Tea Tree Oil Kills Cavity Causing Bacteria!

Tonight I saw some tea tree oil antiseptic mouthwash in a store. Does Melaleuca alternifolia oil actually kill the bacteria that cause cavities? Yes, and quickly with lasting results! Here’s a study:

… 0.5% tea tree oil resulted in a greater than 3 log decrease in viable cells after only 30 seconds treatment. Also, after 5 and 10 minutes, viable cells could not be recovered from these treatments. Less killing was evident when S. mutans cells were treated with 0.12 and 0.25% tea tree oil. Time kill studies conducted with an isolate of Lactobacillus rhamnosus, a species also associated with dental caries, showed that L. rhamnosus was killed rapidly at both 0.5 and 1% tea tree oil, but less rapidly at 0.25%. Studies with these two species showed that tea tree oil exerts a relatively rapid killing effect. This in turn suggests that if tea tree oil was used in a mouthwash formulation it may be effective in reducing the numbers of S. mutans, L. rhamnosus or other bacteria within the mouth.” - rirdc | Confirmed : Oral Microbiol Immunol 2003: 18: 389?392

Another interesting comparison. I was once perscribed Chlorhexidine, but when I read the warnings, I opted out. This looks promising. I wonder if there are any bad effects from 1% tea tree oil?

RESULTS: Chlorhexidine and garlic groups showed antimicrobial activity against mutans streptococci, but not against other oral microorganisms. The tea tree oil group showed antimicrobial activity against mutans streptococci and other oral microorganisms. Maintenance of reduced levels of microorganisms was observed only for garlic and tea tree oil during the two consecutive weeks (fourth and fifth). Unpleasant taste (chlorhexidine 40%, tea tree oil 30%, garlic 100%), burning sensation (chlorhexidine 40%, tea tree oil 60%, garlic 100%), bad breath (chlorhexidine 40%, tea tree oil 20%, garlic 90%), and nausea (chlorhexidine 0%, tea tree oil 10%, garlic 30%) were reported. CONCLUSION: Garlic and tea tree oil might be an alternative to chlorhexidine. - Int Dent J. 2002 Dec;52(6):433-7

An Austrailian University research group says “The component terpinen-4-ol is the most abundant (minimum 30%) and is said to be responsible for most of the antimicrobial activity.” Dangers: One kid drank some tea tree oil and went into shock. Was it contaminated with pesticides or did he just have an allergic reaction? Buy .5% to 2% organic tea tree oil mouthwash if you can find it, just don’t swallow it.

‘God spot’ researchers see the light in MRI study

Brain scans of nuns have revealed intricate neural circuits that flicker into life when they feel the presence of God.The images suggest that feelings of profound joy and union with a higher being that accompany religious experiences are the culmination of ramped-up electrical activity in parts of the brain.

The scans were taken as nuns relived intense religious experiences. They showed a surge in neural activity in regions of the brain that govern feelings of peace, happiness and self-awareness. Psychologists at the University of Montreal say the research, which appears in the journal Neuroscience Letters, was not intended to confirm or deny the existence of God, but set out to examine how the brain behaves during profound religious experiences. - more

If I hooked a button to some electrodes in your brain and every time I pushed it you saw God and felt a profound experience … a godly presence, would you then believe or not believe? Why or why not?

Rats’ noses identify related humans

A rat’s nose knows more about your family than you might think. It seems that rats can identify genetically related humans by similarities in their body odour.

Erin Ables and colleagues at the University of Chicago familiarised rats with a human volunteer’s odour, then tested the length of their response to novel odours. The rats investigated odours from people who were genetically related to the volunteer for a shorter time than those who were unrelated. This supports the idea that closely related humans share similar odours, and that the odours have a genetic basis.

Previous work suggests that humans can also distinguish between the odours of their relatives and non-relatives. Ables speculates that this ability may help us avoid behaviours such as inbreeding. She presented her work at the Animal Behavior Society meeting last week in Snowbird, Utah. - newsci

Nepali 14 yr old boy may be world’s smallest person

A 14-year-old Nepali boy who is only 50 centimetres (20 inches) tall has been put forward for a Guinness world record as the world’s smallest person, his family and supporters said.“We found out that a Jordanian boy holds a record in the Guinness Book of World Records and he is 25.5 inches tall. But Khagendra is 5.5 inches smaller than the Jordanian guy, so we sent an application to the Guinness Book of World Records,” said Min Bahadur Rana, president of Khagendra Thapa Magar Foundation, an organization set up to collect funds for the boy. Fourteen-year-old Khagendra Thapa Magar weighs only 4.5 kilograms and will be taken on tour round Nepal to raise money for his upkeep, his father told AFP.

“We show him in exhibitions to collect fund for his education, health and future,” said Rup Bahadur Thapa, his father.

According to the website set up by his supporters, www.khagendratma.org, Thapa weighed only 600 grams at birth and his hobbies include “playing with pebbles” and “worshipping Buddha.” - yahoo

“They Hate our Way of Life”?

People I know think “the terrorists” are not human. Dehumanization is a form of propaganda (a lie for political purposes) which can lead to genocide. Indeed, I’ve heard the genocidal comment that we should “just nuke the whole place”.

Hate is passed on purposefully and accidentally in many ways. For example, Rush Limbaugh the admitted drug addict is popular because he twists complicated reality into simple undertandable (but wrong) sound bites. Reality, however, is complicated. Iraq is a mess now because people with simple impaired judgement thought war was the answer. They acted on a fantasy “they will welcome us!” and that mistake is costing thousands, tens of thousands of human lives.
Yes, a small minority of Muslims DO have a bizzare bloodletting ceremony, yet all human beings, no matter what religion, get mad if you blow up their children.

Some vague thing like “hating our freedoms” isn’t causing the rage. The seeds of hate are specific. Example: The US recently provided cluster bombs to Israel which then used our US made bombs to kill innocent civilians. Over 100,000 unexploded US bombs will keep on killing for years.

The Bush administration, by providing weapons of mass destruction to the Middle East conflict, has endangered US national security by causing a new wave of tremendous hatred towards us. This makes some foreign peoples (who are also blinded by their own propaganda) wish to strike back at innocent people here in the USA. They WILL teach their children remaining to hate the US because US weapons killed one or more of their other relatives (41,000 to 45,000 Iraqi civilians currently). Gee, if some country started a war that resulted in 40,000 dead Americans do you think we’d love them?

“Israel asked Bush around August 10th for a speedy delivery of M-26 artillery rockets (dumb bombs). It seems the order went though and they started firing them in large numbers at Lebanon a few days later (the week of Aug 14-18th).”

So, do they hate our way of life? Our music? Our nice clothes? Or do they rather much more hate the way we kill them?

Bush tells reporters Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11

Well, here it is. Bush admits in front of a camera that Iraq had nothing to do with the attacks of 9/11.

[youtube]JsPSI-tcoaI[/youtube]

The great smirker admits that he pulled a fast one over on all those American soldiers. Pretty funny. He, Cheney and Powell and the gang tricked the country into going to war by making up some stuff about Weapons of Mass Distruction and by insisting they had secret evidence of Saddam’s ties to al Quaeda.

“in 125 separate appearances, they [Bush, Cheney, Powell, Rumsfeld and Rice] made … 61 misleading statements about Iraq’s relationship with al-Qaeda.” [pdf: ref]

So many people have died. Ha ha ha. Good one Bush. Of course, as we’ve been saying all along, Bush (and others whose names you’d recognize) planned on invading Iraq years before 9/11. Impeach.

CIA Leak Case, The Armitage Ploy

Brent Budowsky: The ’sheep’ story is that Armitage acted as the ‘lone gossip-slinger’ who set in motion a long chain of dominos that has resulted, so far, in Libby being indicted. The real story is actually one of vicious political revenge for ‘disloyalty,’ that involved orchestrated attacks on multiple fronts against the Wilsons and the CIA, apparently ordered by Cheney (covering for Bush?) and for which Libby LIED to protect Cheney. Don’t fall for the Armitage cover story, Fitzgerald hasn’t shut his operation down despite having known about Armitage from the very beginning. The Wiki Plame Affair Timeline does a good job of showing Cheney to be the nexus from which all the intentional ‘outing’ emanates:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair_timeline

Simpsons Theme by Some Classical Guitar Dudes

I dig that one fast little riff near the beginning. Gotta learn that.