I was very excited to learn about the new Nutriganics line by The Body Shop. Touted as the first certified organic (at least in the UK) line of cleanser, toner, day and night moisturizers, serum, and eye cream, the line looks quite green, and the ingredients are quite decent.
However, when I checked the Body Shop.com, the line appeared to be not available for purchase in California and there was nowhere mentioned that it’s certified organic.
A closer inspection of the ingredients lists made me wondering of a few icky “buts” that …

Intralytix, Inc. announced today that it has received a U.S. Army Phase I STTR contract supporting the development of a bacteriophage-based probiotic preparation for managing Shigella infections.
“Shigella species are major gastrointestinal (GI) tract pathogens of particular concern to the US Army, and they are a significant worldwide cause of diarrheal disease,” stated Alexander Sulakvelidze, Intralytix’s Chief Scientist and Principal Investigator for the contract. He added: “The bacterium has been estimated to cause annually about 90,000 food borne cases of shigellosis in the United States, and about 165 million cases worldwide. …

Two Seattle-area startups are looking to combine technologies to turn algae into biochemicals, with food additives on the list of potential products.
Under the partnership announced Friday, Redmond, Wash.-based Bionavitas will grow algae, and Seattle-based Blue Marble Energy will turn it into “high-margin” biochemicals.
Bionavitas has come up with acrylic rods that can carry sunlight deeper into algae ponds, theoretically increasing the depth at which the water-borne plants can grow, an important consideration for costs of open-pond algae systems (see Green Light post).
The company, founded in 2006 and funded by angel investors …

To keep wine from becoming spoiled winemakers sometimes add preservatives. In fact, if preservatives are not added to wine it will only last six months to a year. Preservatives are added to keep wine from turning to vinegar and several types of preservatives are used in the winemaking process.
Two natural preservatives result from the grapes and the fermenting process – alcohol and tannins. These preservatives are excellent for extending the life of wine and kill off most organisms as very few can live in alcohol.
The most popular added preservative is …

Hong Kong (HKSAR) – The Centre for Food Safety (CFS) today (October 7) released its Food Safety Report for August, which covered food surveillance results for the month. About 4,800 food samples were tested in August. Of these, about 3,200 were taken for chemical tests and about 1,600 for microbiological and other tests.
The overall satisfactory rate was 99.7%, with 13 samples being found unsatisfactory. While microbiological tests cover pathogens and viruses, chemical tests are to detect pesticides, preservatives and metallic contamination. Samples included vegetables, fruit and their products; meat, poultry …