Doctor Wortle's School, alternatively Dr. Wortle's School or Dr Wortle's School, published in 1881, is a novel by Anthony Trollope, his fortieth book.

Plot summary
The novel takes place in the respectable, fictional parish of Bowick, Victorian England, with the main plot concerning itself with the renowned Dr. Wortle's Christian seminary academy. The community's morals are outraged and the school's credibility wounded upon the discovery that Mr. and Mrs. Peacocke, a respectable English scholar and an American woman, hired to the academy by Wortle, are indeed improperly married. Their wedlock was rendered asunder by their chance meeting, some years prior, of Mrs. Peacocke's first husband, an abusive drunkard named Colonel Ferdinand Lefroy. Hearing that an ambiguous Colonel Lefroy was killed during the Civil War, the two believed it was Ferdinand, because Ferdinand's brother told them so and they married. Yet it is their strange persistence in living as husband and wife, even after the shocking revelation that Ferdinand was actually alive, that creates a scandal. Wortle, though religious, sympathises with the Peacockes and is understanding of their love for each other and hatred for Colonel Lefroy.
The book is thus of the interest in providing multiple stories: that of Wortle's attempt to rebuild his reputation, provide rebuttal for malicious slander and all the while insist he was right in hiring the Peacockes; Mr. Peacocke's journey to America in search of Ferdinand's true status; the sexual concerns of the Wortles' daughter Mary and the insights of the community members who see the intentional bigamy as a sin.

External links

 "The Westminster review, Volume 116" – Google Books
 "A life of John Calvin: a study in the shaping of Western culture" – Google Books

1881 British novels
Novels by Anthony Trollope
Novels set in schools

Doctor Wortle's School


Cascade Falls Regional Park is a regional park under the administration of the Fraser Valley Regional District in the Hatzic Valley of the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia, Canada. The park was originally 9.5 hectares in area but was expanded to a current 22 hectares. It has picnic tables and pit toilets, with various hiking trails and a walkway leading to a viewing platform over a large waterfall, which is 15 minutes walk from the park's parking lot.

The falls and their associated park have the following features:

 30-metre waterfall
 Suspension bridge spanning Cascade Creek
 Viewing platforms on either side of the suspension bridge
 1 km trail featuring stairs through coniferous forest
 Small run of waterfalls dropping 18 metres into tranquil lower pools

It is located in the McConnell Creek area northeast of Mission. Cascade Creek was formerly named McConnell Creek, after a logger in the area called Jack McConnell, who in fact had changed his name from John Connell further to the failure of his logging business. Cascade Creek drains into the southeast end of Stave Lake southwest of Davis Lake Provincial Park.

The park was first proposed in 1984 via studies commissioned by the Dewdney-Alouette Regional District and officially inaugurated on June 7, 1986. The park is open from 7AM till sunset, throughout the year.

Cascade Falls was featured in the final scene of the film Big Bully, as the location of a fight between characters played by Tom Arnold and Rick Moranis.

References

See also

List of filming locations in the Vancouver area
Hiking to Cascade Falls

1986 establishments in British Columbia
Waterfalls of British Columbia
Regional parks of Canada
Lower Mainland
Fraser Valley Regional District
Protected areas established in 1986
Landforms of Lower Mainland

Cascade Falls Regional Park


Game Wars is a 1991 non-fiction book by Marc Reisner which gives accounts of several U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service sting operations.  First published in 1991, the book centers on undercover agent Dave Hall as he infiltrates groups of poachers and gathers evidence to prosecute them.  The three chapters of the book focus on poaching of alligators in Louisiana, ivory in Alaska, and sacalait in the Southern United States.  The book highlights the debate over whether declines in wildlife populations should be attributed to over-hunting or loss of habitat.  The book also highlights and details several cases and operations that Special Agent Hall conducted along with game wardens from the Louisiana Department of Wildlife & Fisheries – Enforcement Division.

The title was reviewed in The Chicago Tribune.

References

1991 non-fiction books
Hunting in the United States
United States Fish and Wildlife Service

Game Wars


American Scary is a 2006 American documentary film about the history and legacy of classic television horror hosts, written and directed by American independent filmmakers John E. Hudgens and Sandy Clark.

Background
The film features nearly 60 horror hosts, including interviews with and vintage clips of many of the genre's stars, such as Washington, DC's Count Gore De Vol, New York City's Zacherley, Los Angeles' Vampira, Cleveland's Ghoulardi, and Chicago's Svengoolie, among others. Non-host celebrities such as Neil Gaiman, Tim Conway, Forrest J Ackerman, Tom Savini, Leonard Maltin, Joel Hodgson, and Bob Burns appear to reminisce about the influence of horror hosts on their careers and/or lives, as well as many modern hosts who keep the tradition alive in modern shows on public-access television cable TV or the internet.

The film premiered in October 2006 at the Hollywood Film Festival, and was released on DVD in February 2009. In April 2010, it won the award for Best Independent Production of 2009 at the 8th Annual Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Awards.

See also
Virginia Creepers

References

External links

2006 films
American documentary films
Horror hosts
Documentary films about television
2006 documentary films
Documentary films about horror
2000s English-language films
2000s American films
English-language documentary films

American Scary


Vita Hludovici or  Vita Hludovici Imperatoris  (The Life of Louis or the Life of the Emperor Louis) is an anonymous biography of Louis the Pious, Holy Roman Emperor and King of the Franks from AD 814 to 840.

Author
The work was written in Latin in or soon after AD 840 by an anonymous author who is conventionally called Astronomus, the Astronomer or sometimes the Limousin Astronomer. This is due to his many detailed comments on astronomical matters in the work upon which he describes himself as "one credited with having knowledge of this subject." He held office at the court of Louis the Pious, and his cultural and religious references suggest that he was not a churchman. It has been conjectured, based on evidence within the text, that the author was born around AD 800 and that his nationality was not Gothic or Frankish.

The author's attitude to his subject is clearly subordinate and one of admiration, yet he does not idealise Louis in the same way as, for example, Einhard does in his Life of Charlemagne. It has been suggested that the author exhibits a degree of disapproval towards clerics and the workings of the Frankish Church, lending weight to the view that he was not formally connected to the Church. Nevertheless, the most popular recent ideas (see below) do identify him as a cleric.

Identification
Various attempts have been made to identify the author with a particular individual. In 1729, Von Eckhart thought he was a notary attached to Louis' court between 816 and 839. Von Simson in 1909 attempted to identify him as Archdeacon Gerolt, a cleric at court. Max Buchner, the author of one of the most influential modern studies of the Astronomer's work in 1940, identified him as Hilduin, the chancellor of Pippin II of Aquitaine and Charles the Bald.

Ernst Tremp supports this view in his important 1995 study, although Buchner and Tremp differ by about a decade in their dating of the work.

Tischler has most recently tried to make a case that the Astronomer was Jonas of Orleans but the Hilduin theory remains more popular amongst historians. Recently, Courtney Booker suggested Walafrid Strabo was the Astronomer.

See also
 Gesta Hludowici Imperatoris by Thegan of Trier

References

Bibliography

External links
 Full text in Latin from Tremp's 1995 edition.
 Selected text in English on the siege of Barcelona from P.D. King's 1989 edition.

9th-century Latin books
Biographical books
Biographies about royalty
Latin biographies
Carolingian Latin historical texts
9th-century writers in Latin
Writers from the Carolingian Empire
9th-century astronomers

Vita Hludovici


A wall climb is a play in baseball where a fielder makes an out by catching a fly ball or pop up while climbing a wall.

The play is generally made by outfielders robbing hitters of hits that otherwise would have been home runs, or at the very least a double. A wall climb can also be made by climbing the wall in foul territory to make an out. Under Major League Baseball (MLB) rules, the catch is ruled an out when the fielder making the out has at least one foot over legal playing territory during the catch and no feet touching the ground of an out of play area, regardless of whether his body ultimately lands in the field of play or out of play.

One MLB player with a reputation for wall climbing was outfielder Torii Hunter, who won nine Gold Gloves in his 19-year major league career. One notable wall climb by Hunter occurred in the first inning of the 2002 Major League Baseball All-Star Game, when he robbed Barry Bonds of a home run in right-center field.

The wall climb move is also simulated in baseball video games such as the MLB 2K series.

See also
 Steve Bartman incident

References

External links
 Wall climbs at YouTube

Baseball terminology
Baseball plays

Wall climb


Mail-order brides are women who list themselves in catalogs and are picked by males for marriage. The term mail-order bride dates back to the 19th century. These brides often come from one country and immigrate to another for marriage reasons. Finding a foreign husband gives such a woman a chance to leave her country and find better economic opportunities abroad.

Marriage

Mail-order bride


Lean Cuisine is a brand of frozen entrées and dinners sold in the United States by Nestlé, and in Australia by Vesco (under a licensing agreement with Nestlé).  The brand began as low-fat, low-calorie versions of Stouffer's products.  Today, Lean Cuisine includes traditional dinners, ethnic dishes, pizzas, whole-grain Spa Cuisine entreés, and panini. The headquarters of Lean Cuisine in the United States is located in Solon, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland.

In February 2023, Nestle Canada announced their intentions to wind down and exit the frozen meals and pizza business in the Canadian market within the next six months.  Production and sales in the United States market are not affected by this decision and will continue.

Overview and history
Lean Cuisine was created in 1981 to provide a healthier alternative to Stouffer's frozen meals. It began with ten items and has expanded to include 100+ different meals. The brand name "Lean Cuisine" is considered by the FDA as a nutrient content claim, so all Lean Cuisine items are required to meet the "lean" criteria of less than 10 g fat, 4.5 g or less saturated fat, and less than 95 mg cholesterol. Lean Cuisine items are also calorie-controlled, with most items in the 200–300 calorie range, with a minimum of 140 calories and a maximum of 400 calories.

A major competitor of Lean Cuisine is Healthy Choice, manufactured by Conagra Brands. It is required to meet "healthy" criteria by the FDA, since it includes "healthy" in its brand name. This includes a requirement to be below 480 mg of sodium in addition to fat, saturated fat, and cholesterol targets. Other competitors include Smart Ones, made by H. J. Heinz Company, and South Beach Diet, made by Kraft Heinz.  There are also a number of store brand competitors, such as Safeway's Eating Right brand, Easy Meals and Optislim.

Lean Cuisine sponsors Susan G. Komen for the Cure and America on the Move.

Varieties

Timeline
1981 – Brand launched with 10 items and launch communication focuses on "Good tasting entrees at less than 300 calories."
1983 – Tagline adopted "You'll love the way it looks on you" and strong demand leads to product shortages and apologies in print ads to consumers
1984 – Lean Cuisine 14-day diet plan, free booklet called "On Your Way to Being Lean" and another tagline "It's not just the calories that count, it's the taste"
1985 – Product line expanded to 18 items and tagline was "You'll love the taste.  And you'll love the way it looks on you"
1986 – With competition entering category, tagline was "Only Lean Cuisine tastes like Lean Cuisine"
1987 – Product line expanded to 25 items, including shrimp, lamb, and veal items, Tagline "More Satisfaction", and directly targeted Weight Watchers dieters by publishing Weight Watchers exchanges for all items
1991 – Launched 11 new items, focused on low fat message, like "98% fat free!"
1992 – Launched 8 new items, including Honey Mustard Chicken, which contained a jar of Grey Poupon
1993 – Launched 8 more new items, including pot pies and enchilada
1995 – Launched Lunch Express- lower price option, eat from the box and tagline "Time to treat yourself right" and "It's not just Lean, it's Cuisine"
1996 – Launched Cafe Classics- more restaurant-inspired meals and look
1997 – Launched American Favorites- more homestyle classic American dishes
1998 – Launched four new Cafe Classics items
1999 – Launched Skillet Sensations- bag "kit" meals that cook in a pan
2000 – First mention of tagline "Do something good for yourself" in communications
2001 – Launch of Zesty Selections items- more spicy, flavorful dishes
2002 – Launch of Bowls and Dinnertime Selects
2003 – Launch of Asian product lines and pizzas
2004 – Launch of Low carb entrees, deep dish pizzas, and tagline "It's not just Lean, it's Cuisine" gone, replaced with "Do Something Good for Yourself"
2005 – Launch of Spa Cuisine- whole grain entreés and Dinnertime Selects with dessert
2006 – Preservatives eliminated from most (80+) items, launch of Panini sandwiches and Brick Oven style pizzas
2007 – Launch of five Spa Cuisine items with twice the vegetables and two additional panini sandwiches
2008 – Launch of four Flatbread melts
2010 – "The Book of Truth" campaign debuts
2018 - Launch of vegan frozen meals

References

External links

Nestlé brands
Brand name diet products
Frozen food brands
Products introduced in 1981

Lean Cuisine


Collapsible flow is a phenomenon that occurs in steady flow in tubes with significant distensibility, or the capability of swelling or stretching, under conditions of lower internal pressure relative to pressure outside the tube. Such conditions occur rarely in industrial applications but are very common in biological studies such as blood flow in veins and air flow in lungs.

When a flow is driven through a deformable channel or tube, interactions between fluid-mechanical and elastic forces can lead to a variety of biologically significant phenomena, including nonlinear pressure-drop/flow-rate relations, wave propagation,
and the generation of instabilities. Understanding the physical origin and nature of these phenomena remains a significant experimental, analytical, and computational challenge, involving unsteady flows at low or high Reynolds numbers, large-amplitude fluid-structure  interactions, free-surface flows, and intrinsically 2D or 3D motion. Whereas frequently the internal flow involves a single fluid
phase (albeit often of a complex biological fluid such as blood), in many instances the presence of two or more distinct flowing phases is of primary importance (as is the case for air-liquid flows in peripheral lung airways, for example).

Single Phase in Collapsible Tubes
Venous collapse is important during exercise, when muscular compression of leg veins is used to pump blood against gravity up to the heart, and in therapeutic compression of leg veins for the treatment of deep-vein thrombosis

partial vessel collapse occurs in vessels which undergo conditions of higher external pressure relative to the fluid within and can be difficult to predict mathematically. As such, devices such as a Starling Resistor are often used to predict fluid flow under these conditions.

Fluid is forced through an elastically deforming tube which passes through a region of high external pressure causing a flattening of the tube depending on the relative pressures of the inside and outside of the tube.

In the absence of any flow (puD pd), an increase in pe generates a compressive stress in the tube wall causing it to buckle from a circular to an elliptic cross-section (except, of course, near its ends, where it is attached to the rigid tubes). Buckling to a shape with more than two lobes may arise in short, tethered, or inhomogeneous tubes. Once buckled, the tube becomes highly compliant so that small additional increases in pe lead to a substantial reduction in cross-sectional area ®. Further compression leads to contact of the opposite tube walls, first at a point, and then along a line (Figure 2, left); once in opposite-wall contact, the tube's compliance falls because strong bending forces in the tube wall at the bulbous end of each lobe provide an increasing resistance to area reductions. The "tube law," the relation between transmural pressure P – Pexternal (where p is the internal pressure) and , for a long thin-walled tube can be approximated by thin-shell theory for an axially uniform elastic ring

References

Continuum mechanics
Flow regimes
Piping

Collapsible flow


The Taupo Volcano is a supervolcano in New Zealand. Its caldera, which is filled with a large body of water, is named Lake Taupo. This supervolcano is the cause of two of the most violent volcanic eruptions in recent times. These eruptions ranked high on the Volcanic Explosivity Index, with the Oruanui eruption ranking at an 8, and the Hatepe eruption ranking at an 7.

Volcanoes of New Zealand
VEI-8 volcanoes
Geography of New Zealand

Taupo Volcano


Osteen is an unincorporated community in southwest Volusia County, Florida, United States. Osteen is near the St. Johns River as well as typical swamps, forests and wildlife of Florida.  Osteen attracts a number of visitors for these qualities. There are numerous camping areas and preserves such as the Hickory Bluff Preserve, a 150-acre nature preserve with hiking and horse trails.

The Osteen Bridge spans the St Johns River near State Road 46 to the south near the Orlando Sanford International Airport. Sanford and Lake Monroe border the community to the west, with Deltona to the north and the small community of Farmton to the east.

The north-south route of mostly two-lane State Road 415 serves as the main artery through Osteen.  It connects State Road 44 in Volusia County to State Road 46 in Seminole County. State Road 415 is a two-lane road from State Road 44 until just north of Osteen.  The road was recently four-laned beginning approximately three-miles north of Osteen and running the distance to State Road 46.

History
Osteen was named after Hezekiah Ellis Osteen (1821–1904) a cattle rancher, who with his wife, Susannah Gaskins Osteen (1826–?), originally settled in the community in the 19th century. Prior to Osteen, the community was known as Saulsville. A member of the Osteen family fought for the Confederacy in the American Civil War, and was either wounded or killed in battle.  A plaque is dedicated to the founders of the city in the civic center that was built in 1968. The city was once incorporated and the abandoned city hall is located on the corner of Railroad Avenue just west of the post office. Also located within Osteen is the Cypress Point Golf Club, a nine-hole executive length golf course

References

External links
 Hickory Bluff Preserve

6-*

Unincorporated communities in Volusia County, Florida
Unincorporated communities in Florida
Former municipalities in Florida

Osteen, Florida


Stamatios or Stamatis Kleanthis ( or ; 1802–1862) was a Greek architect.

Biography
Stamatios Kleanthis was born to a Macedonian Greek family in the town of Velventos in Kozani, Macedonia in 1802. As a youth he moved to Bucharest where he studied at the Greek School. On 1821, as member of the Sacred Band, he fought in the insurrection against the Turks led by Alexander Ypsilanti and was captured at the Battle of Dragashani. After escaping, he traveled to Vienna, and then to Leipzig, where he studied architecture. Afterwards he pursued his studies further in Berlin with Karl Friedrich Schinkel.

After graduation, he returned with his colleague and friend Eduard Schaubert to Greece, where they were appointed public engineers by Ioannis Kapodistrias. On 1832 they created a new city plan for Athens, which included wide avenues, gardens and grand public buildings and gave the first street names in Athens. The plan was however simplified by Leo von Klenze, as it was considered too expensive. After disagreements with the administration, Kleanthis resigned his position.

Kleanthis gained great wealth not only through architecture, but also through the marble quarries he operated on the island of Paros. Marble from his quarries received a gold medal at the London Great Exhibition in 1851.

On 1862 he was seriously injured in an accident in a quarry and he was transported to Athens, where he died.

Kleanthis designed many important buildings in Athens, including the Duchess of Plaisance's mansion in Penteli, Rododafni Castle and Villa Ilissia (today the Byzantine & Christian Museum of Athens). The University of Athens was initially accommodated in his house in Plaka, which now houses the Athens University Museum.

Gallery

References

External links

1802 births
1862 deaths
Members of Sacred Band (1821)
Greek miners
Greek Macedonians
Greek people of the Greek War of Independence
Modern history of Athens
Architecture of Athens
19th-century Greek architects
Greek urban planners

People from Velventos

Stamatios Kleanthis


Abu Ayyub Sulayman ibn Wahb () (died July/August 885) was a senior official of the Abbasid Caliphate who served several times as vizier.

His family, the Banu Wahb, were originally Nestorian Christians from Wasit, and had produced secretaries in the caliphal administration since late Umayyad times. Sulayman first appears as a secretary to Caliph al-Ma'mun (r. 813–833). Under al-Wathiq (r. 842–847), he forged ties with the powerful Turkish military, serving as secretary to the Turkish generals Musa ibn Bugha and Aytakh. Under al-Mutawakkil (r. 847–861) he served twice as ʿamil (supervisor of finances) in Egypt, during which time he reportedly made a fortune.

As a senior court official, he distinguished himself as the patron of notable poets like Abu Tammam and al-Buhturi. He was first appointed as vizier—by then an almost powerless office due to the internal turmoil and increasing domination of the Turkish military—towards the end of the reign of al-Muhtadi (r. 869–870), and then again in 877 and 878 under al-Mu'tamid (r. 870–892), alternating with his rival al-Hasan ibn Makhlad al-Jarrah. His inability to counter the mounting financial crisis led to his permanent dismissal and imprisonment, dying in prison in May/June 885.

Sulayman was the founder of a veritable administrative dynasty: his son Ubayd Allah, grandson al-Qasim, and great-grandsons al-Husayn and Muhammad all became viziers.

References

Sources

9th-century births
885 deaths
Viziers of the Abbasid Caliphate
Banu Wahb
Prisoners and detainees of the Abbasid Caliphate
9th-century people from the Abbasid Caliphate
9th-century Arab people
9th-century government officials

Sulayman ibn Wahb


The ZFS is a computer file system.
FS stands for file system.
The letter Z was chosen, because it is the last letter in the English alphabet.
This is supposed to mean ZFS was the last, "ultimate" file system ever made.

Development
Originally ZFS has been developed by Sun Microsystems for Solaris.
Later, ZFS has been ported to other versions of Unix, including Linux and FreeBSD.

Design
Traditional file systems focus on managing data and ensuring integrity.
Additional features like RAID had to be added externally, outside of the file system's realm.
This potentially led to difficulties and increased complexity of systems.

The ZFS takes a different approach.
It integrates many useful features into its ecosystem.
This ensures all subsystems work together without problems and increases performance.

Some features include
 disk encryption
 RAID
 logical volume management
 snapshots
 data deduplication
 delegating file system administration rights

Furthermore, during development of ZFS there was a continuing trend to disks having larger capacities.
In designing of ZFS it was taken account of that fact.
The ZFS can handle (in comparison to traditional file systems) very large files, a large number of files, large number of disks, disks having large capacities, and so on.

Application
FreeBSD and Solaris use ZFS as the standard main file system.
Ubuntu's kernel includes ZFS, but it is not the default choice.

Computer file formats
Sun Microsystems
Oracle Corporation

ZFS


Ben E. Kuhl (1884 – paroled 1945, date of death unknown, possibly 1945) was, in 1916, the last known stage coach robber in the United States.  Kuhl took part in the robbery of a mail stage wagon in Jarbidge, Nevada, US; the driver, Fred M. Searcy, was killed. The incident became a myth: "Staging a Robbery Without a Coach".
While most of the evidence against him was circumstantial, a bloody palm print on an envelope led to Kuhl's conviction. Kuhl's trial, which began in September 1917, was noted to be the first time  palm prints were used as evidence in a U.S. courtroom. State v. Kuhl also set the precedent that palm prints were as valid as fingerprints in criminal cases for identifying individuals.

Biography
Ben Kuhl was from Michigan. In 1903, he was jailed in Marysville, California for petty larceny, and had also been sentenced to do 1 to 10 years in Oregon for horse theft. Kuhl arrived in Lander County, Nevada in 1916 and lived in a tent with two other drifters, Ed Beck and Billy McGraw. He worked as a cook at the OK Mine for about a month before he was fired for attempting to jump another man's mining claim. He was arrested for trespassing in Jarbidge.

The Jarbidge Stage Robbery occurred on December 5, 1916, just before 6:30 PM. The mail wagon from Three Creek, Idaho, drawn by two horses, was ambushed. Searcy was killed by a .44 caliber slug to the head, and about $3,000 was stolen. While the money was never recovered, almost fifty pieces of evidence were collected. Kuhl, Beck, McGraw, and another acquaintance, B.E. Jennings, were caught soon after the incident occurred. Most of the evidence against Kuhl was circumstantial. However, there was a bloody palm print on a letter from the wagon's mail pouch; and Kuhl became the first American convicted of murder based on a palm print. His death sentence was commuted to life in prison at the Nevada State Prison in Carson City, Nevada, but he was paroled on May 7, 1945.

Kuhl was slender and nearly  tall; he had light blue eyes. His wife, Minnier (nicknamed "Minnie"), and a son lived in Salt Lake City, Utah; she divorced Kuhl after the conviction. His mother lived in Kalamazoo, Michigan; his father in Walla Walla, Washington. Kuhl is thought to have died of pneumonia or tuberculosis in northern California, possibly Sacramento or San Francisco, within 6 to 12 months of his release.

References

External links
 Ben E. Kuhl - The Complete List of Old West Outlaws

1884 births
Year of death unknown
Criminals from Michigan
History of Nevada
American people convicted of murder
Elko County, Nevada
Deaths from pneumonia in California

Ben Kuhl


Slimane Khalfaoui (born 1975, Algeria) was a French-Algerian terrorist convicted of the Strasbourg Cathedral bombing plot in 2004 and sentenced to 10 years in prison. He was married to a French-Muslim woman during his arrest.

Early life
Khalfaoui became a fugitive wanted  by French authorities in 1996 for participating in an Algerian terrorist network that plotted to carry out attacks across France and Europe. In March 1998, Khalfaoui attended al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan with Ahmed Ressam from Montreal, Quebec, Canada and one of the members of the "millennium bombing". He probably fought in Bosnia during the 1990s.

Arrest
Khalfaoui was one of the plotters of the Strasbourg Cathedral bombing plot in 2000 and was fully correlated with Abu Doha, the ringleader. Khalfaoui and Algerian-British Rabah Kadre, participated in a reported attempt to attack the London Underground, with poisoning substances scheduled in late 2002. He was arrested in France by French police in November 2002 following the arrest of  Kadre in London by British police on the same day.

When the French police came to arrest him, he tried to escape from a second-floor window during an early morning raid at his sister's apartment in the Paris suburb east of Montfermeil, but he was overpowered and arrested a few minutes later.

2004 Trial
Khalfaoui was charged and brought to trial alongside Mohammed Bensakhria and four more defendants at a French court in October 2004. Khalfaoui was sentenced to 10 years in jail in December 2004 for his role in the Strasbourg Cathedral bombing plot.

References

French al-Qaeda members
Algerian emigrants to France
Terrorism in Algeria
Algerian al-Qaeda members
1975 births
Living people

Slimane Khalfaoui


Rhinogobiops is a genus of true gobies in the family Gobiidae. It is monotypic, being represented by the single species, Rhinogobiops nicholsii, also known as the blackeye goby, bluespot goby, and crested goby. They are common inhabitants of coral reefs and rocky habitats along the eastern Pacific Ocean coasts of Mexico, the United States, and Canada, although they are hardly noticed, as they often rest motionless near their shelters.

Blackeye gobies range in color from creamy white to a mottled dark purple-brown, but can easily be recognized by the distinctive black spot on their first dorsal fins and an iridescent blue spot beneath their eyes. They are capable of rapidly changing their color in response to social situations or threats. They are also protogynous hermaphrodites, starting out in life as females. They are highly territorial and each male usually maintains a harem of two to eight females.

Taxonomy
The blackeye goby is the only species recognised in the genus Rhinogobiops. It is a true goby, being classified in the subfamily Gobiinae,

The species was first described in 1882 by the American ichthyologist Tarleton Hoffman Bean from a specimen from Departure Bay, British Columbia, recovered in 1881 by the American survey vessel Hassler. He named it Gobius nicholsii, after Henry E. Nichols, the collector of the specimen and the captain of the ship.

It was transferred to the genus Rhinogobius in 1907 by Edwin Chapin Starks and Earl Leonard Morris. In 1926, American ichthyologist Carl Leavitt Hubbs moved it to its own genus, Rhinogobiops. The name comes from Greek, meaning "resembling Gobius".

In 1960, James E. Böhlke and C. Richard Robins synonymized Rhinogobiops with the genus Coryphopterus, though they noted that it differed from other members of the latter in the number of fin rays and scales and should be treated as a subgenus. In 1995, John E. Randall expressed doubts as to the validity of this move. He was supported by ichthyologists Ray S. Birdsong and even Robins himself in believing that Rhinogobiops is in fact distinct from Coryphopterus.

This was confirmed in 2002 in a phylogenetic study on the genus Coryphopterus by Christine E. Thacker and Kathleen S. Cole. They concluded that blackeye gobies were more closely related to a clade containing Lophogobius cyprinoides than to the rest of the genus. They transferred it back to the genus Rhinogobiops and it is now valid as Rhinogobiops nicholsii.

Fossil record
Abundant otolith fossils of blackeye gobies from the Pliocene epoch (5.3 to 3.6 million years ago) have been found in Lomita Marl. Pleistocene fossils of the species have also been recovered from other fossil localities in California.

Description
Blackeye gobies can easily be identified by the fleshy crest on the upper surface of their heads, the distinctive black upper anterior edge of the first dorsal fin, their large scales, and large, dark eyes. They are small fish, reaching a maximum length of only 15 cm (6 in).

The body is elongated, slightly compressed, and almost completely covered by scales. The head lacks scales and is wider than it is deep, with a small terminal mouth and a projecting lower jaw. The maxilla does not extend below the anterior margin of the eye. The teeth are conical and are present in double rows on both jaws. The eyes are directed slightly upwards and sideways.

The dorsal fins are close together, with the first dorsal fin having five to seven rays and the second having 12 to 15. The pectoral fins have 21 to 24 rays, all of which are rigid. The anal fin has 11 to 14 rays with no spines. It is about the same size as the second dorsal fin. The caudal fin is rounded with about 17 rays, 12 of which are segmented and branched. The pelvic fins are completely fused with each other, forming a disk, each with four rays. These function as suckers.

Coloration can vary, as blackeye gobies are capable of rapidly changing color during social interactions and for camouflage. The basic body color is creamy white to pale tan, but can become a mottled dark purple-brown. The body is irregularly speckled with metallic blue-green. Below the eye is an iridescent bluish spot clearly visible if illuminated (the source of their other common name – bluespot goby). The first dorsal fin has a distinctive black upper anterior edge that is retained even when the fish changes color. During breeding season, the pelvic fins of the males (normally gray in both sexes) turn jet black.

Distribution and habitat
Blackeye gobies are found in the eastern North Pacific, along the coasts of Canada, the United States, and Mexico. It reaches as far north as St. John Baptist Bay (near Partofshikof Island) in Alaska to as far south as San Martin Island of Baja California, Mexico. Its range does not extend into the Gulf of California, however.

Its northern range was previously believed to have reached only as far as Skidegate Channel in the Haida Gwaii Archipelago and the waters around Wales Island, both in British Columbia. However, a 2000 survey recovered blackeye gobies from Sitka and Klawock in southeastern Alaska. This makes the blackeye goby the only known species of goby to be found in Alaskan waters, though the arrow goby (Clevelandia ios) and the bay goby (Lepidogobius lepidus) have also been recovered from northern British Columbia. Subsequent observations on the recovered specimens in aquaria noted that blackeye gobies could only survive in temperatures exceeding , making them unlikely to be found further north than St. John Baptist Bay.

Blackeye gobies are extremely abundant. They are exclusively marine and usually inhabit rocks and reefs from intertidal areas to depths of  from the surface, though they have been found in depths as much as . They are most commonly found in the border area between reefs and sand bottoms. They usually seek out natural crevices and holes in the rock and reef surfaces but are capable of digging their own burrows in softer substrates if needed. They are difficult to see due to their habit of resting completely still until approached closely. When threatened they dart quickly back to their shelters.

Ecology and behaviour
Blackeye gobies are highly territorial. Each male usually guards a harem of two to eight females and a small territory around a shelter. They are diurnal and mostly prey on small crustaceans and mollusks. They are protogynous hermaphrodites, with all individuals being born females and turning into males once they reach a certain size under the correct conditions. They exhibit courtship display and breed between April and October. The larvae are pelagic.

Social behavior

Male blackeye gobies form harem with both females and juveniles. The males in such groups are usually larger than the female members, typically  in length, while the females range in size from .

Males are highly territorial and actively defend nest sites and females from intruders. Their territories can range from as small as  to as large as . Larger males defend larger territories. During breeding season, the size of the territorial range can decrease even further as males concentrate on closely guarding the nests instead of foraging.

Due to the relative closeness of the territories, males often encounter each other. When two males meet, they approach each other, slowly undulating their bodies, and assume combat-threat display with all fins stiffly outstretched. Once directly face-to-face, they gape their mouths and expand their throats. They take turns doing this until the "loser" assumes a mottled darker coloration and retreats to his shelter. From then on, the established dominant fish may harass the subordinate fish by chasing or nipping him if he strays too close.

Reproduction and life history
Blackeye gobies are sexually dimorphic, with different sexes distinguishable from genital papilla, size, and length of dorsal and anal fins. Females attain sexual maturity at  in length, while males mature at  in length. The breeding season lasts for five to seven months, between April and October. During this, the fused pelvic fins (the disk) of the males turn very dark in color.

They exhibit interesting courtship behavior. Males first prepare a nesting site by fanning, rubbing, scooping, and nibbling a selected area. They then entice females into the nesting site by swimming up for  or more with mouths open and fins outstretched then back down again. After doing this once or several times, they resume cleaning the nest site. At times, the males may also rush towards the females. Uninterested females often swim away to a shelter, in which case the males give chase, often nipping her fins. Interested females directly approach the males and slowly undulate their bodies while opening their mouths widely and spreading their fins.

The females spawn a single layer of around 1700 eggs on the bottom surface of the nest,  and may spawn several times. The males follow the females around as they lay the eggs, constantly nipping and bumping them. The males then fertilize the eggs during or immediately after they have been laid. The eggs are spindle-shaped and attached directly to rock surfaces. They are a pinkish to orange color when freshly laid but darken as they mature. The males defend the eggs until they hatch (after 10 to 33 days).

The newly hatched planktonic larvae are  in length and grow rapidly. They are pelagic, and can be found more than  from the shore at depths of several thousands of feet. They differ from adults in having dark-orange vertical bands. They mature after their first winter.

The longest known lifespan in an individual is five years.

Protogynous hermaphroditism
Blackeye gobies are protogynous hermaphrodites – all of them are born females but can shift once to become males once they reach a length of . This is likely to be the result of the limited availability of good nesting sites. Larger males have a competitive advantage in defending these nesting sites, thus larger males and smaller females have much higher reproductive success rates than small males. A change in sex ratio and size distribution can cause of females to undergo the change to become males.

Sex change in blackeye gobies has been correlated with the steroids 17β-estradiol and 11-ketotestosterone. A decrease in the former and an increase in the latter induces females to change to males. This has been artificially replicated in laboratory conditions with the application of 11-ketotestosterone, 11-ketoadrenosterone, and fadrozole (an aromatase inhibitor) on females. The change from female to male takes about four weeks in captive individuals, but the length of time it takes in the wild is unknown.

Diet and predators
Blackeye gobies are diurnal, being primarily active during daytime. They feed almost exclusively on small crustaceans and mollusks. The most common prey include amphipods, copepods, isopods, decapods (particularly hermit crabs), snails, and clams. Other less important prey include annelids and other invertebrates. Parts of echinoderms (mostly sea urchins) and bryozoans are also found in the contents of the stomachs of blackeye gobies, though this is likely the result of incidental ingestion rather than true predation. The preferred prey can vary by season depending on their abundance. Blackeye gobies have also been observed feeding directly on chemosynthetic bacterial mats. It is of particular significance if substantiated, as it would be the first known instance of a fish deriving nutrition directly from chemosynthetic bacteria. Blackeye gobies feed mostly by simply picking off the prey directly from the substrate. Occasionally, they may feed by taking a mouthful of substrate, spitting it out, then picking off edible prey as it drifts to the bottom.

Blackeye gobies are heavily preyed upon, in turn, by bass (such as kelp bass and barred sand bass), rock cod, greenling, and other predatory fishes of their rock and reef habitats, as well as birds such as Brandt's cormorants and double-crested cormorants. Sea urchins of the genus Strongylocentrotus are also known to dislodge blackeye gobies from their territories, possibly as a result of egg predation by the former.

Parasites of blackeye gobies include the trematodes  Pronoprymna petrowi and Lecithaster gibbosus.

In aquaculture
Blackeye gobies adapt well to aquaria and are often caught alive for such purposes. However, they can be troublesome if kept  with other males and other species of fish, as they are extremely territorial and aggressive.

References

External links

Gobiinae
Western North American coastal fauna
Monotypic ray-finned fish genera
Fish described in 1882
Taxa named by Carl Leavitt Hubbs

Rhinogobiops


Lenvil Elliott (September 2, 1951 – October 12, 2008) was a professional American football player who played running back for nine seasons in the National Football League (NFL). He was a part of the San Francisco 49ers Super Bowl XVI winning team.

Early life
Elliot was born in Lexington, Missouri, to Lenvil Nelson and Helen Constance (Williams) Elliott. He grew up in Richmond, Missouri, and was a 1969 graduate of Richmond High School, where he participated in both football and track.

His Richmond coach, Tom Adams, summed up Elliott's high school career reflecting on Elliott's final prep game by scoring all 19 points and running for 201 yards against a Slater team that had lost just one game: "It was a cold, nasty night and no one was real excited about playing," Adams said. "Slater scored first and we came back and scored as Lenvil had a remarkable run, 66 yards from the goal, but he went all over the field. I can remember watching the film over and over, and counting the number of times a Slater player touched or tried to tackle him. The last five yards to the end zone he drug or carried a couple of guys trying to get him down. He was not about to lose his final game in a Spartan uniform." Elliott was named to the All-State Team.

College career
He attended Northeast Missouri State University (now Truman State University) in Kirksville, Missouri, leading  the Bulldogs to three consecutive Mid-American Intercollegiate Athletic Association (MIAA) titles. He became a starter at running back as a sophomore and earned honorable mention All-MIAA honors. He was a second-team choice as a junior, and landed on the first team as a senior when he gained 1,138 yards rushing, an average of 113.8 yards per game.

His former coach, Russ Sloan, said Elliott was the first player he targeted upon taking over at the Kirksville school. "I thought at one point I had lost him to Texas-El Paso, but he called me at home and asked if he could still come to Northeast Missouri," Sloan recalled. "I cannot begin to describe how awesome Lenvil was in his first full contact scrimmage as a freshman. I knew then that he was special, and in my playing career at Missouri I had not seen a better back in The Big 8. Lenvil could do it all. He was a great runner, solid blocker and a superb receiver out of the backfield. His 40 time was 4.3, and rarely was the first tackler able to bring Lenvil down."

Elliott also excelled at track. He was one of the Bulldogs' top sprinters as a senior, running a leg on the 440-yard relay team and finishing third in the MIAA outdoor triple jump.

At NMSU, among his big games was when his three touchdowns led the Bulldogs to a 20–7 win to spoil Missouri State University's homecoming. He received a bachelor of arts degree in education in 1973.

His football abilities and track speed in the 100-yard dash (about 9.6) attracted professional football scouts' attention.

NFL career
Elliott was drafted in the 10th round of the 1973 NFL Draft by the Cincinnati Bengals. He played running back for the Bengals from 1973 to 1979. Playing behind starting running backs Essex Johnson and Boobie Clark, his rookie year he saw action in only six games, but made the most of it with 122 yards in 22 carries (a 5.5 average) and one touchdown with one reception for a 12-yard touchdown. The Bengals posted a 10–4 record before losing in the first round of the AFC Playoffs to the eventual Super Bowl champion Miami Dolphins.

The next season, 1974, was his most productive as he became a model of consistency for four seasons. In 10 games, he rushed for 345 yards in 68 carries (a 5.1 average) and one touchdown plus 18 receptions for 187 yards (a 10.4 average) and one touchdown. He also returned 13 kickoffs for 272 yards, a 20.9 average.

In 1975, he rushed for 308 yards in 71 carries (a 4.3 average) with one touchdown and 20 receptions for 196 yards (a 9.8 average) and three touchdowns. He scored a post-season touchdown on a six-yard run in the third quarter of the Bengals' 24–14 loss to the Oakland Raiders.

He followed that season, in 1976, with 276 yards in 69 carries (a 4.0 average) with 22 receptions for 188 yards (an 8.5 average) and tied his career-high of three receiving touchdowns. However, he fumbled five times.

In 1977, he rushed for 269 yards on 64 carries (a 4.1 average) and 29 receptions for 238 yards (an 8.2 average) and one touchdown. That season, he had his longest career run of 32 yards.

In 1978, he fell to 75 yards in 29 attempts (a 2.6 average) and 12 receptions for 100 yards (an 8.3 average).

He was traded to the San Francisco 49ers in 1979. for whom he played from 1979 to 1981. In 1979, he rushed for 135 yards in 33 carries (a 4.1 average) and a career-high three rushing touchdowns. He also had 23 receptions for 197 yards (an 8.6 average).

In 1980, his eighth NFL season, he came on strong with 341 yards in 76 carries (a 4.5 average) and two touchdowns with 27 receptions for a career-high 285 yards (a 10.6 average) and one touchdown. He also had the longest reception of his career, a 45-yard touchdown pass from Joe Montana in the third quarter to give the 49ers a 20–14 lead over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers before finally falling 24–23.

He was cut by the 49ers during the 1981 training camp, but then re-signed. During his ninth and final NFL season, he was hampered by a knee injury and had only 29 yards on seven carries (a 4.1 average) and seven receptions for 81 yards.

In the 1981 postseason, he played a key role in the 49ers' NFC Championship Game victory over the Dallas Cowboys on January 10, 1982, at Candlestick Park after being activated just a week earlier after a knee injury. Elliott rushed four times for 31 yards on the 49ers' 89-yard final drive, culminating in "The Catch", Dwight Clark's famous six-yard touchdown reception from Joe Montana with 51 seconds left in the game. Elliott suited up but did not play (due to his knee injury) but he earned a Super Bowl ring in the 49ers' victory over his old team, the Cincinnati Bengals.

Following Super Bowl XVI, he retired. He finished his career with 1,900 yards rushing, 1,484 yards receiving, and 18 total touchdowns (eight rushing and 10 receiving).

Later life
Following his retirement, Elliot returned to his hometown of Richmond, Missouri, and was a member of the Laborers Union Local #1290. In 1989, he was inducted into the Truman State University Hall of Fame.

Elliott died of a heart attack at 11:10 p.m., Sunday, October 12, 2008, at the Ray County, Missouri Memorial Hospital in Richmond. He was survived by a son, Lenvil O. Elliott II, a daughter, Melissa R. Elliott, grandsons James Kearney II and RaShaad Elliott, and his former wife and lifelong friend, Linda Elliott.

References

External links
 St. Petersburg Times
 http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1125154
 http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/football/features/superbowl/archives/16/

1951 births
2008 deaths
People from Lexington, Missouri
Players of American football from Missouri
American football running backs
Cincinnati Bengals players
People from Richmond, Missouri
San Francisco 49ers players
Truman Bulldogs football players

Lenvil Elliott


Carl Elliott (born July 25, 1961) is an American academic working as a professor in department of philosophy at the University of Minnesota.

Early life and education
A native of South Carolina, Elliott was educated at Davidson College in North Carolina and at the University of Glasgow in Scotland, where he received his PhD in philosophy. He received his MD from the Medical University of South Carolina.

Career
Prior to his appointment at the University of Minnesota in 1997 he was on the faculty of McGill University in Montreal. He has held postdoctoral or visiting appointments at the University of Chicago, East Carolina University, the University of Otago in New Zealand, and the University of Natal Medical School (now the Nelson R. Mandela School of Medicine), the first medical school in South Africa for non-white students.

Elliott received a Guggenheim Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Humanities Public Scholar Award in 2018. He was the Cary and Ann Maguire Chair in Ethics and American History at the John W. Kluge Center at the United States Library of Congress in 2019. He is a Member of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, where he led a faculty seminar on bioethics in 2003–2004, and an honorary faculty member of the University of Otago Bioethics Centre in New Zealand. He is a fellow of the Hastings Center, an independent bioethics research institution.

Elliott's scholarly interests include the influence of market forces on medicine, the ethics of enhancement technologies, research ethics, the philosophy of psychiatry, and the work of Ludwig Wittgenstein and Walker Percy. His articles have appeared in The New Yorker, Mother Jones, The Atlantic Monthly, The London Review of Books, The Believer, The American Prospect and Dissent. He is known for often taking darkly comic approaches to serious or offbeat topics. His New Yorker article, "Guinea Pigging", covered professional research subjects, while an article in the December 2000 Atlantic Monthly discussed the phenomenon of apotemnophilia, the desire for amputation of a healthy limb. He has also written several satirical pieces, including an article for the American Prospect on Extreme Psychiatry as a reality TV show, and a piece for the Ruminator Review on "how to become an academic failure."

Elliott has authored or edited seven books, including A Philosophical Disease: Bioethics, Culture and Identity (Routledge, 1999), and Better than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream (W.W. Norton, 2003.). His most recent book is White Coat, Black Hat: Adventures on the Dark Side of Medicine (Beacon Press, 2010). In 2011, Elliott won the Erikson Institute Prize for Excellence in Mental Health Media.

Elliott became well known for his advocacy around the death of Dan Markingson, a mentally ill man under a civil commitment order who committed suicide after being pressured into an industry-funded antipsychotic study at the University of Minnesota. Elliott wrote critically about the way the university handled the case in a Mother Jones article in 2010. Although the University of Minnesota denied any wrongdoing for years, it was forced to suspend recruitment into psychiatric drug studies after a scathing investigation by the Minnesota Office of the Legislative Auditor.

References

External links
Carl Elliott's website for Better than Well
"Guinea-Pigging" the New Yorker, Jan 7, 2008.
"A New Way to be Mad," The Atlantic Monthly, December 2000.
"Logical Extreme: The Next Step in Reality Television" (with B. Elliott), The American Prospect (web), 2003.

East Carolina University people
20th-century American philosophers
21st-century American philosophers
American philosophy academics
Bioethicists
Physicians from North Carolina
American medical writers
American male non-fiction writers
American non-fiction writers
University of Minnesota faculty
Alumni of the University of Glasgow
Living people
1961 births
Hastings Center Fellows

Carl Elliott (philosopher)


Government College for Women Dhoke Kala Khan is situated in Rawalpindi, Punjab, Pakistan. It was established for women in 2004, and is located just a kilometer away from Faizabad, Islamabad.

Science is taught at intermediate level and arts at graduation and intermediate level.

The students are around 500 and the number of staff is 15.

Government College for Women Dhoke Kala Khan, Rawalpindi was inaugurated by Sheikh Rasheed Ahmad. The then Federal Minister who made a lot of girls schools in Rwp. Source : Junaid Sultan Resident of Dhok kala Khan Rawalpindi.

See also
 Government College Asghar Mall Rawalpindi

External links
 A news

Public universities and colleges in Punjab, Pakistan


The Velo-Dog (also known as a Revolver de Poche) was a pocket revolver originally created in France by René Galand, son of Charles-François Galand in the late 19th-century as a defense for cyclists against dog attacks. The name is a compound word composed of "velocipede" and "dog".

Surviving examples vary considerably in appearance, but have certain features in common. The hammer is shrouded to avoid its snagging on clothing, so the weapon is double action only. All have short barrels and originally fired the 5.75mm (.22 calibre) Velo-dog cartridge, although many Velo-Dogs produced after 1900 were chambered in .22 LR or .25 ACP rounds. Another feature of many late-model Velo-Dogs is the lack of a trigger guard and a trigger that folds into the body of the weapon when not in use. For the more humane, there were cartridges loaded with cayenne pepper or dust, or which had bullets made from wax, wood, or cork.

The original revolver uses the Galand company's proprietary 5.75 mm Velo-dog cartridge, a centrefire 5.5 mm (nominally 5.75) cartridge slightly less powerful than the 22 Long Rifle, using a jacketed bullet. The cartridge is, or was until very recently, still made by Fiocchi.

Despite the low energy of the round, a suicide case was recorded where a woman shot herself twice in the temple with a .25 (6.35 mm) Velo-dog revolver before succumbing.

Today, the Velo-Dog term is used for a broad assortment of Euro and American pocket revolvers in various calibers by diverse (and often anonymous) makers, probably because no one can think of what else to call them.

They all are pocket-sized. They all have one or more of three specific features — concealed hammer, folding spur-trigger, and manual safety. French manufacturer Galand introduced the first in the mid-1890s. Most came from Belgium, Spain, France, or Russia with additional production in Germany, Italy, USA, and Brazil, with nearly 90 different manufacturers identified. The most prolific production was from the turn of the 20th century to World War I, when a cottage industry sprung up and there was a proliferation of Velo-Dogs of various standards.

At the turn of the century, a large cottage firearm industry was predominantly in the Liege area of Belgium and Spain. Some shops made fine guns, but a lot of cheap junk was also being produced. These guns seldom had a manufacturer mark or unique numbers so identifying them is nearly impossible. Although when exported some manufacturers added identifying numbers.

The firearms museum in Liege has a very large collection of such guns.

There were over 30 different gun makers in the Eibar region of Spain alone before the Spanish Civil War and since only 4 of them survived there is no way to date the manufacture dates or distinguish different assembly and/or batch numbers.

A lot of early gun makers manufactured Velo-Dog firearms in batches or by racks; putting the number of the weapon in the Rack of manufacture. It is usually mistaken for a serial number. When the rack was full, another followed, and the weapons were numbered similarly.

This resulted in a lot of European, Russian, and American gunmakers repeatedly producing clones and copies in batches, one after another. Velodogs were cheap to produce and not very expensive to purchase. Thus making unique Velo-Dogs extremely rare and somewhat valuable.

In popular culture
 A Velo-dog makes a minor appearance as an assassin's concealable pistol in the novel The Death of Achilles, one of Boris Akunin's Erast Fandorin series.

See also
Bossu Revolver

References
Notes

Sources

External links

(Spanish)

Revolvers of France
Revolvers
Early revolvers
.22 LR revolvers
History of cycling

Velo-dog


The Sipuncula, also known as the Sipunculida, or peanut worms, are a small phylum of marine worms, or they may be a class in the Annelida. The phylum has 144–320 species (estimates vary) of these bilaterally symmetrical, unsegmented worms.

Anatomy
Sipunculans are worm-like animals ranging from  in length, with most species being under . The body consists of a narrow front section, called the introvert and a larger trunk section. The introvert is retractable into the trunk.

Sipunculans have a coelom (body cavity), and a body wall somewhat similar to that of annelids. The body wall is strong and muscular. When threatened, Sipunculids can retract their body into a shape resembling a peanut kernel – a practice that has given rise to the name "peanut worm".

Introvert
The most recognizable part of Sipunculan worms is their mouth, which is surrounded by a mass of 18–24 ciliated tentacles, all of which may be inverted into the body. The tentacles are used to gather organic detritus from the water or substrate, and probably also function as gills. The mouth and tentacles lie at the tip of the introvert, which is otherwise decorated with numerous spines or nodules. In contrast, the trunk tends to be relatively smooth.

References

Minor phyla
Annelids

Sipuncula


María Paloma Adrados Gautier (born 16 April 1957) is a Spanish politician of the People's Party, mayoress of Pozuelo de Alarcón between 2011 and 2015, and, since then, president of the Madrid Assembly until 2019, when she became First Deputy President.

Biography
After graduating in Law, she began working in the CEOE, taking responsibility for the International Labor Relations Area. After passing through the International Labour Organization as a consultant, She entered fully into politics, joining the ranks of the Popular Party (PP). Between 1997 and 1999 she worked under Javier Arenas, at that time Minister of Labor and Social Affairs, as an advisor. In 1999 she was elected regional deputy of the Assembly of Madrid, and occupied the position of first secretary of the board.

In June 2007 she was chosen by Esperanza Aguirre to replace Juan José Güemes at the head of the Ministry of Employment and Women of Government of the Community of Madrid.

In 2011, she was elected candidate of her party to run for mayor of the city of Pozuelo de Alarcón, reaching 61.9% of the votes in the May 2011 elections,  being mayor on 11 June 2011

In 2015, she again attended the municipal elections of Pozuelo as a candidate, as well as the regional elections. His party lost 3 councilors in the municipal and although he maintained the majority, Adrados did not take possession and resigned from the act of councilor to assume the presidency of the Assembly of Madrid.

References

1957 births
Living people
20th-century Spanish lawyers
People's Party (Spain) politicians
Government ministers of the Community of Madrid
Women mayors of places in Spain
Presidents of the Assembly of Madrid
First Secretaries of the Assembly of Madrid
Members of the 5th Assembly of Madrid
Members of the 6th Assembly of Madrid
Members of the 7th Assembly of Madrid
Members of the 8th Assembly of Madrid
Members of the 10th Assembly of Madrid
21st-century Spanish women politicians
Politicians from Madrid
Complutense University of Madrid alumni
Members of the People's Parliamentary Group (Assembly of Madrid)
Members of the 11th Assembly of Madrid
Mayors of places in the Community of Madrid
City councillors in the Community of Madrid
Pozuelo de Alarcón

Paloma Adrados


Selasee is a World Music/Reggae artist from Ghana who lives in Boulder, Colorado most of the time. Counting Bob Marley and Nat King Cole as inspirations, his music approaches complex and often profound subjects with grace, simplicity and catchy melodies.

His song "Run" was featured on one of the world's best-selling video games, FIFA 2006.
In 2006 he won the following awards:

"Run" won 1st prize for in the World Music category and 2nd in the People's Choice Award at the ISC (International Songwriting Competition).

At the Billboard World Songwriting Competition, Selasee's song "Agba Yei" received an honorable mention. In early 2009, "Agba Yei" also won in The 8th Annual Independent Music Awards for Best World Fusion Song.
In January 2011, Selasee was nominated in The 10th Annual Independent Music Awards for his song "Saidaway" in the World Beat Song category.

And finally, Selasee was a finalist in the World Music category at the John Lennon Songwriting Contest, Session 1.

Selasee released his second album "African Gate" in 2010, the first demo for which has already been licensed to EA Sports for their "Cricket 2007" video game.

From his teenage years, when he started writing and performing gospel music with a local church group, Selasee has always been driven by a desire to share his music with the world. In 1999 he graduated from a 3-year music program at the school of performing arts at the University of Ghana in Legon.

That same year he made the big move to America. After a short while in Utah and  in southern California – during which he worked variety of odd jobs as well as composing tunes and performing at coffee houses and some restaurants and few workshops – he finally moved to Colorado, where he formed his band. His current band, Selasee and the Fafa Family, a 7-piece band, are currently  recognized as the hottest local Colorado reggae/world music bands in town. Selasee is  releasing his third album September 2014 with Selasee and the Fafa Family.

Discography
 Run (2006)
 "African Gate" (2010)

References

External links

Ghanaian musicians
Living people
Independent Music Awards winners
Year of birth missing (living people)
Place of birth missing (living people)
Ghanaian expatriates in the United States

Selasee


Leverstock Green is a  village in the English county of Hertfordshire. It is located between Hemel Hempstead and St Albans

Leverstock Green has a school, Leverstock Green Church of England Primary School, cricket club, tennis club, football club (Leverstock Green FC), village hall, shops, pubs and a Church of England parish church. Holy Trinity Church, built 1847-49 to the designs of architect Raphael Brandon, is Grade II listed.
Leverstock Green is a "modern" ecclesiastical parish, formed about 1849 from parts of the parishes of St Michael's (St Albans), Abbots Langley and Hemel Hempstead.

There is documentary and archaeological evidence that people lived and worked in the immediate area of Leverstock Green from the time of the Roman occupation onwards.  Recent research indicates that settlement along Westwick Row may well date back even further to the Iron Age and perhaps the Bronze Age. It seems quite likely that this settlement was a "suburb" of the major Iron Age settlement at Pre Wood just outside St. Albans.

Leverstock Green was and is still affected by the 2005 Buncefield oil depot explosion (the largest explosion in peacetime Europe), causing damage to houses and other buildings, such as broken windows, fallen chimneys and in some cases more serious structural damage, temporarily displacing a number of families.

Sport and leisure

Leverstock Green has a Non-League football club Leverstock Green F.C., which plays at Pancake Lane.

References

External links

 The Leverstock Green Chronicle  A detailed history of one village in Hertfordshire, United Kingdom, by Barbara Chapman. Accessed November 2006
 Leverstock Green Village Association
Leverstock Green Football Club
Leverstock Green Cricket Club

Villages in Hertfordshire
Areas of Hemel Hempstead

Leverstock Green


Hestavíg was an entertainment activity during the Viking Age in the Icelandic Commonwealth (930–1262), presumably a sport consisting of a brutal and bloody confrontation between two stallions, egged on by their masters, which mainly served to choose the best specimens for breeding. It was a cultural event of great importance and sometimes behaved verbal and physical confrontations among the spectators. The triumph of a champion or the other could impact socially and politically in the pacts and alliances between goði (chieftains) and bóndi (homesteaders), as testified in the Norse sagas. The site where these battles held was a neutral place used to strengthen friendship or treat issues among rivals. It was also an opportunity for courtship between young couples. Sometimes rivalries raised among participants and ended in bloody conflicts. Some examples appear in the Njáls saga (chapter 59) and  Víga-Glúms saga (chapters 13-14).

The origin of the activity came possibly from Norway. Sometimes Icelanders exported stallions specially trained for competitions on the continent.

Skeið
Skeið was another activity related to horses. It was a popular race competition from mainland Scandinavia.

Popular culture
Hestavíg is featured in the Icelandic viking film In the Shadow of the Raven.

References

Viking practices
Obsolete blood sports
Horses in culture
Early Germanic culture
Animal cruelty incidents
Animal combat organized by humans

Hestavíg


Cesare Federici (c. 1530 – 1600/03) was an Italian merchant and traveler.

Federici was born at Erbanno, in what is now the province of Brescia, then under the rule of the Republic of Venice.

In 1563, he visited India, and spent eighteen years in commercial pursuits and travels on the southern coasts and islands of Asia. He started from Cyprus and made his way to Aleppo and by caravan with Armenians and Moors to Bir on Euphrates then Feluchia (Fallujah), and Babylon. He then went down river to  Basra and then the island of Hormuz, where a Portuguese fort existed. He describes the election of a Muslim king, who swore fealty to the Portuguese. The fort and market was bustling with people from all parts of the world, and included the export of horses to India. At Hormuz, water and wood were supplied from Persia.

He subsequently travelled throughout India, visiting mostly coastal forts and towns, on the west and east coast. Most of these were owned, friendly, or trading with the Portuguese, including  Goa, Diu, Cambaia (Khambhat), Daman, Basain, Tana, Chiaul, Bezeneger Vijayanagara, Onor (Honarwa), Mangalor (Mangalore), Barzelor (Basrur), Canannore (Kannur). Crangenor (Kondungallor), and Cochin.

Of Kannur, he noted it as being ruled by a gentle king, and serving as a hub of the cardamon trade. He noted the population's habit of chewing Betel.

He wrote about pearl diving off the coasts from Cao Comeri to Baste de Chilao (Chennai) and Ceylon. He discusses the politics of Ceylon and the limited control that the Portuguese had over only the town of Colombo.

He went to Negapatan (Nagapattinam) and San Tome. Travelling on a Portuguese galleon he passed the Andaman islands, inhabited by "people of the jungle". In northeastern India, he visited Orifa (Orissa), the city of Satagan (Satgaon) in Bengal on Gulf of Martavan (Martaban), and Sion (Sirian), a city conquered by the king of Pegu. He sailed to Malacca and passed the channel of Nicobar to the island of Sumatra.

He returned through Baghdad and Aleppo  to Europe, and landed again at Venice in November, 1581. He then wrote in Italian an account of his voyages, published at Venice in 1587.

While Marco Polo's travels were centuries old by Federici's time, the latter explorer is generally contemporary with travels by the fellow-Venetian Niccolò de' Conti and Gasparo Balbi. The Genoese Hieronymo di San Stefano and Varthema of Bologna, occurred at the beginning of the 16th century. The more eloquent tale of Gemelli Careri in Giro del Mondo would be over a century later.

Works
 The voyage and travaile into the East India: London 1588 Theatrum Orbis Terrarum New York: Da Capo, 1971.

Sources

1530s births
1600s deaths
People from Darfo Boario Terme
Explorers from the Republic of Venice
Republic of Venice merchants
Explorers of Asia
16th-century Italian businesspeople
17th-century Italian businesspeople

Cesare Federici


Planner (often seen in publications as "PLANNER" although it is not an acronym) is a programming language designed by Carl Hewitt at MIT, and first published in 1969.  First, subsets such as Micro-Planner and Pico-Planner were implemented, and then essentially the whole language was implemented as Popler by Julian Davies at the University of Edinburgh in the POP-2 programming language. Derivations such as QA4, Conniver, QLISP and Ether (see scientific community metaphor) were important tools in artificial intelligence research in the 1970s, which influenced commercial developments such as Knowledge Engineering Environment (KEE) and Automated Reasoning Tool (ART).

Procedural approach versus logical approach
The two major paradigms for constructing semantic software systems were procedural and logical.  The procedural paradigm was epitomized by
Lisp which featured recursive procedures that operated on list structures.

The logical paradigm was epitomized by uniform proof procedure resolution-based derivation (proof) finders.  According to the logical paradigm it was "cheating" to incorporate procedural knowledge.

Procedural embedding of knowledge
Planner was invented for the purposes of the procedural embedding of knowledge and was a rejection of the resolution uniform proof procedure paradigm, which
Converted everything to clausal form.  Converting all information to clausal form is problematic because it hides the underlying structure of the information.
Then used resolution to attempt to obtain a proof by contradiction by adding the clausal form of the negation of the theorem to be proved. Using only resolution as the rule of inference is problematical because it hides the underlying structure of proofs.  Also, using proof by contradiction is problematical because the axiomatizations of all practical domains of knowledge are inconsistent in practice.

Planner was a kind of hybrid between the procedural and logical paradigms because it combined programmability with logical reasoning.  Planner featured a procedural interpretation of logical sentences where an implication of the form  can be procedurally interpreted in the following ways using pattern-directed invocation:
Forward chaining (antecedently):

Backward chaining (consequently)

In this respect, the development of Planner was influenced by natural deductive logical systems (especially the one by Frederic Fitch [1952]).

Micro-planner implementation

A subset called Micro-Planner was implemented by Gerry Sussman, Eugene Charniak and Terry Winograd and was used in Winograd's natural-language understanding program SHRDLU, Eugene Charniak's story understanding work, Thorne McCarty's work on legal reasoning, and some other projects.  This generated a great deal of excitement in the field of AI.  It also generated controversy because it proposed an alternative to the logic approach that had been one of the mainstay paradigms for AI.

At SRI International, Jeff Rulifson, Jan Derksen, and Richard Waldinger developed QA4 which built on the constructs in Planner and introduced a context mechanism to provide modularity for expressions in the database. Earl Sacerdoti and Rene Reboh developed QLISP, an extension of QA4 embedded in INTERLISP, providing Planner-like reasoning embedded in a procedural language and developed in its rich programming environment. QLISP was used by Richard Waldinger and Karl Levitt for program verification, by Earl Sacerdoti for planning and execution monitoring, by Jean-Claude Latombe for computer-aided design, by Nachum Dershowitz for program synthesis, by Richard Fikes for deductive retrieval, and by Steven Coles for an early expert system that guided use of an econometric model.

Computers were expensive. They had only a single slow processor and their memories were very small by comparison with today. So Planner adopted some efficiency expedients including the following:

Backtracking was adopted to economize on the use of time and storage by working on and storing only one possibility at a time in exploring alternatives.
A unique name assumption was adopted to save space and time by assuming that different names referred to different objects.  For example, names like Peking (previous PRC capital name) and Beijing (current PRC capital transliteration) were assumed to refer to different objects.
A closed-world assumption could be implemented by conditionally testing whether an attempt to prove a goal exhaustively failed.  Later this capability was given the misleading name "negation as failure" because for a goal  it was possible to say:  "if attempting to achieve  exhaustively fails then assert ."

The genesis of Prolog
Gerry Sussman, Eugene Charniak, Seymour Papert and Terry Winograd visited the University of Edinburgh in 1971, spreading the news about Micro-Planner and SHRDLU and casting doubt on the resolution uniform proof procedure approach that had been the mainstay of the Edinburgh Logicists. At the University of Edinburgh, Bruce Anderson implemented a subset of Micro-Planner called PICO-PLANNER, and Julian Davies (1973) implemented essentially all of Planner.

According to Donald MacKenzie, Pat Hayes recalled the impact of a visit from Papert to Edinburgh, which had become the "heart of artificial intelligence's Logicland," according to Papert's MIT colleague, Carl Hewitt. Papert eloquently voiced his critique of the resolution approach dominant at Edinburgh "…and at least one person upped sticks and left because of Papert."

The above developments generated tension among the Logicists at Edinburgh.  These tensions were exacerbated when the UK Science Research Council commissioned Sir James Lighthill to write a report on the AI research situation in the UK.  The resulting report [Lighthill 1973; McCarthy 1973] was highly critical although SHRDLU was favorably mentioned.

Pat Hayes visited Stanford where he learned about Planner. When he returned to Edinburgh, he tried to influence his friend Bob Kowalski to take Planner into account in their joint work on automated theorem proving. "Resolution theorem-proving was demoted from a hot topic to a relic of the misguided past.  Bob Kowalski doggedly stuck to his faith in the potential of resolution theorem proving. He carefully studied Planner.". Kowalski [1988] states "I can recall trying to convince Hewitt that Planner was similar to SL-resolution." But Planner was invented for the purposes of the procedural embedding of knowledge and was a rejection of the resolution uniform proof procedure paradigm. Colmerauer and Roussel recalled their reaction to learning about Planner in the following way:

"While attending an IJCAI convention in September '71 with Jean Trudel, we met Robert Kowalski again and heard a lecture by Terry Winograd on natural language processing. The fact that he did not use a unified formalism left us puzzled. It was at this time that we learned of the existence of Carl Hewitt's programming language, Planner. The lack of formalization of this language, our ignorance of Lisp and, above all, the fact that we were absolutely devoted to logic meant that this work had little influence on our later research."

In the fall of 1972, Philippe Roussel implemented a language called Prolog (an abbreviation for PROgrammation en LOGique – French for "programming in logic"). Prolog programs are generically of the following form (which is a special case of the backward-chaining in Planner):

Prolog duplicated the following aspects of Micro-Planner:
Pattern directed invocation of procedures from goals (i.e. backward chaining)
An indexed data base of pattern-directed procedures and ground sentences.
Giving up on the completeness paradigm that had characterized previous work on theorem proving and replacing it with the programming language procedural embedding of knowledge paradigm.

Prolog also duplicated the following capabilities of Micro-Planner which were pragmatically useful for the computers of the era because they saved space and time:
Backtracking control structure
Unique Name Assumption by which different names are assumed to refer to distinct entities, e.g., Peking and Beijing are assumed to be different.
Reification of Failure. The way that Planner established that something was provable was to successfully attempt it as a goal and the way that it establish that something was unprovable was to attempt it as a goal and explicitly fail.  Of course the other possibility is that the attempt to prove the goal runs forever and never returns any value.  Planner also had a   construct which succeeded if  failed, which gave rise to the "Negation as Failure" terminology in Planner.

Use of the Unique Name Assumption and Negation as Failure became more questionable when attention turned to Open Systems.

The following capabilities of Micro-Planner were omitted from Prolog:
Pattern-directed invocation of procedural plans from assertions (i.e., forward chaining)
Logical negation, e.g., .

Prolog did not include negation in part because it raises implementation issues. Consider for example if negation were included in the following Prolog program:

The above program would be unable to prove  even though it follows by the rules of mathematical logic. This is an illustration of the fact that Prolog (like Planner) is intended to be a programming language and so does not (by itself) prove many of the logical consequences that follow from a declarative reading of its programs.

The work on Prolog was valuable in that it was much simpler than Planner. However, as the need arose for greater expressive power in the language, Prolog began to include many of the capabilities of Planner that were left out of the original version of Prolog.

References

Bibliography

Bruce Anderson. Documentation for LIB PICO-PLANNER School of Artificial Intelligence, Edinburgh University.  1972
Bruce Baumgart. Micro-Planner Alternate Reference Manual Stanford AI Lab Operating Note No. 67, April 1972.
 .
 .
 .
 .

 .
Carl Hewitt. "The Challenge of Open Systems" Byte Magazine. April 1985
Carl Hewitt and Jeff Inman.  "DAI Betwixt and Between:  From 'Intelligent Agents' to Open Systems Science" IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics.  Nov/Dec 1991.
Carl Hewitt and Gul Agha.  "Guarded Horn clause languages: are they deductive and Logical?" International Conference on Fifth Generation Computer Systems, Ohmsha 1988. Tokyo.  Also in Artificial Intelligence at MIT, Vol. 2. MIT Press 1991.
 .
William Kornfeld and Carl Hewitt. The Scientific Community Metaphor  MIT AI Memo 641.  January 1981.
Bill Kornfeld and Carl Hewitt.  "The Scientific Community Metaphor" IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics.  January 1981.
Bill Kornfeld. "The Use of Parallelism to Implement a Heuristic Search" IJCAI 1981.
Bill Kornfeld.  "Parallelism in Problem Solving" MIT EECS Doctoral Dissertation. August 1981.
Bill Kornfeld. "Combinatorially Implosive Algorithms" CACM.  1982
Robert Kowalski. "The Limitations of Logic"  Proceedings of the 1986 ACM fourteenth annual conference on Computer science.
Robert Kowalski. "The Early Years of Logic Programming"  CACM January 1988.
 .
 .
 .
Gerry Sussman and Terry Winograd. Micro-planner Reference Manual AI Memo No, 203, MIT Project MAC, July 1970.
Terry Winograd. Procedures as a Representation for Data in a Computer Program for Understanding Natural Language  MIT AI TR-235.  January 1971.
Gerry Sussman, Terry Winograd and Eugene Charniak. Micro-Planner Reference Manual (Update) AI Memo 203A, MIT AI Lab, December 1971.
Carl Hewitt. Description and Theoretical Analysis (Using Schemata) of Planner, A Language for Proving Theorems and Manipulating Models in a Robot AI Memo No. 251, MIT Project MAC, April 1972.
Eugene Charniak.  Toward a Model of Children's Story Comprehension  MIT AI TR-266.  December 1972.
Julian Davies. Popler 1.6 Reference Manual University of Edinburgh, TPU  Report No. 1, May 1973.
Jeff Rulifson, Jan Derksen, and  Richard Waldinger. "QA4, A Procedural Calculus for Intuitive Reasoning" SRI AI Center Technical Note 73, November 1973.
Scott Fahlman. "A Planning System for Robot Construction Tasks" MIT AI TR-283. June 1973
James Lighthill. "Artificial Intelligence: A General Survey Artificial Intelligence: a paper symposium." UK Science Research Council. 1973.
John McCarthy. "Review of 'Artificial Intelligence: A General Survey Artificial Intelligence: a paper symposium." UK Science Research Council. 1973.
Robert Kowalski "Predicate Logic as Programming Language" Memo 70, Department of Artificial Intelligence, Edinburgh University.  1973
Pat Hayes. Computation and Deduction Mathematical Foundations of Computer Science: Proceedings of Symposium and Summer School, Štrbské Pleso, High Tatras, Czechoslovakia, September 3–8, 1973.
Carl Hewitt, Peter Bishop and Richard Steiger. "A Universal Modular Actor Formalism for Artificial Intelligence"  IJCAI 1973.
L. Thorne McCarty. "Reflections on TAXMAN: An Experiment on Artificial Intelligence and Legal Reasoning" Harvard Law Review. Vol. 90, No. 5, March 1977
Drew McDermott and Gerry Sussman. The Conniver Reference Manual  MIT AI Memo 259A.  January 1974.
Earl Sacerdoti, et al., "QLISP A Language for the Interactive Development of Complex Systems"  AFIPS. 1976
 .
 .

External links

History of artificial intelligence
Automated planning and scheduling
Logic programming languages
Robot programming languages
Theorem proving software systems
Programming languages created in 1969

Planner (programming language)


Jean-Baptiste-Gustave Lamothe (April 16, 1856 – November 24, 1922) was a Canadian judge and lawyer. He was the Chief Justice of Quebec between 1918 and 1922.

Life and career
Lamothe was born in Champlain, Canada East, the son ofJoseph-Germain Lamothe and of Émilie Turcotte.

He studied the cours classique at the Séminaire Saint-Joseph de Trois-Rivières, and Law with François-Xavier-Anselme Trudel in Montreal. He was called to the Quebec bar in 1880. He was appointed Queen's Counsel in 1899. He was awarded a doctorate in Law by the Université de Montréal in 1921. He practiced with Trudel and with Napoléon Charbonneau. He was bâtonnier of the district of Montreal between 1904 and 1905. Involved with the Parti conservateur du Québec, he was vice president of the Association libérale-conservatrice de Montréal. He was the director of the Ligue anti-alcoolique in 1909.

He was appointed a judge of the Quebec Superior Court on September 25, 1915. He was appointed to the Quebec Court of Queen's Bench and made Chief Justice of Quebec on September 19, 1918. On October 16, 1918, he served for a few days as Administrator of Quebec because of health problems of Pierre-Évariste Leblanc, the Lieutenant Governor of Quebec. He died in Montreal.

Sources
 Les juges en chef de la province de Québec, 1764-1924 /   Audet, Francis-Joseph, p. 171

Lawyers in Quebec
Judges in Quebec
Canadian King's Counsel
Université de Montréal Faculty of Law alumni
1856 births
1922 deaths

Jean-Baptiste-Gustave Lamothe


Danthonia intermedia is a species of grass known by the common names timber oatgrass, intermediate oatgrass, and mountain wild-oat grass. This clumping erect perennial grass is native to North America, where it is widespread across most of Canada and along the western United States into California.  It is a plant of the plains as well as forested, mountainous, alpine environments.

The bunchgrass reaches about half a meter in height at maximum. Its leaves are short and mostly basal. Each inflorescence is a narrow cluster of up to about ten spikelets, each spikelet holding 3 to 6 florets. The flowers are cleistogamous, meaning they remain closed and pollinate themselves. This grass also sometimes undergoes apomixis, reproduction without fertilization. This independence of the need for pollination between individuals is one reason why this grass is so widespread and able to tolerate a variety of climates.

This is a desirable grass for grazing land because it begins growing earlier in the spring than most other grasses, and it tolerates heavy grazing better than some other grasses because of its basal meristem, that is, new growth occurs low on the grass instead of on the tip where it can be chewed off. This grass is an indicator of ecological climax in many ecosystems.

References

External links
Jepson Manual Treatment
USDA Plants Profile
Ecology
Grass Manual Treatment

intermedia
Bunchgrasses of North America
Native grasses of California
Grasses of the United States
Grasses of Canada
Flora of the Sierra Nevada (United States)
Flora without expected TNC conservation status

Danthonia intermedia


Cycling is a common means of transportation, sport, and recreation in Paris, France. As of 2021, about 15% of trips in the city are made by bicycle, taking place on over  of cycling paths. The Tour de France, the largest sporting event in cycling, finishes on the Champs-Élysées. Four major recreational cycling routes—EuroVelo 3, Avenue Verte, the Seine à Vélo, and the Veloscenic—pass by Notre-Dame Cathedral.

History
Following an accident between a horse-drawn carriage and a velocipede on rue Saint-Antoine, a judgment handed down on May 1869 fined the velocipedist one franc, in accordance with article 113 of the ordinance of 25 July 1862, which banned "games involving skittles, palets, barrels, etc." from the streets. This judgement meant velocipedes were banned from the streets of Paris. The Prefect of Police, Léon Renault, lifted the ban with an ordinance on 9 November 1874 that equated a velocipede with a carriage, and thus required it to be equipped with a lantern, bell and license plate.

In 1869, Richard Lesclide, the editor of the Le Vélocipède illustré, organized the world's first city-to-city bicycle road race, from Paris to Rouen. It took place on 7 November 1869 and counted 323 participants. The race was won by James Moore with a time of 10 hours and 45 minutes.

After having nearly disappeared in the 1980s, when cars were 85 times more frequent than cycling, the number of cyclists in Paris has grown since the 1990s.

Cycleways and routes
There are 1,000 km (620 mi) of cycle paths and routes in Paris. These include piste cyclable (bike lanes separated from other traffic by physical barriers such as a kerb) and bande cyclable (a bicycle lane denoted by a painted path on the road). Since 2008,  of specially marked bus lanes are also open to cyclists. Cyclists have also been given the right to ride in both directions on certain one-way streets in 20 mph zones.

Paris' bike routes are detailed in guides such as Paris de Poche: Cycliste et Piéton (i.e. Pocket Paris: Cyclist and Pedestrian) which costs about €5 or Paris à Velo (i.e. Paris by bike), available for free from Paris town hall offices.

Voies vertes
Some of the French cycle routes known as voies vertes (literally "greenways") pass through Paris. One is the Piste du canal de L'Ourcq (the Ourcq canal path) which runs   through Paris to Sevran.

EuroVelo and other international routes
The long-distance cycle path EuroVelo 3 passes through Paris. Dubbed the "Pilgrim's Route", it runs between Santiago de Compostela in Spain and Trondheim in Norway.

Other international routes that pass through Paris include the Avenue Verte route, which runs between Paris and London. The Avenue Verte crosses the English Channel at Dieppe via the Newhaven – Dieppe ferry.

Vélib'

Following the successful examples of bicycle hire schemes in the cities of Rennes and Lyon, the city of Paris launched the Vélib' rental bikes system on 15 July 2007. Managed by the company JCDecaux, there were originally 10,648 bikes available at 750 Vélib' stations. More than 20,600 bikes at 1,451 stations are planned for late 2007 and Paris may eventually have 50,000 Vélib' bikes for hire.

In 2018, Velib' was rebranded as Vélib' Métropole, and is now operated by Smovengo. The switch between operators was defined by electrical and software issues that lasted for months, leading many users to abandon their memberships and seek reimbursement.

As of October 2023, 19,000 Velib' bikes are available (40% of which are electric) and there are 1,464 stations located in Paris and its adjoining suburbs. The service had 390,000 subscribers in 2022.

Paris Respire

Paris Respire (literally "Paris Breathes") is a car-free event where certain roads are closed to vehicular traffic on Sundays and public holidays between the hours of 9am and 5pm. The roads closed are in popular areas such as along the Seine River, in the Marais, the along the Canal Saint Martin and in Montmartre, as well as some other roads elsewhere in the city. Cycling and walking are the main forms of getting around on these roads on these days.

Sports practice

In Paris, there are two tracks where cyclists can practice racing. The first is an oval track of 3.6km located around the Longchamp Racecourse in the 16th district. It has been used by cyclists since the end of the 19th century, when the first cycling competitions began. Today, the track is the most used cycling segment in France on the sport application Strava and one of the most popular in the world.
The second place is called the Polygone de Vincennes and it is located in the Bois de Vincennes in the 12th district of Paris. The track was recently refurbished.

Government investment

Le Plan vélo de Paris (2015-2020)
Le Plan vélo de Paris (i.e. The Paris Bike Plan) was a 150 million euro investment by the city of Paris that aimed to double the length of bike paths in the city between 2015-2020.

The main focus of the plan was to increase the amount of bike paths and parking spots in the city, but the plan also included subsidies for residents to purchase electric bicycles and a focus on increasing opportunities for people to learn how to ride and maintain bikes.

Bicycle counters recorded an average increase in ridership of 47% between 2019 and 2020, and 22% between 2020 and 2021. On some routes, the increase between 2019 and 2020 was as high as 60%. By 2021, Paris had over 1,000km of bike lanes.

Le Plan vélo de Paris (2021-2026)
In October 2021, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo announced the second act of Le Plan vélo de Paris, which has a budget of 250 million euros and aims to add another 180 km of bike lanes to the city. Her goal is to make Paris "100% cyclable". The 180 km of new lanes includes the 50 km (31 mi) of temporary bike lanes that were constructed in Spring 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic that will now be made permanent. The plan also includes the addition of 130,000 new bicycle parking spots.

Separately, the national government announced in 2023 that it will spend 2 billion euros on new bicycle infrastructure between 2023-2027. If the spending of local and regional authorities is also taken into account, the amount rises to 6 billion euros during the same time frame.

See also
Transport in Paris
Cyclability
15-minute city
Urban vitality

References

Bibliography

External links

Paris goes cycling mad | Environment | The Guardian
Freewheeling Paris – Cycling Paris on a Vélib' bike | Travel | The Guardian
 https://web.archive.org/web/20120827134459/http://www.mdb-idf.org/spip/

Paris
Transport in Paris

Cycling in Paris


The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) is a regulatory body set up by the Government of India under section 3 of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India Act, 1997. It is the regulator of the telecommunications sector in India. It consists of a chairperson and not more than two full-time members and not more than two part-time members. The TRAI Act was amended by an ordinance, effective from 24 January 2000, establishing a Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal to take over the adjudicatory and disputes functions from TRAI.

History
Telecom Regulatory Authority of India was established on 20 February 1997 by an Act of Parliament to regulate telecom services and tariffs in India. Earlier, regulation of telecom services and tariffs was overseen by the Central Government.

TRAI's mission is to create and nurture conditions for the growth of telecommunications in India to enable the country to have a leading role in the emerging global information society.

One of its main objectives is to provide a fair and transparent environment that promotes a level playing field and facilitates fair competition in the market. TRAI regularly issues orders and directions on various subjects such as tariffs, interconnections, quality of service, direct to home services and mobile number portability.

In January 2016, TRAI introduced an important change in telecommunication to the benefit of consumers, where they would be compensated  for every dropped call, subject to a maximum of three dropped calls in a day. In May 2016, this regulation was revoked by the Supreme Court on the grounds of being "unreasonable, arbitrary and unconstitutional".

Secretariat

TRAI is administered through a secretariat headed by a secretary. All proposals are processed by the secretary, who organises the agenda for authority meetings (consulting with the chairperson), prepares the minutes and issues regulations in accordance to the meetings. The secretary is assisted by advisors. These include Mobile Network, Interconnection and FixeNetwork, BroadBand and Policy Analysis, Quality of Service, Broadcasting & Cable Services, Economic Regulation, Financial Analysis & IFA, Legal, Consumer Affairs & International Relation and Administration & Personnel. Officers are selected from the Indian Telecommunications Service and the Indian Administrative Service (IAS). The current chairperson of TRAI is PD Vaghela, an IAS officer of the Gujarat cadre, batch of 1986.

TRAI Mobile Apps
On 6 June 2017, TRAI launched three new apps and a web portal to highlight the telecom services that are being offered to the users.

Mycall app, MySpeed app and Do not disturb (DND 2.0) apps can be used to ensure that there is transparency between what consumers are paying for and what telecom operators are promising to provide at a certain rate.

In December 2018, TRAI released another app called TRAI Channel Selector. Using this app, they can add, remove and manage their channels.

Recent TRAI initiatives
In order to increase broadband penetration in India, TRAI has proposed WANI (Wi-Fi Access Network Interface) architecture. If implemented, it may lead to set up of Public Data Offices (PDOs) where Wi-FI Internet would be available on demand. TRAI relates the same with PCOs which were used to do the voice calls and were very popular hotspots before the mobile phones or home landlines became the ultimate mode of communication.

TRAI reports
To increase transparency and give a data-based overview of Indian Telecom Industry at regular intervals, TRAI publishes multiple reports under Release/Publication "Reports" section on its website.

Controversies

Jio
Allegedly, TRAI bent its rules multiple times to let Jio, a subsidiary of Reliance Industries Limited, become a market leader in the span of a few years. Jio was allowed to "test" its services for a much longer period and with a much larger subscriber base than was the industrial norm. In a letter to the telecom department, Rajan Mathews of the Cellular Operators Association of India wrote that Reliance's offers were "full-blown and full-fledged services masquerading as tests, which bypass regulations and can potentially game policy features." TRAI was also accused of modifying its definition of "significant market power" so as to exclude Jio from strict scrutiny. Whilst initially the definition of market power was based on total network activity, the parameters were changed to subscriber share and gross revenue. Jio qualified as a significant market power according to the first definition, but not the second.

See also
 Telecommunications in India
 The Telecom Commercial Communication Customer Preference Regulations, 2010

References

External links

Government agencies established in 1997
1997 establishments in India
Telecommunications authorities of India
Telecommunications regulatory authorities
Government agencies of India
Regulatory agencies of India

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India