Food desert A food desert is a district with little or no access to large grocery stores that offer fresh and affordable foods needed to maintain a healthy diet. [ 1 ] Instead of such stores, these districts often contain many fast food restaurants and convenience stores. "Access", in this context, may be interpreted in three ways: Physical access to shops can be difficult if the shops are distant, the shopper is elderly or infirm, the area has many hills, public transport links are poor, or if the consumer has no car. Healthy options are unavailable. Food deserts disproportionately affect socially segregated groups in urban areas, specifically single mothers, children, and the elderly living in underprivileged urban neighbourhoods. Many grocery stores that once existed in urban neighbourhoods have moved out of these areas and relocated in the suburbs at the same time as former residents (see urban sprawl ). [ edit ] History [ edit ] Causes [ edit ] Commercial siting and zoning [ edit ] United States
The antioxidant myth is too easy to swallow | Henry Scowcroft When the press release arrived in our inboxes, we knew what would happen next. A controversial Nobel laureate had stated, in a peer-reviewed paper he described as "among my most important work", that antioxidant supplements "may have caused more cancers than they have prevented". Even the most fad-friendly sections of the UK media were bound to cover the story. In reality, Professor James Watson – one of the DNA double-helix's founding fathers – was only restating what we at Cancer Research UK (along with many others) have been pointing out for years. It's a topic we at Cancer Research UK come back to again and again on our science blog and on our social media pages. This isn't going to be a Goldacresque run-down of study after study of evidence (although here's a handy Cochrane review for the nerds). One possible reason for our entrenched attitudes is the ubiquitous use of the word "antioxidants" in adverts proclaiming the health benefits of various foods and drinks.
Food Historically, people secured food through two methods: hunting and gathering, and agriculture. Today, most of the food energy required by the ever increasing population of the world is supplied by the food industry. Food safety and food security are monitored by agencies like the International Association for Food Protection, World Resources Institute, World Food Programme, Food and Agriculture Organization, and International Food Information Council. They address issues such as sustainability, biological diversity, climate change, nutritional economics, population growth, water supply, and access to food. The right to food is a human right derived from the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), recognizing the "right to an adequate standard of living, including adequate food," as well as the "fundamental right to be free from hunger." Food sources Global average daily calorie consumption in 1995 Most food has its origin in plants. Plants Animals Production
BritainsDNA SIFT How-To: Build a Composting System At the heart of every farm should be an efficient composting system. Compost not only reuses some of the food that would otherwise go to waste, but it also helps add rich nutrients to soil—without using pesticides and other additives. Composting is a process; it requires regular maintenance and constant care. To learn about the processes of composting, see the ATTRA publication Composting: The Basics, available online at So how do you go about fitting the right composting system to the needs of your operation? 1. Once you have addressed these questions, you can begin to explore some of the options that exist for composting systems. Turning bins, on the other hand, are designed to make turning compost easy. Turning-bin systems are usually the best choice for small-scale farming operations because they allow you to compost a large amount of waste and rotate this waste between bins as necessary.
10 amazing scientific facts about lists | Dean Burnett | Science A typical list, of a format that is very familiar to the author of this blog People like lists of things. They're everywhere on the internet. You name any subject matter you can think of, odds are there's a list about it. Nowhere is safe. Even here, on the Guardian Science section, one of the most popular articles in recent months is a list. 1. Lists are commonly used as tools for assessing people's memory. 2. Much research has been conducted into how humans store and structure their knowledge and thoughts. 3. There is an increasingly common view that internet use shortens a person's attention span. 4. A lot of lists are lists of 10, or some multiple thereof, given that the majority of humans have grown up using the decimal system. 5. Probability theories of category formation demonstrate that we tend to lump very different things together in the same category, (e.g. 6. Lists are very popular, so logically lists about popular things would be more popular again. 7. 8. 9. 10.
Hungry? Soon you may be able to print out your dinner In the fictional world of “Star Trek,” replicators create food without incident for the crew. But how does that apply to your lunch? As Gawker reports, experts at Cornell University’s Computational Synthesis Lab (CCSL) are working on a commercial 3-D food printer that will enable users to print meals off the Internet using raw-food ink syringes. Will the printer replace a kitchen stove in the future? It's possible that this food printer, called a “FabApp,” may do just that. Using raw-food “inks” set up in syringes, a specialized printer creates cookies, pie and other treats. Dr. Others have focused on the environmental benefits of printable foods. How does the printer work? Ultimately, Lipton and his team say their creation may have a big impact on social networking. For further reading:
Susan Greenfield: Living online is changing our brains - tech - 03 August 2011 We need to talk about how the digital world might be changing our brains, says the neuroscientist and former director of the UK's Royal Institution You think that digital technology is having an impact on our brains. How do you respond to those who say there's no evidence for this? So what evidence is there? There is an increase in people with autistic spectrum disorders. Anything else? What makes social networks and computer games any different from previous technologies and the fears they aroused? Digital technologies were vindicated, in terms of our wellbeing, by the Nominet Trust report last month. I haven't met one parent or teacher who doesn't think we should be talking about this. Profile Susan Greenfield is professor of synaptic pharmacology at the University of Oxford, and former director of the UK's Royal Institution. More From New Scientist Vast glaciers carved out Martian Grand Canyon (New Scientist) Origin of organs: Thank viruses for your skin and bone (New Scientist)
The printed future of Christmas dinner 24 December 2010Last updated at 08:25 By Lakshmi Sandhana Technology reporter Turkey and celery square anyone? Christmas dinner traditionally centres on the turkey or goose. The team at Cornell University's Computational Synthesis Lab (CCSL) are building a 3D food printer, as part of the bigger Fab@home project, which they hope one day will be as commonplace as the microwave oven or blender. Just pop the raw food "inks" in the top, load the recipe - or 'FabApp' - and the machine would do the rest. "FabApps would allow you to tweak your foods taste, texture and other properties," says Dr Jeffrey Ian Lipton, who leads the project. "Maybe you really love biscuits, but want them extra flaky. The goal is to blow the lid off cooking as we know it and change the future of food production. People lacking even basic culinary skills could download the recipe files of master chefs or print out nutrition-packed dishes recommended by their doctors. Local food, could really mean local. 'Designer domes'