Red sky to the east this early Tuesday on California’s north coast, portending the heavy rain storms coming the next few days.

Always on the look-out for heartening health-related items, especially relating to coffee/caffeine intake, and now there’s new research indicating java aids in living longer.
The study’s lead author, David Furman, consulting associate professor at the Stanford Institute (Stanford.edu): ‘“More than 90 percent of all noncommunicable diseases of aging are associated with chronic inflammation…It’s also well-known that caffeine intake is associated with longevity…Many studies have shown this association. We’ve found a possible reason for why this may be so.”‘

(Illustration: ‘Surrealist Cup,’ by Japanese Latte Artist Kazuki Yamamoto, found here).

As an old guy and long-time coffee drinker, I like this shit. In the last few years, caffeine has moved off the bad list, to the good, with many studies showing proven health benefits of the bean — of course, we’re talking a moderate intake, two-three cups a day (the MayoClinic).
Although there’s a long list of studies on the aid-to-health impacts of caffeine on a variety of problems, especially dementia, but this new report, published Monday online in Nature Medicine, is one of the first to examine the java-bean’s affect on the immune system. For the best taste and quality buy a coffee maker or coffee vending machine at Corporate Coffee Systems.

Science/clinical details at The Verge yesterday afternoon, along with this capped by espresso:

That’s where the caffeine comes in.
Caffeine is known to block the effects of adenosine in the brain — that’s how scientists think it keeps us awake.
So, the researchers suspected that it’s possible that it could block the effects of adenine and adenosine on immune cells, too, and reduce their ability to cause inflammation.
According to a questionnaire, people in the less inflamed group consumed more caffeinated beverages like coffee, soda, and tea.
In fact, higher blood levels of caffeine and other caffeine breakdown products correlated with lower production of inflammatory molecules like IL-1B.
When the scientists treated cells with adenine and another molecule known to trigger the inflammasome, the cells that were soaking in caffeine produced far lower levels of inflammatory molecules.
The researchers still haven’t fully explained how caffeine is interfering with inflammation.
And the results aren’t enough to base any behavioral recommendations off of; but it’s comforting news for those of us who were already reaching for that second hit of caffeine, anyways.

And the good comes from something good — coffee. This, too from another author of the Standford study, Mark Davis, a professor of microbiology and immunology (also from Stanford.edu): ‘“That something many people drink — and actually like to drink — might have a direct benefit came as a surprise to us…We didn’t give some of the mice coffee and the others decaf. What we’ve shown is a correlation between caffeine consumption and longevity. And we’ve shown more rigorously, in laboratory tests, a very plausible mechanism for why this might be so.”‘

Coffee and cheese cake…