High Blood Pressure & Drinking Water

By this point in this Section you certainly expected this claim!

Well, think about it.

As I have acknowledged elsewhere, the primary source for the water-related concepts in this Section come from Dr. F. Batmanghelidj. I don’t know of any other person who has done this type of research.

As I’ve written earlier, your arteries are flexible when healthy, and can get larger or smaller, as the body needs dictate. One of the reasons the arteries might need to get smaller is if there is actually a reduction in the supply of volume of blood.

In other words, if the volume of the arteries stayed the same while the volume of blood reduced, you’d have to have pockets of gas or air inside the arteries -- where there wasn’t enough blood to fill the space. So, the arteries contract, get smaller, when there is a reduction in blood volume.

Arteries also change size to reduce the amount of blood going to some particular area, and increase in size when the body requires more blood in some area. For instance, when you eat you need more blood going to the stomach and intestines. Since the body can’t just manufacture new blood for this short-term need, the body shuts off the blood supply in one place in order to increase the blood supply in some other place.

This change in blood supply is not actually handled by changing the size of arteries, but rather by turning on, or turning off, entire sections of capillaries. Arteries are large tubes, containing blood which is moving at a rapid rate. Capillaries are extremely small tubes, carrying blood at very slow rates.

Blood moves through the arteries as fast as 13 miles per hour, but slows down tremendously, to about .02 mph in a capillary! The blood rushes through the arteries, but when it gets to the capillaries, it goes through them, often, one molecule at a time. Some of the capillaries are so thin that the blood molecules have to be bent in half to move through.

There are nerve and chemical messengers which can turn off a whole network of capillaries from receiving new supplies of blood. The blood that was in that "bed" of capillaries mostly stays there until the valve is opened again, and new blood pushes in.

But, the point here is that as these areas of capillaries are turned off, there is more blood available that can go to a different area.

Thus, the blood supply to the stomach and intestines increases during the time of eating and digestion, and decreases somewhere else. The usual place that blood is turned off is in the muscles. When a person has been doing a lot of exercise, the turn-off in the muscles will be less, and more somewhere else.

Thus, the body changes the total volume of the tubes through which the moving blood is moving.

This water/blood rationing system eliminates any need for the total supply of blood to be changing from time to time.

Whether you have just eaten or not, there are priorities for the supply of blood/water, and these are very rigid in the body.

The highest priority in the body is the brain. It gets more blood than any other part, and no matter where else there might be a need for blood, the brain gets its supply first.

The lungs, liver, kidneys and glands come next in priority. When they need blood, they get it, if there is any available.

A shortage of water in the body is first handled by closing off some capillaries. When that happens the areas served by those capillaries can then become diseased or unhealthy in some way. When these capillary networks are closed down, they provide an obstacle to blood movement and the blood pressure must go higher to push through the area.

When the shortage of water is greater than can be accommodated by a shut-off of some capillary area, then the water shortage is made up from the liquid in the arteries.

About 66% of the water shortage is taken from water inside the cells. These cells become dehydrated. Dehydrated cells become diseased much more easily than cells filled with the proper amount of water.

About 26% of the water shortage is taken from the water outside the cells. This reduction in water means that the blood becomes thicker. Thicker blood needs to be pushed harder to move it along -- high blood pressure.

About 8% of the water shortage is taken from the volume of liquid moving through the arteries. When there is less volume of blood in the arteries the arteries MUST get smaller to avoid those air pockets. Smaller tubes require a higher blood pressure to push the amount of blood needed by the body.

So, two of the areas where the body takes water during a shortage will cause an increase in blood pressure.

When you exercise your muscles the capillaries in that area will develop a larger network and they will stay open more often because the larger mass of muscles needs a larger supply of blood. This larger network of capillaries does not close down so easily when there is a water shortage, and therefore exercise is very healthy for you for this reason.

But, most basic, you can see now how a lack of water can cause a tremendous increase in blood pressure, and how just drinking more water can reduce your blood pressure.

Amazing! And, so simple!

Salt plays an important role in balancing the amount of water held outside the cells. There is a great deal more to be written on this subject, in other Books or in my regular newsletter. You’ll find that when you are drinking enough water you can use far more salt than you normally do, enjoy the taste, and have no adverse effects.

Drink water and enjoy salt!

You should realize that many of these variations in the amount of water in the blood cells, or outside the blood cells, or in the capillaries, or not -- all of these various measures of water get missed in most physical examinations.

High blood pressure should be treated by taking increased amounts of water! Blood pressure should NOT be treated by the very drugs which cause the body to need more water. Can you imagine the evil of a drug which decreases your body’s ability to use water, and that reduction in water handling causes high blood pressure -- exactly the symptom which the drug is supposedly handling.

Water quality and contaminants

Throughout most of the world, the most common contamination of raw water sources is from human sewage and in particular human faecal pathogens and parasites. In 2006, waterborne diseases were estimated to cause 1.8 million deaths each year while about 1.1 billion people lacked proper drinking water.[6]. It is clear that people in the developing world need to have access to good quality water in sufficient quantity, water purification technology and availability and distribution systems for water. In many parts of the world the only sources of water are from small streams often directly contaminated by sewage.

Most water requires some type of treatment before use, even water from deep wells or springs. The extent of treatment depends on the source of the water. Appropriate technology options in water treatment include both community-scale and household-scale point-of-use (POU) designs.[7]

The most reliable way to kill microbial pathogenic agents is to heat water to a rolling boil[8] but this requires abundant sources of fuel and is very onerous on the households, especially where it is difficult to store boiled water in sterile conditions. Other techniques, such filtration, chemical disinfection, and exposure to ultraviolet radiation (including solar UV) have been demonstrated in an array of randomized control trials to significantly reduce levels of water-borne disease among users in low-income countries[9], but these suffer from the same problems as boiling methods.

Over the past decade, an increasing number of field-based studies have been undertaken to determine the success of POU measures in reducing waterborne disease. The ability of POU options to reduce disease is a function of both their ability to remove microbial pathogens if properly applied and such social factors as ease of use and cultural appropriateness. Technologies may generate more (or less) health benefit than their lab-based microbial removal performance would suggest.

The current priority of the proponents of POU treatment is to reach large numbers of low-income households on a sustainable basis. Few POU measures have reached significant scale thus far, but efforts to promote and commercially distribute these products to the world's poor have only been under way for a few years.

Parameters for drinking water quality typically fall under two categories: chemical/physical and microbiological. Chemical/physical parameters include heavy metals, trace organic compounds, total suspended solids (TSS), and turbidity. Microbiological parameters include Coliform bacteria, E. coli, and specific pathogenic species of bacteria (such as cholera-causing Vibrio cholerae), viruses, and protozoan parasites.

Chemical parameters tend to pose more of a chronic health risk through buildup of heavy metals although some components like nitrates/nitrites and arsenic may have a more immediate impact. Physical parameters affect the aesthetics and taste of the drinking water and may complicate the removal of microbial pathogens.

Originally, fecal contamination was determined with the presence of coliform bacteria, a convenient marker for a class of harmful fecal pathogens. The presence of fecal coliforms (like E. Coli) serves as an indication of contamination by sewage. Additional contaminants include protozoan oocysts such as Cryptosporidium sp., Giardia lamblia, Legionella, and viruses (enteric).[10] Microbial pathogenic parameters are typically of greatest concern because of their immediate health risk.

Water politics and water crisis

Water politics is politics affected by water and water resources. For this reason, water is a strategic resource in the globe and an important element in many political conflicts. It causes health impacts and damage to biodiversity.

1.6 billion people have gained access to a safe water source since 1990 [1]. The proportion of people in developing countries with access to safe water is calculated to have improved from 30 percent in 1970[4] to 71 percent in 1990, 79 percent in 2000 and 84 percent in 2004. This trend is projected to continue.[5] To halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water is one of the Millennium Development Goals. This goal is projected to be reached.

A 2006 United Nations report stated that "there is enough water for everyone", but that access to it is hampered by mismanagement and corruption.[41]

The UN World Water Development Report (WWDR, 2003) from the World Water Assessment Program indicates that, in the next 20 years, the quantity of water available to everyone is predicted to decrease by 30 percent. 40 percent of the world's inhabitants currently have insufficient fresh water for minimal hygiene. More than 2.2 million people died in 2000 from waterborne diseases (related to the consumption of contaminated water) or drought. In 2004, the UK charity WaterAid reported that a child dies every 15 seconds from easily preventable water-related diseases; often this means lack of sewage disposal; see toilet.

Organizations concerned in water protection include International Water Association (IWA), WaterAid, Water 1st, American Water Resources Association. Water related conventions are United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and Ramsar Convention. World Day for Water takes place on 22 March and World Ocean Day on 8 June.

Water used in the production of a good or service is virtual water.

Industrial applications

Water is used in power generation. Hydroelectricity is electricity obtained from hydropower. Hydroelectric power comes from water driving a water turbine connected to a generator. Hydroelectricity is a low-cost, non-polluting, renewable energy source. The energy is supplied by the sun. Heat from the sun evaporates water, which condenses as rain in higher altitudes, from where it flows down.
Three Gorges Dam is the largest hydro-electric power station

Pressurized water is used in water blasting and water jet cutters. Also, very high pressure water guns are used for precise cutting. It works very well, is relatively safe, and is not harmful to the environment. It is also used in the cooling of machinery to prevent over-heating, or prevent saw blades from over-heating.

Water is also used in many industrial processes and machines, such as the steam turbine and heat exchanger, in addition to its use as a chemical solvent. Discharge of untreated water from industrial uses is pollution. Pollution includes discharged solutes (chemical pollution) and discharged coolant water (thermal pollution). Industry requires pure water for many applications and utilizes a variety of purification techniques both in water supply and discharge

Water industry

The water industry provides drinking water and wastewater services (including sewage treatment) to households and industry. Water supply facilities includes for example water wells cisterns for rainwater harvesting, water supply network, water purification facilities, water tanks, water towers, water pipes including old aqueducts. Atmospheric water generators are in development.

Drinking water is often collected at springs, extracted from artificial borings (wells) in the ground, or pumped from lakes and rivers. Building more wells in adequate places is thus a possible way to produce more water, assuming the aquifers can supply an adequate flow. Other water sources include rainwater collection. Water may require purification for human consumption. This may involve removal of undissolved substances, dissolved substances and harmful microbes. Popular methods are filtering with sand which only removes undissolved material, while chlorination and boiling kill harmful microbes. Distillation does all three functions. More advanced techniques exist, such as reverse osmosis. Desalination of abundant seawater is a more expensive solution used in coastal arid climates.

The distribution of drinking water is done through municipal water systems, tanker delivery or as bottled water. Governments in many countries have programs to distribute water to the needy at no charge. Others argue that the market mechanism and free enterprise are best to manage this rare resource and to finance the boring of wells or the construction of dams and reservoirs.

Reducing usage by using drinking (potable) water only for human consumption is another option. In some cities such as Hong Kong, sea water is extensively used for flushing toilets citywide in order to conserve fresh water resources.

Polluting water may be the biggest single misuse of water; to the extent that a pollutant limits other uses of the water, it becomes a waste of the resource, regardless of benefits to the polluter. Like other types of pollution, this does not enter standard accounting of market costs, being conceived as externalities for which the market cannot account. Thus other people pay the price of water pollution, while the private firms' profits are not redistributed to the local population victim of this pollution. Pharmaceuticals consumed by humans often end up in the waterways and can have detrimental effects on aquatic life if they bioaccumulate and if they are not biodegradable.

Wastewater facilities are storm sewers and wastewater treatment plants. Another way to remove pollution from surface runoff water is bioswale.

Effects on human civilization

Water fit for human consumption is called drinking water or potable water. Water that is not potable can be made potable by filtration or distillation (heating it until it becomes water vapor, and then capturing the vapor without any of the impurities it leaves behind), or by other methods (chemical or heat treatment that kills bacteria). Sometimes the term safe water is applied to potable water of a lower quality threshold (i.e., it is used effectively for nutrition in humans that have weak access to water cleaning processes, and does more good than harm). Water that is not fit for drinking but is not harmful for humans when used for swimming or bathing is called by various names other than potable or drinking water, and is sometimes called safe water, or "safe for bathing". Chlorine is a skin and mucous membrane irritant that is used to make water safe for bathing or drinking. Its use is highly technical and is usually monitored by government regulations (typically 1 part per million (ppm) for drinking water, and 1–2 ppm of chlorine not yet reacted with impurities for bathing water).

This natural resource is becoming scarcer in certain places, and its availability is a major social and economic concern. Currently, about a billion people around the world routinely drink unhealthy water. Most countries accepted the goal of halving by 2015 the number of people worldwide who do not have access to safe water and sanitation during the 2003 G8 Evian summit.[21] Even if this difficult goal is met, it will still leave more than an estimated half a billion people without access to safe drinking water and over a billion without access to adequate sanitation. Poor water quality and bad sanitation are deadly; some five million deaths a year are caused by polluted drinking water. The World Health Organization estimates that safe water could prevent 1.4 million child deaths from diarrhea each year.[22] Water, however, is not a finite resource, but rather re-circulated as potable water in precipitation in quantities many degrees of magnitude higher than human consumption. Therefore, it is the relatively small quantity of water in reserve in the earth (about 1 percent of our drinking water supply, which is replenished in aquifers around every 1 to 10 years), that is a non-renewable resource, and it is, rather, the distribution of potable and irrigation water which is scarce, rather than the actual amount of it that exists on the earth. Water-poor countries use importation of goods as the primary method of importing water (to leave enough for local human consumption), since the manufacturing process uses around 10 to 100 times products' masses in water.

In the developing world, 90% of all wastewater still goes untreated into local rivers and streams.[23] Some 50 countries, with roughly a third of the world’s population, also suffer from medium or high water stress, and 17 of these extract more water annually than is recharged through their natural water cycles.[24] The strain not only affects surface freshwater bodies like rivers and lakes, but it also degrades groundwater resources.

Effects on life

From a biological standpoint, water has many distinct properties that are critical for the proliferation of life that set it apart from other substances. It carries out this role by allowing organic compounds to react in ways that ultimately allow replication. All known forms of life depend on water. Water is vital both as a solvent in which many of the body's solutes dissolve and as an essential part of many metabolic processes within the body. Metabolism is the sum total of anabolism and catabolism. In anabolism, water is removed from molecules (through energy requiring enzymatic chemical reactions) in order to grow larger molecules (e.g. starches, triglycerides and proteins for storage of fuels and information). In catabolism, water is used to break bonds in order to generate smaller molecules (e.g. glucose, fatty acids and amino acids to be used for fuels for energy use or other purposes). Water is thus essential and central to these metabolic processes. Therefore, without water, these metabolic processes would cease to exist, leaving us to muse about what processes would be in its place, such as gas absorption, dust collection, etc.

Water is also central to photosynthesis and respiration. Photosynthetic cells use the sun's energy to split off water's hydrogen from oxygen. Hydrogen is combined with CO2 (absorbed from air or water) to form glucose and release oxygen. All living cells use such fuels and oxidize the hydrogen and carbon to capture the sun's energy and reform water and CO2 in the process (cellular respiration).

Water is also central to acid-base neutrality and enzyme function. An acid, a hydrogen ion (H+, that is, a proton) donor, can be neutralized by a base, a proton acceptor such as hydroxide ion (OH−) to form water. Water is considered to be neutral, with a pH (the negative log of the hydrogen ion concentration) of 7. Acids have pH values less than 7 while bases have values greater than 7.
Some of the biodiversity of a coral reef

Stomach acid (HCl) is useful to digestion. However, its corrosive effect on the esophagus during reflux can temporarily be neutralized by ingestion of a base such as aluminum hydroxide to produce the neutral molecules water and the salt aluminum chloride. Human biochemistry that involves enzymes usually performs optimally around a biologically neutral pH of 7.4.

For example a cell of Escherichia coli contains 70% of water, a human body 60–70%, plant body up to 90% and the body of an adult jellyfish is made up of 94–98% water.

Fresh water storage

Some runoff water is trapped for periods of time, for example in lakes. At high altitude, during winter, and in the far north and south, snow collects in ice caps, snow pack and glaciers. Water also infiltrates the ground and goes into aquifers. This groundwater later flows back to the surface in springs, or more spectacularly in hot springs and geysers. Groundwater is also extracted artificially in wells. This water storage is important, since clean, fresh water is essential to human and other land-based life. In many parts of the world, it is in short supply.

Water cycle

The water cycle (known scientifically as the hydrologic cycle) refers to the continuous exchange of water within the hydrosphere, between the atmosphere, soil water, surface water, groundwater, and plants.

Water moves perpetually through each of these regions in the water cycle consisting of following transfer processes:

* evaporation from oceans and other water bodies into the air and transpiration from land plants and animals into air.
* precipitation, from water vapor condensing from the air and falling to earth or ocean.
* runoff from the land usually reaching the sea.

Most water vapor over the oceans returns to the oceans, but winds carry water vapor over land at the same rate as runoff into the sea, about 36 Tt per year. Over land, evaporation and transpiration contribute another 71 Tt per year. Precipitation, at a rate of 107 Tt per year over land, has several forms: most commonly rain, snow, and hail, with some contribution from fog and dew. Condensed water in the air may also refract sunlight to produce rainbows.

Water runoff often collects over watersheds flowing into rivers. A mathematical model used to simulate river or stream flow and calculate water quality parameters is hydrological transport model. Some of water is diverted to irrigation for agriculture. Rivers and seas offer opportunity for travel and commerce. Through erosion, runoff shapes the environment creating river valleys and deltas which provide rich soil and level ground for the establishment of population centers. A flood occurs when an area of land, usually low-lying, is covered with water. It is when a river overflows its banks or flood from the sea. A drought is an extended period of months or years when a region notes a deficiency in its water supply. This occurs when a region receives consistently below average precipitation.

Water on Earth

Hydrology is the study of the movement, distribution, and quality of water throughout the Earth. The study of the distribution of water is hydrography. The study of the distribution and movement of groundwater is hydrogeology, of glaciers is glaciology, of inland waters is limnology and distribution of oceans is oceanography. Ecological processes with hydrology are in focus of ecohydrology.

The collective mass of water found on, under, and over the surface of a planet is called the hydrosphere. Earth's approximate water volume (the total water supply of the world) is 1,360,000,000 km3 (326,000,000 mi3). Of this volume:[citation needed]
A graphical distribution of the locations of water on Earth.

* 1,320,000,000 km3 (316,900,000 mi3 or 97.2%) is in the oceans.
* 25,000,000 km3 (6,000,000 mi3 or 1.8%) is in glaciers, ice caps and ice sheets.
* 13,000,000 km3 (3,000,000 mi3 or 0.9%) is groundwater.
* 250,000 km3 (60,000 mi3 or 0.02%) is fresh water in lakes, inland seas, and rivers.
* 13,000 km3 (3,100 mi3 or 0.001%) is atmospheric water vapor at any given time.

Groundwater and fresh water are useful or potentially useful to humans as water resources.

Liquid water is found in bodies of water, such as an ocean, sea, lake, river, stream, canal, pond, or puddle. The majority of water on Earth is sea water. Water is also present in the atmosphere in solid, liquid, and vapor states. It also exists as groundwater in aquifers.

Water is important in many geological processes. Groundwater is ubiquitous in rocks, and the pressure of this groundwater affects patterns of faulting. Water in the mantle is responsible for the melt that produces volcanoes at subduction zones. On the surface of the Earth, water is important in both chemical and physical weathering processes. Water and, to a lesser but still significant extent, ice, are also responsible for a large amount of sediment transport that occurs on the surface of the earth. Deposition of transported sediment forms many types of sedimentary rocks, which make up the geologic record of Earth history.
Water cycle

Water and habitable zone

The existence of liquid water, and to a lesser extent its gaseous and solid forms, on Earth is vital to the existence of life on Earth as we know it. The Earth is located in the habitable zone of the solar system; if it were slightly closer to or further from the Sun (about 5%, or about 8 million kilometres), the conditions which allow the three forms to be present simultaneously would be far less likely to exist.[19][20]

Earth's gravity allows it to hold an atmosphere. Water vapor and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere provide a temperature buffer (greenhouse effect) which helps maintain a relatively steady surface temperature. If Earth were smaller, a thinner atmosphere would allow temperature extremes, thus preventing the accumulation of water except in polar ice caps (as on Mars).

The surface temperature of Earth has been relatively constant through geologic time despite varying levels of incoming solar radiation (insolation), indicating that a dynamic process governs Earth's temperature via a combination of greenhouse gases and surface or atmospheric albedo. This proposal is known as the Gaia hypothesis.

The state of water on a planet depends on ambient pressure, which is determined by the planet's gravity. If a planet is sufficiently massive, the water on it may be solid even at high temperatures, because of the high pressure caused by gravity.

There are various theories about origin of water on Earth.

Water in the universe

Much of the universe's water may be produced as a byproduct of star formation. When stars are born, their birth is accompanied by a strong outward wind of gas and dust. When this outflow of material eventually impacts the surrounding gas, the shock waves that are created compress and heat the gas. The water observed is quickly produced in this warm dense gas.[13]

Water has been detected in interstellar clouds within our galaxy, the Milky Way. Water probably exists in abundance in other galaxies, too, because its components, hydrogen and oxygen, are among the most abundant elements in the universe. Interstellar clouds eventually condense into solar nebulae and solar systems such as ours.

Water vapor is present on:

* Mercury - 3.4% in the atmosphere, and large amounts of water in Mercury's exosphere[14]
* Venus - 0.002% in the atmosphere
* Earth - trace in the atmosphere (varies with climate)
* Mars - 0.03% in the atmosphere
* Jupiter - 0.0004% in the atmosphere
* Saturn - in ices only
* Enceladus (moon of Saturn) - 91% in the atmosphere
* exoplanets known as HD 189733 b[15] and HD 209458 b.[16]

Liquid water is present on:

* Earth - 71% of surface
* Moon - small amounts of water have been found (in 2008) in the inside of volcanic pearls brought from Moon to Earth by the Apollo 15 crew in 1971.[17] NASA reported the detection of water molecules by NASA's Moon Mineralogy Mapper aboard the Indian Space Research Organization's Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft in September 2009.[18]

Strong evidence suggests that liquid water is present just under the surface of Saturn's moon Enceladus and on Jupiter's moon Europa where it may exist as a 100km deep ocean covering the whole moon which would amount to more water than is in all the Earth's oceans.

Water ice is present on:

* Earth - mainly as ice sheets
* polar ice caps on Mars
* Titan
* Europa
* Enceladus
* Comets and comet source populations (Kuiper belt and Oort cloud objects).

Water ice may be present on the Moon, Ceres, and Tethys. Water and other volatiles probably comprise much of the internal structures of Uranus and Neptune.

Chemical and physical properties

Water is the chemical substance with chemical formula H2O: one molecule of water has two hydrogen atoms covalently bonded to a single oxygen atom.

Water appears in nature in all three common states of matter and may take many different forms on Earth: water vapor and clouds in the sky; seawater and icebergs in the polar oceans; glaciers and rivers in the mountains; and the liquid in aquifers in the ground.

The major chemical and physical properties of water are:

* Water is a tasteless, odorless liquid at standard temperature and pressure. The color of water and ice is, intrinsically, a very light blue hue, although water appears colorless in small quantities. Ice also appears colorless, and water vapor is essentially invisible as a gas.[9]

* Water is transparent, and thus aquatic plants can live within the water because sunlight can reach them. Only strong UV light is slightly absorbed.

* Since the water molecule is not linear and the oxygen atom has a higher electronegativity than hydrogen atoms, it carries a slight negative charge, whereas the hydrogen atoms are slightly positive. As a result, water is a polar molecule with an electrical dipole moment. The net interactions between the dipoles on each molecule cause an effective skin effect at the interface of water with other substances, or air at the surface, the latter given rise to water's high surface tension. This dipolar nature contributes to water molecules' tendency to form hydrogen bonds which cause water's many special properties.[10] The polar nature also favors adhesion to other materials.

* A result of interplay of these properties, Capillary action refers to the tendency of water to move up a narrow tube against the force of gravity. This property is relied upon by all vascular plants, such as trees.

* Water is a good solvent and is often referred to as the universal solvent. Substances that dissolve in water, e.g., salts, sugars, acids, alkalis, and some gases – especially oxygen, carbon dioxide (carbonation) are known as hydrophilic (water-loving) substances, while those that do not mix well with water (e.g., fats and oils), are known as hydrophobic (water-fearing) substances.

* All the major components in cells (proteins, DNA and polysaccharides) are also dissolved in water.

* Pure water has a low electrical conductivity, but this increases significantly with the dissolution of a small amount of ionic material such as sodium chloride.

* The boiling point of water (and all other liquids) is dependent on the barometric pressure. For example, on the top of Mt. Everest water boils at about 68 °C (154 °F), compared to 100 °C (212 °F) at sea level. Conversely, water deep in the ocean near geothermal vents can reach temperatures of hundreds of degrees and remain liquid.

* Water has the second highest specific heat capacity of any known substance, after ammonia, as well as a high heat of vaporization (40.65 kJ·mol−1), both of which are a result of the extensive hydrogen bonding between its molecules. These two unusual properties allow water to moderate Earth's climate by buffering large fluctuations in temperature.

* The maximum density of water occurs at 3.98 °C (39.16 °F).[11] Water becomes even less dense upon freezing, expanding 9%. This results in an unusual phenomenon: water's solid form, ice, floats upon water, allowing organisms to survive inside a partially-frozen water body because the water on the bottom has a temperature of around 4 °C (39 °F).

ADR label for transporting goods dangerously reactive with water

* Water is miscible with many liquids, for example ethanol, in all proportions, forming a single homogeneous liquid. On the other hand, water and most oils are immiscible usually forming layers according to increasing density from the top. As a gas, water vapor is completely miscible with air.

* Water forms an azeotrope with many other solvents.

* Water can be split by electrolysis into hydrogen and oxygen.

* As an oxide of hydrogen, water is formed when hydrogen or hydrogen-containing compounds burn or react with oxygen or oxygen-containing compounds. Water is not a fuel, it is an end-product of the combustion of hydrogen. The energy required to split water into hydrogen and oxygen by electrolysis or any other means is greater than the energy released when the hydrogen and oxygen recombine.[12]

* Elements which are more electropositive than hydrogen such as lithium, sodium, calcium, potassium and caesium displace hydrogen from water, forming hydroxides. Being a flammable gas, the hydrogen given off is dangerous and the reaction of water with the more electropositive of these elements may be violently explosive.

* At ultrahigh pressures found in deep interiors of giant planets Uranus and Neptune water may become metallic, which would have important implications for the generation of the magnetic fields of these planets.

BMI & Water Consumption

”Drinking water to shed weight is a waste of time”, is the headline in the Daily Mail. Research has found that drinking water, in particular the recommended eight glasses a day, to keep slim is a waste of time as it does not help you shed the pounds. People could be better off “eating foods rich in water, such as fruit, vegetables, rice, soups and casseroles”, the newspaper says.
The study involved more than 1,000 young women whose weight and waist measurement was compared with the amount of water that they drank each day. The study found no link between body size and fluids drunk, but there was a link with the water content of foods eaten. However, the study took place in a group of healthy Japanese women of normal weight who were not dieting. Diet and exercise are always going to have the greatest effect on body weight and adequate intake of water and other fluids throughout the day is necessary for the health of the body.
Where did the story come from?
Kentaro Murakami and colleagues of University of Tokyo, Wayo Women’s University and Kagawa Nutrition University, Japan, carried out this research. No sources of funding were reported for this study. The study was published in the peer-reviewed medical journal: Nutrition.
What kind of scientific study was this?
This was a cross-sectional study examining the association between water intake (consumed in both beverages and in foods) and waist circumference and BMI in a sample of women. The researchers recruited 1,176 female dietetic students (aged 18 to 22) from academic institutions across Japan. They excluded those with very low or very high daily energy intakes, those currently receiving dietary counselling and those with diabetes, high blood pressure or cardiovascular disease, leaving a total of 1,136 women.
The researchers looked at dietary intake over a month using a questionnaire that assessed the consumption of different foods, alcoholic drinks and dietary supplements and also looked at the cooking methods. The average daily intake for a total of 150 food and drink items was estimated, and then the overall water intake was worked out by adding together all beverages and the water content of different foods. Height and weight were measured and the BMI calculated, and waist circumference was also measured. The participants also completed a lifestyle questionnaire that looked at demographic details, including smoking, physical activity and weight loss aims. Statistical methods were used to look at the relationship between BMI and waist circumference and the water consumed.

Drinking Water & Health
DRINKING WATER ON EMPTY STOMACH...
It is popular in Japan today to drink water immediately after waking up every morning. Furthermore, scientific tests have proven its value. We publish below a description of use of water for our readers. For old and serious diseases as well as modern illnesses the water treatment had been found successful by a Japanese medical society as a 100% cure for the following diseases: Headache, body ache, heart system, arthritis, fast heart beat, epilepsy, excess fatness, bronchitis asthma, TB, meningitis, kidney and urine diseases, vomiting, gastritis, diarrhea, piles, diabetes, constipation, all eye diseases, womb, cancer and menstrual disorders, ear nose and throat diseases.
METHOD OF TREATMENT
1. As you wake up in the morning before brushing teeth, drink 4 x 160ml glasses of water
2. Brush and clean the mouth but do not eat or drink anything for 45 minute
3. After 45 minutes you may eat and drink as normal.
4. After 15 minutes of breakfast, lunch and dinner do not eat or drink anything for 2 hours
5. Those who are old or sick and are unable to drink 4 glasses of water at the beginning may commence by taking little water and gradually increase it to 4 glasses per day.
6. The above method of treatment will cure diseases of the sick and others can enjoy a healthy lifeThe following list gives the number of days of treatment required to cure/control/reduce main diseases
1. High Blood Pressure (30 days)
2. Gastric (10 days)
3. Diabetes (30 days)
4. Constipation (10 days)
5. TB (90 days)Arthritis patients should follow the above treatment only for 3 days in the 1st week, and from 2nd week onwards – daily.

Our life, our planet. Over 70% of the earth's surface is water. However, most of it—98%--is salt water. Only 2% of the earth's H20 is fresh water that we can drink, and of this, almost all is trapped in frozen glaciers.You are not just what you eat; you are what you drink.This is why water is so important to your health.The Water Cure (TWC) does not sell water or purification systems or any related products. We offer insights and information; both free and in books that give you easy-to-understand scientific explanations on why water is vital to your well-being.TWC believes promoting "water for health, for healing, for life" is an invaluable public health message. We can all change the way we drink – by drinking pure, natural water that is good for our health, our pocket book, and our environment.No miracles. Just common sense backed by Dr. F. Batmaghelidj’s years of research and investigation into why water works so well in keeping us healthy and pain free. It can even cure illness in some people who get sick.Water is the basis of all life and that includes your body. Your muscles that move your body are 75% water; your blood that transport nutrients is 82% water; your lungs that provide your oxygen are 90% water; your brain that is the control center of your body is 76% water; even your bones are 25% water.Our health is truly dependent on the quality and quantity of the water we drink.Dr. B's pioneering work shows that Unintentional Chronic Dehydration (UCD) contributes to and even produces pain and many degenerative diseases that can be prevented and treated by increasing water intake on a regular basis.If you are committed to a healthy lifestyle, make drinking enough natural water a habit in your life. It won't take long for you to feel the benefit.It is a free investment for your long-term health.