DRINKING TO MUCH WATER CAN KILL YOU

For a long time dehydration was considered a potential danger for people engaged in extended vigorous activity. Thus, athletes were encouraged to drink lots of water while engaged in active sport. The trend toward extensive hydration has spread throughout society, so that today many people carry water bottles everywhere and dutifully keep well hydrated. In some circumstances, however, drinking too much water is a greater danger than not drinking enough. Excess water consumption can lead to hyponatremia, a condition in which the concentration of sodium ion in the blood is too low. In the past decade at least four marathon  runners  have  died  from  hyponatremia-related  trauma, and dozens more have become seriously ill. For example, a first-time marathoner  named  Hillary Bellamy, running  in  the  Marine  Corps marathon in 2003, collapsed near mile 22 and died the next day. One physician  who  treated  her  said  that  she  died  from  hyponatremia induced brain swelling, the result of drinking too much water before and during the race. The normal blood sodium level is 135 to 145 mM (millimolar). When that level drops to 125 mM, dizziness and confusion set in. A concentration below 120 mM can be critical. Dangerously low levels can occur in any active athlete who is sweating out salt (NaCl) at the same time that excessive amounts of NaCl-free water are being drunk to compensate for water loss. The condition affects women more than men because of differences in body composition and patterns of metabolism. Drinking a sport drink that contains some electrolytes helps to prevent hyponatremia.


Pic Source: www.29palms.marines.mil

THE AURA OF GOLD

Throughout history, people have cherished gold, fought for it, and even died for it. The physical and chemical properties of gold make it special. First, its intrinsic beauty and rarity make it precious. Second, it is soft and can be easily formed into jewelry, coins, and other objects. Third, it is one of
the least active metals . It is not oxidized in air and does not react with water , with basic solutions, or with most acidic solutions.Many of the early studies on gold arose from alchemy, in which people attempted to turn cheap metals, such as lead, into gold. Alchemists discovered that gold can be dissolved in a 3:1 mixture of concentrated  hydrochloric  and  nitric  acids, known  as  "aqua regia"
(“royal water”). The action of the nitric acid on gold is similar to that on copper . All the gold ever mined would fit in a cube 21 m on a side andweighing about 1.6  × 10^8 kg. More than 90% of this amount has been produced  since  the  1848  California  gold  rush. Annual  worldwide production of gold is about 2.4  × 10^6 kg. By contrast 16,000 times more aluminum, over 3.97  × 10^10 kg, are produced annually. Roughly three-quarters of gold production goes to make jewellry, where it is often alloyed with other metals. Approximately 12% of gold production is used to meet a variety of industrial applications, most notably in electronic devices where its excellent conductivity  and  corrosion  resistance  make  it  a  valuable  component. A typical  touch-tone  telephone  contains  33  gold-plated  contacts.Gold  is  also  used  in  computers  and  other  microelectronic  devices where fine gold wire is used to link components. Because of its resistance to corrosion, gold is an ideal metal for dental crowns and caps, which accounts for about  of the annual use of the element. The pure metal is too soft to use in dentistry, so it is combined with other metals to form alloys.

Pic Source:pixabay.com,en.wikimedia.org, commons.wikimedia.org
                 

INTERSTING FACTS 1

1. If a person is struck by lightning, they sometimes vaporize (evaporate) completely, so that tnothing  left of them at all.

Pic Credit: Flickr.com




2.Bacteria trapped inside a salt crystal for250 million years were revived and grown by scientists in the USA.


Pic Credit: pixabaycom

3. An adult human takes about 23,000 breaths per day. 

4. It takes less than 0.1 grams (0.004 ounces) of poison found in parts of the pufferfish to kill an adult human.However, some people eat the fish regularly  as they know which bits to remove!