advertisement

Aspinal of London (US)

dvds on wine

health & science news Print

luminous leverage

Lighting Can Influence How Wine Tastes

Light shining through red wineScienceDaily (10 Dec 2009) - The background lighting provided in a room has an influence on how we taste wine. This is the result of a survey conducted by researchers at the Institute of Psychology at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, drugs Germany. Several sub-surveys were conducted in which about 500 participants were asked how they liked a particular wine and how much they would pay for it.

Read more...
bacterial biotech

Winemaking Enhanced by DNA Technology

DNAScienceDaily (19 Nov 2009) — In winemaking, pilule grape juice is turned to wine during the fermentation process by the action of a number of essential beneficial microorganisms —namely bacteria.  Sometimes, though, harmful bacteria also populate the fermentation vat, spoiling the wine in the process.

As part of her doctoral research, researcher Lucia Blasco of MTT developed new methods based on DNA identification for rapidly and accurately identifying detrimental lactic acid bacteria and acetic acid bacteria during the earliest stages of the wine fermentation process.

Read more...
reclaiming remnants

Invention Can Turn Red Wine By-products
Into Yoghurt, Chocolates, Creams and More

grape skinsScienceDaily (18 September 2009) — Two years ago, a group of friends were enjoying a glass of wine in the Mosel region in south-west Germany when their conversation turned to the health benefits which studies attribute to the drink. During the fermentation process of making wine, by-products are left over which are often just discarded as waste and the friends reasoned that since these by-products contain the goodness of wine in an even more concentrated form, and without the alcohol, shouldn't it be more often used and consumed by humans?

Read more...
imperfect pairing

Scientific Basis Found
For the 'Golden Rule' of Pairing Food & Wine

redwine_fish_smallScienceDaily (21 October 2009) — Scientists in Japan are reporting the first scientific explanation for one of the most widely known rules of thumb for pairing wine with food: "Red wine with red meat, white wine with fish." The scientists are reporting that the unpleasant, fishy aftertaste noticeable when consuming red wine with fish results from naturally occurring iron in red wine. The study is in ACS' Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.

Read more...
virus vanquisher

Italian Study Finds Red-Wine Compound
Prevents Viruses from Replicating Inside Cells

virusWine Spectator (30 September 2009) — Resveratrol, drug the polyphenolic compound found in red wine and the prominent focus of medical researchers, hospital may be able to fight off viruses, buy cialis according to a new Italian study. While the chemical has shown hints of anti-viral properties in previous studies, the new work shows that it appears to prevent virus replication at the cellular level. More research is needed to see how widespread the effect is.

Read more...
flavor in the fizz

Champagne's Flavor is Actually in its Bubbles

champagne_spritz_smallBBCNews (28 September 2009) — It is champagne's bubbles which give the drink flavour and fizz, and glasses that promote bubbles will improve the drinking experience, scientists say.  Research shows there are up to 30 times more flavour-enhancing chemicals in the bubbles than in the rest of the drink.  Wine experts say the finding changes completely our understanding of the role of bubbles in sparkling drinks.

Read more...
grape expectations

Expectations Influence Sense of Taste and Evaluation of Wine

white_red_smallScienceDaily (14 September 2009) — Wine tastes different to those who are given information on the product before a wine tasting, tests where the test people received information on the wine before and after the tasting have shown.  Many a wine grower trembles at the prospect of a visit from Robert Parker, one of the most famous wine critics in the world. His "Parker Points" have a similar impact to the Roman Emperor's thumb, deciding the success of a winery instead of life and death. The extent to which product information like Parker's ratings influence the consumer is revealed in a study by Michael Siegrist, Professor of Consumer Behavior at the Institute for Environmental Decisions, and his post-doc Marie-Eve Cousin from ETH Zurich, which was published in the journal Appetite.

Read more...
taste & temperament

Sweet or dry?
Wine Choice Reveals Your Personality

womanwine_smallReuters (31 August 2009) —  A taste for Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay or a liking for Bordeaux or Zinfandel can indicate more than just a preference in wines. It could also reveal personality traits.  New research by scientists in Australia and Britain showed that drinkers who preferred a sweet taste in wine were more likely to be impulsive while those who chose dry varieties had greater openness.

Read more...
elixir with exercise

Regular Drinkers Get More Exercise, ask
Therefore Healthier

pushups_smallReuters (31 August 2009) — People who drink regularly seem to exercise more often than teetotalers, store and those who average more than a drink or two a day may be the most active, tadalafil a new study suggests.  Using data from a government health survey of U.S. adults, researchers found that in general, the amount of time people devoted to exercise tended to inch up along with the number of alcoholic drinks they had each month.

Read more...
brain gain

Value of Alzheimer's-fighting Properties of Wine
Boosted by Frequent Exposure to Polyphenols

green_brain_small

ScienceDaily (17 August 2009) — The polyphenols found in red wine are thought to help prevent Alzheimer's disease, and new research from Purdue University and Mount Sinai School of Medicine has shown that some of those compounds in fact reach the brain.  Mario Ferruzzi, a Purdue associate professor of food science; Connie Weaver, Purdue's head of foods and nutrition; and Elsa Janle, a Purdue associate professor of foods and nutrition, found that the amount of polyphenols from grapeseed extract that can reach a rat's brain is as much as 200 percent higher on the 10th consecutive day of feeding as compared to the first. Many previous experiments, in which absorption was measured after single or sporadic doses, often found very little, if any, of the bioactive polyphenols reaching brain tissues. However, more chronic exposure appears to improve absorption.

Read more...
radiation relief

Patients Undergoing Radiation Treatment for Breast Cancer
See Benefits from Moderate Wine Drinking

radiation_smallReuters (27 July 2009) — A clinical study by an oncology center in South Italy has discovered that women who drink wine moderately while undergoing radiation treatment for breast cancer benefit from it and have fewer side effects than women who don't drink.

The study said polyphenols found in wine may help protect healthy tissues from the effects of radiation while combating cancerous cells.

Read more...
imbibing for benefit

Red Wine Compound Resveratrol Demonstrates Significant Health Benefits

redwine_glitter_smallScienceDaily (12 June 2009) — The benefits of alcohol are all about moderation. Low to moderate drinking — especially of red wine — appears to reduce all causes of mortality, buy cialis while too much drinking causes multiple organ damage.  "Reports on the benefits of red wine are almost two centuries old, tadalafil " said Lindsay Brown, associate professor in the School of Biomedical Sciences at The University of Queensland and corresponding author for the study. "The media developed the more recent story of the French paradox in the early 1990s. However, studies on the actions of resveratrol, one of the active non-alcoholic ingredients, were uncommon until research around 1997 showed prevention of cancers. This led to a dramatic interest in this compound."

Read more...
spoonful of sugar

Herbal Wines Healed Ancient Egyptians

Egyptian AmphoraDiscovery News (14 April 2009) —  A spoonful of sugar may help the medicine to go down, but wine worked even better for the ancient Egyptians, who used to doctor their alcoholic beverages with medicinal herbs and other ingredients, according to a new study.  The oldest of the recently analyzed herbal wines dates to 3150 B.C. Since early medical papyri document the purported health benefits of some of the wine's ingredients, the discovery provides the first direct chemical evidence for wine with organic medical additives.

Read more...
libation for the liver

Two Glasses Of Wine A Day Helps To Reduce Quantity Of Fat In Liver

bottle2glasses_smallScienceDaily (13 May 2009) — PhD research at the University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU have studied the effect of reservatrol — a molecule of plant origin present in wine and several fruits — in rats with non-alcoholic hepatic esteatosis, there an accumulation of fat in the liver when alcohol is not involved.  The author of the thesis is Ms Elizabeth Hijona Muruamendiaraz, store a graduate in Biochemistry specialising in Dietetics and Nutrition, and has entitled her PhD, Effect of resveratrol on simple, non-alcoholic hepatic esteatosis in a murine model.*

Read more...
vinous vessels

Use Of Wooden Casks Or Steel Tanks For Chardonnay
Influences Its Fermentative Aroma

chardonnay_bottle_smallScienceDaily (30 April 2009) — After analysing different points of the process of the transformation of grape juice to wine, find [Basque researcher] Ana Gonzalez Marco concluded that the type of container (wooden cask or steel tank) employed notably influences the fermentative aroma of Chardonnay wine, health and that oak cask-fermented wines have, unhealthy in general, a greater concentration of superior alcohols and esters of medium-sized chains of fatty acids.

Her thesis had two fundamental objectives: to study the formation of volatile compounds of Chardonnay wines, fermented using a number of different methods, and to determine the amine content of the wine and its evolution during the conservation of the product.

Read more...
liquid longevity

Half A Glass Of Wine A Day May Boost Life Expectancy By Five Years

red_wine_glasses_small ScienceDaily (30 April 2009) — Drinking up to half a glass of wine a day may boost life expectancy by five years-at least in men, pharmacy suggests research published ahead of print in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.  The Dutch authors base their findings on a total of 1,373 randomly selected men whose cardiovascular health and life expectancy at age 50 were repeatedly monitored between 1960 and 2000.

Read more...
white on white

White Wine Can Make Tooth Stains Darker

white teethScienceDaily (3 April 2009) — It has long been known that red wine causes teeth to stain.  But white wine?  A recent study by NYU dental researchers found that drinking white wine can also increase the potential for teeth to take on dark stains.  The researchers compared two sets of six cow teeth, buy whose surface closely resembles that of human teeth, stomach and used a spectrophotometer, an instrument that measures color intensities, to evaluate staining levels.

Read more...
glass act

Process For Making 'Unbreakable' Glass Developed

unbreakable glassesScienceDaily (4 April 2009) — Wine glasses that don't shatter?  Baby bottles that don't break? Coffee mugs that last generations?  All are possible with a new process for strengthening glass and ceramics developed by an Alfred University researcher.  Alfred University has signed a royalty agreement with Santanoni Glass and Ceramics, Inc., of Alfred Station, NY, for proprietary technology related to the strengthening of glass.

Read more...
bygones of burgundy

Burgundy Wine Has Long History In France:
Remains Of Gallo-Roman Vineyard Discovered In Gevrey-Chambertin

burgundy_aerial_small ScienceDaily (10 March 2009) — Gevrey-Chambertin, buy 12 km from Dijon, is famous throughout the world for its Burgundy wines.  It is now possible to conclude that winegrowing in this region goes back to the Gallo-Roman era, as testified by the findings of excavations by the Institut National de Recherches Archéologiques Préventives (INRAP), at the spot known as "Au dessus de Bergis".

Read more...
alimentary alleviation

Grape Extracts May Be Effective Against Harmful Gut Bacteria

grapes_in_hand_small

ScienceDaily (4 Mar 2009) — In a new study researchers from Clemson University found various grape extracts and their compounds to be effective at inhibiting Helicobacter pylori, see one of the leading causes of gastritis in humans.

H. pylori is the bacterial agent most commonly associated with peptic ulcers, search gastritis, mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue lymphoma, and gastric cancer. Antibiotic therapy has proven effective at providing initial relief, however resistance can develop over time and relapse can occur. Previous studies have examined other natural plant extracts with anti-H. pylori activity such as garlic, broccoli, cranberries and green tea, however, grapes have yet to be evaluated despite being well known for their high levels of antioxidants and polyphenols.

Read more...
sunscreened skins

Protecting Wine Grapes From Heat And Drought With Particle Film

shielded_grapes

ScienceDaily (17 Feb 2009) — Deficit irrigation is an agricultural technique used to achieve a variety of results depending on the crop. For white wine grapes, it balances the crop load by limiting the canopy size so there aren't too many leaves shading the grapes. For red wine grapes, deficit irrigation again limits canopy size, but also affects berry components associated with wine quality.

A drawback of this canopy-limiting process is that fruit can become sunburned, especially under sunny, arid conditions, which can adversely affect productivity and fruit maturity. A particle film, which increases light reflection and reduces leaf temperature, has been tested on several crops. It acts as a sunscreen by reflecting the harmful ultraviolet rays off of the leaves and fruit, but still allows the right radiation for photosynthesis through to nourish the plant.

Read more...
vinous virility

Alcohol stops men being a flop in bed

champagne_spew_small

NewScientist (26 Jan 2009) — Men might want to remember a new rhyme: a drink a day keeps erectile dysfunction away.

Despite traditional views about the effects of booze on male performance, for sale new research suggests that moderate drinking actually protects against impotence in the long term — perhaps for the same reason a glass or two of wine a day cuts the odds of suffering from heart disease.

Read more...
salubrious steak

Wine marinade cuts steak cancer risk

steak

NewScientist (30 Dec 2008) — If you are frying a steak and mindful of your health, case then marinate it in either beer or red wine. So say food scientists who measured amounts of a family of carcinogens found in fried steaks after steeping them in booze.

Cooking food increases levels of cancer-causing compounds called heterocyclic amines (HAs). Fried and grilled meat are particularly high in these compounds, ailment because fiery temperatures convert the sugars and amino acids in muscle tissue into HAs. Various substances can reduce HA content: an olive oil, lemon juice and garlic marinade cut HAs in grilled chicken by 90 per cent, while red wine reduced HAs in fried chicken.

Read more...
bed in a barrel

Recycled Hotel Rooms from Wine Barrels for the Oenophile

wine-barrel-hotel1

Today's special is for the wine lovers among us: it is a hotel in Stavoren, a very old port in northern Holland. The rooms where you sleep are in 15,000 litre wine barrels. There are four of them, each created from Swiss drums that used to contain Beaujolais wine from the French chateau area.

Read more...
short-circuit shortcut

Make Cheap Wine Taste Like a Fine Vintage?

electricity

NewScientist (17 Dec 2008) —  Most people have got one lying around somewhere: a bottle of cheap, discount nasty wine left over from a dinner party just waiting to be offloaded on someone else - or quaffed late one night when the good stuff has run out.  But what if you could turn that bargain-basement plonk into fine wine in minutes?  In these straitened times it could be just the thing a wine lover needs.

Read more...

 

advertisement

dvds on wine