During the late 1940’s, a practical hydroponic method was developed by Robert B. and Alice P. Withrow, working at Purdue University. Their hydroponics system alternately flooded and drained a container holding gravel and the plant roots. This provided the plants with the optimum amount of both nutrient solution and air to facilitate rapid and efficient growth.
During World War II the shipping of fresh vegetables overseas was not practical and remote islands where troops were stationed were not a place where they could be grown in the soil. Hydroponic technology was tested as a viable source for fresh vegetables during this time.
In 1945, the US Air Force built one of the first large hydroponic farms on Ascension Island in the South Atlantic, followed by additional hydroponic farms on the islands of Iwo Jima and Okinawa in the Pacific, using crushed volcanic rock as the growing medium and, on Wake Island west of Hawaii, using gravel as the growing medium. These hydroponic farms helped fill the need for a supply of fresh vegetables for troops stationed in these areas.
During this time, large hydroponic facilities were established in Habbaniya, Iraq and Bahrain in the Persian Gulf, to support troops stationed in those areas near large oil reserves.
The American Army and Royal Air Force built hydroponic units at various military bases to help feed troops. In 1952, the US Army’s special hydroponics branch grew over 8,000,000 lbs. of fresh produce for military demand. Also established at this time was one of the world’s largest hydroponic farms in Chofu, Japan, consisting of 22 hectares.
Following the success of hydroponics in World War II, several large commercial hydroponic farms were built in the US, most of which were in Florida. However, due to poor construction and management, many of these farms were unsuccessful. Even though the potential of hydroponics was incredible, commercial hydroponics in the US was held back until hydroponic systems that were economical to build and relatively easy to operate, became available in the marketplace.


Colitis, Crohn's and IBS
Illnesses of the intestinal tract are varied in their causes, symptoms and treatments. They can go from merely annoying to life threatening. And as complex as their diagnoses and remedies are, there is also the commonality that these conditions may all benefit from a healthier gut. Here is a snapshot of some GI conditions.
Irritable Bowel Syndrome
Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is the most common GI problem in America, affecting 20% of the population. It generates abdominal pain and bloating, but without severe intestinal inflammation like the more serious IBD (inflammatory bowel disease). Among the possible causes are a rise in the ratio of the bad vs good bacteria in your gut (dysbiosis), and the increase in gas that results.
IBS treatment options are complex, but one choice includes the introduction of butyrate – a short chain fatty acid your probiotic bacteria normally produce by fermenting prebiotic fibers – in your large intestine. The butyrate nourishes the epithelial cells of your intestinal wall lining and helps promote the establishment of a healthy microbiota climate.
To treat IBS, physicians often recommend eating more whole grains, vegetables and fruits, to increase dietary fiber intake. Doctors also suggest omega-3, digestive enzymes, antioxidants, minerals and vitamins. Many of these are also found in ProBiotein.
Inflammatory Bowel Diseases
Inflammations of the large intestine are called inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD). They can be low grade, persistent, chronic inflammations, or severe and intense flare-ups. Among the more common types of IBD are ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease. Both are thought to be a result of autoimmune problems.
Ulcerative colitis (UC) is an inflammation of the mucosal membrane of the large intestine lining, which is the inner most layer. It primarily affects the large intestine and unlike Crohn's, tends to be continuous across tissue. Ulcerative colitis affects less than 1 in 1,000 Americans, and appears intermittently. It is an autoimmune disease and may be preceded by inflammation in other parts of the body, such as knees and joints. There may possibly be a link between UC, the cells lining the intestine, and higher levels of hydrogen sulfide in the large intestine. Production of hydrogen sulfide by pathogenic bacteria in the large intestine is an indication of dysbiosis and may also be linked to UC.
Crohn's disease (CD) is most often a condition that appears near the end of the small intestine and/or in the large intestine. About 1 in 500 Americans has it, and Crohn's is much more common in the U.S. than undeveloped countries. Its origin may be linked to the bacterium MAP (Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis), or E. coli (Escherichia coli). Plus a genetic component for enhanced susceptibility, and the body's self-attacking immune reaction against its own gut tissues.
The disease generally affects all layers of the bowel wall, though primarily in patches, not continuously. Leaky gut may play a part in the development of Crohn's and in its occasional flare-ups. This may also explain why reaction to certain foods can cause episodes, as undigested particles of those foods can slip through the intestinal wall and come under attack by the body's immune response system.
With Crohn's, antioxidant levels are often lower, as they are consumed by the increased number of free radicals which can be produced with inflammation. And with increased free radicals, more healthy cells may be damaged, potentially causing more inflammation and even more free radicals if left unabated.
As with other IBD sufferers, Crohn's patients often have gut microbial imbalances, where pathogenic bacteria numbers are too high. It has been reported that at the core of Crohn's disease is the connection between the microbiota of the gut and the health of the intestinal lining.


GCHD: Travel-related Zika virus identified in Galveston County
The Man is expected to make a full recovery
GALVESTON COUNTY, Texas – According to the Galveston County Health District (GCHD), a man contracted the Zika virus during a recent trip to Dominica.
The man is in between the ages of 60 and 70. He developed symptoms shortly after returning from Dominica in late July. He is expected to make a full recovery.
Although neighboring counties have experienced confirmed cases of the Zika virus, this is the first confirmed case of Zika virus in Galveston County.
There is no evidence of local transmission, but the GCHD will continue to work with the Galveston County Mosquito Control to monitor local mosquitoes.
Most people infected with Zika won’t have symptoms. However, for those who do, the illness is usually mild with symptoms lasting from several days to a week. The most common symptoms of Zika are fever, rash, joint pain and conjunctivitis (red eyes).
Anyone with these symptoms should see a doctor if they visited an area where Zika virus is present or had sexual contact with a person who traveled to an area where Zika virus is present.
Zika virus has been linked to a serious birth defect of the brain called microcephaly, as well as other problems in fetuses and infants infected with Zika before birth. Pregnant women should avoid travel to areas where Zika virus is found and all travelers should take precautions to avoid mosquito bites.
The best ways to avoid getting the Zika virus is to wear EPA-approved insect repellent, dress in long sleeves and pants when outdoors, and drain standing water around your home so mosquitoes don’t have a place to breed.


We are still looking into different possibilities and haven’t defined a final location yet. Though, we have narrowed it down to the municipalities in between the area of Hobro and Viborg where several good possible locations are available.
Our targets are approx. 600,000 tonnes per year reduction of CO2 emissions. Due to Denmark’s interconnections with neighbouring countries, part of the reduction will be seen outside Denmark’s borders, which we see as an advantage for achieving the European climate goals.
Essentially, Power-to-X seeks to convert the green electricity produced by wind turbines and/or solar cells (Power) to something else, symbolised by the “X”. For instance, how we can use our green electricity from wind turbines in transport, e.g. cars, shipping and aviation. With the GHH we will have the possibility of storing the electricity generated from the wind turbine, and therefore be able to charge a car with green electricity even if there is no wind.
The process of converting from renewable electricity to “X” includes three elements: 1) biogas/methane, 2) CO2 and 3) hydrogen. The hydrogen is essential as this is required to use the CO2. The water is split into Hydrogen (H) and Oxygen (O2). The oxygen will then be applied in industrial processes and the hydrogen will be used for renewable energy and fuels.
Electrolysis also creates heat – on a long-term basis it could contribute to the district heating system and essentially to domestic heating.
Hydrogen is the first step in all PtX value chains. Production of hydrogen via electrolysis can, together with hydrogen storage, utilise excess energy from wind and solar. Hydrogen can be used in many sectors where direct electrification is difficult. Storing gas or hydrogen underground is a known technology and it is very safe. Thus, hydrogen becomes an essential part of our contribution to the green transition.
The combination of hydrogen storage and CAES makes it possible to live 100% CO2 free, and have electricity from renewable sources every hour all year round. It is our assessment that hydrogen-powered CAES is competitive if it is properly integrated with solar and wind.
Our targets for the three elements of the value-chain are a 350MW electrolysis plant, 250 GWh hydrogen capacity and a 320MW CAES.
GHH fits very well with other energy storage technologies. What’s special with the GHH is that large amounts of energy can be stored for a very large time period, for example from summer to winter.
As Greenhouse Gas (GHG) reductions impact security of supply, Green Hydrogen Hub Denmark actually increases Danish security of supply by providing new inertia based flexible sources of electricity generation along the whole supply chain by fully integrating growing variable renewable sources.
Hydrogen is a chemical element with symbol H and atomic number 1. It is the simplest, most abundant and lightest element in the universe. Hydrogen constitutes about 75% of the universe's mass.
Hydrogen gas is rarely found alone in nature because it is usually bonded with other elements. Hydrogen can be found in water (H2O). In summary, hydrogen combines with many other elements to form different types of compounds such as water (H2O), ammonia (NH3), hydrogen peroxide (H2O2).
Hydrogen is the key priority in the European Green Deal and in supporting Denmark's ambitious clean energy transition. Renewables will decarbonise a large share of Denmark’s electrical consumption, but not all of it. Clean green hydrogen will plug this gap.
Hydrogen, such as petrol, diesel and natural gas, contains large amounts of energy and must therefore be treated responsibly. When handled and stored properly, hydrogen is just as safe as all other commonly used fuels, but more importantly, it is less toxic and it is an indispensable component in achieving our climate goals.
The vast majority of Hydrogen currently produced worldwide uses steam reformation of natural gas and water electrolysis. Water electrolysis is simply a means to split up water into its two gas constituents that is hydrogen and oxygen. Using an electrolyser fully powered by renewable energy, hydrogen can be split from oxygen by sending an electrical current between two electrodes. When the current flows through the electrodes, hydrogen and oxygen are split.
Hydrogen is seen as a green or pure fuel because H2 is an environmentally friendly fuel with no associated CO2 emission. As such hydrogen has the potential to dramatically reduce our dependence on imported oil as well as reduce the dangers associated with Greenhouse Gas emissions.
The GHH take excess renewable energy that is normally wasted and converts it to hydrogen, as well as storing the renewable energy in the compressed air energy storage cavern. Converting and storing excess renewable energy provides consumers with the lowest cost of decarbonisation, this accommodates sector coupling via case which is an inertia-based zero emission generator that balances fluctuating renewables.


Teaching children to send thank-you notes
Show your child to express gratitude by sending thank-you notes.Did your child just receive a gift? This is an opportune time to teach your child how to write thank-you notes. Teaching your child to express gratitude is important – teaching children to send thank-you notes will be appreciates for generations to come.
When to Begin Teaching Children to Send Thank-You Notes
Children under six years of age could be encouraged to draw a picture to show their gratitude. They can tell one of their parents what they are most thankful for and the parent can write the note for them. When a child becomes about six, they should be encouraged to write their own thank-you notes.
How to Create the Thank-You Note
Teaching your children to write thank-you notes is fairly simple. Begin by giving them stationary. Children will respond positively if they are given special materials just for this project. This makes it feel like an important project. Ask your child what they like the most about the gift or what they enjoyed most about their visit to the person's home. Help them craft this into a short note. A thank-you note is typically two to three short paragraphs.
Developing a Thoughtful Thank-You Note
Some children may need to be encouraged to think about what to say if they receive a gift that they do not like or if they did not enjoy their visit. A thank-you note should be polite, but should not lie. Ask your child to think about one or two things that they may have enjoyed about their visit. Maybe they enjoyed the fact that the gift-giver thought of them and came to their birthday party.
By teaching your child to send out thank-you notes, you are teaching them excellent manners. Someone with excellent manners is more likely to be invited places and have more opportunities than others.


Learning from web-based instructional systems and cognitive style
Two of the principal issues, which have been addressed in assessments of the benefits of web-based instructional systems, are firstly, whether the segmentation of information provided by the web structure aids users in apprehending the interrelationships between the units of information featured in the web. Secondly, whether providing the user with an overview of the web system assists in facilitating his/her learning. It is suggested in the present study that these two issues may be more effectively understood by a consideration of an individual's cognitive style. Fifty participants were assigned to one of two web-based instructional systems featuring information on the subject of psychological ethics. The information in one of the web systems was segmented to a greater degree than the information in the other. Half the participants using each web system were given an overview of the system and half were not. After a given time using the system, participants were tested on the information from the web. The findings suggest that cognitive style and segmentation had an effect on performance, although the provision of the overview had little effect. The results are discussed in terms of a consideration of cognitive style in the design of web-based instructional systems.
Document Type: Research Article
Affiliations: School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Glamorgan CF37 1DL UK. , Email: Mgraff@Glam.ac.uk
Publication date: September 1, 2003


Neuroscience Is…TM is a campaign by the American Academy of Neurology to build public awareness and demonstrate the importance of neuroscience research in care of neurology patients and the development of cures for brain diseases.
|Geared toward K-12 students, this initiative incorporates unusual and fun facts about the brain and nervous system to attract the attention of young minds and help shape a lifelong interest in and commitment to the neuroscience field.|
|Designed to increase awareness of the impact that neuroscience has on the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of as many as 600 known types of brain diseases, this initiative works to inspire medical students to select a career in neurology.|
|This initiative speaks to practicing neurologists and other neuroscience professionals by using compelling facts to demonstrate how research is critical to patient care and day-to-day practice.|
|Without support from government agencies, industry, and the general public, there is not enough funding to sustain neuroscience research. Without research, there are no treatments. And without treatments, there are no cures. This initiative raises awareness of the American Academy of Neurology's support of researchers and access to practitioners to conduct trials and trial recruitment.|


As a mother to two young boys, I learned quickly that children will imitate what they see other people doing – especially their parents, caregivers, and older siblings. As the Child Care Solutions Literacy Specialist, I’ve been able to help parents and child care providers use this “monkey see, monkey do” phenomenon to their advantage—as a way to introduce and encourage a love of reading into their homes and centers.
One of the easiest ways to use this mimicry to engage your children in reading is to let them see you read. If you enjoy reading, use this as an excuse to pick up a few new books and give yourself permission to make time to read. What you read is not important, so find books on topics that interest you, magazines about your hobbies, or catalogs that you enjoy looking though. It is great to read with your children, but let them see you spend some time with yourself, reading what you enjoy. When your children see you making this effort, it teaches them that reading is enjoyable and important.
“When I say to a parent, “read to a child”, I don’t want it to sound like medicine. I want it to sound like chocolate.” – Mem Fox
But what if you don’t enjoy reading, or struggle to make the time to read? Please don’t let this deter you. There are many ways that you can still read around, read with, and show your children that reading is fundamental. Literacy is sprinkled everywhere in our world. With a little creativity and effort, you will start to recognize reading opportunities and easily incorporate them in your interactions with your children. Some of my favorite examples include:
- Talk about what you see when you are in the car together. Talk about the street signs (names), the speed limits (numbers), traffic signs (colors and symbols). Naming things that your children see allow them to increase their vocabulary, and helps with reading. (If you don’t know what something is, how can you recognize the word for it in print?)
- Cook with your children. Whether you are cooking from scratch using a recipe book, or warming up chicken nuggets in the microwave, read the directions with your children and let them help you. Showing your child that reading and understanding directions allows them to do new things is a great way to show the importance of literacy.
- Let your child touch, feel, chew on, stack, and enjoy books. Yes, books have words that we can read, but books also create an experience, and it’s important that children’s experiences with books are pleasant. So, if your 1-year-old enjoys chewing on board books or touch and feel books, allow her to do so (as long as there is no choking danger). If you 2-year-old likes to turn pages from the back of the book to the front, let him. Soon enough, with your example, they will learn to enjoy the printed words. Until then, allow them to just play with books and enjoy them as they will.
Being a parent, child care provider, or both is hard work! A little effort to support your child’s development of print-awareness and their love of reading will be worthwhile. Remember, we shouldn’t limit our children’s exposure to reading to “quiet time” or structured “reading time.” Make reading fun, make it silly, make it personal. For more ideas, please visit the Reading is Fundamental website.


In the US, a 2016 survey of over 2,000 children (aged six to 17) showed that only 52% of boys (versus 72% of girls) said they liked reading books during the summer holidays, while 45% of boys (versus 36% of girls) said they had trouble finding books they liked. In general, boys have also scored lower than girls on national reading tests, with the gender gap widening as children get older.
Two large-scale studies conducted in the UK several years ago also revealed that boys of every age are less careful readers than girls, i.e. they take less time to process what they’re reading, tend to skip over parts, and prefer books that are easy for them.
Here in Singapore, a 2017 survey of about 6,000 secondary school students showed that 59.2% of boys enjoyed reading, compared to 77.7% of girls. Local boys were said to read more for functional reasons, whereas girls tended to read for pleasure. However, both genders reported enjoying adventure, horror, science fiction, and fantasy books, as well as biographies and travel books.
If your son is in primary school and hasn’t caught the reading bug, what can you do? A KSP member with a Primary 3 boy shares her tips:
Start slow. Don’t be pressured to keep up with what other kids are reading, or feel that you need to steer your child towards “proper” or “better” books. My own daughter was reading Harry Potter by age seven, while my son entered Primary 1 still having trouble sounding out and deciphering words.
For my son, I focused on reading picture books with him in his Primary 1 year, and we gradually moved on to Scholastic’s beginner readers, which were useful for helping him to transition to chapter books.
Find creative ways to hone reading skills. Beyond books, you can create opportunities in daily life for your child to read. For instance, you could get your child to check your text messages for you, or to read your e-mails.
When my son watches Netflix or YouTube, I’ll get him to turn on the captions — it’s only natural to read along, and it’s particularly useful when there’s a word that he hasn’t encountered before, so he can see and hear it at the same time.
Buy more than one version of a book. Beginning readers find many books intimidating, usually because a book appears too thick or wordy. In our home, we have the full-colour illustrated versions of well-loved books such as Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, which are much more enticing than the regular texts.
For my son, I’ve taken the additional step of borrowing or purchasing audiobooks for some of the stories in our collection, so he can listen and read at the same time, or simply listen to the story at bedtime. It’s helped to ease his resistance to more challenging books, and to raise his reading level.
What Primary 1 & 2 Boys Are Reading
“In my son’s Primary 2 year, I asked other parents what their sons were reading. A handful of his classmates were reading more advanced stories such as Harry Potter and The Chronicles of Narnia. Some boys were reading classic stories such as Enid Blyton’s Secret Seven series, or books by Roald Dahl. Below are more series books recommendations, based on what my son and his classmates enjoyed in Primary 1 and 2.”
Fly Guy (Series)
Author: Tedd Arnold
Synopsis: A boy catches a fly, and he is amazed when the fly calls him by his name — Buzz. Buzz’s parents think the fly is a pest, not a pet. However, the fly soon proves how smart he is with some quick flying, and earns the name Fly Guy. The adventures of Fly Guy and Buzz are filled with puns, slapstick humor, and goofy illustrations; all guaranteed to keep beginning readers laughing and reading. (Website)
Recommended Age: 4+ Commonsense Media Rating: N.A. Find It At The Library: Print and e-book editions available.
Scholastic Branches (Series Books For Growing Readers)
Synopsis: Scholastic’s Branches line of early chapter books is designed for those ready to read independently, and helps them transition from leveled readers (e.g. Ladybird’s Peter and Jane series) to chapter books. With different series options, each featuring riveting stories, fun characters, and engaging art, there is a Branches book for every reader. (Website)
Recommended Age: 5+ Commonsense Media Rating: N.A. Find It At The Library: E-book editions available.
Dog Man (Series)
Author: Dav Pilkey
Synopsis: From the creator of Captain Underpants comes Dog Man, the crime-biting canine who is part dog, part man, and all hero! With the head of a dog and the body of a human, this hybrid hound has animal instincts and a nose for justice. Although parents might frown upon the toilet humour and deliberate misspellings, kids find the books endearing and compelling — don’t be surprised to find your reluctant reader clamouring for more. (Website)
Recommended Age: 6+ Commonsense Media Rating: Mild warnings. Find It At The Library: Print and e-book editions available.
Geronimo Stilton (Series)
Author: Elisabetta Dami
Synopsis: Imported from Italy, this series about a globetrotting mouse journalist is great for kids who love funny adventures, along with a good dose of cheesy puns. Geronimo Stilton is the editor of The Rodent’s Gazette, the newspaper of New Mouse City, capital of Mouse Island. He embarks on various adventures with his wacky family, each of which is detailed using illustrations and fun fonts. The graphics may be distracting for intermediate readers, but they are good for enticing beginning readers to pick up a chapter book. (Website)
Recommended Age: 7+ Commonsense Media Rating: N.A. Find It At The Library: Print, e-book, and audiobook editions available.
The Magic School Bus (Series)
Synopsis: The Magic School Bus is a series of children’s books about science, featuring the adventures of Ms. Valerie Frizzle and her class, who have access to a school bus that takes them on field trips to impossible locations, including the solar system, clouds, and the human body. (Website)
Recommended Age: 7+ Commonsense Media Rating: Mild warnings. Find It At The Library: Print editions available.
The World’s Worst Children (Series)
Author: David Walliams
Synopsis: From Dribbling Drew, a boy whose drool gets him into terrible trouble, to Sofia Sofa, a couch potato so stuck to the sofa that she’s turning into one, the uproariously funny cast of characters in The World’s Worst Children will delight young readers. (Website)
Recommended Age: 8+ Commonsense Media Rating: N.A. Find It At The Library: Print editions available.
The Treehouse Series
Author: Andy Griffiths
Synopsis: Andy and Terry live in a treehouse that would delight any child — their treehouse has a bowling alley, a see-through swimming pool, a secret underground laboratory, a marshmallow machine, and so much more! (Website)
Recommended Age: 8+ Commonsense Media Rating: Mild warnings. Find It At The Library: E-book editions available.
Diary Of A Wimpy Kid (Series)
Author: Jeff Kinney
Synopsis: It’s a new school year, and Greg Heffley finds himself thrust into middle school, where undersized weaklings share the hallways with kids who are taller, meaner, and already shaving. The hazards of growing up before you’re ready are uniquely revealed through the words and drawings in Greg’s diary. (Website)
Recommended Age: 9+ Commonsense Media Rating: Mild warnings. Find It At The Library: Print, e-book, and audiobook editions available.


CBSE NotesCBSE Notes Class 6 ScienceNCERT Solutions Science
CBSE Class 6 Science Notes Chapter 1 Food Where Does It Come From Pdf free download is part of Class 6 Science Notes for Quick Revision. Here we have given NCERT Class 6 Science Notes Chapter 1 Food Where Does It Come From.
CBSE Class 6 Science Notes Chapter 1 Food Where Does It Come From
All living beings need food.
Food is needed by all living beings for four main purposes:
- for their growth.
- to provide energy for doing work.
- for the repair and replacement of the damaged tissues.
- to provide resistance and protection against diseases from infections.
If a person does not get food, she/he feels weak and is likely to fall ill.
Different people have different choices of food.
There is a wide range of food items eaten across various states of India. Different organisms eat different kinds of food.
Human beings are omnivores.
Our food comes from different sources.
We get food from plants as well as animals.
We eat animals (as meat) as well as their different products like milk, eggs and honey.
Cooked food can be easily consumed and absorbed by our body. Cooking also kills the harmful germs.
We should have sprouted seeds every day. Sprouted seeds are rich in nutrients.
Domesticated animals are classified as meat yielding, milk yielding and drought animals.
Ingredients: Materials needed to prepare a dish or food are called its ingredients.
Edible parts: Those parts (of a plant) which are eatable are called Edible parts
Nectar: Sweet juices found in flowers are known as nectar.
Sprouted seeds: Seeds which grow white thread like structures when soaked in water are called sprouted seeds.
Herbivore: Animals which eat plants and plant products like fruits, flowers, seeds, nectar, etc., are called herbivores.
Carnivore: Animals which eat other animals are called carnivores. Omnivore: Animals which eat both plants and their products, as well as other animals, are called omnivores.
Let us see what Mrs Iyer and Mrs Kapoor have prepared. Have they prepared the same kind of food? List out the six food items that you see on their table.
- Need for food
- Food from plants
- Food from animals
- What do animals eat
We get all these food from both plants and animals. Thus, plant parts and animal products are our sources of food.
- chicken curry
- Fish curry
Food From Plants:
Green plants are known as producers because they prepare their own food. They use light, air (carbon dioxide), water, and chlorophyll (present in their leaves) to prepare their food by the process of photosynthesis.
Different plant parts serve as sources of food for us. Fruits, vegetables, cereals, and pulses that we eat are obtained from different parts of a plant.
Roots of plants like carrot, radish, turnip, sweet potato, and beetroot are eaten (Fig. 1.1).
Stems of certain plants are eaten. For example, the stem of sugarcane plant is eaten and is also used to make sugar. The stem and flower of the banana plant is cooked and eaten in different parts of India. Certain plants have underground stems that we eat. Examples are potato, onion, garlic, and ginger (Fig. 1.2).
Leaves of plants like lettuce, spinach, cabbage, coriander, mint, and basil are eaten (Fig. 1.3).
Flowers of certain plants like cauliflower, broccoli, and banana are also eaten (Fig. 1.4).
Seeds Pulses like mung bean, kidney bean, chickpea, and cereals (wheat, maize, and rice) that we eat are seeds of plants (Fig. 1.5).
Wheat grains are ground to make flour (atta) which is used to make chapattis. Cumin seeds, pepper, and cardamom that we eat as spices are also seeds of different plants.
Sprouted seeds (or sprouts) of mung bean and chickpea (Bengal gram) are very nutritious. Sprouting involves soaking seeds and draining the water and then leaving them till they germinate. Sprouts can be eaten raw as salads or cooked.
Fruits and vegetables Plants also provide us fruits and vegetables (Fig. 1.6).
Like different plant parts, animal too serve as sources of food. Let us learn about the main food products obtained from animals.
Food From Animal:
Animal products like meat, egg, honey, milk, cheese, butter, and curd are eaten by human beings.
Meat of animals like goat, chicken, fish, and prawns is commonly eaten (Fig. 1.7).
Egg Hen’s egg is the most common bird egg eaten in the world. It is a rich source of proteins and vitamins. Some people also eat eggs of goose and duck.
Honey: Honey is a sweet liquid made by bees from the nectar of flowers (Fig. 1.8).
Honey is collected from beehives. It is used in cooking and also has medicinal value.
Milk: Milk is obtained from animals like cow, buffalo, and goat. Fig’1-8 Honev It is a very nutritious food item and is a rich source of proteins. Milk also contains calcium, which is required for proper bone growth and nerve function (Fig. 1.9).
Products made from milk are known as dairy products. Some common dairy products are discussed below.
Paneer (cottage cheese): Common methods of making paneer include adding lemon juice or vinegar to milk. Then, the liquid portion of milk is drained off and the solid part forms paneer. This process is called curdling.
Cheese: Cheese is made from curdled milk of cow, goat, sheep, or buffalo (Fig. 1.10).
Cream: Cream is made by collecting the top fatty layer of the milk.
Butter: Butter is made by churning fresh cream.
Ghee: Ghee is made by gently heating butter and removing the solid matter.
Curd Common methods of making curd include adding a small sample of curd in warm milk. The microorganisms (bacteria) present in the curd sample turn the milk into curd.
Unlike green plants, animals cannot make their own food. They depend on plants and other animals for food.
People living in deserts also drink camel’s milk. In ice-cold places, people mostly have yak’s milk.
Microorganisms Tiny organisms that can be seen only with the help of a microscope
Write two examples for each of the following.
- Roots that we eat
- Stems that we eat
- Leaves that we eat
- Flowers that we eat
- Seeds that we eat
What Do Animals Eat:
Different animals have different feeding habits. Based on their feeding habits, animals can be divided into three groups: herbivores, carnivores, and omnivores.
Herbivorous animals (Fig. 1.11) or herbivores (herbi, plant; vore, eater) are those that eat only plants and plant products. Cow, deer, horse, giraffe, squirrel, and butterfly are examples of herbivores.
Special Characteristics of Herbivores
- Herbivores like cow, horse, and goat have wide, blunt teeth. Such teeth are suitable for pulling plants off the ground and grinding them.
- Herbivores like cow and camel have the ability to bring back previously swallowed food to the mouth for chewing it the second time. This helps them to absorb most of the nutrients from hard-to-digest food like grass.
- Squirrels have a pair of broad, sharp-edged front teeth (incisors) in each jaw They use these teeth to gnaw food items like nuts.
- Herbivores like butterfly and hummingbird do not need to worry about chewing their food. They have mouth-parts shaped like a straw to suck nectar from flowers.
Carnivorous animals (Fig. 1.12) or carnivores (carni, meat; vore, eater) are those that only eat the flesh of other animals. Lion, tiger, jackal, vulture, owl, eagle, snake, and spider are examples of carnivores.
Special Characteristics of Carnivores
- Carnivores like lion and tiger have sharp and pointed front teeth (canines). They also have sharp claws and powerful jaws which help them to tear flesh.
- Carnivorous birds like eagle have curved, pointed beaks that allow them to tear flesh.
- Carnivores like chameleon and frog have a long, sticky tongue that they use to catch insects.
- Carnivorous fish like shark has several small, sharp teeth that help them bite off chunks of flesh.
Omnivorous animals (Fig. 1.13) or omnivores (omni, all; vore, eater) are those that eat both plants and flesh of other animals. Bear, racoon, crow, and human beings are examples of omnivores.
Special Characteristics of Omnivores
- Omnivores like a bear and human beings have different types of teeth that help them to eat both plants and flesh of other animals.
- Omnivorous birds like crow have a sharp and pointed beak to help them eat a variety of food.
Scavengers and Decomposers
Instead of hunting live animals, some birds and animals eat the flesh of other animals that are already dead.
Vulture is one such bird. These animals or birds are called scavengers. Some other organisms feed on and destroy (or decompose) dead plants and animals. Fungi
and bacteria are examples of such organisms (Fig. Fjg 114 Fung.1.14).
These organisms are called decomposers. Together with scavengers, decomposers play a very important role in nature. Without these organisms, our planet would be covered with dead plants and animals.
Herbivore: An animal that eats only plants and plant products is called a herbivore.
Carnivore: An animal that eats only the flesh of other animals is called a carnivore.
Omnivore: An animal that eats both plants and flesh of other animals is called an omnivore.
Scavenger: An animal that eats only the flesh of animals that are already dead is called a scavenger.
Decomposer: An organism that feeds on and decomposes dead animals and plants is called a decomposer.
Different plant parts like root, stem, leaf, flower, and fruit serve as sources of food.
Animal products like meat, egg, honey, milk, curd, cheese, butter, and ghee are eaten by human beings.
Herbivores have wide blunt teeth that help them to grind and chew plants.
Carnivores have sharp teeth and claws that help them to tear flesh.
We hope the given CBSE Class 6 Science Notes Chapter 1 Food Where Does It Come From Pdf free download will help you. If you have any query regarding NCERT Class 6 Science Notes Chapter 1 Food Where Does It Come From, drop a comment below and we will get back to you at the earliest.


We all remember the story about the ancient Roman city, whose residents have been bombarded with live layer of volcanic ash. Because of this, not only survived the voids in the form of figures of people, but also keratin things - nails, hair. Something similar is found on excavations in Chita - voids that will help you understand exactly how dinosaurs looked, also we will be able to recreate the kind of ancient dinosaurs, even see their color. Moreover, we hope that we will be able to find a completely new animal - but it's still a big secret.
If this is true, it would be absolutely amazing! According to this article in Truth of Amur, a new fossil site near Chita, Zabaykalsky Krai, Russia, has been discovered with dinosaur remains preserved in voids, similar to how human remains were preserved at Pompeii. Russian paleontologist Yuri Bolotsky said in the article (poorly translated to English):
According to Google Translate, Bolotsky goes on to say, "Another reason not to dig in the Amur region - the lack of filthy lucre that smells independence". Um. What? I reckon I'll wait for a better translation before I report more on this site, but in the meantime I'm thinking of an excellent idea for a post-doctorate...
About the author
Dr Caitlin Syme is a palaeontologist studying the taphonomy (preservation state) of fossil non-avian dinosaurs, crocodiles and fish from the Winton Formation, Queensland, Australia. Think forensic science or CSI for fossils, and you're on the right track!
Love in the Time ofChasmosaurs
Not Exactly Rocket- Science
Prerogative of Harlots
The Integrative Paleontologists
The Mammoth Prairie
The Professor Is In
UQ Palaeo Blog
Who's been visiting?
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.


Science is probably one of the most popular subjects on the school curriculum. It is very “hands on” and the children enjoy questioning, predicting, investigating, experimenting, estimating, measuring, analysing, classifying, sorting and recording.
Every year since 2008, our school has received a Discover Primary Science and Maths Award in recognition of the work done in both these subjects.
Teachers are very enthusiastic about this award as it recognises the high standard of the work they do in their classrooms in these subject areas. To be eligible for an award, the school has to engage in an extensive range of activities and provide evidence that the children have
- been involved in hands-on science experiments.
- organised or attended a science event.
- used technology as part of their school work.
- investigated engineering in class or in the local area.
- used their maths skills as part of their science work.
Science Day and Engineers Week
As part of our yearly application for the Discover Primary Science and Maths Award we hold an annual Science Day. On this day the children can bring their pets to school. Parents are invited to the school to listen to the children talk about their projects. This is wonderful for oral language development and confidence building. Engineers Week gives the children an opportunity to learn about the work of engineers and perhaps to inspire some of them to think of becoming the engineers of the future.


Jupiter Teacher Resources
Find Jupiter educational ideas and activities
Showing 1 - 20 of 910 resources
Predicting the Configuration of the Satellites of Jupiter
Students plot the positions of the planet Jupiter while predicting what the configuration system looks like from Earth. For this configuration of satellites lesson, students photograph Jupiter and its moons to record the motions of the...
3rd - 4th Science


On August 11, the US Food and Drug Administration recalled a batch of supplements manufactured by a company called PharmaTech because of possible contamination with bacteria that can cause serious respiratory infection.
Supplement recalls — instances when the FDA posts a public notice asking the companies who make these allegedly healthy powders and pills — are not rare occurrences. Most of the time they are not the result of bacteria, however. Instead, the vast majority of recalled supplements contain pharmaceutical drugs. The drugs are almost never listed on the product labels, and they have often been banned by the FDA.
A study of product recalls published in 2013 in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that of the 274 supplements recalled by the FDA between 2009 and 2012, all contained banned drugs. A 2014 report found that more than two-thirds of the supplements purchased six months after being recalled still contained banned drugs.
Ask Steven Tave, the director of the office of dietary supplement programs at the FDA, why the agency isn’t stopping more similar situations, and he’ll give a simple answer: “We’re doing the best we can.”
In 1994, Congress passed a controversial law called the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act. Tave said that before DSHEA passed, the FDA was starting to regulate supplements more stringently, the way it does pharmaceutical drugs, but getting “pushback from the industry.” The law forced the agency to be more lenient.
Before a new drug can be sold, the company making it has to apply for FDA approval, and the agency has to conclude that the drug is safe and does what it claims to do.
“So if the drug says, you know, ‘used to treat cancer,’ then the agency’s reviewers are going to look at it and make a determination that there’s evidence that it does treat cancer,” Tave told Business Insider.
New supplements, however, don’t face any burden of proof.
The agency can review products that add new dietary ingredients when it gets a notification, Tave said, but it doesn’t “have the authority to stop anything from going to market.”
When DSHEA was passed, Tave said, the bill still made sense. In 1994, about 600 supplement companies were producing about 4,000 products for a total revenue of about $US4 billion. But that market has since ballooned — today, close to 6,000 companies pump out about 75,000 products.
“We’re regulating that with 26 people and a budget of $US5 million,” Tave said.
“The products we see today have gone way beyond that sort of core group that they were in 1994,” said Tave. “Now they’re promoted for all sorts of things — some are long term, some are short term, some are chemicals no one’s ever seen before. It’s a much different universe than it was at the time.”
S. Bryn Austin, a professor of behavioural sciences at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, told Business Insider that there are three categories of supplements that consumers should be particularly wary of. Those include formulas marketed for physical enhancement, weight loss, and sexual performance.
“Some of these companies won’t identify ingredients that they purposefully put in the products,” said Austin. “Some weight-loss drugs, for example, that have been pulled from the market — we can still find these in the bottle even though they don’t put it on the label.”
Tave’s 26-person team, the only government employees looking into these issues, didn’t even have a dedicated office until about a year and a half ago.
“We’re pretty sure were not aware of everything that’s out there, but we do what we can,” he said. “All we can do is enforce the law.”
Removing a supplement from store shelves comes down to documented emergency-room visits and calls to poison-control centres. Only when a supplement is reported to be unsafe as a result of one of these “adverse events,” as the FDA calls them, is the agency compelled to act.
“Most of the time, we don’t know a product is on the market until we see something bad about it from an adverse-event report. It’s a very different regime from when we know everything is out there and we know what’s in it,” Tave said, adding: “We don’t want to be reactive. We want to be proactive. But we can’t be.”
NOW WATCH: Briefing videos
Business Insider Emails & Alerts
Site highlights each day to your inbox.


Table of Contents
We all feel anxious sometimes. Anxiety and worry are completely normal reactions to both the everyday and extraordinary stresses we all occasionally experience, in children this is often called separation anxiety in children under 10. When the anxiety starts taking over your life to the point that it affects your daily functioning, and if your anxiety is disproportionate to the level of objective stress you are experiencing, you may be looking at an anxiety disorder.
Anxiety disorders can have a tremendous impact on a person's quality of life, to the point that carrying out normal daily tasks becomes nearly impossible and all aspects of your experience are impacted by a paralyzing tendency to worry.
If your anxiety is making your life hell, you are undoubtedly hoping for a solution, but may also find seeking help to be a very difficult first step. Often, learning more about anxiety can help you take action.
What Is Generalized Anxiety Disorder And How Does It Differ From Related Conditions?
The symptoms of Generalized Anxiety Disorder, shortened to GAD, include restlessness and feeling "on edge", irritability, fatigue and difficulties with sleeping, trouble concentrating, muscle tension, and an inability to turn the worries "off". Worrying about worrying, playing out doom scenarios in your head, and a fear of making mistakes are also part of the symptoms of GAD.
These symptoms have to occur a majority of the time over at least a six month period in order to quality for a GAD diagnosis under the DSM-5, the latest incarnation of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. It must also impact the person's life significantly, and other factors that could explain the symptoms — such as substance abuse — first have to be taken into account. The symptoms being explainable by another mental disorder also rules out a diagnosis of GAD.
People who suffer from Generalized Anxiety Disorder can suffer from related conditions while still meeting the diagnostic criteria for GAD as well. Other anxiety disorders that are related to, but distinct from, GAD, include:
- Panic Disorder: Characterized by panic attacks, episodes of extreme fear that appear out of the blue, worries about when the next panic attack will occur, and feeling completely out of control during panic attacks.
- Social Anxiety Disorder: More related to how the person relates to others, and characterized by feeling anxious about interacting with and being in the presence of others, and a fear of being judged by others.
- Obsessive Compulsive Disorder: Characterized by the patient's need for routines and obsessively checking things. This may well induce anxiety as well, but is a separate disorder.


And we are not sure which ones they are. From ScienceDaily:
Research Centre (CNIO) reveals that up to 20% of genes classified as coding (those that produce the proteins that are the building blocks of all living things) may not be coding after all because they have characteristics that are typical of non-coding or pseudogenes (obsolete coding genes).
They don’t mean “junk DNA,” do they? Not this again.
The work once again highlights doubts about the number of real genes present in human cells 15 years after the sequencing the human genome. Although the most recent data indicates that the number of genes encoding human proteins could exceed 20,000, Federico Abascal, of the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in the United Kingdom and first author of the work, states: “Our evidence suggests that humans may only have 19,000 coding genes, but we still do not know which 19,000 genes are.”
For his part, David Juan, of the Pompeu Fabra University and participant in the study, reiterates the importance of these results: “Surprisingly, some of these unusual genes have been well studied and have more than 100 scientific publications based on the assumption that the gene produces a protein. ”
This study suggests that there is still a large amount of uncertainty, since the final number of coding genes could 2,000 more or 2,000 fewer than it is now. The human proteome still requires much work, especially given its importance to the medical community. Paper. (open access) – Federico Abascal, David Juan, Irwin Jungreis, Laura Martinez, Maria Rigau, Jose Manuel Rodriguez, Jesus Vazquez, Michael L Tress. Loose ends: almost one in five human genes still have unresolved coding status. Nucleic Acids Research, 2018; 46 (14): 7070 DOI: 10.1093/nar/gky587 More.
See also: Human genome shrinks again, lower than projected nematode worm (2014)


With Donald J. Trump as the President Elect, environmental justice -- and all social justice -- will need to be vigilant as ever. Trump released his “Environmental Independence” plan, which will allow rampant fossil fuel usage and the elimination of many successful environmental plans in the name of job creation and business interest. We are justified in our concern about how environmental groups -- including the Environmental Protection Agency, and ourselves -- can respond for all people who will be affected.
TREE has called the EPA to do more for underserved communities in the past, as the EPA’s previous initiatives have not always been entirely inclusive. Thankfully, comments from citizens (probably one of you!) on proposed regulations have given the EPA more insight to the communities it should include in its policymaking.
Just prior to the election, the EPA made a step in the right direction toward environmental inclusiveness. The EPA and the North American Association for Environmental Education (NAAEE) awarded funds toward a five-year environmental education (EE) training program called “ee360.” More than 4,400 educators will be able to gain quality training, state certification, curriculum materials, and more access to teaching resources. The program is set to start in 2017.
TREE has taken a similar approach on a more local level to make sure everyone benefits through its upcoming program, Seeds for Change.
Seeds for Change is a DC-focused environmental justice program also starting in 2017. Our goal is to provide young people between the ages of 16 and 26, and truly give individualized training to combat environmental inequality in Washington, DC caused by gentrification. With leadership clinics, research, and access to resources, Seeds for Change aims to empower DC-area youth to get things done.
Gentrification enrages many people for economic, environmental, and personal reasons. However, most aren't very informed about solutions, nor do they have the training to hold the culprits accountable. This is where TREE comes in with Seeds for Change -- we can provide young, local citizens with the power and tools to overcome injustice in their own communities and hopefully beyond.
2016 is an indication that change is necessary and groups are actively working to make that change. Our goal is to hold those in power accountable for justice. We will continue to do that under a new presidency and party regime. This is why we are working harder than ever with young people to get involved and know that they have a voice. We will equip youth with the seeds they need to change their world.


The wreck of Ernest Shackleton’s ship Endurance has been found 107 years after it became trapped in sea ice and sank off the coast of Antarctica.
His wooden ship had not been seen since it entered the Weddell Sea in 1915, and in February, the Endurance Expedition22 departed Cape Town, South Africa, a month after the 100th anniversary of his death. of Sir Ernest on a quest to find it.
Shackleton was born in Kildare in 1874 and became one of the pioneers of polar exploration.
The Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust said Endurance was found at a depth of 3,008 meters and was far from the original location recorded by the ship’s captain, Frank Worsley.
The expedition’s director of discovery said Endurance footage showed it intact and was “the best wooden shipwreck to date” he had ever seen.
Mensun Bound said: “We were overwhelmed by our luck in locating and capturing the images of Endurance.
“It is upright, very proud of the seabed, intact and in brilliant condition of preservation. You can even see the ‘Strength’ emblazoned on the stern of the train, just below the taffrail plate.
“This is an important milestone in polar history.”
Dr John Shears, the expedition’s leader, said his team, along with historian Dan Snow, had made “polar history” by completing what he called “a trial shipwreck search. most challenging in the world”.
“In addition, we have performed significant scientific research in a region of the world that has a direct impact on the global climate and environment,” he said.
“We have also conducted an unprecedented program of educational outreach, broadcasting live from the ship, allowing new generations from around the world to engage with Endurance22 and be inspired by it. great stories about polar exploration and what humans can achieve and the obstacles they can overcome when they work together. ”
Sir Ernest and his crew set out to make the maiden voyage to Antarctica, but Endurance failed to reach land and became trapped in dense ice, forcing the last 28 people on board to abandon the ship.
https://www.independent.ie/news/irish-born-explorer-ernest-shackletons-lost-ship-endurance-found-107-years-after-sinking-off-antarctica-41426931.html The lost ship of Irish explorer Ernest Shackleton, Endurance, was found 107 years after it sank off the coast of Antarctica.


noun (plural same)
A monetary unit of Tonga, equal to one hundredth of a pa’anga.
- In Tonga the paʻanga is often referred to in English as the dollar and the seniti as the cent.
- Coins come in denominations of one, two, five, ten, twenty and fifty seniti.
For editors and proofreaders
Definition of seniti in:
What do you find interesting about this word or phrase?
Comments that don't adhere to our Community Guidelines may be moderated or removed.


Provided by: International Journal of Advanced Research in Computer Science and Software Engineering (IJARCSSE)
Date Added: Oct 2012
A MANET is an autonomous collection of mobile users that communicate over relatively bandwidth constrained wireless links. Since the nodes are mobile, the network topology may change rapidly and unpredictably over time. The network is decentralized, where all network activity including discovering the topology and delivering messages must be executed by the nodes themselves, i.e., routing functionality will be incorporated into mobile nodes. In this paper, routing protocols OLSR, GRP and TORA for mobile ad hoc network are compared on the basis of delay, load, media access delay and throughput.


A University of St Andrews scientist who is inventing new ways for people to use computers has been tipped as one of the young innovators most likely to “change the world”.
Computer scientist Dr Per Ola Kristensson is one of 35 top young innovators named today by the prestigious MIT Technology Review.
For over a decade, the global media company has recognised a list of exceptionally talented technologists whose work has great potential to “transform the world.”
Dr Kristensson (34) joins a stellar list of technological talent. Previous winners include Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the cofounders of Google; Mark Zuckerberg, the cofounder of Facebook; Jonathan Ive, the chief designer of Apple; and David Karp, the creator of Tumblr.
In the School of Computer Science in St Andrews, Dr Kristensson uses machine learning, signal processing and language modelling to invent new text entry interfaces that enable people to rapidly input text into computer systems.
One example of his work is the gesture keyboard. The gesture keyboard enables users to quickly and accurately write text on mobile devices by sliding a single finger across the keys of a touchscreen keyboard. For example, to write the word “the” the user touches the T key, slides to the H key, slides to the E key, and then lifts up the finger. The result is a gesture that efficiently encodes the word “the” as a shorthand symbol. A gesture is then identified as a user’s intended word using a recognition algorithm.
Today, gesture keyboards are ubiquitous in mobile computing. They have been made available in products such as ShapeWriter, Swype and T9 Trace, and a gesture keyboard comes pre-installed on mobile phones running Google’s Android operating system. Dr Kristensson’s ShapeWriter, Inc. iPhone app, ranked the 8th best app by Time Magazine in 2008, had a million downloads in the first few months.
Recently he has developed a system that enables users to enter text via speech recognition, a gesture keyboard, or a combination of both. The system enables users to fix speech recognition errors by simply gesturing the intended word. The system will automatically detect there is a speech recognition error, locate it, and replace the erroneous word with the result provided by the gesture keyboard. This is possible by fusing the probabilistic information provided by both modalities.
Other contributions include work on improving the communication rates of devices that enable nonspeaking motor-disabled individuals to communicate via speech synthesis. These devices rely heavily on a predictive keyboard that needs to accurately predict the words the user wants to speak. A long-standing problem has been poor predictions due to a lack of representative training data. Dr Kristensson solved this by using crowdsourcing and social media mining to generate efficient domain-appropriate language models. The end-result is faster communication speeds for nonspeaking individuals with motor disabilities. He has also proposed a new eye-tracking based text input method that is potentially twice as fast as the state-of-the-art gaze-based text entry interfaces that currently exists today.
“Over the years, we’ve had success in choosing women and men whose innovations and companies have been profoundly influential on the direction of human affairs,” says MIT Technology Review editor in chief and publisher Jason Pontin.
“Previous winners include Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the cofounders of Google; Mark Zuckerberg, the cofounder of Facebook; Jonathan Ive, the chief designer of Apple; and David Karp, the creator of Tumblr. We’re proud of our selections and the variety of achievements they celebrate, and we’re proud to add Per Ola to this prestigious list.”
This year’s honorees will be featured online at technologyreview.com starting today, and in the September/October print magazine, which hits newsstands worldwide on September 3. They will appear in person at the upcoming EmTech MIT conference from October 9–11 in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
About MIT Technology Review
MIT Technology Review leads the global conversation about technologies that matter. An independent media company owned by MIT, it produces publications read by millions of business leaders, innovators, and thought leaders around the globe, in six languages and on a variety of platforms. The company publishes MIT Technology Review magazine, the most respected technology magazine; daily news features, analysis, and opinion; and Business Reports, which explain how technologies are transforming industries. It produces live events such as the annual EmTech MIT, international EmTech conferences, Summits, and Salons. The company’s entrepreneurial community organization, MIT Enterprise Forum, hosts 400+ events a year around the world.
For St Andrews:
00 44 1334 462530
For MIT Technology Review:
David W.M. Sweeney


SOURCE: Columbia University Medical Center, news release, Jan. 26, 2016
THURSDAY, Jan. 28, 2016 (HealthDay News) -- Although fewer Americans are smoking, the rates of psychiatric disorders among those who do -- particularly more recent smokers -- are on the rise, a new study suggests.
Researchers analyzed data from 25,000 people born in the 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s and 1980s and found that the national smoking rate has been falling since the 1960s. But the percentage of nicotine-dependent smokers has been rising.
The study also found that the risk of substance-use disorders increased among all smokers with each decade, whether or not they were nicotine-dependent.
But nicotine-dependent smokers who began smoking in the 1980s were more likely than older smokers to have psychiatric conditions such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, bipolar disorder or antisocial personality disorder, according to the study. It was published Jan. 26 in the journal Molecular Psychiatry.
"Our study confirms that recent smokers, though a relatively smaller group than those who started smoking decades ago, are more vulnerable to psychiatric and substance use disorders," lead author Ardesheer Talati, an assistant professor of clinical neurobiology at Columbia University Medical Center and the New York State Psychiatric Institute, said in a university news release.
"These findings suggest that today's adolescent and young adult smokers may benefit from mental health screening so that any related psychiatric or substance use problems can be identified and addressed early," Talati added.
Study co-author Katherine Keyes is an assistant professor of epidemiology at Columbia's Mailman School of Public Health in New York City. She said: "These findings also have implications for ongoing nationwide efforts to support smoking cessation efforts.
"Given that mental health problems are also predictive of unsuccessful efforts to reduce or quit smoking, these findings suggest that cessation efforts that treat both withdrawal from nicotine and underlying mental health conditions are increasingly crucial," she added.
Further studies are needed to learn more about possible links between biological and genetic factors and mental health and substance use problems in smokers, the researchers said.
The American Cancer Society offers a guide to quitting smoking.


Scientists have produced the first global geologic map of Ganymede, Jupiter’s largest moon and the largest moon in our solar system. The U. S. Geological Survey has published the map, which illustrates the varied geology on Ganymede’s surface. Scientists say it’s the first complete global geologic map of an icy moon of an outer planet. The geologic map of Ganymede is available for download online here. USGS Astrogeology Science Center director Laszlo Kestay said:
After Mars, the interiors of icy satellites of Jupiter are considered the best candidates for habitable environments for life in our solar system. This geologic map will be the basis for many decisions by NASA and partners regarding future U.S. missions under consideration to explore these worlds.
The video above shows an animation of a rotating globe of Jupiter’s moon Ganymede, with a geologic map superimposed over a global color mosaic. The 37-second animation begins as a global color mosaic image of the moon then quickly fades into the geologic map. The distortion in the shape of Ganymede is a map-maker’s artifact. Ganymede is round, like Earth.
Bottom line: The new map of Jupiter’s moon Ganymede is the first complete global geologic map of an icy moon of an outer planet.


Oxford Teachers' Club
Download these extra practice activities and ideas with your class when you adopt our materials.
Recent Articles and Activities
Try some of our teaching resources
How specialist English dictionaries can be helpful for both teachers and students.
The CEFR is learner centred, promotes learner autonomy, and places an emphasis on self-assessment and the concept of life long learning.
Read the summary of the points raised at the recent ELT Journal/IATEFL Debate.


[sudo-users] Why is root in the sudoers file?
Todd C. Miller
Todd.Miller at courtesan.com
Fri Jun 25 13:12:11 EDT 2010
In message <AANLkTilqWXHNXIn5WtodNyC_Xmm5wM2hGWCd0ei5NNPW at mail.gmail.com>
so spake Nikolas Britton (nikolas.britton):
> Why is root in the sudoers file? Root can do anything because it has a
> UID of 0. So adding "root ALL=(ALL) ALL" to the sudoers file is
> redundant because root does not need to use sudo! In my mind it just
> creates an extra security risk. for example: sudo sudo su - or sudo
> sudo bash to get around command logging.
Having root in sudoers allows users who need to do "sudo su" or
"sudo -s" for certain things to still use sudo have the commands
logged. Obviously, you cannot force people to do this but this is
where local policy about root access comes into play.
> The place I work at has a project to add the following to our sudoers files:
> Cmnd_Alias SUDOSUDO = /usr/local/bin/sudo, /usr/bin/sudo, /bin/sudo
> ALL ALL=!SUDOSUDO
> This is pointless from what I understand of sudo and unix. All that's
> needed to circumvent this is to copy the sudo binary to another
> location. for example: cp /bin/sudo /sbin/sudo; sudo /sbin/sudo su -.
Yes, there's little point in that. Giving access to ALL with certain
restrictions is just not effective. The user could just make a
copy of any command or shell, or simply write a script that does
what they want, and run that.
More information about the sudo-users


Obesigenic | definition of obesigenic by Medical dictionary
obesogenic (redirected from obesigenic)
Also found in: Dictionary
(1) Causing obesity.
(2) Conducive to obesity.
obesogenic (ŏ-bēs″ŏ-jen′ik) [ obes(ity) + -genic]
Tending to promote or contribute to obesity. It is said of unhealthy, calorie-rich diets and sedentary behavior. obesogenicity (-jĕ-nis′ĭt-ē)
obesogenic Anything that promotes obesity. Possible obesogenic factors include excessive food intake, lack of exercise, insufficient sleep, antipsychotic drugs, late pregnancy and some environmental pollutants.
References in periodicals archive
families: Parents' obesity-related behaviors predict girls' change in BMI.
Recent research has demonstrated that sleep apnea, even in healthful weight people, is obesigenic
In addition to the need for more research about parental knowledge, beliefs, attitudes and skills about food and nutrition, environmental interventions to combat the increasing effects of our obesigenic
Western society are obviously required and long overdue.


Short Answer: Alcohol is bad for low blood pressure. Because it has ethanol and it can lower blood pressure by dilating blood vessels, reducing blood volume, and slowing down heart rate and breathing.
Low blood pressure is a condition that affects your blood vessels and heart.
In low blood pressure, your body does not have enough pressure to push blood through your arteries and veins.
This can lead to various health problems, such as dizziness, fainting, shock, and organ damage.
One of the key factors in managing low blood pressure is diet.
What you consume can affect your blood volume, which can impact your low blood pressure symptoms and overall health.
To effectively manage low blood pressure, you should consume sodium-rich foods like salt, cheese, and pickles, and avoid sodium-poor foods like fruits, vegetables, and whole grains.
Now, alcohol is a substance that people usually drink for social or recreational purposes.
It can have different effects on the body depending on the amount and type of alcohol consumed.
Alcohol is bad for low blood pressure because it contains ethanol, which can lower blood pressure by dilating blood vessels and reducing blood volume.
Alcohol can also interfere with some medications that are used to treat low blood pressure.
One drink of alcohol can give you about 14 grams of ethanol, which can lower your blood pressure by 2 to 4 mm Hg.
Ethanol can negatively affect low blood pressure by reducing the ability of your body to respond to changes in posture or blood loss.
It can also cause dehydration, which can worsen low blood pressure.
Furthermore, alcohol is a depressant and depressants are bad for low blood pressure.
Because, they can slow down your heart rate and breathing, which can further lower your blood pressure.
That’s why I suggest you limit your alcohol intake to prevent complications such as fainting, stroke, heart attack, and kidney failure.
Stick to no more than one drink a day for women and two drinks a day for men to minimize the risk of low blood pressure.
Also, you shouldn’t drink alcohol if you have or suffer from orthostatic hypotension, which is a sudden drop in blood pressure when you stand up, to prevent dizziness and falls.
Because, alcohol can make this condition worse by impairing your reflexes and balance.
You can buy alcohol in your local store or online.
Always choose alcohol that has a low percentage of alcohol by volume (ABV), such as light beer or wine.
Because, higher ABV drinks can have a stronger effect on your blood pressure.
You can store them in a cool and dark place for up to a year.
Finally, remember, maintaining a healthy lifestyle, including a balanced diet, regular exercise, stress management and essential medical care is key to managing low blood pressure effectively.
I always recommend my low blood pressure patients to follow a low blood pressure-friendly diet to improve their overall well-being, and enjoy a longer and healthier life.


J ohn James Audubon, whose name is synonymous with American ornithology, was born in Les Cayes, Haiti (then Saint-Domingue) in 1785, and lived in France from the ages of five to eighteen. But, despite his frequent later residencies in Europe promoting and overseeing the production of The Birds of America, most of his life was spent in the United States, which he travelled from Philadelphia to Florida and from Boston to the Badlands. Audubon became a naturalized citizen in 1812 and developed a fierce nationalism. Though something of a dandy as young man (he admitted in an autographical essay written for his two sons that he had been “ridiculously fond of dress. To have seen me going shooting in black satin smallclothes, or breeches, with silk stockings, and the finest ruffled silk shirt Philadelphia could afford, was, as I now realize, an absurd spectacle …”), Audubon came to favor buckskin and homespun. In the preface to Ornithological Biography, he introduced himself to his readers as “an American Woodsman,” and he particularly liked to project a backwoods persona when in Scotland, England, and France – even if he never did quite lose his French accent. Audubon was speaking of himself as much as his fellow-citizens when, in an 1833 letter, he urged the engraver Robert Havell, Jr., to be as accurate as possible in the finishing and coloring of the plates based on his watercolors: “Americans are excellent Judges of Work particularly of Such as are drawn from their Country’s Soil—they are proud of every thing that is connected with America, and feel Mortified when ever any thing is done that does not come up to their Sanguine expectations.”
“I opened a large store at Louisville, which went on prosperously when I attended to it; but birds were birds then as now, and my thoughts were ever and anon turning toward them as the objects of my greatest delight. I shot, I drew, I looked on nature only; my days were happy beyond human conception, and beyond this I really cared not"
Audubon was born Jean Rabine, the natural son of Jean Audubon, a French sea captain and plantation owner, and Jeanne Rabine, a chambermaid who gave the boy her last name but who died when he was just seven months old. The boy was initially cared for by another of Captain Audubon’s mistresses, but with the threat of a slave revolt making Saint-Domingue increasingly unstable, he sent his son and one of his daughters, Rose Bouffard, to live with his wife, Anne Moynet Audubon, in Nantes (another half-sister remained in Saint-Dominigue and was killed during the slave insurrection in 1791). Audubon’s wife accepted the children as her own, and in 1794 both were formally adopted by the couple; the boy took the name Jean-Jacques Fougère Audubon.
Captain Audubon had by now returned to France, where he served in administrative roles with the French Republican Navy and, more importantly, encouraged his son’s early interests in nature and drawing. To his own sons, Audubon recalled that during his childhood “not an hour of leisure was spent elsewhere than in woods and fields, and to examine either the eggs, nest, young, or parents of any species constituted my delight.” In these hours of leisure, Audubon was frequently accompanied by this father, who, he recounts in Ornithological Biography, obtained specimens for him, taught him about “the departure and return of birds with the seasons, … their haunts, and, more wonderful than all, their change of livery. …”
How Audubon’s Birds of America Changed Natural History
And, while others who saw his juvenile bird sketches “never failed to praise them to the Skies,” Captain Audubon was more circumspect. In the essay “My Style of Drawing Birds,” Audubon wrote that his father “constantly assured me that nothing in the world possessing Life and animation was easy to imitate, and that as I grew older he hoped I would become more & more assured of this. … I listened less to others, more to him and slowly improved.” In the same essay, Audubon admitted that his first attempts at drawing birds were made when “I was very far from possessing any knowledge of their Nature. … The first Collection of Drawings I made of this Sort were from European Specimen, procured by my Father or myself. … they were all represented strictly ornithologically, which means neither more or less than in Stiff unmeaning profiles, such as are found in all works published since the beginning of the present century.”
One of those early nineteenth-century books of ornithological illustration that Audubon politely dismissed was given to him by this father. He eagerly paged through the volume, recognizing that although “what I saw was not what I longed for, it gave me a desire to copy nature” (Ornithological Biography). Audubon began to truly copy nature when he arrived in the United States in 1803, dispatched by his father to manage an estate outside of Philadelphia, Mill Grove, that had been purchased in 1789 for its potential lead deposits.
Audubon’s move may have been prompted partially by his failure to qualify for naval officer training, but it was more likely a ploy to avoid conscription into Napoleon’s army. He travelled on a passport that Anglicized to John James and identified him as “a native of Louisiana.” Life at Mill Grove allowed Audubon to return to the pursuits of his boyhood: “Its fine woodlands, its extensive fields, its hills crowned with evergreens, offered many subjects to my pencil. It was there that I commenced my simple and agreeable studies, with as little concern about the future as if the world had been made for me. My rambles invariably commenced at break of day; and to return wet with dew, and bearing a feathered prize, was, and ever will be, the highest enjoyment for which I have been fitted” (Ornithological Biography).
At Mill Grove, too, Audubon first developed the techniques that would inform his drawings with such vitality and precision that could be seen, not simply as scientific representations of a species, but as revealing psychological portraits of individuals. Initially, Audubon tried suspending his subjects from string, “with the desire to shew their every portion as the wings lay loosely Spread as well as the Taile,” but finding the results fit only as “pretty fair sign Boards for Poulterers,” he soon developed an elaborate scheme of wiring the birds into natural attitudes that he had observed in the wild. He describes in “My Style of Drawing Birds” his first trying out of this method. Waking one morning with the inspiration that he had dreamt of a new discovery, Audubon, eschewing breakfast, took his gun to the Perkioming Creek, shot a kingfisher, and quickly brought it home. There he took a soft board and sharpened pieces of wire and “pierced the body of the Fishing bird and fixed it onto the board—another Wire passed above his upper Mandible was made to hold the head in a pretty fair attitude, Smaller Skewers fixed the feet according to my notions, and even common pins came to my assistance in the placing the legs and feet.—the last Wire proved a delightful elevator to the Bird’s Tail and at Last there Stood before me the Mankin of a Kings Fisher! … I sat to, outlined the bird, aided by compasses and My eyes coloured it and finished it. … this was what I Shall ever call my first attempt at Drawing actually from Nature, for then Even the eye of the Kings fisher was as if full of Life before me whenever I pressed its Lids aside with a finger.”
Audubon made modifications and improvements to his wiring scheme – he adopted uniform grids behind his tableaux and on his drawing paper to assist him in depicting proportions—but this became his standard protocol for the original drawings that were the basis for The Birds of America. But always and increasingly the positioning of his “mannequins” was based on field observation: “As I travelled, mostly bent on the Study of birds and with a wish to represent all those found in our Woods to [the] best of my powers, I gradually became acquainted with their forms and Habits, the use of my Wires was improved by an acquirement in the delineation connected with the Naked Eye. … The more I understood my Subjects the better I became able to represent them in what I hoped was a natural Position.” In a letter to a friend of 1828, Audubon emphasized that he never drew from stuffed specimens: “My drawings have all been made after individuals fresh killed, mostly by myself, and put up before me by means of wires, &c. in the precise attitude represented, and copied with a closeness of measurement that I hope will always correspond with nature when brought into contact.”
But while the study of the birds of America was the principal avocation of Audubon’s adult life, it was not to truly become his vocation for more than two decades after he embarked at New York. Shortly after settling into Mill Grove, Audubon fell in love with Lucy Bakewell, the daughter of his neighbor William Bakewell. In 1805, during his protracted courtship of Lucy, Audubon risked conscription and returned to France to seek his father’s permission to marry, but Captain Audubon insisted that he find a means of supporting himself before he would sanction the union. The year-long return to Nantes was not without advantage to Audubon, however; while there he met the young Charles-Marie D’Orbigny, his family’s doctor and a gifted ornithologist, who did much to school Audubon in taxidermy, and in a more scientific way of approaching and cataloguing his subjects.
While back in France, Audubon also became acquainted with Ferdinand Rozier, who returned with him to the United States. Audubon worked briefly as a clerk for Lucy Bakewell’s uncle in New York, while Rozier took a position with a French trading house in Philadelphia. But, as Audubon freely admitted in the autobiographical reminiscence he wrote for his sons, the mercantile business did not suit him. “The very first venture which I undertook was in indigo; it cost me several hundred pounds, the whole of which was lost. Rozier was no more fortunate than I, for he shipped a cargo of hams to the West Indies, and not more than one-fifth of the cost was returned.”
Undaunted, the pair formed a mercantile partnership and opened a general store in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1807. The following year, Audubon and Lucy Bakewell were at last married, and the coupled settled into apartments at the Indian Queen Hotel. In retrospect, Audubon realized that there was an easy fortune to made in Louisville in land speculation, “But,” he related to his sons with equanimity, “young heads are on young shoulders; it was not meant to be, and who cares?”
The store itself could have provided a good living, but Audubon’s affinity for nature, rather than commerce, had not moderated with his move southward: “we had many goods, and opened a large store at Louisville, which went on prosperously when I attended to it; but birds were birds then as now, and my thoughts were ever and anon turning toward them as the objects of my greatest delight. I shot, I drew, I looked on nature only; my days were happy beyond human conception. … I seldom passed a day without drawing a bird, or noting something respecting its habits, Rozier meantime attending the counter.”
There is no indication that Audubon had given any thought up to this point of publishing his growing portfolio of ornithological drawings, but a serendipitous encounter with another naturalist-artist at his Louisville shop may have provided the initial inspiration for his Birds of America. Audubon relates the story at deserved length in Ornithological Biography.
“One fair morning, I was surprised by the sudden entrance into our counting-room of Mr Alexander Wilson, the celebrated author of the ‘American Ornithology’ of whose existence I had never until that moment been apprised. This happened in March 1810. He had two volumes under his arm, and as he approached the table at which I was working, I thought I discovered something like astonishment in his countenance. He, however, immediately proceeded to disclose the object of his visit, which was to procure subscriptions for his work. He opened his books, explained the nature of his occupations, and requested my patronage.
“I felt surprised and gratified at the sight of his volumes, turned over a few of the plates, and had already taken a pen to write my name in his favour, when my partner rather abruptly said to me in French, ‘My dear Audubon, what induces you to subscribe to this work? Your drawings are certainly far better, and again you must know as much of the habits of American birds as this gentleman.’ Whether Mr Wilson understood French or not, or if the suddenness with which I paused, disappointed him, I cannot tell; but I clearly perceived that he was not pleased. Vanity and the encomiums of my friend prevented me from subscribing. Mr Wilson asked me if I had many drawings of birds. I rose, took down a large portfolio, laid it on the table, and shewed him, as I would shew you, kind reader, or any other person fond of such subjects, the whole of the contents, with the same patience with which he had shewn me his own engravings.
“His surprise appeared great, as he told me he never had the most distant idea that any other individual than himself had been engaged in forming such a collection. He asked me if it was my intention to publish, and when I answered in the negative, his surprise seemed to increase. And, truly, such was not my intention; for, until long after, when I met the Prince of Musignano [Charles-Lucien Bonaparte] in Philadelphia, I had not the least idea of presenting the fruits of my labours to the world. Mr Wilson now examined my drawings with care, asked if I should have any objections to lending him a few during his stay, to which I replied that I had none: he then bade me good morning, not, however, until I had made an arrangement to explore the woods in the vicinity along with him, and had promised to procure for him some birds, of which I had drawings in my collection, but which he had never seen. … We hunted together, and obtained birds which he had never before seen; but, reader, I did not subscribe to his work, for, even at that time, my collection was greater than his.”
Alexander Wilson, who is still remembered as one of the pioneers of American ornithological study, never wrote of meeting Audubon—not unusual, perhaps, since he died in 1813, long before the younger man’s work had become well known. But he did record his visit to Louisville in American Ornithology: he claimed he found not one subscriber and not one new bird while there, and that “Science or literature has not one friend in this place." (Although Audubon did not subscribe to Wilson’s work, he did own a copy. Lee Vedder reports that the Huntington Library owns a presentation copy of the first edition of American Ornithology, inscribed by Wilson to Audubon and with the latter’s holograph annotations.)
Rozier and Audubon tried to expand their enterprise to St. Genevieve, Missouri, and Henderson, Kentucky, and but they eventually went their separate ways. Audubon then partnered with his brother-in-law, Thomas Bakewell, in various commercial ventures, including a merchandising house in New Orleans and a sawmill and gristmill in Henderson. Audubon recalled the second decade of the nineteenth century as “a succession of vicissitudes. I tried various branches of commerce, but they all proved unprofitable, doubtless because my whole mind was ever filled with my passion for rambling and admiring those objects of nature from which alone I received the purest gratification.”
Also during this period the Audubons had four children: Victor was born in 1809, John Woodhouse in 1812 (the same year Audubon became a naturalized citizen), Lucy in 1815, and Rose in 1819. The boys both grew to work with their father: Victor would act as his agent in business agent in London during the printing of The Birds of America, as well as in the marketing of the reduced-size “octavo” editions of that work, while John Woodhouse became an artist who closely collaborated with his father on The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America. Neither of the girls would live to a second birthday.
Audubon’s commercial ventures continued to founder: the New Orleans business and Henderson mills all failed, and he lost a significant stake investing in a Mississippi River steamboat with George Keats, brother of the poet. The financial panic of 1819 undoubtedly contributed to the collapse of all of Audubon’s mercantile enterprises, but the fault finally lay in himself and his increasing ornithological obsession, not in the stars of national economic collapse. As he wrote of the Louisville store, “I could not bear to give the attention required by my business, and which, indeed, every business calls for, and, therefore, my business abandoned me. Indeed, I never thought of it beyond the ever-engaging journeys which I was in the habit of taking to Philadelphia or New York to purchase goods; these journeys I greatly enjoyed, as they afforded me ample means to study birds and their habits as I travelled through the beautiful, the darling forests of Ohio, Kentucky, and Pennsylvania. Were I to tell you that once, when travelling, and driving several horses before me laden with goods and dollars, I lost sight of the pack-saddles, and the cash they bore, to watch the motions of a warbler, I should only repeat occurrences that happened a hundred times and more in those days.”
Audubon’s father died in 1818, but his “pecuniary difficulties” prevented his return to France to help untangle an estate that was complicated by Captain Audubon’s numerous extramarital liaisons. In fact, Audubon was briefly incarcerated in debtors’ prison, but secured his release by declaring bankruptcy, after surrendering to his creditors all of his property save the clothes he was wearing, his rifle, and his portfolio of drawings. Returning to Louisville, Audubon discovered a talent for portraiture and for a time found steady work. He was particularly in demand for death-bed portraits and later wrote that “so high did my reputation suddenly rise, as the best delineator of heads in that vicinity, that a clergyman residing at Louisville … had his dead child dis interred, to procure a fac-simile of his face.”
In 1819 Audubon found employment with Western Museum Society in Cincinnati, not as an artist but as a taxidermist, no doubt employing the skills he learned from D’Orbigny in France all those years before. While Audubon benefited from working with the Museum’s valuable collection of specimens, the panic of 1819 made it difficult for its proprietor, Dr. Daniel Drake, to meet his payroll, and in April 1820, he had to let Audubon go.
With other paths closed to him, Audubon at this point resolved to pursue his passion and “Compleat a collection of the Birds of our Country, from Nature, all of Natural Size.” With Lucy contributing income as a teacher and governess, Audubon spent the next five years travelling thought the American Southeast studying and drawing birds—and, when necessarily, giving lessons in drawing, fencing, dancing, and French. But his life now had but a single purpose: in 1823 he recorded in his journal that “I have finally determined to break through all the binds and pursue my ornithological pursuits. My best friends regarded me as a madman, and my wife and family alone gave me encouragement. My wife determined that my genius should prevail, and that my final success as an ornithologist should be triumphant.”
The first collecting and painting expedition Audubon made with this goal clearly in mind was in the autumn of 1820, when he travelled down the Mississippi on a flatboat from Cincinnati to New Orleans, in company with a young assistant Joseph Mason, who would draw backgrounds. For the next five years over various excursions and expeditions, Audubon patiently gathered material, and his body of work grew rapidly.
With his portfolio of drawings of expanding rapidly, Audubon began to give serious attention to the publication of his illustrations. His great desire was that his very American work would be produced in America, but in Philadelphia and New York he was rebuffed by both naturalists and engravers who were irritated by his criticism of Alexander Wilson’s American Ornithology and mistrustful of his frontier mannerisms. George Ord, Wilson’s friend and editor, and Charles-Lucien Bonaparte, the ex-Emperor’s nephew who was at the time writing a supplement to Wilson’s earlier work, ensured that Audubon’s project was given a cool reception by the established and scientific and publishing communities in the United States. This may have been just as well, since it is likely that the American publishing industry was not yet technically advanced enough to produce and print the massive engraved plates that Audubon had in mind. So it was that in New Orleans on 27 May 1826 Audubon boarded the ship Delos bound for Liverpool, hoping that in Great Britain he would find an expert engraver, and abundance of copper, and, most importantly, many wealthy subscribers to finance the undertaking.
England gave Audubon the acclaim and attention that the United States withheld. His backwoods persona was seen as exotic and exciting and he was welcomed by polite society and the scientific establishment alike. Soon after his arrival, he exhibited 250 paintings at the Royal Institution at Liverpool, with similar subsequent exhibitions in Manchester and Edinburgh. He was granted an audience with the Earl of Derby at Knowsley Hall, site of a famous private menagerie that was to be recorded in lithography by Edward Lear in 1846, and, among many notables, met Sir Walter Scott and ornithologists John Gould, Prideaux John Selby, and William Jardine—the last of whom he would accuse of pirating some of his images and accuse, in a letter to John Bachman, of “encumber[ing] the Whole of God’s Creation with Stuff as little like the objects of the Creator’s formations as the Moon is unto Cheese.”
In November Audubon was introduced to the engraver who could make his grand vision a reality: William Home Lizars of Edinburgh. Within a couple of months a prospectus for the work appeared, the first subscribers were signed up (a hundred would be secured by the end of 1827), and work was well underway on the first five plates: the cock wild turkey, the yellow-billed Cuckoo, the prothonotary Warbler, the purple finch, and the Canada warbler. Audubon’s plan was to issue 80 parts or fascicles, each containing images of five birds: one large, one of medium size, and three small species. Payment from subscribers would be due on delivery of each part, the plates of which would be sent rolled in a tin tube. Based on the advice of Lizars, Audubon decided to publish any description text separately from the plates in order to circumvent British copyright-deposit laws.
In December 1826, Audubon described the fledgling publication, and his plans for promoting it, to Lucy: “it is to come out in numbers of 5 prints the size of Life and all in the same size paper of my Largest Drawings called Double Elephant paper. They will be brought up and finished in such superb style as to Eclipse all of the Kind in Existence, the price of each number is Two Guineas—and all Individuals have the privileges to subscribe for all or any portion of it … The Little Drawings in the center of these beautifull Large Sheets have a fine effect and an air of Richness & wealth that cannot but help ensure success in this Country—I cannot yet say that I will ultimately succeed, but at present all bears a better aspect than I ever expected to see. … It is not the Naturalists that I wish to please altogether I assure thee; it is the wealthy part of the community. The first can only speak well or Ill of me but the Latters will fill my pockets. … I must wait patiently until the first Number is finished and Exibit that for although my Drawings are much admired if the work itself was inferior nothing could be done and until I have it I cannot expect many Subscribers. As soon as it is finished I will travel with it all over England Ireland and Scotland and then over the European Continent. …”
While the second fascicle was being printed, the colorists who worked for Lizars—reproducing the palettes of “pattern plates” assembly-line style—went on strike. But this turned out to be good fortune disguised as calamity. Audubon quickly found a more capable and enthusiastic collaborator in Robert Havell, Jr., of London. For the next eleven years, Havell and company engraved, printed, and colored the plates for The Birds of America, many of which incorporated landscape and botanical backgrounds drawn by Havell himself.
While supervising the work—or leaving his son Victor to do so—Audubon made trips back to America to look for subscribers and—more significantly—to find and paint more birds. Both efforts were successful. He won subscriptions from many prominent individuals and institutions and must have been particularly pleased that Philadelphia’s Academy of Natural Sciences and American Philosophical Society both subscribed. As for his painting, he captured so many new subjects that The Birds of America was eventually extended to 87 parts totaling 435 engraved plates, many of which depicted more than one species. One unanticipated benefit of these later birding expeditions is that in Charleston in 1831 Audubon met the Rev. John Bachman, who would write the text for his next major project, The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America—and who, in 1837, would become John Woodhouse Audubon’s father-in-law.
The Birds of America was immediately recognized as an extraordinary achievement and perhaps the greatest contribution ever made of art in the service of science. In Fine Bird Books, Sacheverell Sitwell proclaimed that “There is nothing in the world of fine books quite like the first discovery of Audubon. The giant energy of the man, and his power of achievement and accomplishment, give to him something of the epical force of a Walt Whitman or a Herman Melville. … Audubon is the greatest of bird painters; he belongs to American history, and as a writer he described things that human eyes will never see again.”
The later lithographed “octavo” editions of The Birds of America and The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America are considerable triumphs in their own right. But the name Audubon will ever conjure up images of the Double Elephant Folio: it is sole and incomparable, as much a natural wonder as the remarkable birds it depicts.
Audubon, John James. Ornithological Biography, or An Account of the Habits of the Birds of the United States of America. Vol. 1. Edinburgh, 1831
Desmond, Ray. Great Natural History Books and their Creators. London and New Castle, Delaware, (2003)
Ford, Alice. John James Audubon: A Biography. New York, 1988
Fries, Waldemar H. The Double Elephant Folio. Revised edition with update by Susanne N. Low. Amherst, Massachusetts, (2006)
Hart-Davis. Audubon's Elephant: America's Greatest Naturalist and the Making of "The Birds of America." London, 2004
Irmscher, Christoph, ed. John James Audubon: Writings and Drawings. New York, (1999)
Low, Susanne N. A Guide to Audubon's Birds of America. New Haven and New York, 2002
Rhodes, Richard. John James Audubon: The Making of an American. New York, 2004
Rhodes, Richard, ed. The Audubon Reader. New York, 2006
Souder, William. Under a Wild Sky: John James Audubon and the Making of "The Birds of America." New York, 2004
Vedder, Lee A. John James Audubon and the Birds of America: A Visionary Achievement in Ornithological Art. San Marino, California, (2006)