The writer attacks Target's Earth Day green marketing, singling out its Archer Farms organic milk. It comes from Aurora Dairy, which the USDA found in "willful" violation of federal law for confining cattle to feedlots and fraudulently selling milk labelled organic.
Food Consumer
Cooking
Bring on Spring Cleaning Buttermilk Bread
A quick loaf of whole-wheat flour, cornmeal, buttermilk, honey and fresh herbs, baked 45 to 50 minutes for about 12 slices at 129 calories each. AICR notes research tying whole grain diets to lower risk of colorectal and some other cancers.
Sci-Tech
ARS investigate genes involved in forming plum pits
ARS scientists in Kearneysville, West Virginia found that genes for lignin production switch on sharply in plum pit tissue just before the stone hardens, then quiet down. Silencing them could yield a pitless plum; the team is working from Luther Burbank's early-1900s stoneless crosses.
Obesity
Chewing gum reduces cravings for sweets
Researchers from the Pennington Biomedical Research Center and LSU reported that chewing Wrigley's Extra sugar-free gum cut afternoon snack intake by 40 calories and sweet snacks by 60, and suppressed hunger and cravings between lunch and the snack.
Food
Drinking vegetable juice helps weight loss
Overweight people with metabolic syndrome who drank at least 8 ounces of low-sodium vegetable juice with a calorie-controlled DASH diet lost four pounds over 12 weeks, against one pound on the diet alone. Juice drinkers also took in more vitamin C and potassium.
Food
Pineapple: The true miracle fruit
Pineapple supplies vitamin C along with B1, B6 and magnesium, and its enzyme bromelain aids digestion. The article cites a Duke University Medical Center study finding bromelain effective against bowel disease and a Natural Health editor's claim that it beats drugs at fighting inflammation.
Lifestyle
Laughter really is the best medicine
Dr. Lee Berk followed 20 people with diabetes who were on medication; half also watched 30 minutes of comedy a day. After two months that group had lower stress hormones, and by four months lower compounds tied to hardening arteries and higher good cholesterol.
Phytochemicals
Nigella sativa extract may prevent pancreatic cancer
Thymoquinone, the main compound in Nigella sativa oil, almost completely shut down several inflammatory cytokines in pancreatic cancer cells and blocked NF-kappaB, outperforming trichostatin A, Thomas Jefferson researchers reported at the AACR 2009 meeting.
Nutrition
Mother's sun exposure good for offsprings' bones
A UK study of 7,000 ten-year-olds found children whose mothers' final trimester fell in sunny months tended to have larger bones. The authors tie this to maternal vitamin D, and the piece argues pregnant women should keep their levels adequate, mainly through sunlight.
Drug
Epilepsy drug when taken in pregnancy lowers baby's IQ
In the NEAD study of 309 children, those exposed in the womb to valproate averaged an IQ of 92 at age 3, against 101, 99 and 98 for lamotrigine, phenytoin and carbamazepine. Higher maternal doses meant lower scores.
Diet
Veganism has no adverse effect on bone health
Comparing 105 Vietnamese Buddhist nuns with 105 omnivorous women averaging 62 years old, researchers found no significant difference in bone mineral density or body composition, even though the vegans ate much less calcium and protein.
Cooking
Transition from winter to spring with this flavorful soup
A spring soup of onions, potatoes, chickpeas and spinach, with notes on picking firm, dry onions with shiny skins and avoiding dark spots, and a reminder that the skin holds about half the potato's fiber while most nutrients sit in the flesh.
Miscellaneous
Does your child have Schizophrenia? The pharmaceutical industry hopes so
An opinion piece arguing drug makers keep manufacturing new markets as old ones collapse — menopause, then thinning bones, then fibromyalgia and depression — after hormone replacement and bisphosphonates turned out to cause some of the harms they promised to prevent.
Vitamins
Deficiency of vitamins A and C increases asthma risk
A Nottingham meta-analysis of 40 studies from 1980 to 2007 found people with low intake of vitamin C ran a 12 percent higher asthma risk and also had low vitamin A levels. Vitamin E intake showed no link, though people with severe asthma had very low blood levels of it.
Food
Breast cancer risk reduced by green tea, mushrooms
In a Chinese study of 1,009 breast cancer patients and 1,009 healthy women, the heaviest mushroom eaters were about two-thirds less likely to have the disease, and those eating dried mushrooms 56 percent less likely. Mushrooms and green tea together showed the strongest association.
Food
Garden pea lowers blood pressure
Rats with severe kidney disease given an enzyme-activated pea protein extract showed a 20 percent drop in blood pressure and 30 percent more urine output after eight weeks. Human testing is planned, and eating peas themselves does not confer the same protection.
Sci-Tech
Futuristic Seafood: Raising delicious cobia and pompano—Inland!
ARS researchers in Ft. Pierce, Florida are working out how to raise cobia and Florida pompano hundreds of miles inland in recirculating tanks. In one experiment, 2,400 juvenile pompano reached market size in water of just 5 parts per thousand salinity.
Diet
Food choices and health indicators
ARS nutritionist Rhonda Sebastian analyzed two 24-hour diet recalls from more than 2,000 NHANES volunteers and found that among adults aged 31 to 50, a greater share of calories from fast food went with a higher BMI. The link did not appear in 19- to 30-year-olds.
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