Anna Rubi Sofiana

2C /1231410041

Chemical Engineering

Healthy eating: Is this the ultimate healthy meal?

What's your idea of a perfect meal? Sushi? A large piece of cake followed by hot
chocolate? Even if it satisfies your appetite, it's unlikely to fulfill all your nutritional
needs.

Cutting through the myriad of diet plans and faddish eating regimes, the human body
needs a balanced, healthy eating plan to keep functioning properly. This helps ensure
that our bodies have enough nutrition to:

Grow and build

Repair and heal
Reproduce successfully
Repel illnesses and infections
Avoid weight-related health problems

Eating a variety of foods can also reduce the risk of getting conditions including heart
disease, stroke, some cancers, diabetes and osteoporosis.
What foods do our bodies need to stay healthy?

The foods we need to eat can be divided into five separate groups.

Main
How much should
Food Group nutritional
we have each day?
benefits

Fruit and vegetables Vitamins, Five portions

minerals and fiber
(Includes fresh,
frozen, juiced, dried
or tinned fruit and
vegetables)

Starchy foods Energy, fiber, and A third of everything we

vitamins and eat
(Includes bread, minerals
rice, pasta and
potatoes)

Meat, fish, eggs and Protein and Two to three portions

beans vitamins and (one portion is an egg or
minerals a serving of meat/fish
(Includes fresh the size of a deck of
meat, fresh and cards)
tinned fish, eggs,
nuts and pulses)

Milk and dairy Protein and Two to three portions

foods calcium (one portion is a small
pot of yoghurt or glass
(Includes milk, of milk)
cheese and yoghurt)

Foods containing fat Energy One portion (two

 Main
How much should
Food Group nutritional
we have each day?
benefits

and sugar biscuits or a small

chocolate bar)
(Includes cakes,
biscuits and fizzy
drinks)

Why do we need these nutrients?

The reason we need a diet drawn from all of the groups is that they all deliver
different, but vital, nutritional benefits to our bodies.

Fruit and vegetables are one of our main sources of vitamins and minerals, which the
body needs to perform a variety of functions well. For instance, vitamin A helps to
strengthen our immune system, B vitamins help us process energy from food, vitamin
D helps us maintain healthy teeth and bones, and vitamin C helps to keep cells and
tissues healthy. The steamed carrots and broccoli, pictured above, will maintain a
higher proportion of vitamins than boiled or fried vegetables.

Fruit and vegetables (eaten with the skin on) also contain high amounts of fiber which
help to maintain a healthy gut and digestive system.

Starchy foods, also known as carbohydrates, are where we get most of our energy
from. Our bodies convert these foods into glucose which is used as energy either
immediately or stored for later use. Carbohydrates also contain fiber (especially
wholegrain), and iron which we need to make red blood cells to carry oxygen around
the body.

Meat fish, eggs and pulses provide us with significant amounts of protein which is
essentially a building block of the body. Everything from our hair, muscles, nerves,
skin and nails needs protein to build and repair itself. The grilled mackerel, pictured, is
an excellent source.

Also high in protein are dairy products, and they are also great providers of calcium.
The most common mineral in the body, calcium is needed for functions including
helping blood to clot, and to build bones and teeth.

Fortunately, the fatty and sugary group, the foods that we find the most irresistible,
also have a role to play, in moderation. Fat transports the fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E
and K around the body. It also cushions and protects the internal organs.
Sugar is another food that gives us energy, whether it's the naturally occurring fructose
sugars in fruit or sucrose in table sugar. But, "other sources of carbohydrate, for
example starchy foods, are a better choice for the nutrients they provide", says Lydia
Kelly, a specialist registered dietician who works for the NHS.

Healthy portions
So, how can we squeeze eating such a wide range of foods into one day? Lydia
advises: "Try to base meals on starchy carbohydrates such as bread, pasta or potatoes.
Include a range of different fruit and vegetables in your diet and try to have at least
one to two portions with every meal. Including a moderate serving of protein-
containing food is also important. Then choose adequate calcium sources, aiming for
three portions of low-fat dairy or dairy alternatives daily."

Whilst a small amount of sugary foods each day is acceptable, she warns, "eating
sugar too frequently may increase risk of tooth decay. Weight gain may also occur
if sugar in the diet provides more energy than we are using up".

And many dieticians agree there's no such thing as a 'superfood'. The overall balance
of the diet is what really matters, and guides such as the Eatwell Plate can be helpful.
No single food will provide all the nutrients we really need. And neither can one meal
- so the plate of food above might be one healthy option, but a good diet should
include a wide range of foods from each of the different food groups.

Don't forget the fluids...

Fluids are also vital to help our bodies perform their functions effectively, and the best
fluid of all is water. Two-thirds of a healthy human body is actually made up of water.
It's necessary to help our blood carry nutrients and waste around the body and to help
the chemical reactions that occur in our cells.

Summary :

The human body needs a balanced diet to deliver vital nutrients. The nutrients we need such
as protein, mineral, vitamin, carbohydrate, fiber, and calcium. Fruits and vegetables are main
source of mineral and vitamin which strengthen our immune system. Carbohydrate contain of
energy for our activity and also fiber and iron which we need to make red blood cells to carry
oxygen around the body. Meat fish, eggs provide us with significant amounts of protein
which is essentially a building block of the body. Calcium is needed for helping blood to clot,
and to build bones and teeth. Fatty and sugary group, the foods that we find the most
irresistible. Sugar is one of food that give us energy but we dont need it frequently. In our
diet every nutrition try to have at least one to two portions with every meal and dont forget
to consume fluid.

Comment :
I think everybody need to fulfill their bodies with nutrients protein, mineral, vitamin,
carbohydrate, fiber, and calcium with consume nutritious food such as fruits, vegetables,
meat, eggs, fish, wheat, and milk. We should have portion to consume that foods, because it
doesn't need frequently to consumed. That nutrient help us to ensure that our bodies have
enough nutrition to grow and build, repair and heal, reproduce successfully, repel illnesses
and infections, avoid weight-related health problems. Because of our body is contain two
third of fluid we recommended to consume of water frequently.
Hydrogen Generator and Storage Made Easy with Nano-
Technology
Fuels like gasoline, based on hydrocarbon, create pollution and carbon
footprint. Hydrogen has been claimed to be a good alternative to replace fossil fuel since the
1970s. But hydrogens potential has not been realized even partially mainly because of
storage and commercial production difficulties. There have been research being done on
renewable energy sources like hydrogen for quite some years. Recently, breakthrough
research has been successful in creating a new method for storing hydrogen.

Difficulties faced in usage of hydrogen

Hydrogen is a cleaner renewable energy source if only the two problems of safe storage and
easy access are overcome. The traditional way of fastening hydrogen into solids has not been
very successful. Too less volume of hydrogen was absorbed while storing and too convoluted
methods like too high heating or cooling was needed for releasing it which did not make it
commercially viable.

New way of storing hydrogen

A team of scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab),Department

of Energy (DOE), US have discovered a new material called air-stable magnesium nano-
composites which can help in storing hydrogen without complex methodology. This
composite material consists of nano-particles of magnesium metal sprinkled through a
matrix of polymethyl methacrylate a polymer related to Plexiglas.

Advantages of new material

This nano-composite is a pliable material and it is capable of absorbing and releasing

hydrogen at an ordinary temperature without oxidizing the metal. This capacity has been
touted as the major step towards a better design for hydrogen storage, hydrogen batteries and
hydrogen fuel cells. The scientists have been able to design for the first time successfully
composite materials that are nano-scale and which are capable of overcoming the barriers that
are thermodynamic and kinetic in nature.
Observing the new material scientifically

The team observed the material and its behavior via TEAM 0.5 microscope at National
Center for Electron Microscopy (NCEM). They tracked the behavior of hydrogen in the new
storage material. They further studied the performance of hydrogen in the nano-composite
material at Energy and Environmental Technologies Division (EETD), at the Berkeley Lab.
EETD has been pioneering research about technologies about renewable energies, their
generation and storage etc including hydrogen.

Summary :

Hydrogen is an alternative fuel that is either used as a substitute for fossil fuels and find a
breakthrough creating a new method for storing hydrogen. New way of storing hydrogen is a
new material called water-stable magnesium nano-composites roomates can help in storing
hydrogen without complex methodology. This composite material consists of 'nano-particles
of magnesium metal sprinkled through a matrix of polymethyl methacrylate - a polymer
related to Plexiglas.This nano-composite material is a pliable and it is capable of absorbing
and releasing hydrogen at an ordinary temperatures without oxidizing the metal. This
capacity has been touted as the major step towards a better design for hydrogen storage,
hydrogen batteries and hydrogen fuel cells.

Comments :

I think it should be used energy alternatives due to the use of fossil fuels that result in
persistent scarcity of energy because fossil fuels are fuels that are not renewable. Hydrogen is
the use of appropriate alternative because the material used is a composition of natural gas
available in and how to get it too easy. I think the methods that have been found, namely
hydrogen fuel with nano storage should be developed in other countries, the materials used
were resilient material and is able to absorb and release hydrogen at ordinary temperatures
without oxidizing the metal. The embodiment of this development is expected to be used
commercially, in order to minimize the use of fossil fuels which can lead to pollution and
carbon footprint resulting in global warming.