Hot food off Plastic plates....

Eating hot food off plastic plates can increase the risk of kidney stones

• Heating melamine crockery may harm health 
• Acidic foods can also encourage cheap or old melamine products to contaminate food

By Anna Hodgekiss
PUBLISHED: 15:57 GMT, 22 January 2013 | UPDATED: 16:27 GMT, 22 January 2013

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Its is a favourite of parents and picnic-goers the world over. But new research suggests that eating hot meals on melamine crockery could actually be harmful to health. 

Taiwanese researchers have found that hot temperatures increase the amount of melamine we are exposed to - and this can increase the risk of kidney stones.

They studied two groups of people who ate piping hot noodle soup. One group ate from melamine bowls, the other from ceramic bowls.

People who eat hot food (such as noodle soup) from melamine bowls may increase their risk of kidney stones

Urine samples were collected before the meal, and every two hours for 12 hours following the meal.

Three weeks later, the volunteers consumed the same kind of soup but the type of bowl they used was reversed. Urine samples were collected again. 

Total melamine levels in urine for 12 hours after eating the soup was 8.35 micrograms when the participants ate out of the melamine bowls versus about 1.3 micrograms when they ate out of ceramic bowls. 

Lead researcher by Chia-Fang Wu, of Kaohsiung Medical University in Taiwan, said: 'Melamine tableware may release large amounts of melamine when used to serve high-temperature foods.'

Previous research has found a link between melamine and kidney stones (pictured) in both children and adults

He noted that both higher temperatures (from hot soups, for example) or more acidic foods can encourage melamine to contaminate food, especially in older or low-quality kitchenware. 

But he added that the amount of melamine released into food and beverages from melamine tableware varies by brand, so the results of this study of one brand may not be generalised to other brands.

However the results suggest it is advisable to serve hot food on ceramic crockery, to be on the safe side. 

They added that it's not yet clear what effect all of this might have on human health. However, prior studies have linked chronic, low-dose melamine exposures to an increased risk for kidney stones in both children and adults, the researchers said. 

The findings back up previous research that found a link between melamine and kidney stones in both children and adults.

Studies of melamine toxicity in animals indicate that ingestion can cause kidney stones, kidney damage and may induce cancer.

And in 2008, melamine-tainted baby formula (causing an especially high dose) was linked to six deaths and 50,000 hospitalizations related to kidney stones and kidney disease in China.

The study was published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2266472/Eating-hot-food-plastic-plates-increase-risk-kidney-stones.html#ixzz2IoYYWwrN
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Choosing a good password

How bad spelling and grammar could be the key to choosing a good password

• Researchers say that good grammar makes passwords far easier to crack
• Warn against using sentences as passwords

By Mark Prigg
PUBLISHED: 18:41 GMT, 17 January 2013 | UPDATED: 07:50 GMT, 18 January 2013

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Birthdays, pet names and your place of birth are already huge no-nos when choosing a secure password.

But researchers said today that the key to finding more secure passwords could be straightforward - just don't use good grammar or spelling.

Ashwini Rao and colleagues at Carnegie Mellon University researched the current generation of password cracking systems.

Researchers say that spelling mistakes and bad grammar can actually be an advantage in passwords, making them harder to crack

They found that many people, on being asked to choose longer passwords, made them just as easy to guess.

'Use of long sentence-like or phrase-like passwords such as 'abiggerbetterpassword' and 'thecommunistfairy' is increasing,' the researchers say in their paper, due to be presented at the Conference on Data and Application Security and Privacy in San Antonio, Texas, next month.

 

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The researchers say that other types of familiar structures like postal addresses, email addresses and URLs may also make for less secure passwords, even if they are long.

They say bad grammar can make a huge difference, as hackers are increasingly searching for passwords using correct grammar and spellings in 'brute force' attacks that simply run through combinations of words in a dictionary.

Incorrect spelling and grammar can fool many of these attacks, the team found.

Misspelling your passwords is actually a big advantage, researchers have found (as long as you can remember it)

'Using an analytical model based on Parts-of-Speech tagging we show that the decrease in search space due to the presence of grammatical structures can be as high as 50%. '
They found that in general, asking users for longer passwords didn't work.

'A significant result of our work is that the strength of long passwords does not increase uniformly with length,' they said.

The team also developed an algorithm to improve the cracking of long passwords.

CHOOSING A SAFE PASSWORD

 Research firm SplashData suggests making passwords more secure with these tips:

• Use passwords of eight characters or more with mixed types of characters.
• For example, 'eat cake at 8!' or 'car_park_city?'
  
• Avoid using the same username/password combination for multiple websites.
• Especially risky is using the same password for entertainment sites that you do for online email, social networking, and financial services.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2264079/How-bad-spelling-key-choosing-good-password.html#ixzz2IcbC3HMW
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Migraines....

Migraines are the second biggest risk factor for women suffering a heart attack or stroke

• Severe migraines with visual disturbances, known as aura, are the second biggest risk factor
• Only high blood pressure was a bigger factor
• Findings come from 15 year study of 27,860 women

By James Rush
PUBLISHED: 06:36 GMT, 16 January 2013 | UPDATED: 10:57 GMT, 16 January 2013

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Women who suffer from severe migraines accompanied by visual disturbances may be at an increased risk of heart attacks and stroke.

Scientists have said only high blood pressure was a bigger indicator of a stroke or heart attack than migraines with aura, as the condition is known when accompanied by vision problems including flashing lights.

The landmark 15-year study followed 27,860 women, of who 1,435 had migraine with aura.

Women who suffer from severe migraines are at an increased risk of suffering a heart attack or stroke, according to the study

While previous studies have suggested migraine with aura is linked to a doubling of the risk of a stroke or heart attack, never before has it been named as the second biggest factor.

Over the years there were 1,030 cases of heart attack, stroke or death from a cardiovascular ailment, according to the report from the American Academy of Neurology.

 

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Study author Dr Tobias Kurth said: 'After high blood pressure, migraine with aura was the second strongest single contributor to risk of heart attacks and strokes.

'It came ahead of diabetes, current smoking, obesity, and family history of early heart disease.'

Only high blood pressure was a bigger indicator of heart attacks or strokes, the study found

Dr Kurth, of the Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston and the French National Institute of Health, is also a fellow of the American Academy of Neurology.

He said the risk for migraine-plagued women with aura was three times greater than for those with migraines that lacked this disturbance.

A second study released by the same academy said women who had migraines with aura and took hormonal contraceptives were more likely to have blood clots.

Both studies will be presented at the academy's annual meeting in March in San Diego, California.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2263178/Migraines-second-biggest-risk-factor-women-suffering-heart-attack-stroke.html#ixzz2IQp9HUXO
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