Primary elections, or direct primary are voting processes by which voters can indicate their preference for their party's candidate, or a candidate in general, in an upcoming general election, local election, or by-election. Depending on the country and administrative divisions within the country, voters might consist of the general public in what is called an open primary, or solely the members of a political party in what is called a closed primary. In addition to these, there are other variants on primaries (which are discussed below) that are used by many countries holding elections throughout the world.

The origins of primary elections can be traced to the progressive movement in the United States, which aimed to take the power of candidate nomination from party leaders to the people. However, political parties control the method of nomination of candidates for office in the name of the party. Other methods of selecting candidates include caucuses, internal selection by a party body such as a convention or party congress, direct nomination by the party leader, and nomination meetings.

Primary elections are typically held for offices that have a rigid term, such as a president, governor or member of a legislature. However, offices such as a prime minister, which can be replaced without recourse to a new election, have a similar process: a leadership election, where party members elect the leader of their political party. In the vast majority of instances, a party's leader will become prime minister (in a federal election) or premier/chief minister/first minister (in a province, state, territory, or other first-level administrative subdivision) should their party enter government with the most seats. Thus, a leadership election is also often considered to be one for the party's de facto candidate for prime minister or premier.

However, Prime Ministerial primaries have been held in inter-party electoral alliances, such as the 2021 Hungarian opposition primary, and also in cases where a single party opted to retain its leader but select someone else as its Prime Ministerial candidate, as the Portuguese Socialist Party has done in 2014.

The inverse may also happen; the Democratic Progressive Party in Taiwan automatically bestows the party's internal leadership on a sitting DPP president.

Types

General
Where primary elections are organized by parties, not the administration, two types of primaries can generally be distinguished:

 Closed primary. (synonyms: internal primaries, party primaries) In the case of closed primaries, internal primaries, or party primaries, only party members can vote.
 Open primary. All voters can take part in an open primary and may cast votes on a ballot of any party. The party may require them to express their support to the party's values and pay a small contribution to the costs of the primary.

United States

History
The direct primary became important in the United States at the state level starting in the 1890s and at the local level in the 1900s. However, presidential nominations depended chiefly on state party conventions until 1972. In 1968, Hubert Humphrey won the Democratic nomination without entering any of the 14 state primaries. The Democrats set up the McGovern–Fraser Commission that rewrote the rules to emphasize primaries, and the Republicans followed suit.

The first primary elections came in the Democratic Party in the South in the 1890s starting in Louisiana in 1892. By 1897 in 11 Southern and border states the Democratic party held primaries to select candidates. Unlike the final election run by government officials, primaries are run by party officials, making it easy to discriminate against black voters in the era of Jim Crow. The US Supreme Court declared the white primary unconstitutional in Smith v. Allwright in 1944.

The direct primary was promoted primarily by regular party leaders to obtain more party loyalty.  However progressive reformers like Robert M. La Follette of Wisconsin also promoted them, Starting in 1890 La Follette led the successful fight, winning voter approval in a referendum in 1904.

In the United States, various types can be differentiated:

Closed primary
 People may vote in a party's primary only if they are registered members of that party prior to election day. Independents cannot participate. Because some political parties name themselves independent, the terms "non-partisan" or "unaffiliated" often replace "independent" when referring to those who are not affiliated with a political party. Thirteen states & Washington D.C., Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Pennsylvania, and Wyominghave closed primaries.

Semi-closed
 As in closed primaries, registered party members can vote only in their own party's primary. Semi-closed systems, however, allow unaffiliated voters to participate as well. Depending on the state, independents either make their choice of party primary privately, inside the voting booth, or publicly, by registering with any party on Election Day. Sixteen statesAlaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, Utah, and West Virginiahave semi-closed primaries that allow voters to register or change party preference on election day. Massachusetts allows unenrolled voters or members of minor parties to vote in the primary of either major party, but registration or party changes must be done no fewer than 20 days prior to the primary.

Open primary
 A registered voter may vote in any party primary regardless of his or her own party affiliation. Fourteen states – Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Hawaii, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, South Carolina, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, and Wisconsin – have open primaries. When voters do not register with a party before the primary, it is called a pick-a-party primary because the voter can select which party's primary they wish to vote in on election day. Because of the open nature of this system, a practice known as raiding may occur. Raiding consists of voters of one party crossing over and voting in the primary of another party, effectively allowing a party to help choose its opposition's candidate. The theory is that opposing party members vote for the weakest candidate of the opposite party in order to give their own party the advantage in the general election. An example of this can be seen in the 1998 Vermont senatorial primary with the nomination of Fred Tuttle as the Republican candidate in the general election .

Semi-open
 A registered voter need not publicly declare which political party's primary that they will vote in before entering the voting booth. When voters identify themselves to the election officials, they must request a party's specific ballot. Only one ballot is cast by each voter. In many states with semi-open primaries, election officials or poll workers from their respective parties record each voter's choice of party and provide access to this information. The primary difference between a semi-open and open primary system is the use of a party-specific ballot. In a semi-open primary, a public declaration in front of the election judges is made and a party-specific ballot given to the voter to cast. Certain states that use the open-primary format may print a single ballot and the voter must choose on the ballot itself which political party's candidates they will select for a contested office.

Blanket primary
 A primary in which the ballot is not restricted to candidates from one party, and where the top candidate from each party advances to the general election.

Nonpartisan blanket primary
 A primary in which the ballot is not restricted to candidates from one party, where the top two candidates advance to the general election regardless of party affiliation. Louisiana has famously operated under this system, which has been nicknamed the "jungle primary." California has used a nonpartisan blanket primary since 2012 after passing Proposition 14 in 2010, and the State of Washington has used a nonpartisan blanket primary since 2008.

In the United States
The United States is one of a handful of countries to select candidates through popular vote in a primary election system; most other countries rely on party leaders or paid up party members to select candidates, as was previously the case in the U.S. In modern politics, primary elections have been described as a vehicle for taking decision-making from political insiders to the voters, though political science research indicates that the formal party organizations retain significant influence over nomination outcomes. The selection of candidates for federal, state, and local general elections takes place in primary elections organized by the public administration for the general voting public to participate in for the purpose of nominating the respective parties' official candidates; state voters start the electoral process for governors and legislators through the primary process, as well as for many local officials from city councilors to county commissioners. The candidate who moves from the primary to be successful in the general election takes public office.

Non-partisan
Primaries can be used in nonpartisan elections to reduce the set of candidates that go on to the general election (qualifying primary). (In the U.S., many city, county and school board elections are non-partisan, although often the political affiliations of candidates are commonly known.) In some states and localities, candidates receiving more than 50% of the vote in the primary are automatically elected, without having to run again in the general election. In other states, the primary can narrow the number of candidates advancing to the general election to the top two, while in other states and localities, twice as many candidates as can win in the general election may advance from the primary.

Blanket
When a qualifying primary is applied to a partisan election, it becomes what is generally known as a blanket or Louisiana primary: typically, if no candidate wins a majority in the primary, the two candidates receiving the highest pluralities, regardless of party affiliation, go on to a general election that is in effect a run-off.  This often has the effect of eliminating minor parties from the general election, and frequently the general election becomes a single-party election. Unlike a plurality voting system, a run-off system meets the Condorcet loser criterion in that the candidate that ultimately wins would not have been beaten in a two-way race with every one of the other candidates.

Because many Washington residents were disappointed over the loss of their blanket primary, which the Washington State Grange helped institute in 1935, the Grange filed Initiative 872 in 2004 to establish a blanket primary for partisan races, thereby allowing voters to once again cross party lines in the primary election. The two candidates with the most votes then advance to the general election, regardless of their party affiliation. Supporters claimed it would bring back voter choice; opponents said it would exclude third parties and independents from general election ballots, could result in Democratic or Republican-only races in certain districts, and would in fact reduce voter choice. The initiative was put to a public vote in November 2004 and passed. On 15 July 2005, the initiative was found unconstitutional by the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington. The U.S. Supreme Court heard the Grange's appeal of the case in October 2007. In March 2009, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Grange-sponsored Top 2 primary, citing a lack of compelling evidence to overturn the voter-approved initiative.

In elections using electoral systems where strategic nomination is a concern, primaries can be very important in preventing "clone" candidates that split their constituency's vote because of their similarities. Primaries allow political parties to select and unite behind one candidate. However, tactical voting is sometimes a concern in non-partisan primaries as members of the opposite party can vote for the weaker candidate in order to face an easier general election.

In California, under Proposition 14 (Top Two Candidates Open Primary Act), a voter-approved referendum, in all races except for that for U.S. president and county central committee offices, all candidates running in a primary election regardless of party will appear on a single primary election ballot and voters may vote for any candidate, with the top two vote-getters overall moving on to the general election regardless of party. The effect of this is that it will be possible for two Republicans or two Democrats to compete against each other in a general election if those candidates receive the most primary-election support.

Partisan
As a result of a federal court decision in Idaho, the 2011 Idaho Legislature passed House Bill 351 implementing a closed primary system.

Oregon was the first American state in which a binding primary election was conducted entirely via the internet. The election was held by the Independent Party of Oregon in July, 2010.

Presidential primaries

In the United States, Iowa and New Hampshire have drawn attention every four years because they hold the first caucus and primary election, respectively, and often give a candidate the momentum to win their party's nomination. Since 2000, the primary in South Carolina has also become increasingly important, as it is the first Southern state to hold a primary election in the calendar year.

A criticism of the current presidential primary election schedule is that it gives undue weight to the few states with early primaries, as those states often build momentum for leading candidates and rule out trailing candidates long before the rest of the country has even had a chance to weigh in, leaving the last states with virtually no actual input on the process. The counterargument to this criticism, however, is that, by subjecting candidates to the scrutiny of a few early states, the parties can weed out candidates who are unfit for office.

The Democratic National Committee (DNC) proposed a new schedule and a new rule set for the 2008 presidential primary elections. Among the changes: the primary election cycle would start nearly a year earlier than in previous cycles, states from the West and the South would be included in the earlier part of the schedule, and candidates who run in primary elections not held in accordance with the DNC's proposed schedule (as the DNC does not have any direct control over each state's official election schedules) would be penalized by being stripped of delegates won in offending states. The New York Times called the move, "the biggest shift in the way Democrats have nominated their presidential candidates in 30 years."

Of note regarding the DNC's proposed 2008 presidential primary election schedule is that it contrasted with the Republican National Committee's (RNC) rules regarding presidential primary elections. "No presidential primary, caucus, convention, or other meeting may be held for the purpose of voting for a presidential candidate and/or selecting delegates or alternate delegates to the national convention, prior to the first Tuesday of February in the year in which the national convention is held." In , this date is February .

Candidates for U.S. President who seek their party's nomination participate in primary elections run by state governments, or caucuses run by the political parties. Unlike an election where the only participation is casting a ballot, a caucus is a gathering or "meeting of party members designed to select candidates and propose policies". Both primaries and caucuses are used in the presidential nomination process, beginning in January or February and culminating in the late summer political party conventions. Candidates may earn convention delegates from each state primary or caucus. Sitting presidents generally do not face serious competition from their party.

Primary classifications
While it is clear that the closed/semi-closed/semi-open/open classification commonly used by scholars studying primary systems does not fully explain the highly nuanced differences seen from state to state, still, it is very useful and has real-world implications for the electorate, election officials, and the candidates themselves.

As far as the electorate is concerned, the extent of participation allowed to weak partisans and independents depends almost solely on which of the aforementioned categories best describes their state's primary system. Clearly, open and semi-open systems favor this type of voter, since they can choose which primary they vote in on a yearly basis under these models. In closed primary systems, true independents are, for all practical purposes, shut out of the process.

This classification further affects the relationship between primary elections and election commissioners and officials. The more open the system, the greater the chance of raiding, or voters voting in the other party's primary in hopes of getting a weaker opponent chosen to run against a strong candidate in the general election. Raiding has proven stressful to the relationships between political parties, who feel cheated by the system, and election officials, who try to make the system run as smoothly as possible.

Perhaps the most dramatic effect this classification system has on the primary process is its influence on the candidates themselves. Whether a system is open or closed dictates the way candidates run their campaigns. In a closed system, from the time a candidate qualifies to the day of the primary, they tend to have to cater to partisans, who tend to lean to the more extreme ends of the ideological spectrum. In the general election, under the assumptions of the median voter theorem, the candidate must move more towards the center in hopes of capturing a plurality.

Europe
In Europe, primaries are not organized by the public administration but by parties themselves. Legislation is mostly silent on primaries. The main reason to this is that the electoral system used to form governments, be it proportional representation or two-round systems, lessens the need for an open primary.

Governments are not involved in the process; however, parties may need their cooperation, notably in the case of an open primary, e.g. to obtain the electoral roll, or to cover the territory with a sufficient number of polling stations.

Whereas closed primaries are rather common within many European countries, few political parties in Europe already opted for open primaries. Parties generally organise primaries to nominate the party leader (leadership election). The underlying reason for that is that most European countries are parliamentary democracies. National governments are derived from the majority in the Parliament, which means that the head of the government is generally the leader of the winning party. France is one exception to this rule.

Closed primaries happen in many European countries, while open primaries have so far only occurred in the socialist and social-democratic parties in Greece and Italy, whereas France's Socialist Party organised the first open primary in France in October 2011.

One of the more recent developments is organizing primaries on the European level. European parties that organized primaries so far were the European Green Party (EGP) and the Party of European Socialists (PES)

European Union
With a view to the European elections, many European political parties consider organising a presidential primary.

Indeed, the Lisbon treaty, which entered into force in December 2009, lays down that the outcome of elections to the European Parliament must be taken into account in selecting the President of the Commission; the Commission is in some respects the executive branch of the EU and so its president can be regarded as the EU prime minister. Parties are therefore encouraged to designate their candidates for Commission president ahead of the next election in 2014, in order to allow voters to vote with a full knowledge of the facts. Many movements are now asking for primaries to designate these candidates.
 Already in April 2004, a former British conservative MEP, Tom Spencer, advocated for American-style primaries in the European People's Party: "A series of primary elections would be held at two-week intervals in February and March 2009. The primaries would start in the five smallest countries and continue every two weeks until the big five voted in late March. To avoid swamping by the parties from the big countries, one could divide the number of votes cast for each candidate in each country by that country's voting weight in the Council of Ministers. Candidates for the post of president would have to declare by 1 January 2009."
 In July 2013 European Green Party (EGP) announced that it would run a first ever European-wide open primary as the preparation for the European elections in 2014. It was to be open to all citizens of the EU over the age of 16 who "supported green values" They elected two transnational candidates who were to be the face of the common campaign of the European green parties united in the EGP, and who also were their candidates for European Commission president.
 Following the defeat of the Party of European Socialists during the European elections of June 2009, the PES Congress that took place in Prague in December 2009 made the decision that PES would designate its own candidate before the 2014 European elections. A Campaign for a PES primary was then launched by PES supporters in June 2010, and it managed to convince the PES Council meeting in Warsaw in December 2010 to set up Working Group "Candidate 2014" in charge of proposing a procedure and timetable for a "democratic" and "transparent" designation process "bringing on board all our parties and all levels within the parties".

The European think-tank Notre Europe also evokes the idea that European political parties should designate their candidate for Vice-President/High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs. This would lead European parties to have "presidential tickets" on the American model.

Finally, the European Parliament envisaged to introduce a requirement for internal democracy in the regulation on the statute of European political parties. European parties would therefore have to involve individual members in the major decisions such as designating the presidential candidate.

Armenia
On 24 and 25 November 2007, the Armenian Revolutionary Federation political party conducted a non-binding Armenia-wide primary election. The party asked the people of their recommendation of who they should nominate as their candidate for the upcoming presidential election. What characterized it as a primary instead of a standard opinion poll was that the public knew of the primary in advance, all eligible voters were invited, and the voting was by secret ballot. "Some 68,183 people . . . voted in make-shift tents and mobile ballot boxes . . ."

France
The means by which the candidate of an established political party is selected has evolved. Until 2012, none of the six Presidents elected through direct election faced a competitive internal election.

 The right didn't hold often primary elections to decide for their national candidates.
 In 2007, Nicolas Sarkozy, President of the UMP, organized an approval "primary" without any opponent. He won by 98% and made his candidacy speech thereafter.
 In 2016, The Republicans held, on 20 and 27 November, primaries to decide of their presidential candidate for 2017.
 On the left however, the Socialist Party, which helped François Mitterrand gain the Presidency for 14 years, has been plagued by internal divisions since the latter departed from politics. Rather than forming a new party, which is the habit on the right-wing, the party started to elect its nominee internally.
 A first try in 1995: Lionel Jospin won the nomination three months before the election. He lost in the run-off to Jacques Chirac. Later in 2002, although the candidacy of then-PM Jospin was undisputed in his party, each of the five left-wing parties of the government he led sent a candidate, paving the way for all five to lose by the Spoiler effect.
 The idea made progress as the 2007 race approached, once the referendum on a European constitution was over. The latter showed strong ideological divisions within the left-wing spectrum, and the Socialist Party itself. This prevented the possibility of a primary spanning the whole left-wing, that would give its support to a presidential candidate. Given that no majority supported either a leader or a split, a registration campaign, enabling membership for only 20 euros, and a closed primary was organized, which Ségolène Royal won. She qualified to the national run-off that she lost to Nicolas Sarkozy.
 In 2011, the Socialist Party decided to organise the first ever open primary in France to pick the Socialist party and the Radical Party of the Left nominee for the 2012 presidential election. Inspired by the 2008 U.S. primaries, it was seen as a way to reinvigorate the party. The idea was first proposed by Terra Nova, an independent left-leaning think tank, in a 2008 report. It was also criticized for going against the nature of the regime. The open primary was not state-organized : the party took charge of all the electoral procedures, planning to set up 10,000 voting polls. All citizens on the electoral rolls, members of the Socialist party and the Radical Party of the Left, and members of the parties' youth organisation (MJS and JRG), including minors of 15 to 18 years old, were entitled to vote in exchange for one euro to cover the costs. More than 3 million people participated in this first open primary, which was considered a success, and former party leader François Hollande was designated the Socialist and Radical candidate for the 2012 presidential election.
 Other parties organize membership primaries to choose their nominee, such as Europe Ecologie – Les Verts (EE-LV) (2006, 2011, 2016), and the French Communist Party in 2011.
 At the local level, membership primaries are the rule for Socialist Party's candidates, but these are usually not competitive. In order to tame potential feud in his party, and prepare the ground for a long campaign, Sarkozy pushed for a closed primary in 2006 to designate the UMP candidate for the 2008 election of the Mayor of Paris. Françoise de Panafieu was elected in a four-way race. However, she did not clinch the mayorship two years later.

Germany
In Germany, top candidates for the federal election can be selected in primaries. For party leaders, however, the selection at delegate conferences is required by law. It is, nevertheless, possible to hold a non-binding primary.

Top candidates
The Greens nominated their top candidates for the 2013 federal election (election of Jürgen Trittin and Katrin Göring-Eckardt) and for the 2017 federal election (election of Cem Özdemir and Katrin Göring-Eckardt) in a primary election by all party members (closed primary).

Primary elections are used much more frequently by parties at the regional than at the federal level.

Party leaders
The first party to use a (non-binding) closed primary to select its party leader at the federal level was the SPD in 1993. After the surprising resignation of Andrea Nahles, the SPD held another party primary to determine her successor in 2019. A dual leadership of Saskia Esken and Norbert Walter-Borjans was elected. The CDU used the procedure for the first time in 2021. Friedrich Merz prevailed against two competitors Norbert Röttgen and Helge Braun in an online ballot of all CDU party members.

Hungary

A two-round primary election was held in Budapest, Hungary in 2019 between four opposition parties, to select a single candidate to the 2019 Budapest mayoral election. A smaller primary was also held in the district of Ferencváros.

For the 2022 parliamentary elections, the opposition parties organized a primary to select both their candidates for MPs and prime minister.

Italy

Primary election were introduced in Italy to establish the centre-left candidates for 2005 regional election. In that occasion the centre-left The Union coalition held open primaries in order to select candidates for President of Apulia and Calabria. A more politically significant primary was held on 16 October 2005, when The Union asked its voters to decide the candidate for Prime Minister in the 2006 general election: 4,300,000 voters showed up and Romano Prodi won hands down. Two years later, on 14 October 2007, voters of the Democratic Party were called to choose the party leader among a list of six, their representatives to the Constituent Assembly and the local leaders. The primary was a success, involving more than 3,500,000 people across Italy, and gave to the winner Walter Veltroni momentum in a difficult period for the government and the centre-left coalition. The centre-right (see House of Freedoms, The People of Freedom, centre-right coalition and Forza Italia) has never held a primary at the national level, but held some experiments at the very local level.

Russia
The first primaries in the history of Russia were held in May 2000 in St. Petersburg, the local branches of the parties Yabloko and the Union of Right Forces, who before the Gubernatorial election offered citizens to choose a single candidate from the democratic opposition.

In 2007, before the parliamentary elections, United Russia held primaries in several regions. However, its results were not sufficiently taken into account when nominating candidates from the party. For example, the congress of United Russia included in the regional party list in the Samara region not the winners of the primaries, but those who did not even participate in the primaries.

In the same year 2007, A Just Russia held the primaries to determine the candidate for the Gubernatorial election in Altai Krai. Anyone could vote for them, for which special items were opened. However, in the future, A Just Russia did not begin to pursue the primaries.

In 2011, United Russia, together with the All-Russian People's Front, held primaries for the nomination of candidates for the parlmentary election. This vote was called the "All-People's Primaries", but in fact it was not. Candidates for the primaries were selected by special committees. Not even all party members had the right to vote, but only about 200,000 specially selected electors. In addition, the results of voting on the primaries were in most cases ignored. Of the 80 lists of regional groups of candidates for the State Duma, nominated by the congress of United Russia, only 8 lists coincided with the lists of winners of the primaries. All the same, the event played a role in the elimination of candidates: there were cases when the current deputies of the State Duma, having seen that they did not enjoy the support of electors, withdrew their candidacies.

In the future, United Russia has sometimes resorted to an "open" model of primaries, which allows voting to all interested voters. In 2014, in the primaries of the "United Russia" before the elections to the Moscow City Duma, any Muscovite could vote, and not only registered electors.

In 2016, the primaries for the selection of candidates for parliamentary elections were held by four parties: United Russia, People's Freedom Party, the Party of Growth and the Green Alliance. The most massive were 22 May 2016 primaries of the United Russia, which could vote for every citizen who has an active electoral right. However, the primaries, as well as earlier, were not binding for the leadership of United Russia: a number of winners of the primaries were withdrawn by the leadership without any explanation of reasons, and in 18 single-seat constituencies the party did not nominate any candidates. A striking example was the Nizhny Tagil constituency, where the candidate from the United Russia was approved candidate, who took the 4th place in the primaries. Finally, a number of candidates were included in the party list on the proposal of the party leader Dmitry Medvedev from among those who did not even participate in the primaries.

In 2017, the Party of Growth holds the primaries for the nomination of candidates for the presidential election. These are the first presidential primaries in the history of Russia. However, voting for candidates will take place via the Internet within three months, and, according to the spokesman of the party, the results of the primaries will not be mandatory for the nomination of the candidate and the party convention may nominate another candidate who does not even participate in the primaries, or even not nominate candidates and support President Vladimir Putin, if he decides to be re-elected.

Poland
Poland
 2019 Civic Platform presidential primary
 2020 Confederation Liberty and Independence presidential primaries

Portugal

 2014 Portuguese Socialist Party prime ministerial primary

United Kingdom

For the 2010 general election, the Conservative Party used open primaries to select two candidates for Member of Parliament. Further open primaries were used to select some Conservative candidates for the 2015 general election, and there are hopes other parties may nominate future candidates in this way.

In Canada
As in Europe, nomination meetings and leadership elections (somewhat similar to primary elections) in Canada are not organized by the public administration but by parties themselves. Political parties participate in federal elections to the House of Commons, in legislative elections in all ten provinces, and in Yukon. (The legislatures and elections in the Northwest Territories and Nunavut are non-partisan.)

Local candidates
Typically, in the months before an anticipated general election, local riding associations of political parties in each electoral district will schedule and announce a Nomination Meeting (similar to a nominating caucus in the United States). Would-be candidates will then file nomination papers with the association, and usually will devote time to solicit existing party members, and to sign up new party members who will also support them at the nomination meeting. At the meeting, typically each candidate will speak, and then members in attendance will vote. The electoral system most often used is an exhaustive ballot system; if no candidate has over 50% of the votes, the candidate with the lowest number of votes will be dropped and another ballot will be held. Also, other candidates who recognize that they will probably not win may withdraw between ballots, and may "throw their support" to (encourage their own supporters to vote for) another candidate. After the nomination meeting, the candidate and the association will obtain approval from party headquarters, and file the candidate's official nomination papers and necessary fees and deposits with Elections Canada or the provincial/territorial election commissions as appropriate.

At times, party headquarters may overturn an association's chosen candidate; for example, if any scandalous information about the candidate comes to light after the nomination. A party headquarters may also "parachute" a prominent candidate into an easy-to-win riding, removing the need to have a nomination meeting. These situations only come up infrequently, as they tend to cause disillusionment among a party's supporters.

Party leaders
Canadian political parties also organize their own elections of party leaders. Not only will the party leader run for a seat in their own chosen riding, they will also become Prime Minister (in a federal election) or Premier (in a province or territory) should their party win the most seats. Thus, a leadership election is also considered to be one for the party's de facto candidate for Prime Minister or Premier. If the party wins the second-most seats, the party leader will become Leader of the Official Opposition; if the party comes third or lower but maintains official party status, the leader will still be recognized as the leader of their party, and will be responsible for co-ordinating the activities and affairs of their party's caucus in the legislature.

In the past, Canadian political parties chose party leaders through an American-style delegated leadership convention. Local riding associations would choose delegates, usually in a manner similar to how they would choose a candidate for election. These delegates typically said explicitly which leadership candidate they would support. Those delegates, as well as other delegates (e.g. sitting party members of Parliament or the legislature, or delegates from party-affiliated organizations such as labor unions in the case of the New Democratic Party), would then vote, again using the exhaustive ballot method, until a leader was chosen. Some provincial political parties retain the delegated convention format.

Lately, Canada's major political parties have moved to a "one member, one vote" system for their federal leadership elections. A leadership convention is still scheduled, but all party members have a chance to vote for the new leader. Typically, members may vote either in person at the convention, online, or through a mail-in ballot.

Instant-runoff voting is used in whole or in part to elect the leaders of the three largest federal political parties in Canada: the Liberal Party of Canada, the Conservative Party of Canada, and the New Democratic Party, albeit the New Democratic Party uses a mixture of IRV and exhaustive voting, allowing each member to choose one format or the other for their vote (as was used in their 2017 leadership election). In 2013, members of the Liberal Party of Canada elected Justin Trudeau as party leader through IRV in a national leadership election. The Conservative Party used IRV (where each of the party's 338 riding associations are weighted equally, regardless of how many members voted in each riding) to elect Erin O'Toole as party leader in 2020, Andrew Scheer in 2017, and Stephen Harper in 2004.

Around the world

Americas

 Argentina
 In Argentina, the presidential primary election is structured as a blanket primary system. Within this framework, voters have the freedom to select a single candidate for each available position, irrespective of party affiliations. This approach holds historical significance, as it was previously employed in the United States as well.
 Chile
 2017 Chilean presidential primaries
 Colombia:
 In the 2006 presidential elections, the Liberal Party, and the socialist Alternative Democratic Pole held primary elections, electing Horacio Serpa as the Liberal candidate, and Carlos Gaviria as candidate of the Alternative Democratic Pole.
 In the 2010 presidential elections, four parties held primary elections: The Liberal Party elected former minister Rafael Pardo as candidate, the Democratic Pole elected senator Gustavo Petro, the Conservative Party chose ambassador Noemi Sanin, and the Green Party chose former mayor of Bogota Antanas Mockus.
Costa Rica: the country's three main political parties, the National Liberation Party, the Social Christian Unity Party, and the Citizens' Action Party, have all run primary elections on several different occasions.
 Uruguay
 2019 Uruguayan presidential primaries

Asia
 Hong Kong
 2020 Hong Kong pro-democracy primaries
 Republic of China (Taiwan):
 2019 Democratic Progressive Party presidential primary
 2019 Kuomintang presidential primary
 South Korea
 2017 South Korean presidential election
 United New Democratic Party presidential primaries

Oceania

 Australia
 The Australian Labor Party and the National Party have conducted limited experiments with primary-style pre-selections.
 In 2018, the New South Wales branch of the Liberal Party rejected a motion by former Prime Minister Tony Abbott to have primary-style preselections.

See also

 Leadership election, a similar process used to select the party's internal leadership instead of a candidate for external office
 Sore loser law, which states that the loser in a primary election cannot thereafter run as an independent in the general election

Notes

References
 Bibby, John, and Holbrook, Thomas. 2004. Politics in the American States: A Comparative Analysis, 8th Edition. Ed. Virginia Gray and Russell L. Hanson. Washington D.C.: CQ Press, pp. 62–100
 Brereton Charles. First in the Nation: New Hampshire and the Premier Presidential Primary. Portsmouth, NH: Peter E. Randall Publishers, 1987
 The Center for Election Science. Electoral System Summary

 Cross, William P., Kenig, Ofer, Pruysers, Scott, and Rahat, Gideon. 2016. The promise and challenge of party primary elections: a comparative perspective. Montreal.
 Hershey, Majorie. Political Parties in America, 12th Edition. New York: Pearson Longman, 2007. pp. 157–73
 Jeremias, Ralf. "Primary Elections in the USA: Between Republicanism and Democracy". Topos. Journal for Philosophy and Cultural Studies, 1/2021, pp. 55-72.
 Kendall, Kathleen E. Communication in the Presidential Primaries: Candidates and the Media, 1912–2000 (2000)
 Primaries: Open and Closed
 Palmer, Niall A. The New Hampshire Primary and the American Electoral Process (1997)
 Scala, Dante J. Stormy Weather: The New Hampshire Primary and Presidential Politics (2003)
 Ware, Alan. The American Direct Primary: Party Institutionalization and Transformation in the North (2002)], the invention of primaries around 1900 --they were promoted by regular party leaders as well as reformers online

External links
 The Green Papers – Voter Eligibility

Electoral systems

Primary election


Henry Kater FRS, FRAS (16 April 1777 – 26 April 1835) was a British physicist of German descent.

Early life
He was born at Bristol. At first he intended to study law; but he gave up the idea on his father's death in 1794. He entered the army, obtaining a commission in the 12th Regiment of Foot, then stationed in India, where he assisted William Lambton in the Great Trigonometric Survey. Failing health obliged him to return to England; and in 1808, then a lieutenant, he entered on a student career at  the Senior Division of the new Royal Military College at High Wycombe. Shortly afterwards he was promoted to the rank of captain. In 1814 he retired on half-pay, and devoted the remainder of his life to scientific research.

Scientist
His first major contribution to science was the comparison of the merits of the Cassegrainian and Gregorian telescopes; Kater determined the latter to be an inferior design.

His most substantial work was the invention of Kater's pendulum, enabling the strength of gravity to be determined, first at London and subsequently at various stations throughout the country. As the inventor of the floating collimator, Kater rendered a service to practical astronomy. He also published memoirs on British standards of length and mass; and in 1832 he published an account of his work on verifying the Russian standards of length. For these services to Russia he received in 1814 the decoration of the order of St. Anne; and the same year he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. In 1826, he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Kater was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1832. In 1833 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society.

He won the Copley Medal in 1817 and the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1831.

He is considered as the inventor of the prismatic compass, patented a year later by Charles Schmalcalder.
He also studied compass needles, his Bakerian lecture containing the results of many experiments. The treatise on "Mechanics" in Dionysius Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopedia was partly written by him; and his interest in more purely astronomical questions was shown by two papers in the Memoirs of the Royal Astronomical Society for 1831–1833 — one on an observation of Saturn's outer ring, the other on a method of determining longitude by means of lunar eclipses.

Works

References

Notes

External links

Awarding of RAS gold medal
Biographical information

Obituaries
MNRAS 3 (1836) 155

1777 births
1835 deaths
19th-century British astronomers
English physicists
Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Fellows of the Royal Society
Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
Scientists from Bristol
Recipients of the Copley Medal
Recipients of the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society
18th-century English people
19th-century English people
Suffolk Regiment officers
Military personnel from Bristol

Henry Kater


Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by Billboard magazine in the United States.

This 60-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly mostly by airplay and occasionally commercial sales. Currently, the chart does not count digital downloads towards chart tabulation (although singles that are only available as downloads do chart if they receive enough airplay).

References

Record charts

Hot Country Songs


The Siberian Shelf is a coastal shelf in the Arctic Ocean and is the largest continental shelf of the Earth, a part of the continental shelf of Russia. It extends from the continent of Eurasia in the general area of North Siberia (hence the name) into the Arctic Ocean. It stretches to  offshore. It is relatively shallow, with average depth of 100 m. A number of islands are within the shelf, including the Wrangel Island, Novaya Zemlya, and the New Siberian Islands.

It is encompassed by the Kara Sea, Laptev Sea, and East Siberian Sea,  and respectively subdivided into the Kara Shelf,  the Laptev Shelf and the East Siberian Shelf.

Eastwards it merges into the Chukchi Shelf (of the Chukchi Sea) shared by Eurasia and North America (i.e., by Russia and the United States).

Westwards it merges into the Barents Shelf of the Barents Sea.

Also, the New Siberian Islands and the New Siberian Rift Basin define the 'New Siberian Shelf.'

According to the split of the high Arctic by the Lomonosov mid-ocean ridge into the Eurasian Basin and Amerasian Basin, the Siberian Shelf is split between the Eurasian Shelf and the Amerasian Shelf.

Flora and fauna
The Siberian Shelf is the habitat for numerous flora and fauna. Notably the Polar bear is found through much of the shelf, including the Barents Sea and Chukchi Sea.

See also

 East Siberian Sea
 Milne Ice Shelf

References

Landforms of the Arctic Ocean
Geography of Siberia
Landforms of Asia
Continental shelves of Russia

Siberian Shelf


An ideal gas is a gas with particular characteristics.
 The particles have no volume
 All collisions between particles are elastic collisions and lose no kinetic energy
 The particles neither attract each other nor repel
 They have random movement

Ideal gases are hypothetical which means that they do not exist in their true form.

Equation
The Ideal gas law that relates the volume, pressure, temperature and number of particles in an ideal gas is:

Where:
 n = number of moles of gas
 T = temperature in Kelvin (K)
 R = 8.314 J⋅K−1⋅mol−1, which is the universal gas constant
 V = volume in Litres (L)
 P = pressure in Pascals (Pa)

Chemistry
Gases

Ideal gas


It's My Party is a romance and drama movie. It was released March 1996. The story is about a two-day-long party given by Nick Stark, a man with AIDS. Instead of dying slowly, he decides to kill himself using Seconal. Eric Roberts plays Nick, Marlee Matlin plays Daphne, Margaret Cho plays Charlene Lee, Sally Kellerman plays Sara, Olivia Newton-John plays Lina.

The movie had mixed to positive reviews. Its running time was 110 minutes.

1996 romantic drama movies

It's My Party


The Fleming Museum of Art is a museum of art and anthropology at the University of Vermont in Burlington, Vermont. The museum's collection includes around 24,000 objects from a wide variety of eras and places.

According to the Vermont Encyclopedia, the museum is a cultural center for the community and "attracts a diverse audience from UVM, area colleges, and the general public."

History

The University of Vermont began to acquire a collection of art, artifacts, and other objects in 1826, when a society of faculty and others formed the College of Natural History, a society separate from the university but housing its collections in the Old Mill on the University Green, in order to begin "the acquisition and diffusion of knowledge in every department of natural history, and the accumulation of books, instruments and all materials which can advance these ends." Among the museum's initial collections were "fossils, stuffed birds, a sperm whale tooth, and a cannon ball that a local resident found while gardening."

When the collection outgrew its Old Mill space, it was relocated to Torrey Hall in 1862. Less than ten years later, a third story was built at Torrey Hall for the university's fine art collection, and the space became known as the Park Gallery of Fine Arts. The collection remained at Torrey Hall in the late 1920s, although it was outgrowing its space.

The formation of the modern Fleming Museum of Art came in 1929, when Katherine Wolcott, the niece and only heir of Robert Hull Fleming and an artist herself, traveled from Chicago to Burlington, intending to establish a scholarship in honor of her late uncle, who had graduated from the University of Vermont in 1862 before becoming a wealthy Chicago grain merchant. Wolcott met with university president Guy Bailey, who proposed a new museum building in memory of Fleming. Wolcott accepted Bailey's proposal and donated $150,000 for the construction of the Fleming Museum. Soon afterward, the museum received another large contribution from James B. Wilbur of Manchester, Vermont, who donated $100,000 and his large collection of books and papers - including the papers of Ethan Allen - related to the history of Vermont to the museum. These two gifts funded the $300,000 cost of construction the museum, and Wolcott donated an additional $150,000 for an endowment soon after. The museum opened in 1931.

The university was one of the first to include a room specifically for children, and placed an emphasis on community service and education, including free movies, lectures, and workshops every Saturday, a traveling exhibit program for schools, and an adult education program with evening lectures and classes. In the mid-1930s, between 25,000 and 30,000 people visited the Fleming Museum annually, at a time when the population of Burlington was estimated at 27,000.

The museum impacted the development of the University of Vermont. The university's studio art and art history departments began at the Fleming Museum of Art, and in the 1950s, the museum director was the chair of the university's art department. In the 1950s, the university shifted the museum's focus to make it an art museum, and many original artifacts from the "cabinet of curiosities" were moved to a number of university departments to free up space for newly acquired objects.

A $1.4 million renovation to the museum was completed in 1984. Until 2014, the museum was known as the Robert Hull Fleming Museum.

The previous director of the museum was Janie Cohen, who led it for 20 years.

Collections
The Fleming Museum includes several collections:

 African. The museum's African collection consists mainly of West and Central African sculpture. Among the museum's important Africa pieces are premodern pieces such as a Queen Mother sculpture head from Benin (18th century), Ashanti gold weights, a Mende sowo mask, and southeast African beadwork and carved wooden pieces (19th-century) as well as more recent works, including "a telephone-wire basket from South Africa and plastic Ibeji figures from Nigeria."
American. The museum's American art collection emphasizes "19th-and 20th-century landscapes; early 20th-century prints, drawings, and photographs; early Rookwood pottery; Vermont wedding gowns; and works in a variety of media by Vermont artists active from the mid-19th century through the present." The museum lists John James Audubon, Albert Bierstadt, Ilya Bolotowsky, Margaret Bourke-White, Charles Demuth, Charles Louis Heyde, Lewis Hine, Winslow Homer, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Sol LeWitt, Glenn Ligon, Florine Stettheimer, Alfred Stieglitz, Claire Van Vliet, Andy Warhol, and Kara Walker as some of the artists represented.
 Ancient Art and Archaeology. The museum's collection includes a number of objects dating from antiquity, with artifacts in the collection coming from Ancient Egypt, the Near East, the Mediterranean, and prehistoric Vermont. Notable pieces include an Assyrian bas-relief from the palace of Ashurnasirpal II, dated as 3,000 years old. Other objects in the collection include "Sumerian cuneiform tablets, Greek pottery, Coptic textiles, and more than 400 Egyptian objects, including a late Dynastic mummy and coffin."
 Asian. The museum's Asian collection includes a number of objects, including "Shang Dynasty bronze vessels, Tang Dynasty Tomb figures, and Qing Dynasty textiles from China; East Asian bronzes; and Korean ceramics, as well as Japanese lacquerware, calligraphy, and prints." The highlight of the museum's Japanese print collection is a complete set of Hiroshige's Fifty-three Stations of the Tōkaidō. Sculpture and decorative art pieces from Thailand, Cambodia, and Burma, acquired from the Doris Duke Collection, are also represented in the collection, along with a number of works of Indian art.
 Europe. The museum's European collection includes a variety of works, with an emphasis on Northern European paintings and prints of the 16th and 17th centuries and British portraits of the 18th century. The museum also hold a complete edition of the Description de l'Égypte, the result of Napoleon's campaign in Egypt. Among the oldest items in the collection are 13th-century illuminated manuscripts. According to the museum, European artists represented in the collection include Max Beckmann, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Honoré Daumier, Albrecht Dürer, Hendrik Goltzius, Francisco Goya, William Hogarth, Giovanni Battista Piranesi, and Auguste Rodin.
 Native American. The museum's indigenous peoples of the Americas collection is housed in the James B. Petersen Gallery of Native American Cultures, which reopened in 2006 following renovation. The collection includes some 2,000 objects dating from c. 800 CE and originating in a variety of places in North and South America. Notable items include the Ogden B. Read Northern Plains Collection, which includes beadwork and quillwork; Southwestern objects, including ceramics, baskets, and textiles; and Pacific Northwest Coast objects, including masks, carvings, and a Chilkat blanket. The museum also holds the "Colchester Jar," a ceramic vessel dated to around the year 1500 and representative of the St. Lawrence Iroquoian style, which was found in Vermont in the early 19th century.
 Oceanic. The museum's collection of artifacts from Oceania includes objects from New Guinea, Easter Island, Samoa, the Solomon Islands, the Trobriand Islands, aboriginal Australia, and the Marquesas Islands. Significant objects include "Tatanua ceremonial masks from New Ireland, a Trobriand shield, and contemporary Aboriginal paintings from Australia."
 Pre-Columbian. The museum holds a number of artifacts from the pre-Columbian era, including textiles, ceremonial stone carvings, and ceramics, including jars, bowls, and effigies of humans and animals.

Museum architecture
The Fleming Museum building was designed by William Mitchell Kendall of McKim, Mead & White, a prominent New York City architectural firm in the early 20th century. Several other University of Vermont campus buildings were designed by McKim, Mead & White, the earliest being the Ira Allen Chapel (1926) with the last being the Waterman Building (1940–41). The Fleming Museum building is an example of Colonial Revival architecture, with red bricks and boarding wood trim bordered white. Architectural elements in the museum building include pediments, pilasters, entablatures, and balustrades.

The Marble Court was the museum's original entrance, and includes a two-story central courtyard with columns supporting a balcony on the second floor. The concept was the idea of the museum's first benefactor Katherine Wolcott, who drew a sketch of the design based on the Isaac Delgado Art Museum, which is now the New Orleans Museum of Art. William Mitchell Kendall had built a similar space for the Cohen Memorial Fine Arts Building at George Peabody College for Teachers in Nashville, Tennessee. The Marble Court uses marble from Italy, France, and Vermont for the grand staircase, columns, and floors of the space.

A second important space in the museum is the Wilbur Room, which includes walnut wall paneling, a groin-vaulted white plaster ceiling with decorative scrolls with the names Ira Allen, Thomas Chittenden, Ethan Allen, and Stephen R. Bradley, four people who influenced Vermont's early history. The room also has an enormous brass chandelier. The Wilbur Room is named after Museum benefactor James B. Wilbur of Manchester, Vermont, and the room originally housed Wilbur's collection of historical manuscripts, whilewere later moved to the university's Bailey/Howe Library and today are the foundation of the library's Special Collections.

Renovations to the museum in 1984 reoriented the building's entrance, moving it from the front to the rear of the building and increasing accessibility, and included building additions designed by the Watertown, Massachusetts-based Crissman and Solomon Associates. New additions included a climate control system, corridor display cases, a new reception area, a museum store, and an altered gallery floor plan that allowed for exhibition space to be more flexible. The renovations preserved the original building's brick rear wall as an interior wall of this addition.

References

External links

Buildings at the University of Vermont
Art museums and galleries in Vermont
Museums in Burlington, Vermont
Museums established in 1826
1826 establishments in Vermont
Egyptological collections in the United States
University museums in Vermont

Fleming Museum of Art


Hemiballismus or hemiballism is a basal ganglia syndrome resulting from damage to the subthalamic nucleus in the basal ganglia. Hemiballismus is a rare hyperkinetic movement disorder, that is characterized by violent involuntary limb movements, on one side of the body, and can cause significant disability. Ballismus affects both sides of the body and is much rarer. Symptoms can decrease during sleep.

Hemiballismus differs from chorea in that the movements occur in the proximal limbs whereas in chorea the limb movements are in the distal limbs. Also in chorea the movements are more dance-like, flowing from one region to another.

Symptoms
Ballism was defined by Meyers in 1968 as "Repetitive, but constantly varying, large amplitude involuntary movements of the proximal parts of the limbs. This activity is almost ceaseless and movements are often complex and combined". Hemiballismus is usually characterized by involuntary flinging motions of the extremities. The movements are often violent and have wide amplitudes of motion. They are continuous and random and can involve proximal or distal muscles on one side of the body. Some cases even include the facial muscles. It is common for arms and legs to move together. The more a patient is active, the more the movements increase. With relaxation comes a decrease in movements. Physicians can measure the severity of the disorder by having the patient perform a series of basic, predetermined tasks and counting the hemiballistic movements during a set time session. The physicians then rate the patient on a severity scale. This scale gives scientists and clinicians a way to compare patients and determine the range of the disorder.

The name hemiballismus literally means "half ballistic", referring to the violent, flailing movements observed on one side of the body.

Causes
In examining the causes of hemiballismus, it is important to remember that this disorder is extremely rare. While hemiballismus can result from the following list, just because a patient has one of these disorders does not mean they will also experience hemiballismus.

Stroke
Hemisballismus as a result of stroke occurs in only about 0.45 cases per hundred thousand stroke patients. Even at such a small rate, stroke is by far the most common cause of hemiballismus. A stroke causes tissue to die due to a lack of oxygen resulting from an impaired blood supply. In the basal ganglia, this can result in the death of tissue that helps to control movement. As a result, the brain is left with damaged tissue that sends damaged signals to the skeletal muscles in the body. The result is occasionally a patient with hemiballismus.

Traumatic brain injury
Hemiballismus can also occur as a result of a traumatic brain injury. There are cases in which survivors of assault or other forms of violence have developed hemiballismus. Through these acts of violence, the survivor's brain has been damaged and the hemiballistic movements have developed.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
This disease causes neuronal loss and gliosis, which can include the subthalamic nucleus and other areas of the brain. Essentially any disorder that causes some form of neuronal loss or gliosis in the basal ganglia has the potential to cause hemiballismus.

Nonketotic hyperglycemia
Patients with nonketotic hyperglycemia can develop hemiballismus as a complication to the disease through the development of a subthalamic nucleus lesion. This is the second most common reported cause of hemiballismus. It can be found primarily in the elderly and many of the reported cases have come from East Asian origin, which suggests that there may be some genetic disposition to development of hemiballismus as a result of hyperglycemia. Hemiballistic movements appear when blood glucose levels get too high and then subside once glucose levels return to normal. This time scale for this is usually several hours. In patients with this type of hemiballismus, imaging reveals abnormalities in the putamen contralateral to the movements as well as the globus pallidus and caudate nucleus. While the hyperglycemia itself is not the cause of the hemiballistic movements, it has been suggested that petechial hemorrhage or a decreased production of GABA and acetylcholine could result secondary to the hyperglycemia. One of these issues could be responsible for the hemiballistic movements.

Neoplasms
A neoplasm is an abnormal growth of cells. Cases have shown that if this occurs somewhere in the basal ganglia, hemiballismus can result.

Vascular malformations
Vascular malformations can cause abnormal blood flow to areas of the brain. If too little blood is delivered to the basal ganglia, a stroke can occur.

Tuberculomas
This is another form of tumor that can result in the brain as a result of a tuberculous meningitis infection. This type of tumor can also damage parts of the basal ganglia, sometimes resulting in hemiballismus.

Demyelinating plaques
Demyelinating plaques attack the myelin sheaths on neurons. This decreases the conduction velocity of the neurons, making the signals received by the basal ganglia garbled and incomplete. This disorganized signal can also cause the chaotic movements characterized by hemiballismus.

Complications from HIV infection
Patients with HIV often have complications that arise along with AIDS. Hypoglycemia due to pentamidine use in patients with AIDS has been known to cause hemiballismus. In some patients, hemiballismus has been the only visible symptom to alert the physician that the patients may have AIDS. It is typically a result of a secondary infection that occurs due to the compromised immune system and the most common infection causing hemiballismus is cerebral toxoplasmosis. Most of the lesions that result from this infection are found in the basal ganglia. As long as the diagnosis is not missed, this type of hemiballismus can be treated just as well as in patients without HIV.

Anatomy

Basal ganglia
The basal ganglia are a collection of nuclei that connects to several other areas of the brain. Due to the diverse nuclei that they contain, the basal ganglia are involved in numerous functions, including motor control. It is within this structure that hemiballismus primarily occurs in the brain.

Subthalamic nucleus
This structure within the basal ganglia innervates other structures, including a very important connection to the internal globus pallidus. The subthalamic nucleus essentially provides the excitement needed to drive the globus pallidus. Injury to this area or its efferent or afferent connections can induce this disorder contralateral to the side of the lesion. The structure itself is a regulator of motor function and is also involved in associative and limbic functions. It was traditionally thought that the disorder was only caused by injury to the subthalamic nucleus, but later studies have shown that damage to other basal ganglia regions can also be responsible for causing this disorder. Hemiballismus caused by lesions in the subthalamic nucleus is more severe than other forms of the disorder.

Globus pallidus
From recent studies, it is now thought that hemiballismus can be associated with a decreased output of the globus pallidus. This is because studies have shown that firing rates decrease from 70/s to 40/s. In addition to a decreased firing rate, degenerative neurological disorders that cause patients to exhibit hemiballistic movements show a marked decrease in the globus pallidus mass as well. Increases in activity in this area causes there to be an inhibition of the motor thalamus. This causes cortical activation and thus a movement inhibition. In the case of hemiballismus, the opposite occurs, leading to the characteristic large, irregular movements.

Putamen
The putamen is also part of the basal ganglia and can be involved in hemiballismus due to the fact that it projects to the premotor cortex through the globus pallidus. As a result, damage to this area can also cause hemiballistic movements to be seen as it is also part of the chain in movement.

Caudate nucleus
The caudate nucleus is the portion of the basal ganglia that helps control voluntary movement.  Damage to this area can also result in hemiballismus as it is directly related to voluntary movement.

Cortical structures
While the majority of damage that causes hemiballismus occurs within the basal ganglia, there are still cases that have been documented on which damage to cortical structures has caused hemiballistic movements.

Diagnosis
Diagnosis of hemiballismus is a clinical one, made with observation during clinical examination. Hemiballismus is a clinical sign with a number of different causes. Therefore, a diagnosis underlying this clinical sign should be sought. The observer should note sudden, flinging movements of a limb(s) and occasionally the face. This is commonly unilateral ("Hemiballismus"). The movements must be distinguished from other hyperkinetic movement disorders such as tremor (generally more rhythmic, and smaller amplitude) and chorea, akathisia and athetosis (all are often of lower amplitude and less violent).

Treatments
When treating hemiballismus, it is first important to treat whatever may be causing the manifestation of this disorder. This could be hyperglycemia, infections, or neoplastic lesions. Some patients may not even need treatment because the disorder is not severe and can be self-limited.

Dopamine blockers
When pharmacological treatment is necessary, the most standard type of drug to use is an antidopaminergic drug. Blocking dopamine is effective in about ninety percent of patients. Perphenazine, pimozide, haloperidol, and chlorpromazine are standard choices for treatment. Scientists are still unsure as to why this form of treatment works, as dopamine has not been directly linked to hemiballismus.

Anticonvulsants
An anticonvulsant called topiramate has helped patients in three cases and may be a viable treatment for the future.

ITB therapy
Intrathecal baclofen (ITB) therapy is used to treat a variety of movement disorders such as cerebral palsy and multiple sclerosis. It can also be a possibility to help treat hemiballismus. In one case, before ITB the patient had an average of 10–12 ballism episodes of the right lower limb per hour. During episodes, the right hip would flex up to about 90 degrees, with a fully extended knee. After an ITB pump was implanted and the correct dosage was found, the frequency of ballistic right leg movements decreased to about three per day, and the right hip flexed to only 30 degrees. The patient was also able to better isolate individual distal joint movements in the right lower limb. The patient currently receives 202.4 microg/day of ITB and continues to benefit almost 6 years after the ITB pump was implanted.

Botulinum injections
New uses for botulinum toxin have included treatment of hemiballismus. However, this is still in the early stages of testing. This treatment deals with the muscular manifestations of hemiballismus as opposed to the neurological causes.

Tetrabenazine
Tetrabenazine has been used to treat other movement disorders, but is now being used to treat hemiballismus. Patients using this medication have had a dramatic response. However, lowering the dosage leads to a return of symptoms. This drug works by depleting dopamine.

Antipsychotics
In one case, a patient had not been responding to haloperidol, thus the physician tried olanzapine. The patient made a significant recovery. More research is being performed on the use of these types of drugs in treating hemiballismus.

Functional neurosurgery
Surgery as a treatment should only be used on patients with severe hemiballismus that has not responded to treatment. Lesioning of the globus pallidus or deep brain stimulation of the globus pallidus are procedures that can be used on humans. Usually, lesioning is favored over deep brain stimulation because of the maintenance required to continue stimulating the brain correctly and effectively.

Prognosis
In the past, the prognosis for patients with this disease had been very poor; with many patients experiencing severe disability or death. Now, patients are responding remarkably well to current treatments and the majority of patients go into spontaneous remission. For those that do not go into remission, the symptoms of hemiballismus can generally be very well controlled with medication.
Due to the rarity of this disorder, scientists know very little about the details of hemiballismus.
 There appears to be a discrepancy between this disorder in humans and animals that has yet to be explained.
 Hemiballismus can also be induced by damage to other areas of the basal ganglia besides the subthalamic nucleus. Research is being done in these areas in order to give scientists and clinicians a better model for this disease that will ultimately lead to better diagnosis and treatment of this disorder.
 Research is also being done on why certain treatments seem to help hemiballistic patients when they should seemingly do more harm. An example of this is why lesioning the globus pallidus seems to reduce hemiballistic movements.
 The mechanism behind the effect of dopamine on patients' symptoms remains unknown.

History
The work of J.R. Whittier, F.A.  Mettler, and M.B. Carpenter in the mid-1900s helped scientists and clinicians form a more complete picture of hemiballismus. In their experiments, several lesions were made in the basal ganglia structures in monkeys and then they monitored the results. They noticed that the majority of the time, the monkeys did not have any unusual movements. However, when at least twenty percent of the subthalamic nucleus was damaged, abnormal movements were seen in the limbs opposite to the side of the brain that was damaged. This observation caused scientists to believe that hemiballismus outside the subthalamic nucleus did not occur. It was not until much later that this classical model began to expand to include other areas of the basal ganglia and even some cortical structures. They also noticed that unlike human patients, the unusual movements in the monkeys were mainly in the lower extremities. In about half of the monkeys, the hemiballismus continued until the monkey died.

Other scientists have also worked on this perplexing disorder and have found that the symptoms can be induced by injecting kainic acid or ibotenic acid into the subthalamic nucleus. I. Hamada and M.R. DeLong found that by using these chemicals, they could destroy only four percent of the subthalamic nucleus and still see hemiballistic movements. However, the abnormal movements would usually disappear within four to five hours even though it did not appear as though the damaged tissue had healed. This suggests that the subthalamic nucleus is plastic enough to adapt to small amounts of damage in order to resume normal function.

See also
 Movement disorders

References

External links

Extrapyramidal and movement disorders
Symptoms and signs: Nervous system
Articles containing video clips
Rare diseases

de:Hemiballismus

Hemiballismus


Atlas, most commonly means a collection of maps, traditionally bound into book form.

Atlas can mean:

Greek mythology
 Atlas (Titan), a Titan who bore the spheres of the heavens; inspiring the widely used image of a man carrying a great sphere on his back or shoulders
 Atlas, the first king of Atlantis

Science
In astronomy:
 Atlas (moon), a moon of Saturn
 Atlas (crater), a prominent impact crater on the Moon
 Atlas (star), a triple star system in the Pleiades cluster
In biology:
 A book about flora and/or fauna of an area or region; for example, Atlases of the flora and fauna of Britain and Ireland
 Atlas (anatomy), the topmost cervical vertebra of the human spine
 Atlas Beetle, a rhinoceros beetle (Dynastinae) in the genus Chalcosoma
 Attacus atlas (or Atlas moth), a large saturniid moth
 Atlas Cedar, a large cedar tree native to the Atlas mountains of Algeria and Morocco
 Atlas Flycatcher, a bird in the an Old World Flycatcher family
 Atlas Bear, a species of bear native to Africa, now extinct
 Testudo atlas (or Atlas turtle), an extinct species of cryptodire turtle from the Pleistocene period

In physics:
 ATLAS experiment, a particle detector for the LHC at CERN
 Argonne Tandem Linear Accelerator System, a particle accelerator at the Argonne National Laboratory
In mathematics:
 Atlas (topology), a collection of local coordinate charts in mathematics

Literature and press
 Atlas Shrugged, a novel by Ayn Rand
 Atlas, a book of photography by German artist Gerhard Richter
 The Atlas (novel), by American author William T. Vollmann
 Atlas publishing house for collector series (mainly automobile, plane and train miniatures), active in Switzerland, France and Italy
 Atlas (magazine), Turkish monthly magazine on geography, environment, history and culture.

Computing
 Atlas Computer (Manchester) (1962 - 1971), an early computer built at the University of Manchester
 Titan (computer) (also known as the Atlas 2), its successor
 Atlas Autocode, a programming language developed for the Atlas Computer
 UNIVAC 1101, also known as the Atlas
 UNIVAC 1103, also known as the Atlas II
 ATLAS Transformation Language, an OMG standard for performing model transformations
 ASP.NET AJAX (formerly codenamed "Atlas"), a set of ASP.NET extensions providing Ajax functionality
 Atlas Terrain Engine, developed by Garage Games for use in their Torque Shader Engine
 Automatically Tuned Linear Algebra Software more commonly known as ATLAS, an optimized BLAS implementation
 Atlas.ti, a qualitative analysis software
 Texture atlas

Geography
 Atlas Mountains, a mountain range in northwest Africa
 Atlas (Neighborhood), in Northeast Washington, DC.
 Atlas Township, Michigan, USA

Entertainment
 Atlas Games (company), a publisher of role-playing and card games
 ATLAS (StarCraft), a fictional artificial intelligence in the StarCraft universe
 Atlas (album), an album by Mexican electropop band Kinky
 Advanced Technology Leisure Application Simulator, a large hydraulic motion simulator for the theme park industry
 Atlas (band), a rock band from Christchurch, New Zealand.
 Atlas: Renaissance Voyager, the first in a series of videogames. (See also: Neo Atlas)
 Atlas (Bioshock Character), A Dublin northsider who talks you through the game.

Comics
 Atlas Comics (1950s), the company that evolved into Marvel Comics
 Atlas (comics), a fictional character from Marvel Comics, best known as a member of the Thunderbolts
 Atlas (comic series), a comic book series by Dylan Horrocks
 Atlas/Seaboard Comics, a line of comics published by Seaboard Periodicals
 Agents of Atlas, a Marvel Comics mini-series by Jeff Parker

Companies
 Atlas Aircraft Corporation, South African military aircraft manufacturer
 Atlas Telecom, a worldwide communications company
 Atlas Elektronik GmbH, a naval/marine electronics and systems business based in Bremen, Germany
 Atlas Van Lines, a moving van company
 Atlas Air, a cargo airline based in Purchase, New York
 Atlas Blue, a low-cost airline based in Marrakech, Morocco
 Atlas Copco, a Swedish rock drill manufacturer
 Polar Atlas historic Swedish diesel maker, later part of Atlas Copco
 Atlas-Imperial, a historic American diesel engine builder
 Atlas Model Railroad, maker of scale railroad models
 Atlas Condoms
 Atlas Venture, an international early-stage venture capital firm
 Atlas (light trucks), a Greek vehicle manufacturer
 Atlasjet, an airline of Turkey

Automobiles, trucks & related
 Atlas, name of several automobile & truck companies
 Gutbrod Atlas, a former German small commercial vehicle
 Nissan Atlas, a Japanese light truck
 GM Atlas engine, a family of modern inline piston engines for trucks from General Motors
 Atlas (light trucks)
 Atlas Car and Manufacturing Company, a manufacturer of small railroad locomotives

People
 Meir Atlas (1848–1926), Rabbi of Shavel in Lithuania and one of the founders of the Telz Yeshiva
 Charles Atlas (1892–1972), a famous bodybuilder
 Tony Atlas (born 1944), a professional wrestler, bodybuilder, and powerlifter
 Teddy Atlas (born 1956), a well-known boxing trainer and fight commentator
 Natacha Atlas (born 1964), a Belgian female singer
 James Atlas, founding editor of the Lipper/Viking Penguin Lives Series
 Atllas, a rapper from Phoenix, Arizona

Military
 Atlas Cheetah, a fighter aircraft of the South African Air Force
 Atlas Oryx, a medium-sized utility helicopter manufactured by the Atlas Aircraft Corporation of South Africa
 Abbreviated Test Language for All Systems, a programming language used for automated test equipment
 ATLAS (simulation), a system used to conduct military Command Post Exercises (CPX) within the Royal Thai Army
 Armstrong Whitworth Atlas, an Army Air Cooperation aeroplane of the 1920s

Other
 Atlas (missile), a venerable line of space launch vehicles
 Atlas (architecture), a support or column sculpted in the form of a man
 Farnese Atlas, a 2nd-century Roman marble copy of a Hellenistic sculpture of the titan Atlas
 Atlas languages, a subgroup of the Northern Berber languages spoken in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco
 Atlas Uranium Mill, a decommissioned uranium mill near Moab, Utah
 CF Atlas, a Mexican professional football club
 Radio Atlas, a radio station in Montenegro
 Atlas Vampire, the nickname of the assailant of the unsolved "Vampire Murder" in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1932
 Atlas Economic Research Foundation, an incubator for free market think tanks

 Atlas (1863 - 1885), one of the eight South Devon Railway Dido class steam locomotives
 The Atlas (building), a tower in Midtown New York City
 Atlas, a book size
 Atlas, one of the main characters in the game BioShock.

Atlas (disambiguation)


Advaita Vedanta is a school in Hinduism. People who thoroughly explore Advaita know that their soul is not different from Brahman. The most famous Hindu philosopher who taught about Advaita Vedanta was Adi Shankara who lived in India more than a thousand years ago.

History
Adi Shankara learned the sacred texts of Hinduism, like Vedas and Upanishads under his teacher Govinda Bhagavadpada and later wrote extensive commentaries of Hindu sacred texts called Upanishads. In these commentaries, he proposed the theory of Advaita, saying that the Upanishad actually teach that the individual soul (called Atman) is not different from Ultimate Reality (called Brahman). He also taught that there is only one essential principle called Brahman and everything else is a kind of expression of that one Brahman. Because of this theory of one being, his teachings became popular as the "Advaita" (a = not, dvaita = two, means no-two or non-dual). The way he said this to people was "Atman is Brahman."

Adi Shankara was smart and knew that people would wonder how he could say such an odd thing. He realized that many people would ask him, "If a person's soul is really one with Ultimate all along, then what makes a person feel so separate from Ultimate?" His answer to this was that we are ignorant of our real self being Ultimate because we see through a kind of filter—like looking through a dirty piece of glass—and he called this filter we look through, maya, which means "illusion" in Sanskrit.

Shankara said that our ignorance makes us feel very separate from Ultimate, and even from everything around us. Shankara suggested that the best way people can find the truth is for them to try to clear their thinking of all ignorant thoughts, be very good, and think very hard about who they really are. He said that if a person did all these things he would realize that Brahman was himself all along.

This is a very similar idea to other religions at their esoteric core. For instance within Islam there is an idea of annihilation within the divine, Fana and Waḥdat al-Wujūd (Unity of Existence)

References

Other websites
 Advaita Vedanta of Shankaracharya Portal

Hinduism

Advaita Vedanta


Purchasing power is the amount of goods and services that can be purchased with a unit of currency. For example, if one had taken one unit of currency to a store in the 1950s, it would have been possible to buy a greater number of items than would be the case today, indicating that the currency had a greater purchasing power in the 1950s.

If one's monetary income stays the same but the price level increases, the purchasing power of that income amount falls. Inflation does not always imply falling purchasing power of one's money income if one's income rises faster than the price level rising. A higher real income means a higher purchasing power of the income amount, since real income refers to the income adjusted for inflation.

Traditionally, the purchasing power of money depended heavily upon the local value of gold and silver, but was also made subject to the availability and demand of certain goods on the market. Most modern fiat currencies, like US dollars, are traded against each other and commodity money in the secondary market for the purpose of international transfer of payment for goods and services.

As Adam Smith noted, having money gives one the ability to "command" others' labor, so purchasing power to some extent is power over other people, to the extent that they are willing to trade their labor or goods for money or currency.

For a price index, its value in the base year is usually normalized to a value of 100. The purchasing power of a unit of currency, say a dollar, in a given year, expressed in dollars of the base year, is 100/P, where P is the price index in that year.  So, by definition, the purchasing power of a dollar decreases as the price level rises.

Adam Smith used an hour's labour as the purchasing power unit, so value would be measured in hours of labour required to produce a given quantity (or to produce some other good worth an amount sufficient to purchase the same).

EUROSTAT defines purchasing power standard (PPS) as an artificial currency unit.

See also

 Big Mac Index
 Collective buying power
 Constant purchasing power accounting
 Consumer price index
 Consumerism
 Consumption (economics)
 Fair trade
 Free trade
 Group buying
 Group purchasing organization
 Measuring economic worth over time
 Purchasing power of the U.S. dollar
 Purchasing power parity

References

External links
 MeasuringWorth.com has a calculator with different measures for bringing values in Pound sterling from 1264 to the present and in US dollars from 1774 up to any year until the present. The Measures of Worth page discusses which would be the most appropriate for different things.

 Purchasing Power Calculator by Fiona Maclachlan, The Wolfram Demonstrations Project.

Purchasing power


Sir Thomas Boulden Thompson, 1st Baronet, GCB (28 February 1766 – 3 March 1828) was an officer of the Royal Navy. He served during the American Revolutionary, French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, eventually rising to the rank of Vice-Admiral. He was one of Horatio Nelson's Band of Brothers at the Battle of the Nile in 1798 and Comptroller of the Navy from 1806 to 1816.

Family and early life
Thompson was born in Barham, Kent on 28 February 1766. His uncle, through his mother, was Commodore Edward Thompson, and it was through this relative's influence that Thomas joined the navy in June 1778, when Edward was appointed to command the sloop . He served on the Hyaena with his uncle, spending most of the time in the waters off the British Isles, before accompanying Rodney's fleet to the Relief of Gibraltar in January 1780. The Hyaena was later entrusted with carrying copies of Rodney's despatches.

Thompson later moved to the West Indies, being promoted to lieutenant on 14 January 1782. He was given command of a small schooner, with which he captured a larger French privateer. After the end of the American Revolutionary War, Thompson was moved onto his uncle's flagship, the 50-gun . He served off the coast of Africa until his uncle's death in 1786, after which he was given command of the sloop . He remained in command for the next twelve months, before returning to Britain where she was paid off. He was promoted to post-captain on 22 November 1790.

Command

Santa Cruz de Tenerife

He spent a number of years on land without command of a ship until the outbreak of the French Revolutionary Wars provided employment. By late 1796 he had secured command of the fourth rate . He then joined the Mediterranean Fleet under John Jervis, and was assigned to the squadron under Horatio Nelson. Thompson took part in Nelson's attack on Santa Cruz in July 1797. Thompson was among those leading the landing parties, under the overall direction of Nelson and Thomas Troubridge. The initial attempts to force a landing were hampered by the wind, and when the parties made a successful landing in the evening of 22 July, they came under heavy fire from the Spanish defenders. Thompson's party were able to advance and spike several of the enemy's cannon, but the British forces had become dispersed throughout the town, and were forced to negotiate a truce to allow them to withdraw. Thompson himself was wounded in the battle.

Battle of the Nile
Thompson was later given command of a squadron, and carried out cruises in the Mediterranean, intercepting French and Spanish ships. He returned to Gibraltar, but was ordered to sea again in June 1798 to reinforce Nelson's squadron in their hunt for the French fleet that had earlier escaped from Toulon. He was with Nelson when they located the French fleet, under the command of Vice-Admiral Brueys, moored in Aboukir Bay. In the ensuing engagement Thompson came to the assistance of , which had run aground on shoals in the entrance to the bay. Finding that there was nothing he could do, Thompson took Leander into the battle, despite his ship being considerably smaller than the French ships of the line. He anchored between the Franklin and Brueys' flagship the Orient, firing on them in company with  and  until the Franklin surrendered. Thompson then took the Leander to assist the British attack on the French rear.

Fight with the Généreux

After the battle Thompson was joined aboard the Leander by Captain Edward Berry, and sent with Nelson's despatches to Gibraltar. Whilst sailing there, they were spotted on 18 August by the Généreux, which had escaped the Battle of the Nile. The French pursued the Leander. Being a 60 gun ship to the Généreux 78, and still having battle damage and men wounded from the Nile, Thompson attempted to escape, but was eventually forced to come to battle. The two eventually clashed in a long running engagement, which eventually resulted in Leander being disabled and unmanageable. After conferring with Berry, Thompson agreed to surrender. The Généreux had suffered 100 killed and 188 wounded, to the Leander 35 killed and 57 wounded. Arriving on board the French ship, Berry and Thompson were almost immediately stripped of their possessions. The French went on to plunder their prize, even going so far as to steal the surgeon's equipment as he tried to attend to the wounded. When Thompson protested, and reminded the French captain of how French prisoners were treated under Nelson, he received the reply 'I am sorry for it; but the fact is, that the French are expert at plunder.'

Thompson was later repatriated and brought to court-martial aboard  at Sheerness. He was honourably acquitted for the loss of his ship, the court deciding that his gallant and almost unprecedented defence of the Leander, against so superior a force as that of le Généreux, was deserving of every praise his country and the assembled court could give; and that his conduct, with that of the officers and men under his command, reflected not only the highest honour on himself and them, but on their country at large.  Berry was also commended, and whilst being rowed back to shore after his acquittal, Thompson was given three cheers by the crews of the ships moored at Sheerness. He was subsequently knighted and awarded a pension of £200 per annum.

Copenhagen
Thompson was appointed to command  in spring 1799, joining the fleet under Lord Bridport, off Brest. He then went to the Mediterranean, sailing with the flying squadron. He was involved in the capture of three frigates and two brigs. He returned to England in autumn, and participated in the blockade of Brest, until being assigned to Sir Hyde Parker's Baltic expedition in early 1801. He was present at the Battle of Copenhagen, but ran aground on shoals whilst trying to enter the bay. He continued to fire on the enemy's shore batteries, but being a stationary target was heavily damaged, having 11 killed and 63 wounded. Thompson was amongst the wounded, losing a leg. He shared in the thanks of Parliament after the battle and had his pension increased to £500. He was then appointed to command the yacht .

Later life

Thompson was appointed Comptroller of the Navy in November 1806, an office he held until November 1816. He was created a baronet on 11 December 1806. On relinquishing the post of Comptroller he became Treasurer of the Royal Hospital at Greenwich, succeeding the late Sir John Colpoys, and also became Director of the Chest. He became Member of Parliament for Rochester in 1807, relinquishing the position in June 1818. He became a Rear-Admiral on 25 October 1809 and a Vice-Admiral on 4 June 1814. He was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in the reorganisation of that order on 2 January 1815, and a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath on 14 September 1822, and was formally invested on 21 April 1823. On his death three years later he was buried at the Greenwich Hospital, where his tomb monument is still visible.

Family and personal life
Thomas married Anne Raikes on 25 February 1799. They had a total of five children, three boys and two girls. The two girls were named Anne and Mary. Their first son, Thomas Boulden, died young. Their second, Thomas Raikes-Trigge inherited the baronetcy. He followed his father and had a career in the navy. Their third son, Thomas John, died in 1807. Sir Thomas died at the family seat of Hartsbourne, Manor-Place, Hertfordshire on 3 March 1828.

Notes

References

External links

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1766 births
1828 deaths
Royal Navy vice admirals
Knights Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath
Baronets in the Baronetage of the United Kingdom
Royal Navy personnel of the American Revolutionary War
Royal Navy personnel of the French Revolutionary Wars
Royal Navy personnel of the Napoleonic Wars
People from the City of Canterbury
Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies
UK MPs 1807–1812
UK MPs 1812–1818
Knights Bachelor

Sir Thomas Thompson, 1st Baronet


Eleanor the "Fair Maid of Brittany" (c. 1184 – 10 August 1241) was a member of the nobility of England. She was the eldest daughter of Geoffrey Plantagenet and Constance, Duchess of Brittany. She was seen as a potential threat to the throne by her uncle, John of England, and cousin, Henry III of England. She was put in prison from 1202, and so became the longest imprisoned member of an English royal family. Although still treated honorably as a princess, she was never released or permitted to marry.

1180s births
1241 deaths
French nobility

Eleanor, Fair Maid of Brittany


Yervant Harry Babasin, Jr. (19 March 1921 – 21 May 1988) was an American jazz bassist. His nickname was "The Bear".

Biography
Babasin was born in Dallas, Texas to an American mother and an Armenian father. He attended North Texas State University, one of many noted jazz alumni from the school. Among them were Jimmy Giuffre, with whom Babasin played in Bill Ware's orchestra around 1940, and Herb Ellis, who played with Babasin in the Charlie Fisk Orchestra starting in 1942. Fisk actually fired his rhythm section after hearing Ellis and Babasin play, and after he was admitted, Babasin quit school to go on tour with Fisk. He also toured in the 1940s with Jimmy Joy, Bob Strong, Billie Rogers, Gene Krupa, Charlie Barnet, Boyd Raeburn, Benny Goodman, Woody Herman, Frank DeVol, and Jerry Gray. He also appeared in A Song Is Born, one of many jazz stars to play roles in the film. On the set of the film, he met Brazilian guitarist Laurindo Almeida, and the two began jamming together; along with Roy Harte and Bud Shank, their quartet was an early experiment blending Brazilian music and jazz. Their 1954 10" discs are predecessors to the bossa nova explosion of the late 1950s and early 1960s.
In 1947, he recorded the first cello solos known in jazz music, with the Dodo Marmarosa Trio. In order to do so, he tuned his strings in fourths. In later cello ensembles he added a bass player. He and Oscar Pettiford did a session together with two cellos. In the mid-1950s, he put together his own ensemble, Harry Babasin & the Jazzpickers, who played regularly at the Purple Onion in Hollywood; this ensemble released three albums. One recording of note was made in 1952 at the Tradewinds nightclub in Inglewood. It features Charlie Parker, Chet Baker, Sonny Criss, Al Haig, Larance Marable, and Harry, in one of Bird's few West Coast appearances.

His career cooled in the 1960s, returning to work with Charlie Barnet and supporting Bob Hope on USO tours. In the 1970s he and Harte initiated the Los Angeles Theaseum, a jazz archive and preservation society. Some of the recordings preserved through this effort were released on the Jazz Chronicles label.

Babasin's last tour was given in 1985 with John Banister on piano. Babasin died of emphysema in Los Angeles three years later, having participated in possibly as many as 1,500 recordings.

Discography
 1954: Jazz in Hollywood (Nocturne)
 1957: Harry Babasin and the Jazz Pickers (Mode)
 1957: Command Performance (EmArcy)
 1957: For Moderns Only (EmArcy)

With Laurindo Almeida
Laurindo Almeida Quartet Featuring Bud Shank (Pacific Jazz, 1953–54)

With Barney Kessel
Easy Like (Contemporary, 1953)

With Charlie Parker and Chet Baker
 Inglewood Jam (Jazz Chronicles, Fresh Sound, 1952)

With Pete Rugolo
Introducing Pete Rugolo (Columbia, 1954)
Adventures in Rhythm (Columbia, 1954)
Rugolomania (Columbia, 1955)
New Sounds by Pete Rugolo (Harmony, 1954–55, [1957])
With Bud Shank
Bud Shank - Shorty Rogers - Bill Perkins (Pacific Jazz, 1955)

See also
 Nocturne Records, co-founded by Babasin in 1954

References

[ Harry Babasin] at Allmusic
[ Harry Babasin & the Jazzpickers], Allmusic
 Harry Babasin bio with pictures

1921 births
1988 deaths
American jazz double-bassists
Male double-bassists
American jazz cellists
American male jazz musicians
American people of Armenian descent
University of North Texas College of Music alumni
20th-century American musicians
Jazz musicians from Texas
20th-century double-bassists
20th-century American male musicians
Earle Spencer Orchestra members
20th-century cellists

Harry Babasin