Introduction to nootropics

Introduction

Your brain needs more than just energy molecules like glucose or ketones to run.  Neurotransmitters are depleted by use, for example.  While they can be synthesized to an extent, your brain will work more efficiently if you consume them or their precursors.  There are others, like acetylcholine, that you cannot completely synthesize, and have to consume.  Baseline amounts from a basic balanced diet will keep you going, but getting spike doses can help clear thinking.  Most generally defined, a nootropic is a cognitive enhancer that is not a stimulant and has very low toxicity.

Other supplements may not be found in a natural diet but will enhance or feed existing metabolic pathways.  L-Alpha Glycerylphosphorylcholine is more readily absorbed (though it’s found in milk so it’s not entirely unnatural).  Dimethylaminoethanol is man-made, very easily absorbed, and is methylated in the brain to produce choline.  Choline is one of the most essential building blocks of a nootropic regimen, and often has a significant effect alone.

Some may be concerned with a distinction between supplements and drugs.  As noted above, synthetic substances that produce effects identical to natural substances are readily found, and many will know that natural substances that produce effects outside of necessary metabolism are readily found in nature (caffeine and THC are good examples).  The natural/synthetic thus seems a poor line to divide “supplements” from “drugs”.  For the purposes of these discussions, the “natural effect” versus “synthetic effect” line will be used, when any distinction is made.  It is necessarily informal, and individual distinctions may later be found to be incorrect.  If you have qualms about drug use, thoroughly research the compounds before you use them and make the decision for yourself.

Choline Sources

As a near direct goal of most nootropic supplementation is to increase neural activity in the brain, increased consumption of essential nutrients used to make neurotransmitters is necessary.  Choline is one of primary concern.  One issue of note with choline is that it competes with protein to cross the blood brain barrier – thus spike choline supplementation should be done on an empty stomach.  Generally, an adult male’s adequate intake of choline is about 550 mg/d, slightly less for most females, but significantly higher for pregnant or breastfeeding females.  Listed amounts of the supplements target the ingestion of 100 mg of choline.

Dietary: eggs, chicken, cruciferous vegetables such as cauliflower, milk, fish, and liver, in increasing levels, contain significant amount of choline (varies).

Lecithin (3000 mg): usually available from an all natural source such as soy or sunflower oil.

Choline Bitartrate (1500 mg): Synthetic

Alpha GPG (L-Alpha Glycerylphosphorylcholine) (1200 mg): Hard to find now, but very effective.

DMAE (Dimethylaminoethanol) (1200 mg ?): Dosages not as well documented, but presumed from structure.  Tested and know to be safe well past 1600 mg/day.

Centrophenoxine (1200 mg): Not well documented.

Citicholine (cytidine diphosphate-choline, CDP Choline) (1200 mg): More expensive but one of the best sources.

Racetams

Racetams seem to work by activating glutamate receptors that are colocated with cholinergic receptors, increasing the firing of the cholinergic receptors.  The specific mechanisms are generally not well understood.  They all seem to increase working memory, memory recall, and cognition to various degrees.  Racetams are synergistic with choline sources – that is, the results of taking both is improved when they are used concurrently.  It is important to note racetam solubility.  It varies, and consuming a racetam with a small amount of food with which it is soluble will significantly increase uptake.  For example, consume a dose of a fat soluble racetam like aniracetam with 8 oz of milk.  Each is listed with solubility and a commonly recommended starting dose.

Piracetam: Improves cognition and working memory through increased cross-hemisphere communication within the brain.  Half life is 4-5 hours.  (water, 1000 mg 2bd)

Oxiracetam: Improves cognition, logical performance, memory, and spatial awareness. (water, 750 mg 2bd)

Aniracetam: Improves cognition, more potent and easily absorbed than piracetam or oxiracetam. Half life is 1.5-2 hours.  (fat, 250 mg 3bd)

Pramiracetam: Similar to piracetam. Half life of 4.5-6 hours.  (fat, 50 mg 1/2bd)

Nefiracetam: Antidepressant effects, may improve cognitive function and memory.  Reduction in testosterone and sperm motility associated with extremely high doses.  Half life 3-5 hours. (fat, 600 mg 2bd)

Stimulants

Mild stimulants are regularly used.  Caffeine, in the form of tea, coffee, and soft drinks, is consumed almost universally.  Most mild stimulants are plant alkaloids.  They often show synergistic effects with other compounds.

Caffeine: Practically ubiquitous.   Dosing with pills may be more effective in order to minimize uptake competition and standardize dose.

Ephedrine: More difficult to find due to FDA meddling.  Look for Ephedrine-HCL or Ephedrine Sulfide in Bronkaid or Primatene at a pharmacy.

Nicotine: Improves cognition and working memory. Generally taken as a transdermal patch.

Other

Some compounds show significant benefit but are not members of families with similar marked benefit.  Theanine, for example, has a mild psychoactive effect and appears to improve cognition and mood.

Theanine: Improves cognition and mood.  Found in tea, especially green tea (~10 mg per 8 oz serving) or isolated in pills.

Ginkgo biloba: Improves memory, concentration, and reduces the effects of vertigo.

Stacking

Taking supplements with synergistic effects or precursors is called stacking.

Simple stack

Below are the components of a very simple stack that will result in moderate improvements of cognition, memory, and energy.  It is important that these be taken with a small amount of milk or almond milk or other food (about four ounces of milk is all that is necessary).

800 mg piracetam
1200 mg lecithin
200 mg theanine
100 mg caffeine

Take that twice a day on an empty stomach.

Filed under: Health and wellness, medicine, nootropics, smart drugs, studying

Solar transit of Venus on 5 June

So there’s a solar transit of Venus the evening of 5 June, if you’re in the Americas.  It’s the morning of 6 June if you’re in Europe or the like.

Basically, Venus is going to slowly scoot across the disc of the sun.  There are a few ways to see it directly:

Pinhole viewer

Pinhole projector

Solar glasses

If you can find one, you can look through the storage material of a floppy disk.  It works surprisingly well for looking at the sun.

There’s more info on the times of the transit at http://www.transitofvenus.org/ and local transit times with automatic geolocation at http://transitofvenus.nl/wp/where-when/local-transit-times/.

Filed under: Astronomy

Basic nootropics

So you want to feed your brain what it needs to think faster?  These are compounds that

Cognitive Function

Racetams

Piracetam – Increases cognitive function, memory recall.  500-2000 mg

Aniracetam – Increases memory storage but causes a “sleepyhead” or dream-walking feeling in some.  100-500 mg

Pramiracetam – More concentrated piracetam.  20-50 mg

Nefiracetam – ?

Choline

These make your brain burn more choline than normal.  You’ll want artificial supplements.  Take these on an empty stomach, otherwise the liver will hijack them for glycogenesis.  The choline in 1200 mg of lecithin matches what is needed for about 800 mg of piracetam.

Lecithin – cheap and available.  1200-3600 mg

Alpha GPC – more expensive.

CDP-Choline – even more expensive, but crosses the BBB easier. 200-800 mg

Other

Caffeine – causes increased cognitive function, but can cause jitters and nervousness. 100-500 mg.

L-Theanine – Synergistic with caffeine, found in green tea too.  Reduces physical and mental stress. 50-200 mg.

Fish oil – provides base nutrition.  1000-4000 mg.

Sleep

Melatonin – hormone associated with sleeping. 3-6 mg.

Valerian root – promotes sleep. 500 mg.

Filed under: Health and wellness

Yep, Yelp’s Windows Phone app still sucks

Yeah, it’s just a blind search.  No login, no lists, nothing fun. 

Thinking about getting a Nokia Lumia 900, but the lack of keyboard is lame.  Are there any good windows phones coming out with keyboards?

Filed under: Computers and Internet

Windows Phone Apps

I keep searching for this list of apps that I post around.  It’s the stuff I use all the time on my LG Quantum and pretty much consider killer.

• Multicheckin – automatic foursquare checkin

• Sleep master – monitors sleep cycle through the accelerometer and sounds an alarm near your target time when you’re in the lightest sleep

• Stormglass (free, sideload only) – weather that can automatically update its live tile with the current location and conditions

• Outdoor Navigation – topo and street maps from a variety of sources, breadcrumbs, map caching, made for hiking/biking/offroading

• accurate tuner (free) – music instrument tuner

• Amazon mobile (free) – includes upc scanner and one click buying

• lookuptonight – iridium flares and ISS passes for current location through heavens above

• myfitnesspal (free) – exercise and food intake log

I’m also looking at Radio Controlled and MetroRadio even though Pandora STILL doesn’t work right on the pc.

Filed under: Computers and Internet

Gear: Goal0 Sherpa 120 Battery

Goal0 Sherpa 120 Battery

Background

After I got and reviewed a Goal0 Guide 10 4AA Battery Recharger a couple of weeks earlier, I decided to jump in and get the big battery.  I fly on Southwest and Air Tran a lot, and it’s apparently magically impossible for them to have power outlets on their planes, even though every other 737 operator in creation has them.  So it’s either deal with 90 minutes of movie-playing time, or go without.  Well, it was.  This thing is a hoss, it weighs about three pounds, takes arbitrary power in, and provides power out from a standard USB-B female socket at 5 vdc, and some arbitrary coaxial plug at 12 vdc.  It comes with a near-proprietary charger and a converter from the output socket to a standard car lighter socket.

There’s also Sherpa 50 Battery, which I haven’t tested, which seems to be almost exactly the same thing, but with a smaller battery set.

Construction

The construction is, again, rock solid. This thing is, for all intents and purposes, a brick.  There’s a slight chance of damage to the status indicator and power button, but after a month of heavy travel I haven’t even come close to hurting them.

The thing weighs about three pounds.  It’s got a lithium-iron phosphate (LiFe) battery instead of the more common  lithium-ion/lithium-polymer batteries that most laptops and phones have.  This gives it about 15% less energy density per mass, but the battery will hold a charge longer and not degrade as fast (yeah, that 1-2 year laptop battery lifespan should not apply to this one).

Specifications

From the specs, it looks like the “120″ is a reference to 120 watt-hours of power storage – the 30 watt solar panel charges it in a minimum of 4 hours. That means it would keep my cell phone running for a month (assuming I use about half of its battery’s 5.55 watt-hour capacity a day). Or my laptop running for about six hours (depending on how hard I ran her – it’s a “full sized” laptop, so netbooks and tablets will run longer).

There isn’t much to it.  On the front face, it has a coax charging port, power indicator, battery meter, power button, usb output port, and coax output port.  On the back, it has a coax plug and socket for daisy-chaining.

• The power button switches the unit into charge/chain mode or off.
• The power indicator is solid green when it’s in charge/chain mode, and dark when it’s off.
• The charge socket is an uncommon coaxial socket that fits the included proprietary charger and accepts 15.3 v.
• One output is a USB-B female dumb (doesn’t negotiate) socket with the regular 0.5 A at 5 vdc.
• The other output is an uncommon coaxial socket that fits the included proprietary adapter to a standard cigarette lighter, and puts out 10 A at 12 vdc.
• The daisy chaining plugs/ports on the back are uncommon coaxial and appear to accept only 12 vdc, but that’s just going by what it says.

Observations

The pack only charges from the proprietary charger (or perhaps from another of these units connected to a proprietary charger), or from a Goal0 solar-panel like the Nomad 13.5M.  That means that for any significant use, I have to carry a bulky solar panel or a bulky single-purpose charger.  I tried using my iGo Travel Charger to charge it (and the standard tips fit all of the unit’s uncommon ports), but the charge sensed an input mismatch and turned off.

I’m puzzled as to why Goal0 did not use the 12 vdc input port for charging by default, and have it use a standard cigarette lighter adapter – that would allow an option for charging in a plane or car too.  I suppose the 12 volt output has a coax port to save space, but I have to carry the coax-to-lighter dongle any way, so there’s no real savings.

It also should have been easy to tie a voltage regulator into the primary charge port, to allow it to accept a wider range of inputs.

Several of these points lead to interesting experiments (what happens if I run my 19.1 vdc laptop charger through a voltage regulator and into the 15.3 vdc charge port?  Or do the same into the daisy-chaining port?  That’s for a later post.

It also seems more bulky than necessary.  I’m sure some is ruggedization, but it takes up a lot more space in my travel pack than I’d normally want to dedicate.  I’m sure some of the flashy case could be removed.

Conclusion

This is an attempt at getting the best of the worlds of rechargeable lithium battery technology and lead-acid/acid-mat batteries. As far as that goes, it’s not a bad shot. It approaches the lower weights of rechargeable lithium batteries and has the life span of a lead-acid battery.

Unfortunately, the designers missed several important design points that cost this unit a lot of practicality.  The requirement of a proprietary charger and the complete inability to charge from a DC power source significantly reduce the utility of this device, especially considering the cost.  Given that practically every laptop provides USB power any time a battery or power adapter is connected (even when sleeping or powered off), I’d be MUCH better served by getting two spare batteries for my laptop instead.  And it’s big enough that it doesn’t feel “electronics-heavy”, but like there’s dead air inside – a huge detriment for anything used in travel.

Sorry, Goal0, this gets one and a half out of five stars.

Filed under: Gear

Got mold?

Stolen from Reddit

Got mold? It’s hard to get rid of. (i.e, the following is a summary of a recent nightmare I’ve endured). It can take weeks to remove all visible mold and prevent it from coming back.

First, solve the moisture problem; open windows more, install dehumidifiers or run air conditioner often, check plumbing / seals for leaks, check for entering rain water etc.

Get a cheap temperature/humidity meter or two and place them around your house. I got two that are solar powered (they run off indoor lights) for $15/ea at a hardware store. The relative humidity should be <55% for as much of the time as possible but preferably lower.

Then, clean away the mold with a HEPA filtered vacuum cleaner (on rough surfaces), or clean with bleach (hard surfaces, tiles etc) but this won’t KILL the mold.

Now, kill the mold spores which are remaining by buying some distilled (‘pure’) clove oil from Name Your Linkamazon or a health store. Put about 1/2 tablespoon of the oil into about half a cup of methylated spirits (or denatured spirits, different named in different places around the world) and stir. Dilute this to 1 liter with water and then wipe the moldy surface: WORKS AMAZING FOR MOLDY SHOWERS. Clove oil is an incredible thing!

Lastly, some things are essentially ruined by mold in most cases and cannot be treated; leather and carpets are two examples. Throw them out.

Filed under: Random

Resolved: Windows Media Player shared libraries won’t show up on other devices

I recently had an issue with WMP where my shared libraries wouldn’t show up on other devices.  Specifically this is WMP12, sharing libraries over UPnP. 

I tried all sorts of troubleshooting – even built a UPnP monitor so I could see what was being advertised – they all were (note that WMP won’t show its own shared libraries on the computer that’s sharing them under other libraries).  I noticed a pattern.  The Tablet PC library would show up on both the Laptop PC and the Media PC, and the Tablet PC would see EITHER the Media PC or Laptop PC libraries, but never both.

I tried reconfiguring the home group, rebuilding the libraries, and all that.  I even re-sysprepped the Laptop PC and Media PC.  None of it helped.  I dug in the registry and found something… Turns out it was my export/imported profile causing the issue.

The list of UPnP media servers is in the registry, under "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows Media Player NSS\3.0\Servers".  Turns out that the Laptop PC and Media PC had the same serial number, and that serial number is supposed to be unique per the spec.  So I closed WMP, stopped the related services (UPnP Device Host and Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service), deleted the subkeys, and started it all up again.  And they came right back.

More digging found that those keys are related to "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\UPnP Device Host\Description".  The next leap took a few minutes.  It looks like when you set up sharing, WMP registers its library with the WMP NSS service, which stores the reference under "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows Media Player NSS\3.0\Server Settings".  WMP gets that data from its local settings cache in "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\Preferences\HME".  And it pulls data into that from any library it finds.

Those last two bits (the registry keys and library data) are reinforcing.  WMP will rebuild the settings for one from the other.  The solution was to wipe all the WMP settings and the library, then run WMP again.  It will build a new library with entirely new settings (including a new GUID for the media server serial number).

In script form:

First use an elevated account to stop the related services:

net stop WMPNetworkSvc
net stop upnphost

Then wipe the duplicated data from the user account with the affected libraries:

taskkill -f -im wmplayer.exe
rd /s /q "%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Media Player"
reg /delete "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\MediaPlayer" /f

And restart the services from an elevated account:

net start WMPNetworkSvc
net start upnphost

And start Windows Media Player at your convenience.  It will go through the configuration dialog again, rebuild the library, and it should present a new serial number for the media server UPnP device.

Filed under: Computers and Internet, Windows Media Player; UPnP; DLNA

Thumbs down to Vizio’s E322VL

I was going to get the VIZIO E322VL, but held off and did some more research.  Apparently it has no DLNA support.  I couldn’t find a single Vizio TV that does.  Gonna have to pass on this one.  This ain’t the year 2000 – electronics need to work together without brand lock-in.

Filed under: Computers and Internet, Gear

Mini to Micro USB adapter

Has a USB Mini-B female socket on one end, and a USB Micro-B male plug on the other.  Plus a little tether so you can connect it to a cable.  With my mix of devices that have mini (battery charger, camera) and micro sockets (phone, nook), I’d have to carry around twice the number of cables.  Now I carry two cables, each with one of these adapters on it.  I also keep one on the car charger.

Filed under: Computers and Internet, Gear, Travel