Roquefort cheese or blue cheese, conspicuous by its mould and blue-green veins, has anti-inflammatory properties which could ward off heart diseases, says a new finding.

The cheese, which is aged in caves of Southern France, could perhaps explain why the French enjoy good health despite a diet high in saturated fat, a situation dubbed the French Paradox.

A process that occurs as the cheese ripens is good for a healthy gut, helps slow arthritis, and can slow the signs of ageing, such as cellulite, according to Cambridge-based biotech company Lycotec.

Researchers led by Ivan Petyaev and Yuriy Bashmakov, found that the properties of the blue cheese worked best in acidic environments, such as the lining of the stomach, the Daily Mail reports.

It suggested regular consumption by the French of Roquefort, Camembert and other moulded fermented cheeses could be one of the reasons the nation has the lowest rate of cardiovascular mortality in the developed world.

The blockage of a tiny blood vessel in the brain can alter behaviour, even bringing on dementia and Alzheimer`s in the long run, says a new finding.

"I am afraid that tiny strokes in our patients contribute -- over the long term -- to illness such as dementia and Alzheimer`s," said Patrick D. Lyden, study co-author and head of neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Los Angeles.

"This data shows us, for the first time, that even a tiny stroke can lead to disability. Better tools will be required to tell whether human patients suffer memory effects from the smallest strokes," added Lyden, the journal Nature Neuroscience reports.

"It was surprising that blocking one small vessel could have a discernable impact on the behaviour of a rat," said Andy Y. Shih, who completed this work as a postdoctoral fellow in physics at the University of California, San Diego.

Working with rats, Shih, now assistant professor at the Medical University of South Carolina and colleagues, used laser light to clot blood at precise points within small blood vessels, according to a statement issued by the University of California, San Diego.

When they looked at the brains up to a week later, they saw tiny holes reminiscent of the widespread damage in the brains of dementia patients, as seen during autopsy.

These micro-lesions are too small to be detected with conventional MRI scans, which have a resolution of about a millimetre. Nearly two dozen of these small vessels enter the brain from a square mm of the brain surface.

"It`s controversial whether that sort of damage has consequences, although the tide of evidence has been growing as human diagnostics improve," said David Kleinfeld, professor of physics and neurobiology, who led the research group.

To see whether such minute damage could change behaviour, the scientists trained thirsty rats to leap from one platform to another in the dark to get water.

The rats readily jump if they can reach the second platform with a paw or their snout, or stretch farther to touch it with their whiskers.

Many rats can be trained to rely on a single whisker if the others are clipped. If they can`t feel the far platform, however, the rats will not budge.

"The whiskers line up in rows and each one is linked to a specific spot in the brain," Shih said. "By training them to use just one whisker, we were able to distill a behaviour down to a very small part of the brain."

FDA-approved drug memantine, prescribed to slow one aspect of memory decline associated with Alzheimer`s disease, was found effective in making the rats more alert and active.

The brains of rats that received the drug found fewer signs of damage, and the rats were also better able to negotiate gaps.

Men find women more attractive near ovulation, when they`re most fertile, a new study has found suggesting that hormonal shifts may cause facial and vocal changes in females.

In the largest study yet to look at whether a woman`s allure changes over the course of her menstrual cycle, scientists noted that ratings of attractiveness were related to hormonal shifts, which bring about various physiological and behavioural changes.

Researchers took photographs of 202 women`s faces and made recordings of their speaking voices at two points in their menstrual cycles.

They also took saliva samples to measure hormone levels during both sampling sessions. More than 500 men rated the attractiveness of the women`s faces and voices from one of the two sessions.

The ratings from the first session were averaged for each woman and then compared with ratings for her second session.

Men rated faces and voices as more attractive when women`s progesterone levels were low and estradiol (estrogen) levels were high.

"The only time in the cycle when estradiol levels are high and progesterone levels are simultaneously low is the late follicular phase, near ovulation when fertility is highest," said the study`s lead author David Puts, an assistant professor of anthropology at Pennsylvania State University.

A group of more than 500 women were also asked to rate women`s attractiveness across their cycles.

They scored the photographs and vocal recordings based on two measures: flirtatiousness and attractiveness to men. Women rated the subjects higher on both measures when the subjects were in their more fertile phase.

"We learned beyond a reasonable doubt that women`s faces and voices change over the menstrual cycle, and that both men and women perceive this as changes in attractiveness," Puts told the website.

"This paper establishes conclusive evidence for how men and women rate other women as a function of their hormonal status," Nathan Pipitone, a psychologist at Adams State University in Colorado who studies human mating and voice attractiveness, agreed.

Pipitone, who was not involved in the research, said the study`s large sample size and measure of hormone levels strengthen its conclusions.
Research has suggested hormones, indeed, alter facial and vocal features.

The larynx, or voice box, has estrogen and progesterone receptors, and puberty, pregnancy, menopause, hormone replacement therapy and hormonal contraceptive use have all been shown to change women`s voices, the study authors said.

The new research was published in the journal Hormones and Behavior.

Red wine drinkers are wealthier, more educated and happier than average people - but lovers of white wine are more practical, according to a new study.

It may be possible to generalise about drinkers based on their favourite tipple, the study found, adding that those who like a glass of red wine are ambitious go-getters while people who prefer white are more relaxed and happy-go-lucky.

Rose drinkers are the unquestioned kings and queens of social networking, visiting sites such as Facebook multiple times every day on average, the `Daily Mail` reported.

Those who drink red wine are more likely to have a degree, be married and drink more frequently than those who have a preference for white or rose.

White wine drinkers are home-lovers and are content with their position on the career ladder, the study said.

"They say you can tell a lot about someone from their favourite tipple, and it seems that it is definitely the case when it comes to wine. From the study it looks as though those with certain personality traits are drawn to certain styles of wine," a spokesman for French Wines with Style, which commissioned the report, said.

More than half of red wine drinkers are university graduates, and they typically earn between 40-45,000 pounds per year, the study found.

While 81 per cent are currently happy at work, 65 per cent are still highly ambitious and want to scale higher up the career ladder.

In comparison, a white wine drinker pockets around 25-30,000 pounds per year, with just 43 per cent having attended university.

Most are not very interested in the corporate ladder, with more than two fifths admitting they are not that ambitious.

Fifty-five per cent of rose fans leave school by the age of 18, and they go on to earn around 30,000 pounds on average.

As well as being the wealthiest segment of society, red wine drinkers are the most likely to be happily married, as 86 per cent say they are content with the state of their relationships.

While white wine buyers are less likely to be hitched, 85 per cent of those who are single claim they are happy with their solo status.

A quarter of those who enjoy a glass of red take around three overseas holidays a year, with a third also taking three or more mini breaks in the UK on top of that.

White wine drinkers are more likely to holiday in the UK rather than travelling to far flung corners of the world.

When asked to describe themselves, red wine drinkers are most likely to use words such as confident, relaxed, strong and intelligent, the study found.
White wine drinkers tend to say they are practical, bright, shy, quiet and reserved and rose drinkers like to describe themselves as loud, warm and charming.

The Supreme Court on Thursday reserved its order on a plea for setting up a committee to evaluate the alleged harmful effects of soft drinks on human health and to properly label the beverages, detailing their ingredients.

A bench of justices K S Radhakrishnan and Dipak Misra reserved its order after a detailed hearing on the Public Interest Litigation petition, filed in 2004.

The plea alleged the ingredients of carbonated drinks have "serious deleterious effects on human health" and no action has been taken to test and assess the risk posed by such beverages.

Soft drink major Pepsi, however, opposed the PIL with its counsel senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi arguing that the Food Safety and Standards Act aimed at regulating the standards of beverages was "sufficient" and all the regulations were in place.

The Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL), in its petition filed in 2004, had also sought directions to the cola firms to disclose the contents/ ingredients on the label of their bottles and to regulate "misleading" advertisements targeting children.

Earlier on November 23 the apex court had asked the the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) to file "records" relating to proceedings of its panels, formed following a judicial order on the PIL filed by the NGO.

The court's direction came after Prashant Bhushan, appearing for NGO CPIL, alleged that instead of an expert panel, another FSSAI panel on labelling and claims/ advertisement should consider the grievance of additives in carbonated drinks.

The apex court, on February 8, 2011, had asked FSSAI to reconstitute independent scientific panels to look into the harmful effects of chemicals in carbonated beverages.

FSSAI on September 12 had passed an order, after examining various ingredients of carbonated beverages such as artificial sweetener, phosphoric, malic and citric acid, carbon dioxide, colouring agents, benzoic acid and caffeine.

FSSAI's panel said these ingredients, under prescribed limits, would pose no health hazards.

Scientific Panel On Labelling and Claims/Advertisement of FSSAI, in its order, said, "The expert group reviewed the scientific studies and Food Safety Standards(FSS) Regulations, 2011 and confirmed the following:

"All ingredients mentioned above are within the levels as prescribed in the FSS Regulations, 2011 as per the 'Analytical Data on Carbonated Beverages', produced by Food Research and Standardisation Laboratory, Ghaziabad.

"Based on updated scientific reviews, if these ingredients are consumed within the prescribed levels, no health hazard would be caused in humans."

Earlier, counsel appearing for FSSAI, had said the PIL be disposed of as all reliefs claimed by CPIL "stand satisfied."

He had said that the Food Safety and Standards Act which came into effect in 2006 took care of all the issues raised in the petition.

Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) also said that its study concluded that no health hazard would be caused if the ingredients are within prescribed limits.