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Why dark chocolate is good for her heart

Listen up, men! On this Valentine's Day, why not surprise your special lady with chocolates that are healthier for her heart? Dark chocolate eaten in moderate amounts weekly is associated with improved cardiovascular fitness in women, research suggests. Scientists are only beginning to understand why dark chocolate is heart healthy, but a new study offers this explanation—its rich content of cocoa antioxidant compounds, called polyphenols, could enhance activity of special proteins called sterol regulatory element binding proteins (SREBPs), which are involved in cholesterol metabolism. These activated SREBPs then bind to genes on DNA (sterol regulatory element sequences) that boost liver production of another protein called apolipoprotein A1 (ApoA1), which is the major protein component of HDL "good" cholesterol. Correspondingly, cocoa polyphenols also decreased production of another protein in the liver called apolipoprotein B (ApoB), which is the major protein componen...
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Is working standing up too expensive? It could cost you as little as $10

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Spending too much time sitting down is clearly unnatural, particularly if you sit down on very comfortable chairs . Sitting down per se is probably natural, given the human anatomy, but not sitting down for hours in the same position. Also, comfortable furniture is an apparently benign Neolithic invention, but over several years it may stealthily contributed to the metabolic syndrome and the diseases of civilization. Getting an elevated workstation may be a bit expensive. At work, you may have to go through a bit of a battle with your employer to get it (unless you are " teh boz "), only to find out that having to work standing up all the time is not what you really wanted. That may not be very natural either. So what is one to do? One possible solution is to buy a small foldable plastic table (or chair) like the one on the figure below, which may cost you less than $10, and put it on your work desk. I have been doing this for quite a while now, and it works fine for me. The...
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How much vitamin D? Vitamin D Council's recommendations

Since my recent post on problems related to vitamin D deficiency and excess I received several questions. I have also participated in several discussions in other blogs related to vitamin D in the past few days. There is a lot of consensus about vitamin D deficiency being a problem, but not much about vitamin D in excess being a problem as well. Some bloggers recommend a lot of supplementation, which may be dangerous because: (a) our body evolved to obtain most of its vitamin D from a combination of sunlight exposure and cholesterol, and thus body accumulation regulation mechanisms are not designed to deal with excessive oral supplementation; and (b) vitamin D, like many fat-soluble vitamins, accumulates in fat tissue over time, and is not easily eliminated by the body when in excess. The Vitamin D Council has the following general recommendation regarding supplementation: Take an average of 5,000 IU a day, year-round, if you have some sun exposure. If you have little, or no, sun exp...
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