized to clean up toxic waste sites through a method known as mycoremediation. The term was invented by the author of Mycelium Running, Paul Stamets, but was in common use before the publication of this book.

Synthetic toxic compounds including petrochemicals, dioxins, neurotoxins, toxic industrial waste and much more can be effectively broken down by fungi into harmless compounds. Bacterial contaminants such E. coli can be killed by anti-bacterial compounds excreted by the fungi. And toxic levels of heavy metals may be absorbed and concentrated by mushrooms, which can then be harvested and safely deposed.

At $50 per ton, mycoremediation is a very cost effective method to clean up toxic waste. Conventional incineration may cost upwards of $1,500 per ton.

All that is just in the first half of this 300-page book; the second half is an instruction manual on growing your own mushrooms and mycelia, which is something that may be of interest to forest managers for mycoforestry, environmentalists for mycoremediation, farmers for increasing soil productivity, and the rest of us for growing our own gourmet mushrooms for food and medicine. In other words, this is a book for anyone and everyone.

Dr. Markho Rafael has worked in the natural health field since finishing Chiropractic College in the mid-90’s. He currently specializes in medicinal fungi, frequently consulting two reference books: Mycelium Running by Paul Stamets for medicinal, biological and chemical properties of mushrooms, and Mushrooms Demystified by David Arora, the most complete identification guide of American mushrooms.

 

Protein is essential for any effective arm toning program. It plays so many important roles in the female body that close attention has to be given to its management. After all, a lack of protein quality and quantity will set back your sexy arm mission by leaps and bounds.

But not all protein is created equal.

In fact, there are some types of protein that you should avoid at ALL costs. So here are 5 types of protein you should NOT eat when toning flabby arms:

1. Farm-raised salmon. This type of salmon has way too many toxins to warrant continual consumption. When possible, stick to wild salmon only. And try to get the fattiest cuts.

2. Protein that has been deep fried. Not only is the fat on the protein bad for you, but so are the fumes. In fact, inhaling fumes while frying meat increases rates of lung cancer.

3. Charred meats. We love big grills and big barbecues. Unfortunately, all those black and crunchy edges of meat increase colon cancer risk. So stay away from any type of meat that has been cooked to the point of blackness.

4. Fatty cuts of marbled meat. As the level of fat in meat increases, the level of healthfulness decreases. Now meat isn’t inherently bad for you, it’s the saturated fat that causes harm. So if you can, stick to grass fed meats.

5. Thin-sliced deli cuts. The convenience of deli cut meats is cancelled out by nitrates. What do nitrates do? Increase rates of colon cancer, not good. So stick with natural sources of protein and avoid highly processed protein like deli cuts.

Choosing the right source of protein for getting rid of flabby arms will not only accelerate results but will also maintain your long term health. And getting sexy and lean arms should be a healthy process in both the short-term and long-term. So avoid the above sources of protein!

Get free and valuable advice on the best movement flabby arm exercise immediately by going to Katherine Crawford’s M.S. website Sleeveless in 7. And learn how to get sexy and thin arms ASAP by visiting her blog about how to lose arm flab with techniques for the female body right now!