Caffeine

Hopefully, you’re not just throwing your used coffee grounds in the garbage ... are you? Not only are they compostable, but they can also be used in robot hands, biofuel engines for cars, warm sports clothing, and as printer ink. Now, it turns out that they have yet another use – a scientist from The City College of New York has discovered that they’re good at soaking up stinky sewer gas.  Read More

Science fiction movies would have us believe that, in the future, pills (or possibly green wafers) will meet all our nutritional needs, but Harvard professor David Edwards sees things a little differently. Having already introduced the Le Whif chocolate inhaler, Edwards has now turned his attention to the world's most widely consumed psychoactive drug - caffeine. The AeroShot Pure Energy delivers a fine powder containing vitamin B and 100 mg of caffeine that dissolves instantly in the mouth. That's around the same amount of caffeine found in one large cup of coffee ... without the calories or coffee breath.  Read More

You don’t need an IQ much larger than your shoe size to realize that humanity is forever questing for an alternative reality. Apart from the behemoth industries peddling legalized drugs (alcohol, tobacco and caffeine), the extraordinary profitability of heroin, cocaine, marijuana, methamphetamine and the rapidly growing number of synthetics now constitute the single largest income stream of criminal and terrorist organizations worldwide. Human drug usage began at the dawn of civilization and we may have sought out the first mind-altering substances by watching the behavior of animals which indulged.  Read More

Nobody likes the jittery feelings that come with too much caffeine, or the insomnia that follows. While it takes a lot of caffeine to affect most people that way, those of us who are caffeine-sensitive can get the same feelings from even one cup of coffee. Other people have medical conditions that make caffeine a big no-no. In either case, these individuals usually order decaf when they’re at coffee shops or restaurants, but ... with all the hustle and bustle in those places, what if they get the coffee pots mixed up? Or what baristas can't be bothered brewing up a pot of decaf and just serve up regular coffee and say it’s decaf? It was no doubt that kind of thinking that led Verification Technology Systems to develop Caffeindicator, a litmus-like caffeine-testing system that anyone can use.  Read More

November 5, 2008 Feng Shui Coffee combines one of the world’s most popular drinks - coffee - with natural medicinal herbs and minerals designed for maintaining health and wellness and ties it in with the ancient Chinese principles of Feng Shui. It strikes us as an odd combination, but it does involve coffee.  Read More

October 13, 2006 The diet soda market has traditionally been a place where the soft drinks didn’t add as many calories as non-diet brethren, but Coca Cola is now readying a product for the U.S. market that is proven to burn calories. Enviga hits the Northeast in November and will roll out across the U.S. in January 2007. Enviga is a sparkling tea containing green tea extracts, calcium, and caffeine, and was conceived by Beverage Partners Worldwide (BPW), a joint venture between Nestle and Coca-Cola. Research shows that epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), an antioxidant present in green tea, has the ability to speed up metabolism and increase energy use, especially when combined with caffeine. Studies have shown that when EGCG and caffeine are present at the levels comparable to that in three cans of Enviga, healthy subjects in the lean to normal weight range can experience an average increase in calorie burning by 60 – 100 calories.  Read More

August 17, 2005 Single Serve Coffee is a site devoted to the love of fine coffee and no sooner had we written up the Nespresso Essenza, which comes in at the compact-budget end of the Nespresso scale, than they came up with an actual review of the Nespresso Romeo before it launches this September. The Romeo will come in at the high end of the range for Nespresso, and utilizes the same coffee capsule loading system and is aptly named Romeo, as the coffee capsule is placed on a small balcony. Single Serve's review can be found here.  Read More

The wonders of pharmacology keep appearing regularly, each new drug seemingly too good to be true. In recent times there have been several killer apps for the drug industry – chemical substances that replace depression with a happy disposition or bolster a flagging sex drive to royal command performance (with encore) levels. Prozac and Viagra provided benefits so compelling they have entered everyday language and have a global following. Now there’s another “drug-most-likely-to-succeed” – this one enables you to stay awake for 40+ hours with close to full mental capacity with few side effects  Read More

It had to happen. The success of the heavily caffeinated "energy" drinks such as Red Bull in the tten and twenty-something markets has seen US brewing giant Anheuser-Busch (best known for Budweiser beer) announce a new fruity beer infused with caffeine, guarana and ginseng. Also infused with select hops and aromas of blackberry, raspberry and cherry, the new beer, which will be known as B(E) will offer a lightly sweet and tart taste. B(E) will be priced slightly higher than Budweiser and marketed through local print advertising, point-of-sale materials, bar and club promotions and online programs. B(E) will contain 6.6 percent alcohol by volume.  Read More