LYCOPENE IS THE MOST POTENT FREE RADICAL QUENCHER OF ALL CAROTENOIDS

Tomatoes are delicious and refreshing when fresh-picked or chopped and mixed into a salsa.  And we hear how good they are for your health.  And they are.  But sometimes we find ourselves disappointed when we buy them fresh where they seem to lack all the rich taste and nutritional value.  And that is true.  That's not just folklore or rumor.  If you can find a delicious, vine-ripened tomato, those tend to be the most flavorful.  But the truth is that the tomatoes found inside a can of tomato sauce is actually more flavorful with a higher concentration of Lycopene.   

It's the Lycopene that gives tomatoes their health benefits.  Lycopene is one of 600 or more carotenoids.  Carotenoids accumulate in the skin where their protective compounds go to work.  I use the word protective because these carotenoids protect your skin from UV rays, working in this way as an anti-wrinkle food and anti-aging food.  What's not to like?  

But the health benefits of Lycopene don't end there.  According to NCBI, Lycopene is the most potent of all carotenoid free radicals.  

Lycopene, the most potent singlet oxygen quencher of all carotenoids, is a possible treatment option for male infertility because of its antioxidant properties. 

A singlet oxygen quencher is an antioxidant that destroys single oxygen free radicals.  

Dietary carotenoids seem to participate in the prevention of photooxidative stress by accumulating as antioxidants in the skin.  

Lycopene is the most potent of all carotenoids.  In fact, carotenoids have more powerful antioxidant activity than vitamin E.  

Carotenoids are known to be powerful O₂ (¹Δ_g) quenchers,⁽⁶⁾ and their activities are much higher than that of α-tocopherol and other biological antioxidants.

When the two are combined, Lycopene with vitamin E, they are a powerful compound for reducing erythema.

Stahl, et al ⁽³⁹⁾ found that combination of a relatively low dose of total carotenoids (25 mg/day) and vitamin E (RRR-α-tocopherol; 335 mg/day) significantly diminished the erythema (redness of the skin) on dorsal skin induced by illumination with UV light after 8 weeks.  

Eat your tomatoes and your watermelon and your red apples.  Not only is Lycopene good for your skin, it has terrific affects on your overall fertility, while enhancing your immunity.  Incorporate this food in your diet. 

other beneficial effects via nonoxidative mechanisms in the testis, such as gap junction communication, modulation of gene expression, regulation of the cell cycle and immunoenhancement. 

To achieve these results, however, one must take 4-8mgs per day for 4 to 12 months.  Fine.  You want these health benefits?  Great.  Take Lycopene on a daily basis for a full year and voila!

Okay, so reports on how much lycopene one should get on a daily basis varies.  The above NCBI article cites 4-8mgs per day.  But this Telegraph article says that one needs closer to 22mgs per day.  

One serving of cooked tomatoes a day, and several servings of fresh tomatoes a week. You should ideally eat 22 mg of lycopene a day; there are 27 mgs in two tablespoons of tomato purée. On a gram-for-gram basis, cherry tomatoes contain more lycopene than large tomatoes.

So far no mention of how many milligrams are found in an average-sized tomato.  

How should I eat them?

Here, canned is better than fresh. Lycopene is better absorbed when it is consumed in processed products, such as baked beans and tinned tomatoes, rather than as whole tomatoes. Choose tomato-based pasta sauces rather than creamy ones. Organic tomato ketchup is particularly good, and tomatoes are a fine excuse for a Bloody Mary.  

That surprised me.  You get more Lycopene in processed products. 

Tomato-based foods offer the highest concentrations of lycopene, according to the Linus Pauling Institute. Because carotenoids are fat-soluble nutrients, cooking tomatoes with oil or eating cooked tomatoes with small amounts of fat increases the amount of lycopene that your body can absorb. Tomato sauces, pastes, soups and juices contain more lycopene than the fresh vegetable. One cup of canned tomato paste provides 75 mg of lycopene, compared to 5 mg[s] in one cup of raw tomatoes, the Linus Pauling Institute notes. Watermelon, pink, grapefruit, guava, apricots and papaya contain lycopene. These nutritious foods also provide vitamin C, potassium, folate and other antioxidant pigments.

That should be the final word on tomatoes and lycopene.  You get more Lycopene in processed foods. The one citation above even pointed to ketchup.  I used to think that Ronald Reagan was crazy when he and his commission cited ketchup as a vegetable, but apparently it has enough nutrients in it to have some protective effect against aging, illness, and a more youthful look.  

This was interesting.  If you consume too much carotenoids, they will deposit in your skin and turn your skin yellow, red, or orange.  I once consumed too much carrot juice one night and woke the next with orange arm pits.  Literally.  I freaked out and went to the Emergency Room the afternoon of the next day where the doctor asked if I had consumed any carrot juice.  Guilty as charged.  The best way to get the right amount is not really through supplementation but through food.  Your body will select the amount of Lycopene it needs and discard the rest.  

BUILD STRONGER, MORE USEFUL BODIES THROUGH STRENGTH TRAINING

FOR THEIR LACK OF KNOWLEDGE, THE PEOPLE PERISH

This was a decent presentation, meaning that it took a complex topic and made it comprehensible. It did fail, however, to answer how to balance gut microbes so that you restore your body and your health returns to a more normal state.  Dr. Sears' Zone Diet focused on balancing hormones.  His diet plan definitely does that, for sure.  And as a target, balancing hormones is a good one.  But maybe balancing the whole body is not as easily as we think since certain organs and organ systems, due to their size and volume, play a larger role in health maintenance than others.  The gut is large system.  In fact, the gut starts at your mouth.  Never heard that before.  

The gut (gastrointestinal tract) is the long tube that starts at the mouth and ends at the back passage (anus).  

The key is to know how to repair and remedy a leaky gut. A leaky gut is exactly what it sounds like--it means your gut is porous with all kinds of bacteria spilling out gradually perhaps into other compartments of your body.  That's a large area, so let's be specific.  A leaky gut refers mainly to the small intestine.  You may not even feel any specific pain other than a tire or weak stomach. Or it may show up in the form of dry or flaky skin. It may show up in the form of bruises or scarring.  

CAUSES OF LEAKY GUT  
The list is long.  One thing that tops the causes of a leaky gut is a poor diet.  What does that mean?  We're all guilty of that.  Even if one follows the best diet, we're always tinkering with so as to accommodate our preferences, little cravings, and must-haves.  Eating all vegetables is not good enough.  Prebiotics are perhaps the best foods to eat to restore the gut.  See this list:

Low-fat diets that never satisfy and only induce more food craving instead of a varietal diet rich in prebiotics like mushrooms, pickles, sauerkraut, miso soup, bran, oats, barley that populate our gut with bacteria that produces lean, non-diabetic humans.

At another site, Sardi points out how unhealthy bacteria, the kind that causes your intestines to leak, produces inflammation at the back of your eyes and is responsible for macular degeneration.  Healthy gut bacteria inhibits invasive blood vessels that destroy vision.  

Healthy gut bacteria inhibit inflammation.  Unhealthy gut bacteria generates low-grade inflammation that is characteristic of accelerated ageing.

Fermented foods like pickles, sauerkraut, miso soup, apple pectin, beta glucans (barley), resveratrol and other foods are recommended to restore and maintain healthy gut bacteria.

Unhealthy gut bacteria increase intestinal permeability and allow undigested proteins to enter the blood circulation, sparking allergic and autoimmune reactions.  [EMBO Molecular Medicine Oct 11, 2016]

This explains how fermented and prebiotic foods listed above spare your vision, spare your gut health, spare your immune system.  And how the Biblical saying of "For their lack of knowledge, the people perish" is no small statement.  The gut and its healthy and unhealthy bacteria is a complex topic.  Though the solutions have already been discovered.  We know what works--prebiotics.  Dairy prebiotics may not be the best.  On probiotics versus prebiotics, this might be helpful.  



Probiotics are “good” bacteria that help keep your digestive system healthy by controlling growth of harmful bacteria. Prebiotics are carbohydrates that cannot be digested by the human body. They are food for probiotics. The primary benefit of probiotics and prebiotics appears to be helping you maintain a healthy digestive system.

One of the best sources of probiotics is yogurt. It has good bacteria like lactobacillus or bifidobacteria. Look for “live or active cultures” on the label to be sure your favorite brand of yogurt is a rich source of probiotics. Other good food sources are sauerkraut, miso soup, fermented, soft cheeses (like Gouda), and even sourdough bread. The common feature of all these foods is fermentation, a process that produces probiotics.

There is nothing in particular about probiotics or prebiotics that will give you energy. However, one of the best probiotic-rich foods, yogurt, is an excellent source of lean protein and calcium. Prebiotic foods are a great source of vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients that give you the energy you need to get through the day. Prebiotic-rich foods include whole grains, onions, bananas, garlic, honey, and artichokes.

SERIOUS PROBLEMS FROM A LEAKY GUT  

One of the problems with diagnosing conditions and knowing what you're working with is that the symptoms show up in distal points and start as something else.  Bill Sardi points this out elegantly

Some autoimmune conditions start as something else. Take, for example, Lyme disease. An infection (Borrelia burgdorferi) may or may not result from a tick bite. Such an infection may or may not be quelled by antibiotics. If people are low in zinc, the medication is less likely to be effective. If they are low in critical nutrients and/or have an imbalance in gut bacteria, they be more prone to autoimmune reactions.  So, seemingly out of nowhere, an infection from a tick bite mysteriously becomes an unremitting chronic problem. That effect is reported more frequently among those who are zinc-deficient. Tick bites and the infections have been around throughout human history. The new element may be zinc deficiency made worse by a craving for sugar that is too often satisfied with high fructose corn syrup. 

So in addition to those fermented probiotics, like miso soup, sauerkraut, mushrooms, and others, you need to be on zinc.  The best form of Zinc is OptiZinc.  Bill Sardi explains that high-fructose corn syrup depletes zinc.  We really need to be careful of the sweeteners we're consuming.  

Zinc is crucial for proper function of the immune system (and so much more). Zinc deficiency is rampant in the American population. Anyone who doesn’t get enough zinc or can’t use it properly is prone to autoimmune reactions. It is possible to get enough zinc in the diet, but it takes adequate selenium to release the zinc from its binding protein. And you should know that high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) depletes zinc. Given the high consumption of HFCS in the US, the increasing incidence of autoimmune disorders is not surprising. 

So there's that.

BEWARE OF HOSPITALIZED ANTIOBIOTICS
I write this because my mother died from hospital antibiotics.  The hospital protocol killed her.  Due to a weakness, she was taken to the Emergency Room where after a series of useless tests the ER doctor assigned her a room--you guessed it--for more tests.  Once they learned of her full insurance coverage, the hospital protocol is to treat anyone coming in as an ATM from which to perform cash withdrawls.  Once she was hospitalized, the doctors put her on an IV of Zosyn.  It was slow-drip biological trauma, slowly and effectively destroying any of her remaining good bacteria, leaving her system open to stress and weakness.  And true to the intentions of that restorative protocol [burning sarcasm], ten days later she was dead.  The best place for your loved ones to be IS OUT OF THE HOSPITAL.  Don't just sign their life over to aloof and fully-licensed professionals.  Instead, provide your loved ones with the protocol that Bill Sardi offers up above:

Low-fat diets that never satisfy and only induce more food craving instead of a varietal diet rich in prebiotics like mushrooms, pickles, sauerkraut, miso soup, bran, oats, barley that populate our gut with bacteria that produces lean, non-diabetic humans. 

Find ways to deliver these in delicious, life-affirming dishes.

90% OF INPUT IS VISUAL; SO WE STORE MORE IMAGES THAN SOUNDS

from Business Insider . . . 

Narrator, Jessica Orwig, starts by pointing out that 

 90% of the information we receive is visual, so we store more images in our memory than sounds.  The first thing you have to do is concentrate and make a point of hearing the name.  

In other words, spend a few seconds on the name, even at the risk of looking forgetful.  First, repeat their name.  People love hearing their name anyway.  Hearing other people pronounce your name correctly is an affirmation that you're speaking and working with a talented and articulate, hopefully, intelligent person.  When we hear our name pronounced the right way by someone taking the trouble to work through all the different auditory permutations, it almost feels like they know something about our heritage or our family history that we've someone overlooked.  Too funny.  If someone butcher's your name, however, it means either, one, they don't care too much, at least right now, or two, that they've got other, bigger fish on their mind.  The narrator says to give meaning to someone's name.  They recommend transforming it into a silly picture.  Really?  I like mnemonics, where you create associations with someone's name.  The narrator says to take 20 seconds to transform it into an image.  That's too long.  You can say hello, shake hands, have a brief conversation, and say goodbye in less than 20 seconds.  Makes no sense to spend 20 seconds configuring a picture and attach it to someone's name.  Plus, people will give you that in a kind of branding.  Tamara from BlackJack Pizza.  You'll never forget that one.  Further, a ridiculous image won't stick so well in the mind of a very logical person; in fact, ludicrous and absurd ideas are often and immediately scoffed at and dismissed.  So here Business Insider telling people what memory tricks to use, but their tricks are not so useful.  Follow what has worked.  Noam Chomsky made his bones as a linguistic with his "language is generative" theory.  Go with that.  Use that.  Do word association games with words or names, and then write them down later or as you're getting in the car to leave.  Create a database if you must.  Write a follow-up note, telling them how glad you are that you met.  That'll make you more memorable in their minds.  You might come across as a crazy too, but it might be worth the risk.  

Horsley has 3 methods for remembering: the body method, the car method, and the journey.  Okay, the best picture "body method" was interesting; again, it takes a lot of effort, but I guess for some information you'll have to put in the effort.  I remember I used 3 x 5 cards in college to remember the names of 95 poets, titles of their poems, first lines, what the entire poem was about, its date, and that was about it.  But 95 is nothing to snuff or sniff at.  

Like anything in life, improving your memory takes practice, but the more you learn the more connections you can build making it even easier to learn even more, so the possibilities are endless.  

Why does she use the word "receive"? Why wouldn't she use the word process or "take in" or compute? Receive just sounds too passive of description. Anyway, the narrator explains that what we do when we meet someone for the first time and we hear their name is that we don't quite hear it because we're paying attention to other things about them--height, weight, sex, age, we're paying attention to how they rank whether it he family or work. We are taking in a lot of other information that take precedents to the spelling of their name or the sound of their name or their name's heritage. So we don't hear the name and we just move on. Not good. Treat people like they are a celebrity, whether they want to be on their talk show or not.

RESVERATROL . . . WORKS TO RESTORE BRAIN TISSUE AFTER TRAUMA

My dad was a big fan of professional and amateur boxing.  It was popular in his day.  I couldn't stand it.  Too violent.  Who would willfully step into the ring to get their brains splayed?  That sport was not for me.  Nor was football.  Basketball was as close as I would come to a contact sport, though I did love baseball, I just never played in any organized team or league.  I ran.  I ran cross country, ran track, and played basketball.  Later I played tennis, and that's what I stuck with for most of my life.  Economists might point out that these athletes know the risks, and so they trade off high salaries for the risk of a serious injury.  I would say that they understand the risks, that they've agreed to the risks, and then take every precaution to prepare for and avoid the risk.  Or as best they can.  Until that one day when they're in the middle of an important game, and WHAM!  They don't know the risks unless they know of other players whose football career was destroyed because of an injury, not to speak of a post-football career if one, in fact, exists for them.  

On the video, h/t Jason Kottke.

But what are these young men doing for their organs?  Do they have a pregame vitamin or nutritional regimen?  Do they think that exercise alone is enough for health?  To young, healthy, strong young men, it may seem that way.  But they need more.  They need vitamin C for blood vessel integrity.  All of the blood vessels--veins, arteries, capillaries.  Approximately 6 to 8 grams a day of oral vitamin C.  For bones and muscles, it is vitmain D.  For brain tissue, it is Benfotiamine.  I wishsed someone inside or outside the league would get this information to these guys. 

There are other compounds you'll want to keep on the back of your mind in case something awful happens to somone you love.  The reports on resveratrol's benefits on brain trauma are absolutely stunning.  

Four years ago (2013) a mega-dose of resveratrol was shown to remarkably reduce damage to the brain 5and 12 hours AFTER mild brain trauma.  The intentional brain injury was included in lab animals and overcome with a human equivalent single dose of 7000 milligrams of resveratrol, which would be impractical and problematic dose over the long term.  But it does provide evidence for the use of resveratrol in brain injuries. 

In anotheranimal study a similar protective effect was observed in laboratory animals that had heavy weights dropped on their skulls and mega-dose resveratrol had a healing effect upon brain neurons after the event. 

In yet another animal study daily mega-dose resveratrol was administered and reduced brain edema (swelling) and improved cognition (thinking).  Researchers concluded, “resveratrol may represent a novel therapeutic strategy for traumatic brain injury.” 

There are other corroborative studies.

Resveratrol is not just a preventive but also therapeutic (i.e., it works to restore brain tissues after trauma).

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