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Immunology: Th1/Th2 vs cellular/humoral responses
Discussion of all aspects of cellular structure, physiology and communication.
Moderator: BioTeam
11 posts • Page 1 of 1
Immunology: Th1/Th2 vs cellular/humoral responses
I'm having some trouble getting these distinctions clear in my mind. Could someone please help me to understand the difference(s) between these two distinctions:
Let me try to explain what seems unclear. I understand a "cellular" response to involve increased T cell activity, especially CD8+ cytotoxic T cells, but also 'helper' CD4+ T cells which enhance the activity of CD8+ T cells. I understand a "humoral" response to involve increased B cell activity, especially plasma cells and, therefore, increased production of antibodies. B cells also receive 'help' from CD4+ T cells. This is where the difference between the two distinctions becomes unclear to me. CD4+ T cells that help CD8+ T cells are referred to as Th1 cells, correct? CD4+ T cells that help B cells are referred to as Th2 cells, correct? Or do Th2 cells merely self-promote CD4+ cells?
My confusion leads me to think that the two types of distinction listed above are very similar i.e. that a Th1 response is very much related to a cellular response and that a Th2 response is very much related to a humoral response. I'd be very grateful if someone could confirm this or explain where I'm going wrong.
Two related questions:
I hope I have been clear about the things which are... unclear to me! I look forward to someone helping me out!
Thanks in advance for your time,
As far as I can tell, you have understood the things quite well.
About the direct CD4+ effect: There is no such direct CD4+ response as there is with CD8+ T cells, B cells, or cells of the innate immune system. CD4+ cells function by strenghtening or regulating the response of other immune cells. CD4+ cells themselves depend on the so-called antigen presenting cells (APCs) that collect antigens from their environment and display it to the CD4+ cells. These cells include dendritic cells, macrophages and B cells.
About the Ig molecules: Th1 and Th2 responses are pretty much determined by the cytokines the Th cells secrete. For example, Th1 cytokines, such as IFN-g, tend to promote IgG-based responses that are, for example, protective from allergy. Thus, healthy persons tend to mount Th1-biased immune responses towards harmless allergens, whilst atopic persons have Th2-deviated (cytokines such as IL4) responses that promote IgE formation. IgE, in turn, binds to basophils and mast cells and when an allergen is bound by its specific IgE, it cross-links the FceRI receptors on surface of the basophil and causes the release of substances that cause the allergic symptoms.
Physiologically, Th1 responses are thought to be important for defence against microbes and Th2 against multicellular parasites. The low number of parasitic infections in modern Western world is thought to be one reason for the increase in the prevalence of allergy. However, the precise roles of the different types of responses are still not fully understood and it is quite likely that many other Th responses and T cell subsets wait to be recognized.
Different Th responses do not exclusively target just one cell type (e.g. B cells), but have wider effect on many types of immune cells. The outcome of any given response is a sum of many factors and usually includes cytokines from many cell types and cell-cell interactions between different cells.
Re: Immunology: Th1/Th2 vs cellular/humoral responses
I don't know who you are, biohazard, but I really hope you are a teacher of some kind. That was an incredibly clear and structured explanation. Thank you - I am finally comfortable with these definitions which have eluded me for ages!
Why, thank you :)
I actually do some teaching; I teach microbiology and immunology to medical students a few months in a year. I hope they feel my explanations good enough as well (admittedly, they quite often look like they just didn't understand anything :P)
Most of my time goes to research, though!
Re: Immunology: Th1/Th2 vs cellular/humoral responses
Looks like the story of the role of immunoglobulins is in revision.
Donna L. Mallery, William A. McEwan, Susanna R. Bidgood, Greg J. Towers, Chris M. Johnson, and Leo C. James
Antibodies mediate intracellular immunity through tripartite motif-containing 21 (TRIM21)
PNAS published ahead of print November 2, 2010, doi:10.1073/pnas.1014074107
Open access:
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/ ... 7.abstract
Re: Immunology: Th1/Th2 vs cellular/humoral responses
You're very welcome -- that paper challenged my mental model and I thought you'd find it tasty too.
Re: Immunology: Th1/Th2 vs cellular/humoral responses
The field of immunology is a slippery one to get a grasp on. I like to remind myself that just prior to the discovery of T cells, an eminent immunologist of the time proclaimed at a symposium for the field that they now knew all of the parts of the immune system, it was just a matter of mopping up some details. Here we are talking about Th1, Th1, Th17, Treg etc.
TRIM21 was a very interesting discovery and I look forward to reading about detailed functional analysis in the future.
My point, however, is that I would like to respectfully disagree with biohazard's assessment that CD4+ T cells are not direct effectors in the way a classical CD8+ T cell is thought to be. This was certainly the long-held theory, but not so recent observations have cast confusion onto that neat package. Various groups have indeed described CTL-like function in CD4+ cells. (here is a random reference: ucp.php?mode=activate&u=70785&k=2MS6YGSIGU)
The fact that T cell classifications are still not rock-solid will no doubt be of little surprise to biohazard since based, on reading his very helpful summary of Th cells, biohazard certainly understands the evolving nature of immunological discovery and debate.
Re: Immunology: Th1/Th2 vs cellular/humoral responses
Indeed, I am not surprised about anything when it comes to the field of immunology - new things are discovered every day and old theories get abandoned or remodeled along the way. Thus it is often very difficult to explain these things in any kind of simplified manner as there are exceptions after exceptions everywhere and unknown pathways and previously unknown cell types, and new functions are found for "old" cells all the time.
I know that CD4+ cells engage in lots of cell-to-cell interaction when working with other cells of the immune system and I'm not too surprised if some "direct" mechanism of action has been described that does something else than regulates or controls. Unfortunately I was not able to open the link in your post so I could not take a better look at what that was all about.
Perhaps you could check the link to the reference when you have time and I will take a look at it after I return from my brief holiday. Anyways, thank you for pointing out that I have missed this kind of detail.
Th1/Th2 division is mainly based on the cytokines they produce and they do not exclusively help just one certain cell type. Th1 cells produce cytokines (such as IFN-g) that generally promote cell-mediated immunity, including CD8+ T cells and Th2 cytokines (e.g. IL-4) promote humoral responses / B cell function.
However, this division is simplified since many more cytokines are produced by both helper T cell subsets, and there is overlap in cytokine production and function of different helper T cell subsets.
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I-90 eastbound in bad shape
Gazette staff
Monday, February 17, 2014
JANESVILLE—Anyone considering taking Interstate 90/39 south should have considered another route on Monday afternoon.
The State Patrol reported numerous runoffs between Madison and Beloit, with traffic moving slowly around 4 p.m.
A crash in the eastbound lanes near the Milwaukee Street underpass at Janesville, which occurred at 2:05 p.m., also contributed to a traffic backup. That accident scene was reportedly cleared at 4:40 p.m.
Plows were out, but it would take time to get the Interstate into safer driving condition, a State Patrol spokeswoman said.
Northbound Interstate lanes in the Madison area were also said to be affected by accidents.

subset: commoncrawl


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Project Power: An HIV Risk Reduction Intervention for Black Men Who Have Sex With Men and Women (BMSM/W) (Power)
- Full Text View
- Tabular View
- No Study Results Posted
- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
|Unsafe Sex Risk Reduction
|Behavioral: PROJECT POWER Behavioral: Power Health
|Phase 1 Phase 2
|Study Type:
|Study Design:
|Allocation: Randomized
Intervention Model: Single Group Assignment
Masking: Single (Participant)
Primary Purpose: Prevention
|Official Title:
|Developing and Testing of an HIV Prevention Intervention Targeting Black Men Who Have Sex With Men and Women (BMSM/W)
- unprotected sex [ Time Frame: last 3 month ]Unprotected sex refers to either vaginal or anal sex
- number of sex partners [ Time Frame: last 3 months ]number of sex partners refers to either male or female sex partners
|Study Start Date:
|July 2011
|Study Completion Date:
|March 2014
|Primary Completion Date:
|March 2014 (Final data collection date for primary outcome measure)
|Assigned Interventions
Experimental: POWER
Power is a 3 session intervention delivered through the internet in real time by a trained health educator. It focuses on reducing HIV risk. Each session last from 1 to 2 hours.
Behavioral: PROJECT POWER
POWER is a three session intervention to help Black men who have sex with men and women lead healthier lives, make informed sexual choices and reduce their chances of getting or giving HIV to their sex partners. Interventions are designed to be delivered via the internet in real time by a trained health educator. Each session will last between 1 and 2 hours. The sessions are grounded on the social learning theory and use cognitive behavioral approaches. Participants learn the multiple influences on their behavior, how to identify their triggers and then use problem solving skills to develop a safer strategy for life. The sessions use videos and games to teach the lessons; participants are also given work that they must complete between the sessions.
Active Comparator: Power Health
Power Health is a 1 session general health promotion program designed to be delivered via the internet in real time by a trained health educator. The sessions focus on healthy life styles, cardiovascular health, and prostate health. Participants also receive information regarding safe sex.
Behavioral: Power Health
Power Health is a one session intervention designed to help Black men who have sex with men and women improve their general health. It focuses on health issues (including HIV) that affect Black men. The program consists of 1 session delivered via the internet in real time by a trained health educator and last approximately 2 hours
Detailed Description:
The purpose of this study is to examine the preliminary efficacy, feasibility and acceptability of delivering a culturally and developmentally tailored HIV risk reduction intervention via the Internet in real-time that promotes risk reduction among black men who have sex with men and women (BMSMW). During the Developmental Phase, our activities will consist of completing development (finalizing sessions, completing the manuals) of a theoretically grounded, culturally based, individual intervention, Project POWER, to reduce risk of HIV acquisition and transmission among BMSMW.
The investigators will then conduct a randomized controlled trial (RCT) to test the preliminary efficacy, acceptability, and feasibility of POWER compared to HEALTH. Using chain referral methods, the investigators will recruit 200 BMSMW (100 per arm) and assign them to 1 of 2 conditions (POWER or HEALTH). Participants will complete an assessment battery delivered via ACASI at baseline, immediate post intervention and at 3 months post intervention. The investigators will also measure uptake of HIV and STI testing. Participants will also complete acceptability/feasibility assessments after the
Choosing to participate in a study is an important personal decision. Talk with your doctor and family members or friends about deciding to join a study. To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the contacts provided below. For general information, Learn About Clinical Studies.
|Ages Eligible for Study:
|18 Years to 60 Years (Adult)
|Sexes Eligible for Study:
|Accepts Healthy Volunteers:
Inclusion Criteria:
- Self identify as Black or African descent
- At least 18 years of age
- Resident of Chicago MSA
- Sexually active with men and women
Exclusion Criteria:
- Previously participated in the study
- Identify as transgendered
To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the contact information provided by the sponsor.
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier (NCT number): NCT01376895
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier (NCT number): NCT01376895
|United States, Illinois
|John H. Stroger Hospital of Cook county
|Chicago, Illinois, United States, 60612
|Responsible Party:
|Nova Southeastern University
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
|NCT01376895 History of Changes
|Other Study ID Numbers:
5UR6PS0011095 ( Other Grant/Funding Number: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention )
|First Submitted:
|June 16, 2011
|First Posted:
|June 20, 2011
|Last Update Posted:
|March 11, 2014
|Last Verified:
|March 2014
Keywords provided by Nova Southeastern University:
Black MSM/W


text:
Spring 2014 Class Descriptions
Religion & the Constitution (Steven D. Smith)
3 credit(s)
Requirement(s): Writing
Remedies (Michael B. Kelly)
4 credit(s)
Concentration(s): Public Interest Law (JD), Civil Litigation (JD), Children's Rights (JD)
Legal and equitable remedies under statutes and the common law are examined and compared. The course focuses on methods of evaluating alternative remedies and arguing for or against their creation or use in a given case. The course objective is to enable the student not only to identify all available remedies but also to choose the preferred remedy from among them. The principal subjects covered are equity, restitution and damages.
Note: This is a required course for the Civil Litigation Concentration (JD).


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What are some ways to boost your immune system?
Debate and discussion of any biological questions not pertaining to a particular topic.
Moderator: BioTeam
What are some ways to boost your immune system?
Hello friends,
I have been very ill lately and the virus seem to be never ending and I always suffer weak because I am always ill. I have had three things wrong with me in the last week. Does anyone know of any ways to boost my immune system and stop these never ending virus's?
Any idea suggest me
John Messick
Re: What are some ways to boost your immune system?
Even though "boosting the immune system" is a very popular phrase with sellers of all sorts of useless stuff, I'm not absolutely sure that there is even a reliable way of measuring such an effect. Your immune system does become measurably more active when fighting something, but that's not really what "boosting" means.
Is there some way to "boost" your potential to fight new things off? Probably, but the most accessible means may just involve good nutrition and rest, which isn't very marketable.
And interestingly there are quite a few diseases that are the direct consequences of the immune system over reaction. Common cold is a common example
Science has proof without any certainty. Creationists have certainty without
any proof. (Ashley Montague)
Re: What are some ways to boost your immune system?
Your adaptive immune system gets naturally stronger whenever it gets into contact with pathogen, so paradoxically being too hygiene ( what most people do nowadays ) will make you weaker. People who were raised outside big cities, on farms, where they were exposed to pathogens much more throught contact with animals or dirt, have stronger immunity.
Also using medicines makes you weaker, cause you interfere with natural adaptive processes. Of course I don't advocate complete abandonment of medicines, just avoiding them when they are not necessary - common cold being an example. Whenever I get sick, I just let my immune system do the job. Now usually after few days I am fully recovered, feeling stronger than before the sickness.
From some more safe and controled ways of improving your immunity I would advice implementing some fermented foods into your diet. Bacterias compete with one another for gut flora space, so its advisable to promote the growth of good bacteria. Also they stimulate the lymphoid tissue. But be aware that most commercial fermented products are heated, so you won't find any good bacterias there. Buy some sauerkraut on local farmer's market or do your own kefir ( which is very easy actually ).
And last, but not necessary the least, laughning, enjoying life, meditating - anything that activates your parasympathetic nervous system, because it is like the reverse state of fight-or-flight which, when active in prolonged episodes, can be very detrimental to your health.
The so-called hygiene hypothesis is just that - a hypothesis. There are very little data that support the concept and the presumption that we are not constantly exposed to antigens/immune stimulation in any of our environments is not supported with data. The few reports that attempt to tie farm dwellers to better immunity cite asthma as the relevant measure. The etiology of asthma has not been tied to immune response or strength of immnity. Caban, can you provide more pivotal data on this?
Using medicines make you weaker? Reference please. Some claim Zn can shorten the cold but removing this, there are no treatments but appliative so we really have no choice but to rely on our immune system. I'm not sure what you mean in this context.
Mind giving a reference for the fermented food proposal?
Re: What are some ways to boost your immune system?
Exposure to antigens does broaden your specific immunities, if that means "strengthening," and there is evidence that without exposure to actual pathogens (possibly requiring worms), you immune system might be more prone to responding to allergens, but there would seem to be no mechanism to support your medicine hypothesis. Your immune system reacts to exposure, unrelated to the level of subsequent disease, so curing a disease should not change your antibody response.
Re: What are some ways to boost your immune system?
Hygiene hypothesis:
I will give you more data later, when I find some time.
About the medicines, of course it depends on the type. Some just "weaken" your immunity in the sense of removing part of the job from your immune system, which in consequence bring us to similar case - your white cells don't spend sufficient time on "training" and improving. Other medicines, like antibiotics, directly cotribute to weakening by permanently killing bacterias in your microflora:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v4 ... 6393a.html
http://chriskresser.com/the-high-price- ... ly-recover
Strange that you need any reference to fermented foods, since they are natural resources of probiotics, about which lately there have been made many researches, but anyway here you go:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... x/abstract
Re: What are some ways to boost your immune system?
Not true. Whenever your adaptive immune system is activated it uses memory B and T cells to remember certain pathogens, so next time it get exposed to them, it responds quicker and more efficient.
iCaban – thanks for the sophomoric response.
I'm not sure if you fail to understand the hygiene hypothesis or are blowing us of. Infuenza infection and diabetes has nothing to do with the model you proposed. In fact, one is much more likely to be exposed to influenza in a city environment.
If you meant antibiotic use – you should have said that. "Medicines" is a broad subject and antibiotics have nothing to do with the common cold – as you should know. In any case, antibiotic overuse would bring strains resistant to treatment, not a change in ones immune status.
We're all aware of gut flora's role in health – and you apparently confuse immunity with flora dynamics. The kefir reference you offered spoke of suppression of immune response.
And you should have more carefully read darby's comment before responding. You both spoke to the specificity of response - darby's point being that generation of a specific immune response would not benefit response to an unrelated challlenge. Of course we understand the anamnestic response to the same antigen.
Re: What are some ways to boost your immune system?
Ah, you're welcome.
I am sorry, but since english isn't my native language, I am not familiar with all scientific terms in this language, that's way I may make some misinterpretation.
The question wasn't about only common cold, but being ill/infected by a virus in general. So that is why I wanted to reply with general answer. Not all things directly contribute to better immune system, but nevertheless they can improve its efficacy. In situations like this I always try to take a whole organism perspective. The proper work of immune system heavily depends on its environment - both internal and external. So improving things like circulation, homeostatic balance or nutrition is also very important.
I meant medicines in general. And I don't know if you're aware, but many doctors tend to prescribe antibiotics for influenza ( probably mostly because of misdiagnose ).
Looks like your mature attitude towards my sophomoric response made you miss the articles I provided or you just tend to be too specific and reductionist. Here's the link to a study:
Now before you respond I would like to mention few things:
- probably, in general, you have much bigger knowledge than me in the field of medicine
- there was no intention in my response, it may seem otherwise quite possibly because, again, english isn't my native language
- there's a big chance that there's actually not much disagreement between us, just different attitudes/perspective to the same problem, for instance autoimmunity for me is also a sign of weakened immunity, but not in the strict sense
- of course I can be wrong in many/even all points, but being authoritative instead of dialectic won't do much here, maybe try to provide some counter data?
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Watch These Brides and Grooms Falling — Daily Distraction
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Maybe it's the open bar, but these brides and grooms just can't seem to stay on their feet.
So much about weddings is just great: the moment of the proposal, the faint-inducing ceremony, the happy couple sharing a crazy first dance, the bouquet toss… Somewhere along the line, though, people forget about little things like balance and gravity.
The Daily Distraction is your Internet break from reality. Whether you're eating lunch at your desk or avoiding high school exes on Facebook, you might just laugh, say "aaahhh" or not believe what you just watched.


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I've heard that nostalgia peaks about every 20 years, meaning that about now we should all be feeling warm and fuzzy over fond memories of the 1990s. Makes sense, I guess. After all, the '90s brought us the World Wide Web. And MP3 players. A revival of sorts in music and art. And a housing boom of Biblical proportions. Prosperity abounded. But then what happed? After a few years, the new millennium ushered in one of the worse blows to the global economy in history. Housing markets crashed. People lost jobs. People, businesses, even countries, faced bankruptcy. Miley Cyrus entered pop culture.
While admittedly less dramatic, a similar type of cyclical effect appears in the world of intellectual property. My patent practice began in 1998. The policies in place at the Patent Office, the jurisprudence, and even the vibe around the office then matched that of the general goings-on in the world. Companies had money to spend. Loosely defined inventions were getting patents. Life was good for patent owners.
Things started to change, though not quite as suddenly as the housing bubble burst, but they changed nonetheless. Throughout the 2000s, the Supreme Court issued a series of landmark patent decisions designed to reign in what the Justices viewed as patent-system excesses. Notably, the Festo decision precluded equivalent infringement if the patentee amended the originally filed claims, the KSR decision made inventions obvious simply if they could be deemed "predictable," and the Bilski decision opened the door for categorically denying business method patents as claiming patent ineligible abstract ideas. These decisions had a significant impact on the patent landscape to the detriment of patent owners. Then this year, in what was a remarkably IP-heavy docket, the Supreme Court continued its apparent anti-patent bent by revisiting certain bedrock principles of the U.S. patent system.
The most notable of the recent Supreme Court patent cases is the Alice v. CLS Bank decision, which at its core can be thought of as further constricting the subject matter that is eligible for patent protection. The Alice case involved a number of patents generally directed to schemes for managing settlement risk during financial transactions. The patents involved could be characterized as software and business method patents, which, as noted, have been under attack by the courts (Bilski and others) as claiming patent-ineligible abstract ideas. Even so, claims like those in Alice were generally allowed at the Patent Office (assuming the other requirements were met) provided that they included some type of machine or a tangible transformation of matter. Often, this test was considered satisfied simply through the inclusion of a computer or data-processor hardware in the claim. In Alice, however, the Supreme Court held that reciting a generic computer in software and method claims alone is no longer sufficient to ensure patentable subject matter, and further that the claims must recite some "inventive concept" or "something more" beyond a generic computer in order to convert a patent-ineligible abstract idea into patent-eligible subject matter. Not surprising, the Alice decision lacked useful guidance as to what that an "inventive concept" (or "something more") might be.
The basic proposition of Alice is not all that surprising given the trend in treatment of software and business method claims. The more notable (and troubling for some patent owners) aspect of the decision is that the patents at issue also included claims to the computer system and "computer-readable medium" (also known as "Beauregard" claims), which, by claiming tangible hardware or software storage devices, previously had been free from the controversy surrounding the patent eligibility of software and business method claims. The Supreme Court, however, concluded that these claims were no different in substance from computer-implemented method claims, and thus all of the claims at issue (method, system and Beauregard) were deemed ineligible for patent protection and invalid.
The recent Nautilus v. Biosig decision, at least ostensibly, heighted the standard that courts use to assess the clarity, and thus the validity, of patent claims. This decision concerned a dispute over the meaning of the claim term "spaced" as pertaining to electrodes of a heart rate monitor in exercise equipment. The legal issue was whether the term was sufficiently well-defined to meet the statutory requirement that the claims be definite by "particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming" the invention. Simply put, the law requires claims to be clearly stated. Yet, despite this well-known statutory requirement, even patent attorneys, the very drafters of patent claims themselves, will acknowledge that patent claims are seldom, if ever, a model of clarity.
Courts had previously considered that patent claim terms met the statutory requirement for definiteness as long as they were not "insolubly ambiguous." Put another way, unless the claims were hopelessly confounded, they were definite. The Supreme Court overturned this practice and held that claims are invalid as indefinite unless their meaning can be understood with "reasonable certainty." Putting aside the lack of clarity of the standard itself, this new, objectively tougher standard will make some patent claims easier to invalidate.
Thus, it seems for now that patent owners will continue to face challenging times. So what can you do to ease the pain? To be sure, the long-term impact of these decisions is not yet clear, and much will depend on how the new standards are applied by the Patent Office and the courts. Proactive patent owners, however, should begin changing their approach to prosecution and litigation in certain respects.
It's hard out here for a patent
The future of software patents
Alice: Another (small) step on the way out of Wonderland
For new patent applications, you should be prepared to alter your approach to patent drafting in at least two key aspects. For one thing, would-be patent owners will benefit from a more elaborate specification. The main job of the description and other non-claim sections of the patent application is to support the subject and terminology of the claims. So a good specification has always been important. In light of Nautilus, however, more value is placed on clear explanations of claim terms in the written description. As such, one objective in patent drafting should be to bolster the specification by providing definitions or other specific details (e.g., upper and lower bounds of a term of range) that the courts can use when interpreting the claims during litigation. By calling out and defining key claim terms in the description, drafters can provide courts (and other decision makers) with a clear meaning of the terms to inform claim construction, thereby increasing the likelihood of meeting the "reasonable certainty" standard. Further, definitions included in the written description will be part of the intrinsic record of the patent, which has higher probative value than "extrinsic" sources such as expert testimony at deposition or trial. The goal then is to deprive your opponent, and the court, of a tenable basis for invalidating your patent claims as indefinite.
A second approach to consider is an adjustment to your claiming strategy, especially for software and business method claims. As discussed, simply adding computer hardware to software and method claims will no longer suffice to ensure patent-eligibility. Instead, drafters will be well-advised to seek out ways to introduce improved computer technology into the claims, particularly that which is not part of the basic method alone. Claims combining computerized methods with non-abstract (e.g., industrial) processes for the improvement of those processes may be useful. Also, drafters may consider using markedly different formatting and wording for the system claims compared to the method claims in order to distance the system claims from abstract-idea rejections of the methods. In this vein, avoid the temptation to simply recast software or method claims as system claims by doing a cut and paste operation of the software or method steps into a new claim having a system preamble and a computer hardware element. This is what the patentee did in Alice, which led the Supreme Court to conclude that the method and system claims were the same in substance, and ultimately to introduce bad law for the rest of us to deal with.
Of course, you don't have the luxury of changing claiming strategy or rewriting patents that have already issued, so here are a few ideas to help make the existing patents in your portfolio less vulnerable to invalidity attacks, and thus more enforceable.
In 2011, the America Invents Act was enacted and brought with it new and revised post-grant review procedures. These procedures, along with those previously in effect, give defendants more ways to challenge the validity of a patent. They also can present an opportunity for the patent owner to address certain deficiencies in the issued patent. Here the objective would be to utilize these procedures to improve the issued claims. Re-examination and re-issue proceedings can bolster a patent's strength against anticipation and obviousness challenges, and can also provide a forum to clarify claim meaning through introduction of affidavits and other submissions into the intrinsic record. Other proceedings, such as inter-parties reviews (IPRs), can also provide useful opportunities to clarify, on the record, the meaning of important claim terms. Post-grant proceedings are not risk free, but strategic patent owners may view them as opportunities to bolster or correct the record, with a view towards strengthening patent clarity. Some of these procedures have specific time limitations, and others prescribe what types of issues can be addressed, so you should consult your patent attorney regarding what option is best for your particular situation.
Another thing to consider are your litigation tactics, especially with regard to claim construction and countering a defendant's indefiniteness contention. Often, conventional wisdom during litigation leads patent owners to seek the broadest interpretation possible for disputed claims. This may be useful, for example, to counter potential non-infringement arguments and even to expand the scope of equivalent infringement. Yet, patent owners should be wary of asking for too much. Seeking a claim construction that supports infringement should be balanced with the need to show reasonable certainty in claim meaning in view of the specification and the rest of the intrinsic record. While this balancing is typically present in any patent litigation, in light of Nautilus, ensuring that the sought after meaning is defined with sufficient specificity will take on heightened importance going forward.
With any luck, altering patent drafting techniques and litigation practices in these and similar ways will help patent owners to carry a stronger patent portfolio into the future. Likely, the reality is that true relief for patent owners may not come until the pendulum swings again. If nostalgia is the guide, that's due to happen any day now. Right? In the meantime, keep counting down the hits.


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With the addtion of James Johnson it sure looks like it, u look at the starting line up JC, DD, JJ, Amir without including JC can he hide Bargs's weaknasses by sourrounding him with good defending and rebounding players ?
With the addtion of James Johnson it sure looks like it, u look at the starting line up JC, DD, JJ, Amir without including JC can he hide Bargs's weaknasses by sourrounding him with good defending and rebounding players ?
Last edited by Top5Pick; Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 06:50 PM.
First off we are not building around Bargnani, Andrea is just one piece, not "the" piece. Is BC trying to build a team that can take advantage of what we have, sure, what GM doesn't? I liked Johnson's potential coming out of college, he has a decent frame for the 3 spot and could turn into a nice glue guy. It looks like we have 2 scorers in DeMAr and Andrea, filling out the roster with defenders, shooters, rebounders, and 3 option guys is what is being done. If the draft works out we may get a top tier player to take more pressure off the other players we have. We don't have a superstar so we build a team not a one man show.
He better not be building around Bargnani, but trying to implement useful players in this team "system"... *shudders*.
Bargs is looking like an UN-injured version of Kieth Van Horn, without the terrible experience of dealing with Stephon Marbury. Basically someone who is over 6'10" and shoots jumpers and scores 20pts a game. I'll accept it. He sucks at rebounding and another player must get the rebound, but it would help if Bargs "tried" to get a rebound or "box out".
There is never any player in the league that can carry a team full of D-League scrubs and win a playoff series. Michael Jordan couldn't do it alone either.
You need to hope the Raptors can develop two or more All-Stars down the road through draft and development. Not one-time All-Stars, I'm talking about 4 to 5 time All-Stars when playing on the Raptors.
I do not think it is a secret he is tyring to build an athletic team. I"m not sure I've heard an interview with him in the last year that did not mention athleticism. It is also my opinion that BC is a smart guy who realizes his plan with the Raptors has not panned out. There is definitely a new plan in place.
I'm also not convinced the team is being built AROUND Bargnani versus being built WITH Bargnani as a piece. He is not paid like a franchise guy. He is the most skilled player on a bad team right now.
It is performances like last night that make me giddy about the Raptors future. It is performances like 2 nights ago that make me shudder - amazing what 24hours can do to a person.
Personally, I don't want to see Bargnani go - yet. I'd like another season to see what happens with the re-build and new approach that, in my opinion, BC has taken.
Kyrie Irving?
"Defensively, Irving won't have any problems from a physical standpoint in the NBA, as he has good size, strength and lateral quickness, even if his wingspan probably won't measure out off the charts. He's already way ahead of where most freshman are on this end of the court too, as he plays with good intensity, has excellent fundamentals, and shows great timing jumping in the passing lanes. Like all freshmen, he has some issues defending off the ball and can get impatient coming out of his stance in long possessions, but these are minor qualms that can and likely will be corrected playing under one of the most respected coaches in all of basketball."
From DraftExpress.com http://www.draftexpress.com/profile/...#ixzz1Eu5HGU7R
If he's knees are good i wan't enes kanter, you don't often find players like him. But i also wan't irving, if colangelo could orchestrate a trade for a draft pick that would net us both kanter and irving this would be an exciting team to watch.
Last night's game was tons of fun to watch, hopefully it wasn't a mirage. It'd be tough to replicate though, because Bayless was the only player to have a bad game. There really is only two players in the draft that I want now and that is Irving and Noguiera (the best centre in the draft IMO).
Hopefully, this group stays tough and finishes strong in the second half. I strongly believe that with one addition and this core developing, we may have something to get excited about.
-"You cant run from me. I mean, my heart dont bleed Kool-Aid."
-"I aint no diva! I dont have no blond hair, red hair. Im Reggie Evans.
I agree with this thread. Bargnani is a awkward fit for this team, but he is a valuable offensive player. With Ed Davis, Demar, Bargs we have the starting of a solid young starting lineup.
I agree with getting a defensive point guard that can pass and manage the game. I would say a Charlie Ward type player (great defensively and manages the game, not a scoring threat)
At the 3 spot I would love to see someone like Gerald Wallace. A defensive, rebounding, and offense contributer. Not crazy offensive stats, but someone that makes up for Bargs shitty rebounding skills and defends good SF's.
The scoring in the starting line up would mostly come from Demar and Bargs, and a bit from the SF position.
I hope this is what Colangelo is trying to build.
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La Spaziale
La Spaziale Espresso Machines
La Spaziale founded in 1969 is the fifth largest Italian manufacturer of espresso equipment with a large global presence. La Spaziale has major market shares in the mature espresso markets, such as Italy, Spain, France, and Portugal and are in 70 countries to date. In Milan, Italy, the largest city for espresso consumption, La Spaziale has over 65 percent of the market share. These markets are benchmarks to the espresso industry where quantity and quality are both equally imperative.
The new La Spaziale S1 Vivaldi II and S1 Mini Vivaldi II are excellent 2 boiler machines in the prosumer espresso machine category. Both machines are excellent choices for your home coffee bar, office or cafe or restaurant.
Seattle Coffee Gear is an Authorized La Spazialle Retailer and Service Center.


text: Each Blue Ribbon School is visited by the State Superintendent and other dignitaries. School visits, called "Tours of Excellence," and consist of an all-school commendations assembly with students, teachers, elected officials, school system executives, community partners, and parents. Following the assembly, VIP's may participate in a reception, Blue Ribbon Flag Raising Ceremony, classroom visits, interactive discussions with teachers, or other school activity.


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0verkill is a client-server 2D deathmatch-like game in ASCII art. It supports free connecting/disconnecting during the game, and runs well on modem lines. Graphics are in 16-color ASCII art with elaborate hero animations. 0verkill features 4 different weapons, grenades, invisibility, and armor. The package also contains reaperbot clients, a simple graphics editor, and a level editor.
389 Directory Server (formerly Fedora Directory Server) is a full-featured LDAPv3 compliant server. In addition to the standard LDAPv3 operations, it supports multi-master replication, fully online configuration and administration, chaining, virtual attributes, access control directives in the data, Virtual List View, server-side sorting, SASL, TLS/SSL, and many other features. The transactional Berkeley DB 4.2 is used as its data store and a full plug-in API allows developers to extend the the functionality of the server in many ways, and many of the core features of the server are already implemented using this API. The server is very mature, having started out as Netscape Directory Server.
3D Vertical Bar Graph provides both client and server-side solutions for the incorporation of bar graphs into Web pages. It provides versatile components so that Web authors and Java developers can easily build and publish dynamic and interactive bar graphs. There are many configurable features and functions to both the applet and servlet and as such, the documentation and examples are designed to give both a full understanding of every feature and enable you to implement both the applet and servlet quickly and easily. The series of examples gives an overview of the variety of implementations possible.
ADJE WebMail is a set of Perl CGI scripts which provide a Web interface to existing email accounts on any POP3-compliant email server. The software provides a complete interface, including encoding/decoding attachments, email and URL markup in received emails, and an address book for each user.
AFD is a program to automatically distribute files either locally or to remote hosts. The files are distributed by using FTP or SMTP, and can be sent in parallel and with priority. It provides a GUI to monitor and control the distribution and extensive logging of all activities.
ATG Dynamo integration for JBuilder is a JBuilder 5 plugin that makes it easy to deploy J2EE applications to the ATG Dynamo Application Server version 5.1 (DAS). It can be installed and run with the other JBuilder 5 plugins such as BEA WebLogicServer 5.1, BEA WLS 6, IBM WebSphere 3.5, Borland AS 4.5, etc.
ActiveTcl is a Tcl distribution available for many operating systems. It is complete and easy to use, and offers quality-assured ActiveTcl Business Solutions. It also offers ActiveTcl Enterprise, which gives you support and maintenance packages for your company. The ActiveTcl OEM licensing provides you full redistribution rights, plus optional support and co-marketing packages.


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Autumn in the air: Chili, pumpkins and haunted hay rides
It's officially autumn this weekend, so do something to celebrate the changing season. Check out the haunted barn and haunted hay ride in Walworth, sample the goods at the chili cook-off in Palmyra, or learn more about how hibernating animals prepare for the winter in Eagle. �
Sixth annual PFOC Movers and Shakers Charity Event, Sept. 20, to support the Alzheimer Association Walk to End Alzheimer's. Dinner from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m., the band "Under Cover," plays at 7 p.m., silent auction and raffles all evening. Held at Hemingway's, Lake Geneva. Tickets: Call Jenny Osborne, (262) 348-4902
Haunted barn and haunted hay ride, Sept. 20-21, from 7 p.m. to 11:30 p.m., Pearce's Farm Stand, W5740 N. Walworth Road, Walworth. (262)?374-0325, www.pearcefarms.com
Big Bird Camping Group weekend of camping, Sept. 20-22, at the Walworth County Fairgrounds, 411 E. Court St., Elkhorn. (262) 723-3228
An Evening of Jazz with John Moulder, Sept. 21, Light Recital Hall, Greenhill Center of the Arts, University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, 7:30 p.m.� Reception at 6:30 p.m. Greenhill Center Atrium.
Musical tribute to Civilian Conservation Corps, Sept. 21, 1 p.m. with Bill Jamerson performing stories, songs. Burlington Memorial Library, 166 E. Jefferson St., Burlington. (262) 763-7623, www.burlington.lib.wi.us
Second annual Hispanic Heritage Festival, Sept. 21, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Phoenix Park and Band Shell, Delavan. Festival will feature public presentations, ethnic foods, music, entertainment, a talent contest, and activities for kids. Free event.
Chili Cook-off, Sept. 21, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., sponsored by the Friends of the Powers Memorial Library, held at the Lions Pavilion on Spring Lake, Wisconsin Highway 59, Palmyra.
Milwaukee Day, Sept. 21, East Troy Electric Railroad, 2002 Church St., East Troy. Celebrate Milwaukee's rich rail car history. (262) 642-3263, www.easttroyrr.org
Hibernating Animals program, Sept. 21, from 6:30 p.m. to 7 p.m., at Kettle Moraine State Forest-Southern Unit, Eagle. Get ready for the oncoming winter with Waldo the woodchuck, Maize the corn snake, and Jewel the ornate box turtle. Learn what animals do to get ready for their long winter's nap. Presented by The Wildlife in Need Center. Meet at the Ottawa Lake amphitheater.
Universe in the Park, Sept. 21, at dusk, at Kettle Moraine State Forest-Southern Unit, Eagle. Join astronomers from UW-Madison to explore the night sky. They will have a short slide show with pictures from space, then set up a big telescope to view the night sky up close.
Open Mic night, Sept. 21, and every third Saturday, from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m., Unitarian Universalist Church of the Lakes, 319 N. Broad St., Elkhorn. Come and sing or play a tune or just listen. Refreshments served. (262)?723-7440, www.uulakes.org.
Fall Harvest Festival, Sept. 21-22, with live music at 11 a.m., corn maze, jumping bales, hayrides to pumpkin patch, free corn on the cob on Sunday, Pearce's Farm Stand, W5740 N. Walworth Road (corner of F and 67), Walworth. (262)?275-3783, www.PearceFarms.com
S.M.I.L.E.S. student horse show, Sept. 21, at 9 a.m., N2666 County Highway K, Darien, (262)?882-3470, www.smilestherapeuticriding.org
Rousing with the Roosters Breakfast, Sept. 21, from 6:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m., Old World Wisconsin outdoor historical museum, W372 S9727 Wisconsin Highway 67, Eagle. Try out the 19th-century lifestyle by doing some of the same chores farmers of the past did. (262) 594-6301, www.oldworldwisconsin.org
Fall Harvest Festival, Sept. 21-22, with live music at 11 a.m., plus free corn on the cob on Sunday, corn maze, jumping bales, hayrides to the pumpkin patch. Pearce's Farm Stand, W5740 N. Walworth Road, Walworth. (262)?374-0325, www.pearcefarms.com
Autumn Harvest Fest, Sept. 21-22,� from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Take a trip to the orchard or pick pumpkins from the patch, Elegant Farmer, 1545 Main St., Mukwonago. (262)?363-6770, www.elegantfarmer.com
Fire Bells Fund Raiser, Sept. 22, from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m., Hogs & Kisses, 149 Broad St., Lake Geneva. (262) 248-7447, www.hogsandkisses.com
Discover Whitewater Marathon, Sept. 22, with half Marathon, 5K and Fit Kid Shuffle. This USTAF certified, purse race will include a corralled start for the half- marathon, a wheelchair division and post race events at both the Aquatic center and downtown.� A pre-race spaghetti dinner and health expo will be offered the day before at UW-Whitewater campus. www.runwhitewater.com


text: Because of increased prices, consumers are looking to second hand shopping to make small and large purchases. Thrift stores offer bargain and sale prices for gently used apparel, household decor and other items. Window shop through these key terms that might be useful next time you visit a thrift shop.


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PMQs 'shows what No vote means'
Prime Minister's Questions is a reminder to Scots that they are being governed by "Tory-led governments people in Scotland don't vote for", according to Scottish Finance Secretary John Swinney.
With the penultimate PMQs before the referendum taking place today, Mr Swinney said independence would switch hundreds of millions of pounds of spending from Westminster priorities to Scottish needs.
"The sight of Prime Ministers Questions in the House of Commons is a stark reminder of what a No vote means - Tory-led governments people in Scotland don't vote for, imposing policies we don't support and charging us for the privilege," he said.
John Swinney said PMQs was a stark reminder of what a No vote would mean
"A Yes vote means the opportunity to control economic and tax policy so that many more people in Scotland benefit from our wealth and vast natural resources.
"That's why we're better off with Scotland's future in Scotland's hands."
He added: "Scotland is one of the richest countries in the world, wealthier per head than France, the UK and Japan.
"We have generated more tax than the UK for every one of the last 33 years and people in Scotland will always spend our money much better than Tory Chancellors like George Osborne.
"More and more people are waking up to the opportunities of independence, such as controlling our own budget, so that we can spend our taxes on policies that benefit many more people in Scotland.
"The current Scottish Government has identified savings of around £600 million a year by taking different decisions from Westminster.
"By getting rid of Westminster politicians we can save nearly £50 million alone. To put that in perspective that's around the same amount of money needed to mitigate the costs of Westminster's bedroom tax, which has penalised thousands of disabled and other people.
"With independence any future government will have full control of Scotland's finances - so never again will we be forced to fund policies that have been overwhelmingly rejected by people in Scotland.
"That means we won't have to use taxpayers' money to mitigate the impact of the cruel bedroom tax or pay a share of the obscene £100 billion cost of a new generation of nuclear weapons.
"And why are we spending millions on the unelected House of Lords?"
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Embedded vision boosts driver-assistance designs
1 Comment
Forward facing Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (FF ADAS) are
becoming increasingly important, especially as the European New Car
Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) ratings are tied to AEB (Autonomous
Emergency Braking) and other important car safety features. Euro
NCAP recently announced a new rating scheme for the years 2013 to
2017, which is also driving ADAS trends for players across the
automotive market, from tier 1s and manufacturers, to semiconductor
ADAS applications such as AEB and Lane Departure Warning (LDW) will be taken much more strongly into account by 2014, and will be key for achieving a top Euro NCAP 5-star rating, which significantly impacts car manufacturers sales rates. Along with AEB and LDW, other features such as Intelligent Highbeam Control (IHC) and Road Sign Detection (RSD) are now integrated on most standard FF ADAS cameras. Low- to mid-range systems of the near future will possess at least some version of AEB (described below), LDW and IHC.
It is evident that the auto industry is under pressure to find ways to implement these highly advanced, computationally and network intensive systems without driving up the bill-of-materials (BOM) per vehicle. Indeed, the introduction of these new applications will likely evolve as an overall cost reduction in the ADAS camera platform. Ideally, automakers will want to have a common smart platform from which they can introduce and deploy systems differentiated by feature sets across their various vehicle classes. This means a single platform design for a smart FF ADAS processing camera that is low power, has low BOM cost, and is scalable across vehicle classes, especially low to mid-range.
Application Challenges
There is a host of design challenges for a FF ADAS processing camera targeted at the applications described above. System design requirements which shape the final solution include:
- High-definition (HD) imaging and multi-function support: Applications like people detection, and especially road sign detection, drive higher resolution image sensor requirements. Existing implementations are VGA but are rapidly migrating to megapixel and beyond in next generation systems. In addition with multiple functions, there is a requirement for the system to scale and partition image frames real time in advance of algorithmic processing. Along with increasing image sensor resolution, expect higher frame rates (for example, up to 60fps) to support functions like pedestrian detection at higher vehicular speeds (for example, 60km/h for NCAP testing).
- Computational support: Vision processing requires a careful mapping of software to the embedded hardware to meet demand for very large computational requirements.
- Data flow: Depending on the implementation, there is likely a requirement to support high bandwidth data movement especially between sensor interface, system memory and processor core.
- Differentiation: Tier-1s and OEMS must differentiate and run non-standard analytics algorithms. This requires open, programmable systems that support easy porting of their in-house algorithm code base.
- Temperature sensitivity: Smart camera systems are traditionally situated against the windshield in front of the rear view mirror. This is one of a vehicles more challenging thermal environments, due to direct sun and environmental exposure. Systems, therefore, must be temperature sensitive.
- Power sensitivity: The thermal requirements mentioned above necessitate a tight control of power dissipation. This is particularly true given the sensitivity of higher resolution image sensors to thermal noise.
- Low cost: Cost is a major factor in many markets. Due to the cost-sensitive nature of FF ADAS, manufacturers expect silicon optimized to provide maximum features at appropriate price ranges and within compact chip form factors. Devices with cores that are specific to programmable vision processing at low power and low die area are typically more competitive.
- Functional safety: Vision-based ADAS applications are moving beyond providing information to the driver through useful LEDs to life-critical active safety systems. FF ADAS processing cameras will be subject to the same safety considerations that have existed with radar systems (for example, for ACC).


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Area legislators weigh in on state surplus
A state budget surplus expected to total $977 million is prompting ideas from lawmakers about how the money should be used.
Democratic leaders said they want to eliminate a projected deficit and spend more on education and job training programs.
Gov. Scott Walker has said he wants to provide income and property tax relief.
Here is what area legislators had to say about how they think the surplus should be used:
Rep. Tyler August, R-Lake Geneva
The state's budget surplus needs to go back to the taxpayers in the form of property tax relief and possibly income tax relief, August said.
"I think it is the people's money, and we should sent it back to them," August said.
The money needs to get out of Madison as soon as possible, August said, because the "culture up here is if we find some quarters in the couch, everyone wants to spend them right away."
Sen. Tim Cullen, D-Janesville
Cullen noted that the surplus is only a projection for what might be 17 months from now, so he urges caution.
Half of the approximately $1 billion should be put in the state's rainy-day fund for unforeseen changes in tax collections and expenses, Cullen suggested.
A quarter of the amount should be used for property tax relief, and the remaining quarter should help restore cuts in equalization aid to public school districts, Cullen said.
Cullen rejected a proposal to target technical college property taxes for relief. He noted unelected boards oversee the tech colleges, and "the more you bury their costs in a large state budget, you have even less accountability."
Rep. Andy Jorgensen, D-Milton
Jorgenson said he'd like to see the surplus funneled into areas he says would most aid the middle class.
In addition to potential property tax relief for middle class homeowners, Jorgensen said he'd like to see money directed to education, particularly in the form of worker training education at technical colleges.���
"The Republicans have cut, cut, cut on technical schools. We need to refocus on that. We've heard from major employers we need to prioritize worker training," Jorgensen said.
Sen. Neal Kedzie, R-Elkhorn
Paying off some of the state's debt or putting money towards the transportation fund are ways to use the surplus, Kedzie said.
"I think there is some room in here to pay some bills," he said about Medicaid payments, bonds and other debt. He also mentioned using some of the money for infrastructure investments by improving roads and bridges.
A surplus is a good problem to have, and if used in the right way, can positively affect a large part of the population, he said.
Rep. Deb Kolste, D-Janesville
Kolste said the state should not be sitting on a budget surplus and should instead find ways to return money to the middle class.
Two possibilities, she said, are restoring funding for the state's Earned Income Tax Credit and for the Homestead Tax Credit, both of which lost millions of dollars in the last budget.
Both programs target Wisconsin's lowest-income working families.
She said more money could be targeted to job training grants or paying down the state's debt that increased in Walker's last budget.
"We need to find ways to get the money back in the hands of the people who really need it, the working-class people," she said.
Rep. Amy Loudenbeck, R-Clinton
Loudenbeck said she'd like to see the state split the budget surplus between the state's rainy-day fund and the taxpayers.
The higher than estimated projected revenue indicates the state's economic recovery is "well underway," she said, but Wisconsinites are still struggling with high property taxes and fixed or flat incomes.
"After making a sizeable deposit in the rainy day fund, I would support returning a substantial amount of the surplus funds to the taxpayers," she said in an email.���
Rep. Janis Ringhand, D-Evansville
Lawmakers need to make sure the surplus goes back to the middle class and lower-income residents, Ringhand said.
"By state statute, we are suppose to put half of it into a rainy day fund, which makes sense," she said.
Education would be a good option for some of the surplus, she said, since so much state funding has been cut from all levels of education.
People also need to be cognizant of where the money is coming from, so it's not counted on as an ongoing tax cut or revenue source, she said.


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By Alexander Neef, General Director
As I watched this year's Ensemble Studio members perform their first concert of the season in the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre last week, I was once again struck by the wonderful musical talent that this country produces.
In creating the Ensemble Studio in 1980, former General Director Lotfi Mansouri had the foresight to begin the process of intensive training and nurturing of young Canadian artists, and it's a legacy that I take very seriously.
This summer I visited three different young artist programs, starting in St. Andrews by-the-sea, New Brunswick, observing and participating in Wendy Nielsen's fantastic opera program there. As I'm sure you know, Wendy is a world-renowned soprano who has appeared on our stage, as well as all the major stages of the world. In the past few years she has begun teaching, and last year I asked her to join the COC as a special coach for the Ensemble.
Read more...
Posted by Danielle D'Ornellas / in Alexander Neef / comments (1) / permalink
This fall, spend your Sunday nights at the opera in your own living room with COC General Director Alexander Neef and CinéTFO+'s Sunday opera program! At 8 p.m. each Sunday, from September 22 to October 20, watch as Alexander introduces each of the late 19th-century French operas featured below and shares his insights about the productions, history and cast.
Posted by Danielle D'Ornellas / in Alexander Neef / comments (0) / permalink
I was very saddened to learn of Lotfi Mansouri's death two weeks ago. I knew he had been ill, and the prognosis wasn't good, but I wasn't quite prepared for the loss I felt when I heard he'd passed away.
As everyone who came into contact with him knows, Lotfi was full of life. His enthusiasm for life, and especially opera was infectious. A simple recounting of his many accomplishments while at the head of the COC paints a clear picture of how he communicated his love for this company and his community.
Sara Fulgoni in the COC production of Bluebeard's Castle. Photo: Michael Cooper © 2001


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Politifact: Baldwin correct with claim about green jobs topping those offered in gas and oil
The notion of counting the number of "green" jobs in America made us think, oddly enough, of a middle-age guy trying for cool by pairing a sport coat with blue jeans.
Not easy.
Yet quite matter-of-factly, while touting a clean energy jobs bill she introduced, U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin made the following statement Jan. 22, 2014:
"Over 3 million Americans are employed in the growing green-collar workforce, including in clean energy and sustainability, which is more than the amount of people working in the fossil fuel industry."
When we put the Wisconsin Democrat's claim to Daniel Kish at the Institute for Energy Research, he told us that both green and fossil fuel industry job numbers are sometimes thrown around with abandon.
"This gets really dicey real quick," he said. "Everybody's got their dueling banjos."
That's PolitiFact Wisconsin's kind of music.
Baldwin's evidence
To back his boss' claim, Baldwin spokesman John Kraus cited two reports. Both are from solid sources, though they mix sports coats and—er, apples and oranges—a bit.
Federal report: In 2012, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics embarked on an annual tally of green jobs. The agency had the advantage of considering a definition of green jobs proffered a year earlier by the Brookings Institution, a Washington, D.C. think tank, which produced its own green jobs count.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics surveyed 120,000 business and government establishments within 325 industries that were "identified as potentially producing green goods or providing green services." Those surveyed said whether they produced green goods and services and the percentage of their revenue or employment associated with that output.
Green goods and services were defined as those that "benefit the environment or conserve natural resources." They fall into one or more of the following five groups:
1) Production of energy from renewable sources; 2) energy efficiency; 3) pollution reduction and removal, greenhouse gas reduction, and recycling and reuse; 4) natural resources conservation; and 5) environmental compliance, education and training, and public awareness.
So, the list of green jobs is quite varied, including jobs in areas such as farming; home construction; electric, solar and other types of power generation; petroleum and coal products manufacturing; urban mass transit; newspaper publishing; advertising and public relations services; waste treatment and disposal; museums and zoos; and social advocacy organizations.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics produced its second—and, it turns out, final—green jobs report in March 2013. It estimated that "employment associated with the production of green goods and services"—full- and part-time jobs—exceeded 3.4 million in 2011.
Manufacturing, with 507,000 green jobs, was the largest sector. Goods produced by those jobs included air conditioning and refrigeration equipment meeting selected standards, hybrid cars and parts, and pollution mitigation equipment.
Kish, who is senior vice president for policy at the industry-backed Institute for Energy Research, pointed out that 886,000 of the 3.4 million were government jobs—not jobs, he said, in which people are "making or installing windmills and solar panels."
"Green," Kish said, is a "political word, used by politicians and advocates, that is truly elusive."
Nevertheless, the Bureau of Labor Statistics is well-established as the official jobs counter for the federal government.
The 2013 report, for the number of green jobs in 2011, remains the latest available. That report said that because of budget cuts, no more green counts would be done.
Think tank study: The Brookings Institution report we noted above was produced in 2011, so it's a little dated.
Brookings estimated that in 2010, there were 2.7 million green jobs—that is, jobs that "directly contributed to the production of goods and services that had an environmental benefit."
Brookings didn't do a count of fossil fuel industry jobs, but it did make a comparison using federal government tallies. Its report said that in 2010, there were 1.3 million jobs that directly supported "the production of fossil fuel-based energy, derivative manufactured products and machinery."
If all wholesale and retail distributors, transporters and other workers—such as gas station employees—were included, the fossil fuel tally would be 2.4 million jobs, Brookings said.
Brookings scholar Jonathan Rothwell told us some critics view the think tank's definition of green jobs as too expansive. For example, some 350,000 public transportation jobs in the green tally include not only bus drivers but secretaries, janitors, executives and all other employees who work for bus companies, he said.
Brookings' definition of green jobs "was very broad and included any economic activity that has an environmental benefit—from public transportation to waste management," Rothwell acknowledged, adding that because "only a small portion of energy comes from green sources, fossil fuel employees are a much larger share of the energy sector's workforce."
But Rothwell noted that the Bureau of Labor Statistics adopted a similar definition when it did green jobs counts.
And we note that BLS arrived at a roughly similar green jobs estimate.
So, the most recent federal report backs the first part of Baldwin's statement, that there are more than 3 million green jobs.
The older think tank report she cites doesn't say there were more than 3 million green jobs, but does say that green jobs outnumbered fossil fuel industry jobs as of 2010.
Other views
One thing to underline here is that counting green jobs is a different sort of animal.
As CNN/Money observed when the first Bureau of Labor Statistics green jobs report came out in 2012, comparing "green jobs to another singular sector isn't really fair. The green jobs survey took into account a wide variety of jobs in over 300 different industries."
As for the oil and gas industry itself, a July 2013 report was done by PricewaterhouseCoopers for the American Petroleum Institute, a trade association for the oil and natural gas industry, that was an update of a report done two years earlier.
The later report said there were 2.59 million jobs in the oil and natural gas industry in 2011. PricewaterhouseCoopers said it utilized data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis and the U.S. Census Bureau for its study.
The study noted that the oil and natural gas industry "encompasses a number of activities that span separate industry classifications in government economic data." For example, oil and natural gas exploration and production is included in the mining sector; and oil refining is part of the manufacturing sector. The study defined the oil and gas industry to include all such activities.
The petroleum institute noted to us criticism of how the federal government defines green jobs, including an editorial in Investor's Business Daily that called the annual count "phony."
A final note: In November 2012, U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-Rhode Island, made a claim similar to but more broad than Baldwin's, saying there were "more people working in clean and green energy than in oil and gas in this country."
That was before the latest reports from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and American Petroleum Institute that estimated green and fossil fuel jobs for 2011.
PolitiFact Rhode Island rated the statement True. Our colleagues noted that at the time, the number of green jobs as estimated by BLS exceeded the number of oil and gas jobs estimated by the petroleum institute.
Our rating
Baldwin said: "Over 3 million Americans are employed in the growing green-collar workforce," which is more than the number "of people working in the fossil fuel industry."
The latest estimates are for 2011. The federal government says there were 3.4 million green jobs, while a national oil and gas trade group says there were 2.59 million oil and gas jobs.
We rate Baldwin's statement True.


text:
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
I have always loved the one about the movie Prognosis Negative. I still say that to this day instead on just No. Love it!!
Wiki has a page on the ficitional movies of Seinfeld
Rochelle Rochelle
Prognosis Negative
Sack lunch
Rochelle Rochelle ("The tale of a young girl's strange erotic journey from Milan to Minsk")
Last edited by ichabodius; 02-26-2008 at 07:29 PM.
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
5, 10 minutes (chinese food resturant episode)
Life's no good without a good scare
I love Georges rules (which I know I have posted previously)..
Rule No. 1 - Never walk without a document in your hands.
People with documents in their hands look like hardworking employees heading for important meetings. People with nothing in their hands look like they're heading for the cafeteria. People with a newspaper in their hand look like they're heading for the toilet. Above all, make sure you carry loads of stuff home with you at night, thus generating the false impression that you work longer hours than you do.
Rule No. 2 - Use computers to look busy.
Any time you use a computer, it looks like "work" to the casual observer. You can send and receive personal e-mail, chat, and generally have a blast without doing anything remotely related to work. These aren't exactly the societal benefits that the proponents of the computer revolution would like to talk about but they're not bad either. When you get caught by your boss -- and you will get caught -- your best defence is to claim you're teaching yourself to use new software, thus saving valuable training dollars.
Rule No. 3 - Keep a messy desk.
Top management can get away with a clean desk. For the rest of us, it looks like we're not working hard enough. Build huge piles of documents around your workspace. To the observer, last year's work looks the same as today's work; it's volume that counts. Pile them high and wide. If you know somebody is coming to your cubicle, bury the document you'll need halfway down in an existing stack and rummage for it when he/she arrives.
Rule No. 4 - Use voice mail.
Never answer your phone if you have voice mail. People don't call you just because they want to give you something for nothing -- they call because they want you to do work for them. That's no way to live. Screen all your calls through voice mail. If somebody leaves a voice-mail message for you and it sounds like impending work, respond during lunch hour when you know they're not there -- it looks like you're hardworking and conscientious even though you're being a devious weasel.
Rule No. 5 - Look impatient & annoyed.
One should also always try to look impatient and annoyed to give your bosses the impression that you are always busy.
Rule No. 6 - Leave the office late.
Always leave the office late, especially when the boss is still around. You could read magazines and storybooks that you always wanted to read but have no time until late before leaving. Make sure you walk past the boss' room on your way out. Send important e-mail at unearthly hours (e.g. 9:35 p.m., 7:05 a.m., etc.) and during public holidays.
Rule No. 7 - Use sighing for effect.
Sigh loudly when there are many people around, giving the impression that you are under extreme pressure.
Rule No. 8 - Opt for the stacking strategy.
It is not enough to pile lots of documents on the table. Put lots of books on the floor etc. (thick computer manuals are the best).
Rule No. 9 - Build your vocabulary.
Read up on some computer magazines and pick out all the jargon and new products. Use the phrases freely when in conversation with bosses. Remember; they don't have to understand what you say, but you sure sound impressive.
Rule No. 10 - Don't get caught.
MOST IMPORTANT: Don't forward this to your boss by mistake!
IMO, the most overrated show ever on television......sorry. But I like Curb Your Enthusiasm. So go figure. I just don't like Mr. Seinfeld. I don't find him funny. But I won't dispute the show's popularity. You can't argue the ratings.
I loved Seinfeld..my husband and I would just laugh our selves silly on Thursday nights! that was when must see TV really was must see! I loved the episode where George made a little nap area under his desk at work..too funny..and the one where he said he was a Marine Biologist..I just saw the puffy shirt episode the other night.."But I don't wanna be a Pirate!" So many Gems!
Zombie kitteh is Hungry!!
l can't spare a square!!!
(l have had the lucky opportunity to actually use this twice in public washrooms. once at a funeral. haaaaa)
I can't pick a favorite episode. Love them all. Do like Elaine's boyfriend Puddy, he's so cute and funny.
I love Seinfeld...my daughter and her husband have almost all the seasons on DVD...even the grandsons love the show...their favorite is Kramer.
I like the sponge episode. The one where Elaine buys up all the Sponge contraceptives because they're discontinuing them. She's asking the guys if they're "sponge worthy"....
So many good ones....
"Dying is just nature's way of saying, hey, you're not alive anymore!"
"Look at the cute little bastard!"
"This son of a bitch is ice cold!"
"Why separate knob, WHY SEPARATE KNOB?!"
In the first year of the show two different
actors played jerry's father.
Seinfeld as Queen
Last edited by cachluv; 02-28-2008 at 01:24 AM.
"So, what, no fuckin' ziti now?"
Congrats catchluv
I didn't like it when it was on, but I love the reruns. I can't figure that out. My favorite was when they yanked the sponge off the market, so Elaine drove around all weekend buying sponges and then rationed them, and they were asking her if any new boyfriend was "sponge-worthy" meaning, was he good enough for her to use one of her limited-available sponges instead of other birth control.
Here are some reminders from Seinfeld
Double Dipping
Art Vandalay
Festivus Pole
Muffin Tops
Smelly Car
Pig Man
The Bro
Man Hands
No Soup for You
Library Cop
Master of Your Domain
Yada Yada Yada
The Jerk Store
Big Toe Captain
Puffy Shirt
Astronaut Pen
High Talker
Covenant of the Keys
"These pretzels are making me thirsty."
Bubble Boy
Gotta Love the Drake
You gotta see the baby!
The Human Fund: Money for People
Here is another list
I loved Seinfeld; as did most of my friends.
I used to tape three or four eps; then have friends over for a Seinfeld "party".
I'd grill steaks or burgers; and we would sit around watching Jerry and friends; enjoying good food and drinks.
One of my favorites; don't recall the name; was when Cosmo had the "amazing technicolor overcoat"; and was pimpin' large down the side walk.
And of course; the Soup Nazi.
I still hear people say, "No soup for you!!!"
i love this show too!
the finale was on the night of my aunt & uncle's serenade (in south philly, its like an engagement party and block party at the same time)... a lot of people didnt show up because the last seinfeld episode was on.
Seinfeld is my favorite show ever but unfortunately the last two season were pretty disappointing. Actually to be honest, I'd say they were just plain bad (perhaps a couple of good episodes but that's about it).
Wonderful grade-A show that I still watch every single day but they should have pulled the plug sooner.
There are still about three eps from the last season that I still have not seen. What a joy it will be to stumble across them watching the reruns!
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
My dad & I are still huge fans. It really is a part of of our culture now. I hear Seinfeldisms all the time & I use many myself.
Heeey that was my 2,000th post.
A guy I went to College with and was in a couple of plays with..did a guest spot on Seinfeld..He was the guy at the Gym who caught George peeing in the shower..his name is Scott Larose..very cool to see him on that show!
Zombie kitteh is Hungry!!
how much fun would that have been?!?!
every time l see the one with george's singing answering machine, l get it stuck in my head for ages
l love when elaine rips the toupee off george's head and throws it out the window after shouting "l don't like this thing!!!"
also, in the "nip" episode -- "you want your christmas card? you want your christmas card?! HERE'S your christmas card!!"
Zombie kitteh is Hungry!!
The oven mitts that George wore for his hands! That was too funny.
I love the ep when George gets called Cantstandya Cantstandya!! HAAAAAAAAAAA
Thanks, P.
You are always too kind to me, I love that picture of Kramer.
Which episode was it wherin they were recreating the trajectory of spit at the ball park, ala the "Magic Bullet" of JFK infamy?
And I liked the one where George had the realization that he should always do the exact opposite of what he thinks.
And the time when Elaine thought all of the waitresses at the diner were being hired because they had big boobs; when in reality...
The second spitter is called The boyfriend part 1 and is mentioned in part 2
Newman.: Wow, it was McDowell.
Jerry: But why? Why McDowell?
Kramer: Well, maybe because we were sitting in the right field stands cursing at him in the bullpen all game.
Newman: He must have caught a glimpse of us when I poured that beer on his head.
The Opposite one with George is called The Opposite. That was hilarious.
"Why did it all turn out like this for me? I had so much promise. I was personable. I was bright. Oh, maybe not academically speaking, but I was perceptive. I always know when someone's uncomfortable at a party. It all became very clear to me sitting out there today, that every decision I've ever made in my entire life has been wrong. My life is the complete opposite of everything I want it to be. Every instinct I have in every aspect of life, be it something to wear, something to eat... It's often wrong."
The large brested one was called The Pilot, Part 1 & Part 2
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
George feels like an out of work porn star. Vacation from ourselves... HAAAAA
you gotta get a job. Damn it!
Serenity Now!
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
Serenity Now, Sanity Later.... So true!
It's a festivus Miracle!
As I reigned blows upon him... a festivus for the restofus
I find tinsel distracting
It is still funny!!!!! Do it! Do It!
If someone has a baby, I will always chime in with You Gotta See The Baaaaby!!
One Word.
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
GEORGE: This week. My father got a deal from a friend of his. It's Gore-Tex. You know about Gore-Tex?
JERRY: You like saying Gore-Tex, don't you?
ELAINE: You can't even turn around in that thing.
GEORGE: You know that coat was Gore-Tex. It was worth a hell of a lot more than that cheap Chardonnay.
I am a real anti-dentite


text:
U.S. regulators are considering doubling a minimum capital requirement for the largest banks, which could force some of them to halt dividend payments.
The standard would increase the amount of capital the lenders must hold to 6 percent of total assets, regardless of their risk, according to four people with knowledge of the talks. That's twice the level set by global banking supervisors.
U.S. regulators last year proposed implementing the 3 percent international requirement for what's known as the simple leverage ratio. Now the Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC), under pressure from lawmakers, are weighing increasing that figure for some of the biggest banks, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the discussions are private.
"The 3 percent was clearly inadequate, nothing really," said Simon Johnson, an economics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a former chief economist for the International Monetary Fund. "Going up to five or six will make the rule be worth something. Having a lot of capital is crucial for banks to be sound. The leverage ratio is a good safety tool because risk-weighting can be gamed by banks so easily."
Five of the six largest U.S. lenders, including JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley, would fall under the 6 percent level, according to estimates by investment bank Keefe, Bruyette & Woods Inc. That means they would have to retain more of their earnings and withhold dividends to build capital.
Among the biggest U.S. banks, only San Francisco-based Wells Fargo & Co. would exceed the 6 percent threshold being considered, with a 7.3 percent ratio estimated by KBW in a report this week. Morgan Stanley would be the worst, with 3.8 percent. JPMorgan and Citigroup Inc. would be at 4.5 percent; Goldman Sachs Group Inc. at 4.6 percent; and Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America Corp. at 5.1 percent. JPMorgan, Citigroup, and Goldman Sachs are all based in New York.
Morgan Stanley Chief Executive Officer James Gorman said his New York-based company doesn't have capital problems.
"We're very comfortable with our capital, so we certainly don't feel like we have capital challenges as an institution," Gorman said in an interview today.
Banks don't report what their ratios would be under the new Basel method of calculating assets or the off-balance-sheet items that would go into the calculation. Spokesmen for the five other companies declined to comment.
By going above the figure adopted in 2010 by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, the U.S. could put pressure on Europe to affirm its commitment to the standard, which is seen as a tool to rein in risk in the financial system. Regulators in the U.K. and Switzerland told banks yesterday to increase their ratios of capital to total assets.
U.S. banks have had to comply with a simple leverage requirement of 4 percent for two decades. The new version, proposed last June, expands the definition of what counts as assets in calculating the ratio, incorporating some commitments such as lines of credit kept off balance sheets under current accounting rules. The draft is an attempt to bridge U.S. and international accounting standards.
Hoenig Rule
Lenders in the U.S. and in more than 100 other countries already comply with Basel's risk-based capital rules, which assign weightings to assets based on their riskiness. Corporate debt is given a heavier weight than government bonds, requiring that more capital be held against it. As more of the calculations shifted to complicated models designed by banks, the credibility of the risk weightings has been challenged.
FDIC Vice Chairman Thomas Hoenig has called for scrapping risk-based rules entirely, in favor of a 10 percent leverage ratio, calculated to include even more off-balance-sheet assets than allowed under Basel and define capital more narrowly. To reach Hoenig's requirements, the three largest U.S. banks—JPMorgan, Bank of America, and Citigroup—would have to stop distributing dividends for about five years, according to FDIC data and analysts' earnings expectations compiled by Bloomberg.
The Systemic Risk Council, an advisory group led by former FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair, has called for 8 percent. Bair fought for a global leverage ratio in Basel committee meetings when she led the U.S. agency.
A bipartisan Senate bill introduced in April by David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican, and Ohio Democrat Sherrod Brown would set the leverage ratio at 15 percent. Banks have assailed the proposal. It "would limit an institution's ability to lend to businesses, hampering economic growth and job creation," the Securities Industry & Financial Markets Association, a Washington-based lobbying group, said at the time.
Fed Governor Daniel Tarullo, who heads the central bank's supervision efforts, is leading the push for tighter regulation and higher capital requirements. Before joining the Fed in 2009, he published a book criticizing Basel rules for allowing banks to calculate their own capital requirements. Last month, in a speech in Washington, he said Basel's leverage ratio "may have been set too low." Governors Sarah Bloom Raskin and Jeremy Stein also have called for higher capital requirements.
Fed Study
The FDIC, prodded by Hoenig, is pushing for a leverage requirement even higher than 6 percent, according to four people with knowledge of the talks.
The Fed has resisted going beyond that figure. The central bank is concerned that relying on a measure that doesn't take risk into account could result in banks making riskier investments, as they wouldn't have to allocate more capital, one of the people said. It is studying the impact such an increase might have on bond markets and the economy, the person said.
Negotiations haven't concluded, and the final ratio hasn't been set, the four people familiar with the discussions said. It also hasn't been decided which banks would be covered under the tougher rules.
While the final version of the proposal to implement Basel rules could be issued in the next few weeks, the increased leverage requirement might not be included, according to the people with knowledge of the talks. In that case, regulators would adopt the global 3 percent standard and then propose an increase later, allowing time for public comment, they said.
Basel Requirements
Rules promulgated by the Basel committee, which brings together regulators and central bankers from 27 countries, aren't binding on members. Each nation must translate the standards into its own laws and rules. The committee asked that governments put the new leverage ratio into effect by 2018.
The Basel committee has reopened discussion about what off-balance-sheet items should be included in the calculation of total assets, which could lead to revisions in the original guidelines. Members met this week in Basel to consider changes, according to two people briefed on the talks.
The committee and other regulators refer to leverage in a different way than investors and analysts do. In financial rules, a 4 percent ratio means a bank's assets are 25 times its Tier 1 capital, which includes common stock and some hybrid debt securities. While leverage typically is stated as a multiple of assets to capital, the regulatory standard flips the numerator and denominator to express the ratio as a percentage. A bank with a leverage ratio of 4 percent would see its equity wiped out if the value of its assets drops 4 percent.
The Basel committee also increased the minimum capital requirements based on risk-weighted assets. The world's two dozen largest financial institutions need to have common equity equal to 8 percent to 9.5 percent of those assets by 2019. The six biggest U.S. lenders either already meet that requirement or are close, with their risk-weighted capital ratios ranging from 8.4 percent to 9.7 percent at the end of March.
The banking industry is pushing regulators to revise the calculation of leverage to include fewer off-balance-sheet assets and even exclude some balance-sheet items, two of the people with knowledge of the discussions said. In meetings with regulators earlier this month, lobbyists suggested exempting Treasury holdings and cash held at the Fed, they said. That would subtract hundreds of billions of dollars from each bank's total assets, improving their ability to meet the new standard.
'Big Difference'
"What goes in the denominator and what doesn't would make a big difference in what the capital requirement really means at the end," said Brian Kleinhanzl, one of the KBW analysts who wrote the report.
KBW analysts based their calculations on the current version of Basel's simple leverage ratio, which uses a similar definition of assets as the one outlined in the U.S. proposal.
The new Basel leverage rule also changes how derivatives are counted as assets. Under generally accepted accounting rules known as U.S. GAAP, JPMorgan's derivatives holdings, which have a notional value of $71 trillion, appear on its balance sheet as only $71 billion of assets and $62 billion of liabilities. The new Basel rules would require the bank to add several hundred billion dollars of assets when calculating its leverage ratio.
"The notional derivative figures are in trillions, so any tweaking of definitions on how they're included in the denominator can make a huge difference," Kleinhanzl said.
Banks say that the notional amount is only used to calculate payments of a derivative contract and doesn't represent money changing hands or the risk of loss.
Political Pressure
Senators Vitter and Brown have gone further than Basel in what should be included in the calculation of assets. While their bill has failed to gain much support, it has increased pressure on regulators to get tougher in their rule-making, the people with knowledge of the talks said.
As the U.S. weighs a higher leverage ratio, the European Union is wavering. The draft law to implement the new Basel rules, approved by EU governments yesterday, doesn't include a binding leverage ratio. The EU has said it needs more time to study its impact on the economy.
European banks would fare even worse than U.S. counterparts under the new rule, KBW's London analysts have estimated. Barclays Plc, Societe Generale SA, Deutsche Bank AG, UBS AG, and Credit Suisse Group AG all would have leverage ratios below 3 percent, the minimum required under Basel, according to KBW. Paris-based BNP Paribas SA would barely exceed 3 percent.
'Highly Unstable'
The U.K. and Switzerland have backed the U.S. during Basel committee discussions about the introduction of a global leverage standard. Yesterday the two European countries urged their banks to improve capital positions to meet the new Basel requirements. The Bank of England asked five banks, including Barclays, to increase capital by a combined $21 billion. The Swiss National Bank said UBS and Credit Suisse need to focus on "capital-building" to improve leverage ratios.
The U.K. has taken a tougher stance on banking rules than its EU partners, according to Stefano Micossi, a visiting professor at the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium. Switzerland, which isn't an EU member, also has imposed higher capital standards on its biggest banks than required by Basel.
"The real problem is in Europe, because they're still resisting de-levering their banking system," said Micossi, who's also director general of Assonime, an Italian trade association. "A banking system 33 times levered, as the Basel rule was set at, is still highly unstable."


text:
ARM's low end undercut by Andes core
15 comments
SAN JOSE, Calif. Andes Technology takes microcontrollers to a new low with the launch of a soft core that can deliver up to 108 Dhrystone MIPS/milliwatt and fit into 0.04 mm2 in a 90-nm process. The Hummingbird N7 core uses about 30 percent less power at the same performance of an ARM Cortex M0.
Two customers have already licensed the N7 for use in Bluetooth and touchscreen controllers. Separately, Andes (Hsinchu, Taiwan) is also shipping its high-end N13 cores, geared for dataplane networking systems running Linux.
The low-end N7 delivers 1.19 to 1.45 DMIPS/MHz using a mix of 16- and 32-bit instructions. It has a two-stage pipeline, can be implemented in 12,000 to 30,000 gates and employs a prefetch buffer that acts as a small instruction cache.
Click on image to enlarge.
Although the smartphone applications processor gets most of the limelight these days, a smartphone uses many more cores outside that chip, Gwennap said. Thats a big opportunity in a wide range of comms and peripheral controllers.


text: According to one popular myth, the word "cocktail" derives from the use of roosters' tails to garnish beverages in Colonial America. Whatever your cocktail, wine or beer needs, forgo the convenience market and shop at a liquor store for the biggest selection. Here are some popular terms in the world of liquor stores.


text:
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