Dear Friends,

Our newest product, Phyto Power, offers up a powerful serving of the flavonoids (Red, Green, and Blue).  We were, for that matter, thinking of incorporating in its name something with “flavo” because of the abundance of its flavonoids.  However, it contains other phenols as well, in fact, it contain powerful amounts of nutrients across the full spectrum of phytochemicals—hence Phyto Power.

The red in Phyto Power is multiple species of rose hips; the green offers multiple species of dandelions; and the blue embodies multiple species of blueberries.  Let’s take a closer look at why Phyto Power is, well, very powerful.

As so many of you know, we are activists for organic, globally-local (to be explained momentarily), high active foods.  High-actives are possible when these multiple factors are met:  the environment the plant is grown in has to be specific for the plant, and the variety of plant selected needs to be a high yield variety, the quality of the soil (fertile), the intensity of the sun, the timing of the harvest, the drying and bottling technologies employed, and the means of delivery to us—the consumer.  All these factors are taken into account as we select and produce products for our Therapeutic Foods.

Organic, of course, means growing fruits and vegetables without pesticides, herbicides, and synthetic fertilizers.  Monocultural farming (synonomous with industrial agricultural farming), emblematic of the disasterous Green Revolution, doesn’t work without these toxic adjuvants.  Organic farming, on the other hand, uses more horticultural techniques which encourages a diversity of plants grown together which naturally controls pests without pesticides and herbicides.  Biodynamic farming, the One-Straw Revolution, and Permaculture represent the ultimate in organic farming methods.  They are our salvation.  This bring us to the ingredients we have secured for Phyto Power—the Rosehip, the Dandelion, and the Blueberry.  They are sustainable wildcrafted which means they come straight from Mother Nature—hand picked in the wilderness.  It takes us back to a time when organic was the way the world was.  More on this in a moment.

Globally-local may seem like an oxymoron, but it’s not.  It bring us to a very important truth about our world today.  We are all in a global community—Africa’s pathogens are our pathogens, India’s pollution is our pollution, Japan’s radiation is our radiation, and of course, our fast food franchises are the world’s fast food franchising health problem. We are more globally connected today. Our immune systems are more globally adapted.

While it is critical for people  to have abundant access to their own locally produced organic foods, it is also important for us to be able to benefit from organic produce from all over the world.  It can support not only our health, but also supports the livelyhood of peoples in far off places. Eating healthy foods from places around the world boost our immune system, allow us to fight the pathogens from global places. In other words, our bodies are not local anymore but are global in nature.

The ingredients for our newest product, Phyto Power, come from Alaska.  It’s not exactly China (in terms of distances) but if you live in Florida it is a long ways away.  But thanks to technology, people all over the world can receive the health benefits of this product.  Alaska is a vast land.  It is wilderness.  Its fruits, berries and vegetables, like our rosehip, dandelion and blueberry grow wild all over the State.

These factors are all brought to bear with our newest offering- Phyto Power.  The rose hips, dandelions and blueberries are all wild crafted, globally-local, sustainable, and economically enhancing to the local culture.  The high-actives of this product, because of the environmental conditions it grows under, are literally ”off-the-chart”.

Alaska is a vast area, larger than most people realize.  It is as wide as the lower 48 States (stretching from Jacksonville to San Diego) and larger than Texas, California and Montana combined.  It wasn’t incorporated as a State within the United States until 1959.  Alaska’s growing season is unique, and the plants have adapted  to an unusual life cycle.  Summer, the growing season, runs from May through August, when there is almost 24 hours each day of total sunlight.  The local flora are bombarded with this sunlight and in response to protect themselves from this ultraviolet light produce prodigious amounts of phytochemicals—polyphenols, flavonoids, anthocyanins, OPCs, terpenes, etc.  High bush blueberries are six to eight feet tall and cover much of the State.  There are estimates that there are at least five billion pounds that grow in Alaska every year with no cultivation what so ever.

The sun is not the only reason for the abundance of phytochemicals.  Another trigger for flavonoid biosynthesis is cold shock.  The plants grow in cold soil.  Even in the hot summer one can’t take off their shoes and walk around because the soil is still that cold.  This temperature gradient makes all plants go wild in putting out the bioflaonoids to protect themselves.  Hence this makes for berries and plants in general that are, as we say, very powerful.

The native peoples of Alaska, the many Indian and Eskimo tribes, lived a paleolithic life style up until the 60s, and epidemeological studies show that there was very little chronic degenerative diseases amongst their populations.  Of course, as we brought in the modern conveniences  of sugar, pop, alcohol, etc.  We all know too well the disaster this brings to the health of a people, their health deteriorated.  In the old traditions amongst the native Alaskans blueberry, dandelions and rosehips were amongst the most cherished of berries for their medicinal properties.

BioImmersion in collaboration with its Alaskan corporate partners source and manufacture the dried blueberries, rosehips and dandelions from Alaska.  They are totally and sustainably wildcrafted by the native peoples.  These berries provide a precious health resource for peoples ailing bodies and a sustainable economy for the native peoples.  More on Phyto Power‘s health benefits next week.

Sincerely yours,

Seann Bardell

BioImmersion.com

Clinical Note:

Phyto Power: the ingredients and the benefits

The ingredients: As you can see from the label there are three species of rose hips, four species of dandelions and 4 species of blueberry.  More specifically regarding the rose hips they are Rosa acicularis, Rosa nutkana and Rosa woodsii.  This includes the fruit pulp and the seeds.  With the dandelion the species are Taraxacum offincinale, Taraxacum ceratophorum, Taraxacum lyratum and Taraxacum phymatocarpum.  This includes 90% aerial parts, 10% roots and the flower.  And, with the blueberry Vaccinium ovalifolium, Vaccinium alaskensis, Vaccinium uliginosum alpinum and Vaccinium uliginosum mycrophyllum.  This includes > 95% fruit w/w and < 5% leaves and stems w/w.

The benefits: Phyto Power is loaded with phytochemicals.  From the bioflavonoids alone there is so much to say.  In the preceeding six newsletters, since January 11th’s, we have focused on the features and benefits of the flavonoids.  Robust consumption of the flavonoids reduces the risks of CVD, arthritis, diabetes and cancer.  They are antioxidants and anti-inflammatories.  They work epigenetically.  They protect cognitive functioning, protecting us against dementia and Alzheimeres.  They protect against the diseases of aging.  Cultures that consume robust amounts of flavonoids and phytochemicals in the diet are cultures with robust longevity for its citizens as witnessed in the Blue Zones.  Next week we will dig deeper into the features and benefits of Phyto Power.

The Last Quiz Answer:

This amazing creature is an Aardwolf, which means “earth wolf” in Afrikaans.  They live in underground burrows and love termites—to eat them that is.  They also consume bird eggs.  They are carnivores, but also are labeled “incomplete carnivores” because of their insectivorous habits.  Although it looks like a dog, it’s been classified as a relative of the hyena.  The smaller  aardwolf weighs between 50 and 60 pounds.

Remember back a couple newletters ago we alerted you to the lawsuit being brought again Monsanto by the Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association (OSGATA).  Fifty-five farmers and the plantiffs converged on the Manhattan Federal District Court. Monsanto’s goal was to have charges dismissed. Here’s an update.  So far, so good!  Check it out.

Dear Friends,

In this week’s newsletter we will close out our discussion of the flavonoids—which we began with the anthocyanins back in the January 18th Forward Thinking—by looking at perhaps the most widely studied of the flavonoid groups—the isoflavones.

Isoflavones are found in abundance is soybeans, soy foods and legumes.  They are a class of phytoestrogens. Three of the isoflavones are genistein, daidzein and glycitein.  To the right is genistein.  Notice the molecular differences between the three:  Daidzein does not have an OH on top of the left hand phenol, otherwise it is exactly the same as genistein.  Glycitein has no OH like Daidzein but has a H3CO coming off the left phenolic.

Phytoestrogens, such as genistein and daidzein, can act both as aids in reducing hot flashes in menopause, and bone loss in postmenopausal women by increasing estrogen stimulation; while at the same time reducing the incidence of cancers caused from excess estrogen by reducing estrogen stimulation.  How can that be?  How can you have it both ways?

One possible answer is through understanding the concept of alpha and beta estrogen receptors.  In the ’80s scientists discovered the alpha and beta receptors for estrogens. The alpha receptors are associated with the initiation of the development of estrogen related cancers and the beta receptors are associated with the good effects of estrogen.

Different tissues appear to have different ratios of these two receptors.

The beta-receptors, which exercise favourable effects for health, can be found mainly in the blood cells, the lungs, the prostate, the bladder, bones and thymus. Isoflavones stimulate their function even after the level of estrogens has decreased.

The alpha-receptor can be mainly found in the breast tissue, the uterus, the ovaries, the testicles and the liver. In those places, isoflavones protect the receptor against estrogens and help reduce the proneness to tumors. (Isoflavones.info)

It seems that we are inferring here that isoflavones behave differently in regards to alpha and beta receptors, whereas with beta receptors these phytoestrogens are strong enough to enhance the estrogen effect and with alpha receptors they block the estrogen effect.  I need further illumination on this point.  Your feedback is always appreciated.

Benefits of isoflavones:

American’s breast cancer rate is 22.4 per 100,000 people, which is nearly four times Japan’s rate of 6 per 100,000.  America’s prostate cancer rate is 15.7 per 100,000 people, yet again four times Japan’s rate of 3.5 per 100,000.  The Japanese consume 30 to 50 times more soy product than do Americans … When the urinary excretion of certain phytoestrogens found in soy—primarily genistein and diadzen— were measured … the Japanese women excreted 2,000 to 3,000 nanomolar per day, and the American women, 30 to 40 nanomolar per day … The soybean abyss is probably the most dramatic difference between the Japanese and American diets (Gaynor M. et al 1999).

Genistein has been shown to possess a wide variety of activities using in vitro animal cells and in vivo animal models, including tyrosine kinase inhibition, chemoprevention of breast and prostate cancer, prevention of cardiovascular disease and amelioration of postmenopausal ailments (Nutritional Genomics 2011 pg 117).

Tyrosine kinase is an important cell-signaling molecule that when activated, helps confer immortality on cancer cells (Dr. Gaynor’s Cancer Prevention Program 1999 pg 94).

Isoflavone phytoestrogens such as genistein from soy … may protect against the possible carcinogenic actions of estrogen by … inhibiting the production of estrogen by the enzyme aromatase … [and by] competing at the estrogen receptor level, with either estrogen or xenoestrogens (industrial and agricultural chemicals such as bisphenol A and pesticides), which have potent estrogen-like and carcinogenic activities (Forever Young 2010 pg 201).

In a 1989 study of 8,000 Hawaiian men of Japanese ancestry, those who ate the most tofu had the lowest rates of prostate cancer.  A shanghai study found that women who seldom ate soy foods had twice the rate of breast cancer of those who ate soy frequently (Gaynor, pg 97).

Scientists compared the blood levels of soy isoflavonoids in Japanese men with those of Finnish men, who have higher rates of prostate cancer.  The Japanese men’s blood contained from 7 to 110 times as much isoflavonoids, suggesting that the higher levels protect men from prostate cancer (Gaynor, pg 98).

So, we’ve look at Vitamin P (the Flavonoids) and their health promoting attributes, since January. We’ve seen how even though they are structurally very similar, small differences in each of the flavonoid subgroupings’ molecular structures make for many varied and necessary functional benefits critical for our body’s health.  In the coming weeks we will look at Vitamin Q and Vitamin U, and other phytochemicals whose dietary inclusion arms our bodies with the nutrients necessary for our robust health in our world today, and to enhance our physical ability to fight the good fight.

Sincerely yours,

Seann Bardell

BioImmersion.com

Clinical Note:

I would like to introduce you to our newest Therapeutic Foods product:  Phyto Power.  It is a product that contains many of the powerful health building flavonoids that we have been looking at over the last while.  It represents the ultimate in BioImmersion’s goal to give you absolutely clean, natural, organic, high active products.  I will devote next week’s Foreward Thinking to a proper introduction; but, just to give you a taste here I’ll show you the label.  We’ll fill in the details next week.  You’ll be amazed.

The Last Quiz Answer:This marvelous creature is a Green Tree Python. Also called Morelia viridis if you are a Herpetologist.  These Pythons live in New Guinea and Australia.  They ground forage at night for small rodents and birds, and sleep in the trees by day.  This python species may reach a length 12ft. It looks and acts much like a South American Emerald Tree Boa. However, the resemblance is all they have in common.  Boas bear live young; pythons species are oviparous (animals that lay eggs).

The real Green Revolution is a systemic thinking revolution—you are a part of everything and everything is a part of you.  It is a new/old way of seeing and being.  As my old zen master Roshi Robert Aiken wrote in his book, The Morning Star—Watching a spider at work, I vow with all beings, to cherish the web of the universe: touch one point snd everything moves.

Dear Friends,

We want the whole package that mother nature can give us.  Not just the vitamins, minerals, carbs, proteins, fats and fibers, extracted out and remixed into some highly processed concoction that we have come to call food.

We need a broad range of flavonoids to protect our health.  Good, bad or otherwise, nature does not put all 6,000 of them in every single fruit and vegetable; so we must eat off the color wheel—eat paleolithic.

A good supplementary program brings in a wide variety of phytochemicals.  We’ve been focusing on the flavonoids and we continue this week with two more—the flavones and the flavanones.

Flavanones are found in large amounts in citrus fruits—naringenin is the most abundant citrus-derived flavanone. The main aglycones are naringenin in grapefruits, hesperetin in oranges, and eriodictyol in lemons.

The white fleshy pulp on the innersurface of the citrus skin and the membranes that separate the segments have a high flavanone content.  Only a small amount is transfered to the juice during processing (hence drink fresh squeezed juice).

The consumption of citrus fruit has been associated with lower risk of acute coronary events and strokes (Brassi et al 2009).

The major flavonoid in oranges, hesperidin, was evaluated in overweight men.  Four weeks consuming 500ml of orange juice per day resulted in a decrease in the diastolic BP as well as postprandial increases of endothelium-dependent microvascular reactivity and cardiovascular risk biomarkers (Morand et al 2011).

Remember last week we talked about Vitamin P as an old label given to the group of bioflavonoids that protect against acute permeability conditions within the vascular system—an extreme example would be a conditions like scurvy.  Hesperidin is a major player on this anti-permeability team, as is Vitamin C.  They seem to work together. Vitamin C functioning as an antioxidant and hesperidin rebutting Vitamin C back to it antioxidant state.  In Europe, hesperidin is used to treat venous insufficiency and hemorrhoids.  It is helpful in reducing capillary peremeability.  Researchers in Italy have shown that hesperitin reduces inflammation, lowers hypertension and increases HDL and lowers LDL.  In a series of animal and human experiments at the University of Western Ontario by Dr. Kurowska hesperitin was found to restrict the liver’s production of cholesterol esters, which are a major constituent in LDLs, without which they cannot be formed.

This is only the tip of the iceberg regarding the health benefits of hesperidin and other phytochemicals within oranges.  Reseachers have found that hesperidin slowed the replication of several viruses including polio, herpes and flu.  It may also treat cancer and some autoimmune diseases.  Another phytochemical within oranges, the limonoids, which are in the terpenoid subgroup (not a flavonoid) are 45 times more effective in blocking tumor formation than hesperitin.  Consider the fact that University of Western Ontario researchers found hesperidin more effective at slowing the proliferation of breast cancer cells than genistein—the highly touted cancer fighting compound in soy (Joseph, The Color Code 2002).  We will cover limonoids in a couple weeks when we look at the Terpenes.

Flavones are less frequent than the flavonols from last week (ie quercetin) in fruits and vegetables.  The most common flavones are luteolin, apigenin and chryslin and their respective glycosides.  They are found in broccoli, celery, cherries, tea, olives, thyme, parsley and some herbs.  There is some very exciting research regarding their health benefits.

In recent years, scientific and public interest in flavones has grown enormously due to their beneficial effects against atheroscherosis, osteoporosis, diabetes mellitis, autoimmune disease and cancers.  I’ll focus in brief on the last two—autoimmune disease and cancer.

Autoimmune Disease

In Richard Verbeek’s and fellow researchers study, the inhibiting effects of various flavonoids on antigen-specific proliferation and interferon-gamma production by human and murine autoreactive T cells, were evaluated in vitro.  T-cell responses were evaluated for the human autoantigen alpha B-crystaqllin, a candidate autoantigen in multiple sclerosis, and for the murine encephalitogen proteolipid protein peptide.

The flavones apigenin and luteolin were found to be strong inhibitors of both murine and human T-cell responses, while fisitin, quercetin, morin and hesperitin, members of flavonols and flavanones were ineffective. (Verbeek, R. et al, Biochemical Pharmacology 2004)

Anti-Oxidant, Anti-Inflammatory and Anti-Allergic Activities of Luteolin (Seelinger, G et al, Planta Med 2008)

It [luteolin] displays excellent radical scavenging and cytoprotective properties, especially when tested in complex biological systems where it can interact with other anti-oxidants like vitamins. Seelinger further explains that luteolin operates as an anti-oxidant at micromolar concentrations, but it also does much more.  It also works on an epi-genetic level, activating anti-oxidant enzymes and suppressing NFkB pathways.  He maintains that luteolin has great potential to protect from diseases associated with inflammatory processes.

Cancer

Previous studies have indicated that flavonoids exhibit antiproliferative properties on some hormone-dependent cancer cell lines, such as breast and prostate cancer … among the flavonoids tested, apigenin and luteolin are the most potent inhibitors… the present study suggests that flavonoids may prepresent a new class of therapeutic agents in the management of thyroid cancer. (Vin, F. et al, Growth Inhibitory Effects of Flavonoids in Human Thyroid Cancer Cell lines, Thyroid 2009)

A study to assess the antioxidant potencies of several dietary flavonoids showed that only apigenin, rutin and quercetin were more potent than Vitamin C in reducing DNA oxidative damage. (Notoozi, M et al, American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 1998)

The Dietary Flavones Apigenin and Luteolin Impair Smooth Musclee Cell Migration and VEGF Expression through Inhibition of PDGF Phosphorylation. (Lamy, S et al, Cancer Prevention Research 2006).

Platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) … plays a central role in the maturation and stablization of newly formed vasculature during angiogenensis … [Lamy et al] shows that the dietary flavones apigenin and luteolin may interfere with this event through their inhibitory effect on PDGF…these results identify apigenin and luteolin as dietary-derived chemopreventative proventative molecules.

In closing, structural variations in each of the flavonoids leads to wide differences in their observed therapeutic effectiveness; and, makes the case for constructing a diet that brings in a wide variety of fruits and vegatables.  It is, of course, argued that the low incidence of cardiovascular disease and cancer in the Mediteranean population correlates with a high intake of flavonoid rich foods.  I concur. Let’s bring more flavonoids into our diet.

Next week we will finish up the flavonoids by looking at the isoflavones.

Sincerely yours,

Seann Bardell

BioImmersion.com

Clinical Note:

We teach the power of food to heal and implement the tradition of food as medicine.  That’s what BioImmersion Inc. and the Therapeutic Foods Line are all about.  One of many possible examples of implementing the Therapeutic Foods Platform would be to drink a large glass of water with a tablespoon of the Beta Glucan Synbiotic Formual and a teaspoon of the Number 7 Systemic Booster.  Right there you have quite a collection of colors and phytochemicals coming in—beets, pomegranate, cranberry, pineapple, tart cherry, not to forget the fiber, vitamins, probiotic organisms (12 different strains) and so on.  You could use this drink to chase down a couple tablets of Organic Chlorella, Wild Blueberry Daily, and Cruciferous Sprouts.  Now you’ve added the powerful greens and deep dark blues big time.  Try it.

The Last Quiz Answer:

This beauty is a Caraval.  It is a cross between a male Caracal and a female Serval.  These are bread for the pet market.  A pure caracal weighs 35-50 pounds.  It is the largest of the African lesser cats (the greater being lions, cheetah, etc).  The caracal is an exceptional climber and jumper.  It hunts by night seeking small animals—birds of all sizes and the young of larger grazing animals.

The Serval weighs 30-40 pounds.  They hunt by night for rodents, reptiles, birds and small deer. Remember the Duiker antelope from the January 5th Forward Thinking? It’s unbelieveable, an antelope the size of a jackrabbit, and food for these cats.  Life is amazing, isn’t it!  How would you like to have a 40 pound caraval as a pet?  I would!!!

TED talks are special, aren’t they?  And, here is a very special TED talk for our health and happiness.  Who doesn’t want more happiness.  This talk by Shaun Achor is entitled, The Happy Secret to Better Work. It is very very funny and the information very inspiring.  You’ll really enjoy it.  Enjoy!

Dear Friends,

We have been illuminating a category of phytochemicals called the Flavonoids over the past three weeks.  The Flavonoids subgroups are: anthocyanins, isoflavones, flavanols, flavanones, flavonols, and flavones.  We will continue our journey this week unfolding the Flavonols.

Flavonols are amongst the most wide spread flavonoids found in foods.  There are three main flavonols:  quercetin, kaempferol and myricetin.  Quercetin is found in cruciferous vegetables, onions, apples, berries, citrus fruits (it’s in the white part on the inside of the peel), seeds and nuts.

In the flavonol on the right, Kaempferol has R1=H and R2=H.  Quercetin has R1=OH and R2=H.  Myricetin has R1=OH and R2=OH.

The amounts of the flavonols found in fruits, vegetables and beverages varies depending on the varieties, seasonal differences and effects of processing.  Quercetin is the most potent antioxidant of the group [and we will focus on its benefit as it is highly studied]. The quercetin glycosides were thought to be poorly absorbed in the GI tract following consumption.  However, evidence now indicates that about 50% of quercetin glycosides are absorbed whereas only 25% of the aglycone form is absorbed (Nutritional Genomics, 2011).

Health Benefits of the Flavonols

• Quercetin’s chemical structure provides a strong antioxidant effect and increases the activity of superoxide dismutase, catalase, and glutathione peroxidase, which enhances the cellular oxidative defense mechanisms.  One major result is a significant decrease in the oxidation and peroxidation of membrane lipids, thereby preventing cell damage (Boots et al. 2008).
• Quercetin is used in many countries as  medication for blood vessel protection.
• Quercetin’s role in the cardiovascular system may result from these protective effects.  In animal models, quercetin has been shown to lower blood pressure and ameliorate hyperglycemia and conditions caused by hyperglycemia.  In a trial involving prehypertensive and stage 1 hypertensive patients, the consumption of 730 mg/day of quercetin for 4 weeks led to a reduction in blood pressure, but did not affect the parameters of oxidative stress (Bischoff 2008).
• Quercetin has potent mast cell blocking action.  It can inhibit the release of histamine and prostaglandin D2 (PGD2) as well as the proinflammatory moelcules IL-2, IL-8, and TNF alpha from human cultured mast cells.  Quercetin inhibits mast cell dependent stimulation of activated T-cells involved in autoimmune diseases.

Quercetin is active in many metabolic processes related to diseases of aging, auch as cardiovascular and neurodegenerative disorders.  In addition, quercetin also exhibits anti-inflammatory, antiproliferative, and apoptotic effects both on cells in culture as well as when ingested in vivo.

Next week we will look at Flavones and Flavanones.

Sincerely yours,

Seann Bardell

BioImmersion.com

Clinical Note:

Swollen and bleeding gums, loose teeth, hemorrhaging under the skin, slowly healing wounds, and eventual death.  All symptoms of scurvy, the scourge of sailors during the 15th,16th and 17th centuries, until it was recognized as a Vitamin C deficient disease, corrected by adding citrus foods to their diets.  Hence, the British label “limey” for their sailors took hold.

It was Albert Szent-Gyorgvi PhD/MD in the 1930s who first isolated Vitamin C from Hungarian paprika, indentifying it as ascobic acid, which literally means without scurvy.  He also identified a food nutrient or nutients from citrus fruits, that he called Vitamin P (the p for permeability), that decreased capillary fragility and permeability in humans.  The name Vitamin P was dropped in favor of the term bioflavonoids, of which the flavonols are an important member.

It is important to take Vitamin C along with bioflavonoids for maximizing the health benefits of Vitamin C.  For it is the additive and synergistic effects of phytochemicals in fruits and vegetables that are responsible for their potent antioxidant and anticancer activities.

The Last Quiz Answer:

The largest antelope in Africa, the eland is one of the most nervous or skittish animals and take flight at the slightest sign of danger, capable of running for miles without stopping. In southern Africa, three subspecies exist: Cape, Livingstone and East African Eland, and in central and west Africa there is the Giant or Lord Derby Eland.  A big eland bull can easily weigh over 2500 lbs.

Eland are prolific feeders, browsing in the early morning and late afternoon and sometimes through the night. They are usually found in sparsely wooded savannahs with adequate young trees and shrubs.  Eland travel great distances for food, often moving with the seasons and blooming of fruits and flowers.

You know Annie Leonard, the author of The Story of Stuff.  Well, she has just rolled out yesterday a new project, the first episode of The Good Stuff—a bimonthly podcast.  Episode 1 is called Take That, Plastic Bags! She interviews two inspiring individuals who are making a different when it comes to plastic bag pollution.  This is a podcast worthy of tuning-in to.