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We love coming home after a long week and having a glass of wine, and now it seems you can get PAID for doing just that.

Northumbria University is doing a research piece about the effects of red wine on the brain because they believe it can actually improve your mental function! Interesting…

Scientists at the uni believe that a compound called resveratrol, which is found in grapes, has an effect on your brain when working.

However, if you want to take part you'll have to travel over to the Newcastle in the UK.

PhD student Timothy Eschle told ITV news: "There are a number of benefits to consuming red grapes.

"A specific extract from the skin of red grapes, resveratrol, has been found to increase blood flow to the brain and in some cases, increase mental performance on cognitive tasks.

"Most studies have been carried out in young adults at the peak of their cognitive abilities, thus the benefits of resveratrol are expected to be more prominent in older adults who may suffer a slight natural decline in certain aspects of mental function such as memory and reaction time," he explained.

"We also want to establish whether resveratrol can affect mental function at altitude, which often impacts on people’s performance."

People who want to take part in the study will be paid £30 (€35) and will also get a glass of swanky red wine.

You can sign up here if you're interested.

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We all know the devastation that comes with dropping a much coveted piece food on the floor, so naturally on occasion we have employed the Five Second Rule.

But unfortunately for those of us who’ve justified the consumption of fallen food with the argument that it “barely touched the floor”, a two-year study has found that no matter how little time food spends on your kitchen tiles it will undoubtedly pick up bacteria.

According to The New York Times, the recently published results of the New Jersey based study which tested four different types of foods – cut watermelon, bread, buttered bread and gummy candy – on four different types of surfaces – stainless steel, ceramic tile, wood and carpet – for periods of one, five, 30 and 300 seconds show that no fallen food escaped contamination.

While the research did show that the longer the food spent on the ground the more bacteria it picked up, the main microbiologist involved said that “bacteria can contaminate instantaneously”.

The surfaces which transferred the most germs were tiles and stainless steel, while the food which absorbed the most bacteria was watermelon because of its moist texture.

So all those seemingly grand bits of toast, pasta, doughnuts and cake that bounced from the floor right into our bellies were well and truly – shudder – contaminated.

GIFs: giphy.com

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Every tea drinker knows the devastation of having to fish a soggy biscuit out of what was once a perfectly good cup of tea.  But thankfully this tragic experience can now be avoided forever more as science has determined which biscuit is best able to withstand the test of tea.      

A group of scientists at The Institute of Physics used a robotic arm to test the dunkability of ten different types of biscuit and officially discovered that there is nothing better for dipping in your cuppa than a plain old McVitie’s Rich Tea.

When compared to classic treats like Fox’s Party Rings, Milk Chocolate Digestives and Bourbon Creams, the humble Rich Tea surpassed all expectations by holding its shape for ten whole minutes.

The Rich Tea also absorbed more tea than any of its competitors by soaking up an impressive 14 grams.

The McVitie’s Digestive came second of the bunch as it managed to stay together for 4 minutes and the Fox’s Party Ring came third despite sticking it out for ten minutes because it only managed to absorb 1 gram of tea.

Maryland Chocolate Chip Cookies fared worst of the bunch as they only took 45 seconds to fall apart once wet.  The scientists concluded that the cookie’s crunchiness is what led to its loss of shape.

According to The Daily Mail, the robotic arm was used to place each biscuit exactly half way into a mug of tea for 15 seconds to ensure no external forces could throw off the results.

Despite it all sounding very official, we're sure there will be plenty of tea-loving people ready to contest these results.

Feat image: Getty

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It seems that everyone and their granny have a theory when it comes to the Bermuda Triangle.

Some think it's an alien abduction site, others think the disappearance of boats and planes can be explained by the gulf stream that goes through the Triangle. There's a million and one theories; but no one has actually come up with a substantial reason yet.

Well, until now that is. Norwegian scientists think that they can put all of the other theories to rest as they've found a huge crater off the coast of Norway. They believe the crater has caused huge build-ups, as well as huge blow-outs of methane gas.

A big release of methane gas would reduce water density, which means (theoretically) that the water would no longer have the buoyancy to keep anything floating.

Methane gas is also highly flammable, so it could destroy anything flying overhead, too.

Now, the methane gas theory has been around a while, but with the discovery of the craters left behind because of it – it's a huge breakthrough.

But do you think this is the solid reason? Or are you going to stick with the aliens? 

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For anyone struggling to off-load their provisional licence – there is now a seriously handy tip that makes you far more likely to pass your test.

Yes, those who take to the roads in the morning are an incredible 50 percent more likely to be successful than those who take afternoon or evening tests.

And the same applies for exams and job interviews too.

Researchers from the Danish National Centre For Social Research attribute this difference to 'cognitive function' – aka your brain’s power to think and do.

To come up with their results, which were published in the academic journal PNAS, they looked at two million tests taken by schoolchildren aged 8-15 across a three year period.

And they found that results dipped 0.9 percent for each subsequent hour the papers were completed.

So students taking an exam at 3pm scored 54 per cent lower than those who took the same exam at 9am.

However, rather than resigning yourself to hibernating after lunch, the study also revealed that there are tips and tricks to better conquer brain fatigue – namely the art of the short nap.

Indeed, a rest of just 20-30 before taking your driving test would improve your chances of success by an average of 1.7 per cent.

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Scientists the world over were celebrating yesterday after NASA finally confirmed some pretty huge news – that the gravitational waves predicted by Albert Einstein a century ago do indeed exist.

As with any signifcant piece of scientific research, the discovery was embargoed from the media until an official release was sent out yesterday afternoon.

But one scientist based at NASA's Flight Centre in Maryland got a little over-excited, and broke the news to the world 16 minutes she was meant to… via a picture of cake.

Yup, the folks at NASA had a specially iced cake commissioned for their celebration day, with the words "Here's to the first direct detection of gravitational waves" written on it.

Unfortunately for NASA, Erin Ryan happens to be followed on Twitter by both the Washington Post and the NPR (National Public Radio). Oops.

Bizarrely, this is not the first time poor Erin has broken an embargo via a picture of cake – which could explain why she has such a host of media followers on Twitter.

Back in 2013, Erin tweeted a snap of an (albeit half-eaten) cake celebrating the discovery of a chemical called propene on one of Saturn's moons.

She admitted to the Washington Post yesterday that her employer advised her "to maybe chill with the tweeting for a week or so" after the original cake-leak in 2013… but we kinda hope she never stops.

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We love rice! After all, it's cheap, it's delicious and it goes with LOADS of different dips, sauces and dishes.

However, in particular with the white variety, sadly a lot of rice isn't really healthy. That's because even a modest serving has around 200 calories in it, and most of those calories come in the form of starch.

In our bodies, starch converts to sugar, and excess sugar converts to… yup, you guessed it, FAT! 

Still, one undergraduate student at the College Of Chemical Sciences in Sri Lanka has now come up with simple way to reduce the number of calories in rice by up to 50 percent – AND the technique actually adds in further health benefits too.

So what does it involve? 

"What we did is cook the rice as you normally do, but when the water is boiling, before adding the raw rice, we added coconut oil – about 3 percent of the weight of the rice you're going to cook," said Sudhair James, who presented his research at the National Meeting & Exposition Of The American Chemical Society earlier this week.

"After it was ready, we let it cool in the refrigerator for about 12 hours. That's it."

So how does it work? Well, not all starches are created equal, with digestible starches generally being worse for you than resistant starches. The latter take longer for your body to process and therefore aren't converted into glucose or glycogen in the same way as their digestible counterparts.

This, in short, means fewer calories. Hurrah!

And it is possible to change the makeup of a starch – which is what the coconut oil does to rice during the cooking process. 

"The oil interacts with the starch in rice and changes its architecture," said Mr James. "Chilling the rice then helps foster the conversion of starches. The result is a healthier serving, even when you heat it back up."

The calorie reduction in the dishes he looked at ranged from 10 percent to 50 percent.

And people should be able to replicate the process at home, although Mr James warns the results might vary depending on the type of rice used. 

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It might be time to quit the gym as there is a new exercise pill being developed. 

According to Trends in Pharmacological Sciences, scientists are one step closer to developing the new wonder pill. 

Researchers at the University of Sydney studied four untrained, healthy males following ten minutes if high intensity exercise and discovered that there are 1,000 molecular changes that take place in the body during a workout. 

"While scientists have long suspected that exercise causes a complicated series of changes to human muscle, this is the first time we have been able to map exactly what happens," said Dr. Nolan Hoffman, co-author of the research paper. 

"This is a major breakthrough, as it allows scientists to use this information to design a drug that mimics the true beneficial changes caused by exercise." 

The new findings prove that unlike most drugs that only target one molecule, these new tablets will target multiple molecules. 

"Our research has provided the roadmap to figure this out," said the head of the study Professor David James. 

But, it seems that those who are still physically able to exercise shouldn't throw in the towel just yet as these pills are more ideal for people who are unable to exercise traditionally like amputees or stroke victims. 

"I want to be clear that really there is no way to replace routine exercise with an exercise pill."

"Exercise requires your heart rate to go up, blood to flow faster, and you cannot do that with an exercise pill… but in particular groups, it's the next best thing."

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With models protruding from our world left, right and centre, it seems nowadays any pretty girl is in with a chance of running the catwalk. 

Timing, personality and, of course, looks all go into consideration when creating a supermodel. 

But a new study has found that the rise of a supermodel is not as random as it seems. 

Researchers from the Indiana University School of Informatics and Computing looked into "the social and professional determinants of success in the fashion industry".

The scientists wanted to figure out – before anything was announced – who the coming season's catwalk star would be. 

They named the study The Kendall Jenner Effect (of course), and it actually is a bit tricky to get your head around. 

Are you ready for the equation?

So, between the months of September and December 2014, the school's research professor, Emilio Ferrara, and his team counted how many Instagram posts various top models did, and assessed how many likes and comments each post got on average. 

Next, using the Fashion Model Directory, they assembled portfolio data – including how many times the model had appeared on the catwalk so far, as well as other statistics like their height and shoe size. 

This information was then fed into multiple algorithms, which lead the team to predict how popular the model would be in the upcoming fashion month. 

Although, as this might sound all well and good, the New York Magazine noted that walking a maximum number of shows is not necessarily a measure of how popular the model is.

In fact, once a model gets to the point of when she only has to walk in a few select shows, for a few select brands, like Cara or Gisele for instance – that is the true measure of supermodel success. 

We'll just have to wait and see who is the next Supermodel Queen. 

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While you might assume that your nose, eyes or mouth is the most important feature on your face, scientists beg to differ. 

In a recent study by the University Of Lethbridge in Canada, researchers found that your EYEBROWS hold the highest face value. 

Beyond their function as a filter against dust, dirt and sweat that might enter your eyes, brows have a strong social significance for "emotional expression as well as facial recognition". 

Given the general fascination about lush brows over the past few years, we can't really say we're surprised. 

If we weren't born with Cara-esque brows, we're compensating with brow fillers, tints, growth-stimulating serums and even hair transplant procedures. 

But now we know we're not going crazy as the obsession with our arches is finally validated with factual evidence. 

Thank you, science!

The researchers of the study showed 25 images of celebrities without brows, followed by 25 images of celebs without eyes. 

The participants were able to correctly identify over half (56 percent) of the stars shown without eyes, yet only 46 percent of the celebrities shown without brows. 

So the conclusion? Eyebrows are more important than eyes if you want to make a good impression. 

Hurrah!

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Put down those oysters because they are not helping your cause, sorry everybody.

A study recently published by the International Society for Sexual Medicine has analysed what are most commonly thought of as popular aphrodisiacs. What they found out has got some people second-guessing everything they thought they knew about matters of libido.

Most of what people believe are actual aphrodisiacs in fact don’t do much except for make you believe you are supposed to be acting sexy.

The Food and Drug Administration in the US has defined an aphrodisiac product as “any product that bears labelling claims that it will arouse or increase sexual desire, or that it will improve sexual performance”.

As of now, there aren’t any products which have been approved to treat female sexual dysfunction, which is why many people have been seeking solutions from natural products.

The issue now is that likely don’t actually work the way people think they do.

Time magazine rounded up some of the things which fall into the urban legend category with their non-existent libido boosting.

Chocolate, honey and oysters have all been busted. Researchers are saying that there has been no trials that can confirm these food items have any effect on sexual function or desire.

However, all hope it not lost, ginger looks like it could be a winner.

The specific Korean red ginseng herb apparently has “been shown to improve sexual arousal in menopausal women”.

Well now, there’s some information for you to consider next time you're planning a night in…

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What a great way to end the week for anyone who is a Celiac Disease sufferer, or any people who are averse to gluten in all of its glory.

Scientists are developing a simple little remedy that will allow the unlucky bunch to eat gluten. Yay! Plates of spaghetti for everyone.

At team of scientists and researchers at the University of Alberta have apparently come up with a solution to the devastating foodie issue.

According to Quartz they have discovered a supplement from chicken egg yolks that stops the absorption of gliadin. For anyone who does not have a food science background that is apparently the part of gluten that Celiac sufferers can’t digest.

“This supplement binds with gluten in the stomach and help to neutralize it, therefore providing defence [sic] to the small intestine, limiting the damage gliadin causes,” said Hoon Sunwoo, who worked on the project.

The team are due to start trials soon and they are hoping to have the supplement available to the public in the next few years.

It is going to make things a little awkward for those people who viewed Celiac disease as more of trend than anything else.

You know the ones, they can’t even smell gluten without launching into an anti-gluten protest and yet, they are right beside you on Sunday when you’re feeling a touch fragile and ordering a large carbonara at two o’clock in the afternoon.

However, the important thing to remember here is that anyone who is both Celiac and an avid pizza lover will now soon be able to indulge in the joyful combination of eating pizza and not dying. This calls for a pizza-pasta party, yes? 

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