food
In the world of gratuities, the bigger they are, the harder they fall. Psychologists at Washington University in St. Louis have shown that the larger the bill, the smaller the tip percentage that food servers, hair stylists and cab drivers receive. Leonard S. Green, Ph.D., Washington University professor of psychology in Arts & Sciences, and Joel Myerson, Ph.D., research professor of psychology, compiled data from nearly 1,000 tips left in restaurants, hair salons and with cab drivers. Their findings indicate that the percent of the tip actually decreases with the amount of the bill across all three tipping situations.
Imagine that your doctor, using a small hand-held sensor, could detect from a drop of your blood if you carry the gene for cystic fibrosis, or whether or not you have HIV. Or on the battlefield, a soldier could wear a small sensor that detects the smallest amount of anthrax in the air. In the food industry the same type of sensor could check for the DNA signature of salmonella.
In the fishbowl of life, when hordes of well-fed predators drive their prey to the brink of extinction, sometimes evolution takes the fast track to help the hunted survive -- and then thrive to outnumber their predators. This rapid evolution, predicted by Cornell University biologists in computer models and demonstrated with Pac-Man-like creatures and their algae food in laboratory habitats called chemostats, could play an important role in the ecological dynamics of many predator-prey systems.
Despite greatly increasing food production for humans, the growing use of nitrogen as a nutrient is affecting people's health far beyond just the benefits of growing more crops, according to a new University of Colorado at Boulder-led study. Study leader Alan Townsend of CU-Boulder's Institute for Arctic and Alpine Research said changes in the global nitrogen cycle, while beneficial in increasing crop growth, appear to pose a growing health risk. Roughly half of the inorganic nitrogen ever used on the planet has occurred in the past 15 years.
Dangerous levels of mercury appear to be present in whale, dolphin and porpoise meat sold widely as food in Japan, according to a study by Japanese scientists. One U.S. researcher says the findings point to a "major health problem" in Japan. The Japanese scientists bought samples from across the country, and found that every single slice of toothed whale red meat -- Japan's most popular whale product -- exceeded that country's provisional limit on mercury, with some samples containing almost 200 times the maximum value. The researchers also found that mercury levels were higher in whales caught off the coast of the southern part of the country.
As authorities across the United States take part in a five-day exercise this week to test how well emergency teams respond to terrorist attacks, what can the public do to prepare? According to the American Dietetic Association, a nutritious food supply and safe food handling must be a top priority.
Some people like peanut butter in sandwiches. Other people mix it in desserts or feed it to squirrels. Now there is a new use for peanut butter -- as a quality assurance tool. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) recently issued Standard Reference Material (SRM) 2387, a peanut butter sample that has been characterized with state-of-the-art measurement methods to provide values for the amount of fat, protein, vitamins, minerals and other analytes it contains. It is one of a series of food-matrix SRMs that can be used by food manufacturers to validate production and quality control procedures as well as ensure accurate labeling of product content.
The combination of high temperature and very high pressure in the preparation of processed meats such as hot dogs and salami may effectively reduce the presence of infective prions while retaining the taste, texture, and look of these meats, according to a study in today?s Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) Early Edition.
A new mouse study suggests fasting every other day can help fend off diabetes and protect brain neurons as well as or better than either vigorous exercise or caloric restriction. The findings also suggest that reduced meal frequency can produce these beneficial effects even if the animals gorged when they did eat, according the investigators at the National Institute on Aging (NIA). ?The implication of the new findings on the beneficial effects of regular fasting in laboratory animals is that their health may actually improve if the frequency of their meals is reduced,? says Mark Mattson, Ph.D., chief of the NIA?s Laboratory of Neurosciences.
Researchers have found disturbing new evidence suggesting that environmental exposure to a ubiquitous substance may cause chromosomally abnormal pregnancies. They have learned that low levels of a compound used in the manufacture of common plastic food and beverage containers and baby bottles interfere with cell division in the eggs of female mice. The disruption of cell division can result in an abnormal number of chromosomes in the eggs, a condition known as aneuploidy, which is the leading cause of mental retardation and birth defects in humans. Down syndrome is an example of a disorder caused by the addition of an extra chromosome.
You literally are what you eat, at least when it comes to the amount of abdominal visceral fat, Johns Hopkins researchers say. Studying the food diaries of a group of middle-age adults, they found that the more saturated fats such as butter and lard the group ate, the higher the amount of visceral fat surrounding their internal organs. By contrast, a diet of more polyunsaturated fats like vegetable oils yielded lower visceral fat.
In the future, consumers may be adding a powerful "spice" to their food that could save lives. Researchers in Canada are developing a natural antibody cocktail that can help prevent the most common foodborne germs, including E. coli and Salmonella, which cause thousands to become sick or die each year in this country. Derived from freeze-dried egg yolk, the substance is nicknamed a spice because it can be sprinkled or sprayed onto meats, fruits and vegetables to complement existing sanitation protocols. The so-called spice does not alter the taste of food.<
Teens are impacted more by social consequences than by fear of food allergy reactions, causing a possible reluctance to use their medication. These findings were presented today at the 60th Anniversary Meeting of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (AAAAI).
Lack of exercise - and not diet - causes obesity and diabetes among those who are predisposed to the conditions, suggests new research on wild baboons. In addition, researchers discovered that obese animals were NOT the ones with the highest cholesterol levels, suggesting cholesterol problems and obesity are triggered by different mechanisms. "Figuratively speaking, if humans don't exercise, some are likely to become obese and as fat as baboons."
Researchers at the University of Washington have found a species of crow that distinctly alters its behavior when attempting to steal food from another crow, depending on whether or not the other bird is a relative. The Northwestern crow (Corvus caurinus) uses a passive strategy when it attempts to take food from kin but becomes aggressive when it tries to steal a morsel from a non-related crow. This is believed to be the first time that such a behavior pattern has been observed in any bird species.
