What are Minerals and Why are They Required for the Body?

Like vitamins, minerals are also essential for the growth, development, of the body. Minerals also have their own functionality and strengths. There are 22 minerals that have been identified to be necessary for specific metabolic functions and their absence would result in health related problems. There are two types of minerals.

1. Macro or major minerals
2. Trace minerals.

Macro minerals are the minerals needed for body in larger amounts whereas the trace minerals are the minerals needed for body in less amounts.

These minerals are known as body minerals or sometimes dietary minerals are required for our body in building the structure of strong bones and teeth, maintaining nerve impulses, heart rhythm, muscle contractility, neural conductivity, acid-base balance hormones and to maintain a normal heartbeat.

Only 5% of the body weight needs minerals and help to regulate cellular metabolism and is significant and life is not possible to sustain without them.

These can be naturally occurring food or added in elemental or mineral form, such as calcium carbonate or sodium chloride. Some come from natural sources such as ground oyster shells. Sometimes minerals are added to the diet separately from food, as vitamin and mineral supplements to get to our body.

Each and every mineral under macro and trace elements varies from each other and is useful in physiological improvement, digestion, absorption. Interaction with other nutrients and metabolism of each mineral varies. Some minerals come from the earth’s crust, and end up in the soil where they’re extracted by plants, which are then eaten by humans and other animals.

Last but not the least excessive intake of a dietary minerals may either lead to illness directly or indirectly because of the competitive nature of mineral levels in the body.

Related Links:
Vitamins

Women Smokers are more Susceptible to Cancer: John Hopkins

There is a drastic increase in the number of people getting addicted to smoking all over the world. Besides male smokers, women also tend to use tobacco based products like smoking cigarettes and are increasing their risk to develop cancers.

A new research from New york studied nearly 3000 men and women aged 40 and older who have smoking history. They have taken their age, sex and number of smoking years in to consideration and studied how they impacted the possibility of developing lung cancer. And the research showed that women have twice the risk of developing lung cancer from smoking when compared to men.

At present, lung cancer is found to be the leading cause of cancer death among men and women in United States. During this study the researchers diagnosed 77 lung cancers in both men and women. They further studied that the possibility of cancer based on the size and texture of nodules found in their lungs and they are not yet clear why women have the increased risk of getting cancers. They also found that older people who smoke more are at greater risk of lung cancers.

Another research from the University of Minnesota and John Hopkins University in Baltimore conducted a study on around 4 million people and found that female smokers have a 25% higher risk of contracting heart diseases and double the risk of suffering from lung cancer compared to the males. The experts believe that females are more susceptible to toxic fumes in tobacco, as they smoke fewer cigarettes than men.

Smoking During Pregnancy Makes the Kids Drug Abusers: Study

According to the reports from a credible source in US, an estimated number of about 820,000 women smoke while they are pregnant. The researchers based on the above number have though of conducting research on the kids of these women, to see if this habit was passed to the kids. Surprisingly, they have found an interesting news which may help prevent smoking in mothers.

The study was published in the Journal Epidemiology, which found a link between the mothers habits and the later effects on their kids. They clearly found that smoking by mothers during pregnancy makes their kids use anti anxiety drug, anti psychotics, anti depressants, stimulants and lead to addictions.

Even though the researchers didn't find a direct relation between cigarette smoking during pregnancy and the changes made in the child's brain and behavior they showed a connection that provides another reason which makes the mothers to avoid tobacco.

Their findings showed that usage of tobacco during pregnancy is directly related to the mild and severe psychiatric morbidity. The researchers looked at the data of about, 175,000 children and tracked their use of medications between the ages of 5 and 20. Finally, they found that among children whose mothers are not exposed to tobacco, 8.3 percent of required psychiatric medication while the percentage jumped to 11.3 percent in case of children whose mothers smoked up to nine cigarettes a day, and it was 13.6 percent for the children whose mothers smoked more than 9 per day.

These types of reports may at least create some kind of awareness in the mothers who want to have a perfect child and who grows up in to a stronger one.

Maintenance of Rose Garden Landscape

Most of us like to add roses to our garden landscape to enhance its beauty. However, special care and maintenance is required to retain the healthy beautiful roses. It is necessary to feed the roses with fertilizers specially formulated for them. Also, it is good to fertilize them in spring when the buds are just beginning to swell. Humid and rainy weather conditions develop black spots on infected roses. A fungal infection causes brown colored patches on stems and branches. It is advised to take the suggestions of experts to avoid this problem.

Do not forget to water the plants or flowers frequently. It is preferred to water them in morning. They should also be watered at roots instead of leaves. Effective mulching is also necessary for proper maintenance of roses. Spread mulch around the base of your rose bushes and vines. The mulch avoids excess of water evaporation in winter. It insulates the roots of roses helping them to protect from the effects of freezing and thawing.

Remember to prune the rose garden to maintain the form and appearance of the rose garden. It is better to prune the roses in early spring before the flowering season begins. Ensure that dead stems and roses are cut and removed to avoid infecting the neighboring roses. Use pruning shears to cut the cane at a 45-degree angle in order to trim back a rose cane. The cane flush can be cut at the base when you need to trim off the entire cane. However, make sure that a stub of cane is not left as it may die back and rot. Thinning unwanted canes from center of the rose bush allows air to circulate through the entire bush. Thereby, settling of mildew and fungus on the bushes can be prevented. Follow these tips for maintaining your rose garden and accentuate the beauty of your garden.

Benefits of Buying a Shower Wrap

In general we never feel like wearing clothes the moment we had bath or shower. We just want to wipe all the water present on the body and be wrapped in some towels and after shower apparels to let them absorb all the moisture from the body. But when we are in a vacation or at somebody's house, wrapping in towels may not look good. For such purposes and to make ourselves comfortable in the after shower clothes we should consider purchasing a shower wrap.

Shower wrap is a perfect accessory which is versatile, makes us look good and gives the ease in wearing at several places like house, hotels, beaches, and while simply relaxing. Following are few more benefits of buying a shower wrap.

When compared to wrapping a towel these shower wraps exhibit great benefits because you don't have to use your hands to make sure that the towel stays secure and in place. They completely absorb the moisture from the body when compared to the towel. We don't have to worry about the little knot that you made while wearing a robe. We don't have the need to tuck them in the ends and hope that it will stay in place.

They come in different styles and patterns and are available with matching accessories like sandals and hair turbans. They make people look great and provides them the ease in wearing and provides them with maximum comfort. Especially women shower wraps are designed in unique styles and patterns, they can be personalized according to the individual tastes by placing special orders. These shower wraps are easily available both in the retail and online stores, however online stores offers you with the flexibility of choosing huge range of products.

Different Options of Front Doors for Striking Look

Front doors of homes are the foremost features which strike your guests. So they need to be elegant, unique and attractive. When you wish to add new front doors as a part of home improvement, then consider the different types and varieties of front doors available and get the right ones.

The front doors for homes can be generally of three types including single acting doors, bi-fold doors and sliding doors. Single acting doors are hinged at one side. They open in one direction. However, there are even double acting doors that open in both the directions, inside as well as outside. These are mostly used for interior doors. The other type of front doors are bi-fold doors. These have two panels and each of the panel can fold to the middle to one side. These are ideal for homes having wide opening for front doors. These days, people are even preferring sliding doors. Pocket doors are the type of sliding doors that slide in a unique way in between the wall. They are mostly installed at the time of construction. It is very difficult to fix them later during remodeling.

Different types of materials are used for front doors. Wooden doors are the more popular and prominent ones giving an elegant touch to your house. They are also available in different styles, designs, colors and combos. Glass doors bring a new stylish look to your home. They are also found in different styles. You even have various choices of types of glasses. These days, doors made of fiberglass have become popular. They look more elegant when combined with wooden frames. Apart from these, you also have steel doors which can be chosen when considering the strength. However, opt the right one that suits the size and style of your home.

Things to Know Before Practicing Yoga

Many people have their own perspective about yoga. As it is ancient and derived from India many people think that it belongs to a certain culture and needs to be followed by particular group of people. But in fact it is not. Yoga is a form of exercise which is useful for the mankind to cope up with many health related problems in a natural and effective manner. Similarly there are few misconceptions in the minds of the people about yoga and it is essential to be clear about such things even before starting the practice of yoga.

Yoga is not a religion: Since yoga involves meditation and some spiritual practices, it doesn't mean that it is a religion. It is simply a form of exercise. Even though few yoga meditations involve chanting of few expressions related to Hinduism, it is optional to decide whether to do it or not.

Yoga is non competitive: There is nothing helpful if we compare our yoga practice with the fellow members of the same class. Every person has his/her own ways of doing different postures. One will be well versed and familiar with certain poses and the other with few other. The main theme of yoga is to make the body flexible. Few people need little time to achieve flexibility, while some others need a little more time. Hence it is completely waste of time to compare your progress with others. Instead it is helpful to compare your present performance with the past one to see your progress and the places of improvement.

Yoga is for all: Many people think that yoga is only for men. And women and children cannot do it. In fact, a women's body is more flexible than the men's body and hence it becomes more easy for the women to practice and get used to yoga much quickly and to enjoy the positive changes in their health. The same applies to the children, they can practice yoga which will help them to strengthen the muscles at such tender ages.

Finally, what is required is a positive feeling towards yoga and belief that it can cure your health problems. With this positive note one can achieve effective results in much shorter time. So, make sure that you are free from all the myths before entering the yoga class.

How Server Monitoring Helps in Decreasing Sites Down Time

Downtime is one of the major issues which many websites are facing now a days. Despite of your efforts to build your site to make it look better, increased downtime for your website makes it unavailable for the clients and hence affects your business revenue. Simple faults somewhere in the host server or network could lead to the suspension of site for hours and thus creates greater losses. So, if you want to save your site from drastic downtime, all you can do is to monitor your servers properly with effective tools.

One of the best solutions to get rid of these downtime issues is server monitoring. If you opt for a reliable server monitoring service, it will act as a savior to monitor the server, network and applications all the time and gives you peace of mind. Any threats encountered by this tool will alert the administrator and makes sure that they are resolved before they cause downtime to the site. Apart from the external issues, these services also detect any internal issues related to the networks, firewalls and so on and make sure that the functioning of the server is not affecting the site.

By using a server monitoring service, one can improve the performance of your server and hence eliminate downtime. Greater uptime and lesser downtime helps in offering best user experience for all your clients, which further increases the revenues of your business. A reliable server monitoring service often provides a good monitoring and checks the health of your server regularly without fail. If it detects any threat or issue with the server it will alert the administrator with email or SMS and tells him about the overall condition of the server.

So, in order to reduce your site's downtime and to increase the server performance one has to opt for a good and reliable server monitoring service.

Importance of Agro-ecology in Farming

Agroecology involves applying ecological principles to production of food, fuel, fiber, and pharmaceuticals and the management of agro-ecosystems. It is, indeed "a science, a movement, or a practice."

It is a scientific discipline that uses ecological theory to study, design, manage and evaluate agricultural systems that are productive but also resource conserving. Agroecological systems consider interactions of all important biophysical, technical and socioeconomic components of farming systems and regards these systems as the primary units of study, where mineral cycles, energy transformations, biological processes and socioeconomic relationships are analyzed as a whole in an interdisciplinary fashion.

Agroecology is solicitous with the maintenance of a productive agriculture that sustains yields and optimizes the use of local resources while minimizing the negative environmental and socioeconomic impacts of modern techniques such as:

• The utilization of ecology to the design and management of sustainable agroecosystems.

• It develops agriculture for the food production by making us of traditional knowledge, alternative agriculture, and local food system experiences.

• It relates ecology, culture, economics, and society to sustain agricultural production, healthy environments, and viable food and farming communities.

Modern agriculture in most of the industrial areas, uses maximizing high-input technologies and yields or generates environmental and health problems that often do not serve the needs of producers and consumers. In developing countries, in addition to promoting environmental degradation, modern agricultural technologies have routed circumstances and socioeconomic needs of large numbers of resource-poor farmers. However, the main goal of application of agro-ecological science in agriculture is to solve the real world problems.

Things Required for a Traditional Garden Wedding

For those who love nature and want to compliment their wedding decoration with a natural touch, garden wedding is the best theme. Garden, itself is a background which acts as best wedding decorative thing and it can also support various decorative items. A garden wedding which is organized and planned properly will definitely become a memorable experience for the couple. Following are few things which are required for a traditional garden wedding arrangement.

Few seating arrangements like the tables, chairs, table linen, etc., are required to serve the food. Apart from them decorative items like strings, lights, Chinese paper lanterns are of much help to enhance the look of the surroundings.

Lighting objects are available in different shapes and sizes. So, depending on your theme and your taste you can choose them. Color of the light also plays a major role. Since, garden means a lot of greenery, it is better to switch to opposite colors which look attractive over the green background.

Tables and chairs covered with good combination of table linen compliments the entire décor. They also work as center pieces if the garden do not have any extra attractions. White is the best color which adds beauty to the entire arrangement and also look prominent among the woods. You can also use shining cloth to cover the chairs, to make them look attractive. To cover the legs of table you can use balloons and strings which help them to look prominent.
If you are planning to have a nice center stage at a medium high, it would be perfect for the evening time. Highlighting the stage with the required decorations to make it look specially made for the couple gives extra energy to the party.