Dry Land Farming Ideas

This provides us an eyeball on some of the simple things that can be done out in face of dry conditions.  The advent of farm machinery made a range of strategies possible and not yet enough time to sort them all out.  Thus work like this provides real guidance outside of traditional sources.

The simple idea of rolling the top of the soil is one such.  Spacing trees better is another obvious move that should have long since been adopted.

We need to rethink grading so as to capture the added value of water stressed food in general.  It is obvious that a massive root system will produce better quality and that a simple ABC grading system will capture that.  There is a really good reason why the wild cousins always taste better.  It is also core to organic crops.

Farming without water

By Brie Mazurek

Cross-posted from The Center for Urban Education about Sustainable Agriculture

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Farmer David Little of Little Organic Farm grows potatoes without irrigation in a dry part of California.

http://grist.org/food/farming-without-water/

This week, as the nation grapples with the worst drought in decades, the USDA added more than 218 counties to its list of natural disaster areas, bringing the total to 1,584 — more than half of all U.S. counties. Farmers in the Midwest and Great Plains have been the hardest hit, but the drought is a growing reality for farmers across the country, including California. While the secretary of agriculture won’t comment on the drought’s link to climate change, it’s at the forefront of everyone’s mind, and as global warming unfolds, knowledge of dryland agriculture will become increasingly valuable.

David Little of Little Organic Farm has had to adapt to water scarcity in California’s Marin and Sonoma counties, where most farmers and ranchers rely on their own reservoirs, wells, and springs, making them particularly vulnerable in years with light rainfall. Through a technique known as dry farming, Little’s potatoes and squash receive no irrigation, getting all of their water from the soil.

Mediterranean grape and olive growers have dry-farmed for thousands of years. The practice was common on the Californiacoast from the 1800s through the early 20th century, but it became a lost art during the mid-century. Today, it is experiencing a modest resurgence along the coast, where temperate, foggy summers offer ideal conditions for dry farming grapes, tomatoes, potatoes, cucumbers, melons, grains, and some tree fruit.

“In the beginning, I searched out people who were known dry-farmers,” says Little, who started farming in 1995. “It seemed like no one had done it for 30 years or so.”

To find mentors, Little made the rounds at local bars, asking older farmers about their experiences. “They were very humble,” he says. “They told stories about how things were done, and I would pick up tidbits.” After years of trial and error, he now considers himself an expert.

To help people understand how dry farming works, Little often evokes the image of a wet sponge covered with cellophane. Following winter and spring rains, the farmer will cultivated and break up the soil to create a moist “sponge.” Then the top layer is compacted using a roller to form a dry crust (the “cellophane”). This three- to four-inch layer, sometimes referred to as a dustmulch, seals in water and prevents evaporation.

“It’s very challenging because you have to hold the moisture for long periods of time, and you don’t know how different crops are going to react in different areas,” Little says. Much of the land he farms is rolling hills and valleys, which present additional challenges because they hold and move groundwater differently than flat land.

Deprived of any surface irrigation, dry-farmed plants develop deep, robust roots to seek out and soak up soil moisture. Because they absorb less water than their conventionally irrigated counterparts, dry-farmed crops are characteristically smaller but more nutrient-dense and flavorful.

 “When you water a tree, it dilutes the flavor a lot in some cases,” says Stan Devoto, who dry-farms more than 50 varieties of heirloom apples at Devoto Gardens. “Instead of having a really hard, crisp, firm texture, your apple will be two or three times the size of a dry-farmed apple, and you just don’t get the flavor.”

Devoto has been dry-farming in Sebastopol, Calif., since the 1970s. “We had no choice,” he says. “There’s just not enough water. Pretty much all the orchards are dry-farmed, with the exception of the orchards where trees are planted super close or use dwarf rootstock.”

Having wide orchard rows, which allow tree roots to spread out, is essential for dry-farming apples, as is thinning (removing much of the fruit early in its development) to ensure that each apple gets as much water as possible. In drier years (like this one), Devoto must work extra hard to control weeds, which drink water needed by thirsty trees. As the summer progresses, the ground slowly dries out, stressing out the fruits as they ripen, which helps the sugars become more concentrated.

But while water conservation and intensely flavorful crops are the clear benefits of dry farming, the major tradeoff is yield. Devoto says that apple growers in West Sonoma County, which was once home to a booming apple industry, only get about 12 tons per acre, compared to 30 to 40 tons produced by large apple farms in the state’s Central Valley.

Similarly, Joe Schirmer of Dirty Girl Produce says that his famous dry-farmed Early Girl tomatoes sometimes yield only about a third of what their irrigated counterparts produce. Meanwhile, Little estimates that he gets about a quarter to a third the yield of large organic potato growers. “It it’s hard to compete with some of these big organic farms that are watering,” he says.

Without irrigation, his crops are at the mercy of seasonal rainfall and varying soil conditions from year to year. “You’re on the edge constantly, and one little thing could tip you over,” Little reflects. “We’re barely making it, really, but I believe in coastal farming. I believe we’re going to come back to it.”

While dry farming has geographic limitations, it could pave the way for more coastal agriculture and offer techniques for farmers in drier areas to farm with less water. “The coast of Californiaused to be our main source of food in the state, until they started developing farms in the Central Valley because of all the water,” Little continues. “Now they’re running out of water.”

Devoto’s Gravenstein apples are coming into season as we speak. They may not be picture-perfect or super large, Devoto adds, “But the flavor is just phenomenal.”

Brie Mazurek is the Online Education Manager at the Center for Urban Education about Sustainable Agriculture (CUESA), which operates the San Francisco Ferry Plaza Farmers Market. She is also a consultant for Nourish, a nonprofit educational initiative designed to engage people in the story of our food.

Studies Show Antioxidant Cocktail Suppresses Pancreatic Cancer

The take home is something that is becoming better understood. Something approaching a vegan diet suppresses cancer risk significantly. Whether going vegan is totally correct or not is another matter but the high level of plant intake appears to be firmly indicated. What is key is that the plant intake suppresses the failures of other goods. So actively blending them into your diet is strongly indicated.

And yes, skip the wheat while you are at it and you are likely good to go.

As more and more of these studies are been done we are developing a body of work that is slowly reshaping our diet. Often the reaction is over the top but that is easily balanced. The fact remains that a lot of our food choices are a very bad idea in anything but rare treats. Too rich remains too rich and implies rare small portions. What is so hard about obvious common sense?

Antioxidant cocktail slashes pancreatic cancer risk by up to two thirds

Wednesday, August 08, 2012 by: John Phillip

(NaturalNews) Pancreatic cancer is a particularly deadly form of the disease that takes the lives of nearly 40,000 people in the US each year. Mortality rates for pancreatic cancer are high (five year survival rate is less than three percent) as the disease is typically not suspected or diagnosed until it has progressed to an advanced stage and metastasized to other major organs. Similar to other cancers, pancreatic cancer develops as a result of dietary digressions after the large exocrine gland fails to meet metabolic demands from a diet high in processed, hormone-infused animal protein, hydrogenated fats and sugar.

Researchers publishing the results of a ground breaking study in the British Medical Journal, GUT found that increasing dietary intake of the antioxidant vitamins C, E, and selenium could help cut the risk of developing pancreatic cancer by up to two thirds. Although the study is observational in nature and can only suggest an association, not a cause-and-effect relationship, researchers believe following a diet with optimal intake of the nutrient trio could prevent eight percent of pancreatic cancer cases.

Dietary antioxidant trio dramatically lowers the risk of developing pancreatic cancer

To conduct the study, researchers tracked the health of more than 23,500 individuals, aged 40 to 74 years who had entered the EPIC study between 1993 and 1997. Participants completed a comprehensive food diary, detailing the types and amount of every food they ate for seven days, as well as the methods they used to prepare it. Dietary nutrient values were calculated using a specially designed computer program.

After 10 years, 49 participants (55 percent of whom were male) had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. By 2010, the number of participants diagnosed with pancreatic cancer increased to 86 (44 percent were men). Due to the extremely high mortality rate associated with this invasive form of cancer, patients averaged a six month survival rate after diagnosis. The nutrient intakes of those diagnosed with the disease were compared with nearly 4,000 healthy people to see if there were any differences.

Researchers found that a weekly intake of selenium in the top 25 percent of consumption roughly halved their risk of developing pancreatic cancer compared with those whose intake was in the bottom 25 percent. Participants with the highest intake of all three nutrients (vitamins C, E, and selenium) were 67 percent less likely to develop pancreatic cancer than those who were in the bottom 25 percent. Dietary antioxidants are the cornerstone of cancer prevention and must be consumed daily from a variety of freshly prepared foods to dramatically limit the risk of pancreatic cancer and other deadly, chronic diseases.

Sources for this article include:

http://gut.bmj.com

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/07/120723193203.htm

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/248152.php

http://www.medpagetoday.com/HematologyOncology/OtherCancers/33889

About the author:

John Phillip is a Health Researcher and Author who writes regularly on the cutting edge use of diet, lifestyle modifications and targeted supplementation to enhance and improve the quality and length of life. John is the author of 'Your Healthy Weight Loss Plan', a comprehensive EBook explaining how to use Diet, Exercise, Mind and Targeted Supplementation to achieve your weight loss goal. Visit My Optimal Health Resource to continue reading the latest health news updates, and to download your Free 48 page copy of 'Your Healthy Weight Loss Plan'.

Learn more:

http://www.naturalnews.com/036737_antioxidants_pancreatic_cancer_risk_reduction.html#ixzz22yOvgl33

Sea Ice Losses Outruns Models

The irony here is rich because the sea ice loss is galloping ahead of their so called climate models which are at best spacious anyway. Way more important they are finally looking at what is actually happening in the ocean in the off chance that it may bear on the calculation.

In the meantime we finally hear more of the AMOC which has been barely measured over the past years. Yet its physical variation could easily impact hugely just by shifting a few miles in some direction. Whatever changes occur, the Gyre spreads the effect around. Yet we get no sense that more heat is arriving in the Arctic from the Gulf Stream most likely because it is not carefully measured.

This is not confirmed yet, but it is my conjecture that the last three thousand years can be taken as separate from the past and what is now working out are effectively three thousand year old trends. Thus the flushing of the Arctic may be a completely new event should it occur.

Regardless, we now have a viable shipping season in the North West Passage and may have a similar story for the North East Passage.

One-third of Arctic sea-ice retreat could be due to natural variability

Aug 3, 2012

http://environmentalresearchweb.org/cws/article/news/50436

Arctic ice is disappearing fast. The summer sea-ice minimum has hit record lows in recent years and satellite data show a decline in sea-ice extent of 12% per decade since 1979. Most of this melt has been blamed on anthropogenic climate change but a new study indicates that natural variability could account for as much as one-third of the sea-ice retreat.

[ since 60% was lost since 1960 through 2000, the balance of forty percent would disappear in two decades. For sure we remain fully on track. In fact the right conditions could now wipe out the bulk of the remaining ice in one or two seasons. If we accept a 12 % loss rate and go back to 1970, then half of the ice should still be intact which is patently not true. We are close to the twenty percent mark this year of what is presently out there or even substantially under. - arclein – Please note that I am referring to total mass and not the seriously misleading areal measure]

Most of the Arctic Ocean is covered by a floating platform of sea ice, which grows and shrinks with the seasons each year. At its maximum, usually in March, it covers around 15.86 million square kilometres (6.12 million square miles), while its minimum, usually in September, averages 6.71 million square kilometres (2.59 million square miles). However, these maxima and minima (based on a 1979 to 2000 average) have become smaller and smaller in recent years, with the September 2011 minimum, for example, at just 4.33 million square kilometres.

The shrinking of Arctic sea ice could be a boon for shipping and resource extraction, but for Arctic wildlife these sudden changes are proving hard to adapt to. Shrinking sea ice also has global effects, influencing the climate far beyond the Arctic Circle.

Climate models have failed to capture this diminishing sea-ice trend, suggesting that the models are missing significant climate processes. One such component could be an element of natural climate variability that until now has been overlooked.

To investigate this possibility Jonny Day from the University of Reading, UK, and his colleagues at the Japan Agency for Marine Earth-Science and Technology (JAMSTEC), decided to study the role that the Arctic oscillation (AO), Atlantic multi-decadal oscillation (AMO) and the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC) play in decadal sea-ice variability, using simulations of pre-industrial climate.

These three natural cycles play a vital role in moving heat around the northern hemisphere. The AMOC is the Atlantic part of the thermohaline circulation. "It pulls warm water along the surface to the Arctic where it cools and sinks, returning south along the bottom of the ocean," explained Day. The AMO, meanwhile, is a sea-surface temperature pattern in the North Atlantic, most likely driven by the AMOC, which appears to oscillate on a 65 to 80-year time period. The AO describes wind-driven cycles that move pockets of air around in the northern hemisphere. In negative years, warm air extends into the Arctic, while in positive years the Arctic is more isolated.

[ I wish they would stop worrying about the air and remember that the work horse is the warm surface water]

Day and his colleagues ran multi-centennial pre-industrial model simulations, comparing the results with modern-day satellite data and observational records going back to the 1950s. They found that the AO had very little influence on sea-ice extent, but that the AMO and AMOC played a significant role.

"We show that when the AMOC is high there is more heat transport to the Arctic, limiting ice formation and increasing ice melt, depending on the season," Day told environmentalresearchweb. Right now the AMO is in a positive phase, bringing excess warmth to the Arctic, and possibly contributing to as much as 30% of the currently observed decline.

However, as Day points out, that still leaves a large chunk of ice melt which cannot be explained by natural variability, and is most likely due to man-made greenhouse-gas emissions.

The AMOC and AMO are still poorly understood and it is not yet clear what kind of influence they will have on Arctic sea ice over the coming decades. Day and his colleagues will continue to work on this issue. They hope that eventually their work will help provide more accurate predictions of sea-ice extent, ultimately feeding into more reliable climate models and enabling us to better prepare and plan for the future.

Bo's Wife Pleads Guilty

First read what the official line says, then read what the unofficial line is. I am loath to comment at all except the organ game in China has been common knowledge and not likely invented at all. Otherwise, I find the body factory a little over the top and implausible.

Whatever is happening, the upcoming transition of power is extremely important to not just China but also the rest of us. The potential for something going very wrong is there and should not be repeated in another ten years.

However, I think that China is about to enter a consolidation stage after this transition with a vengeance just as I am expecting the USA economy to lift of after the upcoming election. These are scary thoughts but in both cases, the economic cycle has run its course and a reversal is due and also welcome.

Sensational China trial ends in seven hours, verdict later

By John Ruwitch

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/09/us-china-trial-idUSBRE87718320120809

(Reuters) - The woman at the center of China's most politically explosive trial in three decades did not contest charges of murder on Thursday in a hearing that lasted just seven hours and could determine the fate of her husband, former Politburo member Bo Xilai.

A formal verdict will be delivered at a later date, a court official said, recounting details of the closed-door hearing.

Bo's wife, Gu Kailai, chose not to contest the charge of murdering British businessman Neil Heywood whose alleged secretive dealings with the couple fuelled a scandal exposing the intimate nexus between money and power in China's elite.

The dramatic account of Heywood's death by poisoning is also likely to sound the final death knell to Bo's political career, even as sympathizers cast him as the victim of a push to oust him and discredit his left-leaning agenda.

"The accused Bogu (Gu) Kailai and Zhang Xiaojun did not raise objections to the accusations of intentional homicide," the official, Tang Yigan, said after the hearing, referring also to Gu's co-accused, an aide to the family.

State television showed Gu, wearing a dark pant suit and a white shirt, being led into the courtroom and being seated in the dock. She appeared to have put on weight since she was detained earlier this year.

The court official quoted prosecutors as saying Gu and Zhang had killed Heywood with a poisoned drink in far southwestern Chongqing last November, after a business dispute between Gu and Heywood. Bo ruled the vast municipality until he was sacked in March just before the murder scandal burst into the open.

As a result of the dispute with Heywood, Gu had become convinced Heywood was a threat to her son, Bo Guagua, the official said without elaborating.

Courtroom observers quoted by the Washington Post said prosecutors alleged Heywood had threatened in an email to "destroy" Guagua, and demanded money from him after a botched commercial property deal - a threat duly conveyed to Gu.

Bo Guagua told Reuters in an email that he could not "comment on any of the details" of alleged transactions with Heywood.

"I can disclose there is no such thing as either possessing or transferring 130 million pounds," Guagua said, referring to the value of the soured deal that prosecutors said Heywood and Guagua were involved in.

"Gu Kailai believed that Neil Heywood had threatened the personal safety of her son Bo and decided to kill him," the official added, reading from a statement to a packed news conference of dozens of reporters who had been barred entry to the courtroom in the eastern city of Hefei.

The aide, Zhang, had driven Heywood to Chongqing last November from Beijing and prepared a poison which was to be put later into a drink of water. Later that day, Heywood met Gu at a hotel, he became drunk and then asked for water.

"She poured a poison into his mouth," the official said.

GU MAY AVOID DEATH PENALTY

Gu and Zhang face the death penalty if convicted. But many legal experts expect Gu will be convicted but only sentenced to a lengthy jail term, citing her desire to protect her son, who graduated from Harvard this year, as a mitigating factor.

Gu's state-appointed lawyer told the court on Thursday that Heywood himself had some "responsibility in the matter", the court official said, adding that a Heywood family representative had voiced respect for the court during the hearing.

In London, family members declined to comment on the case.

Britain's Foreign Office also declined to comment until the outcome of the case. It said two British diplomats had attended the trial "to observe the proceedings and fulfill consular responsibilities to the Heywood family", a spokesman said.

As the trial took place, police dragged two Bo supporters into an unmarked car after they appeared outside the courthouse, singing patriotic songs that were the trademark of Bo's populist leadership style and condemning the trial as a sham.

"I don't believe it. This case was decided well in advance," Hu Jiye, a middle-aged man wearing a T-shirt and baseball cap, told foreign reporters at the rear of the court building, which was cordoned off by dozens of police standing in heavy rain.

Hu and his friend were then shoved by plainclothes police into a car. His companion, also a middle-aged man, struggled, yelling "Why are you taking me? Why are you taking me?"

State censorship of Internet chatter on the trial was swifter than normal on Thursday, with users of China's popular Twitter-like service Sina Weibo playing cat and mouse with censors to discuss the case, using word play to try and get around the controls.

COVER-UP ALLEGATIONS STALK BO

In sketching out the case against Gu for the first time, the court official also revealed that four Chinese policemen had now been charged with trying to protect her from investigation - a development that could prove dangerous for Bo, who has so far not been charged with any criminal offence.

Police sources in Chongqing have said that the former Politburo member tried to shut down the investigation into his wife after being told she was a suspect.

Bo and Gu have been in detention and have not made any comment since Gu was officially accused of murder in April. Bo's supporters see it as part of an attack on his populist brand of politics in Chongqing, which appealed to many of the party's leftists but was seen as dangerous by his enemies in Beijing.

Gu, herself a career lawyer, was defended by a state-appointed lawyer with meager experience in criminal cases.

The state decided who was to represent Gu, denying her the use of a family lawyer - a move that prompted Gu's 90-year-old mother, Fan Chengxiu, to recently complain to the Justice Ministry, according to a source close to the family.

"The answer (from the ministry) was that the legal process did not have to be fully carried out in this case and that Fan should stop pestering them," the source said.

The trial of Gu, glamorous daughter of the ruling Communist Party aristocracy, is the most sensational since the conviction of the Gang of Four more than 30 years ago for crimes during the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution.

But despite British calls for the case to be handled fairly and to unearth the truth around Heywood's death, her defense was entrusted to two provincial lawyers.

The two lawyers, Jiang Min and Zhou Yuhao, could not be reached for comment but a search of public information showed the more senior attorney, Jiang, is a specialist in financial cases and that neither has any obvious connection to the Bo family.

YOUNGER BO

Bo and Gu's son, who is believed to be still in the United States after graduating from Harvard this summer, told CNN in an e-mail that he had submitted a witness statement to the court.

"I hope that my mother will have the opportunity to review them," added Bo Guagua. "I have faith that facts will speak for themselves."

The trial and sentencing of both Gu and Zhang are widely seen as a prelude to a possible criminal prosecution of Bo, who is being detained for violating party discipline - an accusation that covers corruption, abuse of power and other misdeeds.

Bo, who was a favorite of party leftists by promoting himself as a friend of the poor and an enemy of corruption, was sacked as Chongqing party chief in March after his police chief, Wang Lijun, identified Gu as a suspect in Heywood's death.

On Thursday morning, there was no sign of Gu's elderly mother, nor of any members of Heywood's family in or around the courtroom.

(Additional reporting by Chris Buckley, Benjamin Kang Lim and Ben Blanchard in BEIJING, Alessandra Prentice and Karolin Schaps in LONDON; Writing by Mark Bendeich; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)

The Real Reason Gu Kailai Murdered UK Businessman Neil Heywood

Revealing Her and Bo Xilai's organ harvesting crimes led to Heywood's murder

By Wang Yiru  August 9, 2012

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n2/china-news/british-businessman-neil-heywood-divulged-too-much-276439.html

The murdered British businessman Neil Heywood knew too much—and apparently talked about what he knew. That, according to a source familiar with the matter, was the motive for his being killed.

Heywood’s involvement with former Chinese Communist Party heavyweight Bo Xilai and Bo’s wife Gu Kailai was far more extensive than has previously been reported. It apparently included profiting with them from the atrocity of forced live organ harvesting and from allegedly trading in dead bodies. It also involved his assisting them in plans for a coup.

Heywood was found poisoned to death in the Lucky Holiday Hotel in the central-western megalopolis of Chongqing on Nov. 14, 2011. On April 10, Gu Kailai and her employee Zhang Xiaojun were reportedly in custody as suspects in the murder.

Gu was originally described by state-run media as having murdered Heywood due to disagreements about financial matters. On July 25, in its first comment on the matter since April, the regime mouthpiece Xinhua elaborated on this motive: as a result of the disagreements over business matters, it was said Gu feared Heywood would harm her son, Bo Guagua, and so decided to murder the British businessman.

Heywood was certainly involved in the Bo family’s business dealings—he helped them move the billions Bo and Gu had acquired through various deals inside China to accounts outside China.

But Heywood’s involvement went far beyond moving money offshore.

Trading in Organs

Heywood’s involvement with Bo and Gu goes back to their time in Dalian City in northeastern Liaoning Province. Bo was mayor of Dalian City when the persecution of the spiritual practice Falun Gong began in July 1999, and he advanced his career by becoming an early and fervent supporter of this campaign.

First Dalian City, and then Liaoning Province, became hellish places for Falun Gong practitioners after Bo became governor in 2000. According to reports compiled by the Falun Gong website Minghui, Liaoning Province during Bo’s time as governor had the fourth highest number of deaths of Falun Gong practitioners due to torture and abuse among China’s 33 provinces and province-level cities.

In April 2006, The Epoch Times first reported on the crime of forced, live organ harvesting in China with detailed stories about a hospital in Sujiatun, a suburb of Liaoning’s capital, Shenyang City.

At the time the forced, live organ harvesting was first discovered, there were five different websites in Liaoning Province advertising organs for transplantation, with prices listed—a new heart cost US$180,000, a new cornea US$3,000. The largest such enterprise was in Shenyang City.

The organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners had started soon after the persecution began.

Canadians David Kilgour, former Canadian secretary of state (Asia-Pacific) and crown prosecutor; and David Matas, an international human rights lawyer, investigated the allegations of organ harvesting and published the report “Bloody Harvest” (later to be a book) in July 2006. They claimed that in the years 2000–2005 41,500 transplants took place in China for which the most likely source of the organs was Falun Gong practitioners.

Allegedly Heywood was involved with Bo and Gu in the business of organ harvesting in Liaoning, according to The Epoch Times’ source, and this is what sealed his death warrant. Heywood had begun leaking information about their involvement in this atrocity.

Trading in Bodies

Heywood was also allegedly involved in the trade of dead human bodies.

Beginning in 2000, two factories opened in Dalian that preserved human bodies for exhibition purposes.

In 2003, “The Oriental Outlook Magazine,” an affiliate of state mouthpiece Xinhua, reported that in 2003 China had already become the country exporting the largest number of human corpses, and that one of the companies in Dalian City was the largest human body mummification factory in the world.

Earlier this year, The Epoch Times obtained reliable information from Dalian City that the vast majority of bodies made available to the mummification factories were murdered Falun Gong practitioners.

Chinese law prohibits the trading of human bodies except in certain circumstances, and Bo and Gu were in a position to ensure the companies could receive any paperwork necessary to profit from these bodies.

Colluding with high-ranking officials in the Political and Legislative Affairs Committee (PLAC), such as former Party secretary of the PLAC Luo Gan, Gu and Bo took advantage of loopholes in Chinese law and prevented family members of Falun Gong practitioners who had been tortured to death from claiming the bodies (and the information obtained by The Epoch Times did not indicate that the companies were aware of the origin of the bodies).

Instead, public security bureaus and courts collected the bodies and sold them at a high price to the mummification factories. From there the bodies were shipped to museums around the world for exhibition, generating billions of dollars each year.

Gu Kailai was a mastermind in financial management, international and domestic online advertisement, and the opening up of export channels for organ and human body trafficking.

According to The Epoch Times’ source, Heywood assisted Gu.

Plotting a Coup

The Epoch Times has written exclusive reports regarding how Bo Xilai, domestic security czar Zhou Yongkang, and other members of Jiang Zemin’s faction had set up a second power center in the CCP based on the PLAC, which they intended Bo to assume control of at the 18th Party Congress this October.

When the time was ripe, Bo would displace Xi Jinping, expected to be named Party head of the CCP at the upcoming congress, and assume the rule of China.

However, the plotters didn’t expect the flight of Bo’s former henchman Wang Lijun to the U.S. Consulate in Chengdu on Feb. 6, which exposed and destroyed their entire plan.

According to The Epoch Times’ source, Gu played an important role in this plan. After Gu was arrested, to escape the death penalty she revealed Bo Xilai and Zhou Yongkang’s plans to overthrow Xi Jinping. She also admitted that she was the contact person between Bo Xilai and Zhou Yongkang.

Gu claimed that under orders from Zhou and Bo, she conducted operations overseas to bribe foreign media and use them to release announcements in order to boost the political status of Bo and Zhou, while attacking and slandering Xi Jinping.

She viewed Heywood as a trusted aide, and he helped with activities outside China and knew about Zhou Yongkang and Bo Xilai’s coup plans.

Gu goes on trial for Heywood’s death Aug. 9 in Hefei City, Anhui Province. Analysts do not expect any new information about Heywood’s murder to come out of that event.

chinareports@epochtimes.com

Future Foods

 The truth is that we are still a long way from having to make much in the way of radical changes, but it is sometimes fun to pretend. Just recall that every hectare of tropical soil can support a family using the biochar protocol and even depending on present cropping and animal husbandry regimes. What we have successfully worked to the present are those soils that are particularly forgiving.

In the meantime increasing attention is been applied to insects. This has huge promise not least because of their ability to convert biomass into high quality protein, but the sheer weight of their presence on Earth. They are quite capable of supplying all the high quality protein for a human population of 100 billion which would otherwise be challenging.

Seaweed is barely tapped also as is noted here.

The moment we step outside our traditional paradigms, it becomes surprisingly easy to produce food stocks. Our own efforts have identified a multiproduct agriculture for the boreal forest. I began with low expectations and a generally unpromising environment. Yet it will be no more difficult than any other agricultural development. You just will not be growing mangos.

Future foods: What will we be eating in 20 years' time?

By Denise WintermanBBC News Magazine

29 July 2012 Last updated at 19:09 ET

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18813075

Volatile food prices and a growing population mean we have to rethink what we eat, say food futurologists. So what might we be serving up in 20 years' time?

It's not immediately obvious what links Nasa, the price of meat and brass bands, but all three are playing a part in shaping what we will eat in the future and how we will eat it.

Rising food prices, the growing population and environmental concerns are just a few issues that have organisations - including the United Nations and the government - worrying about how we will feed ourselves in the future.

In the UK, meat prices are anticipated to have a huge impact on our diets. Some in the food industry estimate they could double in the next five to seven years, making meat a luxury item.

"In the West many of us have grown up with cheap, abundant meat," says food futurologist Morgaine Gaye.

"Rising prices mean we are now starting to see the return of meat as a luxury. As a result we are looking for new ways to fill the meat gap."

So what will fill such gaps and our stomachs - and how will we eat it?

Insects

Insects, or mini-livestock as they could become known, will become a staple of our diet, says Gaye.

It's a win-win situation. Insects provide as much nutritional value as ordinary meat and are a great source of protein, according to researchers at Wageningen University in the Netherlands. They also cost less to raise than cattle, consume less water and do not have much of a carbon footprint. Plus, there are an estimated 1,400 species that are edible to man.

Gaye is not talking about bushtucker-style witchetty grubs arriving on a plate near you. Insect burgers and sausages are likely to resemble their meat counterparts.

"Things like crickets and grasshoppers will be ground down and used as an ingredient in things like burgers."

The Dutch government is putting serious money into getting insects into mainstream diets. It recently invested one million euros (£783,000) into research and to prepare legislation governing insect farms.

A large chunk of the world's population already eat insects as a regular part of their diet. Caterpillars and locusts are popular in Africa,wasps are a delicacy in Japan, crickets are eaten in Thailand.

But insects will need an image overhaul if they are to become more palatable to the squeamish Europeans and North Americans, says Gaye, who is a member of the Experimental Food Society.

"They will become popular when we get away from the word insects and use something like mini-livestock."

Sonic-enhanced food

It's well documented how the appearance of food and its smell influence what we eat, but the effect sound has on taste is an expanding area of research. A recent study by scientists at Oxford University found certain tones could make things taste sweeter or more bitter.

"No experience is a single sense experience," says Russell Jones, from sonic branding company Condiment Junkie, who were involved in the study. "So much attention is paid to what food looks like and what it smells like, but sound is just as important."

The Bittersweet Study, conducted by Charles Spence, a professor of experimental psychology at Oxford University, found the taste of food could be adjusted by changing the sonic properties of a background soundtrack.

"We're not entirely sure what happens in brain as yet, but something does happen and that's really exciting," says Jones.

Sound and food have been experimented with by chef Heston Blumenthal. His Fat Duck restaurant has a dish called the Sound of the Sea, which is served with an iPod playing sounds of the seaside. The sounds reportedly make the food taste fresher.

But more widespread uses are developing. One that could have an important impact is the use of music to remove unhealthy ingredients without people noticing the difference in taste.

"We know what frequency makes things taste sweeter," says Jones, also a member of the Experimental Food Society. "Potentially you could reduce the sugar in a food but use music to make it seem just as sweet to the person eating it."

Companies are also increasingly using the link between food and sound in packaging. One crisp company changed the material it used to make packets as the cruncher sound made the crisps taste fresher to consumers. Recommended playlists could also appear on packaging to help enhance the taste of the product.

Jones says the use of sound is even being applied to white goods. Companies are looking into the hum fridges make, as a certain tone could make people think their food is fresher.

Lab-grown meat

Earlier this year, Dutch scientists successfully produced in-vitro meat, also known as cultured meat. They grew strips of muscle tissue using stem cells taken from cows, which were said to resemble calamari in appearance. They hope to create the world's first "test-tube burger" by the end of the year.

The first scientific paper on lab-grown meat was funded by Nasa, says social scientist Dr Neil Stephens, based at Cardiff University's ESRC Cesagen research centre. It investigated in-vitro meat to see if it was a food astronauts could eat in space.

Ten years on and scientists in the field are now promoting it as a more efficient and environmentally friendly way of putting meat on our plates.

A recent study by Oxford University found growing meat in a lab rather than slaughtering animals would significantly reduce greenhouse gases, along with energy and water use. Production also requires a fraction of the land needed to raise cattle. In addition it could be customised to cut the fat content and add nutrients.

Prof Mark Post, who led the Dutch team of scientists at Maastricht University, says he wants to make lab meat "indistinguishable" from the real stuff, but it could potentially look very different. Stephens, who is studying the debate over in-vitro meat, says there are on-going discussions in the field about what it should look like.

He says the idea of such a product is hard for people to take on board because nothing like it currently exists.

"We simply don't have a category for this type of stuff in our world, we don't know what to make of it," he says. "It is radically different in terms of provenance and product."

How is a hamburger made in a laboratory?

There are several steps and the procedure starts when muscle stem cells are taken from animals in a biopsy, says Mark Post, who is leading the project at Maastricht University.

Algae

Algae might be at the bottom of the food chain but it could provide a solution to some the world's most complex problems, including food shortages.

It can feed humans and animals and can be grown in the ocean, a big bonus with land and fresh water in increasingly short supply, say researchers. Many scientists also say the biofuel derived from algae could help reduce the need for fossil fuels.

Some in the sustainable food industry predict algae farming could become the world's biggest cropping industry. It has long been a staple in Asia and countries including Japan have huge farms. Currently there is no large-scale, commercial farm in the UK, says Dr Craig Rose, executive director of the Seaweed Health Foundation.

"Such farms could easily work in the UK and be very successful. The great thing about seaweed is it grows at a phenomenal rate, it's the fastest growing plant on earth. Its use in the UK is going to rise dramatically."

Like insects, it could be worked into our diet without us really knowing. Scientists at Sheffield Hallam University used seaweed granules to replace salt in bread and processed foods. The granules provide a strong flavour but were low in salt, which is blamed for high blood pressure, strokes and early deaths. They believe the granules could be used to replace salt in supermarket ready meals, sausages and even cheese.

"It's multi-functional," says Gaye. "And many of its properties are only just being explored. It such a big resource that we really haven't tapped into yet."

With 10,000 types of seaweed in the world, including 630 in the UK alone, the taste of each can vary a lot, says Rose.

Magnetic Field, Mantle Convection and Tectonics

Something startling here. It appears that the whole crust shifted thirty degrees around 120,000,000 years ago. Thus my conjecture regarding the Pleistocene Nonconformity does have a real precedent in time in space. The shift was also the correct thirty degrees as was the one that occurred 13,000 years ago.

Since I have been arguing for the recent shift been deliberate, I knew that there had to be a precedent to work from in order to attempt such a stunt. I presumed that it had been closer in time but this is much better. It clearly asks the right questions and suggests that it can be done again. We will be reaching those same conclusions over the next few years.

I have also proposed in this blog a plausible alternative explanation for crustal magnetism that conforms nicely to the available evidence. The explanation presented here flies in the face of all the evidence and is mostly hand waving comparable to theories of land bridges from sixty years ago.

Magnetic field, mantle convection and tectonics

by Staff Writers

Munich, Germany (SPX) Aug 02, 2012

It is known that the Earth's magnetic field is produced by convection currents of an electrically conducting iron-nickel alloying the liquid core, about 3,000 kilometers below the earth's surface. The geomagnetic field is highly variable, there are changes in Earth's magnetic field on a multitude of spatial and temporal scales.

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Magnetic_field_mantle_convection_and_tectonics_999.html

On a time scale of tens to hundreds of millions of years, the geomagnetic field may be influenced by currents in the mantle. The frequent polarity reversals of Earth's magneticfield can also be connected with processes in the mantle.

These are the research results presented by a group of geoscientists in the new advance edition of "Nature Geoscience" on Sunday, July 29th. The results show how the rapid processes in the outer core, which flows at rates of up to about one millimeter per second, are coupled with the processes in the mantle, which occur more in the velocity range of centimeters per year.

The international group of scientists led by A. Biggin of the University of Liverpool included members of the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, the IPGP Paris, the universities of Oslo and Utrecht, and other partners.

It is known that the Earth's magnetic field is produced by convection currents of an electrically conducting iron-nickel alloy in the liquid core, about 3,000 kilometers below the earth's surface. The geomagnetic field is highly variable, there are changes in Earth's magnetic field on a multitude of spatial and temporal scales.[i really do not think that this is known. What it is is a somewhat convincing explanation not subject to experimental confirmation. Calling it a liquid core does not make it so - arclein]

Above the liquid outer core is the mantle, the rock in which behaves plastically deformable due to the intense heat and high pressure. At the boundary between Earth's core and mantle at 2900 km depth there is an intense heat exchange, which is on the one hand directed from the Earth's core into the mantle.

On the other hand, processes within Earth's mantle in turn also affect the heat flow. The interesting question is how the much slower flow in the solid mantle influences the heat flow and its spatial distribution at the core-mantle boundary, and how this will affect the Earth's magnetic field which is produced due to the much faster currents in the Earth's core.

Key variable heat transfer

"The key variable is the heat flow. A cooler mantle accelerates the flow of heat from the hot core of the Earth, and in this way alters the also heat-driven convection in the Earth's core", said Bernhard Steinberger of the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences.

"Ocean floor sinking into the mantle due to tectonic processes can lead to cooling in the mantle. They cause at these sites an increased heat flow into the cooler parts, namely until they have been heated to the ambient temperature." That might take several hundred million years, however.

Conversely, the hot core of the Earth leads to the ascent of heated rocks in form of large bubbles, so-called mantle plumes that separate from the core-mantle boundary and make their way up to the surface of the earth. This is how Hawaii came into existence. This increases the local heat flux out of the earth's core and in turn modifies the generator of the geomagnetic field.

Reversals of the magnetic field

In the Earth's history, polarity reversals of the geomagnetic field are nothing extraordinary. The most recent took place only 780 000 years ago, geologically speaking a very short period of time.

The research team was able to determine that in the period of 200 to 80 million years before present, reversals initially happened more often, namely up to ten times in hundred million years. "Surprisingly, these reversals stopped about 120 million years ago and were absent for nearly 40 million years," explains GFZ scientist Sachs.

Scientists presume that the reason for this is a concurrent reorientation of the whole mantle and crust with a shift in the geographic and magnetic poles of about 30 degrees.

Known as "true polar wander", this process is caused by a change in density distribution in the mantle. If it increases the heat flux in equatorial regions, it would presumably lead to more frequent field reversals, if it decreases it, the field reversal might not occur.

White - Brown Fat Conversion Understood

Still early days and a long way from a safe drug protocol, however we are learning how to convert white fat cells into brown fat cells. This is good news that should allow superior fat loss protocols that work safely to limit accumulation through exercise. It has been far too easy for the body to retain fat while also improving in fitness.

At least we understand that conversion is possible and even inducible.

In the meantime, we get to wait.

Study Finds Mechanism That Turns White Fat Into Energy-Burning Brown Fat Raises Hopes for New Obesity and Diabetes Treatments

Released: 7/30/2012 4:50 PM EDT

Source: Columbia University Medical Center

Raises hopes for new obesity and diabetes treatments

http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/592023/?sc=dwhn

Newswise — New York, NY (August 2, 2012) — Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC) researchers have identified a mechanism that can give energy-storing white fat some of the beneficial characteristics of energy-burning brown fat. The findings, based on studies of mice and of human fat tissue, could lead to new strategies for treating obesity and type 2 diabetes. The study was published today in the online edition of the journal Cell.

Humans have two types of fat tissue: white fat, which stores excess energy in the form of triglycerides, and brown fat, which is highly efficient at dissipating stored energy as heat. Newborns have a relative abundance of brown fat, as protection against exposure to cold temperatures.In adults, however, almost all excess energy is stored as white fat.

“Turning white fat into brown fat is an appealing therapeutic approach to staunching the obesity epidemic, but it has been difficult to do so in a safe and effective way,” said study leader Domenico Accili, MD, professor of Medicine and the Russell Berrie Foundation Professor at CUMC.

White fat can be “browned” with a class of drugs called thiazolidazines (TZDs), which increase the body’s sensitivity to insulin. However, TZDs have many adverse effects — including liver toxicity, bone loss, and, ironically, weight gain — which have limited the use of these drugs.

The current study was undertaken to learn more about the function of TZDs, with the ultimate goal of developing better ways to promote the browning of white fat.

Scientists have known that TZDs promote the browning of white fat by activating a cell receptor called peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor–gamma (ppar-gamma), but the exact mechanism was not clear. To learn more, Dr. Accili and his colleagues studied a group of enzymes called sirtuins, which are thought to affect various biological processes, including metabolism.

The researchers had previously shown in mice that when sirtuin activity increases, so does metabolic activity. In the present study, they found that sirtuins boost metabolism by promoting the browning of white fat. “When we sought to identify how sirtuins promote browning, we observed many similarities between the effect of sirtuins and that of TZDs,” said lead author Li Qiang, PhD, associate research scientist in Medicine at CUMC.

Sirtuins work by severing the chemical bonds between acetyl groups and proteins, a process known as deacetylation. “So the next question was whether sirtuins remove acetyl groups from ppar-gamma and, indeed, that was what we found,” said Dr. Qiang.

To confirm that the deacetylation of ppar-gamma is crucial to the browning of fat, the researchers created a mutant version of ppar-gamma, in effect mimicking the actions of sirtuins. The mutation promoted the development of brown fat–like qualities in white fat.

“Our findings have two important implications,” said Dr. Accili. “First, they suggest that TZDs may not be so bad — if you can find a way to tweak their activity. Second, one way to tweak their activity is by using sirtuin agonists — that is, drugs that promote sirtuin activity.”

“The truth is, making sirtuin agonists has proved to be a real bear — more promise than fact,” he continued. “But now, for the first time, we have a biomarker for good sirtuin activity: the deacetylation of ppar-gamma. In other words, any substance that deacetylates ppar-gamma should in turn promote the browning of white fat and have a beneficial metabolic effect.”

Dr. Accili’s paper is titled, “Brown Remodeling of White Adipose Tissue by SirT1-Dependent Deacetylation of Ppar-gamma.” The other contributors are Ning Kon (CUMC), Wenhui Zhao (CUMC), Sangkyu Lee (University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois), Yiying Zhang (CUMC), Michael Rosenbaum (CUMC), Yingming Zhao (University of Chicago), Wei Gu (CUMC), and Stephen R. Farmer (Boston University School of Medicine, Boston, Mass.)

This research was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health (HL087123, DK58282, DK64773, DK063608, and RR024156).

The authors declare no financial or other conflicts of interest.

Columbia University Medical Center provides international leadership in basic, pre-clinical and clinical research, in medical and health sciences education, and in patient care. The medical center trains future leaders and includes the dedicated work of many physicians, scientists, public health professionals, dentists, and nurses at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, the Mailman School of Public Health, the College of Dental Medicine, the School of Nursing, the biomedical departments of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and allied research centers and institutions. Established in 1767, Columbia's College of Physicians and Surgeons was the first institution in the country to grant the M.D. degree and is among the most selective medical schools in the country. Columbia University Medical Center is home to the largest medical research enterprise in New York City and State and one of the largest in the United States.

Upon its official opening in October 1998, the Naomi Berrie Diabetes Center at Columbia University Medical Center established a new standard of care for the 1.6 million people with diabetes in the New York area—combining world-class diabetes research and education programs with unprecedented family-oriented patient care. Named for the mother of the late Russell Berrie, founder of RUSS™ Toys, the center is today recognized as the most comprehensive diabetes research and treatment center in the tri-state region and has been designated a national “Diabetes Center of Excellence” – one of only three in the state of New York. Approximately one hundred faculty and students, affiliated with the Center, conduct basic and clinical research related to the pathogenesis and treatment of all forms of diabetes and its complications. For more information, visit www.nbdiabetes.org.