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I think this is a GREAT place to start in the classroom. A truly
non-partisan slant. Looking at politics through humor.
The event I posted a link to yesterday... we will have a political
cartoonist from the Baltimore Sun on hand who will teach the audience how to
draw George Bush and John Kerry in several quick strokes. It should be
interesting seeing 700 people trying to draw the two top candidates
As I spoke with him on the phone the other day it really *clicked* for me
that students (of any age) connect with cartoons. And they know of Gary
Trudeau's - if not just simply his style of cartoon. This is something that
even has a cross-collaborative effect with a history class. A history
instructor could pair with an art instructor to pull in older political
cartoons... let the students try to determine if the cartoonist supported
Abe Lincoln or if he was making fun of it.
FYI: Our cartoonist is Kevin 'KAL' Kallaugher of the Baltimore Sun. He
does have a book out... and of course you can find his work online.
> Subject: RE: Social Comment - Political Concerns- Cartoonists
> From: "mary maloney johnson" <[email protected]>
> Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 17:03:27 -0400
> X-Message-Number: 8
> Judy and all,
> I was just thinking- How about the cartoonists, like Gary Trudeau of
> Doonesbury and Walt Kelly of Pogo fame (to those of us old enough to know
> and love him- he was a big influence on the artistic style of the man who
> did Calvin and Hobbes). They're both quite loaded with political and social | <urn:uuid:01812a58-0a0e-4668-8a5d-36c7328484f8> | {
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All writing teachers are familiar with the “hamburger paragraph” and other well-intentioned but ultimately faulty systems to help students organize their writing. And while not all organizational structures are irrelevant, in this installment of Questions & Authors Jennifer Jacobson argues that helping students think of their audience and guiding them to discover writing structures and styles as they read their favorite books, are the foundations of better organized writing. Jennifer is the author of No More “I’m Done!” Fostering Independent Writers in the Primary Grades.
We’ve long accepted that learning to read is a developmental process. We know that, year by year, students will grow in their understanding of how print is constructed. They will increase their knowledge and application of reading strategies and comprehension. But when it comes to writing, we often fail to think developmentally. This is particularly true in the teaching of organization, where we provide lists of instructions or formulas to students so they can produce seemingly well-organized products. In many instances, the formulas are bogus, no more than fabrications designed by well-meaning educators to prompt students for a patterned (but often hollow) response.
The hamburger paragraph is one example of well-intentioned but faulty scaffolding. In this popular lesson, we teach students to begin each paragraph with a topic sentence, follow with three supporting sentences, and end with a concluding sentence. Imagine for a moment trying to write a letter, an essay, or a report this way. All paragraphs would be approximately five sentences long. Transitions from one paragraph to another would be a nightmare: all those conclusions, all those new openings. If you examine professional writing, you’ll discover that sometimes a topic sentence comes in the middle of the paragraph, sometimes at the end. (Years ago, when doing some writing for a textbook company, I had difficulty finding a mentor text that had even a single paragraph modeled after the hamburger.)
But, you say, once we started teaching the hamburger, our students scored higher on the state assessment! I’m not surprised. In some states, teachers who are enlisted to score state assessments have been taught to look for the hamburger structure in student responses. Another name for the hamburger paragraph, then, could be the Big Test Paragraph.
This is not to say that all of the structures we teach students—the compare-and-contrast essay, the persuasive essay, the rising action to climax in fiction, the haiku, or the sonnet, for example—are not relevant. They certainly are. However, we need to give students knowledge of and experience with different organizational patterns. And before we do that, we need to help them grow in their intrinsic understanding of organization. That is, we need to help them realize that organization serves a particular function, and that they—as writers—have important decisions to make.
How do we accomplish this?
We begin by building a sense of audience. When a writer shifts his purpose from writing for himself to writing with a reader in mind, he becomes increasingly aware of the need for structure. He first recognizes that organization is essential for clarity, and then grows to understand that by manipulating the organization he can better inform, persuade, entertain, or move the reader.
There are a myriad of positive ways that we can help young writers keep audience in mind. As your students leave the rug where you have gathered for your mini-lesson, ask, “What are you going to write about today?” And then, “What do you think the reader would like to know about (your cat, your trip to the Laundromat, your birthday party)?”
During writing conferences we can ask questions that help the writer keep the reader in mind:
• What is the purpose of your piece?
• What is the most important thing you wish to tell the reader?
• Do you have a lead that will hook the reader?
• Are there any places in your work that might confuse the reader? How could you make this part clearer?
• What does the reader learn in the middle of your piece?
• What do you think the reader will want to know at the end?
• How do you think the reader will react to this ending?
I conduct mini-lessons in which I model prewriting with audience in mind. I tell students my topic choice—for example, my dogs—and then ask, “What do you think the reader would like to know about them?” They provide me with a list of questions, which I record on the board. After the questions have been generated, we discuss which ones I should answer in the beginning of the piece (What are your dogs’ names? What do they look like?), those that should be answered in the middle of the piece (What do they like to do? Do they get into trouble?), and the questions that will serve the ending (How do you feel about your dogs?). Then I write a piece that includes the answers to all of the questions. I think out loud, indicating when it’s time to shift to another paragraph (for example, when I’m introducing a new idea about my subject).
Of course, the very best way to help students develop a sense of audience is to give them one (the teacher alone does not serve as an effective audience). Daily sharing of writing in the author’s chair; peer conferencing; and publishing student work in newsletters, podcasts, and collective anthologies all go a long way toward helping students keep listeners and readers in mind.
After they have developed a sense of audience, students need to understand that writers make choices about how to organize their work. When reading a mentor text to primary students, I often ask, “How did the author choose to organize this piece?” Many of the stories I read are chronological, so students say, “She told the story in the order it happened.” But I’m careful to read fiction and nonfiction that are organized around other structures as well. We read Carmine: A Little More Red by Melissa Sweet (2005), an adaptation of Little Red Riding Hood that is organized as an alphabet book; The Great Blue House by Kate Banks (2005), which is organized according to the seasons; Previously by Allan Ahlberg (2008), a story told backward; Now and Ben: The Modern Inventions of Benjamin Franklin by Gene Barretta (2006), which alternates between present and past; and many other books that allow us to examine different structural bones.
Once young students become familiar with the many organizational possibilities that exist, they often adapt them for their own purposes. As I mentioned in my book No More “I’m Done”: Fostering Independent Writers in the Primary Grades, it is a great feeling when a young student says, “Look! I’m using the Now and Ben pattern, only my book is Me as a Baby, Me Now.” Choosing their own organizational structure is a far more sophisticated approach than following a list of instructions.
Students can also examine the ways in which authors begin and end their pieces. In the not-so-distant past, I recommended providing students with a list of strategies that authors use. I now realize that an even more productive exercise is to invite students to conduct their own investigations of the techniques, and to provide their own names for these strategies. One group of students discovered that many writers begin a piece with a sentence that tells when:
• “When Owen’s granny heard he was a baby . . .” (Banjo Granny by Sarah Martin Busse and Jacqueline Briggs Martin )
• “Not so long ago, before she could even speak words . . .” (Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale by Mo Willems )
• “When I was younger it was plain to me . . .” (A River of Words: The Story of William Carlos Williams by Jen Bryant )
We know that with discovery comes ownership—not something that students are likely to forget.
Only when students truly understand the need and function for organization should we have them experiment with structures that are particularly useful to writers. I often begin by showing students the “pattern of three” that appears in some works of fiction: 1) a character wants something and tries to get it but fails, 2) he tries again and fails again, and 3) he tries a third time and either gets what he wants or changes his mind. Although fiction can be difficult, it is usually the genre children know best; therefore, they are able to apply a good deal of background knowledge. In addition, the pattern of three is a common organizational structure: the five-paragraph essay and the traditional persuasive essay are two familiar examples. Both essays begin with an introductory paragraph (equivalent to the opening of a story in which we are introduced to a character and what he wants), followed by three supporting paragraphs (the three tries), and a conclusion (the story’s resolution). Once students have developed a solid understanding of one of these formats, it’s easy to introduce the others.
When it comes to teaching writing, there is a constant tension between allowing students to practice the craft and rushing them to create a product that looks accomplished. With subjects such as mathematics or music, we accept that mastery will take hours and hours of exposure. Writing, on the other hand, we too often treat as a fill-in-the-blank exercise. Providing formulas too early not only stunts writing growth, it also interferes with the development of ideas, voice, and sentence fluency. Instead, we must encourage students to identify themselves as writers and to know that writers first ask themselves “What do I want to write about?” and then “How will I organize this piece?” Teaching students this foundational concept of the writing process will serve them well.
2 comments October 27th, 2010 | <urn:uuid:7b057dc5-b7f6-4203-b028-163995e847a6> | {
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A byproduct of the geological research for Metro's Westside subway extension is that the northern end of the deadly Newport-Inglewood Fault is better understand by scientists. What they learned is that a branch of the fault called the West Beverly Hills Lineament reaches up through Culver City and Century City through Beverly Hills almost to Sunset Boulevard. "As a scientist, it’s very exciting,” says Lucy Jones of the U.S. Geologic Survey and Caltech, in a story at ZevWeb.“Knowing that the Newport-Inglewood Fault is active this far north is new.” Newport-Inglewood is the fault that produced the major 1933 Long Beach quake and others through history.
Oh by the way: If you didn't realize, Santa Monica Boulevard on the Westside essentially follows the line of a lesser fault. See the larger map with the story. | <urn:uuid:112891a5-9b18-4a0a-85f2-86f6f52e0bf6> | {
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Between 1910 and 1940, Chinese immigrants to America were detained at the Angel Island Immigration Station in the San Francisco Bay. As they waited for weeks and months to know if they could land, some of them wrote poems on the walls. All the poems we have on record were found in the men’s barracks: the women’s quarters were destroyed in a fire.
Islanders imagines the lost voices of the detained women. It also tells stories of their families on shore, the staff at Angel Island, and the 1877 San Francisco Chinatown Riot. A blend of fact and fiction, politics and intimacy, these poems chronicle a forgotten episode in American history and prefigure today’s immigration debates. | <urn:uuid:1c0433c7-b385-4135-90b5-a864626233bc> | {
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Vogue Italia Oct 2008 ‘The New Vision’ - Iris Strubegger by Mert & Marcus
Police Report on Arrest of Rosa Parks
On December 1, 1955, during a typical evening rush hour in Montgomery, Alabama, a 42 year-old woman took a seat near the front of the bus on her way home from the Montgomery Fair department store where she worked as a seamstress. Refusing to yield her seat to a white passenger when instructed by the bus driver, police were called and she was arrested.
The police report shows that Rosa Parks was charged with “refusing to obey orders of bus driver.” According to the report, she was taken to the police station, where she was booked, fingerprinted, and briefly incarcerated.
The event touched off a 381-day boycott of the Montgomery, Alabama, bus system in which a 26-year-old unknown minister, Martin Luther King, Jr., emerged as the leader.
(more via DocsTeach) | <urn:uuid:02b2419e-5606-4615-8f35-d9c34f3a32a4> | {
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Enter a grandparent's name to get started.
John Andrew O’Farrell was born in the county of Tyrone, province of Ulster, Ireland, on the 13th day of February 1823. He pursued his education in the common schools until his thirteenth year, and was then placed in a naval school where he remained for two years. He went to sea in the Oriental Steamship line when fifteen years of age, sailing from the East India dock on the Thames, London, England, to the city of Calcutta, Hindustan, East Indies. The return trip occupied seven months time and the vessel delivered and received mails and passengers at the isle of St. Helena, off the west coast of Africa, and at all the ports of entry on the African coast and the isles of Madagascar and Ceylon in the Indian ocean, thence to Madras and Calcutta. At the age of sixteen, on his return from India to London, Mr. O’Farrell was transferred to the Australian liner, Nebob, of the East India Company, sailing from Birkenhead, opposite Liverpool, England, to Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. On the return trip they stopped at Chinese and Japanese ports for mails and passengers, and sailed the Pacific route through the straits of Magellan, crossing the southern Atlantic to the Cape of Good Hope and taking on mail and passengers at St. Helena and other stations on the way to England. This trip occupied thirteen months time.
The father of our subject was Andrew O’Farrell, a military engineer, who served in that capacity on the battlefield of Waterloo under the Duke of Wellington. He was for thirty-one years an engineer in the British service. His eldest son, Patrick Gregory O’Farrell, entered the British navy as a cadet and served continuously in the navy for twenty-eight years, being on the Arctic expedition with Captain McClure in the early ’40s, on a three-years trip in the frozen polar region.
After his return from Australia in the ship Nebob, John A. O’Farrell remained at home for eighteen months, working at the trade of shipsmith in Captain Coppin’s shipbuilding works on the river Foyle, at Londonderry, in the north of Ireland. He was then between nineteen and twenty years of age. The White Star liner, City of New York, was undergoing repairs, and he worked on her and shipped as one of her crew, as an able seaman, bound for New York. He landed in New York City on the 5th of January 1843, being nineteen years and eleven months of age. The following day he left for Philadelphia, and through his uncle secured a position in the Philadelphia navy yards as ship smith. He was employed in that capacity until the Mexican war broke out, when he sailed on the United States store-ship, the Lexington, which was ordered to the Mexican frontier on the Pacific waters, bound for Monterey, the Mexican capital of Alta, or Northern, California. There was no such place as San Francisco then on the Pacific coast, and on the site of the present city was an old Spanish settlement of two hundred people, the place being known as Yerba Buena. The ship was loaded with arms and ammunition and a force of marines under command of Captain C. Q. Tompkins, of Company F, Third Artillery, and Lieutenant W. T. Sherman. The Lexington sailed around Cape Horn, making the trip from the Delaware to the bay of Monterey in one hundred and ninety-eight days. They arrived at their destination January 29, 1847, and found the United States frigate. Independence, commanded by Commodore William Branford Shubrick, lying at anchor in the bay. When the Lexington arrived Commodore Shubrick boarded her and finding Captain C. O. Tompkins with Company F, of the Third Artillery, placed him in command of the land forces, while Lieutenant Sherman, afterward the celebrated general of the civil war, was made quartermaster and adjutant. Two days later the sloop of war Cyane, under command of Captain Dupont, entered the harbor, having on board General S. W. Kearny with his staff and troops. He established headquarters at Monterey and Commodore Shubrick took command of the sea on the frigate Independence. General Kearny’s staff was composed of the following: Colonel R. B. Mason, of the First Dragoons; Captain Folsom and Lieutenant Ord. afterward General Ord, with Lewis Dent as private secretary. Dent was the brother of Mrs. General Grant. He was appointed probate judge and magistrate, before whom all difficulties were tried. In May 1847, General Kearny returned to the United States in the sloop of war Cyane, to report to the government his opinion and to give an account of the new territory of Alta California. Colonel R. B. Mason was left in command of the land forces, with Lieutenant Sherman as adjutant and Captain Folsom quartermaster. There were no mail routes then on the Pacific coast in California, not even a wagon road. All travel was over the trails or by canoes on the rivers. A trimonthly mail was established by Colonel Mason and Commodore Shubrick, being carried three times a month from Monterey to Point Danas, thence to Los Angeles and on to San Diego, and returning by the same ports to Monterey, thence north to Yerba Buena, Captain Folsom’s station. The store-ship Lexington was detailed for the mail service from December 1847, until the 1st of May 1848.
Mr. O’Farrell was a seaman on the mail ship and on the first Sunday in May 1848, at the trading post in Yerba Buena, he met Captain John Sutter, Jim Marshall and others who had arrived from Sutter’s sawmill at Coloma, forty miles from San Francisco. They had the first gold dust Mr. O’Farrell had ever seen. It was as coarse as grains of wheat and corn. Marshall gave him three grains of gold, worth about two dollars, and he engaged with Sutter to work in the gold mines. He was to receive a percent of what he washed out of the ground at the mill, and his daily wages averaged from thirty to fifty dollars. Being fond of excitement he visited all the newly discovered gold-producing localities in the territory of California. On the 9th of September 1850, California was admitted into the Union with the provision that all men over twenty-one years of age in the state on that date were made by act of congress lawful citizens of the United States. Mr. O’Farrell had been seven years in America, either on land or in American waters, and was twenty-seven years of age, so he cast his first vote in California, in the fall of 1850. That winter the snow was very deep in the mining districts of California, and the bay of San Francisco was crowded with ships from all quarters of the globe. Seamen’s services commanded high wages and Mr. O’Farrell engaged on the Red Jacket, a Baltimore clipper, for the round trip from San Francisco to Auckland, New Zealand, thence to Melbourne and Sydney, Australia, stopping at Honolulu both going and on the return trip. The vessel at length arrived again in San Francisco, laden with coal, which was then a valuable cargo in San Francisco. Nine months had been consumed in making the voyage. In 1851 William H. Aspinwall & Company, of New York, secured the United States mail contract, to carry the mail by the isthmus route, and placed three large steamships on the Pacific side to run between San Francisco and Panama. These vessels were called the California, the Oregon and the Panama. Commodore Vanderbilt was an unsuccessful candidate for the mail contract, which paid several millions of dollars during the four years of its term. Vanderbilt, however, resolved not to be defeated in his plans. He went to Liverpool, England, and connected himself with all the Atlantic Ocean lines of every nation of Europe, and they placed four large steamers on the Pacific between San Francisco and the Central American port of San Juan del Sur. From that port passengers were taken across the isthmus to Graytown, whence the English lines of steamers carried the mail and passengers to Kingstown, Jamaica, where they could be transferred to American and English vessels. In the winter of 1852, when the snow in the mountains was too deep to admit of profitable gold-washing, Mr. O’Farrell worked on the Vanderbilt line between San Francisco and San Juan del Sur, and in 1853 he was engaged on the ships of the same company on the Caribbean sea, on the Atlantic side, sailing between Graytown and Southampton, England.
In the fall of 1853 England and France declared war against Russia and Patrick Gregory O’Farrell, the eldest brother of our subject, was one of the naval officers under Admiral Dundas, being stationed on the Black sea and the sea of Azov. As seamen were in great demand for that naval service, John A. O’Farrell shipped at Spithead, Portsmouth, England, on the Agamemnon, the flagship of Admiral Lyons, for service on the Black sea and along the Crimean coast. That vessel reached the bay of Odessa about the 15th of February 1854. The British fleet, under the command of Admirals Dundas and Lyons, numbered twenty-one ships, including war ships, frigates and curvets or sloops of war, while the French fleet, under command of Admirals Hamlin and Brunnette, numbered twenty-three ships. The orders to demand the surrender of Odessa arrived on the night of the 21st of April 1854, by the naval mail packet Credock from Constantinople to the fleet. Of course the order was not complied with, and the first guns of the Crimean war were turned upon Odessa about five o’clock on the morning of Saturday, April 22, 1854, the cannonading continuing thirteen hours. The city was on fire, but Prince Mencicoff, the Russian general, did not surrender. The British war ship Terrible was destroyed by the Russian fire from the guns of the forts of Odessa, and several ships of the French and British fleets were crippled, and the fleets were unable to effect a landing. The British army of over thirty thousand men under Lord Raglan, and the French army of forty thousand men under Marechal St. Arnod, with ten thousand Turks under Omar Pasha, were ordered to the front under the protection of the combined fleets of France and England. On the 14th of September 1854, at Kilmatta bay, where the river Alma connects with the Black sea, the French, British and Turkish troops were landed. The Heights of Alma, a rocky cliff, are situated from one to three miles from the shores of the Black sea, and along the apex of the cliff was the Warnsoff stage road from Sebastopol to Odessa. A telegraph station and mercantile houses were located there, and General Mencicoff, commander-in-chief of the Russian army, concentrated seventy thousand men there on the night of September 19, 1854. On the following morning the French, British and Turks, under the command of Field-Marshal Arnod, of France, formed a battle line three miles in length at right angles on the north bank of the Alma and the shore of the sea. The Russian army of seventy thousand opened fire on the French army, who had their position along the sea ‘shore, hoping to drive the French into the sea, but the heavy guns of the fleet kept the Russians at bay until Lord Raglan with his command arrived, bringing the cannon up the Alma river and onto the heights in the third hour of the battle, and attacked the Russians on the level plain of the heights. This move drew the strong force of the Russians from the French, who almost as if by magic scaled the heights. The roar of artillery and the thunderous sounds of the battle lasted for three hours, at the end of which time the Russians retreated toward the valley of Balaklava. So intense had been the battle that it required six days to bury the dead and get the wounded on board the hospital ships. On the seventh day after the battle of Alma the combined force of French, English, the Piedmontese, under General Forey, and the Turks, under General Omar Pasha, marched toward the Balaklava valley, a thriving agricultural district farmed principally by Scotch farmers who immigrated there to raise wheat on a large scale. At the head of this valley the Warnsoff stage road from Odessa to Simferopol and Sebastopol crosses the Takernea River on a long stone bridge of many arches. A Russian fort stood in this locality. The two famous brothers, the Generals Luder, held this position, fifteen miles from Sebastopol, with a strong army, and General and Prince Mancicoff with his men who fought in the Alma, were fortified on the heights on the south side of the valley, whilst the sons of Emperor Nicholas, Michael and Nicholas, held their artillery and cavalry forces for any emergency on a commanding position. The Russians held position where the guns of the fleet could not reach them, and where they could deliver a deadly fire on the French, British and Turks. The French and British marines and the marine artillery were ordered ashore together with the artillery of the navy, and the troops forced a position on the nearest heights, known then as the marine heights. While getting their guns in place under cover of darkness, on the morning of October 17, 1854, the Russian pickets opened fire, and the battle of Balaklava commenced. Captain Nolan, of the Seventeenth Irish Hussars, was field dispatcher for Lord Reglan, who gave him a written dispatch to the Earl of Cardigan, who commanded the cavalry, to charge up the valley in order to know better the Russian position. Cardigan ordered Captain Nolan to lead the charge. He and his six hundred men then dismounted, tightened their saddles and then remounted for the fatal charge. They rode over a rolling ridge about one thousand yards only to find themselves within the range of sixty field-pieces, planted on each side of the valley. To retreat was certain death. Captain Nolan charged for the battery, he and his men cutting the Russian gunners from their guns, and then turning at the command to right about face, cut through a second time and charged down the valley to their own line, where Captain Nolan, who had lead in what was one of the most daring and brilliant military movements in history, was killed by a cannon shot.
On the 5th of November 1854, the allied armies of France and England, in connection with the fleets, had arranged for the final assault on Sebastopol. Marechal McMahon, of France, with his men, stormed the Malakof, capturing the principal defense of Sebastopol, Forts Nicholas and Alexander, with several hundred guns, which commanded the naval entrance to Sebastopol. Here the Agamemnon, the flagship of Admiral Lyons, was crippled. Many of the men were killed, and Mr. O’Farrell was among the wounded. For his meritorious services in that engagement, however, he received a Crimean prize medal, which he still has in his possession. In 1856 the Crimean war was ended, and he returned to California, where he resumed mining in the gold districts.
In the fall of 1857 Mr. O’Farrell was one of a party who organized a company at Downieville, California, to prospect for gold on the Pike’s Peak mountain range, at the headwaters of the Platte River, then in western Kansas, but now in the state of Colorado. He was one of the first to find gold, making his discovery April 6, 1860, in what is known as California Gulch, where the Leadville Mining Camp is now located. Attracted by the gold discoveries through out the northwest he has visited and worked in the mining regions of Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada and the territories of New Mexico and Arizona, but has made his home in Boise, Idaho, since June, 1863. | <urn:uuid:66816817-c199-4806-a63f-66b0b7b410f8> | {
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Erik VII, also called Erik of Pomerania, Danish Erik af Pommern, Swedish and Norwegian Erik av Pommern, (born c. 1381, Pomerania—died c. June 1459, Rügenwalde, Pomerania [now Darłowo, Poland]), king of the united realms of Denmark, Norway (as Erik III), and Sweden (as Erik XIII) from 1397 to 1439; his autocratic rule and foreign wars eventually lost him the throne in all three of his dominions.
The son of Duke Vratislav VII of Pomerania and the great-nephew of Margaret, queen of the three united Scandinavian realms, Erik was adopted by Margaret in 1387. Her skillful diplomacy won him the throne of the three realms (the Kalmar Union) in 1397, but she continued as effective ruler until her death in 1412.
Erik soon set out to establish a powerful Scandinavian Baltic empire, based in Denmark. Supported by the Danish diet (1413) and the German king Sigismund (1424), he launched two wars (1416–22, 1426–35) against the counts of Holstein to regain control of Schleswig. The Holsteiners were joined in 1426 by the north German trading towns of the Hanseatic League, whose trading interests were threatened by Erik’s preferential policy toward Danish merchants and artisans. Although Schleswig was completely lost to the Holstein-Hanseatic coalition by 1432, Erik defeated Hanseatic fleets and imposed the first tolls (1428) on ships plying the strait between Denmark and Sweden.
Erik’s favouritism toward Danes in his official appointments and his war financed by heavy taxes meanwhile had aroused opposition in Norway and Sweden and among the Danish peasants. When a Hanseatic blockade stopped Swedish exports of iron and copper in 1434, Swedish miners revolted. Leading Swedish nobles exploited the conflict and won the support of the Danish council of state in demanding that Erik institute a new union with constitutional forms of government. When Erik refused, he was deposed in Denmark, Sweden (1439), and Norway (1442) and was succeeded by Christopher III of Bavaria in all three of his realms. From his exile on the Baltic island of Gotland, Erik tried to regain the throne until 1449, when he withdrew to Pomerania. | <urn:uuid:480b9175-bcaf-48a2-b7af-87733fcd6f05> | {
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The observation lends hope to the idea that NASA will be able to analyse Europa’s water for life without having to drill deep into the moon’s surface.
“Europa’s ocean is considered to be one of the most promising places that could potentially harbor life in the solar system,” said Geoff Yoder, acting associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. “These plumes, if they do indeed exist, may provide another way to sample Europa’s subsurface.”
Despite being slightly smaller than the Moon, Europa contains a gargantuan global ocean containing twice as much water as Earth’s oceans. Protected by a layer of extremely cold and hard ice of an unknown thickness, NASA would have previously needed to land on the surface in order to test the water.
The plumes however could provide a solution. NASA believes they’re rising to around 125 miles above the moon’s surface which means that a passing spacecraft could easily pass through the plume and sample the water.
The plumes were spotted as Europa passed in front of Jupiter, creating a shadow which showed up against the backdrop of the gas giant.
Out of the 10 times Europa passed in front of Jupiter during their 15 month observation they were able to directly witness the plumes three times.
While scientists on the ground will continue to make observations of Europa, NASA has confirmed that it is formulating a mission to the tiny moon with the aim being to directly sample one of the plumes.
Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2016:
- 14Stephen Voss
- 13Richard Inman
- 12Rick Whitacre
- 11Tommy Richardson
- 10Nicholas Roemmelt
- 9Philippe Jacquot
- 8Ivan Eder
- 7Giles Rocholl
- 6Sean Goebel
- 5Lee Cook
- 4Katherine Young
- 3Rune Engebø
- 2Melanie Thorne
- 1Michael Jäeger | <urn:uuid:faa5bdc4-8aa6-4eb6-b608-b0f438ef95e7> | {
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Memorial Day weekend marks the start of summer. As New Mexicans head outdoors to enjoy their favorite places, public land managers are urging the public to be careful with the use of fire where it is allowed and to know if the area they plan to visit is under fire restrictions: Know before you go!
Before the monsoon and lightning season, most wildfires are human-caused. Due to prolonged drought and very high to extreme fire danger, public land management agencies are implementing fire and smoking restrictions to protect public health and safety by preventing human-caused wildfires.
Year-around restrictions, local burn bans, Stage I and Stage II fire restrictionsare in effect across New Mexico. For detailed information, visitors are encouraged to contact the nearest land management agency office where they plan to work or play, visit http://firerestrictions.us/nm, or call the toll-free Southwest Fire Restriction Hotline 1-877-864-6985.
Currently restrictions apply to the following agencies:
- Forest Service: Carson National Forest, Cibola National Forest (except for the Magdalena Ranger District and National Grasslands), Gila National Forest, Lincoln National Forest, Santa Fe National Forest, and the Valles Caldera National Preserve.
- National Park Service: Guadalupe Mountains National Park, Petroglyph National Monument, and Salinas Pueblo Missions National Monument.
- New Mexico State Forestry: All state and private land (including New Mexico State Parks) that is non-municipal, non-federal and non-tribal.
- Bureau of Land Management: Albuquerque District, Las Cruces District, and Pecos District.
- Bureau of Indian Affairs: Pueblo de Cochiti, Pueblo of Acoma, Pueblo of Isleta, Pueblo of Jemez, Pueblo of San Felipe, Pueblo of Sandia, Pueblo of Santa Ana, Pueblo of Santo Domingo, Pueblo of Zia, and Pueblo of Zuni.
Recreational opportunities on public lands are plentiful. People can still enjoy hiking, camping, mountain biking, or fishing. Land managers ask that folks enjoy their public lands responsibly: remember that fires and charcoal grills used in developed campsites or picnic areas where allowed by current fire restrictions should never be left unattended and always completely extinguished and cold to the touch before departing.
Useful online wildfire prevention and information resources:
- Take Smokey Bear’s Pledge: http://www.smokeybear.com/take-pledge.asp
- Comprehensive New Mexico Fire Information:http://nmfireinfo.com/
- Public Lands Information Center: http://publiclands.org/firenews/?plicstate=NM
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nmfireinfo
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/NMFireInfo | @NMFireInfo | <urn:uuid:43e75b93-2ea7-4f13-9aee-447210f259fb> | {
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2.2. Basic Source Types
Most of the X-ray sources found in deep surveys are AGN. Considering X-ray, optical, and multiwavelength information, the types of AGN found are
Unobscured AGN. Blue, broad-line AGN are found that do not show signs of obscuration at either X-ray or optical/UV wavelengths. They cover a broad range of redshift (z 0-5), and they comprise a significant fraction of the brightest X-ray sources (e.g., Barger et al. 2003a; Szokoly et al. 2004). At z 1.5 they also comprise a substantial fraction of all X-ray sources with spectroscopic identifications, certainly in part because these objects are the most straightforward to identify spectroscopically.
Obscured AGN with clear optical/UV AGN signatures. Some objects showing X-ray evidence for obscuration have clear AGN signatures in their rest-frame optical/UV spectra. Notably, such AGN can have both type 1 and type 2 optical/UV classifications (e.g., Matt 2002). Most of these objects have z 1.5.
Optically faint X-ray sources. These sources have I > 24-25 and usually cannot be identified spectroscopically (see Figure 4). Many, however, appear to be luminous, obscured AGN at z 1-4 when their X-ray properties, optical photometric properties (including photometric redshifts), and multiwavelength properties are considered (e.g., Alexander et al. 2001; Barger et al. 2003a; Fiore et al. 2003; Mainieri et al. 2004; Treister et al. 2004; Zheng et al. 2004). Thus, many of these objects likely represent an extension of the previous class to higher redshifts and fainter optical magnitudes. Some have no optical detections at all, even in deep images, and are termed extreme X-ray/optical ratio sources (EXOs); most of these are detected in near-infrared images (Koekemoer et al. 2004; Mignoli et al. 2004). EXOs usually can be plausibly explained as z 1.5-5 obscured AGN in dusty or evolved hosts, although a minority may lie at z 7 where the intergalactic medium absorbs essentially all of the observed-frame optical emission.
X-ray bright, optically normal galaxies (XBONGs). XBONGs are early-type galaxies at z 0.05-1 that have X-ray luminosities ( 1041-1043 erg s-1), X-ray spectral shapes, and X-ray-to-optical flux ratios suggesting AGN activity of moderate strength (e.g., Comastri et al. 2004). However, AGN emission lines and non-stellar continua are not apparent in optical spectra. Some XBONGs have X-ray spectra suggesting the presence of obscuration while others do not (e.g., Severgnini et al. 2003). The nature of XBONGs remains somewhat mysterious. Many and perhaps most may just be normal Seyfert galaxies where dilution by host-galaxy light hinders optical detection of the AGN (e.g., Moran et al. 2002; Severgnini et al. 2003), but some have high-quality follow-up observations and appear to be truly remarkable objects (e.g., Comastri et al. 2002). These "true" XBONGs may be (1) AGN with inner radiatively inefficient accretion flows (Yuan & Narayan 2004), (2) AGN that suffer from heavy obscuration covering a large solid angle ( 4 sr), so that optical emission-line and ionizing photons cannot escape the nuclear region (e.g., Matt 2002), or, in some cases, (3) BL Lac-like objects (e.g., Brusa et al. 2003). XBONGs appear related to "optically dull galaxies" (e.g., Elvis et al. 1981) and "elusive AGN" (e.g., Maiolino et al. 2003) studied in the local universe.
Morphological studies show that the AGN from deep X-ray surveys are generally hosted by galaxies with significant bulge components, and they do not show evidence for enhanced merging or interaction activity relative to normal field galaxies (e.g., Grogin et al. 2004). Many of the non broad-line AGN have the rest-frame colors of evolved, bulge-dominated galaxies, and there is little evolution of these colors from z 0-2 (e.g., Barger et al. 2003a; Szokoly et al. 2004). Most AGN from deep surveys are "radio quiet" in the sense that the ratio, R, of their rest-frame 5 GHz and 4400 Å flux densities is R < 10 (e.g., Bauer et al. 2002b).
In addition to AGN, several other types of objects are found in deep extragalactic X-ray surveys. These include
Starburst and normal galaxies. At the faintest measured X-ray flux levels (0.5-2 keV fluxes below 5 × 10-16 erg cm-2 s-1; see Figure 3), a significant and rising (up to 30-40%) fraction of the detected sources appears to be starburst and normal galaxies at z 0.1-1.5 (e.g., Hornschemeier et al. 2003; Bauer et al. 2004). These galaxies are discussed in more detail in Section 3.4.
Groups and clusters of galaxies. Groups and low-luminosity clusters of galaxies at z 0.1-1 are detected as extended, soft X-ray sources in deep surveys (e.g., Bauer et al. 2002a; Giacconi et al. 2002; Rosati et al. 2002a). Their X-ray luminosities (LX 1041.5-1043 erg s-1), basic X-ray spectral properties (kT 3 keV), and sizes appear broadly consistent with those of nearby groups and low-luminosity clusters. The surface density of extended X-ray sources is 100-260 deg-2 at a limiting 0.5-2 keV flux of 3 × 10-16 erg cm-2 s-1; no strong evolution in the X-ray luminosity function of clusters is needed to explain this value.
Galactic stars. Some stars are detected in the high Galactic latitude fields targeted by deep surveys. These are typically of type G, K, and M, and their X-ray emission is attributed to magnetic reconnection flares. The observed X-ray emission constrains the decay of late-type stellar magnetic activity on timescales of 3-11 Gyr (e.g., Feigelson et al. 2004). One of the stars detected in the Lynx field has notably hard X-ray emission, and Stern et al. (2002a) propose this is a binary system where accretion powers the X-ray emission.
Figure 5 shows the source classifications in the Hubble Deep Field-North (HDF-N) and the Hubble Ultradeep Field (UDF). These lie near the centers of the CDF-N (see Figure 2a) and CDF-S, respectively, and thus have the most sensitive X-ray coverage available. Despite the many intensive studies of the HDF-N prior to the acquisition of the Chandra data, several new AGN were identified in the HDF-N based upon their observed X-ray emission (e.g., the three XBONGs; see Brandt et al. 2001a).
Figure 5. HST images of (a) the HDF-N proper and (b) the UDF proper with Chandra sources circled; the circles are much larger than the Chandra source positional errors. The numbers are source redshifts; redshifts followed by a "p" are photometric. Basic source type information for many of the sources is also given. The shown HDF-N and UDF images subtend 5.3 arcmin2 and 9.5 arcmin2, respectively.
Contributions to the total X-ray number counts from a few of the source classes mentioned above are shown in Figure 3. Bauer et al. (2004) provide detailed decompositions of the number counts by source class, luminosity range, and estimated amount of X-ray absorption. | <urn:uuid:15d34251-e190-4cad-8b3a-2e0838087b31> | {
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Even though the psychological benefits from regular exercise are well known in the general population, research has only recently begun to examine the impact of physical activity on the mental and physical health of individuals with serious mental illness, including major depression, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder.
Complicating their diagnoses, these individuals often have poor physical health, are less active than the general population, and experience significant psychiatric, social, and cognitive disabilities. Many people with serious mental illness also live with the dual challenge of a psychiatric illness and a serious medical condition such as diabetes, obesity, or hypertension. The high prevalence of obesity is at least as alarming for individuals with serious mental illness as it is for the general population, and individuals who take antipsychotic medication may be at particularly high risk of obesity-related morbidity. On average, people with severe mental illness die 10 to 15 years earlier than the general population. Rates of co morbid illnesses, such as hypertension, diabetes, respiratory disease, and cardiovascular disease, are as high as 60%. This population has a right to healthy lifestyles and programs that promote and support this concept, leading to improved quality of life.
Sanctuary House provides members access to wellness activities that include YMCA sessions and exercise sessions on-site with an instructor. Along with basic aerobic exercise and stretching, we offer yoga classes to improve balance, strength and coordination. While experts note that exercise is unlikely to ever replace medication and psychotherapy for this population, it can increase the likelihood that those traditional strategies will be more effective.
We are particularly proud of our relationship with Rae Anne Mullins of RAM Fitness. Rae Anne provides Wellness Programming and consultation. | <urn:uuid:c481113b-6c0f-4760-a64c-afa74cdac59c> | {
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Dusky hopping-mice are distributed from Ooldea in S Australia to past Lake Eyre to SW Queensland. They also currently inhabit the regions of SE Western Australia, S Northern Territory, Southern Australia, N New South Wales, and NE South Australia (southern Strzeleki Desert and the Cobblers Desert). Since 1985, http://www.anca.gov.au/plants/threaten/sched123.htm)specimens have been collected from Carraweena, Montecollina Bore and Quinyambie Station, and from Pelican Waterhole. (Grizmick 1990, Honaki 1982, Nowak 1991, Rodent Action Plan
Dusky hopping-mice inhabit sand dunes, grasslands, tree and shrub heaths, and lightly wooded areas. The temperature of their habitat is usually very high with desert-like conditions.also live in sand ridge habitats, which alternate with gibber flats and clay pans, in the Pelican Waterhole area. (Grizmick 1990, Honaki 1982, Nowak 1991, Rodent Action Plan
is characterized by its strong incisor teeth, long tail, large ears, dark eyes, and extremely lengthened and narrow hind feet, which have only four sole pads. Head and body length is 91-177 mm, tail length is 125-225 mm, and weight is about 20-50 grams. Coloration of the upper parts varies from pale sandy brown to yellowish brown to ashy brown or grayish. The underparts of dusky hopping-mice are white. The body covering is fine, close and soft; and long hairs near the tip of the tail give the effect of a brush. has a well-developed sebaceous glandular area on the underside of its neck or chest. Females have four mammae. (Grizmick 1990, Honaki 1982, Nowak 1991)
Little is known of the breeding biology of this species in the wild other than that it is an opportunistic breeder. In captivity, its breeding pattern is polyestrous, with no evidence of seasonality, thus it breeds throughout the year. The gestation period is 38-41 days; a postpartum estrus is not common in, but some females enter estrus 14-22 days after giving birth. The estrous cycle lasts about 7-8 days. Dusky hopping-mice rear litters of 1-5 young. Their young weigh about 2-4 grams at birth and open their eyes at 18-28 days. The young cling to the nipples of the mother and are dragged about wherever she goes, and weaning occurs at about 30 days. Both sexes of reach reproductive maturity at 70 days. It was seen that one female produced 9 litters in her lifetime of 26 months. Males are capable of breeding up to the age of 38 months. (Grizmick 1990, Honaki 1982, Nowak 1991)
The sebaceous glandular area is active in all adult males but is active in females only during pregnancy and lactation. Nowak (1991) suggests that the glands are used for territorial marking and marking of group members, including newborn young. Dusky hopping-mice are saltatorial and normally move awkwardly on all fours or make short hops. If startled, they bound rapidly using only their large hind feet. The mice dig their own burrows, some being of a simple construction but others being complex. The dusky hopping-mouse digs a burrow on the flat top of a dune with a single tunnel about 10 cm in diameter, more than a meter below the surface and up to 5 m long. It is connected to the surface by up to 6 vertical entrance shafts that are dug from below and may end up anywhere on the surface. A nest, consisting of a pad of finely chewed vegetation, is placed in the center of a small alcove off the main shaft, and well-marked pads connect different burrows along the top of the dune. The width of the entrance shafts is critical because the animals move in them by hopping; they brace their backs against the sides with their forefeet between hops. Progress when coming down a shaft is a headlong dive, with the back braced against the wall of the shaft and the forelegs used as a brake. If the entering animal finds that the burrow is blocked with loose sand, it often squeaks several times. This usually attracts other occupants and together, from opposite sides, they rapidly clear the blockage.is commonly found in association with marsupial counterparts and sometimes shares the same tunnel systems. Living in groups of about five individuals in one or two adjacent burrows systems, the Dusky Hopping-mouse spends all its life on the dunes. Being a nocturnal animal, it rests in its burrow during the day, insulated from the hot surface. At night, it forages on the top and sides of a dune, and rarely ventures more than a few meters away. Even in apparently favorable localities, population density is low, with individuals inconspicuously congregated in a loose colony in a small area of a sandhill. Dusky Hopping-mice calls include twittering during animated chases. However, none of the sounds was associated with threats or fighting. (Grizmick 1990, Honaki 1982, Nowak 1991)
is like other hopping-mice in that it does not drink, but obtains all its water and food requirements from a diet of seeds, berries, leaves, green plants and occasionally insects. (Grizmick 1990, Honaki 1982, Nowak 1991)
is used in studies of reproduction because of its rapid breeding cycle. Some studies have included female and male reproductive anatomy and physiology, while other studies have focused on genetic analyses. (Baverstock 1977, Breed 1982, Breed 1985)
The `N. fuscus <<Notomys fuscus>` population size is not known. is noted in the lists of ANZECC, and in Appendix II of the Convention in International Trade of Endangered Species (CITES). IUCN considers to be a vulnerable taxon with populations that have been seriously depleted and whose ultimate security is not yet assured. There have been some efforts to assist the recovery of populations of by organizations including the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, SA, and Qld Department of Environment and Heritage and Conservation Commission of the Northern Territory. Their recovery objectives are to undertake a survey to determine the species' current distribution, population size, and habitat requirements. (Refugia for Biological Diversity in Arid and Semi-arid Australia http://kaos.erin.gov.au/life/general_info/biodivser_4/bio119.htmlpopulation is very small, and the species is rarely seen in its known habitats. Recent capture rates suggests the numbers of dusky hopping-mice to be 10 000. The reason for decline in
Rodent Action Plan http://www.anca.gov.au/plants/threaten/sched123.htm)
Kenneth Kim (author), University of Michigan-Ann Arbor.
Living in Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania, New Guinea and associated islands.
having body symmetry such that the animal can be divided in one plane into two mirror-image halves. Animals with bilateral symmetry have dorsal and ventral sides, as well as anterior and posterior ends. Synapomorphy of the Bilateria.
uses smells or other chemicals to communicate
in deserts low (less than 30 cm per year) and unpredictable rainfall results in landscapes dominated by plants and animals adapted to aridity. Vegetation is typically sparse, though spectacular blooms may occur following rain. Deserts can be cold or warm and daily temperates typically fluctuate. In dune areas vegetation is also sparse and conditions are dry. This is because sand does not hold water well so little is available to plants. In dunes near seas and oceans this is compounded by the influence of salt in the air and soil. Salt limits the ability of plants to take up water through their roots.
animals that use metabolically generated heat to regulate body temperature independently of ambient temperature. Endothermy is a synapomorphy of the Mammalia, although it may have arisen in a (now extinct) synapsid ancestor; the fossil record does not distinguish these possibilities. Convergent in birds.
having the capacity to move from one place to another.
the area in which the animal is naturally found, the region in which it is endemic.
reproduction that includes combining the genetic contribution of two individuals, a male and a female
uses touch to communicate
A terrestrial biome. Savannas are grasslands with scattered individual trees that do not form a closed canopy. Extensive savannas are found in parts of subtropical and tropical Africa and South America, and in Australia.
A grassland with scattered trees or scattered clumps of trees, a type of community intermediate between grassland and forest. See also Tropical savanna and grassland biome.
A terrestrial biome found in temperate latitudes (>23.5° N or S latitude). Vegetation is made up mostly of grasses, the height and species diversity of which depend largely on the amount of moisture available. Fire and grazing are important in the long-term maintenance of grasslands.
Baverstock, PR. Polymorphism of the X-Chromosome, Y-Chromosome and Autosomes in the Australian Hopping Mice N. fuscus. Chromosoma.. 1977. 61(3): 243-56.
Breed, WG. Morphological variation in testes and accessory organs of Australian rodents in genera Notomys. Journal of Reproductive Fertility. 1982. 66(2): 607-13
Breed, WG. Morphological variation in female reproductive tract of Australian rodents in genera Notomys. Journal of Reproductive Fertility. 1985. 73(2): 379-84.
Endangered Species in the Arid Zone http://rubens.anu.edu.au/student.projects/rabbits/endangered.html
Grizmick, B. Grizmick's Encyclopedia of Mammals. McGraw-Hill, Inc. New York, NY. 1990. 3: 202-203.
Honaki, J. Mammal Species of the World. Allen Press Inc. Lawrence, KA. 1982. 538.
Nowak, R. Walker's Mammals of the World. John's Hopkins University Press. Baltimore, MD. 1991. 824.
Refugia for Biological Diversity in Arid and Semi-arid Australia http://kaos.erin.gov.au/life/general_info/biodivser_4/bio119.html
Rodent Action Plan http://www.anca.gov.au/plants/threaten/sched123.htm
Wilson, D. E., and D. M. Reeder. Mammal Species of the World, A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference. 2nd edition. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington. 1993. 2: 753. | <urn:uuid:13d82897-ed66-490d-b457-d9a8b1aec505> | {
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Radiation levels indicate the leak discovered within the stricken Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant involves water used to cool melted nuclear fuel, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Jan. 19.
“The leaked water is highly likely to have come from the water that was already used to cool fuel rods, and not from leaked rainwater or cooling water (on its way to the reactor),” a TEPCO official said.
TEPCO said earlier that contaminated water was discovered on the first floor of the plant’s damaged No. 3 reactor building. At the time, the utility said water was flowing into the basement and not outside the building.
Due to high radiation levels, the company used a robot to take a water sample. An analysis found that the concentration of radioactive materials was higher in the leaked water than in water destined to be used to cool the reactor or rainwater.
The water sample contained 2.4 million becquerels per liter of radioactive cesium, while the reading for substances emitting beta rays, including strontium, reached 24 million becquerels per liter.
The temperature of the leaked water was around 20 degrees, also higher than that of unused cooling water and rainwater, TEPCO said.
The leak is the latest in a series that has plagued work in the sprawling nuclear complex. Storage tanks for radioactive water have leaked at the site, and groundwater has entered the basements of reactor buildings and mixed with contaminated water.
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At the time of the first war of independence, any number of papers were in operation in the country. Many of these like Bangadoot of Ram Mohan Roy, Rastiguftar of Dadabhai Naoroji and Gyaneneshun advocated social reforms and thus helped arouse national awakening.
It was in 1857 itself that Payam-e-Azadi started publication in Hindi and Urdu, calling upon the people to fight against the British. The paper was soon confiscated and anyone found with a copy of the paper was prosecuted for sedition. Again, the first Hindi daily, Samachar Sudhavarashan, and two newspapers in Urdu and Persian respectively, Doorbeen andSultan-ul-Akbar, faced trial in 1857 for having published a ‘Firman’ by Bahadur Shah Zafar, urging the people to drive the British out of India. This was followed by the notroiusGagging Act of Lord Canning, under which restrictions were imposed on the newspapers and periodicals.
In the struggle against the British, some newspapers played a very notable role. This included the Hindi Patriot! Established in 1853, by the author and playwright, Grish Chandra Ghosh, it became popular under the editorship of Harish Chandra Mukherjee. In 1861, the paper published a play, “Neel Darpan” and launched a movement against the British, urging the people to stop cultivating the Indigo crop for the white traders. This resulted in the formation of a Neel Commission. Later, the paper was taken over by Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. The paper strongly opposed the Government’s excesses and demanded that Indians be appointed to top government posts. The Indian Mirror was the other contemporary of this paper which was very popular among the reading public.
Yet another weekly, Amrita Bazar Patrika which was being published from Jessore, was critical of the government, with the result that its proprietors faced trial and conviction. In 1871, the Patrika moved to Calcutta and another Act was passed to suppress it and other native journals.
Mahadev Govind Rande, a leading leader of Maharashtra, used to write in Gyan Prakash as well as in Indu Prakash. Both these journals helped awaken the conscience of the downtrodden masses. Another Marathi weekly, Kesari was started by Tilak from January 1, 1881. He aIongwith Agarkar and Chiplunkar started another weekly journal, Mratha in English. The Editor of the ‘Daccan Star’ Nam Joshi also joined them and his paper was incorporated with Maratha.
Tilak and Agarkar were convicted for writings against the British and the Diwan of Kolhapur. Tilak’s Kesari became one of the leading media to propagate the message of freedom movement. It also made the anti-partition movement of Bengal a national issue. In 1908, Tilak opposed the Sedition ordinance. He was later exiled from the country for six years. Hindi edition of Kesari was started from Nagpur and Banaras.
Press and the First Session of Congress
The Editors commanded a very high reputation at the time of the birth of the Indian National Congress. One could measure the extent of this respect from the fact that those who occupied the frontline seats in the first ever Congress session held in Bombay in December 1885 included some of the editors of Indian newspapers. The first ever resolution at this Session was proposed by the editor of The Hindu, G. Subramanya Iyer. In this resolution, it was demanded that the government should appoint a committee to enquire into the functioning of Indian administration. The second resolution was also moved by a journalist from Poona, Chiplunkar in which the Congress was urged to demand for the abolition of India Council which ruled the country from Britain. The third resolution was supported by Dadabhai Naoroji who was a noted journalist of his time. The fourth resolution was also proposed by Dadabhai Naoroji.
There were many Congress Presidents who had either been the editors or had started the publication of one or the other newspapers. In this context, particular mention may be made of Ferozeshah Mehta who had started the Bombay
Chronicle and Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya who edited the daily, Hindustan. He also helped the publication of Leaderfrom Allahabad. Moti Lal Nehru was the first Chairman of the Board of Directors of theLeader. Lala Lajpat Rai inspired the publication of three journals, the Punjabi, Bandematramand the People from Lahore. During his stay in South Africa, Gandhiji had brought outIndian Opinion and after settling in India, he started the publication of Young India; Navjeevan, Harijan, Harijan Sevak and Harijan Bandhu. Subash Chandra Bose and C.R. Das were not journalists but they acquired the papers
like Forward and Advance which later attained national status. Jawaharlal Nehru founded the National Herald.
Revolutionary Movement and the Press
So far as the revolutionary movement is concerned, it did not begin with guns and bombs but it started with the publication of newspapers. The first to be mentioned in this context is Yugantar publication of which was started by Barindra Kumar Ghosh who edited it also.
When the Ghadar party was organised in Amenca, Lala Hardayal started publication of the journal ‘Ghadar’. Within one year, millions of copies of this journal were published in Hindi, Urdu, Punjabi, Gujarati, Marathi and English and sent to India and to all parts of the world· where Indians were residing. In the beginning the copies of the journal were concealed in parcels of foreign cloth sent to Delhi. It was also planned to smuggle the printing press into India for this purpose.
But then the war broke out and it became almost impossible to import printing machinery from abroad. Lala Hardayal was arrested in America and deported to India. One of his followers Pandit Ramchandra started publishing Hindustan Ghadar in English. With the U.S. joining the war, the Ghadar party workers were arrested by the American Government. When the trail was on, one of the rivals of Pandit Ramchandra managed to obtain a gun and shoot him dead in the jail itself. The death of Ramchandra led to the closure of this paper.
In 1905 Shyamji Krishna Verma started publication of a journal Indian Sociologist from London. It used to publish reports of political activities taking place at the India House in London. In 1909 two printers of this journal were convicted. Shyamji Krishna Verma left England for Paris from where he started the publication of the journal. Later on, he had to leave for Geneva. He countinued to bring out the journal from there for two or three years more. In Paris, Lala Hardayal, in collaboration with Madam Cama and Sardar Singhraoji Rana brought out Vandematram and Talwar.
After Yugantar, it was Vandematram that played a significant role in the freedom struggle. This journal was established by Subodha Chandra Malik, C.R. Das and Bipin Chandra Pal on August 6, 1906. Its editor, Aurobindo Ghosh, the editor of Sandhya, B. Upadhyay and editor of Yugantar B. N. Dutt had to a face a trial for espousing the cause of freedom.
So far as the Hindi papers were concerned, they looked to government for support for some time. Bhartendu Harish Chandra was the first to start a journal Kavi Vachan Sudha in 1868. Its policy was to give vent to the miseries of the people of India. When the Prince of Wales visited India, a poem was published in his honour. The British authorities were given to understand that the poem had two meanings and that one word used in the poem could also mean that the Prince of Wales should get a shoe-beating!
The government aid to journals like Kavi Vachan Sudha was stopped for publishing what was objectionable from the government point of view. Bhartendu Harish Chandra resigned from his post of an honorary Magistrate. His two friends, Pratap Narain Mishra and Bal Krishna Bhatt started publication of two important political journals Pradeep from Allahabad, and Brahman from Kanpur. The Pradeep was ordered to be closed down in 1910 for espousing the cause of freedom.
The Bharat-Mitra was a famous Hindi journal of Calcutta which started its publication on May 17, 1878 as a fortnighly. It contributed a lot in propagating the
cause of the freedom movement. The journal exposed the British conspiracy to usurp Kashmir. Several other papers published from Calcutta which played an important role in freedom struggle included Ambika Prasad
Vajpayee’s Swantrtmtra, Ramanand Chatterjee’s Modern Review’ in English, Pravasi Patra’ in Bengali and Vishal Bharat in Hindi. One of the foremost Hindi journalist who has earned a name for his patriotism was Ganesh Shanker Vidyarthi. In 1913, he brought out weekly Pratap from Kanpur. He made the supreme sacrifice in 1931 in the cause of Hindu-Muslim unity. Krishna Dutt Paliwal brought out Sainik from Agra which became a staunch propagator of nationalism in Western U. P. The noted Congress leader, Swami Shradhanand, started the publication of Hindi journal Vir Arjun and Urdu journal Tej. After the assassination of Swami Shradhanand, Vidyavachaspathi and Lala Deshbandhu Gupta continued the publication of these journals. They were themselves prominent Congress leaders.
In Lahore, Mahashaya Khushal Chand brought out Milap and Mahashaya Krishna started publishing Urdu journals which helped a lot in promoting the national cause. In 1881, Sardar Dayal Singh Majitha on the advice of Surendra Nath Bannerjee brought out Tribuneunder the editorship of Sheetala Kant Chatterjee. Bipin Chandra Pal also edited this paper for sometime. Later in 1917, Kalinath Rai joined the paper as its editor.
There is not a single province in India which did not produce a journal or newspaper to uphold the cause of the freedom struggle. A. G. Horniman made the Bombay Chronicle a powerful instrument to promote militant nationalism. He himself took part in the meetings where Satyagraha used to be planned.
He published vivid accounts of the Jallianwala Bagh carnage for which one correspondent of his paper, Goverdhan Das, was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment by a military court. Horniman too was arrested and deported to London even though he was ill at that time. Amritlal Shet brought out the Gujarati journal Janmabhumi which was an organ of the people of the princely states of Kathiawad, but it became a mouthpiece of national struggle. Similarly another
Gujarati journalSaanjvartman played a prominent role under the editorship of Sanwal Das Gandhi, who played a very significant role in the Quit India Movement in 1942. It was soon after independent formed a parallel Government in Junagarh and forced the Nawab of Junagarh to leave the country. The three editors of the Sindhi journal Hindi Jairam Das Daulatram, Dr. Choithram Gidwani and Hiranand Karamchand, were arrested, their press closed and the property of the paper confiscated.
In Bihar the tradition of national newspapers was carried forward by Sachidanand Sinha, who had started the publication of Searchlight under the editorship of Murtimanohar Sinha. Dev Brat Shastri started publication of ‘Nav Shakti and Rashtra Vani’. The weekly yogi and the Hunkar’ also contributed very much to the general awakening. | <urn:uuid:caa61461-c103-4934-a1a7-15fa9f4f42fc> | {
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Pray: Begin by making the sign of the cross and calling upon God's name.
From God to us, from death to life, from me to you …
in the name of the Father, and of the Son + and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
O God, as the new school week begins, we thank you for guiding us forward. Be with us now, as we study our Bible story, and help us to understand it more fully. We ask this through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
Listen: Pay close attention as these verses from the Bible are read aloud.
Six days later Jesus took Peter and the brothers James and John with him. They went up on a very high mountain where they could be alone. There in front of the disciples, Jesus was completely changed. His face was shining like the sun, and his clothes became white as light.
All at once Moses and Elijah were there talking with Jesus. So Peter said to him, “Lord, it is good for us to be here! Let us make three shelters, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.”
While Peter was still speaking, the shadow of a bright cloud passed over them. From the cloud a voice said, “This is my own dear Son, and I am pleased with him. Listen to what he says!” When the disciples heard the voice, they were so afraid that they fell flat on the ground. But Jesus came over and touched them. He said, “Get up and don’t be afraid!” When they opened their eyes, they saw only Jesus. (CEV)
Engage: Talk about the Bible by having parents respond to children’s questions.
Child: This Bible story is called the Transfiguration – which means “to change appearance.” In what ways did Jesus’ appearance change when he was up on the mountain?
Child: Have you ever been to the top of a high mountain before? When? What might be different on a mountain top, compared to the ground below?
Affirm: Pray for God to put his Word into action in your daily life.
Heavenly Father, you have every reason to be pleased with your Son, Jesus. Like the disciples, we want to listen to what he says, and to follow him, too. Please help us to do this each day. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
Have each person in the family bless one another with these words:
May you listen to Jesus! Amen. | <urn:uuid:1b17277f-4a8c-49ec-96b8-e2091342de61> | {
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Maps help us make sense of our world.
A sampling of the Library of Congress Geography
and Map Division’s 4.5 million treasures has been digitized
and is available in Map
Collections: 1500 - 2003. This activity introduces historical
maps from the American Memory collections. A Primary Source Analysis Tool for analysis and note taking has been provided. The teacher can use the Teachers Guide to Analyzing Maps to find guiding questions and activity ideas.
Analyzing a Map: What are maps and what do
they do? What common characteristics do they have? Most maps
a title, which often includes temporal information.
Maps have orientation, which includes compass
direction and geographic relationships within an established
Maps have a source, or author, which often gives
insight about its intended purpose and reason for creation.
may have a legend explaining the symbols used
and a scale showing how distance is represented.
Many maps use grids to show lines of latitude
What can be learned from historic maps? In addition
to teaching geographic understanding, maps do an excellent job
of illustrating change over time. They personalize history by
giving evidence of familiar landmarks and of people, their beliefs,
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Shingles Home > Is Shingles Life Threatening?
Is shingles life threatening? In most cases, the answer is no. However, patients with a weakened immune system are at a higher risk of developing serious complications (such as viral pneumonia or secondary bacterial infection). Left uncontrolled, these complications could become life threatening.
Is Shingles Life Threatening? -- An OverviewFor most people, shingles is not a life-threatening condition. However, for people with a weakened immune system ("immunosuppressed" individuals), shingles can cause serious complications and can potentially be life-threatening.
Examples of people with a weakened immune system include those with HIV infection (or AIDS) or patients with cancer who are receiving treatments that can weaken their immune systems. These treatments destroy cancerous tissue, but unfortunately also have the potential to damage cells of the immune system that normally fight invading organisms.
Patients who receive transplants, such as a kidney transplant or stem cell transplant, are also vulnerable to shingles. To prevent the body from rejecting the foreign tissue of the transplant, these patients are given drugs that suppress the immune system.
Should any of these people contract shingles, there is a possibility that the varicella-zoster virus (the "shingles virus") will spread throughout the body, reaching vital organs like the lungs. If uncontrolled, such widespread infection can lead to death from viral pneumonia or secondary bacterial infection. | <urn:uuid:ba2edcd8-9179-4c4a-a0a4-5aab7a6b8134> | {
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Issue No. 03 - May/June (2006 vol. 21)
DOI Bookmark: http://doi.ieeecomputersociety.org/10.1109/MIS.2006.51
Daniel E. O'Leary , University of Southern California
Guessing is what we do when logic and information don't provide sufficient insight to answer a question completely. Current theories and research on intelligent guessing?that is, guessing that's tied to a rational process?are limited and disjoint. An integrated theory of intelligent guessing could provide an organizing theme for research currently performed under multiple AI subdisciplines.This article is part of a special issue on the Future of AI.
artificial intelligence, research and development
Daniel E. O'Leary, "Intelligent Guessing", IEEE Intelligent Systems, vol. 21, no. , pp. 74-75, May/June 2006, doi:10.1109/MIS.2006.51 | <urn:uuid:03363611-bcc9-4dc3-8c3e-543dd0d67713> | {
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Friday, June 22, 2012
THE UPSIDE DOWN BOY by Juan Felipe Herrera
This book is non-fiction and bilingual in English and Spanish. A slight heavier weight seems to be given to English; in most of the book English text is at the top of the page and Spanish text is a at the bottom. The book has accurate translation by the same author, who is a native Spanish speaker and bilingual and biliterate in both languages. The author writes some words in English on the Spanish text and vice versa, which is interesting because it resembles his initial language experiences and how it feels to learn another language. There is no rhyme, rhythm, alliteration or repetition in the text, nor is a glossary provided.
The book is beautifully illustrated and the paintings enrich it. The topics discussed include immigration, food, music and painting. The book illustrates childhood experiences when moving from a rural to an urban area. The featured character is a child who is supported by his family and his new classmates as he integrates into a new society. The positive interactions can inspire kids to understand a different society even when challenged by alienation.
The Upside Down Boy/El Niño de Cabeza is about courage and the importance of family and community. At the beginning of the book, Juanito is exited about moving with his family from a rural area to an urban community in San Diego. At the turning point of the story, he is nervous, intimidated, and confused due to the school environment that is all new to him. Eventually, he becomes confident, included, and successful thanks to his teacher, peers, and parents, who guide him toward personal growth by emphasizing his courage and talents. The story focuses on the support children need to achieve their goals.
I recommend this book because it gives a great opportunity to native Spanish speakers and newcomers to relate to the main character and overcome difficulties. Also, due to the elaborate and rich text in both languages, the book delivers an opportunity to develop biliterate language skills. Interesting and uncommon vocabulary in both languages is included, which facilitates a connection to the book. A good audience for this book would be second and third graders, or students at an intermediate language development level.
Ariel Castillo Garrido
This review is part of the Special Section: Books in Spanish, featuring a collaboration with Policy and Language Studies students at San Diego State University. Read more about it here. | <urn:uuid:3b24a583-3110-4c08-a610-8732f8318d74> | {
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I’m not going crazy, you can indeed eat a rainbow. And it’s good for you. By rainbows, I’m not talking about those delicious candies that come in a packet that are too good to eat just a handful of. I’m talking fruits and veggies- and lots of them. The more colourful your dish the healthier you’re eating. Stuck for were to begin? Here’s a list of the perfect rainbow to add to your next dish.
- Red: Peppers, tomatoes, chillies. They contain a powerful natural plant pigment called Lycopene which is said to help reduce the chances of cancer including skin cancer. They also contain the usual but important vitamins A and C.
- Orange & yellow: Sweet potato, carrots, pumpkins. Orange veggies contain Carotenoids which is what gives that wonderfully bright orange colour. The most popular carotenoid is Beta-carotene, which is famously known for keeping your eyesight healthy and lowering the chances of blindness. There’s also plenty of delicious recipes you can try with your colours here.
- Green: Celery, peas, spinach. The super colour of our rainbow possibly because green fruits and vegetables offer a dictionary of health benefits. They boost your iron levels, immune system, and metabolism. Greens contain a healthy does of fibre and folate. Eating a portion of broccoli with your meal provides you with a healthy dose of vitamin K which helps cell growth.
- Purple/blue: My favourite colour and super healthy for you. Beetroot, cabbage, radish. A unique colour addition to your meal but these beauties have Nitrates which help reduce blood pressure, inflammation (goodbye bloating) and can lower cholesterol. This means happy body from the inside out.
- White: Potato, mushrooms and bananas. Potatoes may be a food you want to avoid when eating healthy due to its high carbohydrate content, but they are actually better for you than you think. They have high amounts of vitamin C and potassium which help regulate salt levels. It is also an important mineral for the normal heart and muscle function, great for those who have suffered heart problems in the past or those living with the condition. Although white vegetables may seem a little bland, they are just as important as the other colours and link back to the history of eating a rainbow.
Words: Melina Zachariou | Subbing: Harry Bourner | <urn:uuid:8b29642f-a2fe-4cf1-8df6-f4ded11d0bfc> | {
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In the USA, the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act defines a drug as : (1) a substance recognized in an official pharmacopoeia or formulary (2) : a substance intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease (3) : a substance other than food intended to affect the structure or function of the body (4) : a substance intended for use as a component of a medicine but not a device or a component, part, or accessory of a device.
The FDA says: "The legal difference between a cosmetic and a drug is determined by a product's intended use."
In Canada, the Food and Drug Act defines a drug as:
“drug” includes any substance or mixture of substances manufactured, sold or represented for use in
(a) the diagnosis, treatment, mitigation or prevention of a disease, disorder or abnormal physical state, or its symptoms, in human beings or animals,
(b) restoring, correcting or modifying organic functions in human beings or animals
The European Union DIRECTIVE 2001/83/E defines a 'medicinal product' as:
(a) Any substance or combination of substances presented as having properties for treating or preventing disease in human beings; or
(b) Any substance or combination of substances which may be used in or administered to human beings either with a view to restoring, correcting or modifying physiological functions by exerting a pharmacological, immunological or metabolic action, or to making a medical diagnosis.
What's wrong with this picture?
It seems to say that the difference between a drug, and a non-drug depends on the use. But if you read more carefully, that's not what it says. It really says, in simple English:
"The difference between a drug, and a non-drug is defined by the way the product is marketed." (intended for use, sold or represented for use in, presented as having properties for).
If it looks like a drug, and walks like a drug and talks like a drug - it makes no difference at all. It's not a drug until the paperwork is done.
But if the marketing paperwork to the government says:
in the USA: "a substance intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease"in Canada: "substances manufactured, sold or represented for use in
(a) the diagnosis, treatment, mitigation or prevention of a disease, disorder or abnormal physical state, or its symptoms"in the European Union: "presented as having properties for treating or preventing disease in human beings".
If the marketing department says it can be used to diagnose, cure, mitigate, treat or prevent disease, - it is a drug. That is the only requirement for a drug. Thus, everything and anything can be a drug - if it is marketed as a drug. Of course it must pass some significant paperwork hurdles - but these are easily managed by large corporations and their lawyers.
Note: to create a drug in any of these countries, it is not necessary for the drug to be particularly effective, nor for the scientific or medical community to believe that the drug is effective. Nor is it necessary for the drug to be safe in all situations. It is only necessary to pass the paperwork tests. Government offices cannot and do not pass judgement on the efficacy of any drug application. Governments pass judgement on the paperwork. Many new drugs cannot truly be tested for effectiveness, nor safety, on the general population until after they are in public use for many years, possibly even decades.
It is easily seen that one of the problems with the USFDA, Health Canada, and European Unions definition of a drug is that there is little said about what is 'not a drug'. Almost everything can be defined as a drug.
This has lead people to ask if water is a drug - because it can be marketed to prevent and cure dehydration (they failed due to the fact their the paperwork was not completed correctly). And it lead me to blog that the wind is my drug, because I claim it makes me feel better.
We need a different definition of a drug.
Wikipedia says: "A drug, broadly speaking, is any substance that, when absorbed into the body of a living organism, alters normal bodily function. There is no single, precise definition, as there are different meanings in drug control law, government regulations, medicine, and colloquial usage."
Webster's Dictionary says: "a substance used as a medication or in the preparation of medication".
We need a definition of DRUG, from a health viewpoint.
Is there a simple way to delineate between drugs and non-drugs from a health viewpoint. A definition not depending on a marketing department. Rather a definition that depends on science and facts about our health and healthiness.
The first thing we should recognize about drugs is that they are almost all toxic by design. Drugs are designed to throw your health system off balance, to counter the imbalance of your illness, not to create health. You need a prescription for drugs because they are toxic.
Can we define drugs in a useful fashion? Can we define non-drugs?
A healthicine is a substance that has a direct effect on the balances of healthiness. Healthicines are non-drugs. That effect might be positive, or if the healthicine is deficient or excessive - it will be a negative effect.
A drug is a substance that has an effect on illness. Drugs have an indirect, usually negative effect on the balances of healthiness. This negative effect is designed to throw the illness off balance and allow your body to heal. Or sometimes the illness is designed to simply trick your body into 'feeling healthy', by minimizing symptoms.
Water is not a drug. If you are dehydrated, water still cannot be a drug. Water cures dehydration, or it restores the balance of hydration - but it is not a drug. Water is necessary for healthiness. A deficiency or an excess results in an illness and possibly death.
Can we extend this distinction to other substances - it gets a bit more complicated. If you have a Vitamin C deficiency, taking Vitamin C to 'treat' the deficiency is not taking a drug - any more than eating oranges is taking a drug.
Vitamin C can also be used as an injection to treat a serious inflammation. In that case the Vitamin C is not addressing a normal Vitamin C deficiency, it is being used to tackle a health problem that is best treated by an excess of Vitamin C. Vitamin C has a negative effect on the problem - the inflammation - note, inflammation is normally a healthy response to stress. Administering an excess of Vitamin C, or any substance, for a therapeutic effect separate from the Vitamin C health balance, is administering a drug.
Is this a clear dividing line? Maybe, maybe not. The government definition of drugs for sale needs to be a clear, black and white, legal definition. But the definition of drugs for health, and for personal healthiness, has many shades of grey, ranging from black to white and every shade in-between, possibly even different colours.
A healthy definition of ''drug" needs to be open to dispute and discussion. The government definition is like a proclamation from God, there is not room for argument, not way to dispute the decision. This is not a healthy definition. It is not a democratic definition. It is not a 'freedom' definition. I believe in Personal Health Freedom. The freedom to differ.
All illness and disease are be caused by an imbalance, a deficiency or excess of genetics, nutrition, parasites, toxins, stress, growth (including healing and immune systems) - or a combination thereof.http://personalhealthfreedom.blogspot.com/2011/10/hierarchy-of-health-primary-and.html
A drug is always an excess. In most cases, if you are healthy, a drug is toxic to some aspect of your health. You need a prescription - a doctor must sign that you 'need the drug'. When you are ill, the drug may have a beneficial effect. By design. Drugs are not designed to fix health imbalances. Drugs are not nutrients. Drugs are not designed to cure - they are designed to create an 'opposing imbalance' so that your body can heal.
All drugs have 'side effects'. Why is that? Because all drugs are toxins - they have toxic effects. If they didn't have toxic effects, they would have no effect at all. In some cases, the toxic effects are intended. That's the 'design' of drugs. But in many cases the toxic effects are unintended, or even unknown. Generally unknown until many people fall ill or die. Mercola tells us that drugs kill more people than car accidents in the USA.
Are some drugs worthwhile? Are some drugs the 'best treatment'? Yes. Of course. If you have a bacterial infection, the best treatment might be a toxin that kills the bacteria, but has minimal effect on your health and healthy cells. An anti-biotic. However, most, possibly all antibiotics kill some healthy cells as well.
We need to search for health, not illness. We need to search for 'heals', not 'cures'. We need honesty and openness about treatments; to measure which treatments have the best effect on any illness, not which is the 'latest (untested on the public at large) drug'.
New drugs have the most potential for danger. We need a health paradigm, not an illness paradigm. We need a healthicine paradigm, not a drug paradigm.
Yours in health, tracy
Tracy is the author of two book about healthicine: | <urn:uuid:c0f2b0ed-9b72-473b-ab77-91ec00b2d81c> | {
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When women eat a Mediterranean-style diet they may be less likely to have trouble conceiving according to a 2011 Spanish study presented at the ASRM (American Society For Reproductive Medicine) annual meeting in Orlando Florida.
Researchers analyzed the diets and fertility histories of almost 500 women who had experienced fertility problems and over 1,600 similar women who had at least one child. The women's diets were scrutinized to see whether they adhered more closely to the basic principles of a Mediterranean diet or a Western diet.
A Western diet is defined as containing frequent servings of: red meat, fast food, whole-fat dairy products, potatoes, refined grain, sugar-sweetened soda. By comparison, a Mediterranean diet is defined as containing frequent servings of: olive oil, fish, lean meats, beans and legumes, whole grains, fresh fruits, herbs and vegetables, olives and nuts.
The study results showed that seventeen percent of women whose dietary habits closely mirrored the principles of a Mediterranean diet reported having trouble conceiving compared to twenty six percent of women whose diets were least Mediterranean-like. The researchers concluded that:
"A greater adherence to the Mediterranean-type dietary pattern may enhance fertility. Further evidence about the relationship between this dietary pattern and fertility is needed to develop nutritional interventions for women desiring to get pregnant."
This is not the first study to find a link between eating a Mediterranean style diet and increased fertility. A previous Dutch study found that couples who ate a Mediterranean-style diet had a 40% greater chance of conceiving than couples who ate a regular diet. Eating a Mediterranean diet has been shown to prevent other health problems too especially heart disease and the main feature of any such diet is freshness. Focus on buying fresh - preferably organic - produce, making home-made meals and minimizing pre-packaged processed foods to give your diet a more Mediterranean feel.
This article is intended for informational purposes only and is NOT intended to diagnose, offer medical or nutritional treatment or replace medical or nutritional advice for which you should consult a suitably qualified physician or dietitian. | <urn:uuid:063d5247-0d61-4d13-a83d-e06aaa31cb6b> | {
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The beard fashion of the past 10 years on both sides of the Atlantic mirrors an earlier facial hair craze, which started during the Crimean War, lasted for three decades, and was only entirely stamped out with the invention of the disposable razor in the early 1900s, writes Lucinda Hawksley.
They were not merely growing the well-coiffed whiskers and neat moustaches hitherto deemed acceptable, but cultivating enormous whiskers that connected to huge, bushy beards and left just about enough space between them and the ever-expanding moustache to allow the owner to eat and speak.
In Britain the return of the beard (the full beard had last been in vogue in Tudor times) was thanks to the Crimean War of 1854-56. Beards had been banned in the British army until this time, but the freezing temperatures of Crimean winters, and the impossibility of getting shaving soap, led to a necessary change.
By the time the last troops returned home, beards were the mark of a hero. Men who had never seen any military action began to grow beards. Within a few years, it was almost impossible to see a beard-free male face in Victorian Britain – except in Buckingham Palace, as Prince Albert refused to conform to the fashion. | <urn:uuid:4caf48f2-fc03-4830-b1b9-bb9ef8057186> | {
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Psamathe is so distant from Neptune it takes almost 26 Earth years to make a single orbit around the ice giant. The moon's orbit is among the most distant from its planet than any other known moon in our solar system.
The small moon shares similar orbital parameters with with another moon of Neptune -- Neso. Both Psamathe and Neso may be fragments from the break-up of a larger moon billions of years ago.
Psamathe was discovered by Scott S. Sheppard, David C. Jewitt and Jan T. Kleyna 29 August 2003 using the 8.3-m Subaru reflector at the Mauna Kea Observatory on the island of Hawaii.
How Psamathe Got its Name:
Moons of Neptune are named for characters from Greek or Roman mythology associated with Neptune or Poseidon, or the oceans. Irregular satellites are named for the Nereids, daughters of Nereus and Doris and the attendants of Neptune.
Psamathe like many of the satellites of Neptune, is named after one of the Nereids. Psamathe was originally designated S/2003 N 1. | <urn:uuid:ff62f7fa-e849-4de0-a837-fce093d2fda3> | {
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We continue the inquiry of finding family- the investigation into morphological and etymological relationships, of base elements developing from the same source, a shared root, and the nuances of meaning each word springing from this source brings. Students share their research and findings in webs and matrices ( see previous post).
The representation of the relationships between base and root and other words sharing the base element has been an interesting challenge. Aiming for depth of thought is inevitably less appealing than the desire of some to ‘finish fast’. These ‘fast finishers’ often fail to search thoroughly or ask questions. Popova discusses perseverance reminding us to ‘expect anything that is worthwhile to take a long time’. This insight is so important for both me and my students to recognise in order to work against the ‘140 character culture’, our culture of ‘entitled impatience’. Often word inquiry, therefore, is as much an inquiry into thinking, research, self discipline and persistence as it is in into morphology and etymology. There has been much clamouring of: “Is this right? Is this right?” an insidious refrain that immediately shuts down thinking by placing the teacher as the expert and ‘the right answer’ as the holy grail of their quest! The challenge has been to avoid quick morphemic analysis as students construct matrices and thoughtless grabbing of words that coincidentally share the same strings of letters but not the same roots.
Explaining their Findings:
Listen to the student below sum up her group’s early research and their discoveries on this journey. Compare their initial hypothesises to the web they created later for Latin <ligare>. You will note they reconsidered <lic> as a potential base when they realized the impossibility of <-tor> as a suffix! They also reconsidered <lig> as a base- see their web.
Read here about <furl>.
The role of final non syllabic <e>:
Several groups have reinserted a single, final, non-syllabic <e> at the end of their base element so that analysis of <punish> , formerly<pun+ish>, has become <pune+ish>. Using the suffix checker from Real Spelling, students examined their word sums and matrices arising from these morpheme divisions to ascertain the ‘soundness’ of their hypothesises.
Students know that a vowel suffix has the potential to remove a non-syllabic, final <e> or to cause a single consonant preceded by a single vowel suffix to double. So following the initial hypothesis of <pun> the result when adding a vowel suffix, <-ish>, would be :*<punnish>.
When confronted by this result there were mutterings of “That’s not right!” I asked was there anything that might prevent this from occurring? At no stage did they take the easy route and claim this to be exception.They recognize that there is a logical reason for the orthographic structure of all words in English. They may not know it at the the time but they know enough from their year’s forays into morphology and etymology to anticipate there will be a clear reason for a word’s orthographic structure- the word certainly will not be an ‘oddball’ or a ‘demon’!!! I gave students time to mull over this, suggesting they examine words like: <conspiracy> and <inspiration>,<hit+ing> and <take+ing>until they realized that the <e> can prevent consonant doubling. There is a stronger awareness now of the several functions of a final non syllabic <e>.
Class discoveries of the function of a final, non syllabic <e>, it:
- avoids plural confusion
- represents the pronunciation indicating that a single medial vowel is long
- prevents doubling
Here’s how Shea presented his understanding of the journey the words <sensitive> and <dissent> into English.
How do we analyze <furl>? Is <fur+l> possible? The benefit would be to show its compounded past and connection with L.<ligare> and the host of other words derived from this root.Is the <l> today in present day English, a base element? So far no other words other than furl, furled, unfurling.
It had been easy to prove the <e> in <quire> from words sharing the base element such as <inquire> and <require>. Groups puzzled over <quer> or <quere>. Here is a synopsis of their thinking :<qu> is considered a single entity as the grapheme < q> never occurs alone in English. This then explains why <quiz+es> is perfectly logical as <quizzes>. Therefore, the base element must be <quere> as <quer+y> would be *<querry>. Hence <quere+y> is logically <query>.
While one group postulated <sens> as the base element for <consensus> and <sensible>, it was finally the word <sense> itself that proved the existence of the final, non-syllabic <e> whose role in this word students saw must be to prevent plural confusion. The suffix <-s> is a frequent indicator of plurality.
Questions now abound around the suffixes: is it <-ite> or <-it>? We have know of habit from Latin : ‘habere’ to have, to hold which is the root of Latin frequentitive of ‘habitare’. Is inhabit then <in+habe+it>? However, we have <prerequisite> and <requisite> which is analyzed as <pre+re+quise+ite>. It was these words that ultimately led us to conclude the suffix to be <-ite> in the regards to the <quise> base. But what about words such as <sensitive> <sensitize>? We need to understand how this suffix operated in Latin.
And by now dear reader, as you regard the image above, no doubt you are puzzled as to the splayed bird foot! The foot belongs to the bird below.
Still none the wiser? Consider the word <pedigree>. How is this analyzed? We hypothesized <ped+igree> adjusted this to <pede+i+gree>, reinserting the final non-syllabic <e> to avoid doubling the <d>. We thought of <pedal> , <pedestal>, <pedestrian> and <pedicure> all from Latin pedem, the accusative of L. pes meaning foot. And the root and meaning of the <gree> morpheme? Look carefully at the image at the beginning of the post to see written in red, the Latin etymon <grus>, nominative form of <gruem> meaning crane. So ‘pedigree’ in the literal sense means a ‘crane foot’. This not only refers to descent and idea of being pure in lineage, but also the recorded ancestry or lineage of someone. Genealogy diagrams show branching lines similar to the imprint of crane feet. Look for the crane like feet in the illuminated genealogical table below and note our crane like feet in our word webs!
Genealogical Diagrams of British Kings:
The British library tells us that ‘Chronicles in the form of genealogical diagrams featuring kings in order of succession became a popular way of telling English history. Forty such roll chronicles survive from the period between Edward I’s accession to the throne (1272) and the death of Henry V (1422).’ …These rolls shape the past of the English monarchy and try to create the image of the dynastic identity of the Plantagenets as descendants of both Anglo-Saxon kings and the dukes of Normandy. Look for the blue line at the side which attempts to connect William Duke of Normandy to ‘Maud [Matilda] the Empress, who was the daughter of Henry and Maud [Matilda], daughter of the King of Scotland and Saint Margaret.’
I was thrilled to discover that the image at the bottom of this chronicle was of the remarkable Mathew Paris (1200-1259) monk, illuminator and scribe. If you, like me are enchanted by an illuminated manuscript, then watch BBC Illuminations The Private Lives of Medieval Kings to understand how power and justification of kingship were represented in these manuscripts.
Footnote (!) I just have to state that inquiry into the PIE root *ped provides a wonderful excursion with many word gems as a reward for student or teacher inquiry! I would like to ask my classes before the end of the year: What are the connections between cranes, feet and pawns? Explain.
Here follows a tantalizing preview of what lies ahead in such an inquiry, a quick gallop of amazing findings after several entertaining hours spent reading and following leads in the OED yesterday!
PIE root *ped
The PIE root *ped led to the Old English etymon ‘fót’ and the accusative plural fét ‘ (OED). (The Online Etymology dictionary states that the plural ‘feet’ is an example of i-mutation- don’t panic read more about this process in Harper’s account here and think man-men, tooth-teeth. Ancient PIE *ped has led to Latinate roots pedem, pes, resulting in the base element <pede> in English, Greek πούς genitive ποδός foot, πεζός has led to the bases <pode> <pus>.
Foot and feet:
Compounds: Foot as a base element has provided many compounds: footwear, footsoldier, footsore, the noun foot-swather attested in1762 in Oliver Goldsmith’s Citizen of World I. 7: ‘Your nose-borers, feet-swathers..would all want bread, should their neighbours want vanity.’ (OED).
Browning’s example in the OED under <foot> three vivid compounds were revealed: foot-kissing, foot-washer and foot-wiper too :’R. Browning Ring & Bk. III. ix. 226: ‘Born foot-washer and foot-wiper, nay Foot-kisser to each comrade of you all!’
Keats in Endymion referred to Mercury as ‘foot-feathered’. ‘Foot-fastness’ refers to captivity, foot-halt is a disease attacking sheep, a foot-land-raker is a footpad and Johnson gives us foot-licker: ‘a slave, an humble fawner, one who licks the foot’.
Phrases:Then there are the phrases: ‘footloose and fancy free’. Initially in the 17th century this meant free to move the feet, the broader sense of without commitments occurred in the 19th century and then the addition of ‘fancy free’ expanded the sense to an object of someone’s affection.
Other phrases include: feet of clay, have or keep your feet on the ground, put your best foot forward. You ‘take the weight off your feet ‘or ‘put your feet up‘ in order to relax but ‘put your foot down‘ to emphasise a point or take a stand.
The feet are ‘handy’ for metaphors expressing awkwardness or error: ‘to put your foot in it’ or ‘foot in your mouth’. Nervousness or hesitancy is indicated with ‘cold feet’ and to ‘dig in your feet or drag your feet’ can indicate reluctance or stubbornness. However to ‘land on your feet‘ , ‘fall on your feet’ can show luck or fortune, while to be ‘run off your feet’ or ‘wait on someone hand or foot’ or ‘walk someone off their feet’ leads to exhaustion. To ‘play footsie’ with someone is to indicate a romantic or cosy relationship and ‘to sweep someone off their feet’ is to overpower with romantic charm but ‘to get itchy feet’ or ‘shake the dust off your feet’ means impatience or wanderlust.
Fetter from Old English fotor started as’ A chain or shackle for the feet of a human being or animal’ and broadened to take on the expanded sense of anything that impedes or restrains’ (OED). Fetch from Old English feccan too links back to this PIE root!!
The <pede> base has been rich source of foot words:impede, and expedite (15th century) meaning, at the literal sense, to free the feet from fetters thereby to free from difficulties. An aliped is wing-footed, biped-two footed,while capriped is goat footed;or satyr like.
Ever had the feeling of hot , burning feet? This is ignipedites while lassipedes– is to have tired feet. A pedestrian may at times be pedetentous, proceeding step by step or advancing cautiously.
There are several conditions that would make one concerned such as being described as pedimanous – to have hand like feet-such as lemurs,while being remiped, having feet that are oar shaped, would be useful whilst swimming but potentially unattractive out of the water!
Did you know that pedomancy is divination by the soles of the feet? And who would have thought the humble pawn, the foot soldier of the chess piece, too had foot origins?!! . Likewise peon and also pioneer, originally foot soldiers preparing the way for the army, later broadening to anyone going first!
The base element <pode> from the Greek root too has led to many fascinating words that I wished I’d known before: so many foot worries such as brachypodous: having abnormally short feet, cryapodia, having cold feet, dolichopodous, having long feet!
Who would have thought there was a specific word for an animal with rough or hairy feet- a dasypod! Despite being Australian I had not realized that a platypus meant flat footed. Nor did I realize this was the proposed name for the genus given by G. Shaw in 1799 but apparently the name was already in use for a genus of beetles, and so the Ornithorhynchus label was attached to the platypus. And in referring to creatures from Australia I must mention antipodes that initially meant: ‘Those who dwell directly opposite to each other on the globe, so that the soles of their feet are as it were planted against each other; esp. those who occupy this position in regard to us’ (OED) later broadening to ‘Places on the surfaces of the earth directly opposite to each other, or the place which is directly opposite to another’
And there you have it, so far <foot>, <feet>, <fet> <fetch>,<pede>, <pode>,<pus> and <pawn>. All this footwork brings to mind unipeds with dextropedal tendencies. So it’s just a quick ‘hop’ to the video clip below to watch One Leg Too Few as performed by the incomparable comic duo Peter Cook and Dudley Moore, in this their final reprisal of the brilliant skit for Amnesty’s 1989 Secret Policeman’s Biggest Ball. And with that dear reader, you will be pleased to know I leave you: ‘Now is the time to say goodbye…We wish you all goodbye. Fartatata, fartatata..’ | <urn:uuid:c7fe4d47-450d-42f4-a5ce-c46f85b1cc7a> | {
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Henry Kaiser, reknowned guitarist and ice diver, gives a remarkable video tour of Antarctica under the ice. To cut through the 20-foot blanket of frozen water over the Ross Sea, Kaiser explains “we use dynamite… but we don’t harm any penguins, and that gets us down to the world I love, beneath the ice.”
(The jellyfish slowly and stealthily reeled in by the carnivorous anemone at 9:50 is sublimely terrifying!)
Danielle Woodward (23) is the youngest science diver in the US Antarctic Program. In this interview with the Atlantic, she attributes Kaiser with introducing her to the world of cold SCUBA diving.
When asked what was your first dive like, Woodward described its wonders:
The dive was amazing. We spent the first few minutes just working on buoyancy and making sure that everything was working well. The water was so cold against my face that after just a few seconds, my lips were numb. But in all honesty, I didn’t care. I was so distracted by everything that was around me. The visibility was incredible, everything that they said it would be. There were really interesting creatures everywhere and they were huge. Lots of sponges with openings the size of dinner plates and starfish that looked like they weighed 20 lbs. I also got to see a sea spider, a.k.a. a pycnogonid. They live in several oceans and are usually smaller than the size of a dime, but in Antarctica they grow larger than my hand.
On Danielle’s blog FrozenDannie she describes an encounter just this month with a couple of Weddell seals as she warm up after a dive. Her frequent and interesting posts transport you to the otherworldly life of a research diver in the frozen Ross Sea. Thank you, Dannie! | <urn:uuid:020d677a-e679-453d-9f0d-e8a44dc472eb> | {
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- The first step to make a patch is creating a making patchers is making a patcher window.
- Next, you'll place objects in a patch using the object palette, and connect objects together using patch cords.
- As you edit a patch, you'll move around a patcher window and zoom in and out.
Presentation mode is a great way to create a refined user interface for your patch.
- As you refine your patcher, you'll be aligning objects, aligning patch cords, and using the edit grid.
- To modify the z-ordering of objects in a patcher, you can use the background layer, or the commands to change relative object ordering.
- To clean up complex patchers, subpatchers are very useful.
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alu operations table
آخرین مطالب درمورد alu operations table
Function Table for ALU
Function Table for ALU. Operation Select. S3. S2. S1. S0. Cin. Operation.
Function. 0. 0. 0. 0. 0. F = A. Transfer A. 0. 0. 0. 0. 1. F = A +1. Increment A. 0. 0. 0.
Arithmetic Logic Unit Design
Jul 14, 1996 ... An arithmetic logic unit, or ALU ( sometimes pronounced "Al Loo" ) , is a
combinational ... a function of its inputs based on either logic or arithmetic
operations. ... MisII's output on the espresso truth table is shown in Figure 5.21.
4-BIT ARITHMETIC LOGIC UNIT
arithmetic logic unit (ALU) capable of providing 16 binary arithmetic operations
on two 4-bit words ... outputs F, by using the appropriate truth table. HCF40181B
Arithmetic Logic Shift Unit - YouTube
Jun 8, 2017 ... Truth Table ... Shift Micro Operations - Duration: 9:09. ... How Computers
Calculate - the ALU: Crash Course Computer Science #5 - Duration: ...
Arithmetic / Logic Unit – ALU Design
ALU control lines define a function to be performed on A and B. ... Operation. • A
number of functions are performed inter- nally, but only one ... table and after.
The Control Unit ALU Control
Building the ALU Control Unit. • Use truth table to determine how output will be
generated based on the inputs. Operation. ALUOp. Funct. Output. Load/Store 00. | <urn:uuid:a94b7698-8ac9-405c-921f-d4c46c32cd40> | {
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- 1 Teacher Frontend
- 2 Possible Applications
The teacher gets an overview of the whole setup's status (connected devices etc.) and can choose applications from a main screen.
Until screen shots are available, see the UX Design Wireframes at Interaction Design Version 0.4 to get an idea of how it looks like.
We are far from having implemented all the ideas we have of what could be run on the EduBuzzers -- they will be added over time.
Raise Your Hands
Also see HSC2011/Documentation#Screenshots
The teacher poses a question to the class. He presses the start button in the frontend. Buzzers change status (e.g. pulsing LEDs) as a sign that users can press a button to raise their hands.
During the timeout period
As soon as a user presses a button on his or her buzzer, the buzzer changes status to a different LED signal. The frontend displays each buzzer status change.
It ends either automatically or the teacher hits the stop button in the frontend. Buzzers change their status to show that the time is over. The computer selects a random buzzer. The selected buzzer changes status (e.g. plays sound, yellow LED flashes). The user with selected buzzer answers the teacher's question.
The teacher presses one of the following buttons in the frontend:
- Correct answer: The buzzer changes status to reflect correct answer. The application returns to the start screen.
- Incorrect answer and start a new timeout. The buzzer changes status to reflect wrong answer. The application returns to the start screen.
- Incorrect answer and select a new random buzzer. This option is disabled if there aren't any buzzers left that have pressed a button. The buzzer changes status to reflect wrong answer. The new selected buzzer changes status to answer please.
Students vote on a topic without raising your hand in front of the class which ultimately leads to a more honest voting behaviour. This application enables voting mechanisms that are hard to do with paper like multiple choice and ratings on preferred solutions as in "I'd like option A but if we don't get enough votes for that, option B would be my second favourite".
A question is displayed, there are four possible answers. The students press the button for their most preferred answer, this is their first choice. The button LED is blinking now. If the student wants to select an additional answer (second choice) he presses another button. For affirmation it also blinks, but slower. This procedure works up to four options.
When the vote is over, how many points each option gets is calculated and displayed. The first choice is worth four points, the second three etc.
Group Work/Group Games
Teams of students are chosen by a random generator. This would take the social stress off the teacher. (Student: "I don't want to be in a group with this guy." - Teacher: "The computer has chosen fairly.") Games would be possible where groups compete and if a group performs better it has to let a member go into another group. Also the opposite is possible where the best performing group gets new members.
Quiz mode (à la "Who wants to be a millionaire")
If a student doesn't know the answer he could ask the audience and the other students press the button for what they think is the right answer. The question is displayed to the classroom (beamer or similar). A countdown timer is running, meanwhile the students may press a button corresponding to the possible answers. The result is displayed as a bar chart. The teacher reveals the solution by pressing the blue button, pressing blue again advances to the next question.
Multiple Choice Tests
The teacher holds a live test where the students answer questions with multiple choice answers. (FIXME: Multiple choice tests are not very common in Europe so we need to spend research on this subject.)
A.k.a. Mafia: The base station choses who is the wolf and the others have to find out who it is by talking to each other on a round based system.
Multiple buzzers are laid out about the class room. Students go from device to device, plug in their ibutton, and push a buzzer button to enter their solution to the quest presented at this station, then go to next station. | <urn:uuid:435f56d0-424c-4f06-ab40-6927d4810564> | {
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Histopolis features a different cemetery, town, county or other place every
day on the Place-of-The-Day.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
The Histopolis Place-of-the-Day for Thursday, February 10, 2011 is Winchester National Cemetery in Winchester, Winchester City, Virginia.
"Winchester National Cemetery was established on land appropriated for burials during the Civil War. Although the land was used for burial purposes as early as 1862, the cemetery was not officially dedicated until April 8, 1866, and the land was not legally transferred to the U.S. government until Dec. 1, 1870, when Jacob Baker was paid $1,500 for the 4.89-acre tract and the deed was signed and executed.
"Winchester National Cemetery was the final resting place for Union soldiers who fought and died at the battles of Winchester, New Market, Front Royal, Snickers Gap, Harper’s Ferry, Martinsburg, and Romney.
"Physically, it was typical of first-generation national cemeteries built before 1870: the grounds were surrounded by a fence and thereafter a wall, a flagpole was centrally located, and a frame lodge followed by a masonry lodge served as an office and dwelling for the superintendent.
"The Winchester cemetery benefited from federal programs initiated during the Great Depression. In 1930, the original tool house/comfort station was removed and a new, brick and stucco tool house/storage/comfort station building was erected by Civil Works Administration labor. During 1934 and 1936, headstones were reset and realigned, sunken graves were filled in, existing trees trimmed, new trees and roses planted, and the wall was repointed and repaired. In 1936, a brick and stucco gasoline storage building was constructed and a one-story addition and basement was added to the superintendent’s lodge by Workers Project Administration laborers. On Aug. 28, 1939, the original flagstaff was replaced with a new tubular steel one.
"Winchester National Cemetery was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996."
Source: Cemeteries - Winchester National Cemetery - Burial & Memorials
The Histopolis Grave Index for Winchester National Cemetery contains 3,213 entries with 1,992 unique surnames.
Explore Winchester National Cemetery on Histopolis now. If you have a place that you would like to see featured as the Histopolis Place-of-the-Day, contact the webmaster to suggest it.
|1||Mobile National Cemetery, Mobile, Mobile County, Alabama|
|2||Jefferson City National Cemetery, Jefferson City, Jefferson Township, Cole County, Missouri|
|3||Roseburg Veterans Cemetery, Roseburg, Douglas County, Oregon|
|4||Union Confederate Monument, Union Cemetery, Kansas City, Missouri|
|5||Quantico National Cemetery, Prince William County, Virginia|
|6||San Antonio National Cemetery, San Antonio, Bexar County, Texas|
|7||Fort Bayard National Cemetery, Grant County, New Mexico|
|8||Kerrville National Cemetery, Kerrville, Kerr County, Texas|
|9||Biloxi National Cemetery, Biloxi, Supervisor District 5, Harrison County, Mississippi|
|10||Winchester National Cemetery, Winchester, Winchester City, Virginia|
|11||Alabama National Cemetery, Shelby County, Alabama|
|12||National Military Cemetery, Dayton, Montgomery County, Ohio|
|13||Saint Francois County, Missouri|
|14||Lincoln Parish, Louisiana|
|15||Conecuh County, Alabama|
|16||Saint Tammany Parish, Louisiana|
|17||Aroostook County, Maine|
|18||Sumner County, Tennessee|
|19||Hendricks County, Indiana|
|20||Carroll County, New Hampshire|
|21||Dakota County, Nebraska|
|22||Madison County, Kentucky|
|23||Allegany County, Maryland|
|24||Becker County, Minnesota|
|25||Mitchell County, North Carolina|
|26||Kootenai County, Idaho|
|27||Sumter County, South Carolina|
|28||Miami County, Kansas|
Note: The first Place-of-the-Day was in September 2010 | <urn:uuid:d8594081-3762-4cf6-ae6a-c3099d9f1560> | {
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A. Description of New York University
The opening of the University of London in 1828 convinced New Yorkers that New York, too, should have a university, and in 1831 a group of prominent citizens founded New York University. This was an historic event in American education. At the time, most students in American colleges and universities were members of the privileged classes. The founders of New York University intended to enlarge the scope of higher education to meet the needs of persons from other strata of society who aspired to careers in business, industry, science, and the arts, as well as in law, medicine, and the ministry. The first president of New York University’s governing council was Albert Gallatin, secretary of the treasury in Thomas Jefferson’s cabinet. Gallatin and his cofounders said that the new university was to be a “national university” that would provide a “rational and practical education for all,” regardless of national origin, religious beliefs, or social background.
While the University’s commitment to these ideals remains unchanged, Albert Gallatin would scarcely recognize NYU today. New York University is one of the 60 institutions, of the more than 3,000 US colleges and universities, that are members of the Association of American Universities. It is the largest private university in the United States, and perhaps the world, and is recognized nationally and internationally as a center of research, scholarship, and teaching. There are approximately 21,000 undergraduate students, the same number of graduate and professional students, and 20,000 non-credit students. Students attend from all 50 states and more than 130 countries. The University includes numerous schools, colleges, institutes, and programs, a major center in Abu Dhabi (UAE), and 13 study away sites. In 2013, NYU and NYU Abu Dhabi will be joined by a third portal campus in Shanghai, China, and a study away site will open in Washington, D.C. in fall 2012.
NYU’s schools and colleges are the College of Arts and Science, School of Law, Graduate School of Arts and Science, (which includes the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, the Institute of Fine Arts and the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World), Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, Leonard N. Stern School of Business, School of Continuing and Professional Studies, Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, Silver School of Social Work, Tisch School of the Arts, Gallatin School of Individualized Study, School of Medicine and Post- Graduate Medical School, and the College of Dentistry (which includes the College of Nursing). In addition, the University operates a branch campus program in Rockland County at St. Thomas Aquinas College. The Nelson Institute of Environmental Medicine is located in Sterling Forest, near Tuxedo, New York. Although the University is large, most of the divisions are small to moderate-sized units, with its own traditions, programs, and faculty. Enrollment in the undergraduate divisions of the University ranges between 130 and 7,672. While some introductory classes are large, many classes are small. Nearly 4,600 undergraduate courses are offered. The University grants more than 25 degrees.
The University provides housing for over 11,000 undergraduate, graduate, and professional students. Its eight libraries hold over 4.5 million volumes. The Elmer Holmes Bobst Library and Study Center at the main campus on Washington Square alone holds over 3.3 million volumes.
The faculty totals over 7,200 full-time and part-time members. Among them are 12 MacArthur fellows, 4 Nobel and Crafoord Prize winners, 21 members of the National Academy of Sciences, 68 members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and 7 Howard Hughes Investigators. There are over 9,000 administrative and staff employees.
B. NYU Mission Statement
Great cities are engines of creativity, and New York University takes its name and spirit from one of the busiest, most diverse and dynamic cities of all. The University lives within New York and other great cities, from Abu Dhabi to Shanghai, Paris to Prague, Sydney to Buenos Aires—all magnets for talented, ambitious people.
Thriving beyond borders and across academic disciplines, NYU has emerged as one of the most networked and extensive worldwide platform for learning, teaching, researching, building knowledge, and inventing new ways to meet humanity’s challenges. Its students, faculty and alumni feed off the stimulating power of swirling intellectual and cultural experiences by mastering academic disciplines, expressing themselves in the arts, and excelling in demanding professions.
New York University’s mission is to be a top quality international center of scholarship, teaching and research. This involves retaining and attracting outstanding faculty who are leaders in their fields, encouraging them to create programs that draw outstanding students, and providing an intellectually rich environment. NYU seeks to take academic and cultural advantage of its location and to embrace diversity among faculty, staff and students to ensure a wide range of perspectives, including international perspectives, in the educational experience.
C. Recent Developments
Several significant recent developments relate to the Self-Study. In March, President John Sexton announced the inauguration of the NYU Global Institute of Public Health, which will help “…galvanize the existing intellectual critical mass in global public health at NYU, [and] also…serve as a model for other mulit-university initiatives that seek to create bridges across traditional academic disciplines and units.” In April, the Mayor of New York announced that NYU’s proposed Center for Urban Science and Progress (CUSP) was a winner of the Applied Sciences NYC Initiative. CUSP, which is being developed in conjunction with several other educational institutions and with the support of corporate partners, is “…an applied science and engineering institute that will conduct research, support graduate study, and fashion real-world technologies to address the challenges of an increasingly urbanized planet….” [CUSP] will be located adjacent to the Brooklyn campus of the Polytechnic Institute of New York University.
New York University will continue to evolve as a global network university. Provost David McLaughlin pointed out in a September 2011 letter to the faculty: “The developing research programs in Abu Dhabi and Shanghai, coupled with the excellence of our academic programs in New York, will open a whole new range of possibilities for future developments…. [C]oordinated development within and across schools and campuses…is intended to create the kind of synergies and interdisciplinarity that will make the most of our resources and bring them to bear on the complex issues of our time. Accordingly,...NYU will focus its attention on multi-school initiatives….” Among the initiatives he cited were the humanities, global public health, the future of the cities, and statistics and bio-statistics.
Arrangements continue to progress for the Polytechnic Institute of New York University to become the school of engineering and technology of NYU. Several administrative systems have been intergraded and academic integration has begun.
In terms of physical facilities, the main development at the Washington Square campus will be the implementation of a twenty-year expansion plan, NYU2031: NYU in NYC, which has been approved by the New York City Planning Commission and City Council. This will provide new and increased facilities for academic purposes, research, student uses, and housing.
E. Preparation for the Self-Study
In the summer of 2011, President John Sexton asked Professor Norman Dorsen of the School of Law, and Counselor to the President, to chair the 2014 Middle States Self-Study, and Assistant Provost Barnett W. Hamberger to serve as Self-Study Coordinator, as both had done for the 2004 Self-Study on undergraduate education and the 2009 Periodic Review Report. As was the case for previous Middle States self-studies, it was decided to choose a topic of importance to the University (what Middle States classifies as a Selected Topics Report). During the ensuing months, Professor Dorsen and Assistant Provost Hamberger had a series of meetings with the president, provost, other senior University officers, and several deans about the possible focus of the self-study. Eventually, the University selected the theme of multi-school programs because of the many important University initiatives of this kind. Four areas were selected for primary study: cities and the environment, data science and statistics, humanities, and public health. In April 2012, President Sexton appointed members of the Self-Study Steering Committee and subsequently Professor Dorsen appointed four Steering Committee members to chair the working groups, which were then constituted. Over the course of the 2011-12 academic year, the deans of individual schools made presentations about their multi-school programs to the University’s senior leadership. Professor Dorsen and Assistant Provost Hamberger drafted charges to the working groups, which were reviewed and affirmed by the group chairs and the Steering Committee in July 2012.
2) Nature and Scope of the Self-Study
As a large research university which is historically school-centric, NYU has a special need to address and integrate the increasing interdisciplinarity of knowledge in its educational offerings and research activities. What have been its experiences to-date? What are its opportunities for the future? What are the challenges to overcome?
Working groups have been established for the four selected areas of multi-school collaboration.
• Cities and the Environment. The working group will build on a recent report by the dean of the Law School on cities, the environment, and sustainability.
• Data Sciences and Statistics. A new discipline “with the goal of extracting knowledge from the deluge of data. ” It reaches “…across many disciplines in the sciences, social sciences and humanities.”
• Humanities. Exemplified by the three multi-school programs under the aegis of the Provost—the Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics, the Humanities Initiative, and the Remarque Institute.
• Public Health. Multi-school collaboration is “…forming a truly interdisciplinary approach to addressing our most pressing global health challenges.”
• Depending on preliminary results of the working groups, we may develop a questionnaire to distribute to a sample of other multi-school programs and to collect additional information which might be helpful in developing our final conclusions and recommendations.
3) Intended Outcome of the Self-Study
The goals of the Self-Study are to demonstrate compliance with the accreditation standards of the Middle States Commission on Higher Education and to develop an understanding of major initiatives—their structure, how they function— to facilitate improvements in existing multi-school programs and to guide in the development of new programs. We hope to develop interdisciplinary activities so well-grounded that they are not dependent on particular individuals, and which, while operating outside of schools, have deep foundations within the schools. We also will try to discover best practices and establish dependable structures for interdisciplinary work and predictors of success.
4) Organizational Structure of the Steering Committee and Working Groups
|Norman Dorsen, Professor of Law, School of Law, Self-Study Chair|
|Barnett W. Hamberger, Assistant Provost, Self-Study Coordinator|
|Alicia Bell, Graduate Student, Educational Leadership, Politics, Advocacy, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development|
|Nina Cornyetz, Associate Professor, Gallatin School of Individualized Study|
|Martin Daughtry, Assistant Professor of Music, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Randall Deike, Vice President of Enrollment Management|
|André A. Fenton, Professor of Neuroscience, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Tracey Gardner, Chief of Staff, Wagner School of Public Service|
|Ingrid Gould Ellen, Professor of Urban Planning and Public Policy, Wagner School of Public Service|
|Lisa Gitelman, Associate Professor of Media and English, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development|
|Heather Herrera, Director of Academic Affairs, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development|
|Anthony Jiga, Vice President, Budget and Planning|
|Yann LeCun, Professor of Computer Science, Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences|
|Jacques Lezra, Professor of Spanish and Portuguese and Comparative Literature, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Mary E. Northridge, Assistant Professor of Epidemiology and Health Promotion, College of Dentistry|
|James Pace, Clinical Associate Professor, Associate Dean, College of Nursing|
|Cybele Raver, Vice Provost for Academic, Faculty and Research Affairs|
|Carol Shoshkes Reiss, Professor of Biology, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Elizabeth Rohlfing, Assistant Dean of Planning, School of Law|
|Tazuko Shibusawa, Associate Dean, Silver School of Social Work|
|Griffin Simpson, Undergraduate Student, Liberal Studies Program|
|Marcia Thomas, Executive Director, Public Health Initiative|
|Ingrid Gould Ellen, Professor of Urban Planning and Public Policy, Wagner School of Public Service, chair|
|Mosette Broderick, Clinical Professor of Art History, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Wyatt Cmar, Undergraduate Student, Metropolitan Studies, and Economics, College of Arts and Science|
|Roderick Hills, Professor With Chair, School of Law|
|Alan Lightfeldt, Graduate Student, Urban Planning, Wagner School of Public Service|
|Anne Rademacher, Assistant Professor of Environmental & Metropolitan Studies, Social and Cultural Analysis, Faculty of Arts and Science|
|Amy Schwartz, Professor of Public Policy, Education, and Economics, Steinhardt School, Wagner School of Public Service|
|Patrick Sharkey, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Yann LeCun, Professor of Computer Science, Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, chair|
|Constantin Aliferis, Associate Professor of Pathology, School of Medicine|
|David Greenberg, Professor of Sociology, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Michael Laver, Professor of Politics, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Foster Provost, Professor of Information Systems, Stern School of Business|
|Michael Purugganan, Professor of Genomics, Biology, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Marc Scott, Associate Professor of Applied Statistics, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development|
|Margaret Wright, Professor of Computer Science, Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences|
|Jane Tylus, Professor of Italian, Faculty of Arts & Science, chair|
|Michael Beckerman, Professor of Music, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Toral Gajarawala, Assistant Professor of English, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Linse Kelbe, Undergraduate Student, Art History, College of Arts and Science|
|Laura Slatkin, Professor, Gallatin School of Individualized Study|
|April Strickland, Graduate Student, Department of Anthropology|
|Diana Taylor, Professor of Performance Studies and Spanish, Tisch School of the Arts|
|Larry Wolff, Professor of History, Faculty of Arts & Science|
|Marcia Thomas, Executive Director of Public Health Initiatives, Office of the Executive Vice President for Health, chair|
|Marc Gourevitch, Professor, Medical School|
|Perry Halkitis, Professor of Applied Psychology, Public Health, & Medicine, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development|
|Erica Humphrey, Undergraduate Student, Public Health, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development|
|Katty Jones, Director of Program Services, Wagner Graduate School of Public Service|
|Pricila Mullachery, Graduate Student, Public Health, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development|
|Mary E. Northridge, Assistant Professor of Epidemiology and Health Promotion, College of Dentistry|
|Deborah Padgett, Professor of Social Work, Silver School of Social Work|
|Nancy Van Devanter, Associate Professor of Nursing, College of Nursing|
5) Charges to Working Groups and Guidelines for Their Reports
A. Charges to Working Groups
Each working group should consider the following issues in its assigned area and other issues that it regards worthy of examination:
1. Organization, leadership, and governance. How do existing units in a group’s interdisciplinary area relate to each other? What new organizational structures have been formed in an area or might be needed? How is the activity governed? How does a multi-school activity relate to the provost’s office? How is participation of NYU Abu Dhabi or NYU Shanghai (or a study away site), if relevant to the academic area, integrated into broader programs?
2. Faculty. How are the competing agendas of the multi-school activity and a faculty member’s home school’s expectations reconciled? Is there or should there be dedicated faculty? Can faculty participate in these programs and still meet their own research agendas? What are the issues relating to appointment? What are the ramifications of split loyalty for tenure? How are faculty teaching, advising, and other arrangements negotiated?
3. Finances. What arrangements have been made on budget and finances? Are others needed?
4. Administrative staff. What are staffing needs? Are they being fulfilled?
5. Student community. In collaborative multi-school programs that might not be housed in a school, how is a sense of identity and community created among students? How is consistent advisement provided? If applicable, how are internships and career guidance/opportunities managed?
6. University administration. What types of support are needed from the University administration? How can this be assured at various administrative levels?
7. Curriculum. Is there a defined interdisciplinary curriculum in an area? How was the curriculum developed and by whom? Does the special curriculum, if any, take account of perspectives from different disciplines and methodologies? Is there an apparent relationship to curricula in traditional disciplines? Does there seem to be coherence in the curriculum? Do appropriate teaching materials exist or do they need to be created?
8. Assessment. How are programmatic and student learning outcome goals established? How is success defined and how are successful outcomes measured? Is there evidence that assessment results are used to improve programs? Is there a timetable for carrying out assessment activities?
9. Support Services. Are additional support services and resources, or special arrangements, needed (e.g., library, IT)?In addition to stating its conclusions, each working group should describe how its findings provide evidence that the University is in compliance in whole or in part with Middle States Standards for accreditation:
• Standard 5 – The institution’s administrative structure and services facilitate learning and research/scholarship, foster quality improvement, and support the institution’s organization and governance.
• Standard 7 – Institutional Assessment: The institution has developed and implemented as assessment process that evaluates its overall effectiveness in achieving its mission and goals and its compliance with accreditation standards.
• Standard 9 – Student Support Services: The institution provides student support services reasonably necessary to enable each student to achieve the institution’s goals for students.
• Standard 10 – Faculty: The institution’s instructional, research, and service programs are devised, developed, monitored, and supported by qualified professionals.
• Standard 11 – Educational Offerings: The institution’s educational offerings display academic content, rigor, and coherence that are appropriate to its higher education mission. The institution identifies student learning goals and objectives, including knowledge and skills, for its educational offerings.
Working with the Self-Study coordinator, each working group should identify the documents and data it will need to review, and the individuals it will want to interview. Working groups should gather and analyze evidence, and produce outlines, preliminary drafts, and final drafts of reports in accord with the self-study timetable that is being developed. Working groups “are not expected to discover definitive solutions for every problem [or to resolve problems or issues].” Their charge is to identify critical issues…and to propose possible courses of action that might lead to improvements (Middle States Self-Study Handbook, p. 19).”
B. Guidelines for Working Group Reports
The reports submitted by the working groups should be about 15 pages and follow the style and format guidelines in Section VII, below, and should be organized as follows:
1) Overview of the group’s subject area and the questions it addressed.
2) The group’s findings and conclusions, including strengths and challenges. The group should explain how its findings, analysis, and conclusions relate to the Commission’s standards.
3) Recommendations for improvement. Recommendations should be based on the evidence and analysis produced by the working group.
6) Inventory of Support Documents
A. Standards to be covered by the Document Review
Documents will address the Middle States Standards to be covered in whole or in part by the document review and will include the following:
The University’s two major planning documents NYU Framework 2031 and NYU in NYC:NYU 2031Strategic plans and annual reports for major administrative unitsNYU charter and bylawsFaculty and student handbooksPolicy statementsSchool bulletinsMinutes of major institutional committees (including the university senate)School outcomes assessment plans and reportsRelated websites.
B. Standards to be covered by the selected topics Self-Study
The Self-Study working groups should determine what data and documents they need. They will include at the least the following, which are all available:
Report on the Initiative in Data Science and StatisticsData Science program proposal
Report on Establishing a New Institute on the Cities, the Environment, and Sustainability at New York University (June 12, 2012)
The Inauguration of the NYU Global Institute of Public Health
(President Sexton’s March 26, 2012 email to University community)
Public Health accreditation reportProposal to New York State Education Department for revision of Ph.D. program in Public Health (December, 2011)
Proposal to New York State Education Department for ten new undergraduate interdisciplinary majors in global public health and another discipline (October, 2011)
Description of relevant programs including enrollments and faculty.
Documents (including website) related to the Center for Urban Science and Progress
7) Organization of the Self-Study Report
Our report will follow the Middle States guideline for a self-study of a 100 single spaced pages. The report will have an introductory chapter with an overview of New York University, an explanation of the importance of the topic we selected for our self-study, and a description of the self-study process (approximately 7 pages). There will be a chapter for each of the four areas being considered by the working groups (about 15 pages each). If a survey is conducted of other multi-school programs, the results and analysis will be presented in a separate chapter (10 pages). There will be a chapter integrating the findings of the previous chapters (20 pages) and a brief concluding chapter (3 pages).
8) Editorial Style and Format of All Reports
All reports should be written using Times New Roman font, 12 point, and saved in Microsoft Word format. Charts and tables should be produced as Word documents. Top and bottom margins should be 1”, the left 1.125” and the right 1”. Page numbers should be printed in the lower right corner. Reports should be single spaced.
For consistency, the following words should be capitalized: University, when referring to NYU; Evaluation Team; Steering Committee; Working Group when used with the name of the group (e.g., Working Group on Public Health), otherwise working group should be lower case. Self-study should be lower case. The chair of a body should be lower case. The type of programs we are studying should be described as multi-school, not inter-school or cross-school.
9) Timetable for the Self-Study and Evaluation
The following is the timetable for the self-study as of October 10, 2013:
|Logistical and other preparations for self-study||Spring 2012|
|Status report to President ||March 15, 2012 |
|Steering Committee Appointed||March-April 2012|
|First meeting of Steering Committee||April 16, 2012|
|Consultation visit by Ellie Fogarty, Middle States liaison||April 25, 2012|
|Status report to President ||July 9, 2012 |
|Working Groups formed||July 15, 2012 |
|Draft of Self-Study Design submitted to Middle States||September 15, 2012|
|Presentation to meeting of provosts and deans||September 19, 2012|
|Announcement of Middle States Self-Study to NYU community||September 2012|
|Response from University community||October 10, 2012|
|Recommendations for Evaluation Team Chair submitted to Middle States ||October 2012|
|Working Group chairs interim report to Steering Committee meeting||December 12, 2012 |
|Evaluation Team Chair selected by Middle States||January 2013|
|Working Group chairs initial draft reports to Steering Committee meeting||February 21, 2013|
|Status report to President ||February 25, 2013|
|Draft questionnaire to be sent to sample of inter-school programs sent to Steering Committee for comments and suggestions of other groups.||February 27, 2013|
|Questionnaire sent to sample of inter-school programs||March 12, 2013|
|Preliminary draft reports from working groups - sent to steering committee||April 1, 2013|
|Steering Committee meeting to discuss working group reports and integrating chapter||April 15, 2013|
|Steering Committee comments on working group reports||April 22, 2013|
|Working Group reports revised; |
draft introduction, integrating chapter, and financial sections prepared
|May, June 2013|
|Status report to President ||June 25, 2013 |
|Information received from NYU offices for Document Review||July 2013|
|Draft report, excluding conclusion, sent to Steering Committee||July 19, 2013|
|Meeting of Steering Committee to discuss draft report ||August 1, 2013|
|Status report to President ||September 6, 2013 |
|Status report on Common Days ||September 10, 2013 |
|Draft 2 of report (including conclusion and preliminary list of proposed appendices) sent to University community ||September 10, 2013|
|Responses received from those who received draft 2 ||October 3, 2013|
|Document Review Roadmap related to Middle States standards not covered by Self-Study Design submitted||October 14, 2013|
|Draft 3 of report sent to Steering Committee||October 15, 2013|
|Steering Committee comments received ||October 30, 2013|
|Visit by generalist evaluators for review of documents related to standards not covered by Self-Study ||October 28, 2013|
|Visit by Evaluation Team Chair ||October 29, 2013 |
|Evaluation Team to be appointed by Middle States||Fall 2013|
|Report of generalist evaluators received from Middle States||December 2013|
|Final draft for President Sexton||December 5, 2013|
|Documents to verify compliance with federal regulations to be submitted to Middle States by||December 15, 2013|
|Submission of Self-Study to Middle States||February 1, 2014|
|Self-Study distributed to University community on website||February 2014|
|Visit of Evaluation Team member to study abroad sites||March 2014|
|Site visit by Evaluation Team||March 24-27, 2014|
|Evaluation Team draft report sent to NYU to correct factual errors||April 10, 2014|
|NYU responds to team report||April 20, 2014|
|Team Chair sends formal report to Middle States||April 27, 2014|
|NYU formal response to final report||TBD|
|Middle States Commission on Higher Education meeting on NYU accreditation||June 2014|
10) Profile for the Visiting Evaluation Team
The chair of the evaluation team should be the president or provost of a major research university at the level of NYU, with prior experience as an evaluation team chair or as team member. The team should consist of faculty and senior administrators from major research universities who have dealt with organized multi-school and interdisciplinary activities. The chair and team members should have an understanding of the complexity and cacophony of NYU, what we are trying to accomplish through an emphasis on interdisciplinarity and the Global Network University, and how we are trying to do it. | <urn:uuid:8c98fffb-4c01-4d90-85d1-f54eb94f9c40> | {
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There have been various recommendations over the years in our profession about the recommended number of repetitions and sets of exercises that patients should perform. To judge for yourself what numbers are best for those in your care, you need to consider several factors — not the least of which is the hectic, fast-paced lives many of your patients already have.
Determine the Goal(s)
People exercise for a variety of reasons. Some do it for enjoyment and relaxation, some for general fitness, and some to improve their appearance. And then there are the athletes, who are trying to excel at a sport or win a competition.
Chiropractors generally have a different approach. We want to help our patients regain an improved level of health. The forms of exercising that work best for body builders, football players, and other athletes are not necessarily ideal for patients. We need to keep this in mind when recommending rehabilitative exercises, especially when we are working with patients who are not used to exercising at all. Because of that, many doctors find that simpler is better. Since the goal is just to get a patient to do the exercise regularly, it’s advisable to keep instructions clear and easy to follow. All patients do a lot better when they know exactly what is expected, and they will tend to do only the minimum necessary.
It All Adds Up
The repetition number (“reps”) means the number of times a patient performs an exercise consecutively, without stopping. In most programs this number is usually somewhere between 5 and 20. “Sets” are a series of reps, defined by the rest period between (which varies from 30 seconds to several minutes). Set recommendations vary from 1 to 3 or 5, or occasionally more. The “total reps” of an exercise can be determined by multiplying the number of reps times the number of sets performed.
The reps and sets can vary, even when the total reps are the same. For example, total reps of 20 can be performed as 2 sets of 10 reps, or 4 sets of 5 reps, or 5 sets of 4 reps. Strength and conditioning specialists, working with exercise physiologists and coaches, have developed a tremendous variety of exercise routines. Some of these have been found to be useful for certain sports, and others have developed from muscle research. The variations are determined to some extent by the athlete’s goal—maximum strength, power, or endurance.
Of course, doing fewer repetitions and fewer sets takes less time, but we obviously want our patients to exercise at least enough to improve their condition. What does the research show?
Since 1962, most exercise recom-mendations have been based on the Berger method1, which consists of 3 sets of 6 repetitions, for 18 total repetitions. Because it was a scientifically based recommendation, as well as being pretty simple for patients to follow, the Berger method has been widely used right up to the present day. While many still believe it is an effective program, an even simpler and easier method has gained popularity lately.
The literature review by Drs. Carpinelli and Otto2 found that there is now a large volume of research which disputes the need for 3 sets of exercise. In fact, they state that, “One set of repetitions has been shown to be as effective as multiple sets, and more time efficient, for increasing muscular strength and hypertrophy in males and females of different ages, for a variety of muscle groups and using various types of exercise equipment.” The article concludes by recommending that by “employing a single-set protocol, individuals can achieve similar results in less time and with less work and a decreased potential for injury.” This has been strong enough evidence for many doctors to change their approach to exercise recommendation.
Less Is More
In many instances, having patients perform just one set of 8 to 12 repetitions of their recommended exercise(s) has proven successful. Since this is only 8 to 12 total repetitions, without the need for rest periods, it can be completed in much less time. Patients are more likely to become consistent with the recommended exercises when the time commitment is less. And this approach has been found to be just as good for getting rapid results.
In many cases, patients can be instructed to perform at least 8 repetitions of the exercise, but they should initially attempt 12. If 12 repetitions can be done fairly easily, have them increase the resistance slightly the next time. When using surgical tubing exercises, this means increasing the starting distance from the door in which the tubing is temporarily attached.
Instruct patients to do their exercises every day, at least initially. This gets them into the habit of doing an exercise, and brings about more rapid change and improvement. And since the patient is being asked for such a minimal time commitment, it’s difficult for him or her to say that there isn’t enough time to exercise on a daily basis
Faster Recovery, Happier Patients
Either the traditional, multi-set exercise program or the newer, single-set protocol can help patients regain muscle function and improve spinal support and posture. However, I find that patients are appreciative when I express an awareness of how busy their schedules are and minimize the time needed for exercising.
Patients are more likely to do the exercises you recommend when they fit into a busy schedule. With only 6 to 12 total repetitions, several exercises can be done in just five or ten minutes.3 This helps ensure acceptance of the entire treatment program, which can lead to rapid progress under your expert care.
Kim Christensen DC, DACRB, CCSP, CSCS, directs the Chiropractic Rehab & Wellness program at PeaceHealth Hospital in Longview, Washington. He is a popular speaker, and participates as a team physician and consultant to high school and university athletic programs. Dr. Christensen is currently a postgraduate faculty member of numerous chiropractic colleges and is the past-president of the American Chiropractic Association (ACA) Rehab Council.
He is a “Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist,” certified by the National Strength and Conditioning Association. Dr. Christensen is the author of numerous publications and texts on musculoskeletal rehabilitation and nutrition. He can be reached at PeaceHealth Hospital by email at
1. Berger RA. Effect of varied weight training programs on strength. Res Q 1962; 33:168-81.
2. Carpinelli RN, Otto RM. Strength training: single versus multiple sets. Sports Med 1998; 26(2):73-84.
3. Winett RA, Wojcik JR, Fox LD, Herbert WG, Blevins JS, Carpinelli RN. Effects of low volume resistance and cardiovascular training on strength and aerobic capacity in unfit men and women: a demonstration of a threshold model. J Behav Med 2003; 26(3):183-195. | <urn:uuid:608bb887-92d6-4905-bb75-e4a0045af539> | {
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Researchers shined a laser light on fossil leaves and found some surprising results. Instead of mere impressions of leaves, the fossils turned out to contain original molecules—persisting after millions of supposed years.
Research led by Lund University in Sweden used FTIR to find original molecular bonds still intact inside fossilized leaf wax. The technique detects stretches in specific chemical bonds.
Then the team compared the waxy cuticle that somehow persists in leaf fossils with the same cuticle molecules found in their living counterparts. Many of the scan results showed a match, even after all the years those fossils remained underground. The team published their results in Nature: Ecology & Evolution.1
They scanned leaves from living Araucaria trees—tropical conifers that today grow in New Guinea, Australia, and Argentina—and from fossil Araucaria leaves locked in Cretaceous stone. Only the living leaves had FTIR signatures indicating complex sugars like cellulose, but surprisingly the technique revealed the same alkanes, alkenes, and carbon-based ring structures in both living and fossil Araucaria.
Alkenes have double bonds. These tense bonds react more readily with other chemicals than many single bonds. They have not yet reached what chemists call thermodynamic stability—when they lose their potential to react. How can so much chemical potential persist in leaf molecules that are supposedly millions of years old?
Lund University News wrote, “The [waxy] membrane has been preserved in the fossil leaves, some of which are 200 million-years-old.”2 This age assignment clearly conflicts with short-lived original plant chemical bonds.
The second surprising result came from scan results between several fundamentally different kinds of plants. They found that specific chemical bond signatures signified the same basic plant kinds. For example, fossil and modern Araucaria had unique chemicals not shared with ginkgos. Lead author Vivi Vajda told Lund University,
The results from the fossil leaves far exceeded our expectations, not only were they full of organic molecules, they also grouped according to well-established botanical relationships, based on DNA analysis of living plants i.e. Ginkgoes in one group, conifers in another.
So they didn’t expect to find original organic molecules after supposed millions of years, nor did they expect to find those same molecules in similar plant kinds. It was as though millions of years of evolution never changed these plants’ basic forms or even their basic molecules.
Could ginkgos remain ginkgos and Araucaria remain Araucaria because they have been reproducing faithfully within separately created kinds from the beginning of creation?
The original biomolecules in fossil leaf cuticles point to their deposition thousands of years ago, not millions. Also, biochemical similarities between ancient and modern plants of similar groups show no hint of evolution, but fit just fine with the created kinds of Genesis 1:12.3
- Vajda, V. 2017. Molecular signatures of fossil leaves provide unexpected new evidence for extinct plant relationships. Nature: Ecology & Evolution. DOI: 10.1038/s41559-017-0224-5.
- Through fossil leaves, a step towards Jurassic Park. Lund University News. Posted on lunduniversity.lu.se July 4, 2017, accessed July 24, 2017.
- "And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind."
*Mr. Thomas is Science Writer at the Institute for Creation Research.
Article posted on August 3, 2017. | <urn:uuid:a0e75bda-3bab-42d3-a253-4ffe52c407fb> | {
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TITLE: The Streak: How Joe DiMaggio Became America’s Hero
AUTHOR: Barb Rosenstock
ILLUSTRATOR: Terry Widener
PUBLICATION INFO: Calkins Creek, 2014
INTENDED AUDIENCE: ages 8 and up
GENRE: nonfiction picture book
OPENING and SYNOPSIS:
“It all started quietly, like a conversation with Joe DiMaggio himself.”
From the publisher:
“In the summer of 1941, Yankee center fielder Joe DiMaggio and his favorite bat, Betsy Ann, begin the longest hitting streak in baseball history. But when Betsy Ann goes missing, will DiMaggio keep hitting? Set on the brink of World War II, this is a spellbinding account of a sports story that united the country and made DiMaggio a hero, at a time when one was profoundly needed. Barb Rosenstock’s action-packed text and Terry Widener’s powerful illustrations capture DiMaggio’s drive as well as his frustration. The book also includes headlines, quotes, stats, and a detailed bibliography.”
THEMES/TOPICS: history, biography, sports
WHY I LIKE THIS BOOK: I’m taking a course on picture book pacing right now. Pacing, speeding up and slowing down the reader to build tension, is something I really struggle with in my own writing. To help, I’ve been studying pacing by reading LOTS and LOTS of nonfiction picture books. Though I love all of Barb Rosenstock’s books, this is perhaps the best I’ve seen when it comes to pacing. She uses vivid verbs, as well as repetition. The word “streak” is used throughout, printed in red, like the crowd’s chant. Sometimes, Rosenstock repeats the word three times in a row for more emphasis: “streak, streak, streak.” Rosenstock also uses numbers to help build tension, driving the reader forward, as in “28, 29, 30 games.” All in all, this book is a dramatic read.
- Use baseball stats to teach math in a practical way.
- A teacher’s guide is available through Rosenstock’s Web site.
- PBS’S American Experience has a Joe DiMaggio film with instructions for how to use the film and Web site in the classroom.
You’ll find way more cool books at Susanna Leonard Hill’s “Perfect Picture Books.” Every Friday folks review a host of new books. Join us! | <urn:uuid:4b053e0b-3547-4694-b9ee-dbab8d640035> | {
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To design the PCR primers, you must collect a lot of sequence information and analyze it. Some of the steps I will tell you about, others you will have to figure out for yourself. The gene names for these five genes are IDH1, IDH2, IDP1, IDP2 and IDP3. Below are some key steps to take and some web sites to consider. However, you might find other sites you prefer. No matter which web site you use, be sure to cite each one on your web pages. See the full list of expectations for web pages here.
First, you will need to find all five DNA sequences. Start at this URL or you might prefer this one (Genebank).
Next, you will need to get restriction maps for each gene. Try here. Be sure to note the length in bp of the ORF.
Now you will need to design the PCR primers. (Helpful Hints Here) You want to keep the reading frames in mind. Each PCR primer should be about 20 bases long. However, more important than length is melting temperature (Tm). We would like all 10 primers to have about the same Tm so use this web page to help you calculate approximate Tm.
Finally, write out the DNA and amino acid sequences for the fusion proteins from His6 tag through the first 10 amino acids of each IDH.
Map of expression vector from Qiagen (pQE 30 UA).
PCR Primers used for this lab.
Lab Schedule Outlined
Lab Schedule In Context of Research Project
Molecular Biology Main Page
Biology Main Page | <urn:uuid:bf214d07-f430-4e12-bb72-ad890d273185> | {
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Cellulose plastics are bioplastics manufactured using cellulose or derivatives of cellulose. Cellulose plastics are manufactured using softwood trees as the basic raw material. Barks of the tree are separated and can be used as an energy source in the production. To segregate cellulose fiber from the tree, the tree is cooked or heated in a digester. Resins and lignins are produced as a byproduct in the digester. The byproducts can be used as a fuel or as a feedstock in the production of other chemical products. The pulp such produced is comprises hemicelluloses and alpha cellulose. Pulp is then treated with bleaching chemicals to eliminate any traces of resins and lignins and to reduce the hemicelluloses content of the pulp. The processed pulp contains water which is removed from the pulp before processing the pulp with high alpha cellulose content. The pulp is then used in the production of cellulose esters used in the production of cellulose plastics.
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Cellulose esters are produced by reaction of the processed pulp with certain acids and anhydrides in varied concentrations and temperatures depending on the end user application. The properties and chemical composition of cellulose esters is dependent on the acids and anhydrides used in the production process. Butyrate, acetate and propionate are among the major types of cellulose esters. Cellulose acetate is the dominant product type for cellulose esters and the trend is anticipated to continue during the forecast period. Major applications for cellulose plastics include thermoplastics, extruded films, eyeglass frames, electronics, sheets, rods, etc. Molding materials is the most dominant application segment for cellulose plastics and the trend is expected to continue for a foreseeable future.
Plastic is produced mainly using non renewable sources such as crude oil and its several derivatives owing to which, the carbon footprint is high during the production of plastics. Moreover, other issues such as biodegradability and other environmental hazards associated with traditional plastics have led to surge in number of regulations to control the use of plastics. The regulations imposed on plastics have led to surge demand for bio based plastics and thus has been driving demand for cellulose plastics. Furthermore, increasing demand for electronics products such as transparent dialers, screen shields, etc. has been among foremost growth drivers for cellulose plastics market. Softwood is the dominant raw material used in the production of cellulose plastics and increasing number of deforestation regulations is a major restraint for the market. Easy availability and low cost of conventional plastics is also among major restraint for cellulose plastics market growth. Moreover, high efficiency and comparative cost benefit of conventional plastics over cellulose plastics has restrained market growth for cellulose plastics. Increasing research and development to produce high efficiency and low cost cellulose plastics is anticipated to offer huge growth opportunity in cellulose ester market.
Browse the full Research report at : http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/cellulose-plastics-market.html
North America followed by Europe dominates the global cellulose plastics market. Increasing demand for bio based plastics has been a major factor driving demand for cellulose plastics in North America and Europe. North America is expected to dominate the cellulose plastics market during the forecast period. Some of the major players in the cellulose plastics market include Eastman Chemical Company, Mitsubishi Rayon Company Limited, Celanese Corporation, Solvay, SK Chemicals Co. Ltd. and Daicel Chemical Industries among others.
Transparency Market Research (TMR) is a market intelligence company, providing global business information reports and services. Our exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trends analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMR's experienced team of Analysts, Researchers, and Consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.
Our data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts, so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With a broad research and analysis capability, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques in developing distinctive data sets and research material for business reports. | <urn:uuid:9dac19b4-e4ec-4b13-95ce-45f05e718a41> | {
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Layout Modeling in Autodesk Inventor29 Sep, 2012 By: Nino Caldarola
IMAGINiT Tricks Tutorial: Changes may be inevitable, but Layout Design can help you make modifications quickly.
Editor's Note: This tutorial courtesy of IMAGINiT Technologies.
Form over function has been an adage in design forever. In the past, the shape and characteristic features of a part/assembly were of the utmost importance, because corrections and modifications were tedious tasks. With the advent of the CAD revolution, it became possible to accomplish modifications — and even complete reworks — in hours rather than days. However, as designers we still try to avoid major edits as much as possible, particularly when it comes to large, complex assemblies.
Modifications, however, are sometimes inevitable, especially if we haven't established the function of the assembly completely. This causes many hours of rework due to the fact that we've designed good-looking parts that don't work together well. This is where having the function of the assembly nailed down initially can free the designer to create parts that not only look good, but also function properly.
Three-dimensional design is the new paradigm. It allows us to see the parts before they are made; however, the "coolness factor" sometimes overrides the need to create functional parts. This is why my proposal is a slight rework of that familiar adage to read function before form.
So how do we achieve this? We use a functionality within Autodesk Inventor called Layout Design. This is a form of skeletal modeling that utilizes simple 2D sketches to establish the function in the quickest way. Yes, 2D — and with the power of part-based conceptualization. This creates a very sophisticated setup which allows us to establish the functionality very quickly and efficiently. Let's take a look at how it's done.
In the image below, we have a part file (IPT). Within the file we've sketched out all the "parts" for a single-cylinder engine. The purpose of creating all the parts in a single sketch is for simplicity, and to get all of the pieces drawn up. Also notice that the "parts" are very simplistic; we don't want too much detail at this point because we are still figuring out the concept. We are, therefore, only concerned with the B-rep (Boundary Representation: how much space does it take up?) of each "part."
Our next step is to convert the sketches to something that can be recognized as individual "parts." This is done by creating blocks out of the sketch geometry. (Block creation is located on the Layout panel in Sketch.)
As we can see, all the sketches have now been grouped into blocks, and each can be viewed in the part history browser in its own folder.
The blocks are now ready to be "assembled" within the parts environment. We use standard 2D constraints to place them in the correct locations, similar to constraining 2D geometry.
The blocked geometry is positioned and tested to establish the functionality of all the "parts" in normal operation. At this point, we can tweak the "parts" to ensure that they are working correctly together.
Now that we are satisfied that the "assembly" is functioning correctly, we are ready to convert the concept into a true assembly. This is accomplished using the Layout panel in Parts mode. We select the Make Components button to activate the routine.
When we get the dialog box, we set up the name, template, location, and potentially the BOM structure in the dialog box. The most important task will be to select the sketch "components" (blocks) so as to create the conversion.
Next, we ensure that all the components have the correct name, as well as any parameters that we'd like to include. At this point we click OK, and Inventor starts creating the conversion.
When we look at the Browser in the new file, we see the familiar assembly setup. All the 2D constraints have been converted to equivalent 3D constraints, so this is a fully constrained assembly model of our engine. It is, however, still a simple sketch representation. We are also able to add additional 3D constraints at this time.
We can now create the individual parts of the engine. The function has been proven; time can now be spent in creating each part exactly how we'd like it, and we can still be confident that the function has been preserved.
Upon completion of each part, we will test the assembly. In this example, we discover that the crank collides into the piston — the connecting rod is too short. (As I noted earlier, modifications are inevitable.)
We go back to the sketch concept and analyze it; the con rod is indeed too short. However, we have the ability to go into the sketch to make a correction. Since every "part" is correctly linked, the change automatically adjusts the sketched assembly.
When we return to the actual assembly and do an update, the problem is solved. The concept part resides with the assembly and allowed the modifications to be done in a simpler environment.
This is one of the true strengths of concept modeling and skeletal modeling. Add the benefit of establishing and maintaining the function of the assembly and allowing quick modifications, and this proves the revised adage — function before form.
In her easy-to-follow, friendly style, long-time Cadalyst contributing editor and Autodesk Technical Evangelist Lynn Allen guides you through a new feature or time-saving trick in every episode of her popular AutoCAD video tips. Subscribe to the free Cadalyst Video Picks newsletter and we'll notify you every time a new video tip is published. All exclusively from Cadalyst! | <urn:uuid:f954e09c-2dcf-492b-bedc-c4386ecb584c> | {
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etymon(redirected from etymons)
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n. pl. et·y·mons or et·y·ma (-mə)
1. An earlier form of a word in the same language or in an ancestor language. For example, Indo-European *duwo and Old English twā are etymons of Modern English two.
2. A word or morpheme from which compounds and derivatives are formed.
3. A foreign word from which a particular loan word is derived. For example, Latin duo, "two," is an etymon of English duodecimal.
[Latin, from Greek etumon, true sense of a word, from neuter of etumos, true.]
n, pl -mons or -ma (-mə)
(Phonetics & Phonology) a form of a word or morpheme, usually the earliest recorded form or a reconstructed form, from which another word or morpheme is derived: the etymon of English "ewe" is Indo-European "*owi"
[C16: via Latin, from Greek etumon basic meaning, from etumos true, actual]
n., pl. -mons, -ma (-mə)
the linguistic form from which another form is historically derived, as the Latin word cor “heart,” which is the etymon of English cordial, or the Indo-European base *ḱ(e)rd-, which is the etymon of Latin cor, Greek kardía, Russian serdtse, and English heart.
[1560–70; < Latin: the origin of a word < Greek étymon the essential meaning of a word seen in its origin or traced to its grammatical parts, neuter of étymos true, actual, real]
A form of a word from which another word has been derived.
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|Noun||1.||etymon - a simple form inferred as the common basis from which related words in several languages can be derived by linguistic processes| | <urn:uuid:13f8dae5-dcb8-4b19-9d19-5cd5c3e6d5c2> | {
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For decades, the Assad regime rallied support and crushed dissent in Syrian society through mobilizing networks of local intermediaries. Since 2011, the varying relationships between the central authorities in Syria, these local intermediaries, and the country’s different localities have played a fundamental role in shaping the outbreak of protests and descent into armed conflict. While six years of war have left the state’s administrative structures in tatters, Bashar al-Assad’s regime has focused on maintaining, reviving, or renewing its network of local intermediaries to keep control in its areas and retake lost territory. However, the conflict has crucially and irreparably changed local politics in Syria, and a return to the pre-2011 status quo is impossible. For any negotiated settlement to be sustainable, these changes will need to be incorporated into a new, decentralized power-sharing bargain, which will shape Syria’s economic and physical reconstruction and postconflict recovery.
Syria’s Localities Amid Conflict
- The Assad regime has long relied on networks of local agents and intermediaries to enforce its authority, and it is currently seeking to reassert control over each opposition area either by luring local elites back into its networks or by crushing the area with military force.
- The Syrian uprising and subsequent insurgency have never been a unified national movement; from the beginning, the opposition has been defined and divided by local identities. The brutality of the war and the chaotic nature of foreign aid have entrenched local divisions and undermined efforts to create a unified leadership.
- While most groups opposing Assad have sought to replace the regime’s administrative structures in the areas they control, Kurdish forces in Syria have instead focused on a less centralized and more geographically based vision of power sharing, controlling their territory without attempting to replace the central authorities.
A New Bargain for Decentralization
- Six years of conflict have irreparably altered the Syrian state’s administrative structures of governorates and districts, making the country’s politics more localised than ever. This often empowers new local elites and provides them with new areas of decisionmaking and policy implementation.
- For there to be an effective decentralization framework in any negotiated peace settlement, the areas of decisionmaking and policy implementation under the purview of new local intermediaries should be incorporated and formalized.
- Local communities with greater influence over local politics would likely help mitigate the corruption emanating from Damascus. This is necessary to avoid the possibility of reconstruction funds re-empowering a cadre of regime-affiliated, kleptocratic elites, similar to those against whom much of the population rose up in 2011.
Since the Baath Party took power in 1963, the Syrian central government has worked to penetrate local Syrian society to mobilize support and crush dissent. It began with attempts to organize local elites under the umbrella of Baathist organizations and later by relying on Syrian state administrative structures to embed clientelist networks and enforce its authority across the country. This strategy, built up and refined under former president Hafez al-Assad, began to unravel under the rule of his son Bashar as economic reforms brought to power a new kleptocratic class of regime affiliates who undermined the prevailing social contract.
The 2011 Syrian uprising revealed a deep dissatisfaction with Damascus’s management of local affairs across the country as protesters mobilized against the regime’s networks of local affiliates. Soon, the local elites who had traditionally functioned as the regime’s intermediaries—distinguished families, tribal and religious leaders, wealthy traders, and others—were no longer able to manage the population or contain dissent.
As the uprising morphed into an armed conflict, the Assad regime rapidly expanded its networks of local intermediaries in an attempt to maintain its authority. Meanwhile, a new class of local power brokers emerged in many of the localities that joined the opposition, often serving as intermediaries between their regions and the foreign donors who began backing the Syrian opposition. However, the opposition had started the uprising without any central leadership, resulting in localized and fragmented power in areas under the control of regime opponents. The brutality of the war and the incoherence of foreign support further undermined efforts to unify command and control.
The most important power dynamics in Syria will continue to be those that exist between the central authorities in Damascus and the various localities.
After six years of war, the regime is now moving aggressively to re-establish Damascus’s political authority over opposition-held localities by centralizing the flow of resources to these localities from the capital. With Russian assistance, the regime is attempting to either co-opt current local intermediaries or create new ones and absorb these intermediaries within the regime’s networks—or, failing that, to crush localities through military force, as with the brutal siege and subsequent recapture of opposition-held East Aleppo in late 2016.
Looking ahead, the most important power dynamics in Syria will continue to be those that exist between the central authorities in Damascus and the various localities , as manifested in local networks of respected family members, wealthy businessmen, prominent religious figures, and other influential people. The search for a resolution to the conflict and the establishment of a meaningful peace should place a renewed focus on these local networks, something that will be central to the success of any future political arrangements as well as any economic plans for reconstruction. Syria will likely remain a centralized state, but a renewed focus for peace negotiations must aim to resolve the parameters of the Syrian central government’s federal authority relative to the areas of local decisionmaking authority enjoyed by various localities.
Damascus and Syria’s Localities Before 2011
The Development of Centralized Control Under the Baath Party
Since the Baath Party’s inception in Syria, its leadership has been preoccupied with how to penetrate the country’s localities and bind them to the central authority.1 A locality (al-mahalla) in Syria can refer to either an urban area or a rural village, but it also carries a particular sociopolitical significance far more profound than the Western conception of a neighborhood. The boundaries of these localities are clearly understood by those who inhabit them. Residents are linked by a common sense of identity that is rooted in a feeling of shared guardianship, with families often able to trace their histories and inter-relations back hundreds of years.
Since the Baath Party’s inception in Syria, its leadership has been preoccupied with how to penetrate the country’s localities and bind them to the central authority.
When the Baath Party took power in Damascus in 1963, it was keenly aware that while it remained strong in the capital, its presence in the country’s peripheries was limited. At that time, a class of traditional leaders and landowners dominated local politics. The second wave of Ottoman reforms (tanzimat) at the end of the nineteenth century had created administrative positions to govern Syria’s localities, which remained in place and were passed down through families during the French Mandate from 1923 to 1946. One of the Baath Party’s priorities was thus to replace this class of traditional local leaders with a new local leadership loyal to the regime, consolidating political authority within the various localities into a centralized power structure operating from Damascus.2
During the 1960s, Baathist attempts to penetrate the localities took different forms. They created new organizations in the localities, such as peasant unions, to which they appointed young, educated cadres loyal to the party who could challenge the authority of traditional local elites.3 However, the family structures that had dominated the localities for nearly a century largely remained intact. The new local elites promoted by the Baath Party grew into parallel, competing power structures within the community, albeit ones that served the regime as a nexus through which it could organize and exert control. For example, the historian Hanna Batatu, when visiting the village of Ibbin Samaan west of Aleppo in 1985, noted that the same landowning families of the pre-Baath era had maintained their social prominence and still collected a percentage of the local peasant farmers’ earnings, although the regime in Damascus wielded political dominance.4
To manage the animosity between new and traditional local leaders, Hafez al-Assad, who ruled Syria from 1970 to 2000, worked to absorb both groups into the state’s administrative framework. To this end, its various branches and appointments (such as governors, heads of provincial councils, heads of districts, and so on) became important channels through which the regime could co-opt and contain local elites by offering them posts in the local administration without granting any significant decisionmaking power.5
Local administrators therefore became useful to the regime as a way of containing political dissent. The regional expert Fabrice Balanche has highlighted the link between the proliferation of local administrative bodies and social unrest. In 1983, only a year after the Muslim Brotherhood revolt, Damascus issued the Law of Local Administration.6 This law introduced a system for regulating local administration that de facto increased the regime’s sway over localities, as it made local administrative bodies—such as governorate councils and local councils—organize the local elites into functionaries, or intermediaries, who would operate between Damascus and the localities.
In parallel with local administration’s evolution, Hafez al-Assad also drove a major expansion of the Baath Party, bringing diverse social groups and interests under its umbrella and thereby further helping absorb local elites and power brokers into the regime apparatus. However, an important distinction remained between those elites who were the regime’s direct agents and representatives—in many cases members of the intelligence agencies (mukhabarat)—and those who were merely intermediaries between the regime and a local community, who were not necessarily antagonistic to the regime but also not directly a part of it.
Decisionmaking power for political, security, judicial, and budgetary affairs remained centralized in Damascus. The responsibility of implementing decisions made by the central authorities was dispersed to the localities through the regime’s networks, local intermediaries, and security agencies, which operated in parallel to the official local administration.7
Local Intermediaries and the Regime’s Networks
Before the Syrian uprising began in 2011, local intermediaries (wasata mahallyn) were typically prominent members of the locality , often members of powerful families and tribes, religious figures, or businessmen. While lacking independent decisionmaking power over the affairs of their locality, local intermediaries acted as informal go-betweens—contact points for locals to access the centralized regime’s decisionmaking process and power structure, as well as a means by which regime leaders in Damascus could exert their authority in the localities. These intermediaries could be employed in either the private or public sector. A key characteristic was that they were respected members of the community and enjoyed a degree of prominence in their respective localities.
Official regime representatives, or members of the regime’s network (shabakat al nizham), derived their legitimacy from the regime in Damascus, which granted them decisionmaking powers within their localities. They, too, would hail from the locality in which they worked or resided. However, where intermediaries would generally seek to advance the interests of their localities and improve their reputation among their own people, the regime’s representatives acted as clients of the regime in their areas and often prioritized personal benefit over their reputations. Thus, it was through a combination of these formal and informal channels that the regime in Damascus maintained control over the population.
Before the Syrian uprising began in 2011, local intermediaries were typically prominent members of the locality.
Importantly, although the Assad regime is dominated by members of the Alawite sect, its approach focused on the sociopolitical dynamics of each locality rather than on the sectarian affiliation of the residents. This was illustrated by the clashes that broke out between members of the Alawite and Ismaili sects in the coastal town of Qadmous in the summer of 2005. Ismaili notables—teachers, well-educated professionals, and the heads of large families—subsequently stepped in to resolve the conflict. Some proposed contacting the spiritual head of the Ismailis who lives outside Syria, the Aga Khan, for assistance, but they were overruled by those who preferred to reach out to their Alawite counterparts to find a solution at the local level. The regime, for its part, wanted the tensions resolved but also insisted that these intercommunal meetings be held under state auspices. To defuse the sectarian element of the dispute, it deployed troops from the army’s Fourth Division to the area, mostly Sunnis from eastern Syria.8 In this particular instance, when some Ismaili delegates refused to meet in government offices, those who did attend acquired a new status as local intermediaries for the regime.
When Bashar al-Assad came to power in 2000, the regime’s means of managing local politics did not fundamentally change. However, Bashar’s program of economic liberalization reforms profoundly impacted the regime’s ability to manage the population. Within the first four years of his rule, Bashar al-Assad embarked on a series of reforms ostensibly intended to open up Syria’s economy. Dozens of Damascus-based firms working in real estate, technology, and other fields were established. These companies were highly centralized in the capital and large cities, and rather than fostering wider economic activity across Syria, the country’s wealth began to orbit these business interests. The regime’s network of local affiliates added growing segments of the business community. Under Hafez al-Assad, the regime’s networks had been primarily engaged in politics and attempting to create a degree of cooperation with the localities. However, under Bashar, the new breed of regime representative was far more profit-motivated. Many of them treated localities as personal business projects to be exploited, effectively establishing a new kleptocratic elite.
As Syrian sociologist Mohammed Jamal Barout has noted in detail, this new network of businessmen in Syria began to rapidly buy up land at artificially deflated prices.9 For instance, in the areas of Daraya and al-Moadhimiyah around Damascus, Barout found that up to 70 percent of available land plots were purchased by these regime-affiliated businessmen. As a result, the social contract and balance of control between Damascus and the localities, which Hafez had carefully cultivated over decades, started unraveling under his son Bashar. This has only worsened during the war.
The 2011 Uprising
The Syrian uprising and subsequent insurgency against the ruling regime has never been a unified national movement. While many attempts have been made to create an umbrella organization to unite the various regions and groups that joined the opposition—such as the simultaneous country-wide demonstrations on Fridays, followed by the establishment of the ostensibly national Free Syrian Army—none proved successful at creating a sustainable common front. Rather, the Syrian opposition has been effectively defined and divided along the lines of various localities. For instance, Moadamiya and Barzeh, on the outskirts of Damascus, joined the opposition, and armed groups formed within both localities. In 2013, one of the armed groups from Barzeh went to Moadamiya and fought alongside local fighters there for more than a year. Despite sharing a common Sunni background, people within Moadamiya continually referred to Barzeh’s fighters as gharbatlyeh—meaning foreigner or alien.10
The Syrian uprising and subsequent insurgency against the ruling regime has never been a unified national movement, despite many attempts to create an umbrella organization.
In April 2011, with protests breaking out in city peripheries and rural towns across the country, the regime in Damascus began bringing in delegations from various localities to try to negotiate an end to the demonstrations on a case-by-case basis. The regime was still operating by the old system, which no longer applied in the new context. While many opposition localities had by then formed their own popular committees to represent their areas, Assad was receiving the delegations and would only agree to meet with local intermediaries who had remained loyal to the regime.11 Being called to a meeting with the Syrian president had previously been considered an honor reserved almost exclusively for society’s elite. In addition to this gesture, Assad made other concessions, such as releasing prisoners from various localities.12
At the local level, however, regime intermediaries who were permitted to attend the meetings represented the very system of centralized control the protesters were demonstrating against and thus no longer held the influence they had once enjoyed in their localities. The brutal violence and siege tactics the regime unleashed against rebellious areas and the opposition’s subsequent militarization entrenched the divisions and competition between opposition localities and reinforced the localized nature of the conflict.
Yet the affiliation of each locality with one side of the conflict was not always clear-cut. This ambiguity is demonstrated by the town of Dumair, in the Qalamoun region. During the 1980s, housing for Syrian army officers was built around Dumair but not within the city itself. Tensions rose as the uprising progressed throughout 2011, with the original locals largely supporting the opposition and contributing fighters to the Free Syrian Army, and the army families considered members of the regime apparatus. People from Dumair began to distinguish themselves by the part of the city they were from—the army housing (Dumair al-Masaken) or the city’s interior (Dumair al-Balad). At one point in 2011, the two areas even received entirely separate public bus services from Damascus. Yet local communities maintained basic economic links and a shared interest in isolating Dumair from the quickly escalating war, and prominent locals and army officers from the two areas coordinated to ensure the city remained peaceful.
Syria’s Localities Post-Uprising
The sociopolitical dynamics inherent in Syria’s localities have shaped, and been shaped by, all the major actors in the Syrian conflict. The Assad regime has significantly expanded its networks of intermediaries in the areas where it has maintained control, even as the functions of these intermediaries have been adapted to fit the conflict’s new realities; in areas where the regime lost control, it has often pursued a strategy of either trying to co-opt a new cadre of local elites back into the regime’s fold or seeking to crush the locality with military force. Kurdish forces, for their part, have sought to build a network of their own intermediaries and new governance structures in predominantly Arab areas where they have seized control. The opposition more generally, which entered the conflict without a centralized authority, has never been able to build an effective center in large part due to competition and rivalry between opposition localities over access to foreign resources and funding. This has left a number of localities stuck in the middle.
The sociopolitical dynamics inherent in Syria’s localities have shaped, and been shaped by, all the major actors in the Syrian conflict.
Hama: A City Under Continuous Regime Control
Hama has a highly urbanized Sunni population with a history of conflict with the Assad regime. In 1982, a regime crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood’s uprising in the city led to a siege by the Syrian army and the deaths of some 20,000 people, mostly civilians.13 In 2011, some of the largest demonstrations against the regime took place in Hama. While all areas in Syria where protests broke out experienced a regime crackdown in response, Hama was spared the sort of extreme violence that was regularly meted out in more rural localities. Indeed, the regime began increasing public service provision in the city following the outbreak of protests, for instance by opening a new university.14 As other areas of the country descended into armed insurgency, there was no comparable development of armed opposition groups in Hama.
After the uprising, the regime significantly expanded the number of local intermediaries to address the increased scope and intensity of the conflict’s rapidly changing dynamics.
Hama has thus remained under regime control throughout the conflict. While the structure of the regime’s relationship with its local intermediaries has remained fundamentally unchanged, the substance of these relationships has changed significantly. Before the uprising, it was relatively simple for the regime to contain and control local politics by employing its intermediaries in matters related to security, politics, public services, trade, and the local economy. After the uprising, the regime significantly expanded the number of local intermediaries to address the increased scope and intensity of the conflict’s rapidly changing dynamics. Their concerns now relate to items such as the needs of the hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people who have sought refuge in Hama, and the bribes that businesses must pay to get commercial goods through the checkpoints surrounding the city, among many others.
The social structure in Hama has historically been based around dozens of large, mercantile families, which typically also include prominent religious figures and educated professionals. Prior to the uprising, these families were key contact points for the regime to access the local community due to their prominence. At the same time, this process helped these families maintain social capital in their localities and facilitated their business interests. As the conflict has isolated Hama from the rest of the country, these families have become even more integral to providing support for the local population through aiding local charities and helping provide services. The focus of these families has remained highly localized and focused on Hama, as has their increased cooperation with local regime representatives.
One of these families, whose history stretches back generations, currently includes seven brothers, most of whom are businessmen and factory owners while one is a Sunni sheikh. This family has well-established ties with local regime figures through its businesses, and the family also has maintained ties with opposition activist networks through the sheikh and works actively with charities to support internally displaced people since the beginning of the uprising.15 This has allowed the family to remain an important intermediary while being neither a direct part of the regime apparatus nor a part of the opposition. This, in turn, has ensured that the family can secure and advance its social status and maintain its business interests. Given their local legitimacy, local intermediaries, such as this family, could gain formalized authority over the areas of decisionmaking and policy implementation that have already effectively come under their purview as the conflict has evolved, thereby providing an effective decentralization framework for Syria. Such a framework could also help mitigate corruption emanating from the central authorities in Damascus and give local communities greater influence over politics in their communities.
Al-Tal: Regime Relations With an Opposition Locality
Al-Tal, a city on the periphery of Damascus, has also had a long history of tensions with the Assad regime even before 2011. Members of prominent families in the city had joined the Muslim Brotherhood during the unrest of the 1980s and were subsequently jailed. The Syrian army had appropriated large swaths of land in the city, the regime had shelved prospective urban renewal plans for it, and, throughout the 1990s, local state institutions had seen a large influx of regime security personnel, leading to an increased sense of oppression among the local population. When protests erupted in al-Tal in 2011, the demonstrators broadly fell into two categories: one group demanding the return of lands the Syrian army had appropriated during the Muslim Brotherhood uprising and calling for a new deal between al-Tal and Damascus, and another group led by educated professionals demanding that Syria’s entire system of government be changed.16 From the middle of 2012, armed opposition groups took control of al-Tal, and civilians began to establish civic administration bodies to address the locality’s needs.
Throughout the 1990s, local state institutions had seen a large influx of regime security personnel, leading to an increased sense of oppression among the local population.
In mid-2012, the regime created the so-called Ministry of National Reconciliation in Damascus. A general in the Republican Guard was appointed to head the ministry’s operations in al-Tal.17 This general and his team then sought to work with the former networks of local intermediaries and to establish new ones among prominent families, technocrats, small traders, and religious leaders, even while the battles continued between the armed opposition groups in al-Tal and the Syrian army outside. Over time, recognizing the need to be able to communicate with the regime, a reconciliation committee (lijnat al-musalaha) evolved in al-Tal, whose members, often technocrats, included family members of former regime intermediaries from the locality.18
The Syrian army and associated groups, including the Russians, began to enforce a severe siege on al-Tal that lasted through mid-2014, which brought large-scale suffering to the civilian population and put pressure on the armed groups in the locality. By February 2016, the Russians had created their own center for reconciliation in the coast city of Jableh, led by a Russian general and his staff.19 After the regime’s prolonged bombing campaign and siege against al-Tal, the local reconciliation council contacted an officer from the Russian reconciliation center in Damascus. This led to a series of stop-and-start negotiations between the armed rebels and the regime. The reconciliation committee acted as the primary intermediary between the two, while the Russians acted as the guarantor that, as long as the negotiations were under way, the regime would refrain from bombing the locality. When negotiations broke down, the bombing resumed, only to halt again when negotiations restarted. The result was that, at the end of 2016, an agreement was reached under which regime forces ended the siege in return for the armed opposition groups leaving al-Tal for Idlib Province.20
Families in al-Tal, the reconciliation committee, and other local bodies then selected more than 200 local people whom, after being vetted by the regime, formed the new Lijnat Hemayat Madenat al-Tal—the al-Tal City Protection Committee. The regime security services then established a process dubbed Taswiyat al-Awdae (Settle your situation); the security services submitted to the al-Tal Protection Committee a list of more than 1,000 names of people who, to varying degrees, had been involved in the opposition. The committee then arranged for those people to be interviewed by regime security personnel at the University of Damascus’s School of Political Science, located between al-Tal and the capital. Following the interviews, the security services sent a list of names back to the al-Tal City Protection Committee indicating who would be permitted to remain and who must leave for Idlib (as the rebel fighters had), with some sixty-two people obligated to leave.21
Throughout this process, the regime dismantled the opposition networks and institutions that had been established inside al-Tal after 2011 and fostered a new type of security relationship between Damascus and al-Tal in which the locality itself became charged with maintaining security. The regime also ended all independent external support for al-Tal, with it again dependent on Damascus to provide services such as electricity and healthcare, as well as official documents. As one resident said: “It is almost as if the revolution never happened because we went back to negotiating with the regime as before.”22 Although some independent actors remain, the reconciliation process in al-Tal is a prime example of the regime’s methods when attempting to reintegrate itself into the localities. This process is likely to be replicated in various locations throughout Syria in the near future although it is a problematic model for decentralization. By decentralizing local security policies while keeping the distribution of state resources, aid, and development money centralized, such policies will create long-term friction in local communities, which could lead to future conflict.
Localities Under Opposition Control
Unlike the regime, the opposition did not enter the conflict with a strong central structure to guide it. This lack meant that each opposition locality quickly became its own power center: each employed a different model of self-governance and each made different arrangements between the armed groups and the civic authorities. This led to varying degrees of success. The regime’s brutal violence against opposition areas and the chaotic nature of the foreign aid supporting them then further entrenched their isolation and animosity, which in turn undermined attempts to form a unified opposition front.
Each opposition locality quickly became its own power center: each employed a different model of self-governance and made different arrangements between armed groups and the civic authorities.
In areas where the regime lost control, opposition figures within the localities organized local councils under the banner of the Syrian revolution. Prominent local families became involved in these councils to help manage resources in the localities. After 2015, their involvement became increasingly conspicuous as advisory shura councils spread across northern Syria, where they helped staff executive offices and run city affairs.23 Yet despite their local prominence, in practice these local councils were unable to consolidate under a centrally managed framework. The official national Syrian opposition, represented at various times by the Syrian National Council and the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, nominally speaking for opposition-held areas in Syria at international forums, but it never had effective or sustained decisionmaking authority in the localities on the ground. Attempts were made at various times to establish a system of influence over the opposition localities that mirrored the Syrian state’s centralized administrative structures. Governorate councils (muhafadhat) were meant to act as hubs between the central authority and its intermediaries in the various localities.24
Several factors undermined efforts to establish centralized opposition leadership. One was the ineptitude of the central leadership and the muhafadhat in effectively delivering funds and aid to the localities under their jurisdiction, helping to foster local distrust of the central leadership. Another was that localities established their own intermediaries with the outside world and thus independently procured aid and funds from a multitude of international donors. This created competition among the localities for access to resources, thus further splintering political action and undermining the significance and influence of the centralized opposition leadership at the local level.
The Syrian conflict has attracted massive inflows of resources to opposition areas in the form of weapons, food, medicine, equipment, money, and more. A common conception among international donors, especially Western-based organizations, was that supporting local groups on the ground could empower them to challenge the central authority in Damascus. What these donors did not grasp was the rigidity of the identity boundaries of these localities, reinforced by decades of Assad regime policies. They were thus unable to foresee that the localities would not easily coalesce. Furthermore, regime bombing campaigns and jihadi insurgencies, the disunity among international donors and policymakers, and the short-term, project-based nature of the aid all led to wildly inconsistent outcomes and provided few sustainable results while also exacerbating competition among the localities.25
The inability of international donors’ personnel to operate on the ground in Syria has also meant that they have been almost entirely dependent on their own local intermediaries to deliver aid. The power to provide access to foreign aid and redirect it has turned these intermediaries into a new class of elites in many areas and has often created fissures within the local leadership as the new elites have fought for influence and authority. Rather than empower localities to challenge Damascus, foreign aid has often helped create rifts within the opposition that the regime has exploited. Local networks in areas outside regime control have been specifically targeted by the Ministry of National Reconciliation, the Syrian army, and security agencies to co-opt them into the regime’s centralized network, or, if they refuse, to crush them with military force.
The towns of Dana and Sarmada, in Idlib Province near the Turkish border crossing of Bab al-Hawa, demonstrate how the war has changed traditional trade and distribution networks inside Syria, and how this, coupled with a sudden inflow of foreign aid, has upset the power balance across the region.26 By the end of 2014, the war had severed many of the established supply routes to northern Syria from the country’s south. Dana and Sarmada then became hubs for new trade routes from Turkey into Syria’s northern Idlib Province. This in turn led to Syrian nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and various international NGOs (INGOs) to locate their offices in and operate their programs out of the two towns. In an attempt to expand its own networks and economic influence throughout Idlib’s localities, the al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra began infiltrating the Dana and Sarmada local councils, leading many donors to halt funding for these local councils. Meanwhile, the sudden enrichment of the two towns sparked competition, resentment, and animosity with other localities in Idlib. At the end of 2015, the Russian air force commenced a bombing campaign against the towns, putting an end to their status as hubs for trade, NGOs, and INGOs.27
What international donors have not grasped is the rigidity of the identity boundaries in Syria’s localities, reinforced by decades of Assad regime policies.
Even when various opposition localities were crushed, however, the identity and structures of the locality often survived among the displaced. For instance, when al-Qusair fell to regime forces and allied Hezbollah fighters in 2013, many residents fled across the border into Lebanon, accompanied by members of their opposition-supporting local council. After settling in the same area, these members took the lead in securing aid for the community. Similarly, when the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) took Tal Rifaat in 2016 from the rebels, the displaced locals moved with their council to Azaz, where they settled apart from the greater Azaz community. Foreign donors, who had been aiding the community in Tal Rifaat, continued to channel their aid through the displaced intermediaries and the council for the benefit of the displaced community.28
The result of these trends is that the opposition now faces a serious dilemma. All the structures it has built in Syria have been developed in response to fast-moving developments on the ground and have thus been temporary in nature—in short, the opposition has always been reacting and has never developed a truly proactive strategy. Meanwhile, local power structures have become increasingly entrenched. If the opposition were to empower regional power centers, they might be accused of separatism. However, a heavily centralized structure is no longer possible because of local divisions.
The Kurdish Exception
In June 2015, a military campaign by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF)—the Kurdish-led, U.S.-backed fighting force in Syria’s north—pushed Islamic State fighters out of the northern town of Tal Abyad. This was followed by Kurdish forces capturing the town of Manbij from the self-proclaimed Islamic State in August 2016.
After doing so, the SDF implemented a new model of a state administrative structure that was a departure from the state model, which was based on fourteen governorates (or provinces). The SDF created the so-called Federation of the North, which took parts of Aleppo, Raqqa, and al-Hasakeh Provinces and integrated them into one entity, within which they created majles al-aeyan, or councils of notables.
The council members were able to offer their personal guarantee for the individuals because they knew the local population.
A figure from the military cadre of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) who implemented a council of notables described the experience in an interview.29 He visited Tal Abyad after Kurdish forces had expelled the Islamic State and met with seven prominent members of the local community. He asked them to reach out to other people in their network, and soon the council grew to eighty people. This council then helped broker the release of 700 people, out of a total of 1,000, who had been arrested during raids that were aimed at capturing suspected Islamic State militants. The council members were able to offer their personal guarantee for the individuals because they knew the local population.
These council members functioned as intermediaries between the PKK and the local population. Their primary qualifications were that they were from the local area, were in good standing with the local population, and were not affiliated with any political or military group. However, the council members do not wield direct authority or power.
In Manbij, the Kurdish security units created a security committee (lijan amnia), from local notables, the police, and Kurdish-associated cadres.30 The role of the security committee has been to vet local community members, with the local notables required to vouch for their fellow community members. For instance, in the area of Solouk, near Tal Abyad, Kurdish forces allowed people who had previously been displaced by the conflict to return to their homes under the guarantee of the local notables.31 The committee thus has become the most important intermediary and assumed a role of social surveillance in the community.
It should be noted that this arrangement falls short of power sharing with the local community, given that real power and control of resources—in terms of access to services and fuel, running the bakeries, and control over policing—in these primarily Arab towns remain in the hands of the Kurdish forces.
Policy discussions related to Syria in international diplomatic circles often posit that some form of decentralization of power in Syria will be necessary for the long-term success of any peace settlement. Decentralization, as it is usually discussed among experts and officials, refers to the power relationship between the authorities in Damascus and governorates, such as Idlib, Hama, or Homs. In this sense, however, Syria was already decentralized in accordance with Law 107, issued in 2011.32 The more important relationships have been, and will continue to be, those that exist between the central authorities and the localities, as manifested in local networks of family notables, businessmen, religious figures, and others. On the ground, Syria has historically seen a continuous bargaining process and struggle for authority between the regime and these groups, which have enjoyed varying degrees of independence and autonomy. In the search for a means to resolve the current conflict and establish a meaningful peace in Syria, there should be a renewed focus on these local networks, as they will be central to the success of any future political arrangement as well as any economic plans for reconstruction.
Syria’s political situation has been significantly complicated by the breakup of administrative boundaries and state administrative structures over the course of the war
Syria’s political situation has been significantly complicated by the breakup of administrative boundaries and state administrative structures over the course of the war, particularly in northern and eastern Syria. For instance, Aleppo no longer functions as a single governorate but has large sections that have been captured and incorporated into separate political projects of Kurdish militias, the Islamic State, Turkish-backed opposition groups, and the regime.
Further compounding the challenges, a decentralization process assumes that there is, or can be, a functional relationship between the center and the periphery (or the localities), but this is not a certainty in the context of a country that has been at war for six years and the massive grievances this entails between the central authorities and many of the localities. Even opposition groups that are ostensibly on the same side have been unable to establish a decentralized means of governance among themselves. Earlier in the conflict, the opposition created a temporary government (hakuma moaqata) that was meant to replicate the centralized Syrian state. However, because the uprising was heavily localized from the beginning and developed very much with a bottom-up approach, the temporary government found itself confronting empowered localities that were not always willing to cooperate. Faced with this hurdle, the opposition has struggled to construct a new model without being perceived as separatists, an accusation that the Kurds received after declaring a federalist system that had effectively no relationship with any central authority.
For any political settlement to be effective, it will need to take into account the relative power of localities and the prevailing dynamics. A division of power based solely on geography would not likely work for Syria because each region is fragmented into various localities with different levels of power and authority and different relationships with the outside world. Similarly, a power-sharing agreement based exclusively on reform of the Syrian central government is unlikely to gain traction because it is doubtful that the regime will let anyone into its internal structure in a meaningful sense. In this sense, decentralization, as it is often conceptualized, will not resolve the current conflict. Instead, the long-term peace negotiations must aim to resolve the parameters of the Syrian central government’s federal authority relative to the areas of local decisionmaking authority enjoyed by the various localities. This approach would help ease long-term tensions between local communities and the state, as well as among the localities themselves, and would contribute to the establishment of a lasting peace.
In many areas of Syria, the localized structure inherent in the country’s sociopolitical dynamics has persevered through six years of war, even while the ways and means of its functioning has changed radically and the Syrian state’s previous administrative structures of governorates and districts have been irreparably altered.
The Assad regime has expanded its networks of local intermediaries in areas it controls to maintain its centralized authority amid the conflict’s rapidly changing scope and intensity. Many localities under opposition control have meanwhile seen the rise of new elites who act as intermediaries to the litany of discordant foreign donors, fueling competition and rivalry between these elites and their localities while fragmenting attempts to centralize opposition leadership. Kurdish forces of the SDF have brought in an entirely new administrative structure to ensure security in the areas they have conquered, while the basic sociopolitical and geographic dimensions of these localities have persevered.
One of the regime’s apparent aims in the current phase of the conflict is to re-establish Damascus’s political authority over opposition-held localities in Syria by centralizing the flow of resources to them from the capital and, with Russian assistance, attempting to either co-opt current local intermediaries (or create new ones) and absorb these within the regime’s networks, or crush the locality entirely by military force, as exemplified late last year in East Aleppo and previously in Daraya.
A meaningful peace following the conflict, however, will almost certainly require political negotiations resulting in a new bargain between the central government and the localities.
A meaningful peace following the conflict, however, will almost certainly require political negotiations resulting in a new bargain between the central government and the localities, one that defines the limits of federal authority and formalizes local control and decisionmaking in various areas of local interest. Constitutional reforms enacted to achieve decentralization will amount to empty gestures, however, if the regime is able to recentralize resource control and re-establish authority over intermediaries within opposition-held localities. Were such a situation to take place, the funds that would inevitably pour into Syria for reconstruction would likely re-empower a similar cadre of regime-affiliated, kleptocratic elites against whom much of the population rose up in 2011. Given the vast destruction of wealth resulting from the conflict, economic disparity and resentment would be severely exacerbated. In such an environment, the long-term stability of any peace agreement would be highly questionable.
1 Raymond A. Hinnebusch, “Local Politics in Syria: Organization and Mobilization in Four Villages Cases,” Middle East Journal 30, no. 1 (January 1976): 1–24.
2 Fabrice Balanche, “Les Municipalités dans la Syrie Baathiste: déconcentration administrative et control politique,” Revue de Tiers Monde 183, no. 1 (2008): 169–87.
3 As Hinnebusch (cited above) highlights, through land reforms and organizations such as the peasant unions the Baath attempted to erode landlords’ power, promote a new class of intermediaries, and mobilise the masses.
4 On this point, see Hanna Batatu, Syria’s Peasantry, the Descendants of Its Lesser Rural Notables, and Their Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999), 23; and Dawn Chatty, “The Bedouin in Contemporary Syria,” Middle East Journal 64, no. 1 (Winter 2010).
5 Ibid., 172–75.
6 Balanche, “Les Municipalités dans la Syrie Baathiste.”
7 Heiko Wimmen, “Syria’s Path From Civic Uprising to Civil War”, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, December 16, 2016, http://carnegieendowment.org/2016/11/22/syria-s-path-from-civic-uprising-to-civil-war-pub-66171.
8 Author interview with Qadmous resident, Istanbul, March 2016.
9 Muhammad Jamal Barout notes that much of this land was sold to the regime affiliates at 1985 market prices, which were approximately one hundredth of their 2010 market value. See Muhammad Jamal Barout, “Syria in the Last Decade: The Dialectic of Stagnation and Reform,” Doha Institute, 2012, 317.
10 Author interview with local NGO worker (via phone), January 2016.
11 See Alassa yastaqbel Wafdan Mn Alijan Alsha’bia mn Homs Wa Douma, All4Syria, April, 14, 2011, http://www.all4syria.info/Archive/3473.
12 See Azmi Bishara, Suriya, Darb al-Alam nahwa al-Huriya: Mu- hawala fil-Tarikh al-Rahn [Syria, a path to freedom from suffering: An attempt in contemporary history] (Beirut: al-Markaz al-Arabi lil-Abhath wa-Dirasat al-Siyasat, 2013), 125
13 See Jason Rodrigues, “1982: Syria's President Hafez al-Assad Crushes Rebellion in Hama,” From the Archive (blog), Guardian, August 1, 2011, https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/from-the-archive-blog/2011/aug/01/hama-syria-massacre-1982-archive.
14 See the text of the decree, published by the Syrian Parliament, May 13, 2014, http://www.parliament.gov.sy/arabic/index.php?node=201&nid=4224&ref=tree&.
15 Author interview with a civil society activist from Hama (via phone), February 2016. The name of the family has been withheld for security reasons.
16 Author interview with a resident from al-Tal (via phone), February 2016.
17 See “Al-Amid Qais Farwa, Arrab Almosalahat wa Zirae Iran Fi El Ref Al Dimashqi” [The General Qais Moruwa, the godfather of the reconciliation, and the arm of Iran in Damascus outskirts ], All4Syria, January 21, 2017, http://www.all4syria.info/Archive/381224.
18 Author interview with a resident from al-Tal (via phone), February 2016.
19 “Russia Opens Talks Center at Air Base in Syria: Agencies,” Reuters, February 23, 2016, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-centre-idUSKCN0VW1S4.
20 See Al-Assad Yosharef Ala Inhae Almuaradeh Almousalahe Fi Dimasheq wa refaha, Enab Baladi, April 12, 2016, http://www.enabbaladi.net/archives/117243.
21 See this post from the City Protection Committee in al-Tal, February 16, 2017, https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=1193652974089638&id=847546085366997&match=2LLZg9ix2YrYpyDZhdi12YXYtQ%3D%3D.
22 Author interview with a political activist from al-Tal (via Skype ), January 2016.
23 See Sam Heller, “Keeping the Lights On in Rebel Idlib,” Century Foundation, November 29, 2016, https://tcf.org/content/report/keeping-lights-rebel-idlib/.
24 See Luigi Narbone, Agnès Favier, and Virginie Colombier, “Local Governance Dynamics in Opposition-Controlled Areas in Syria,” Middle East Directions, 2016, http://cadmus.eui.eu/bitstream/handle/1814/41644/Inside%20wars_2016.pdf.
25 Author several interviews with Syrian opposition council members, March and August 2016.
26 Author interview with the head of a Syrian NGO, Gaziantep, Turkey, May 2016.
27 Author interview with an employee of an international organization based in Turkey, Gaziantep, Turkey, May 2016.
28 Author several interviews with local NGO workers, Gaziantep, Turkey, May 2016.
29 Author interview with a member of the Movement for a Democratic Society (TEV-DEM) from Kobani (via phone ), February 2017
30 See Kheder Khaddour, “How Regional Security Concerns Uniquely Constrain Governance in Northeastern Syria,” Carnegie Middle East Center, forthcoming.
31 Author interview with a cadre member from Tal Abyad (via phone), February 2017.
32 See Syrian Arab Republic, Legislative Decree 107, “Local Administration Law,” August 23, 2011, http://www.syrianlawjournal.com/index.php/main-legislation/constitutional-law/#l1-4. | <urn:uuid:b7ca1d16-b31a-4252-a29b-066dc56311a5> | {
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Sometimes, the sky really is falling, and other times it just seems that way.
Near the small town of Mazsalaca, Latvia on Sunday night, an object appeared to have crashed into the ground, leaving a gaping hole about more than 25 feet across. A YouTube video of the incident featured a group of excitable Latvians rushing to the hole and exclaiming their astonishment with English swear words.
But something about this presumed meteorite impact seemed fishy and conflicting reports emanated from the Baltic state about the nature of the incident. From stateside, it was impossible to tell what caused the hole just by looking at photos posted to a Latvian website.
“It could be a piece of space debris from a spacecraft, it could be a weird explosion, or it could be a meteorite,” said Michael Zolensky, a meteorite specialist at NASA’s Johnson Space Center. “The only way to know, though, is to dig it up.”
Now that Latvian scientists are examining the scene in the light of day, it appears to be a very nerdy hoax.
“The photographs and video footage showing the crater and material in the base of it burning indicates that the alleged meteorite crater in Latvia is not an impact crater — meteorites are not ‘on fire’ or even hot when they land on Earth,” wrote Caroline Smith, meteorite curator at the Natural History Museum, London, in an e-mail to Wired.com. “Additionally there have been no witness reports of any large ‘fireball’ sightings in the region on Sunday afternoon, when the crater was allegedly formed.”
Latvian investigators came to a similar conclusion.
“This is not a real crater. It is artificial,” Uldis Nulle, a scientist at the Latvian Environment, Geology and Meteorology Center, told the Associated Press after inspecting the site on Monday.
Another Latvian scientist said the hole in the ground was dug with a shovel.
Zolensky’s colleague at Johnson Space Center, Gene Stansbury, an orbital debris specialist, said that their records do not indicate a piece of space debris scheduled for reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere. NASA generally tracks objects larger than a meter in size.
A network of Air Force satellites known as the Defense Support Program do track fireballs — which a real meteorite presumably would have caused — but Wired.com has been unable to confirm whether these satellites captured anything unusual.
Update 10:30 AM PST: Added comment from Caroline Smith.
Image: Associated Press.
Via Universe Today
- Sept. 25, 2002: Mysterious Meteorite Dazzles Siberia
- First-Ever Asteroid Tracked From Space to Earth
- The Peekskill Meteorite – Video – Wired
- Wired 15.01: The Meteor Farmer
- Meteorite Makes Villagers Sick!!! Maybe. | <urn:uuid:d6e3e475-1258-49bd-9adb-5619d635aec7> | {
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© SHANNON MAY
In the late 1970s, a bizarre theory began making its way around the scientific community. DNA sequencing pioneer Frederick Sanger of the Medical Research Council’s Laboratory of Molecular Biology and his colleagues had just published their landmark paper on the genome of virus Phi X174 (or φX174), a well-studied bacteriophage found in E. coli.1 That genome, some said in the excitement that followed, contained a message from aliens.
In what they termed a “preliminary effort. . . to investigate whether or not phage φX174 DNA carries a message from an advanced society,” Japanese researchers Hiromitsu Yokoo and Tairo Oshima explored some of the reasons extraterrestrials might choose to communicate with humans via a DNA code.2 DNA is durable, the authors noted in their 1979 article, and can be easily replicated. What’s more, it is ubiquitous on Earth, and unlikely to become obsolete as long as life continues—convenient for aliens waiting for humans to develop the sequencing technologies necessary to decode their messages.
The thesis wasn’t taken terribly seriously, and the researchers themselves admitted there was no obvious pattern to Phi X174’s genome. But for biologist George Church, then a Harvard University graduate student learning how to sequence DNA under Walter Gilbert, the speculation in the paper was intriguing. “I didn’t believe it,” he says of the alien theory, “but it planted the idea that one could encode messages into biological DNA.”
At the time, of course, there was a glaring obstacle: cost. Back then, “we synthesized 10 nucleotides for $6,000, and that was considered a pretty good deal,” says Church, now a professor of genetics at Harvard. “Obviously, you can’t encode much information in 10 nucleotides.”
© SHANNON MAYA few decades later, however, things began to change. Oligonucleotide synthesis was becoming more routine, and researchers could write small amounts of arbitrary information into nucleic acids for under a dollar per base. In 2001, for example, a team at Mount Sinai School of Medicine wrote out two Dickens quotes totaling 70 bytes in DNA sequences—encoding each letter of the alphabet as combinations of the bases A, C, and T (e.g., AAA = A, AAC = B, etc.). Eight years later, researchers in Toronto created a plasmid library containing more than 200 bytes of coded text, music, and an image from the nursery rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” In 2010, Craig Venter’s group demonstrated progress in oligonucleotide synthesis by artificially synthesizing the entire genome of the bacterium Mycoplasma mycoides—about 1.1 million base pairs.
Around this time, Church decided to get involved. He and two Harvard colleagues translated an HTML draft of a 50,000-word book on synthetic biology, coauthored by Church, into binary code, converted it to a DNA sequence—coding 0s as A or C and 1s as G or T—and “wrote” this sequence with an ink-jet DNA printer onto a microchip as a series of DNA fragments. In total, the team made 54,898 oligonucleotides, each including 96 bases of data along with a 22-base sequence at each end to allow the fragments to be copied in parallel using the polymerase chain reaction (PCR), and a unique, 19-base “address” sequence marking the segment’s position in the original document.
The resulting blobs of DNA—which the team later copied with PCR and ran through an Illumina sequencer to retrieve the text—held around 650 kB of data in such a compact form that the team predicted a storage potential for their method of more than 700 terabytes per cubic millimeter.3 Not only did this result represent far and away the largest volume of data ever artificially encoded in DNA, it showcased a data density for DNA that was several orders of magnitude greater than that of state-of-the-art storage media, never mind the average computer hard drive. (For comparison, an 8-terabyte disk drive has the dimensions of a small book.)
DNA can store data at a density that is several orders of magnitude greater than that of state-of-the-art storage media, never mind the
average computer hard drive.
The study’s publication in late 2012 was met with excitement, and not only among biologists. In the years since Yokoo and Oshima’s discussion on extraterrestrial communiqués, the world of computing had started to acknowledge an impending crisis: humans are running out of space to store their data. “We are approaching limits with silicon-based technology,” explains Luis Ceze, a computer architect at the University of Washington in Seattle. Church’s paper, along with a similar study published a few months later by Nick Goldman’s group at the European Bioinformatics Institute, part of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Germany,4 brought the idea of using DNA for data storage squarely into the spotlight. For Ceze and his colleagues, “the closer we looked, the more it made sense that molecular storage is something that probably has a place in future computer systems.”
The idea of a nucleic acid–based archive of humanity’s burgeoning volume of information has drawn serious support in recent years, both from researchers across academic disciplines and from heavyweights in the tech industry. Last April, Microsoft made a deal with synthetic biology startup Twist Bioscience for 10 million long oligonucleotides for DNA data storage. “We see DNA being very useful for long-term archival applications,” Karin Strauss, a researcher at Microsoft and colleague of Ceze at Washington’s Molecular Information Systems Lab, tells The Scientist in an email. “Hospitals need to store all health information forever, research institutions have massive amounts of data from research projects, manufacturers want to store the data collected from millions of sensors in their products.”
With continued improvements in the volume of information that can be packed into DNA’s tiny structure—data can be stored at densities well into millions of gigabytes per gram—such a future doesn’t look so fanciful. As the costs of oligonucleotide synthesis and sequencing continue to fall, the challenge for researchers and companies will be to demonstrate that using DNA for storage, and maybe even other tasks currently carried out by electronic devices, is practical.
THE SCIENTIST STAFF
In theory, storing information in DNA is straightforward. Researchers synthesize their data into a series of oligonucleotide fragments by translating electronic data—typically written in binary digits, or bits, of zeros and ones—into DNA. As DNA has four bases, the molecule can potentially hold up to two bits per nucleotide, for example, by coding the sequences 00, 01, 10, 11 as A, T, C, G. The resulting fragments, which are usually labeled with an individual address sequence to aid reassembly, can be printed onto a microchip or kept in a test tube and stored somewhere cool, dark, and dry, such as a refrigerator. Recovering the information involves rehydrating the sample, amplifying the fragments using PCR, and then sequencing and reassembling the full nucleotide code. Provided the user knows the strategy employed to generate the DNA, she can then decode the original message.
In reality, though, DNA storage presents several practical challenges that are the focus of current research efforts. The greatest challenge remains the cost of reading and especially writing DNA. Although some companies, such as Twist, offer synthesis for less than 10 cents a base, writing significant volumes of data is still prohibitively expensive, notes EMBL’s Goldman. To take DNA data storage beyond proof-of-concept research, “I think we need five orders of magnitude improvement in the price of writing DNA,” he says. “It sounds overwhelming, but it’s not, if you’re used to working in genomics.” Church is similarly optimistic. “Things are moving pretty quickly,” he says. “I think it’s totally feasible.”
The researchers encoded and read out, error-free, more than 2 MB of compressed data—stored in 72,000 oligonucleotides—including a computer operating system, a movie, and an Amazon gift card.
A more technical challenge involves minimizing error—a problem familiar to anyone working with electronic equipment such as cell phones or computers. “In all of those [devices], there will be some errors at a certain rate, and you’ve got to do something to mitigate the errors,” Goldman explains. “There’s a trade-off between the error rates, how much correction you need, [and] processing costs. . . . Using DNA will be the same.”
Some of the errors in DNA data storage are similar to those in electronic media—data can go missing or be corrupted, for example. When reading DNA, “sometimes you simply miss a letter,” Goldman says. “You read ACT when it actually was ACGT.” One solution is to build in redundancy by writing and reading multiple copies of each oligonucleotide. But this approach inflates the price researchers are so desperate to bring down.
DNA also risks other types of errors that aren’t an issue with traditional data storage technology, such as those that arise due to the biochemical properties of the nucleic acid and the molecular machinery used to read and write it. (See “Designer DNA” here.) Sequences containing lots of G nucleotides are difficult to write, for example, because they often produce secondary structures that interfere with synthesis. And polymerase enzymes used in next-generation sequencing are known to “slip” along homopolymers—long sequences of the same nucleotide—resulting in inaccurate readouts. Encoding methods like Church’s that write just one bit per nucleotide can avoid problematic sequences—for example, by writing four zeros as an alternating sequence such as ACAC—but greatly reduce the maximum possible information density.
Researchers have explored multiple ways to circumvent these errors while still packing in as much information per nucleotide as possible. In his 2013 paper, published shortly after Church’s group encoded the synthetic-biology book into DNA, Goldman and his colleagues used a method called Huffman coding, which has also been adopted by several other labs, to convert their data into a trinary code, using the digits 0, 1, and 2, instead of just 0 and 1. To ensure that no base was used twice in a row, the digit that each DNA base encoded depended on the nucleotide that immediately preceded it. For example, A, C, and G were assigned to represent 0, 1, and 2 at the nucleotide immediately after a T, but following an A, the digits 0, 1, and 2 were encoded as C, G, and T. This strategy avoided the creation of any homopolymers while still making use of DNA’s four-base potential. Then, Goldman’s team synthesized oligonucleotides carrying 100 bases of data, with an overlap of 75 bases between adjacent fragments, so that each base was represented in four oligonucleotides. Even so, the researchers lost two 25-base stretches during sequencing, which had to be manually corrected before decoding.
More recently, labs have taken advantage of error-correction codes—techniques that add redundancy at specific points in a message to aid reconstruction later. In 2015, a group in Switzerland reported perfect retrieval of 83 kB of data encoded using a Reed-Solomon code, an error-correcting code used in CDs, DVDs, and some television broadcasting technologies.5 And earlier this year, Columbia University researchers Yaniv Erlich and Dina Zielenski published a method based on a fountain code, an error-correcting code used in video streaming. As part of their method, the pair used the code “to generate many possible oligos on the computer, and then [we screened] them in vitro for desired properties,” Erlich tells The Scientist in an email. Focusing only on sequences free of homopolymers and high G content, the researchers encoded and read out, error-free, more than 2 MB of compressed data—stored in 72,000 oligonucleotides—including a computer operating system, a movie, and an Amazon gift card.6
Along with the more recent development of specialized algorithms to handle the challenges of coding information in DNA specifically, these advances toward error-free DNA data storage and retrieval have helped broaden the appeal of the strategy. At the IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory this year, for example, “there was a whole session on coding for DNA storage,” notes University of Illinois computer scientist Olgica Milenkovic, who got involved in the field after reading Church’s 2012 paper and seeing the technology’s potential. “Coding theorists are getting very excited about it.”
© THE SCIENTIST STAFF
Error isn’t the only challenge facing those looking to store data in nucleic acids. Another problem is figuring out how to retrieve just part of the information stored in a system, what’s known in computing as “random access.” In electronics, Milenkovic explains, “every storage system has random access. If you’re on a CD, you have to be able to retrieve a certain song. You don’t want to go all the way through the disk until the song starts playing.” Many published DNA storage methods, though, require sequencing all the data at once—a costly and time-consuming approach for large archives.
A couple of years ago, Milenkovic’s lab came up with a solution: instead of using a single unique address sequence to tag each synthesized oligonucleotide, plus separate flanking sequences for PCR that were common across all the oligos in a sample—which meant all of them had to be amplified together—the team proposed just adding two unique sequences to every oligonucleotide, one at each end. By designing primers that were complementary to these unique sequences, the researchers could target PCR amplification to just one oligo of interest simply by adding the unique primers matching each of its flanking sequences.7 “It’s a way to selectively amplify only the sequences that you want,” explains Ceze, whose group independently developed a similar primer-based approach.8 The amplified oligonucleotide will “have high concentration compared to everything else, so when you take a random sample, you only get what you want, and then you sequence that.”
To demonstrate the technique’s potential, Milenkovic’s team encoded 17 kB of text into 32 1,000-base oligonucleotides, each carrying two unique 20-base addresses and 960 base pairs of data. The researchers then successfully amplified and sequenced three specific sequences from that pool. Ceze notes there’s potential to massively scale up the approach, provided primers are chosen carefully to avoid accidental amplification of off-target oligonucleotides. His group’s most recent work, a joint project with Microsoft’s Strauss, selectively amplified specific sequences from a DNA sample of more than 10 million oligonucleotides, a subset of 13 million oligos that stored 200 MB—more data than had ever been stored in DNA before.9
In addition to making information access faster and cheaper for future potential data-storage systems, these projects have brought computer scientists and biologists into closer collaboration to solve the biological and computational barriers to making DNA storage possible, Ceze says. “There is a little bit of language adjustment, and even different ways of thinking,” he acknowledges, but “the field is so exciting that I think it’s going to happen more and more.”
Thinking outside the box
Until recently, most research on ensuring the accuracy and accessibility of information written into nucleic acids has been framed under the assumption that data-storing DNA will be confined to one or a few central storage units—rather like the temperature-controlled Global Seed Vault—where information is only intended to be accessed infrequently. But there’s a push in the research community to consider a wider spectrum of possibilities. “People coming into this from the industry side are looking long-term,” says Goldman. “They’re definitely wanting to encourage discussion about making devices that are not just for rarely accessed, archival, backup copies of data.”
© SHANNON MAYWith more-frequent data access in mind, Milenkovic’s group has been working on making at least part of DNA storage systems portable. For data reading, “every solution so far has exclusively focused on Illumina sequencing,” she says. But “Illumina machines are exceptionally expensive,” not to mention bulky. “You wouldn’t want to carry one on your back when you want to read your data.” Instead, Milenkovic and her colleagues are using a newer technology, MinION—Oxford Nanopore’s handheld sequencer. Though error-prone, nanopore sequencing is fast and cheap, and Milenkovic’s group has devised error-correcting algorithms specifically for the kinds of mistakes the MinION makes. The result is an error-free read-out, demonstrated earlier this year when the team stored and sequenced around 3.6 kB of binary data coding for two compressed images (a Citizen Kane poster and a smiley face emoji).10
Other groups are working on combining DNA storage with different molecular technologies. Church’s lab, for example, envisages incorporating information capture into the DNA storage system itself. “I’m interested in making biological cameras that don’t have any electronic or mechanical components,” says Church. Instead, the information “goes straight into DNA.” The lab has been laying the groundwork for such a system with research using CRISPR genome-targeting technology in living bacterial cells, paired with Cas1 and Cas2 enzymes that add oligonucleotides into the genome in an ordered way, such that new integrations are upstream of older ones. This summer, the group reported recording a 2.6 kB GIF of a running horse in bacterial DNA by supplying the cells with an ordered sequence of synthetic oligonucleotide sets, one set coding for each of the five frames.11 “We turn the time axis into a DNA axis,” Church explains. The movie can then be “read” by lysing the bacteria, and sequencing and decoding the oligonucleotides.
SETH SHIPMANCombined with photosensitive elements that capture information in the first place—much like the tissues that allow animals to see or plants to photosynthesize—DNA recorders could archive audiovisual information all by themselves, Church suggests. “You could paint it up on walls, and if anything interesting happens, just scrape a little bit off and read it—it’s not that far off.” Plus, he adds, the information wouldn’t have to be of the audiovisual variety. “You could record biological events in your body,” Church says, noting that the team is currently working on developing an in vivo DNA recorder for neural activity. “We’d like to record essentially from all the neurons in the brain simultaneously—something that would be very difficult to do with electrodes.”
Meanwhile, researchers at the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) have announced a project to develop DNA storage in conjunction with molecular computing—a related area of research that performs operations through interactions between fragments of DNA and other biochemical molecules. DNA computers hold appeal because, to a greater extent than silicon-based computers, they could carry out many parallel computations as billions of molecules interact with each other simultaneously. In a statement this March, Anne Fischer, DARPA’s molecular informatics program manager, explained: “Fundamentally, we want to discover what it means to do ‘computing’ with a molecule in a way that takes all the bounds off of what we know, and lets us do something completely different.”
Right now, combining DNA storage and computing sounds a little ambitious to some in the field. “It’s going to be pretty hard,” says Milenkovic. “We’re still not there with simple storage, never mind trying to couple it with computing.” Columbia’s Erlich also expressed skepticism. “In storage, we leverage DNA properties that have been developed over three billion years of evolution, such as durability and miniaturization,” Erlich says. “However, DNA is not known for its great computation speed.” But Ceze, whose group is currently researching applications of DNA computing and storage, notes that one solution might be a hybrid electronic-molecular design. “Some things we can do with electronics can’t be beaten with molecules,” he says. “But you can do some things in molecular form much better than in electronics. We want to perform part of the computation directly in chemical form, and part in electronics.”
Whatever the future of DNA in these more complex technologies, such projects are a testament to the perceived potential of molecular data storage—and an indicator of just how much the field has progressed in a very short period of time. Just five years ago, Church recalls feeling “a little skeptical” about how his team’s first DNA storage study would be received by the scientific community. “We were just trying to show what was possible,” he says. “I wasn’t sure people were going to take it seriously.” Now, with his lab just one of many research groups aiming to make DNA part of the future of data storage, it appears that his concerns were unfounded.
- F. Sanger et al., “Nucleotide sequence of bacteriophage φX174 DNA,” Nature, 265:687-95, 1977.
- H. Yokoo, T. Oshima, “Is bacteriophage phi X174 DNA a message from an extraterrestrial intelligence?” Icarus, 38:148-53, 1979.
- G.M. Church et al., “Next-generation digital information storage in DNA,” Science, 337:1628-29, 2012.
- N. Goldman et al., “Towards practical, high-capacity, low-maintenance information storage in synthesized DNA,” Nature, 494:77-80, 2013.
- R.N. Grass et al., “Robust chemical preservation of digital information on DNA in silica with error-correcting codes,” Angew Chem Int Ed, 54:2552-55, 2015.
- Y. Erlich, D. Zielinski, “DNA Fountain enables a robust and efficient storage architecture,” Science, 355:950-54, 2017.
- S.M.H.T. Yazdi et al., “A rewritable, random-access DNA-based storage system,” Sci Rep, 5:14138, 2015.
- J. Bornholt et al., “A DNA-based archival storage system,” ASPLOS ’16, 637-49, 2016.
- L. Organick et al., “Scaling up DNA data storage and random access retrieval,” bioRxiv, doi:10.1101/114553, 2017.
- S.M.H.T. Yazdi et al., “Portable and error-free DNA-based storage,” Sci Rep, 7:5011, 2017.
- S.L. Shipman et al., “CRISPR-Cas encoding of a digital movie into the genomes of a population of living bacteria,” Nature, doi:10.1038/nature23017, 2017. | <urn:uuid:9ff7adbb-7029-47ef-a5e7-3698ecfc658d> | {
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Aftershocks from Saturday's 5.6-magnitude earthquake in Oklahoma are likely to continue for weeks or even months, the U.S. Geological Survey says, but rattled residents can expect them to decrease in intensity.
The USGS says dozens of aftershocks from the temblor, and a 4.7-magnitude foreshock, have been recorded since the 5.6 quake hit at 10:53 CT Saturday night.
The Oklahoma Geological Survey says the quake was the largest ever to strike in the state, topping a 5.5-magnitude temblor that struck on April 9, 1952.
Saturday's quake was centered about four miles east of Sparks, in Lincoln County, Oklahoma. The USGS says on its website that it has not been able to determine what fault line the quake occurred on, but scientists are focusing on the Wilzetta fault, which they describe as one of a series of small faults that formed in the area about 300 million years ago. If the Wilzetta fault did rupture Saturday, it would be the first time a surface-rupturing quake has been recorded on it.
All previous surface-rupturing quakes in Oklahoma have occurred on the Meers fault, in the south-central portion of the state, the USGS says.
Damage from Saturday's quake was slight, with The Oklahoman newspaper reporting minor damage to 12 homes and a buckling of U.S. Highway 62 near the epicenter in Lincoln County.
But the quake was anything but minor to one couple whose home sits near the epicenter. The chimney of Joe and Mary Reneau's home came crashing through their roof in Prague, Oklahoma, CNN affiliate KJRH-TV reported.
"Wham! It wasn't just a sudden bang,‚ÄĚ Joe Reneau told KJRH. ‚ÄúThis house was rocking and rolling."
But it wasn't just people that the quake stirred up. Birds and bugs were so rattled that they took to flight in massive numbers, enough to show up the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's weather radar, CNN affiliate KTUL-TV reported. Check out the radar images here. | <urn:uuid:fc53c6b5-caca-4b84-9dfe-9acae1203638> | {
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Here’s something I didn’t know about. Radio geeks and hobby audio enthusiasts use PCB copper cladding material to fabricate handsome project chassis. The main method of assembly is soldering. In this PDF tutorial from QRP Builder, a small chassis for a radio transceiver is built, cut from a 24″ X 36″ piece of Grade G-10/FR4 Copper-Clad Garolite sheet, clad both sides, 1/16″ thick (from McMaster Carr). There are some really good tips in this article about building such project boxes and making sure the results are sturdy and handsome.
Fabricating a chassis from clad PCB board material [PDF, 1.6MB] | <urn:uuid:3bb44a11-0fe7-4f25-8e00-0cc62ba23168> | {
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A new study from K-State researchers documents the extensive
environmental damage that dredging causes to the Kansas River. Listen to these
preliminary findings (and remember to email your public comment by December
- The scientists have documented riverbed incision in dredged
reaches, which is most likely also causing excessive bank erosion both upstream
and downstream of dredge sites.
- Private in-channel dredging operations on sand bed rivers
like the Kansas River cause deepening and widening of the channel and
accelerate erosion of the banks. As a result, dredging lowers the water level
of the river and the adjacent water table in the floodplain.
- This creates the risk for harm to public river uses (such as
water treatment facilities, municipal wells, bridge footings, etc.) as well as
to fish communities throughout the watershed, including endangered species.
The Army Corps of Engineers is considering a proposal from
five private dredging companies to increase dredging on the Kaw close to 50%,
from 2.2 million tons to 3.2 million tons. Make your comments by this Friday, December 9, 2011. It’s easy - see instructions and a
Personal comments are always preferred but just making a
comment is the most important action – you can even add personal comments to
the sample letter. Make it your holiday gift to the Kaw!
MORE ON THE STUDY:
nonprofit conservation group Friends of the Kaw (FOK) recently interviewed
Daniels for its public comment to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The study was
funded by the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks (KDWP) and carried out by
Kansas State University researchers Melinda Daniels and Craig Paukert. The
final study results will be released in late December.
“If you take 3.2 million tons from the river bottom, then
the river will take 3.2 million tons from the riverbanks, trying to balance the
sediment load in the system,” Daniels said. “That’s the simple physics of how
water works in river channels to transport sediment. Any riparian owner should
be worried, particularly farmers with unforested river banks next to their
fields. So should anyone with a water intake pipe or a creek in their
backyard. The effects of
in-channel dredging will propagate both upstream and downstream from the dredge
site until a hard control point, like a dam or a bedrock outcrop, is
reached. That means up tributary
streams as well as the main river.”
Daniels surveyed major dredge holes on the Kansas River with
a sophisticated new measuring technology, an acoustic Doppler instrument that
mapped river channel topography and measured water velocity. The researchers
discovered that while the Kansas River averages four to five feet deep, active
dredge holes can measure up to forty feet deep.
The researchers also discovered that these deep dredge holes
can migrate up and down river - sometimes very rapidly, depending on water
conditions. Even during small flow increases, researchers documented the
upslope lip of a dredge hole traveling upstream.
“People used to think the dredge holes just filled up, but
now we know they don’t. The holes first cause erosion upstream and downstream
and then eventually do fill in, but not before causing a net loss of sediment
from the bed and banks of the channel, meaning the channel does not simply go
back to its original state,” Daniels said. “If there’s no bedrock, or physical
structure like the Bowersock Dam to stop them, those dredge holes cause channel
erosion that will keep on going through the entire river network. Their effects
can even travel up the tributaries.” Unless a bridge footing or other
engineering infrastructure in the river is armored, then the migrating hole
could erode that physical structure as well.
The technical term for this river phenomenon is a “migrating
head cut.” Here’s how it works:
The Kansas River is a sand bed river. Sand is a light
sediment, and water transports it easily. When dredgers excavate into the
riverbed, that hole creates a steep wall (or head cut) where the river depth
suddenly increases. Water rushes rapidly over that wall, gaining speed and
picking up sand from the upstream edge.
At the same time, some sand falls into the hole. The water passing over
the hole then picks up new sediment downstream, causing erosion there as
well. The hole starts to expand,
both upstream and downstream.
Part of the dredging proposal before the Army Corps is to
re-open a closed dredge site above Topeka. The Army Corps previously shut down
the site, operated by Meier’s Ready Mix, due to unacceptable bed
“Whatever happens above Topeka will eventually migrate
upstream through the entire network, stopping only at the bases of Tuttle Creek
and Milford and other dams,” said Daniels. “It could happen quickly, within one
to two years. Dredging incisions set up cascading environmental effects – bed
degradation, riverbanks become unstable and steep from accelerated erosion,
etc. Change happens very quickly on a sand bed river.”
Over time, repeated dredging deepens and widens the river by
removing sediment from the system. The result is that the river bottom lowers,
too, along with the water level. This can leave the intakes for water treatment
plants stranded. Dredging on the
Missouri River has been scaled back recently because of similar problems
propagating into the lower Kansas River and other tributaries to the Missouri.
When the river deepens, the water table in the floodplain
lowers. Daniels said that this creates the potential for less water storage,
which could affect the many municipal wells along the river. A lower water
table also affects river vegetation and forests. For example, the cottonwood –
the state tree of Kansas – can’t survive unless its roots can reach a good
The deep dredge holes may affect fish populations, too. “The river’s physical habitat is
significantly different between dredged and un-dredged areas,” noted Daniels.
However, dredging’s most major environmental impacts for
fish are not limited to the Kaw. Since migrating head cuts can also affect
river tributaries, Daniels said the K-State study raises questions about risks
to the habitat of endangered species (like the Topeka Shiner) that live in
these smaller streams.
Daniels said that knowledge of the environmental impacts of
dredging is incomplete without studying dredging’s impacts on the entire Kansas
“We need a new environmental impact study that considers the
impacts of dredging on fish that live in the tributaries as well,” said
Daniels. Right now, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is depending on an
environmental impact statement (EIS) dating from 1991.
Before Daniels and Paukert carried out their study, the
effect of sand and gravel dredging on the Kansas River had not been seriously
studied. This study was the first time such sophisticated measuring technology
has been used.
“The Army Corps has studied similar conditions with sand
dredging on the Missouri River,” said Daniels. “They are aware of the problems,
and if dredging is a problem for the Missouri River, then it’s going to be a
problem for the Kansas River.
Simply shifting the problem from the Missouri to the Kansas is not a
How fast will the dredge holes move? Water movement on the
Kaw is greatly influenced by how much water the Army Corps releases from
upstream reservoirs. Extreme rains plus reservoir releases can add a lot of
extra velocity to the Kansas River system. In some circumstances, this may mean
the dredge holes have the potential for very rapid movement.
Daniels is seeking additional funding for a second phase of
the study, to model dredge hole migrations under different flow regimes.
You can help.
Send a public comment to the Army Corps on the dredging
proposal by emailing [email protected] by December 9, 2011.
More information and public comment template can be found at Friends of the Kaw's web site | <urn:uuid:f59bbad1-5e06-4adf-88b9-daf182a7aa80> | {
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Anniebell Marrngamarrnga is a Kuninjku woman from Maningrida, in western Central Arnhem Land. Her moiety is Yirritja and subsection Bangardidjan. In her work Marrngamarrnga frequently depicts animals such as the crocodile that lives at Kubumi, and most often the yawkyawk spirit.
In the Kuninjku/Kunwok language of Western Arnhem Land yawkyawk means ‘young woman’ and ‘young woman spirit being’. The Kuninjku people have various yawkyawk stories, which
relate to specific locations in clan estates. Yawkyawk are female water spirits who live in freshwater streams and rock pools, and are usually described and depicted in bark painting, sculpture and some rock art, as having the tail of a fish and long hair (associated with trailing green algae, man-bak in Kuninjku). There are interesting parallels with the European (and other) mythology around mermaids.
In Kuninjku mythology the creation ancestor yawkyawk travelled the country in human form and changed into spirit form as a result of ancestral adventures. Certain features of country are equated by the Kuninjku with body parts of yawkyawk, for example, a bend in a river or creek may be said to be the tail of the yawkyawk or a billabong may be said to be its head. Like much ancestral and creation mythology the yawkyawk stories link clans and language groups across country.
The people of Arnhem Land are well known for their beautiful fibre objects, which are an important part of everyday and ceremonies. The fibre art of Maningrida is some of the finest in Australia; its forms and techniques have been around for many thousand of years and that knowledge has been passed down through generations. Some of the distinctive fibre objects of the Arnhem Land region are coiled baskets, dilly and string bags, fish traps and mats, most of which are made by Aboriginal women.
The activity of making fibre objects is a very social one, involving women and children in the community. The most commonly used fibre is the pandanus (Pandanus spiralis).For weaving, the only part of the pandanus collected is the new leaf growth found at the top of the tree, which is only in season at certain times of the year, usually during and several months after the monsoon season. The natural dyes used are collected from the roots, leaves, berries and barks of local flora. The process of collecting fibres and native dyes, and then dyeing and drying the fibres takes days.
Marrngamarrnga uses a combination of colour and pattern in her work, often featuring reds, purples, oranges and white to create contrasting patterns and shapes that complement the woven form. The yawkyawks begin as a bamboo frame with strips of pandanus leaves finely woven from the outside in, until segment by segment the body and features are created. Many of Marrngamarrnga’s forms are quite large, demanding much time and skill.
Marrngamarrnga’s fibre art is innovative, playful and stunning. Her woven sculptures breathe new life into the rich traditions of her Kuninjku culture, bringing it to a world audience.
Information on yawkyawk stories from Murray Garde and Christine Kellor, provided by Apolline Kohen, Maningrida Arts and Culture, 2007. | <urn:uuid:c9689868-577a-4ee2-999b-600ff97d26e5> | {
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Background: Using questionnaires to assess children’s residential exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) may result in misclassification from recall and response bias. Questionnaire data have frequently been validated against urinary cotinine measurements, but rarely against actual measurements of residential air nicotine.
Objective: To compare questionnaire reported smoking with air nicotine concentrations in a large population of children and with urinary cotinine levels in a subpopulation; and to assess the potential impact of the symptom status of the children on the agreement between different measures of exposure.
Methods: The authors assessed residential exposure to ETS in 347 German, 335 Dutch, and 354 Swedish preschool and schoolchildren by questionnaire and air nicotine measurements, and in a subset of 307 German children by urinary cotinine measurements. They then compared the different measures of ETS exposure.
Results: In all countries, air nicotine concentrations increased with increasing questionnaire reported smoking in a dose-response fashion. Specificity and negative predictive values of questionnaire reports for nicotine concentrations were excellent. Sensitivity and positive predictive values were moderate to good. Excluding occasional smokers, the overall percentage of homes misclassified was 6.9%, 6.7%, and 5.1% in Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden, respectively. Similar results were found for the agreement of urinary cotinine concentrations with questionnaire reports and air nicotine levels. There was no indication of underreporting by parents of symptomatic children.
Conclusion: Despite some misclassification, questionnaire reports are an inexpensive and valid estimate of residential ETS exposure among preschool and school children.
- ETS, environmental tobacco smoke
- LOD, limit of detection
- environmental tobacco smoke
- air nicotine
- urinary cotinine
Statistics from Altmetric.com
The evidence for health hazards associated with exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) has been extensively reviewed.1–5 Children have been identified to be particularly sensitive: ETS exposure is associated with an increased risk of lower respiratory tract infections; increased prevalence of fluid in the middle ear, symptoms of upper respiratory tract irritation; reduction in lung function; new cases of asthma, and additional episodes and increased severity of symptoms in children with asthma.1,2
In epidemiological studies, exposure to ETS is most frequently assessed by questionnaire reports,6 less often by measurements of biomarkers, such as urinary nicotine and its metabolite, cotinine, in body fluids,1,2 and rarely by passive monitors.7–9 All these methods have assets and drawbacks and cover somewhat different aspects of exposure. Questionnaires represent an inexpensive method to assess long term exposures as well as short term exposures experienced by study participants at different locations. However, using questionnaires may result in misclassification from recall bias and response bias due to awareness of the hypothesis or parents’ feelings of guilt for smoking in the presence of their children. Passive monitors can be used for stationary or personal monitoring of short term exposures. While stationary monitoring provides a measure of exposure in one specific environment (for example, an individual’s home), personal monitoring provides an integrated measure of exposure across a number of environments, but does not provide information on exposure in individual environments. Urinary cotinine is used as a measure of the internal dose of a subject and (like personal monitoring) provides an integrated measure of exposure experienced across different environments. Its half-life time makes it a good indicator of integrated exposure over the previous day or two.1
Within the AIRALLERG study we investigated the agreement between questionnaire reported smoking and air nicotine concentrations measured in the living rooms of more than 1000 German, Dutch, and Swedish (pre)school children. We compared questionnaire reports and air nicotine levels with urinary cotinine concentrations in the German subpopulation.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Study design and study population
The AIRALLERG study was designed as a nested case-control study within four ongoing birth cohort studies: GINI10 and LISA11 in Germany, PIAMA in the Netherlands,12 and BAMSE in Sweden.13 In each country, approximately 180 children with and 180 children without sensitisation to common food and inhalant allergens at age 2–4 years were selected.
Between January 2002 and May 2003 in each country approximately 360 children were visited twice, mostly in the cold season of the year (mid October to mid April). Median (minimum-maximum) age of the children at the home visit was 5 (3–7), 5 (4–6), and 7 (5–9) years in Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden. Data collection included measurements of air nicotine, collection of questionnaire information on smoking and housing characteristics, and collection of urine samples (Germany only). Response rates (defined as the number of children who were eligible for the study, were invited to participate and agreed to home visits) were 81%, 77%, and 59% in Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden. The study was introduced to parents as a study on indoor allergens and air pollution, without mentioning nicotine or ETS.
Measurements of air nicotine concentrations
Air nicotine concentrations were measured for approximately two weeks in the living rooms of the participants’ homes with passive monitors described earlier.14 Trained fieldworkers installed monitors during the first home visit and removed them during the second home visit. Ninety six per cent, 88%, and 95% of the measurement periods in Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden were 14 (±2) days long; measurement periods ranged from 11–20, 7–29, and 9–22 days, respectively. All monitors were prepared at Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA and analysed at the University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA. For calculation of the limit of detection, field blanks were taken in approximately 20 randomly selected homes per country. The limit of detection (LOD) defined as three times the standard deviation of these blanks was 0.08 μg/m3. Values below the LOD were assigned a value 2/3×LOD.
Questionnaire information on smoking
The same standardised questionnaire was used in all three countries. Parents were asked to report the number of days during the measurement period on which household members and visitors had smoked in the living room along with the number of cigarettes, cigars, and pipes. In addition, parents in Germany were asked to report smoking of household members and visitors in the child’s home during the 24 hours prior to urine sampling. Moreover, from all four cohorts data on residential ETS exposure at the child’s age 4 are available. Questions on smoking in the child’s home from the 4-year questionnaires differ between cohorts with regard to the persons and the time they refer to (BAMSE, current smoking of household members; GINI, any smoking in the child’s home during the past 12 months; LISA, any smoking in the child’s home during the past two years; PIAMA, current smoking of household members and other persons); and in contrast to the questions for the measurement period, they refer to the child’s home in general and not to the living room specifically.
Measurements of urinary cotinine concentrations
Measurements of urinary cotinine were performed in the German centre only. If possible, morning urine was collected on the last day of the two week measurement period and stored frozen until analysis. Cotinine levels were measured with a reverse phase high performance liquid chromatography method with ultraviolet detection described earlier.15 In some cases high performance liquid chromatography extracts were re-extracted in ethyl acetate and measured by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry. The LOD was 2 ng/ml. Creatinine was measured by auto-analyser using an enzymatic colour reaction and cotinine concentrations were expressed as μg/g creatinine. Values below the LOD were assigned a value 2/3 the lowest observed detectable value.
Questionnaire reported smoking during the measurement period and during the 24 hours prior to urine sampling was classified into four categories (none, occasionally, ⩽5 cigarettes daily, and >5 cigarettes daily) and three categories (none, ⩽5 cigarettes, and >5 cigarettes), respectively. Since smoking of cigars and pipes was rare (n = 5 homes in total), we combined data on cigarettes, cigars, and pipes. One cigar was equated to four cigarettes according to Boffetta et al;16 one pipe to one cigarette. Agreement between different measures of exposure is presented as sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value, and percentage misclassified. Air nicotine and urinary cotinine concentrations were divided into two categories using the limit of quantification (LOQ = the smallest concentration that can reliably be quantified, defined as three times the LOD) as cut-off for air nicotine and the LOD as cut-off for urinary cotinine.
Air nicotine concentrations and questionnaire reported smoking during the measurement period were available for 347, 335, and 354 German, Dutch, and Swedish homes. The comparison of urinary cotinine concentrations with questionnaire reported smoking and air nicotine was based on data from 307 German children.
Questionnaire reported smoking and housing characteristics
Country specific prevalence and amount of smoking during the measurement period, during the 24 hours prior to urine sampling and when the child was 4 years old, along with some housing characteristics, are presented in table 1. For the majority of homes no smoking in the living room was reported for the measurement period. In homes with reports of smoking, it was usually the household members (with and without visitors) who smoked. Smoking visitors in non-smokers’ homes were rare except for the Netherlands. Smoking during the measurement period and smoking during 24 hours prior to urine sampling were in agreement for 91% of the homes. Smoking was more often reported in the regular cohort questionnaires at age 4 years compared to the measurement period. However, prevalences cannot be compared directly since 4-year questionnaires refer to smoking anywhere in the child’s home while measurement period questionnaires refer to the living rooms only. In addition, smoking by persons other than household members was not included in the Swedish 4-year questionnaires. Nevertheless, the two questionnaires were in agreement for more than 80% of the homes (table 2). In the Dutch cohort agreement was much better for household members (94%) compared to guests (81%), which is in line with the 10% of homes for which the amount of smoking during the measurement period was reported to be higher than normal.
Air nicotine concentrations and questionnaire reported smoking
Air nicotine concentrations ranged from <LOD (73%, 79%, and 89%) to 14.3 μg/m3, 10.2 μg/m3, and 3.2 μg/m3 in Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden. Percentage of homes with air nicotine concentrations >LOQ was 13%, 11%, and 3%. Figure 1 shows that air nicotine concentrations increase with questionnaire reported amounts of smoking (median nicotine concentrations were: <LOD, 0.18 μg/m3, 0.59 μg/m3, and 1.37 μg/m3 in Germany; <LOD, <LOD, 0.25 μg/m3 and 0.65 μg/m3 in the Netherlands; <LOD in Sweden). Air nicotine concentrations were much higher in Germany compared to the Netherlands and Sweden. Results remained unchanged when we excluded families that had been away from home for more than two days during the measurement period (n = 40, 28, and 47 in Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden).
The agreement between questionnaire reports of smoking and air nicotine concentrations is presented in table 3. In Germany and the Netherlands, sensitivity and positive predictive value were fair to good indicating some misclassification. However, nicotine levels in living rooms without reports of smoking were generally low. In both countries, positive predictive value increased when homes with occasional reports of smoking were excluded. In Sweden, sensitivity and positive predictive value were poor. However, they should be interpreted very carefully due to the small number of children with questionnaire reported smoking. Specificity and negative predictive value were larger than 90% in all three countries (except for the Netherlands and any smoking)—that is, almost all homes with non-quantifiable air nicotine concentrations were reported to be non-smoking homes and almost all non-smoking homes had air nicotine concentrations below the limit of quantification. Percentages of homes misclassified were low. Data on residential ETS exposure collected with the standard cohort questionnaires when the children were 4 years old performed only slightly worse than smoking during the measurement period.
Urinary cotinine concentrations and questionnaire reported smoking and air nicotine
Urinary cotinine concentrations ranged from <LOD (83.1%) to 74.6 μg/g creatinine. Questionnaire reported smoking and urinary cotinine levels match very well: median cotinine concentrations were highest in children from homes with reports of more than five cigarettes daily (median concentrations were: <LOD, 1.5, 3.5, and 5.8 μg/g creatinine, respectively; fig 2). The difference in cotinine levels between children with and without reports of smoking during 24 hours prior to urine sampling was less pronounced (<LOD v 3.3 μg/g creatinine). The results remained unchanged when we excluded families that had been away from home for more than two days during the measurement period. Median cotinine concentrations were highest in children from homes with air nicotine concentrations >LOQ.
The agreement between questionnaire reported smoking, air nicotine, and urinary cotinine concentrations is presented in table 3. Again, sensitivities were moderate, positive predictive values were fair to good, and specificities and negative predictive values were very good. Thus, there was a considerable percentage of children with detectable urinary cotinine concentrations who had no reports of smoking, and there were some (but fewer) children with questionnaire reports of smoking who had urinary cotinine levels <LOD. The agreement with urinary cotinine concentrations was somewhat better for smoking during the measurement period compared to smoking during the 24 hours prior to urine sampling and smoking reported at age 4 years. There was a considerable percentage of children with detectable urinary cotinine concentrations who had air nicotine levels ⩽LOQ and children with air nicotine levels >LOQ who had urinary cotinine levels above the limit of detection. Percentages of children misclassified were low for questionnaire reported smoking and somewhat higher for air nicotine.
Assessment of the impact of the symptom status of the children
Parents of asthmatic children might be more likely to underreport smoking than parents of non-asthmatic children. We tested this hypothesis by excluding symptomatics (that is, children with a diagnosis of asthma or symptoms of wheeze and nocturnal dry cough without a cold during the past 12 months when they were 4 years old; 23%, 38%, and 26% in Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden, respectively) from the analysis. Sensitivities did not increase (data not shown).
Air nicotine concentrations and urinary cotinine concentrations increased with increasing amounts of questionnaire reported smoking in a dose-response fashion. Specificity and negative predictive values of questionnaire reports for nicotine and cotinine concentrations were excellent. Sensitivity and positive predictive values were moderate to good indicating some misclassification. A similar agreement was found between air nicotine concentrations and urinary cotinine levels. There was no indication of a systematic underreporting by parents of symptomatic children.
Air nicotine concentrations measured in the present study were comparable to concentrations that have been reported from a Dutch17 and a US study,18 but air nicotine concentrations in the homes of smokers who smoked more than five cigarettes daily (median 1.37 and 0.65 μg/m3) were somewhat lower then concentrations that have been reported from a Korean study (median = 3.23 μg/m3 for homes where six or more cigarettes were smoked daily)19 and another US study (geometric mean = 0.66 μg/m3 for homes without smoking restrictions).20 Within the present study we also found differences in air nicotine concentrations between countries: median air nicotine concentrations in German homes were approximately twice as high as air nicotine concentrations in Dutch homes. We hypothesise that the higher percentage of open kitchens in the Netherlands—by itself and via differences in ventilation habits and the use of ventilation appliances—is at least partly responsible for this difference. Furthermore, Dutch living rooms were somewhat bigger than German living rooms, which might also result in lower air nicotine concentrations per cubic meter of air associated with the same amount of smoking. Ventilation (windows opened frequently during measurement period) was significantly associated with air nicotine concentrations in Germany and the Netherlands (data not shown). However, the number of homes with reports of smoking or air nicotine concentrations above the limit of quantification was too small for a stratified analysis by ventilation. Statistically significant associations were not found between air nicotine concentrations and the presence of an open kitchen and the volume of the living room in Germany and the Netherlands. In Sweden, the number of homes with reports of smoking was too small to allow any further investigation.
Previous studies on the validity of questionnaire reported smoking show different results. Some authors found strong associations between air nicotine concentrations and questionnaire reported smoking,7,17,21 whereas others indicated an underreporting.22,23 In the present study, there was a clear dose-response relation between questionnaire reported smoking and air nicotine concentrations. However, sensitivity of the questionnaire was only fair to good—that is, no smoking was reported by questionnaire for a considerable percentage of homes with air nicotine concentrations above the limit of quantification. The reason for this could be either underreporting out of guilt or denial, or smoking outside the home (for example, on the balcony), which was found to reduce ETS exposure but does not completely protect the home from exposure.18 The same probably holds for smoking in rooms other than the living room. Neighbours’ smoking might be another source of nicotine for people living in apartment buildings. Although we did not ask parents about smoking on the balcony (which is frequently attached to the living room) or in rooms other than the living room, several families reported this to our field workers without being asked. All cohorts collected questionnaire information on smoking anywhere in the child’s home around the child’s fourth birthday, which we assume to be a valid estimate of the child’s residential ETS exposure. We compared this information with the information collected within the present study and found moderate to good agreements in Germany and the Netherlands. Agreement in the Netherlands increased considerably when smoking was restricted to household members and then was in agreement with previous findings.17 Potential explanations are that there were by coincidence more smoking visitors during the AIRALLERG measurement period than normal (in line with the 10% of homes for which smoking during the measurement period was reported to be more than normal; table 1) or that people tend to underestimate guests’ smoking when they are asked about it in general, whereas they remember smoking visitors very well when asked about a two week period. Agreement in Sweden was found to be poor indicating that Swedish parents do smoke, but not in the living room. This might explain at least part of the extremely low sensitivity and positive predictive value. We tested this hypothesis by using age-four information on residential ETS exposure in Sweden. This resulted in a considerably higher sensitivity, but the positive predictive value remained poor. The fact that not only sensitivities but also positive predictive values were not very good in Germany and the Netherlands argues against exclusive underreporting. Likewise does the fact that prevalence of questionnaire reported smoking was the same magnitude as prevalence of air nicotine concentrations above the limit of quantification (Germany 12% v 13%, Sweden 3% v 3%) or larger (Netherlands 25% v 11%) argue against exclusive underreporting. The overall percentage of homes misclassified has been found to be low, but these figures must be interpreted carefully. They are strongly influenced by the large number of unexposed children, which are correctly classified as unexposed by either method of exposure assessment. Percentages of homes misclassified would be much higher in populations with higher prevalence of smoking (and the same sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values).
Urinary cotinine is frequently used as a biomarker for nicotine intake.24 Urinary cotinine levels in children with questionnaire reported ETS exposure in the present study were in agreement with the levels reported by Matt et al18 for children with indirect exposure and much lower than the levels reported for children with direct exposure. However, no information about the direct or indirect nature of exposure is available for the present study. Due to its half-life, it is considered to be a good indicator of recent exposure.1 The present study indicates however that urinary cotinine concentrations somewhat better reflect daily exposure to ETS during a 14 day measurement period than smoking during the 24 hours prior to urine sampling. Although urinary cotinine provides an integrated measure of exposure experienced by a subject across a number of micro-environments (that is, that it reflects more than domestic ETS exposure), the agreement between urinary cotinine concentrations and questionnaire reports of smoking and air nicotine measurements was good. Information on ETS exposure experienced outside the home might improve this agreement.25 No information on exposure outside the child’s home was collected within the present study. However, we do have questionnaire information from the original German cohort studies, which indicates that exposure outside the child’s home is uncommon (only 3.4% were exposed at least once a week at age 4 years).
Avoidance of misclassification is a major concern in epidemiological studies, in particular avoidance of differential misclassification—that is, misclassification associated with the outcome under study that can result in systematic over- or underestimation (or even reversal) of health effects. Differential misclassification by questionnaire reported smoking was reported by Clark et al22 who found that parents of asthmatic children were more likely to underreport smoking than parents of non-asthmatic children. We tested this hypothesis by excluding symptomatic children, but sensitivities did not increase. As the present study was introduced to parents as a study on indoor allergens and air pollution, without mentioning nicotine or ETS, we believe that results were not influenced by the parents’ potential concern with ETS exposure. Although there might be some underestimation of the child’s ETS exposure by using questionnaire information, we think that there is a sufficiently good agreement between questionnaire reports of smoking, air nicotine, and urinary cotinine concentrations to justify the use of questionnaires to assess ETS exposure. Moreover, using questionnaires is less time consuming and less costly than measuring air nicotine or urinary cotinine. In particular in large studies and/or studies of children’s health in populations with a known low prevalence of smoking, measuring urinary cotinine or air nicotine means spending considerable amounts of time and money to measure large numbers of values below the limit of detection. However, measuring air nicotine instead of or complementary to questionnaires might be useful in settings where there is concern about biases in ETS exposures as reported by the study participants and a more objective marker of ETS exposure is needed, or if exposure to ETS is the main exposure variable and therefore a more accurate exposure assessment is desired. In the present study, air nicotine has been measured as part of a fixed measurement programme including air nicotine and other exposures. If we had performed a study on nicotine and questionnaire reported ETS only, we would have enriched our study population (based on prior knowledge) with children living in smokers’ households. Furthermore, response rates were lower for urine samples compared to questionnaires (almost everyone answered our questions on smoking, compared to urine samples obtained from 89% of the children). Urinary cotinine is the only biomarker that has been measured in the present study. It is one of the most widely used biomarkers; due to its short half-life it only reflects recent exposure. However, there are others such as hair nicotine or plasma and saliva cotinine, which have not been included in the present study. For a review of these methods see Benowitz24 and Jaakkola et al.6
Comparisons of smoking prevalences between the present study and the general population are limited, because questions asked in the AIRALLERG study were very specific referring to ETS exposure at the participants’ homes or, even more specifically, the participants’ living rooms. No such data are available for the general population. In a recent German national survey, 32–39% of adults aged 30–44 years living together with a partner and children reported to be current smokers.26 Figures for the Netherlands are very similar (see http://www.stivoro.nl/cijfers.html). In Sweden, 6% of 6 year old children were reported to have a daily ETS exposure (Bellander, personal communication). However, due to the difference in questions asked, it is not clear how these percentages compare to the percentages reported from the present study. No significant difference in prevalence of parental reported smoking was found between symptomatic and non-symptomatic children. We therefore do not expect our data to be influenced by the children’s health status. In all countries, the prevalence of ETS exposure decreases with increasing educational level. As parents with a high level of education are overrepresented among the participants of the present study, the percentages found in the present study are most likely lower than those in the general population.
Questionnaire reports are an inexpensive and valid estimate of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure among preschool and school children.
Epidemiological studies using questionnaires to assess exposure to ETS are suitable to assess the impact of ETS on the respiratory health of children.
Despite some misclassification, questionnaire reports are an inexpensive and valid estimate of ETS exposure among preschool and school children.
We are indebted to all scientists and technical staff involved in the planning and conduction of the AIRALLERG study and the BAMSE, GINI, LISA, PIAMA birth cohort studies.
Published Online First 15 August 2006
The AIRALLERG study was funded within the European Union Quality of Life and Management of Living Resources Program, Key action Environment and Health (Proposal No QLK4-2000-00073). Ulrike Gehring was supported by a post-doc fellowship of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).
Competing interests: none.
If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways. | <urn:uuid:a00f2924-da5a-404a-8adc-bf178d1ceecb> | {
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active learning and practicing的用法和样例：
- Project Learning will be promoted to cultivate active learning, which lays the foundation of life-long learning and helps develop multiple intelligences.
- The essence of the teaching method of elicitation initiated by Confucius stresses the combination of students active learning and teacher s timely tutoring.
- Even the slowest person on the playground can become a fast runner by learning and practicing running techniques.
- ELFA believes that every child is a naturally active learner and explorer. | <urn:uuid:f7c18cc3-ed9c-4be1-a5fb-386ccda382e8> | {
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All About Glass
All About Glass
This is your resource for exploring various topics in glass: delve deeper with this collection of articles, multimedia, and virtual books all about glass. Content is frequently added to the area, so check back for new items. If you have a topic you'd like to see covered, send us your suggestion. If you have a specific question, Ask a Librarian at our Rakow Research Library.
Listen as John Fox, director of the Corning Glass Center in 1972, recalls an attempted rescue of a Venetian dragon-stem goblet, which at the time was believed to be a rare 16th century piece. The effort was unsuccessful. It was impossible to get into the case without damaging the goblet, and Fox
Listen as Joe Maio and William Warmus talk about the clean up efforts after the flood. The Flood of '72: Community, Collections, and Conservation chronicles the determination of Museum staff and the community to rebuild, and sheds light on the unique conservation techniques that were used to
On June 23, 1972, Corning, New York and the surrounding communities were devastated by a major flood, as a result of the tropical storm Agnes. At The Corning Museum of Glass, hundreds of objects were broken, more than half of the Library's materials were saturated with flood water, and the
"Our goal was to overcome defeatism before it ever had a chance to set in, and to provide encouragement for the stricken people of the community," declared Dr. Robert H. Brill, director of the Museum during the post-flood restoration period. The Flood of '72: Community, Collections, | <urn:uuid:93f1e270-7664-4c8a-8891-4b5a1acf7464> | {
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Scrofula is a
Causes, incidence, and risk factors
Scrofula in adults is most often caused by the bacteria Mycobacterium tuberculosis. In children, can also be caused by Mycobacterium scrofulaceum or Mycobacterium avium.
Infection with mycobacteria is usually caused by breathing in air that is contaminated by these organisms.
- Fevers (rare)
swelling of lymph nodesin the neck and elsewhere in body
- Sores (ulceration -- rare)
Signs and tests
Tests to diagnose scrofula include:
- Biopsy of affected tissue
- Chest x-rays
- CT scan of the neck
- Cultures to check for the bacteria in tissue samples taken from the lymph nodes
- HIV blood test
- Other tests for TB
When infection is caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis, treatment usually involves 9 - 12 months of antibiotics. Several antibiotics need to be used at once. Common antibiotics for scrofula include:
- Isoniazid (INH)
When infection is caused by another type of mycobacteria (which often occurs in children), treatment usually involves antibiotics such as rifampin, ethambutol, and clarithromycin.
Surgery is sometimes used first. It may also be used if medications are not working.
With treatment, patients usually make a complete recovery.
- Draining sore in the neck
Calling your health care provider
Call your health care provider if your child has a swelling or group of swellings in the neck. Scrofula can occur in children who have not been exposed to someone with tuberculosis.
People who have been exposed to someone with tuberculosis of the lungs should have a PPD test.
Ellner JJ. Tuberculosis. In: Goldman L, Schafer AI, eds. Cecil Medicine. 24th ed. Philadelphia, Pa: Saunders Elsevier; 2011:chap 332.
Fitzgerald DW, Sterling TR, Haas DW. Mycobacterium tuberculosis. In: Mandell GL, Bennett JE, Dolin R, eds. Principles and Practice of Infectious Diseases. 7th ed. Philadelphia, Pa: Elsevier Churchill Livingstone; 2009:chap 250.
David C. Dugdale, III, MD, Professor of Medicine, Division of General Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine. Jatin M. Vyas, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor in Medicine, Harvard Medical School; Assistant in Medicine, Division of Infectious Disease, Department of Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital. Also reviewed by David Zieve, MD, MHA, Medical Director, A.D.A.M. Health Solutions, Ebix, Inc. | <urn:uuid:05a824f3-3a49-4712-906d-38c59cdaffee> | {
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Researchers have uncovered the world's oldest known tattooist's kit - and among the most startling conclusions is that two of the four tattooing tools found are made from human bone.
The intricate, multi-toothed tattooing tools were found on Tongatapu Island - Tonga's main island.
Radiocarbon dating found them to be around 2,700 years old, making them the oldest confirmed tattooing combs found in Oceania.
The presence of a likely ink pot originally discovered with the tools in 1963, which was documented at the time but is now missing, also makes the find the oldest complete tattooing kit to be discovered anywhere in the world.
Associate Professor Geoffrey Clark of The Australian National University (ANU) School of Culture, History & Language said the discovery sheds further light on the long-running debate about where Polynesian style tattooing first developed.
"These bone tattoo combs are a very specific type of technology found across Oceania," Associate Professor Clark said.
"The question has always been were these tools introduced to the Pacific through migration, or were they developed in Polynesia where we know tattooing has a very prominent role in society and spread from there.
"This discovery pushes back the date of Polynesian tattooing right back to the beginnings of Polynesian cultures around 2,700 years ago."
The tools themselves have seen very little change in almost 3000 years, with traditional tattooing equipment still used in the Pacific near identical to the ancient examples.
Dr Michelle Langley, from Griffith's Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution, said the discovery of early tattooing implements is exceptionally rare.
"To find an entire kit is phenomenal. We very rarely find a whole kit of any type of tools in the archaeological record," Dr Langley said.
"These artefacts show that the modern tattooist toolkit - one-piece narrow combs, haft, mallet, carbon pigment, mortar, pestle, and ink-holding vessel - were in use 2,700 years ago in West Polynesia.
"The kit most likely belonged to one tattoo artist. One tool was broken and it looks like it was being repaired, so perhaps the kit was accidentally left behind or was too broken to bother salvaging. Perhaps the tattooist was given a new set.
"The actual tool itself - the comb shape and the way it's used - hasn't changed much, and that's why this find is so interesting. These ancient tools continue to be used today."
The ancient tattooist's kit was excavated on Tongatapu by Dr Jens Poulsen, then of ANU. The entire kit was feared to have been destroyed during the 2003 Canberra bushfires.
While the tattooing combs were found safe and unharmed, the ink pot has not been recovered.
A/Prof. Clark and Dr Langley, who are the first researchers to minutely study and date the kit, said the four tattooing tools are made from bone - two from a large seabird and two from large mammals.
"As there were no other mammals of that size on the island at the time, and human bone is known to be a preferred material for making tattooing combs, we believe they are most likely made from human bone," Dr Langley said.
"Tattooing combs like these are important for making the complex linear designs famous in Oceania.
"Tattooing is very important in the Pacific. When Christian missionaries came through and banned tattooing on certain islands, people would travel to other islands to get their tattoos as they represented important aspects of their beliefs and traditions."
The oldest evidence for tattooed skin goes back more than 5000 years to the age of mummies in Egypt and the Italian iceman Otzi, but the tattooing tools in these places are largely unknown.
The article, Ancient tattooing in Polynesia, has been published in the Journal of Island & Coastal Archaeology (JICA). | <urn:uuid:f722cb08-6d89-427d-8063-f5fcdaa69cb7> | {
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You are probably aware of the many benefits massage offers to your physical health, including soothing sore muscles, helping you recover from injury faster, and easing headaches. Just look to professional athletes to see how massage can have a positive impact on your body. But did you know that massage actually offers many benefits for your mental health? Whether you have a mental health condition or not, everyone can enjoy the mental benefits of massage.
Cortisol is the stress hormone. People who experience a lot of stress have elevated levels of cortisol. High cortisol levels are associated with several mental health conditions, including anxiety and depression. If your hormones are imbalanced, you may be experiencing some unpleasant effects on your mental health. Massage has been associated with a 31 percent decrease in cortisol levels, suggesting that if you have issues with this hormone, massage may be able to help you.
Boosts Serotonin and Dopamine
Massage is beneficial to mental health because it has shown to boost serotonin and dopamine. These two neurotransmitters are essential to mood regulation and are sometimes known as the “happy hormones.” People who suffer from depression and anxiety are low in these chemicals. If you have either of these mental health disorders or simply have been feeling low recently, a massage may be just what you need to elevate your mood.
Everyone experiences stress. While this is a normal part of life, chronic stress has a detrimental impact on your health long-term. If you work in a high-stress job or experience stress on a daily basis, it’s important to take steps to relieve it. A massage is a great way to address the physical symptoms of stress, which include tension, headaches, joint pain, and insomnia.
Lowers Blood Pressure
Speaking of stress, it’s common for people with chronic stress to experience hypertension or high blood pressure. High blood pressure is an issue because it increases your risk of heart attack and stroke and contributes to a variety of different health conditions. Massage is a great supplement to treating low blood pressure because it has been shown to lower blood pressure temporarily.
Improves Sleep Quality
Poor sleep is correlated with poor mental health. Anyone who has spent a night tossing and turning and tried to get up and act cheery the next day knows the impact sleep problems have on your mental wellbeing. Poor sleep has been linked to anxiety, depression, paranoia, and even hallucinations.
Sleep is essential for our bodies to heal and repair, so if you aren’t getting adequate sleep, you just can’t function at your best. Massage helps you sleep by promoting muscle relaxation and stress reduction, which allows you to let go of any physical or mental tension and drift to dreamland with ease.
If you’re looking for a massage in Chelsea, Unique Threading Salon would be happy to help! We have professional and experienced massage therapists on staff who can give you the ayurvedic massage you need to improve your mental wellbeing. Contact us today to schedule an appointment! | <urn:uuid:6d9fd14a-239f-4b6e-8eff-b99c3374a7fa> | {
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- Wednesday | 31st July, 2019
- Wednesday | 24th July, 2019
- Tuesday | 23rd July, 2019
- Wednesday | 17th July, 2019
- Tuesday | 25th June, 2019
A team of researchers from IIT Guwahati has come up with tissue-engineered meat in their laboratory which is equally nutritious and tasty.
The increased consumption and demand for non-veg food has led to the rise in greenhouse gas emission and cruelty towards animals. What if all these can be avoided and you can still eat nutritious and equally tasty meat.
A team of researchers from IIT Guwahati has come up with tissue-engineered meat in their laboratory which is equally nutritious and tasty. Team of Biman B Mandal, an associate professor of the department of biosciences and bioengineering, has also received a patent for production for consumption.
"Here muscle progenitor cells isolated from animals via small biopsies are grown on edible material base. Fat cells, cartilage cells or bone cells can be grown in conjunction with the muscle stem cells in different layers and is now being tried out. These tissue-engineered meat are being cultured and grown in inexpensive culture media recently developed and patented in our laboratory," said a statement issued by the team.
It said that the method can be manipulated depending on whether the consumer demands lean and fatty meat product or a solid dry meat product to be available in various shapes and sizes.
"Daily edible components are being used to make the support matrix in order to increase the nutrient content. At the penultimate stage, bioreactors will be used for large scale production of this product to achieve a yield of approximately 100 chickens from one chicken," it said.
They claimed that usage of external chemicals like hormones, animal serum, growth factors or antibiotics have also been restricted making it safe on ethical concerns.
"The lab-grown meat will have immense value in the Indian as well as the foreign market as it is nutritious and can be tuned for the high in demand needs of fast-food joints. Since our affordable meat production is expected to mimic natural meat in terms of taste, appearance, nutritive values, and will prevent slaughtering of animals, the same can cater to the growing demands of our country in the future," it said.
Stating that the meat industry was facing tremendous pressure to meet the growing demand, the researchers said, "Around 4000 litre of water are required to produce 1 kg chicken meat and more than 8,000 litres of water are required to produce just 1 kg of mutton. The livestock industry also contributes to wastewater and more greenhouse gas emissions than all of the world’s transport combined. Moreover, billions of animals are killed each year for meat. The lab-grown meat will open new vistas towards cruelty-free food thereby saving the environment as well as the animals."
The story was originally published in deccanherald
Your support to NYOOOZ will help us to continue create and publish news for and from smaller cities, which also need equal voice as much as citizens living in bigger cities have through mainstream media organizations. | <urn:uuid:62548553-bcda-46b0-8daf-dac816a9474c> | {
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In a video shared by the Random Acts of Kindness Foundation, Dr. Dan Seigel explores the adolescent brain and offers insight to dispel common, disempowering myths about teen development. Learn more about the Random Acts of Kindness Foundation here.
Sleep is essential to proper brain functioning. When the brain is asleep the brain is not resting. (Medina) Sleep is one of the most important ways we integrate memory and emotion. Dreams occur when the sophisticated area of our brain is uninhibited enough to allow the lower areas of the brain to run wild with[…] | <urn:uuid:856efcdc-d9fa-4795-b9c7-b18aecb6aab4> | {
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Strategies used by public secondary schools in managing students indiscipline in Kilifi District, Kilifi county, Kenya
Orek, Francis Ouma
MetadataShow full item record
The trend of student unrest has evolved from simple protest to destruction of property sometimes even deaths. While the present situation raises concerns internationally and nationally it is not yet beyond control and effective measures can restore a normal attitude among students and the young generation. On the other hand failure to take effective steps at this stage can only lead to a national disaster because the upheavals in today's society such as corruption, immorality, poor methods of governance insecurity and political instability are to be blamed on indiscipline. It is therefore important to have strategic management of students' indiscipline. Chapter one gave the background of the study. It included the purpose of the study which was to investigate strategies used by public secondary schools in management of students' indiscipline Kilifi District, Kilifi County in Kenya .The study objectives were to identify the strategies used by schools to manage students' indiscipline in Kilifi District, Kilifi County and the success of these strategies in view of the causes of indiscipline. In the Conceptual framework, scientific formulation, organization, implementation, evaluation and control of strategies improve student discipline. Assumption of the study was that strategies being used, .lack professional, scientific and technical approach hence weakness that need to be checked. Chapter two had Literature review to the study that covered concepts related to strategies, causes of indiscipline, effects of indiscipline and strategies used by schools in managing students' indiscipline. This offered comparatively secondary source of information for the actual study. Chapter three provided for-the research methodology. The research design used to conduct the study was descriptive survey which probed the current status of students' indiscipline and strategies used in managing students' indiscipline. The study population included 30 public secondary schools, 30 head teachers, 30 deputy head teachers 2706 teachers and 9604 students in Kilifi County. The study sample included 10 schools 10 head teachers, 50 teachers and 140 students selected using random sampling method. Questionnaires for teachers, students and questionnaires for head teachers were administered. In chapter four provided for data analysis, presentation and discussion. the responses weretallied manually, analyzed using SPSS and other computer· software. The results were Presented using descriptive tables. Chapter five provided the summary of the findings, conclusions and recommendations. The research found out that teachers stayed longer in the institutions than the head teachers and that most schools a majority being mixed day and boarding had experienced student strike. Majority of the total number of teacher and head teachers agreed that they had limited skills to manage student indiscipline. Most of the schools used non-collaborative methods such as punishment instead of collaborative methods such as partnership with students' barazas among others. | <urn:uuid:db90ac8a-fd61-4a44-b7de-30eec1ce2d07> | {
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Jawahar Lal Nehru Issues (India & Foreign)
Jawaharlal Nehru - India's first Prime Minister and the founder of almost all aspects of its modern growth. Jawaharlal Nehru was a multi-feceted personality. Loved by the people of India as a patriot and tireless fighter for freedom, he symbolised the newly emerging forces which have served to transform our age. Nehru was the foremost disciple of Mahatma Gandhi and translated the Mahatma's philosophy into a concrete plan of action for the independence of India. When this was achieved in 1947, Nehru served the nation for 17 years as its Prime Minister. | <urn:uuid:dc3c5013-925f-4ebc-88d2-09f96aac230c> | {
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In memory of Erica-Irene Daes
Dr. Erica-Irene Daes, an academic, diplomat, UN independent expert and strong human rights defender, was undoubtedly one of the main protagonists in the significant progress achieved over the last four decades in relation to recognising Indigenous Peoples as subjects of international law. She passed away the 12th of February, 2017.
Erica Daes was a member of the UN Sub-Commission on the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights and Chair of the Working Group on Indigenous Populations (1984-2001). As UN expert and Chairperson of the first mechanism established by the UN to consider the human rights situation of Indigenous Peoples, she was one of the main drivers behind the development of an international standard for the protection of the rights of Indigenous Peoples and the full inclusion of Indigenous Peoples into UN processes related to their rights.
Under her mandate, the Working Group on Indigenous Populations became the gateway for hundreds of indigenous representatives, who were able to participate in its annual sessions in Geneva and become the main catalyst in recognising and protecting the rights of Indigenous Peoples within the UN system. As Chair of the Working Group, she played a major role in developing the draft United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. For the first time in the UN’s history, the elaboration of an international legal norm enjoyed the full and active participation of the subjects of the rights themselves: Indigenous Peoples.
In addition, during her 18 years as expert and Chair / Rapporteur of the Working Group, Dr. Daes was the author of numerous studies and reports that have been fundamental in developing the legal argumentation behind the rights of Indigenous Peoples.
The UN recognised her outstanding work by awarding her the United Nations Human Rights Prize in 1993.
Erica-Irene Daes and her work with IWGIA
IWGIA also had the privilege of working with Dr. Daes on her book "Indigenous Peoples - Keepers of our past, custodians of our future”
. The book, published by IWGIA in 2008, is a personal account of her experience. As she herself points out in the preamble to the book, this work comes from the depths of her heart, collects together her own experiences on the diversity of indigenous cultures and celebrates the enormous contribution of Indigenous Peoples to our civilisation. The book is undoubtedly a unique testimony, a historical and human memory, which she dedicated to all indigenous representatives whom she had had the honour and privilege to know, to visit and to work with.
Erica Daes leaves us with a legacy of great legal value to all defenders of the rights of indigenous peoples in her numerous studies, reports, contributions to academic publications, etc. But she also leaves us with an example to follow, proof that courage, perseverance, commitment and humanity in the cause of the world's Indigenous Peoples are just as necessary and valuable as the first.
Rest in peace, dear Erica!
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Officials at Niskayuna High School are riding the green wave with the focus on implementing energy-efficient technology upgrades. Its new eco-friendly geothermal heating system, an alternative to fossil-fuel boilers, is expected to reduce the district's reliance on fossil fuels as energy costs and environmental concerns grow.
The installation of a new geothermal heating system began in October as part of the district's $94.5 million facilities project, approved by voters in January 2006, and on Friday, May 2, lead architect Garrett Hamlin of the Thomas Group, and project manager George Weingartner of Sabo-Rubin Services, conducted a tour of the geothermal well field outside the high school for school and town officials.
Attending the tour were Kevin Baughman, superintendent of schools; Matt Bourgeois, business superintendent of schools; and Bill Lee and Jim Burgess, chairman and vice chairman of the town's environmental committee.
Baughman said the benefits of the eco-friendly system go beyond the savings.
In addition to saving energy, I will use the geothermal system as a teaching tool for the high school students, said Baughman. "They will learn about the new trends in energy conservation."
Bourgeois said original estimates for the system, which is more expensive than a conventional boiler, put the predicted payback at only seven years.
"That was when the project was proposed and when energy was much less costly than it is now so the actual payback should be shorter," said Bourgeois.
Joe Miranda, vice president of ADT, the company drilling the required holes from which geo-thermal energy is extracted, explained the construction and use of the wells.
"Each well contains the water piping, and we encapsulate the tubes in grout with a high thermal conductivity," said Miranda.
A total of 300 wells will be drilled. In October, crews began drilling the wells, each 400 feet deep. To date, the process is 90 percent complete. Meanwhile, installation of the network piping is approximately 40 percent complete. The geothermal heating system is expected to begin phasing in later this year as renovations are completed in other areas of the high school. | <urn:uuid:c720f68e-1d8c-469d-a0e4-e8bfdd1c249c> | {
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|TAF >> Teaching Materials >> Online Publications|
|PART I Myself & the Neighborhood|
|Myself & Neighborhood|
|The Mail Carrier|
|Let Your Fingers Do the Walking|
|The Sign Walk|
|Who I Am|
|Baking Bread with the Little Red Hen|
|PART II Exploring Systems|
|What's in a Thumb|
|Parts of You|
|Puzzles Are Systems|
|How Many Systems Do I Belong To Right Now|
|PART III Communicating with Others|
|Talking with our hands|
|Lullabies link people|
|PART IV Myself and the Larger World|
|Move, Feet, Move|
|The Challenge of the Desert|
|Planning a Park|
|TV or Not TV|
|Missing the Point|
|Who Likes Animals|
|A Simple Chocolate Bar|
TO MYSELF AND OTHERS
The activities here are divided into those for primary grades (Part 1) and intermediate grades, (Part 4). Parts 2 and 3 provide connecting links with activities that can be used at practically all grade levels. You can best decide which materials fit your needs and the learning readiness of your students.
All the materials have been tested in classrooms in various parts of the country. The development process has reflected the reactions of teachers and students and appropriate changes have been made. We have included here only those activities that have proved engaging for children while also providing important learning experiences.
Much of that learning will be familiar, and development of basic skills is always an aim. The goals of this material areöto provide experiences that will better prepare children for the kind of society and world they will be living in.
With the lessons
in Part 3, children will begin to see that interconnections and human
commonalities extend to people throughout the world, not just people in
their immediate surroundings. They will learn some ways people everywhere
communicate with each other and help meet one another's need for affection
and a sense of belonging.
It is probably better
to use the activities of any one part in a sequential order; later activities
often build on earlier ones. However, teachers have been successful in
using selected materials in random patterns, fitting them in where they
meet the needs of their classrooms.
I Myself and the Neighborhood
II Exploring Systems
In simplest terms,
students will become aware of systems as things or groups made up of interconnected
and mutually dependent parts. If one part fails to function properly,
the whole system will be affected. This seems like an easy idea÷and it
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A new Constitution of the People's Republic of China was adopted in 1982, and amendments were made in 1988 and again in 1993.
(Adopted at the Fifth Session of the Fifth National People’s Congress and Promulgated for Implementation by the Proclamation of the National People’s Congress on December 4, 1982.)
China is a country with one of the longest histories in the world. The people of all of China's nationalities have jointly created a culture of grandeur and have a glorious revolutionary tradition.
After 1840, feudal China was gradually turned into a semi-colonial and semi-feudal country. The Chinese people waged many successive heroic struggles for national independence and liberation and for democracy and freedom.
Great and earthshaking historical changes have taken place in China in the 20th century.
The Revolution of 1911, led by Dr. Sun Yat-sen, abolished the feudal monarchy and gave birth to the Republic of China. But the historic mission of the Chinese people to overthrow imperialism and feudalism remained unaccomplished.
After waging protracted and arduous struggles, armed and otherwise, along a zigzag course, the Chinese people of all nationalities led by the Communist Party of China with Chairman Mao Zedong as its leader ultimately, in 1949, overthrew the rule of imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat-capitalism, won a great victory in the New-Democratic Revolution and founded the People's Republic of China. Since then the Chinese people have taken control of state power and become masters of the country.
After founding the People's Republic, China gradually achieved its transition from a New-Democratic to a socialist society. The socialist transformation of the private ownership of the means of production has been completed, the system of exploitation of man by man abolished and the socialist system established. The people's democratic dictatorship held by the working class and based on the alliance of workers and peasants, which is in essence the dictatorship of the proletariat, has been consolidated and developed. The Chinese people and the Chinese People's Liberation Army have defeated imperialist and hegemonist aggression, sabotage and armed provocations and have thereby safeguarded China's national independence and security and strengthened its national defense. Major successes have been achieved in economic development. An independent and relatively comprehensive socialist system of industry has basically been established. There has been a marked increase in agricultural production. Significant advances have been made in educational, scientific and cultural undertakings, while education in socialist ideology has produced noteworthy results. The life of the people has improved considerably.
Both the victory in China's New-Democratic Revolution and the successes in its socialist cause have been achieved by the Chinese people of all nationalities, under the leadership of the Communist Party of China and the guidance of Marxism and Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought, by upholding truth, correcting errors and surmounting numerous difficulties and hardships. The basic task of the nation in the years to come is to concentrate its effort on socialist modernization. Under the leadership of the Communist Party of China and the guidance of Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought, the Chinese people of all nationalities will continue to adhere to the people's democratic dictatorship and the socialist road, steadily improve socialist institutions, develop socialist democracy, improve the socialist legal system, and work hard and self-reliantly to modernize the country's industry, agriculture, national defense and science and technology step by step to turn China into a socialist country with a high level of culture and democracy.
The exploiting classes as such have been abolished in our country. However, class struggle will continue to exist within certain bounds for a long time to come. The Chinese people must fight against those forces and elements, both at home and abroad, that are hostile to China's socialist system and try to undermine it.
Taiwan is part of the sacred territory of the People's Republic of China. It is the inviolable duty of all Chinese people, including our compatriots in Taiwan, to accomplish the great task of reunifying the motherland.
In building socialism it is essential to rely on workers, peasants and intellectuals and to unite all forces that can be united. In the long years of revolution and construction, there has been formed under the leadership of the Communist Party of China a broad patriotic united front which is composed of the democratic parties and people's organizations and which embraces all socialist working people, all patriots who support socialism and all patriots who stand for the reunification of the motherland. This united front will continue to be consolidated and developed. The Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, a broadly based representative organization of the united front which has played a significant historical role, will play a still more important role in the country's political and social life, in promoting friendship with other countries and in the struggle for socialist modernization and for the reunification and unity of the country.
The People's Republic of China is a unitary multi-national state created jointly by the people of all its nationalities. Socialist relations of equality, unity and mutual assistance have been established among the nationalities and will continue to be strengthened. In the struggle to safeguard the unity of the nationalities, it is necessary to combat big-nation chauvinism, mainly Han chauvinism, and to combat local national chauvinism. The state will do its utmost to promote the common prosperity of all the nationalities.
China's achievements in revolution and construction are inseparable from the support of the people of the world. The future of China is closely linked to the future of the world. China consistently carries out an independent foreign policy and adheres to the five principles of mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, mutual non-aggression, non-interference in each other's internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful coexistence in developing diplomatic relations and economic and cultural exchanges with other countries. China consistently opposes imperialism, hegemonism and colonialism, works to strengthen unity with people of other countries, supports the oppressed nations and the developing countries in their just struggle to win and preserve national independence and develop national economies, and strives to safeguard world peace and promote the cause of human progress.
This Constitution, in legal form, affirms the achievements of the struggles of the Chinese people of all nationalities and defines the basic system and basic tasks of the state; it is the fundamental law of the state and has supreme legal authority. The people of all nationalities, all state organs, the armed forces, all political parties and public organizations and all enterprises and institutions in the country must take the Constitution as the basic standard of conduct, and they have the duty to uphold the dignity of the Constitution and ensure its implementation. | <urn:uuid:60979716-77c7-4d40-8cd7-92b8086b956e> | {
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Health Highlights: May 23, 2017
Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by the editors of HealthDay:
Dozens of Genes Linked to Intelligence Identified by Scientists
Scientists who identified 52 genes associated with human intelligence say their findings could help improve understanding of our thinking abilities and lead to improved treatment of learning disorders.
The findings, made by analyzing the DNA of 80,000 people of European descent, appear in the journal Nature Genetics.
The team of American and European researchers said these genes do not determine intelligence. Combined, the genes account for a small amount of the variation in intelligence test scores, with each gene affecting I.Q. by only a small fraction of a point, The New York Times reported.
It's likely there are thousands more genes that play a role in intelligence, according to the scientists, who added that environment also has a major impact on intelligence.
However, experts say identification of these 52 genes could lead to new experiments into the biological roots of intelligence, and may even help identify the best methods of helping children who are struggling to learn, The New York Times reported.
The study authors said they focused on people of European descent because it improved their chances of pinpointing common genetic variants associated with intelligence. But different genetic variants are important in different groups of people, and that may be the case with intelligence.
"If you try to predict height using the genes we've identified in Europeans in Africans, you'd predict all Africans are five inches shorter than Europeans, which isn't true," study senior author Danielle Posthuma, a geneticist at Vrije University Amsterdam in the Netherlands, told The Times.
It's unclear what the 52 genes actually do. Four are known to control the development of cells, and three do a variety. of things inside neurons.
Experiments on brain cells may help shed light on what makes these genes special. For example, one possibility is to test cells from people with variants that predict high and low intelligence.
The cells could be prompted to develop into neurons, leading to the creation of neuron clusters -- or "mini-brains" -- that could be tested to determine if their genetic differences make them behave differently, The Times reported.
© 2019 HealthDay. All rights reserved.
Posted: May 2017 | <urn:uuid:820eca55-0ec1-4dea-a03d-c8b20fde4f53> | {
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The Blue River is a high quality stream in the cave country of far southern Indiana. The watershed for the Blue River is 620 square miles and drains portions of seven counties.
The Blue River is an Outstanding State Water Resource designated by Indiana's DNR Division of Outdoor Recreation. This status is afforded to less than 10% of all river miles in the state. A vibrant canoe livery exists on the river and many people canoe, kayak and swim in the Blue River. It is also an excellent smallmouth bass fishery.
A spring-fed river, the Blue has cool water that is oxygen-rich for fish and other aquatic animals. The Nature Conservancy works to conserve clean water because numerous plants and animals love their Blue River home and we want to keep them there.
Hellbender salamanders love Blue River and have inspired a 5K, the Hellbender Hustle, to raise awareness of their need for clean water. Purdue University has a large research project focused on increasing the Blue River’s hellbender population.
Darters love Blue River for its oxygen-rich riffles, which canoeists call “white water”. These riffles create the perfect feeding grounds for darters.
Short’s goldenrod exists in only two places in the entire world, and the Blue River is one of those places. It grows from the cracks of limestone that line the river banks.
Freshwater mussels can filter over 30 liters of water a day! They clean the water as they filter, but also depend upon water with the right algae content to nourish themselves. The Blue River supports more than 20 mussel species, with colorful names like elephantear and three-horned wartyback.
Bats use the Blue River corridor to feed. They like the open “highway” along the river that is sheltered by a tree canopy above them. Blue River’s good water yields lots of flying insects that emerge in the summer coinciding with the time baby bats are born.
The sinkhole plain that drains to Blue River plays an important role in water quality. What enters a sinkhole eventually enters the Blue River.
Northern cavefish live in some cave streams that feed into Blue River. The Nature Conservancy recently assisted the Indiana Karst Conservancy in purchasing a portion of the Shawnee Cave system that has Indiana’s most significant Northern cavefish population.
The Nature Conservancy has helped Blue River by planting over half a million trees in the watershed, partnering with cities and counties to improve wastewater handling, helping private landowners manage their forest land for sustainable timber production and by continuing to purchase special natural areas. | <urn:uuid:a77381df-e71f-4939-97cc-5ac58de20603> | {
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Large Hadron Collider Begins Second Run
University of Maryland Researchers Continue Search for New Particles, including Dark Matter Particle
The world’s most powerful particle accelerator is about to begin its second act. After two years of upgrades and repairs, proton beams are once again circulating around the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), located at the CERN laboratory near Geneva, Switzerland.
During the LHC’s second run, University of Maryland physicists will continue looking for new particles, including those that make up dark matter. Although the nature of dark matter and its counterpart, dark energy, remain a complete mystery, taken together they make up a total of around 95 percent of the universe.
The signature that will indicate the dark matter particle is known as missing transverse energy. UMD physicists are very familiar with this measurement, as they are a leading institution in the missing transverse energy group of the LHC’s Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) detector. And they already have a head start: during the first LHC run, UMD’s Sarah Eno managed a group that produced three dark matter search results.
UMD physicists will also harness the LHC to investigate the origin of matter-antimatter asymmetry in the universe. When the Big Bang created matter, it also created an equal quantity of antimatter, made up of particles with identical mass but an opposite electrical charge. For as-yet unknown reasons, antimatter is no longer common in the universe, but can be recreated in particle accelerators such as the LHC.
UMD’s Hassan Jawahery leads a group that will use the LHCb detector to study the “beauty” or “bottom” quark— hence the “b” in the detector’s name. The goal is to also produce and detect the antimatter counterpart to the beauty quark. Comparing the properties of these two complementary particles could reveal laws of nature that treat matter and antimatter differently.
During the LHC’s second run, particles will collide at a staggering 13 teraelectronvolts (TeV), which is 60 percent higher than any accelerator has achieved before. Higher energy collisions produce more particles and a greater number of heavy particles. This essentially allows researchers to look further back in time by creating a “soup” of interacting particles that could mimic the conditions of the universe just milliseconds after the Big Bang. University of Maryland chemists will study these heavy ion collisions during Run 2.
Several key members of the University of Maryland LHC team are available to comment on their work and the broader context of the LHC’s second run:
- Drew Baden, physics department chair and professor
- Alberto Belloni, physics assistant professor
- Sarah Eno, physics professor
- Nicholas Hadley, physics professor
- Hassan Jawahery, Distinguished University Professor of Physics and Gus T. Zorn Professor
- Alice Mignerey, chemistry and biochemistry professor
Last minute repairs delayed the run’s start date, but it restarted on April 5, 2015. The UMD team is available for comment at any time.
Media Relations Contact: Abby Robinson, 301-405-5845, [email protected]
About the College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences
The College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences at the University of Maryland educates more than 7,000 future scientific leaders in its undergraduate and graduate programs each year. The college's 10 departments and more than a dozen interdisciplinary research centers foster scientific discovery with annual sponsored research funding exceeding $150 million. | <urn:uuid:8ef20f02-0dea-43b0-91b1-b0907f9eb112> | {
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Could the answer to providing internet to everyone around the world be as simple as balloons? Simple doesn’t actually have anything to do with it, but Google has announced “Project Loon“, which aims to bring connectivity to the 2 out of 3 people around the world who have never had access to this transformational technology.
“We believe that it might actually be possible to build a ring of balloons, flying around the globe on the stratospheric winds, that provides Internet access to the earth below. It’s very early days, but we’ve built a system that uses balloons, carried by the wind at altitudes twice as high as commercial planes, to beam Internet access to the ground at speeds similar to today’s 3G networks or faster. As a result, we hope balloons could become an option for connecting rural, remote, and underserved areas, and for helping with communications after natural disasters. The idea may sound a bit crazy—and that’s part of the reason we’re calling it Project Loon—but there’s solid science behind it.” | <urn:uuid:71caecfe-5e1e-43d1-b4e2-ea7aea792821> | {
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Manage and Maintain Physical and Logical Devices
These questions are based on 70-290 – Managing and Maintaining a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Environment
Self Test Software Practice Test
Objective: Manage and maintain physical and logical devices.
Sub-objective: Troubleshoot server hardware devices.
Single answer, multiple-choice
You are a network administrator for your company. A Windows Server 2003 computer named SQL1 runs SQL Server 2000 and hosts a database with customer data. All hard disks on SQL1 are dynamic disks. Database files are located on a RAID-5 volume, and transaction logs are located on a mirrored volume. Employees access the database through a custom client application.
SQL1 experiences a catastrophic hardware failure. After analyzing the nature of the failure, you discover that repairing the failed computer would not be cost-efficient. The hard disks have not been damaged, and no data loss has occurred. You have a spare computer, and you decide to use it instead of the failed computer. You install Windows Server 2003 and SQL Server 2000 on the new computer, and then you move the disks that host the RAID-5 volume with the customer database files and the disks that host the mirrored volume with the transaction log files to the new computer. You must ensure that users can access the customer database without making any changes to the client application.
What should you do next?
- Reactivate the disks.
- Repair the disks.
- Import the foreign disks.
- Initialize the disks.
C. Import the foreign disks.
To ensure users can access the customer database without making any changes to the configuration of the client application, you should assign the new computer the same name as that of the failed computer. When dynamic disks are moved between computers, the volumes on those disks usually retain their original drive letters. However, the disks that have been moved from the failed computer in this scenario have a different signature than the existing disks on the new computer. Therefore, the moved disks will be marked as foreign disks, and the volumes on those disks will not be accessible. To make the volumes with the database and transaction log files accessible on the new computer, you should import the foreign disks. Note that all of the disks that constitute a multi-disk volume should be moved between computers and imported at the same time. Otherwise, the volume will not function properly.
You would need to reactivate an existing disk if the disk became temporarily unavailable due to a transient hardware problem or data corruption. Disks cannot be repaired; only RAID-5 volumes can. For example, if one of the disks in a RAID-5 volume failed and there was sufficient unallocated space on another disk, then you could repair the volume by replacing the RAID-5 region on the failed disk with another region, which would be automatically created in the unallocated space. When a new disk is added to a computer, it is necessary to initialize it before you can start using the new disk. Initializing involves writing a master boot record and a signature on the new disk. In this scenario, the disks that host the customer database are not new; they already contain a signature.
Windows Server 2003 Online Help, Contents, “Disks and Data,” “Managing Disks and Volumes,” “Disk Management,” “Concepts,” “Understanding Disk Management,” “The Disk Management Window.”
Windows Server 2003 Online Help, Contents, “Disks and Data,” “Managing Disks and Volumes,” “Disk Management,” “How To…,” “Manage Disks,” “Move disks to another computer.”
Windows Server 2003 Online Help, Contents, “Disks and Data,” “Managing Disks and Volumes,” “Disk Management,” “Troubleshooting.” | <urn:uuid:fd801399-225f-4bf8-9eb2-3dc08abe0645> | {
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Asha Layne, PhD
Thuggin verb; adj.
1. Either living or pretending to live a criminalistic lifestyle,
2. The behavior of a thug (violent criminal).
As violence hit the streets of Baltimore City following the funeral services of Freddie Gray it became impossible to ignore the barrage of media coverage. From local Baltimore news outlets like Channel 13and FOX 45 to eponymous CNN, the world saw protests and riots throughout West Baltimore as citizens responded to the racial and social injustices that are too common for American cities. At the forefront were the voices and actions of young individuals who showed the world through action that they were going to be heard by any means – love it or hate it. In the wake of these riots, many interpretations circulated of these actions and were condensed into one word: ‘thugs.’ By definition, a thug is a violent criminal, and when used as a form of action, ‘thuggin’ becomes a behavior that mimics a criminal lifestyle.
Beyond the definition, as one examines the landscape of West Baltimore, it becomes evident that the reality of poor neighborhoods was created by a greater and powerful system that is the most violent – capitalism. The earliest form of capitalism can be traced back to Western Europe as early as the Middle Ages through merchant capitalism or long-distance profit seeking, but changed rapidly as towns and states became centralized. Mercantile capitalism declined and gave way to industrial capitalism in the 1800s, which was supported by the economic gains appropriated by mercantile capitalism. Industrial capitalism brought about a new division of labor which stratified members of society. First described in Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations, division of labor was seen as being cost effective to capitalists as people worked with machines in factories. In essence, division of labor and economic progress went hand in hand, and created a system of social control. Karl Marx would later describe that social control as the function of stratification which is inherently tied to class and hierarchy. As this principle evolved, the effects of it were seen through various forms of mass production by laborers and mass surplus in markets.
The stages of capitalism have, and will always have, an economic base. Although Marx wrote primarily about English capitalism, Das Capital helped introduce principles of economics in which American capitalism would be eponymously known for its major characteristics: free enterprise, private property and wage labor (among other things). In looking at the historical discourse, slavery embodied these characteristics of capitalism as it helped finance the Industrial Revolution in England and America alike. Perhaps the most durable and notable fact is the link between modern capitalism and slavery. Historian Eric Williams explains that the West Indian slave trade gave an impetus to British industries as slave plantations were dominated by the English colonial system. The global commerce of slaves assisted in the production of an integrated system of commerce as slave capital improved the manufacturing industry. The expanding cotton frontier of the global mercantile commerce of slaves helped to offer support for British colonies not only in the Caribbean but also in colonial British America.
In North America, the commercialization of enslaved Blacks did not yield the maltreatment of Black men and women as cash crops continued to fill the coffers of slave owners and the industry. Some would describe that racialized chattel slavery as a struggle between the colonial elites and the popular classes of Virginia over the cultivation of tobacco. Colonists would later seize the land from the indigenous people of Virginia and would turn to African slavery for labor after failed attempts of exploiting the Native Americans and indentured servants. Many Americans infused with the idea of the pursuit of life, liberty, happiness and justice were juxtaposed by the reality of chattel slavery as slaves adopted the status of alienable rights despite the words of Virginia leaders Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and James Madison. The spirit of the revolution was authored by men who defended freedom but were also slaveholders. As a result, slavery and liberty would be incompatible as chattel slavery superseded the ideals of freedom.
Chattel slavery allowed plantation slave-owners more aggressive and inhumane ways to protect their livelihoods as slaves were viewed as mere products. Eponymous to chattel slavery is William Lynch, a slave owner in the West Indies during the 1800s whose manifesto and reputation of “how to break a slave” would create psychological and physical control strategies that would impose negative effects on African Americans for generations to come. The Willie Lynch Letters of Making a Slave 1712explains the following six basic principles of making a Negro slave:
1. Both horse and nigger are no good to the economy in the wild or natural state.
2. Both must be broken and tied together for orderly production.
3. For the orderly futures, special and particular attention must be paid to the female and the young offspring.
4. Both must be crossbred to produce a variety and division of labor.
5. Both must be taught to respond to a particular new language.
6. Psychological and physical instruction are created for both.
We hold the above six cardinal principles as truths to be self-evident based on the following discourse concerning the economics of breaking and tying the horse and the nigger together – all inclusive of the six principles above. Note: Neither principle alone will suffice for good economics (Lynch 1712/1992, pg.12).
The effects of chattel slavery are seen throughout every modern inner-city, in which the pathology of inner-city violence can be traced to its economic base. Slavery, a primitive form of labor exploitation, was a criminal enterprise in which slaveholders and advocates of slavery perpetrated acts of criminal behavior protected by the ethos of capitalism. The aftermath of centuries of chattel slavery and its multi-generational effects has crippled the identity of Blacks in America as racial and self-identity is becoming more and more difficult to locate among the stigmas associated with the Black race. From the cotton fields to the concrete jungles, African Americans are subjected to the chronic acute environmental stressors that make up their social realities, all stemming from this still-recent historical path.
Poverty, unemployment, violence, single-parent female-headed households, poor access to healthcare, and poor school systems have become the normal etchings for inner-city neighborhoods across America. Baltimore City is no different. A once bustling and promising economy during Industrialization, Baltimore City is in stark comparison to its once gilded days. With a population of 622,793, of whom 63 percent are Black, Baltimore City has a 24 percent poverty rate compared to 10 percent for the state of Maryland (U.S. Census, 2014). Substantial contrasts are seen comparatively between the richest and poorest communities. For example, 66 percent of Upton/Druid Heights households (compared to 9 percent of Canton households) earned less than $25,000 in 2013 (Baltimore Neighborhood Indicator Alliance). Furthermore, during that same year, Baltimore City unemployment rate was 10 percent while the Upton/Druid Heights community of West Baltimore was 29 percent.
Amidst the social upheaval witnessed in the aftermath of the Freddie Gray murder, we must not forget the key realms of social stratification as identified by Max Weber: power (political power), wealth (economic power), and prestige (social status) under capitalism. These three tenets outline the critical indices by which we as a society subscribe to analyze and hierarchically place members of society. Moreover, our youth in parts of Upton, Druid Heights, Coppin Heights, Penn North, Walbrook and other West Baltimore neighborhoods are very aware of these indices through the social allegory of hip-hop lyrics. As versed in Wu Tang Clan’s “C.R.E.A.M,” and The Lox’s “Money, Power, Respect,” the world of formal education meets the streets in which Weber, Marx, and Smith can be understood through the melodic beats of authors that resemble the struggles and plights of inner-city Black males.
On April 27, 2015, descendants of chattel slavery, only a few generations removed, took the streets to protest against the racial and social injustices brought upon by the effects of capitalism, the most onerous and criminal enterprise known to the African Diaspora. The locus of thugs lies in the heart of a political economy born from a contradiction of rhetorical freedom and the reality of enslavement for Blacks and the indigenous peoples of this country. The psychological and physical deterioration of Blacks in America speaks to that macabre appendage of capitalism called slavery. In1712, William Lynch stated that a ‘nigger is no good to the economy’ in their wild/natural state; and in 2015, Mayor Rawlings Blake blamed ‘thugs’ for the riots and destruction that ensued after Gray’s funeral. The acts witnessed that day were a response to being reared under an oppressive political economy that has blighted sections of West Baltimore like the Upton/Druid Heights area, which sits as a stark contrast to the gentrified Canton area on Southeast Baltimore. Market and global capitalism have used violence and criminal behavior to widen the gap between the rich and poor, so why are we calling those who rise against it ‘thugs?’ | <urn:uuid:b90eaaa6-1865-48dd-adcc-472d773e0b62> | {
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What is Episcleritis?
It is the abrupt onset of inflammation in the tissue that lies over the white part of your eye. It is a loose, elastic tissue that connects your part of the eye that is white and the mucous membrane that covers the front part of your eyelid along with lining the eyelid. It is normally a benign infection. When you see a person with this medical condition it is looks much worse that it really is. The reason is that what was the white part of your eye is now bright red and can appear quite alarming.
Episcleritis does not usually pose a threat to your vision if you make an appointment with your optometrist as soon as possible. If you do not seek medical attention and get it treated you could loose your vision. Approximately seventy percent of the cases of episcleritis occur in females. Although it can affect any age it is most frequently seen in middle-age and occurs between forty and fifty years of age but any one of any age or gender can get episcleritis. It is rare to see this medical condition in children younger than the age of five or in babies. If a child or baby does get episcleritis it will just be a inflammation that is mild and can last a week up to ten days. It is a common cause for someone to have red eye and can have episcleritis in one or both eyes.
Types of Episcleritis
There are different types of episcleritis:
This is the most painful type of episcleritis and have nodules in the loose connective tissue that you have between the white of your eye and the inside of your eyelids
This is the most common type of episcleritis and can cause bouts of inflammation to recur with each recurrence lasting from a week to ten days. The duration can be longer if it is connected to another medical condition.
The symptoms will normally be mild. The main symptoms are usually pain in the eye and acute redness. Some of the symptoms that can be associated with episcleritis can include:
- Tenderness in the eye.
- Being sensitivity to light which is called photophobia.
- Tearing of the eye but without discharge.
- In the white part of the eye you may see a purple or pink color.
What actually cases a person to have episcleritis is still not known. This makes this medical condition an idiopathic medical condition. This just means that it is a medical condition that has no particular known cause. Although there is no exact cause known for episcleritis there are some things that might cause a case of episcleritis.
Inflammatory conditions are thought to be one of the causes of having this medical condition and some of these inflammatory conditions can include:
- Having rheumatoid arthritis.
- Having lupus
- Having irritable bowel disease like Colitis.
- Having Irritable bowel syndrome.
There are also a variety of other underlying medical conditions that could cause of a person having episcleritis which can include:
- Herpes simplex infection
- Herpes zoster
- Having rosacea
- Having gout
- Being stressed out
- Addison’s disease
- Autoimmune diseases and disorders
- Allergies such as hay fever
In children under the age of five and babies there is no exact answer as to what can cause episcleritis but in children older than five it is thought to be associated with rheumatologic diseases. When a woman was it during the end of her menstruation or during her pregnancy it could be hormonal changes as the reason for cases of episcleritis during these times.
Photos, Images and Pictures collection of Episcleritis…
In addition to seeing your eye they optometrist will do an exam of your eye to positively diagnose episcleritis as there are other eye diseases that could cause these symptoms. They will also do a family history to see there is any medical condition or disease that could cause the episcleritis.
Normally it is not necessary to have treatment done because it is just a mild inflammation that will generally go away with a week or two on its own. If a person has nodular episcleritis it can take a little longer to clear up as it is a more aggressive form of episcleritis. For discomfort you can get an over-the-counter saline solution. To make sure that the solution is going to help with you eye put in the refrigerator for an hour so the chill of the solution will help with the inflammation. If it is a severe case of episcleritis your optometrist may give you a prescription for mild steroid eye drops and/or anti-inflammatory medication. Either of these medications will help make the symptoms disappear quicker. Unfortunately with either of these two medications there are side effects that could be worse than actually having episcleritis. Other treatments can include:
- Several times a day put in topical corticosteroid eye drops.
- Topical lubricant eye drops like Artificial Tears.
- Using cold compresses three to four times a day to give you dome comfort from the pain.
If you notice anything in or around your eyes or you are experiencing blurred vision, eye strain, or any other problems with you vision you should see your eye doctor as soon as you can. | <urn:uuid:7adfbd1e-fee0-45a8-95d3-f27117bfca94> | {
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If you took pop culture as gospel, you’d think the only people who take on any pioneering exploits were posh, hairy, white men. But plenty of badass women have grabbed adventure by the horns over the centuries too.
There are two definitions for the term ‘pioneer’ in the modern Oxford English Dictionary. The first description is of a person who is “among the first to explore or settle a new country or area”. The second describes someone “among the first to research and develop a new area of knowledge or activity”.
Judging by these descriptions, it’s abundantly clear that pioneers of adventure travel still exist all around us. And included on that list of pioneers are plenty of women who have been accomplishing amazing feats throughout history—and continue to right up to the current day.
Women who have battled against all odds to show that the impossible is nothing but a mental boundary we create for ourselves. Women who have helped clear the way and made it easier for the rest of us. Women who are inventing technology that’s changing the travel photography industry—and even opening up platforms to continue to lift up the diverse voices of women in adventure travel.
If you asked me to name at least five women who pioneered adventure over time, the very first one that comes to mind is Amelia Earhart, the American aviator. She became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic in the early 1900s and her plane mysteriously disappeared in 1937 during a bold attempt to circumnavigate the earth.
Eighty years later and Amelia’s is still the first name that comes up when I think of women adventurers—mostly because her story has been covered across all forms of media for so long and in so many ways. While Earhart was certainly a forerunner, this also shows how dated our collective views and definition of the word ‘pioneer’ can still be when it comes to adventure and adventure travel. I firmly believe that the spirit of adventure is as diverse as we all are, and shouldn’t be narrowly defined to a single stereotype, be it gender, race or anything else.
In 1921, African-American pilot and pioneer Bessie Coleman became the first black woman to obtain a pilot’s license and fly in the United States. Adding to her badass credits, she specialized in aerial stunts and parachuting, but died in a tragic plane accident in in 1926 during rehearsals for an upcoming airshow.
When I started my research for this piece, I came across even more of these fascinating women pioneers across history and well into modern times. Women who epitomized courage, tenacity, energy. While I wish I could share all their stories here, I’ve picked a few I wanted to highlight.
The proliferation of round-the-world (RTW) tickets can literally take backpackers around the world in a matter of days. The 20th-century American investigative journalist Elizabeth Jane Cochrane, aka Nellie Bly, was inspired by French author Jules Verne’s novel, Around the World in Eighty Days, and set out to match the feat. Except Bly accomplished her goal over a week faster and chronicled the adventure in her book, Around the World in Seventy-Two Days, which was published in 1890.
There are so many jokes I could crack about women getting things done quicker than men. But I’ll refrain (for now).
While we’re on the topic of circumnavigation, in 1985, Tania Aebi, at the mere age of 18, set sail around the world—solo—on her boat Contessa 26 Varuna, covering a distance of 27,000 miles (43,452 kilometers). When I think back to what I was doing at 18 years old, it probably involved a sofa and some chicken wings—not a boat and 27,000 miles.
RELATED: Meet the women changing travel
I once had lunch with a Swedish friend who was about to embark on a round-the-world cycling trip. At the time, while his feat was certainly impressive, it didn’t seem impossible because so many people have accomplished the very same over the years. But reflecting back on that conversation, it got me thinking about Latvian immigrant Annie Cohen Kopchovsky, aka Annie Londonderry, who was already a mother of three young children when she decided to bike around the world (with a few steam ferry crossings in-between) in 1894.
What intrigued me the most about Annie Londonderry—who changed her name from Kopchovsky for safety reasons while traveling—wasn’t her amazing adventure, but the fact that she also had her young children at the time.
As a mother myself to two small kids, who also happens to love adventure and enjoys working as a travel writer and photographer, it’s inspiring to see role models who have paved the way against a backdrop of judgemental whispering. Londonderry was part of the reason why I penned this ode to traveling mothers.
I was also drawn to ‘Grandma Gatewood’. In 1955, Emma Gatewood was the first woman to hike the entire Appalachian Trail solo—a 2,050-mile-long (3,299 kilometers) feat. What made her story particularly remarkable was the fact that she did this at the age of 67—while a mother of 11 children and grandmother to 23. Sadly, ageism still exists and often, older adventurers—pioneers though they may be—can fade into the background while the young and the rugged are pushed into the limelight.
Another older adventurer was African-American adventurer Barbara Hillary, who trekked to both the North and South Poles in her late 70s—and became the first black woman to do so.
As a lover of husky sledding—I’ve tried it in Sweden, Finland, and Greenland—I’d be remiss not to mention American dog musher Libby Riddles on this list of inspirational women. She was the first woman to win the legendary Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, a 1,100-mile (1,770 kilometer) trans-Alaska race.
And if space is the final frontier of travel, then Mae Jemison already paved the way for thousands of African-American girls by being the first black female astronaut, flying into space aboard NASA’s Endeavour in 1992.
Back on earth, summiting Everest remains the epitome of human achievement and Japanese mountaineer Junko Tabei was the first woman to reach its peak. That iconic black-and-white Associated Press photo of Tabei—taken in 1975 as she held the Japanese flag while kitted up in full expedition gear and an oxygen mask—has since become a a powerful visual metaphor for me.
Looking at that image, you can’t really tell if it was a man or woman behind that mask. And as the women mentioned here are a testament to, adventure truly is for all of us. | <urn:uuid:78bc1e23-346c-422c-a116-b8604c7534dc> | {
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|Sword of Damocles|
Richard Westall (1765-1836)
Noun. Mid-18th century.
[Latin from Greek Damokles, of a flatterer whom Dionysius of Syracuse (4th century BC) feasted while a sword hung by a hair above him.]
Sword of Damocles, Damocles sword, Damocles's sword:
an imminent danger, a constant threat, especially in the midst of prosperity.
Damoclesian adj. L19
Damocles was a sycophant, a fawning admirer of the tyrant Dionysius II of Syracuse. One day, after he happened to mention (again) how he admired the opulent lifestyle of Dionysius and how fortunate he was to have it, the ruler asked him if he'd like to give it a go, to experience the lavish and privileged life of a powerful man like him. Of course, Damocles was all too eager to take the chance, and was soon sitting in the throne of Dionysius, enjoying all the trappings of a man with such power. However, Dionysius had sneakily arranged for a sword to be hung above his throne by a single thread of horse hair. When Damocles noticed, he was perturbed to say the least, and was soon begging Dionysius to restore him to his humble (but safe and swordless) station. Thus, Dionysius had taught Damocles the precarious nature of the life of the man in power, and the Sword of Damocles has become a famous metaphor for living under such constant threat and imminent danger.
Do please leave your sharpest comments in the box below. | <urn:uuid:a876ec64-b925-40c7-811e-e44779853d70> | {
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Stunning Superbird footage: An Imperial Cormorant dives 150 feet underwater
Researchers from Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and the National Research Council of Argentina fitted a small camera on the back of Imperial Cormorant, a South American sea bird. What they recorded was stunning and incredible as no one before watched a bird dive 150 feet underwater in 40 seconds to feed on sea creatures. The bird remained underwater for almost 80 seconds during which a snake like fish found its way into bird’s beak. That’s true, the Cormorants can dive deep enough and stay underwater for more than a minute to search food.
This fascination footage was recorded after a small camera was fitted on the bird by a group of researchers, which included members from two teams, one led by Dr. Carlos Zavalaga along with Ken Yoda from the University of Nogoya and other WCS team led by Dr. Flavio Quintana, who have been studying the feeding behavior of the Cormorants. The experiment was conducted at the coast of Punta León in Patagonia, Argentina.
WSC have been using hi-tech technologies to track more than 400 Cormorants at the same coastal area. Multi channel archival tags and high resolution GPS-loggers are some of the tools used to track and understand the environmental conditions that affect the population of Cormorant. | <urn:uuid:9856dc93-8f06-4f7a-949f-25e78a58ccfa> | {
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Metastasis, the spread of cancer throughout the body, can be explained by the fusion of a cancer cell with a white blood cell in the original tumor, according to Yale School of Medicine researchers, who say that this single event can set the stage for cancer’s migration to other parts of the body.
Their work was Published in the May issue of Nature Reviews Cancer. The studies, spanning 15 years, have revealed that the newly formed hybrid of the cancer cell and white blood cell adapts the white blood cell’s natural ability to migrate around the body, while going through the uncontrolled cell division of the original cancer cell. This causes a metastatic cell to emerge, which like a white blood cell, can migrate through tissue, enter the circulatory system and travel to other organs.
“This is a unifying explanation for metastasis,” said John Pawelek, a researcher in the Department of Dermatology at Yale School of Medicine and at Yale Cancer Center, who conducted the studies with colleague Ashok K. Chakraborty and several other Yale scientists. “Although we know a vast amount about cancer, how a cancer cell becomes metastatic still remains a mystery.”
The fusion theory was first proposed in the early 1900s and has attracted a lot of scientific interest over the years. Pawelek and his colleagues began their research several years ago by fusing white blood cells with tumor cells. These experimental hybrids the researchers observed, were remarkably metastatic and lethal when implanted into mice. In addition, the scientists noted, some of the molecules the hybrids used to metastasize originated from white blood cells, and these molecules were the same as those used by metastatic cells in human cancers. Pawelek and his team then validated previous findings that hybridization occurs naturally in mice, and results in metastatic cancer.
“Viewing the fusion of a cancer cell and a white blood cell as the initiating event for metastasis suggests that metastasis is virtually another disease imposed on the pre-existing cancer cell,” said Pawelek. “We expect this to open new areas for therapy based on the fusion process itself.”
The research team recently began studying cancers from individuals who had received a bone marrow transplant—a new source of white blood cells for the patient. Genes from the transplanted white blood cells were found in the patient tumor cells, indicating that fusion with white blood cells had occurred. But Pawelek said these studies must be greatly expanded before his team can say with certainty that white blood cell fusion accounts for cancer metastasis in humans.
“To date, the fusion theory and the considerable evidence supporting it have largely been overlooked by the cancer research community,” said Pawelek. “The motivation for our article is to encourage other laboratories to join in.”
Citation: Nature Reviews Cancer 8: 377-386 (May, 2008). | <urn:uuid:23bc2cae-aa6d-4c8b-b09b-56421f875b81> | {
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The readiness of our healthcare facilities to respond to terrorist acts or naturally occurring epidemics and disasters has been at the center of public attention since September 11, 2001. The many other tragic events that have occurred throughout the world since then further reinforce the need for all healthcare facilities and medical personnel to increase their level of preparedness if they wish to optimize outcomes. Maximizing survival rates and minimizing disability during any MCI hinges on rapid, seamless, and coordinated response between first responders and first receivers. The Incident Command System and the HEICS are organizational tools that form the foundation for such a rapid and coordinated response. The ICS provides a simple and adaptable management structure that is capable of being expanded or contracted to meet the needs of a specific situation. The HEICS adapts the ICS into the hospital setting and, in addition to the benefits stated above; its use of the ICS nomenclature and terminology facilitates the communication and the sharing of resources between all agencies and health care institutions involved. A basic knowledge and understanding of the ICS principles and structure is essential for all individuals participating in a disaster response. Previous efforts at disaster preparedness have focused predominantly on the pre-hospital and rescue phase of the disaster response, but a complete and coordinated community response requires creation of integrated disaster plans. True readiness can only be achieved by testing and modifying these plans through integrated simulation drills and table top exercises. Hospital-wide drills are essential to educate all staff members as to their institutional plan and serve as the only substitute at present to first hand experience. At present, there is no evidence-based literature to define what constitutes the best medical response by medical personnel within a disaster setting. This information will likely evolve over the next several decades as we now recognize Disaster Medicine as a separate scientific and medical entity. In the interim, we can develop and modify our response plans based on the “lessons learned” from past experience. Prior events have demonstrated that general surgeons and surgical subspecialists are critical components to a successful hospital response for the vast majority of all mass casualty incidents. Thus, surgeons must take responsibility for increasing their knowledge and understanding of basic disaster management principles and must play an active role in developing their institutional disaster plans. | <urn:uuid:c5925ac1-f171-4e26-85f2-0491c50debff> | {
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This Demonstration considers expressions of the form where , , , , and are positive rational numbers or integers and is one of the six trigonometric functions, sin, cos, tan, cot, sec, or csc. For any set of such parameters, the value will never be an integer (nor even an algebraic number).
The goal of the hunt is to find values of the parameters such that is as near as possible to an integer. Easy integers are excluded, like the sine or cosine of a small number, which can easily be made very close to 0 or 1. Using all possible slider combinations, more than 1030 possible values of can be tested, allowing the hunter to be busy for weeks. How small can you make the difference between the value and an integer? | <urn:uuid:be213d33-ed8e-46e1-b154-9e7ac4e17a72> | {
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Shelters are busy environments, where time is always something difficult to find. Because it is always a rush, sometimes our attention can slip… and this is when certain “zootechnical” errors may occur. One of the most common I see concerns food storage.
Poor storage = consequences
Proper storage condition is indeed crucial to preserve the quality of the diet you are feeding your animals:
– It decreases the risk of food contamination: poor storage exposes the food to air-borne pathogens/bacteria (which are definitely NOT uncommon in shelter environments) or any other type of “organic” contamination (I’ve seen some bags of food soiled by animal dejections like urine or feces for instance when the animals are allowed in the room where the food is stored: this kind of accident is not uncommon).
– It decreases the risk of nutriment alteration: sometimes the food is put in an open-ended container and kibbles are directly in contact with air. Prolonged exposure to air will lead to oxidation of the lipids (=fat) that are present in the kibbles. They become rancid and the quality of the product is then altered.
– It decreases the potential consequences on animal health: poor storage can lead to decreased palatability of the diet, as well as clinical signs such as vomiting / diarrhea because of the modifications that occurred after the bag of food was opened.
What we recommend
#1: Keep the food inside its original bag and put them all together inside a clean closed plastic bin as showed on the picture below. This will add extra layers that will protect the food from alteration/contamination.
#2: Do a regular cleaning / disinfecting of your food plastic containers (as described here) In a perfect world, we’ll do it each time we switch to a new bag of food.
#3: Do not re-fill a new bag with “older” kibbles, or re-fill a container that still contains “older” kibbles. This will expose the new bag to contamination.
#4: Have a separate storage room / kitchen, away from the kennels / catteries. Good way also to decrease organic contamination of the diets.
#5: Temperature / ventilation / humidity of the storage room MUST be controlled. Remember that cold can decrease the palatability of the diet and warm/humid conditions favor bacterial overgrowth. These elements are crucial as well. | <urn:uuid:8e478b2d-1a4f-4a68-8625-441966d2eb96> | {
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A plant of the genus Glycyrrhiza (G. glabra), the root of which abounds with a sweet juice, and is much used in demulcent compositions.
- A Mediterranean perennial plant (Glycyrrhiza glabra) having blue flowers, pinnately compound leaves, and a sweet, distinctively flavored root.
- The root of this plant, used as a flavoring in candy, liqueurs, tobacco, and medicines.
- A confection made from or flavored with the licorice root.
- Any of various similar plants. | <urn:uuid:a590d65a-23ff-4d71-8758-647f92b4d2b9> | {
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There is a moral value to economic growth. In difficult economic times, it is important to pursue policies that serve the disadvantaged. It is also important to pursue policies that increase wealth more broadly—policies that encourage the creation of private sector jobs, which are a source of personal independence and dignity. Policies that reward effort, enterprise and investment.
Sometimes Christians view the creation of wealth as a second order concern. And there are many biblical warnings about the spiritual dangers of greed and materialism.
But a respect for facts requires another recognition. Capitalism—the economics system in which the means of production are privately owned—has been history’s greatest engine of economic growth, wealth creation and prosperity. And this should mean a great deal to anyone concerned about the poor and oppressed.
In our book, The City of Man, my coauthor and I argue that capitalism has produced two things that for much of history were regarded as inconceivable: a large middle class and intergenerational wealth-building. In doing so, it has lifted untold numbers of people out of poverty and misery. The medical, scientific and technological advancements associated with capitalism have brought greater health, longer lives and relief from backbreaking labor. By contrast, where capitalism has not yet taken root, we often find destitution, widespread misery, illiteracy and much early death.
Because of the wealth created by capitalism, charity and generosity are increased. The moral philosopher Adam Smith put it this way: “If our own misery pinches us very severely, we have no leisure to attend to that of our neighbor.”
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It’s a commonly held notion that a Canadian can be easily identified by the end-of-sentence “eh?” However, true connoisseurs of all things Canadian know that what separates citizens of the north from the south, the true identifier, is that when naming someone notable, the name is followed by a knowing nod and the enthusiastic comment “Canadian!”—as in, Peter Jennings (Canadian!), Brendan Frazier (Canadian!), or Eugene Levy (Canadian!). The impulse to not only include Canadian cultural contributions in the broader American context, but to distinguish them, is deeply ingrained.
For this reason I thought it important, when planning Mining Modern Museum Education, an upcoming panel discussion on four seminal figures in early- to mid-twentieth-century museum education, to consider the significant contributions of my fellow Canadian Arthur Lismer. An iconic Canadian artist of the modern era (Group of Seven), Lismer was also an influential museum educator whose work in this field merits investigation.
For those in need of a brush-up on culture north of the 49th parallel, here is a brief synopsis by Kelly McKinley, the Richard and Elizabeth Currie Director of Education and Public Programming at the Art Gallery of Ontario, who will discuss Lismer at MoMA (along with presentations about educators Victor D’Amico, Katharine Kuh and Hilla Rebay), on Friday, June 25, at 6:30 p.m.
A Thoroughly Modern Art Educator: Arthur Lismer at the Art Gallery of Ontario, 1927–38
Arthur Lismer is best known as one of the founding members of the Group of Seven—the group mythologized as Canada’s first national school of art. Outside of Canada, he is more likely known, if at all, as a pioneering art educator—the work to which, ironically, he devoted the majority of his professional life.
Lismer wrote that the purpose of art was not the decoration of life, but life itself. He decried the state of art education as not serving the needs of modern society by being too technical and skills-based, focusing on training the hand and the eye to the exclusion of the mind and of a more holistic view of art as a form of vision and understanding. In his lectures and writings, he explored the role of art in human development and growth and its importance in adapting to change. Against the backdrop of the Great Depression, Lismer made the case for artists as interpreters of change, and for art as an antidote to a materialistic world. His views on art and art education are also echoed in his democratic social agenda for the public art museum—which he envisioned as a community center, open and at the service of people of all ages and from all walks of life.
In 1927 Arthur Lismer was hired to establish art education programs at the Art Gallery of Toronto (today the Art Gallery of Ontario). His philosophy and approach cannot be attributed to one particular individual or school of thought; rather he borrowed liberally and creatively from across many (Dewey, American Progressive Education, Dana, D’Amico, Ruskin). His work was also informed by a rich and varied professional life as an artist, art instructor, lecturer, graphic artist, and teacher trainer. The result of his eleven-year tenure in Toronto was a groundbreaking program and pioneering vision, not just for the city and the country, but for the world—a program and vision that brought invitations to speak, consult, and work from across Canada, and from the U.S., South Africa, Italy, France, Australia, and New Zealand.
The June 25 presentation will look specifically at Arthur Lismer’s tenure at the Art Gallery of Ontario to make the case for his place in the history of art museum education as a thoroughly modern art educator. | <urn:uuid:0e13c7fe-80a6-49dc-afd8-0fa88233a756> | {
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Detroit Tests of Learning Aptitude - 4th Edition (DTLA-4)
Author(s): Donald D. Hammill, EdD
- Language, Attention, Perception
- Ages 6 through 17
- Individual Administration
- Norm Referenced
- Qualification Level B
The DTLA-4 represents another refinement of this well-established test of general mental ability. It can be used to evaluate areas of strengths and weaknesses in an individual's cognitive functioning, as well as to diagnose learning disabilities and mental retardation. Eleven subtests assess abilities in 3 general domains: language, attention, and manual dexterity. Included in this are measures of short- and long-term memory and visual-motor integration. The DTLA-4 is normed on more than 2500 children. Issues of reliability and validity are well-researched.
The following subtests are contained in the DTLA-4: Word Opposites, Design Sequences, Sentence Imitation, Reversed Letters, Story Construction, Design Reproduction, Basic Information, Symbolic Relations, Word Sequences, and Story Sequences.
Overall Composite: Because this composite is formed by combining standard scores of all 10 subtests in the battery, it is probably the best estimate of g.
Optimal Level Composite: Because this composite comprises the four highest standard scores made by the subject on the subtests, it is the best estimate of a persons overall potential. In this context, potential means the highest level of performance that an individual is capable of when the inhibiting influences of his or her deficits are disregarded.
Domain Composites: Contrasting composites are provided for three domains: language, attention, and manual dexterity. DTLA-4 includes the following: Verbal Composite, Nonverbal Composite, Attention-Enhanced Composite, Attention-Reduced Composite, Motor-Enhanced Composite, and Motor-Reduced Composite.
Theoretical Composites: Subtests are easily assigned to composites that represent major popular theories. Thus, the subtests can be related to Horn and Cattells fluid and crystallized intelligence, to Jensens associative and cognitive levels, to Dass simultaneous and successive processes, and to Wechslers verbal and performance scales.
Administration and Scoring
A variety of problem solving tasks assessing each domain can be completed in a total time between 1 to 2 hours, usually in one testing session. The resulting raw scores can then be converted easily into standard scores, percentile ranks and age equivalents for each of the 11 subtest and 16 composite scores. An overall cognitive composite score is also obtained.
The new DTLA-5 will be available in May 2017. | <urn:uuid:83643fa4-15bf-44a1-996c-350300ca8b31> | {
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Home heating comparison
A guide to home heating options
In any house the effectiveness and efficiency of space heaters is a function heat lost (through walls, floors, ceilings, windows etc.), the amount of solar heat gain, the size of the space to be heated, the age of the system and the availability of the various fuels.
Affordability is a big factor. A ground-source heat pump might be very efficient but it is also very expensive to install. Ease of use also affects people’s choices. A heat pump is much easier to use than a woodburner. Unfortunately a guide like this cannot factor in all of these variables, however it does give an indication of the relative merits of each system in terms of cost-efficiency and sustainability.
A note on sustainability
‘Sustainability’ is based on the level of emissions and the renewability of the fuel only. Wood and pellet burners are theoretically carbon-neutral if the wood is regrown – which we are assuming is the case. Modern wood burners are more efficient than older ones and have much fewer particle emissions. Electric systems rate slightly lower than wood because 30% of New Zealand’s electricity is generated from fossil fuels (natural gas and coal) which are not renewable and emit greenhouse gases. Gas and diesel heaters emit CO2 and use a non-renewable resource – which will become more and more expensive. (Having said that, if the fuel is from biomass i.e. biodiesel, it is theoretically carbon-neutral and renewable.)
This guide has data for modern (2008) systems. Energy prices and system prices vary so the figures in the guide are indicative only. | <urn:uuid:c3e3ccc7-3bb6-480a-81e8-cc31b4614158> | {
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Air Quality in Latin America: High Levels of Pollution Require Strong Government Action
Posted April 29, 2013
The suffocating cloud of smog that hung over Beijing in January this year was a very real reminder that air pollution is an ongoing and serious problem. A new report assessing air quality and efforts to monitor in Latin America shows that the toxic threat of air pollution is not limited to Asia; indeed, it is a global problem with real impacts in Western Hemisphere countries, too. From Mexico to Argentina, pollutants in the air have reached dangerous levels, with implications for both public health and the planet’s changing climate. The good news is that the solutions already exist: international standards and best practices are out there, and can to be adapted to and adopted in Latin America. Clean transportation and energy generation technologies are already taking root in the region. If leaders work to get their countries off of dirty fossil fuels, the skies will clear up and their people will breathe freely.
According to the new report, published by the Clean Air Institute (CAI), over 100 million people in Latin America breathe polluted air. The authors looked at levels of particulate matter (PM10 and PM2.5), ozone (O3), nitrous oxide (NO2), and sulfur dioxide (SO2) in the region. They compared the levels of those compounds with the World Health Organization (WHO)’s Air Quality Guidelines, and found that:
- Of the 16 countries that measured for PM10 in 2011, all exceeded the WHO’s recommended level
- Of the 11 countries that measured for PM2.5 in 2011, 10 exceeded the WHO’s recommended level
- Ozone was difficult to measure, but the authors did manage to take measurements of ozone in 2011 in Santiago (Chile), Mexico City and Quito, and all three cities exceeded the WHO’s recommended level
- Of the 13 countries that measured for NO2, 7 exceeded the WHO’s recommended level
Encouragingly, the researchers also found that many countries have some standards in place to limit these emissions:
- Approximately half of the countries included in the study have PM2.5 standards
- All of the countries that have any standards in place (16) have PM10 standards
- 13 of the countries have Ozone (8 hour) standards
- All 16 countries have SO2 (24 hour) standards
- 15 of the 16 countries have (annual) NO2 standards *
traffic in Mexico City
However, a standard alone will not make a difference. Governments need to make sure that the standards they pass are strident enough to drive results. The CAI’s report duly notes that many of the standards I refer to above do not meet WHO guidelines or guidelines used by the European Union and the United States. In response to January’s smog-cloud, Chinese authorities finally set a timetable for stricter fuel regulations, requiring cleaner diesel and gasoline fuels for transportation. Countries in Latin America need to follow suit – long before they endure a similar experience. Chile is leading the way here, having recently approved a new regulation on the emissions of NO2, SO2 and PM2.5 from vehicles, and by requiring the use of cleaner, ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel nationwide. Mexico should be next, as the new government has stated that it will work to pass vehicle efficiency and fuel quality standards that will make Mexico’s new vehicles comparable to those sold in the U.S. and Europe.
In addition to passing good standards, governments must also implement them, perform ongoing monitoring of the air quality, and reliably report the data. The CAI report noted that these were all areas in which Latin America’s countries need improvement.
Finally, Latin America’s leaders need to address the problem before it starts, by getting off of dirty diesel fuels that create air pollution, and instead encouraging cleaner modes of transportation and more sustainable energy generation. Renewable energy is taking off throughout the region – Brazil, Chile and Mexico tend to get the most attention for it, but other countries are also making progress, such as Peru, Panama and Costa Rica. Although worldwide renewable energy investments fell in 2012, in Latin America total investments in clean energy rose 127% in 2012 over 2011 numbers (that does not include Brazil).
The solutions for Latin America’s dirty air problems exist and, indeed, are within reach. International standards to regulate air pollutants and make fuels cleaner are already in practice in countries around the world. Cleaner modes of transportation and energy generation using sustainable, renewable resources are growing in the region already. The CAI’s report is an excellent roadmap to get things started.
*This info in these bullet points is taken from Table 8 on page 10 of the study, which lists Buenos Aires and La Paz separately from Argentina and Bolivia (respectively), since those countries set different standards for the cities and the regions. For the purpose of this blog, I counted one if either or both of Buenos Aires and Argentina, and La Paz and Bolivia, had standards. | <urn:uuid:1638d6cd-6c12-4481-af17-0459c0e05612> | {
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Past Extra Credits|
How the No Child Left Behind "Microscope" is Helping Close the Achievement Gap in Suburban Schools
One of the major priorities of the No Child Left Behind Act is eliminating the achievement gap between disadvantaged and minority children and their peers. To achieve this goal, No Child Left Behind requires schools to monitor the performance of various sub-groups of their students, including African Americans, Hispanics, and low-income students. Each sub-group must be making adequate yearly progress (as defined by the state) toward the goal of 100 percent proficiency on state standards in math and reading by the 2013-2014 school year.
In a recent article, U.S. News & World Report examined the achievement gap in suburban schools. The article cited as an example a school that had 76 percent of its nonpoverty students pass the state's third grade reading test while only 28 percent of its low-income students passed the same exam. U.S. News went on to note: "While states have long targeted low-performing urban schools for improvement, suburban schools with high overall test scores and pockets of racial and economic diversity are only now coming under the reform microscope. And the early readings in many cases are not impressive."
Quoted in the article is Education Trust Director Kati Haycock, who aptly describes the No Child Left Behind reforms when she states: "Historically, we've judged our schools primarily on how their top kids did. But this law says you are no longer successful if you are not successful with every group of kids."
The complete text of the U.S. News & World Report article is available by subscription at: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/culture/articles/030428/28education.htm
About Extra Credit
NCLB Extra Credit is a regular look at the No Child Left Behind Act, President Bush's landmark education reform initiative passed with bipartisan support in Congress.
If you would like the NCLB Extra Credit emailed to you, please send a request to Geoff Goodman at [email protected] or call (202) 205-9191.
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They will be taught by teachers who themselves have received training from Juilliard professionals. They’ll even have opportunities to be inspired by Juilliard alumni visiting us from New York and elsewhere in the world.
The focus of the programme is on the performing arts, but the unique collaboration offers our students so much more:
- Transferable skills: The ability to take a skill or expertise and apply it in a wide variety of roles or occupations.
- Cultural literacy: The ability to understand and participate fluently in a given culture.
To find out more, follow this link to our NAE - Juilliard Performing Arts Social Hub. | <urn:uuid:3ed0ee0e-2c02-4dad-aba8-3658083c7bde> | {
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Those military campaigns known uniformly in the military history of the Old West as “the Indian Wars” were a sad, violent chapter in American life.
Arguably the “whites” won and the “Indians” lost in all of those wars — but of course there were no winners or losers, simply those who were killed on both sides and those who survived on both sides. To say the Indian Wars represented the ultimate clash of opposing cultures, i.e., white Europeans and tribal Native Americans, would be to overly simplify the groups, civilizations, and individuals involved with westward expansion. In reality, there were ongoing battles among all the Indian tribes who were “here” before European settlement came, and never any unified Native American culture — just as there were very diverse European cultures and ethnic groups involved in the battles. Click on any of the article links below to read about the Indian Wars that ravaged the West during the 19th Century. | <urn:uuid:ba36b470-baca-41d8-bd64-289f905a7ab1> | {
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The Storage Games
Most of the computerized data you interact with is stored in a corporate data center or the cloud, on a class of device known as enterprise storage. Their capacity is measured in petabytes, or millions of gigabytes. The number of input/output operations per second (IOPS) generated by applications from Excel to Facebook would boggle your mind.
In response, the once-lethargic $20+ billion enterprise storage industry is exhibiting unprecedented innovation. Giants like EMC and Dell are vying with, partnering with and acquiring start-ups for supremacy in a morphing landscape.
It’s a serious game. More than $3.5 billion was pumped into VC-backed storage start-ups between 2007 and 2011, with more than $1 billion in 2011 alone. And $10 billion more has been poured into M&A, with the most recent example being EMC’s $430 million purchase of a company that hasn’t finished developing an initial product. Tectonic shifts come from collisions of forces. There are three major force vectors here.
First is the demand for more scalable, instantly provisionable, faster and higher-capacity storage. Even in an anemic economy, demand for data storage grows more than 50 percent per year.
Storage in a Flash
The second driver is the widespread proliferation of flash memory. Remember when you could feel the hard drive spinning inside your iPod? Today, practically every consumer carries flash memory in his or her pocket or purse.
Flash has been around for years, but was too expensive for broad adoption. Thanks to companies like Apple, which consume enormous amounts of flash, the cost is dropping like an apple from a tree. It’s still much more expensive than rotating hard drives, but its notable physics are compelling. Solid-state flash is faster than mechanical drives, and doesn’t forget everything when the power is turned off. Perfect, right?
Flash in the Pan?
Actually, not so perfect for corporate, governmental or cloud environments. In addition to high cost, flash has some unfortunate features. For example, it wears out in the same way your favorite pair of jeans will become threadbare with use. You’ll never wear out your phone from too much texting. But in an enterprise application, the number of IOPS can be so staggering that flash has to be treated almost like a printer cartridge, a consumable.
Many companies are developing techniques to deal with flash’s inherent limitations to make it suitable for data centers. It’s a gold rush, with vast sums of capital chasing big markets. That $430 million acquisition by EMC? Yup, flash.
Why pay so much for a pre-product company? There were multiple bidders. NetApp made a rich offer, which Dell topped by a lot, which EMC topped by an equally wide margin. There will be more M&A.
Interestingly, this activity is driving breakneck commoditization. This is great for customers, but not for vendors, who will not long enjoy rapacious (oops, I meant healthy) margins on proprietary technology. Ironically, the value in flash-based systems is really in the software that wrests the value from the hardware. Everyone in the industry knows that the days of differentiated flash hardware are numbered.
When Is Storage Not Real? When It’s Virtual.
As if hot, high demand and cool flash aren’t enough, the storage games are impacted by a third force called virtualization. Virtualization has transformed computing. The leading vendor, VMware (not coincidentally, owned by storage company EMC), has built a market capitalization of roughly $40 billion. All by making fake computers.
We call them virtual machines. Your iPhone may be talking to one right now over the Internet. Their magic allows the creation of what looks like a physical computer server. A virtual machine, or VM, appears to embody central processing units, memory and communication networks like physical computers. But it’s a software abstraction. Through this prestidigitation, data centers run scores of VMs on a single server box.
Enterprises can deploy vastly more applications because virtualization from Microsoft, Citrix, Red Hat and VMware saves enormously on capital and operating expenses. And provisioning is so much faster. Just a few clicks and, voila, you have a new server. By the way, you can buy server hardware from anyone. That freedom makes vendors compete harder, which you like if you run an information technology department.
What does this have to do with data storage?
Enterprise and cloud storage still live in the physical age. That is, storage system features are embedded in proprietary hardware. Want a cool software feature? You have to buy hardware to get it. Before virtualization, this was how the server industry worked. But virtualization is stressing traditional modes of delivering storage to applications. Performance problems, high costs and inflexibility cause VM users great pain on a daily basis.
Hello, Storage Hypervisor
The key enabling technology in compute virtualization is called a hypervisor. This core magic remade the server industry for the benefit of all. Until recently, there was no storage equivalent.
Now the storage industry is beginning to buzz about the concept of a storage hypervisor — the analog of the server hypervisor, but for storage. Storage hypervisors promise to increase the effective performance of hardware by an order of magnitude. By virtualizing resources to provide the administrative paradigm needed in virtualized environments — VM-centric management — they provide unprecedented flexibility and efficiency. Naturally, the ideal storage hypervisor leverages flash, just as server hypervisors unleash the power of Intel-based silicon.
Giant publicly-traded storage vendors and ambitious start-ups alike are talking up their offerings. All have differing approaches, but share the goal of giving data-center storage buyers the benefits already bestowed on server customers.
A Serious Game
Today we observe a convergence of forces transforming a multi-billion dollar market. The unending pressure for more data increases demand for high-performance flash-based storage hardware. This in turn is driving the essential requirement for virtualization of storage hardware resources. This confluence will enable vastly larger amounts of storage to be applied to every imaginable use case, all while making the economics not only affordable, but also compelling.
The winners in this game? Corporate and cloud data centers and their users. In other words, you.
Before co-founding Virsto, Mark Davis was CEO of storage resource management vendor Creekpath, where he engineered its acquisition by Opsware (now HP). | <urn:uuid:6cafb425-3fc1-4f09-94df-c315cccf4475> | {
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The scientists measured CO2 concentrations as high as 95,000 parts per million (ppm), more than 200 times the concentration of CO2 found in the atmosphere.
Climate change-driven sea-level rise could trigger mass migration of Americans to inland cities, finds new AI study.
Research led by the University of Göttingen calls into question sustainability claims by large corporation
In January 2020, a vast area of melt formed on the surface of the ice shelf west of the Antarctic Peninsula.
During the early summer, corals simultaneously release tiny balls composed of sperms and eggs, known as bundles, that float to the ocean surface.
Pine forests are chock full of wild animals and plant life, but there's an invisible machine underground.
The formation of deep water, which is an important and sensitive component of the climate system, takes place in only a few parts of the ocean.
The Journal of Clinical Investigation (JCI) recently published “Viewpoint” articles by Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine professors who warn that global climate change is likely to unlock dangerous new microbes, as well as threaten humans’ ability to regulate body temperature.
New pan-European research has found that proactive land management with agroforestry – mixing livestock and trees – reduces the risk of wildfires occurring in European Mediterranean areas.
Increasingly extreme temperature, hydrology, or other meteorological phenomena are some of the most widely predicted impacts of climate change.
Page 9 of 3471
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Flags is a freeware program written to teach the International Code of Signals flags, used by ships to communicate at sea. The program will quiz you on the ICS flags, which include letters A-Z, numeral pennants 0-9, and the 4 repeater flags (ICS actually only uses 3; the fourth one is used by NATO.) There is an optional "cheatsheet" that shows all the flags to help you get started.
You also get the option of including the NATO flags: Corpen, Designation, Division, Emergency, Flotilla, Formation, Interrogative, Negative, Port, Preparative, Screen (Black Pennant), Speed, Starboard, Station, Squadron, Subdivision, and Turn; and the NATO numeral flags.
Other modes will quiz you on the meanings of the ICS flags (as described in NIMA Pub. 102), show you one of 1000 words spelled out in nautical flags and ask you to identify it, or just display in flags a word that you type in. Your score is kept and you can bring up a display showing which flags you got right and which ones you had problems with.
I wrote this program so I could learn the flags and as a Visual BASIC exercise. It does not contain adware, spyware, virii, trojans, or anything other than a program that teaches flags.
Download it as:
Flags v1.3.6 [204KB ZIP archive w/ EXE & instructions] or
[272KB EXE] and Instructions [144KB PDF] | <urn:uuid:a540ba81-e05c-454b-8740-a24475b33641> | {
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Sometimes we get home from the market with a fruit or vegetable and can't for the life of us figure out where it should be stored. In the crisper drawer in the fridge? Out on the counter? In a paper sack in the pantry? We finally figured out an easy way to remember what goes where!
Quite simply, we store fruits and vegetables according to where they're found in the grocery store. If it comes from the refrigerator section, we store them in the fridge. If they're kept in open bins, we know they can be stored at room temperature.
Couple this with the idea that root vegetables like to be stored in the dark (since that's where they originally grew!), and it's easy to remember that things like potatoes and onions are best stored in the dark at room temperature.
There are exceptions to every rule, of course! We learned a while back that apples are best kept in a fairly cool environment. So although we find them in the open at the grocery store, we generally keep them in the crisper drawer of the fridge. Some citrus, like lemons, also does better and lasts longer when kept cool in the fridge, although they are fine kept at room temperature for shorter periods of time.
But in general, this guideline holds pretty well! Can you think of other exceptions?
Related: Quick Tip: Don't Store Potatoes and Onions Together
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University of Chicago Press (2005)
Roman Stoic thinkers in the imperial period adapted Greek doctrine to create a model of the self that served to connect philosophical ideals with traditional societal values. The Roman Stoics-the most prominent being Marcus Aurelius-engaged in rigorous self-examination that enabled them to integrate philosophy into the practice of living. Gretchen Reydams-Schils's innovative new book shows how these Romans applied their distinct brand of social ethics to everyday relations and responsibilities. The Roman Stoics reexamines the philosophical basis that instructed social practice in friendship, marriage, parenting, and community. From this analysis emerge Stoics who were neither cold nor detached, as the stereotype has it, but all too aware of their human weaknesses. In a valuable contribution to current discussions in the humanities on identity, autonomy, and altruism, Reydams-Schils ultimately conveys the wisdom of Stoics to the citizens of modern society.
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William Turpin (2008). Tacitus, Stoicexempla, and Thepraecipuum Munus Annalium. Classical Antiquity 27 (2):359-404.
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A. A. Long (2006). From Epicurus to Epictetus: Studies in Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy. Oxford University Press.
Richard E. Crouter (1974). H. Richard Niebuhr and Stoicism. Journal of Religious Ethics 2 (2):129 - 146.
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Gretchen J. Reydams-Schils (1999). Demiurge and Providence: Stoic and Platonist Readings of Plato's Timaeus. Brepols.
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Plant Breeding is an art, science and technology which deals with the genetic improvement of economical crop plants with the aims of producing high yielding varieties of better quality and resistance against biotic and abiotic factors.
Plant Breeding is a significant tool for the fight against food security in the 21st century. For more than one hundred years, Plant Breeding has been widely recognized for developing novel Breeding methodologies and discovering economically important genes and varieties in order to meet the challenges of food security in the world.
Plant breeders use traditional Breeding methods, genetic and cytogenetic tools to seek out;
- Food fulfillment for the rapid growing world population.
- Producer need, consumer preference and environmental impact.
The Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics at Balochistan Agriculture College, is a center of excellence for conventional plant breeding, as well as molecular approaches. It imparts quality education to graduates and postgraduates in the areas of Plant Breeding, Cytogenetics, Biometry, Quantitative Genetics, Stress Breeding, Molecular Biology and Genetic Engineering.
- To completion of semester course program under the aegis of HEC updated curriculum.
- To imparts education and training to undergraduate and graduate levels.
- Evaluation of local and exotic lines and varieties of different crops in the experimental field area.
- To acquaint the students about various abiotic and biotic stresses influencing crop yield, mechanisms and genetics of resistance and methods to breed stress resistant varieties.
- To Cognizance students with modern techniques of Plant Breeding and Plant tissue culture.
- To impart practical training and field exposure to students to gain professional confidence.
- Developing Concepts of students about conventional and non-conventional breeding methods.
- Demonstration of selfing and crossing techniques of different crop plants in Vitro and in Vivo circumstances. | <urn:uuid:b10a3ad9-7301-45bc-8cbf-334c58f5c802> | {
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High-resolution images of Klebsiella pneumonia
KPC Outbreak - NIH Clinical Center (2012) On Other Sites: Tracking a Hospital Outbreak of Carbapenem-Resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae with Whole-Genome Sequencing
Science Translational Medicine, Aug. 22, 2012
Tracking infectious outbreaks by their genomes
NHGRI researchers help NIH Clinical Center stem hospital epidemic
By Larry Thompson
Chief, Communications and Public Liaison Branch
The medical staff knew the seriously ill woman carried a drug-resistant bacterium when she entered the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center, the nation's premier 243-bed research hospital.
A New York City hospital had transferred her in June 2011 to be part of a clinical study at NIH. At age 43, she had already been through a lot, including a lung transplant for which her immune system had to be suppressed. She probably contracted the Klebsiella pneumonia during an earlier hospital stay; the bacterium, after all, causes about 6 percent of infections spread in hospitals nationwide. Worse, her strain of K. pneumonia carried genes that made it impervious to nearly every antibiotic in the medicine chest.
The NIH Clinical Center had never suffered an outbreak of K. pneumonia - and it did not want one now.
To manage the threat, the hospital put her in isolation, limited staff contact, imposed strict rules about visitors, and required the use of gloves and gowns. During her stay, the patient spent two 24-hour periods in the intensive care unit, and the doctors treated her infection with gentamicin, tigecycline and colistin, an older and potentially toxic medicine from the 1940s considered a drug of last resort. The combination worked, however, and she recovered, leaving the hospital in July 2011. The danger of an outbreak, the NIH staff believed, had passed.
They were wrong.
Two months later, in early August 2011, a 34-year-old man with cancer became sick with a K. pneumoniae infection. A sputum culture identified the bacteria but could not confirm whether he had the same strain as the New Yorker. The two patients, after all, were never in the same ward at the same time, so his infection could have come from a separate source before he arrived at NIH. Still, the Clinical Center team responsible for controlling hospital-acquired infections began to investigate the two cases.
Like all good detectives, the team first looked for fingerprints. "For decades, we used pulsed-field gel electrophoresis to differentiate between strains," said Tara N. Palmore, M.D., the Clinical Center's deputy hospital epidemiologist. This test produces a barcode-like pattern from bacterial DNA that shows whether strains are genetically similar; if the tests showed the same bar patterns, then the two cases might have the same source. In K. pneumoniae, however, 70 percent of the strains in the United States belong to one strain type with one pulsed-field pattern. "This test is not very helpful for that organism," she said.
Moreover, even as the investigation began, new cases started to appear in the Clinical Center at the alarming rate of one a week, sending shudders through the hospital's leadership and an increasing sense of urgency in the infection-control team. For a hospital filled with the sickest of sick patients, an outbreak of multi-drug resistant K. pneumoniae could be disastrous. The microbe commonly spreads in intensive care units or ICUs - especially in patients with suppressed immune systems - producing a 40 percent death rate. The team rapidly applied a set of epidemiology tools to control transmission, but many questions remained unanswerable with existing techniques - and the outbreak continued to spread.
Despite heroic efforts to isolate and separate affected patients, enforce hand hygiene and infection-control precautions and disinfect large sections of the Clinical Center - including use of hydrogen peroxide vapor to decontaminate rooms and ripping out contaminated sink drainpipes - the bacteria ultimately colonized 17 patients over the next five months. Six would sicken and die from the infection. Five others died from their underlying disease while actively infected. The remaining eight survived because K. pneumoniae can enter the body, colonizing the gastrointestinal tract but never causing illness. Colonized patients, however, can unwittingly serve as bacterial reservoirs capable of transmitting infections to vulnerable patients, or even infect themselves if the bacterium moves to a vulnerable part of the body.
"It is very difficult to contain an epidemic once these kinds of organism are introduced into the hospital environment," said David Henderson, M.D., NIH Clinical Center's deputy director for clinical care and associate director for quality assurance and hospital epidemiology. "They become endemic and part of the hospital flora."
A depressing prospect given K. pneumoniae's virulence.
Early in the outbreak, the Clinical Center's unique location on the 400-acre campus of the National Institutes of Health paid off. Behind the hospital, in a basic research building, a team led by Julie Segre, Ph.D., a senior investigator at the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), offered to help. Head of the epithelial biology section of the intramural Genetics and Molecular Biology Branch, Dr. Segre had been working with the Clinical Center's Clinical Microbiology Department to study the evolution of bacterial antibiotic resistance when she heard about the outbreak.
"We were already trying to develop clinical molecular diagnostics tools," Dr. Segre said, "We thought we could use genome sequencing to tell whether the K. pneumoniae from the first patient was the same strain as the one that infected the second patient."
Genome sequencing produces an ordered list of As, Ts, Cs and Gs that represent the chemical subunits (nucleotides) of DNA, the long thread that stores genetic information in a cell. Sequencing bacterial genomes delivers far more precise data than the pulse-field gel approach. Where the older pulse-field gel produces a barcode, sequencing gives the exact order of genetic letters, allowing researchers to spot and track even single nucleotide changes.
In essence, genome sequencing measures bacterial evolution in real time. Bacteria reproduce rapidly, some species taking only 20 minutes to produce a new generation. Despite the accuracy of DNA replication, however, each succeeding generation has a small chance of carrying a new mistake - the substitution of one nucleotide, say an A being replaced by a G - among the 6 million nucleotides that make up the K. pneumoniae genome. Geneticists call these changes variations, or, when they cause malfunctions, mutations. Genomic variations occur regularly, and the more variations that accumulate, the more the current generation of bacteria has evolved away from the parent strain. "Genome sequencing can be used as an evolutionary time stamp for bacteria," Segre said.
Sequencing, Dr. Segre reasoned, should provide a powerful way to show the relatedness of bacteria in many affected patients. If patients carried K. pneumoniae with essentially identical genomes, then the bacteria were passing from patient to patient within the Clinical Center. Dramatically different genomes probably meant the bacteria came from an unrelated source.
The strategy only became feasible because sequencing costs and turn-around times have plummeted in recent years, reaching a point where the NIH Intramural Sequencing Center (NISC) in Rockville, Md., run by NHGRI, could actually afford to analyze a large number of samples from patients and environmental samples and deliver the results in clinically relevant turnaround time.
"This was so cool," said NISC Director James Mullikin, Ph.D. This experienced showed that sequencing "can help solve medical mysteries in the clinical setting."
The Clinical Center quickly accepted NHGRI's offer.
Meanwhile, the sense of urgency was growing. All the early patients had been in the intensive care unit (ICU). By September, the antibiotic-resistant K. pneumoniae had spread to patients in regular rooms of the Clinical Center. The worried infection-control team had been isolating the medical staff and equipment since August, so those caring for infected patients remained only with those patients, preventing any possible cross contamination. This strategy, called cohorting, is extremely disruptive and expensive. The infection-control team began collecting rectal swabs from every patient in the hospital to search for signs of silent K. pneumoniae colonization.
The task was enormous. More than 1,100 patients passed through the Clinical Center at the height of the outbreak; they all needed regular testing.
The NHGRI and NISC teams went back to the beginning of the outbreak and sequenced the genome of the K. pneumoniae that infected the first patient. Her medical records suggested that the New Yorker had been infected for many months. During her four-week stay at NIH, doctors had isolated the bacteria from samples from her throat, lungs, groin and urine. The first step was to sequence the bacteria's genome so it could be used to determine if the outbreak started with her.
To sequence a bacterial genome, the microbe must first be isolated from a patient and grown overnight in the lab to produce enough cells. The NIH Intramural Sequencing Center's staff then purified the DNA and ran it through a sequencer. This process takes a couple of days.
"We can provide the sequencing turnaround time that is required for solving cases and saving lives," Mullikin said. "You want to get the information back to the clinical center so they know how to stop the outbreak sooner."
With the sequence data in a computer, Evan Snitkin, Ph.D., an NHGRI postdoctoral fellow in the Segre lab, started to look at the variations between different bacterial samples.
Basically, Dr. Snitkin compared bacterial genome samples to see what is the same and what is different. When one DNA letter is changed in a genome, researchers call this a single nucleotide variation or SNP (pronounced "snip"). SNPs occur all the time during normal cell division. Most SNPs produce no effect; some cause disruptive mutations. Any SNP may produce an identifiable fingerprint useful for tracking epidemics.
SNPs samples from different body sites of the New Yorker showed she had been colonized long enough for bacterial evolution to occur. The pattern of SNPs from the bacteria in her urine showed consistency with the ancestral genotype of K. pneumoniae. But the samples from her lungs and groin where different: Each shared 3 SNPS compared to the ancestral form. The throat sample showed three still other SNPS in the 6 million nucleotide genome. All of these isolates are clearly derived from the same original strain, but at the level of sequencing, even these small numbers of variants made the urine, lung, groin and throat isolates distinct from each other.
These distinctions would provide powerful clues. Where the pulse-field gel method made all the samples look identical, genome sequencing could differentiate them with precision, down to a single genetic letter. Now the NIH team could track how the bacteria spread.
Traditionally, epidemiological detectives track the order in which patients become sick and try to connect the dots with possible overlap in specific wards on specific days. The doctors normally expect Patient 1 to give the infection to Patient 2 and Patient 2 to give it to Patient 3, and so on. That works well if patients get sick in the order in which they were colonized.
This outbreak would not be that simple. The New Yorker had been discharged three weeks before the second patient became sick. The third case did not arise for another 10 days, more than a month after the first patient left the Clinical Center. Moreover, there was no obvious thread to connect these dots. Patient 2 never overlapped with Patient 1 in the hospital.
The genomic data initially complicated things even further. The genome of Patient 2 was 2 SNPs different from Patient 1, suggesting it did not come directly from Patient 1. As the sequence data poured in, the picture became clearer and the hospital infection-control staff and Drs. Palmore and Segre's team created a transmission map. The results were surprising: Patient 1 transmitted the bacteria to other patients on two separate occasions, from infections on different parts of her body, creating two major clusters of infected patients.
The first transmission went from Patient 1 to Patient 3, the second one to shows signs of sickness; Patient 3 gave it to Patient 2, the first new patient to get sick. Epidemiological tracking showed that Patient 3 did overlap with Patient 1 in the ICU where the transmission presumably occurred. These individuals were infected with bacteria that shared SNP patterns with Patient 1's groin and lung samples.
A second, completely separate transmission event linked to Patient 1's throat isolate - identified only by genomic data - to Patient 4, for whom no connection with Patient 1 could be found. Patient 4 went on to infect Patient 10 who passed the K. pneumoniae isolate to the largest cluster of patients affected in this outbreak.
Genomic data also identified a final transmission from Patient 1 to Patient 8, for whom no epidemiological link could be found.
The intensive investigation led to several startling discoveries: K. pneumoniae is hardier than previously shown in the hospital environment, which may spread the bacteria. Strains from the outbreak were found in six sink drains that were then ripped out and replaced, and on a ventilator that had been thoroughly cleaned after use by Patient 6. Bacteria from the outbreak also were found in the room of Patient 8 after it had been cleaned.
"They didn't know how the bacteria were being transmitted," NISC's Mullikin said. "They assumed it was from patient to patient, but it was going through a sink. They would never have imagined that as possibility without the sequence data to prove it."
The bacteria even survived standard decontamination procedures. "If Patient A is in the hospital room, and you clean the room thoroughly, and the next patient gets sick with the same isolate, then you know your cleaning method is not sufficient," Dr. Segre said. The genomic results started changing hospital procedures.
Sequence analysis showed all infections originated with Patient 1 and not from different sources, a conclusion difficult to prove with other techniques. The infection-control study, however, never really determined the exact mechanism by which the bacteria passed from one patient to the next; there may have been some individuals or patients who were silently colonized and passed the bacteria on to susceptible patients. It also may have been passed by hospital personnel and equipment.
The infection-control interventions proved successful, and by the end of the year, no new cases arose in the Clinical Center, stemming the outbreak.
"This study makes it clear that genome sequencing, as it becomes more affordable and rapid, will become a critical tool for healthcare epidemiology in the future," said the Clinical Center's Dr. Henderson. His team is preparing a paper that will outline the use of genome sequencing within the methodology of infection control for similar outbreaks. "Now that we know what genome sequencing can do," he said, "I anticipate this methodology will be rapidly adopted by the hospital epidemiology community."
More than one million healthcare-associated infections occur across the spectrum of healthcare each year; in hospitals alone, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that one in 20 hospitalized patients has a healthcare-associated infection. These infections can be life threatening and also add to our growing health care costs, accounting for billions of dollars in excess health expenditures each year. Multi-drug resistant K. pneumoniae is among the more dreaded infections because few effective treatments exist and it has a mortality rate of 40 percent.
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Parental Education and Investment in Children's Human Capital in Rural China
Numerous empirical studies from developing countries have noted that parental education has a robust and positive effect on child learning, a result that is often attributed to more educated parents making greater investments in their children's human capital. However, the nature of any such investment has not been well understood. This study examines how parental education affects various parental investments in goods and time used in children's human capital production via an unusually detailed survey from rural China. It is found that more educated parents make greater educational investments in both goods and time and that these relationships are generally robust to a rich set of controls. Evidence suggests that making greater investments in both goods and time stems both from higher expected returns to education for children and from different preferences for education among more educated parents. A second key finding is that the marginal effect of mother's education on educational investments is generally larger than that of father's education.
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
- Behrman, Jere R. & Khan, Shahrukh & Ross, David & Sabot, Richard, 1997. "School quality and cognitive achievement production: A case study for rural Pakistan," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 127-142, April.
- Lillard, L.A. & Willis, R.J., 1995.
"Intergenerational Educational Mobility, Effects of Family and State in Malaysia,"
95-02, RAND - Reprint Series.
- Lee A. Lillard & Robert J. Willis, 1994. "Intergenerational Educational Mobility: Effects of Family and State in Malaysia," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 29(4), pages 1126-1166.
- Lillard, L.A. & Willis, R.J., 1993. "Intergenerational Educational Mobility: Efects of Family and State in Malaysia," Papers 93-38, RAND - Labor and Population Program.
- Zeba A. Sathar & Cynthia B. Lloyd, 1994. "Who Gets Primary Schooling in Pakistan: Inequalities among and within Families," The Pakistan Development Review, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, vol. 33(2), pages 103-134.
- Xiaogang Wu & Donald Treiman, 2004. "The household registration system and social stratification in China: 1955–1996," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 41(2), pages 363-384, May.
- Zhang, Linxiu & Huang, Jikun & Rozelle, Scott, 2002.
"Employment, Emerging Labor Markets, And The Role Of Education In Rural China,"
11969, University of California, Davis, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
- Zhang, Linxiu & Huang, Jikun & Rozelle, Scott, 2002. "Employment, emerging labor markets, and the role of education in rural China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 13(2-3), pages 313-328.
- Scott Rozelle & Liniux Zhang & Jikun Huang, . "Employment, Emerging Labor Markets, and the Role of Education in Rural China," REAP Papers 22568, Rural Education Action Project at Stanford University.
- Zhang, Xiaobo & Li, Guo, 2003.
"Does guanxi matter to nonfarm employment?,"
Journal of Comparative Economics,
Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 315-331, June.
- Du, Yang & Park, Albert & Wang, Sangui, 2005. "Migration and rural poverty in China," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 688-709, December.
- Connelly, Rachel & Zheng, Zhenzhen, 2003. "Determinants of school enrollment and completion of 10 to 18 year olds in China," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 379-388, August.
When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ucp:ecdecc:y:2006:v:54:i:4:p:759-89. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.
For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Journals Division)
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Asparagus frittata is a tasty summer treat
Asparagus has been harvested worldwide for thousands of years. Its use dates back to ancient Rome and Egypt, where it was harvested for its nutritional content and once believed medicinal properties. This vegetable was so highly prized in Ancient Rome, fleets of ships were sent out to collect asparagus for royal emperors. This practice is believed to be the story behind this vegetable’s nickname, “the aristocrat of vegetables.”
This spear-like vegetable comes from the perennial plant Asparagus officinalis and can be found in the state of Michigan growing wild or freshly harvested at your local farmer’s markets during the months of May and June.
There are over 300 different types of asparagus, but only 20 varieties are edible. These edible varieties fall into one of three categories: green, purple, and white asparagus. The most commonly consumed asparagus in the United States, green asparagus, grows at an average height of eight inches while purple asparagus thrives at only one to three inches.
While green and purple asparagus is naturally found, white asparagus is not. This unique variety is grown by covering the spears of conventional green asparagus with dirt or plastic coverings to cast away sunlight. This agricultural practice ultimately prevents photosynthesis and the formation of chlorophyll, resulting in this distinct variety’s pigment-less appearance.
While all varieties of asparagus have nutritional properties, their pigmentation greatly affects their nutritional content. Purple asparagus ranks as the most nutritious variety of asparagus due to its array of vitamins and minerals and its phytonutrient content, while white asparagus provides significantly less nutrients due to its lack of pigmentation. Traditional green asparagus remains in the middle and is an excellent source of vitamin A, vitamin K, vitamin C and folic acid. Just one cup of cooked asparagus is only 43 calories and provides 3g of fiber.
Makes 4 Servings
1/2 pound asparagus spears
2 whole eggs and 4 egg whites
1/4 cup skim milk
1/4 cup reduced fat shredded cheddar cheese
Extra virgin olive oil cooking spray
Shredded Parmesan cheese (optional)
1. Steam asparagus spears for 2-3 minutes, then plunge in cold water and drain.
2. Cut asparagus into desired size and set aside.
3. Combine eggs, egg whites, and skim milk
4. Preheat broiler.
5. Coat a medium cast iron skillet with cooking spray and heat over medium-high heat.
6. Add asparagus, immediately followed by egg mixture.
7. Cook frittata for five minutes or until edges begin to set.
8. Sprinkle shredded cheddar cheese on top.
9. Carefully transfer skillet to broiler and cook frittata under broiler for 2-3 minutes or until golden in color.
10. Serve hot and top with shredded Parmesan cheese if desired.
Nutritional Content (per Serving, without Parmesan Cheese): Calories 92, Fat 4g, Carbohydrate 4g, Fiber 1g, Protein 10g
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Florida Water Snake
Scientific name: Nerodia fasciata pictiventris (COPE 1895)
* Currently accepted name
* scientific names used through time
- Coluber fasciatus – LINNAEUS 1766
- Tropidonotus fasciatus – HOLBROOK 1842
- Nerodia fasciata – BAIRD & GIRARD 1853
- Tropidonotus pogonias – DUMÉRIL & BIBRON 1854 (fide WALLACH)
- Natrix fasciata fasciata – COPE 1888
- Natrix fasciata pictiventris – COPE 1895
- Natrix sipedon pictiventris – CONANT 1958
- Nerodia fasciata – CONANT 1963
- Nerodia fasciata pictiventris – CONANT & COLLINS 1991
Description: Adults average from 24-42 inches (61-106.7 cm). The record is 62.5 inches (158.8 cm). Stout bodied snake with broad black, brown, or red crossbands over most of body. The lighter narrower bands are tan, gray, or reddish and may contain a dark spot on the side. The light bands may be broken by a black strip down the middle of the back. Crossbands may be obscured as snake darkens with age. Belly is creamy yellow with wormlike red or black markings. Scales are keeled and there are 23-27 dorsal scale rows at midbody. The pupil is round. A dark stripe extends from the eye to the angle of the jaw. Juveniles have very clear red or black crossbands on light background.
A. Top of the head
B. Underside of the head (chin and throat)
C. Elongated scales below the tail (subcaudal scales) are typically divided
D. Front (face view) of the head
E. Side of the head
F. Keeled scales
Range: In Florida, the Florida Water Snake is found throughout the peninsula, excluding the Florida Keys. Outside the Florida, it occurs in extreme southeastern Georgia and has been introduced to Brownsville, Texas.
Habitat: The Florida Water Snake can be found in nearly all freshwater habitats, preferring the shallow waters of swamps, marshes, ponds, lakes, streams, and rivers.
Comments: HARMLESS (Non-Venomous). When threatened, the Florida Water Snake defends itself by biting and smearing its tormentor with a foul smelling musk. Active mainly at night, but may be found during the day sunning on banks or on vegetation hanging over the water. Feeds on live or dead fishes, frogs, and aquatic invertebrates. The Florida Water Snake bears live young. Mating occurs mid-winter to spring and litters of 20-30 young are born in late spring through summer. The young are 7.5-10.5 inches (19-26.6 cm) at birth.
Comparison with other species: The Brown Water Snake (Nerodia taxispilota) has squarish dorsal blotches along its entire body. The Midland Water Snake (Nerodia sipedon pleuralis) has fewer than 30 darker brown crossbands near the neck, which break up into alternating blotches further down the body, and the belly is yellowish marked with two rows of half moons.
Florida Water Snakes are harmless, though they have a mouth full of teeth and will bite to defend themselves. Because they are found around bodies of water, Water Snakes are often killed in the mistaken belief that they are the venomous Cottonmouth (Agkistrodon piscivorus). Since Cottonmouths can easily be distinguished from Water Snakes there is no excuse for killing Water Snakes out of confusion. The Cottonmouth has a triangular shaped head and a vertical pupil. If the head is viewed from above, the eyes of Cottonmouths cannot be seen while the eyes of Water Snakes are visible; Cottonmouths have elliptical pupils and Water Snakes have round pupils; and Cottonmouths have a facial pit between the nostril and the eye, while Water Snakes do not. | <urn:uuid:d1453e0c-07ca-4545-a923-0bccacf21576> | {
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10 New Weight Loss and Diet Myths and Facts
Is it a no-no to eat after 8 PM? Discover the real answer to this question and more
Remember the old riddle: What weighs more -- 100 lbs of brick or 100 lbs of feathers? They, of course, weigh the same, but the size of the feather pile would be much bigger than the stack of bricks. That analogy kind of helps when you think of grams of food: a gram of protein has four calories; a gram of carbohydrates also has four calories; but a gram of fat has nine calories.
Capitalize on the facts: The difference in calories per gram is the reason why one food may have way more calories than an identical serving size of another. It's also the reason for the proliferation of low-fat and fat-free products. Limiting the number of grams of fat you consume each day makes it easier to stay in your caloric budget (and your skinny jeans).
Next: It's not (all) your parents' fault
SEE NEXT PAGE: Your body has a biologically pre-determined set weight and all attempts to change it will fail. | <urn:uuid:5d72671c-72ea-4cb9-8530-353b3607ed8f> | {
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Junior doctors in Northern Ireland are being trained in sign language so they can communicate with the deaf.
The needs of deaf people are being addressed
A specialist course is being offered during their medical training at Queen's University in Belfast.
The course, which also includes training in deaf awareness, is being run in association with the Royal National Institute for the Deaf.
The students will produce a sign language dictionary on topics such as thyroid disease and pregnancy.
It is thought one in seven people a doctor encounters during his or her career will be deaf or have hearing problems.
However, research carried out by RNID in 2004 suggested that more than a third of deaf and hard of hearing patients were unclear about their condition because of communication problems with their GP.
Director of RNID NI, Brian Symington, said the course was "incredibly important", with an increasing number of students taking the module
"RNID NI is campaigning for equality in healthcare provision for thousands of deaf and hard of hearing people," he said.
"Having doctors who are able to communicate effectively with their deaf and hard of hearing patients is a major step forward in making healthcare services in Northern Ireland accessible."
Dr Jayne Woodside, head of the specialist module on deafness at Queen's University, said: "This is an important opportunity for the QUB medical students to develop deaf awareness and communication skills, and we are very keen to both maintain and develop these links with RNID."
Since 2003, 60 students have successfully completed the course at Queen's.
The sign language dictionary which they produce for health professionals will deal with common ailments.
Each year, the students add new chapters to the dictionary as part of their coursework and the students themselves, in photographs within the dictionary, illustrate the signs.
There are 219,000 deaf and hard of hearing people in Northern Ireland, according to the RNID. | <urn:uuid:f02e2c03-f4cb-4dc1-85b8-37bddc5dcfca> | {
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A new report ‘Scenarios for the future of water South Africa’ has revealed how the drought-stricken, water-scarce country needs to transition towards a water-conscious, water smart economy with stronger water governance.
In the report unpacking various scenarios, the World Wide Fund for Nature South Africa (WWF-SA) and the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) outlined that there were actions that could be “taken now” to better prepare the country for all eventualities.
“We have already taken steps towards greater water consciousness as a nation during the 2016/17 drought,” the report said.
However, water was increasingly becoming a scarce resource and, based on current consumption trends, South Africa is expected to face a water deficit of 17% by 2030.
“South Africa's water crisis is not a future problem. It's an urgent challenge today,” the parties warned.
The report highlights that to become more water-conscious, South Africa needs to be equipped with sufficient knowledge and skills in the water sector and to educate on the value of water and water conservation in schools, while promoting and sharing best practices from water stewardship partnerships and programmes through an online platform aimed at protecting water resources, developing skills and providing job opportunities in water management and wastewater treatment, besides several others.
In addition, WWF-SA and BCG encouraged the implementation of strong water governance with resilient stakeholder partnerships; the establishment of water-use compliance and disclosure reporting requirements for JSE-listed companies; the regulation, enforcement and effective collection of water tariffs; the enforcement of punitive action for noncompliance with water-use entitlements and wastewater treatment requirements and incentivising the private sector through water stewardship programmes to plan, invest in and implement water management systems and infrastructure.
To manage water supply and demand more rigorously and protect water resources, it was also suggested that water tariffs be differentiated across various industries and consumption levels; the charges for water use over a certain consumption threshold be increased; stakeholders be incentivised to monitor and rectify their contribution to water pollution; a "fit for purpose" domestic water policy be established; and critical water infrastructure be fast-tracked by resolving bottlenecks identified as delaying the infrastructure pipeline.
Lastly, the report supported a water-smart economy commercialising low-water technologies for industry and agriculture.
This included the adoption of smart water technologies in irrigation techniques and water reuse to sustain the agriculture industry; the stimulation of commercialisation and development of new technologies in water management and the promotion of the implementation of new solutions; enhancing information sharing and awareness of water users' impact through centralised data-sharing platforms; and leveraging technology to set up rule-based algorithms to calculate and control how much water should be used according to seasonal and cyclical patterns. | <urn:uuid:b44c8e7f-205a-4afe-bd1e-e3b636fd3ece> | {
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Private wealth across the globe jumped by almost 15 per cent to a staggering $152-trillion (U.S.) in 2013, but only a tiny fraction of the world’s population controls the vast majority of the money.
A new study from Boston Consulting Group shows that 42 per cent of the world’s wealth was held by just 1 per cent of households last year. The year before, the top 1 per cent held 39 per cent.
The report measures cash, deposits, stock holdings and other assets, held by households. It doesn’t include business ownership, real estate and luxury goods or collections.
Canada didn’t match the pace of global wealth growth, with the the increase in this country at 8.4 per cent, to $4.4-trillion in 2013. BCG projects that the pace of wealth accumulation in Canada will slow substantially in the coming years, averaging just 2.2 per cent a year between 2013 and 2018.
Like most of the rest of the world, the expansion in wealth in Canada has mainly resulted from the increased value of individuals’ equity holdings, spurred by the rebound in stock markets. These holdings jumped almost 14 per cent in value in 2013 in Canada, while cash deposits and bonds increased by much lower amounts.
The BCG report notes that overall, new wealth creation is shifting toward the Asia-Pacific region, which will be richer than North America and Western Europe – the current regional leaders – by 2018. Among individual countries, China is expected to see a massive 84 per cent increase in wealth between 2013 and 2018, solidifying its hold on second place behind the United States. Russia will see similar growth rates to China, and India will outpace both with growth of almost 130 per cent, BCG says, although it is starting from a much smaller base.
Leilani Farha, executive director of lobby group Canada Without Poverty, said the BCG numbers underline the shocking income inequality that exists around the world, and how it is getting worse. It is “slightly obscene,” she said, that there is “so much wealth in the hands of so few households,” especially when there is so much extreme poverty around the globe.
The shift of wealth to developing countries in Asia could be cause for concern “if it is off the backs of disadvantaged groups or it is being accumulated in ways that deepen poverty,” she said.
Governments must have the resources to ensure that the most disadvantaged have at least an adequate standard of living, she said, and this means ensuring there is a sufficient tax base to support those programs. Indeed, governments have a legal obligation to put in place laws, policies and programs to address income inequality or wealth gaps, she said.
While wealth is not inherently bad, Ms. Farha said, the mere accumulation of wealth “does not make for great nations.”
Canada currently ranks seventh in the world when it comes to millionaire households, with about 384,000. The United States is far out in front of any other country, with more than 7 million millionaire households. (This threshold is measured in U.S. dollars). Globally, the number of millionaire households rose by 20 per cent in 2013 to 16.3 million.
But only 2.9 per cent of Canada’s households are millionaires, a sharp contrast to Qatar, which tops the “millionaire density” list at 17.5 per cent. Switzerland is second when it comes to percentage of millionaires, and Singapore third.
As for what BCG calls “ultra-high-net-worth” households – those with more than $100-million in private financial wealth, the United States has the most with 4,754, followed by Britain at 1,044. Canada comes seventh with 465 people in this category. Hong Kong has the highest proportion of these ultra-rich folks.
Anna Zakrzewski, one of the authors of the BCG report, said that one reason for the dramatic growth in wealth in Asia is the expansion of the upper middle class, a segment that was very small until recently. Asia is also seeing more new wealth creation, rather than just investment growth from existing assets, she said. | <urn:uuid:fdf24c6e-4a0c-4fab-b630-1981ca199a84> | {
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By the end of 12 months after you quit, the risk of heart disease is half what it was when you smoked. While it may take ten years for the risk of cancer to decrease fully and fifteen years before you are in the same risk category as people who have never smoked, it is encouraging that the early benefits of quitting smoking start to appear almost immediately.
For many people it is almost impossible to kick the habit of smoking, but for others it is simple. For they have chosen to live better lives, while at the same time enjoy the life that they have now that they have quit smoking. In addition, they are not at risk of a heart attack or lung cancer. It is said that cigarettes are one of the leading causes of death in the United States, as well as other countries. While cigarettes can be very addicting, the benefits of quitting can be a real joy. Quitting smoking takes strength, for instance to tell yourself that if you continue to smoke you could end up with lung cancer. Quitting smoking also takes courage; say for instance, when someone asked you if you want a cigarette. One must have the courage to say no thank you I’m trying to quit.
When many of the people in the world think about lighting up a cigarette, the benefits of quitting never even crosses their minds. However, say for instance we cigarette smokers take some time, and think about the benefits of quitting smoking and you can do it well if you will be well aware about how to quit smoking Perth.
Knowing smoking is bad for you and being able to quit are two separate issues. Quitting involves the fear of nicotine withdrawal symptoms while you are not seeing any results for your suffering. Here’s good news for you: new research has found that, while you may still experience withdrawal effects in the early days or weeks of quitting, the health benefits to quitting smoking can be seen (and felt) almost immediately.
It would be almost impossible not to be aware of the health risks of smoking, with all the media coverage and irrefutable medical proof of the serious risks. The benefits of quitting smoking are also well-documented.
Did you know that people who use quit smoking aids have a much higher chance of stopping smoking? If you want to enjoy the benefits of quitting smoking without having all the withdrawal side effects, then you need the free stop smoking aids report. | <urn:uuid:6f9fb4fa-6273-4f43-bb83-ae81b7bc666a> | {
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Some homeowners have poor soil and a small area to start gardening. However, this is not a big problem because many available methods you can try and one of them is hay-bale gardening, enables you to grow tomato plants. Growing tomatoes in hay bales have benefits such as won’t over-water your plants since the materials quickly drain any excess moisture. Let’s learn how to start!
1. Prepare hay bales and then, put them for two or more layers end to end in a row. You have to set up the bales so the baling twine can goes around the sides of the bales.
2. You have to watering the bales daily before planting or three days before planting the tomato seeds. Please never let the bales dry out.
3. You have to fertilize the bales with ammonium nitrate fertilizer (give 12 cups per bale on the fourth, fifth and sixth days; ¼-cup per bale on the seventh, eighth and ninth days). Then, you can give a balanced 10-10-10 fertilizer on the tenth day.
4. You can plant two to three tomato plants per bale and make sure the spacing equally apart.
5. Don’t forget daily watering the hay bales since they are dry quickly and need more water during hot temperature.
6. Fertilize still important, give 10-10-10 granular fertilizer or liquid balanced fertilizer for every 1 to 2 weeks, you can read and follow package instructions.
Growing tomatoes in pots is easier than hay bales. However, a newbie gardener can run those steps above. | <urn:uuid:bcce60c5-dd17-416d-8eff-6587411d3adb> | {
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For years, the United States was denounced for befriending Latin American right-wing dictatorships. The critics argued that the criminal repression of Pinochet, Trujillo, the Somozas and Duvaliers could not be sustained were it not for American support.
Gradually, U.S. policy shifted to supporting democracy in Latin America. Yet today, the voices raised are harshly critical of President George W. Bush for refusing to coddle the repressive, left-wing, communist dictatorship in Cuba. The irony - hypocrisy, if you will - is as astounding as it is mystifying.
Eleven million people are suffering under the anti-American totalitarian regime of the Castro brothers, who remain contemptuous of democracy and free markets. The spate of critical commentary of Bush's speech reiterating American support for democracy in Cuba suggests that his critics neither heard nor read the speech.
The president was accurate when he said: "Cuba's rulers promised individual liberty. Instead they denied their citizens basic rights that the free world takes for granted. In Cuba it is illegal to change jobs, to change houses, to travel abroad and to read books or magazines without the express approval of the state."
"The day is coming," Bush added, "when the Cuban people will chart their own course for a better life," noting that "peaceful demonstrations are spreading....Cuban dissidents have come together for the first time to issue a declaration for change." The president spoke the truth about a process that succeeded in Chile, South Africa, Czechoslovakia, Poland and elsewhere and that will likely triumph in Cuba.
While minimizing the reality of Castro's repression, Bush's critics, such as Wayne Smith of the Washington, D.C., Center for International Policy, strongly objected to his call for an international Freedom Fund for Cuba "to enlist foreign governments and international organizations" to help reconstruct a democratic Cuba.
What's wrong with such help? Following World War II, President Harry Truman wasn't popular when he pushed the Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe. Still, he was right. President Reagan drew harsh criticism for telling Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall. Reagan, too, was right, and the wall came down. | <urn:uuid:6d83ecdb-b7cf-49d1-b98f-e656c4a07190> | {
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Behind the buzz and beyond the hype:
Our Nanowerk-exclusive feature articles
Posted: Aug 18, 2011
Nanofluidic device allows protein detection with unprecedented sensitivity
(Nanowerk Spotlight) Molecular separations are extremely important in a wide range of technologies, from conventional proteomics to pathogen detection and DNA fingerprinting. A complication arises from the fact that molecular components in mixtures can span an enormous range of concentration. Conventional approaches such as antibody depletion are not sensitive enough to detect numerous medically significant biomarkers, whose incidence in blood could be as much as a trillion times less abundant than the most plentiful protein, albumin.
"This limitation prevents the isolation, characterization, and discovery of millions of new proteins where key disease markers could be identified," David Inglis, a Research Associate in the Department of Physics at Macquarie University, tells Nanowerk. "Overcoming this barrier requires new approaches to analytical detection that minimize sample preprocessing steps while achieving high throughput with very high levels of sensitivity."
A recent paper in Angewandte Chemie International Edition ("Simultaneous Concentration and Separation of Proteins in a Nanochannel"), first authored by Inglis, shows a new path in miniaturized molecular separations. It describes a new device that demonstrates simultaneous concentration and separation of proteins by conductivity gradient focusing. Concentration and separation take place in an electric-field-driven 120 nm deep nanochannel that supports a stable salt and conductivity gradient. The results show that relevant proteins can be concentrated to detectable levels.
This work demonstrates that a simple nanochannel that connects to chemically different solutions creates a stable and robust gradient between those two solutions. This gradient can then be used to perform separations and selective concentration enhancement. Such processes have previously been demonstrated in systems that create the gradient in more complex ways.
"Our work is based on the idea that, by placing the gradient and the molecules in the nanochannel, the gradient is extended, thus allowing separation of molecules while they are being concentrated" explains Inglis. "Furthermore, rather than relying on concentration polarization, we use a nanochannel that connects a high-conductivity and a low-conductivity microchannel to impose an electric field gradient."
Device description. a) Cross-section of the device showing a 120 nm-deep nanochannel. b) Top view of the nanochannels (purple) connecting two microchannels. The four vertical lines are microchannel edges. c) Top view of the entire device. The four dark circles (one is obscured) are holes cut through the silicon for liquid and electrode access. (Reprinted with permission from Wiley-VCH Verlag)
As illustrated in the figure above, the device consists of a pair of microchannels (8.6 µm deep) connected by 25 parallel nanochannels (each 120 nm deep). The nanochannels are almost three times as wide at the right end (62 mm) than at the left (22 nm), with a 2° half-angle.
As Inglis explains, low- and high-salt buffers are continuously transported through the left and right microchannel, respectively. "The proteins under investigation are added to the right-hand, high-salt microchannel. Capillary forces and evaporation at the downstream end continuously drive the fluid in the microchannels at approximately 5 nL per minute. This flow sustains the salt concentration gradient despite the buffer exchange through the nanochannels. A positive voltage is applied to electrodes in the right-hand, high-salt microchannel, while the left-hand, low-salt channel is grounded. Electro-osmotic flow carries the buffer with dissolved proteins into the nanochannel, where they may be trapped."
Since the bulk protein concentration is much less than the salt concentration, the presence of the protein does not affect the gradient.
The fundamental concepts of conductivity gradient focusing. A conductivity gradient is established in a nanochannel connecting
two reservoirs. At the high-concentration salt (+) side, the electro-osmotic force dominates (blue arrow), while at the low-salt (-) side the electrophoretic force dominates (red arrow). Proteins (green) are trapped in positions within the nanochannel wherever the net force is zero. (Reprinted with permission from Wiley-VCH Verlag)
The researchers demonstrated their device by simultaneously concentrating and separating two fluorescent proteins (R-phycoerythrin and Dylight488-labelled streptavidin). Initially, the two proteins are mixed high-salt microchannel. After applying a voltage of 4V for 110 seconds, both proteins are well-resolved (see image below).
Image showing simultaneous separation and concentration of a green and red protein, and DNA (fluorescent green close to the middle of the channel). DNA is much more negatively charged than the proteins so traps much closer to the high-salt, positive-voltage microchannel. (Image: Dr. David Inglis, Macquarie University)
Inglis says that the R-phycoerythrin molecules have been concentrated by a factor of 60 and the Dyl-Strep molecules by a factor of 51. " We calculated concentration enhancement as the peak intensity divided by the microchannel intensity times a geometric factor that corrects the fluorescence intensity for the depths of the microchannels and nanochannels."
Applications of this novel device will most likely be found in proteomics, especially in the integration of separation and electro spray mass spectrometry; mobility shift immunoassays for molecular detection; and detection of nucleic acids using fluorescent molecular beacons.
Taking their work forward, Inglis and his collaborators are now trying to develop better control over the range of molecules that are trapped and they plan to investigate new materials and coatings with low protein adsorption.
Below is a brief time-lapse movie showing the flow of proteins into the nanochannel where they are
concentrated and separated into two clearly resolved bands near the low-salt end. | <urn:uuid:67be043b-f6b7-4451-bcf4-a0dd9728d774> | {
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