Back in the beginning of May when I was at the Total Beauty Summit, I was thrilled to have met Dr. Alan Hirsch who told me all about Sensa - a revolutionary new approach to weight loss, that he developed. I remember seeking the Doctor out at our welcome party before I even totally knew what Sensa was all about. That is how excited I was about this product. I needed to hear more.

“What Sensa does is intensify the smell and the taste of the food. This induces something called ’sensory-specific satiety.’ It makes your brain perceive that you’ve eaten more than you have and, thus, you eat less and lose weight.” - Dr. Alan Hirsch.

Basically, when you sit down to eat - and on everything you eat (not drink) you sprinkle a bit of these special “Sensa Tastants” on your food. You get two shakers that will last you a month. One shaker is for salty foods while the other is for sweet foods. Simple, right?

These “tastants” trick the brain into thinking that we are full by enhancing the smell of the food, not the taste. The certain smells have been researched and researched and are proven that these smells trigger a full feeling.

With Sensa, there are no food restrictions. It is designed to help you overcome the biological urge to overeat, so you can reduce your calorie consumption and lose weight while continuing to enjoy the foods you love and feeling fully satisfied. It works gradually, with no shock to your system.

The Doctor has put over 25 years of research into Sensa and the studies are proving that this works. A huge study was conducted over a 6 month period of time on over 1400 men and women between the ages of 19 - 55. Without changing anything else about their diet or exercise habits except for using Sensa sprinkled onto their food, these participants lost an average of 30.5 pounds in the six month period. 5 pounds a month, which is healthy, reasonable and easy to control once it is off.

I have intermittently tried Sensa, but I will be honest with you. I did not use it every day on every meal and I only did it for less than two weeks. I did not make the commitment, but now I am ready. Who wants to try Sensa with me? I have a six month program of Sensa (a $354 value) to give away and will fill you in on the contest in a bit.

To learn more about Sensa and see if it is something you would like to try, you need to visit the Try Sensa website where every part of this program is explained. It is a revolution and I cannot wait to put it to the test - for real this time.

images - Sensa

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From the Splendicity community, comes this week best in beauty, fashion and shopping.

FASHION

Painfully Hip suggests the perfect havoc-wreaking ensemble for the next time a wild streak sneaks up on you.

Wardrobe Oxygen offers some tips for a woman in her ’30s to perform a proper closet clean-out.

The Well-Heeled Society interviews Shoe Designer Mark Schwartz about his journey from being the protégé of Roger Vivier to his website launch of High Heeled Art.

Snarkstress wants your opinion on Jessica Simpson’s latest look: Is she hot…or not?

Teen Style Lounge has found 3 pairs of double-duty cuties that will take your footwear wardrobe from summer to fall.

BEAUTY

A Touch of Blusher reveals where to indulge in beauty retail therapy in London.

The Fragrance Fanatic suggests some great gift sets exclusive to Nordstrom’s Beauty Exclusives sale.

Beautiful Makeup Search says to Ban the Bumps with Bikini Zone. She is so excited about this product that she is giving away five tubes of this fantastic cream.

Aging Fabulous says that she is in dire need of this neck cream from StriVectin.

Beauty Blogging Junkie has identified her holy grail concealer. Find out what it is here.

Beauty Banter uncovers the secret powers of ZINC… in sunscreen!

Beautyholics Anonymous discovered the joys of Too Faced’s Shadow Insurance. Bye bye crease lines!

15 Minute Beauty Fanatic found a great liquid makeup from Tarte, but hurry, it’s Limited Edition!

Beautynomics interviews PCA Skin Head Scientist/Dermatologist Dr. Jennifer Linder about PCA Skin and gets to learn alot about skin care!

Steeping Beauty gets cleansing with NARS balancing foam mousse.

SHOPPING

eye4style gives in to a guilty fashion pleasure -Tori Spelling’s new jewelry line for HSN. Check it out here!

image (c) splendicity

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The brain is a singular organ - our selves are defined by its structure. The aging brain can't be replaced by the same near-future tissue engineering techniques that will give us new hearts and other organs grown fresh from our own stem cells. Thus we are going to have to become very good at repairing the brain in situ, cell by cell, aggregate by aggregate.

One of the biotechnologies needed to achieve this goal is mature regenerative medicine, specifically the ability to manipulate and reprogram stem cells within the brain. Those stem cells must first be found and categorized, and progress continues on that front:

Evidence strongly shows that the true stem cells in the mammalian brain are the ependymal cells that line the ventricles in the brain and spinal cord, rather than cells in the subventricular zone as biologists previously believed. Brain ventricles are hollow chambers filled with fluid that supports brain tissue, and a layer of ependymal cells lines these ventricles.

Knowing the cell source is crucial when developing stem cell-based therapies. Additionally, knowing that these normally dormant cells can be coaxed into dividing lays the groundwork for future therapies in which a patient's own stem cells produce new brain cells to treat neurological disorders and injuries such as Parkinson's disease, stroke or traumatic brain injury.

"With such a therapy, we would know which cells in the body to target for activation, and their offspring would have all the properties necessary to replace damaged or missing cells," said Darius Gleason, lead author of the study and a graduate student in the Department of Developmental and Cell Biology. "It is a very promising approach to stem cell therapy."

Replacing cells is only one part of repairing an age-damaged brain, however. You might take a look at the Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence to see the many other issues that accumulate in brain tissue of the course of a lifetime. A lot of work lies ahead.

From Milbar Laboratories, the lab that has been formulating innovative skin care in the medical market for Dermatologists and Plastic Surgeons for over 25 years comes their own brand M LAB. M LAB Skin Care just launched this year in the United States.

M LAB is the first line of innovative skincare that consists of unprecedented levels of clinically active ingredients, ranging from 45% to 74%. Average luxury cosmeceuticals may contain up to 20%, making M LAB the most powerfully corrective and effective skincare line.

Created to target every visual sign of the aging process, the M LAB line includes treatment creams, serums and sunscreens to combat the effects of aging as well as cleansers and toners to soothe and calm the skin. M LAB harnesses the power of active ingredients like peptides, antioxidants, and plant extracts to purify skin and turn back the clock with measurable, clinically tested results.

The best way to probably try the line is with their Travel Collection. For $130, you get six pieces of their star products.

In the travel kit are the following:
anti-aging cleanser
anti-aging toner
anti-aging treatment cream
anti-aging treatment serum
anti-aging day treatment SPF 15
anti-aging eye cream

I am really falling for the Eye Cream ($170) as I feel my skin is quickly becoming more even around the eyes and I swear I am dealing with less puffiness. The other favorite products of mine is the Treatment Serum ($275). I have noticed that my makeup glides on more effortlessly and stays on, looking freshly applied, when using. It is almost the most perfect makeup primer - with huge beneficial treatment ingredients.

As you may have noticed, the full size products are pretty expensive, making the travel kit a superb value. It really is the best way to try out the brand and see which products you really want before spending.

image credit: mlab

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An interesting post over at In Search of Enlightenment:

Firstly, support for legitimate longevity science is hampered by the vast number of products currently being sold as "anti-aging" therapies without any science to substantiate their claims. See here, for example. And thus one has to be very careful when convincing people that (1) aging is something that ought to be retarded (as it increases our risks of morbidity and mortality); and yet at the same time convince them that (2) we might actually be able to slow human aging and yet (3) none of the current products being sold on the market have been demonstrated to do this (indeed, they might be harmful). The latter point is emphasized, for example, in this excellent piece in the Scientific American by Jay Olshansky, Leonard Hayflick and Bruce A. Carnes.

Now if one is pressing (as indeed I am) (1) and (2), it is of course understandable that people will be want to do something about aging (and thus be tempted to violate (3)). But when asked "So what can I do to slow aging?" my response is "(a) support increasing the amount of public funding we invest in the biology of aging and (b) encourage linkages between different fields of research-- from genetics and evolutionary biology to engineering and statistics". Well, as you can imagine, many people will find that answer rather flat! They want the solution and they want it now (today)! The same is true about climate change. Few people have an interest in being told the best solution is investing in new R&D and might be long-term. Patience never was a human virtue.

There's more in that vein, so take a look. I'm not in the "slow aging by massive government funding of the same community that's strongly resisted progress to date" clade, but the excerpt above is a fair summary of the immediacy problem - that once you've convinced people to think about healthy life extension on the merits, the natural result is a lot of waste and noise in addition to helpful additions to the community. That's the way that humans tend to act; we're given to look for the backsliding easy way out, even when we know it's not going to work. For every person who donates to the Methuselah Foundation's longevity research program, there will be another who decides to look into a new wrinkle cream.

You can lose a lot of sleep over things like this, but I think we advocates are better for accepting that other peoples' choices are not our responsibility. Everyone has free will; our task is to make better information available and persuade those who can be persuaded to help advance the state of longevity science. However well we do, there will continue to be a dubious "anti-aging" snake-oil industry and some number of people making poor choices.