What is a child psychologist and what do they treat? At HPA/LiveWell, our psychologists treat a variety of disorders in children and adolescents.
A child psychologist is a doctoral-level therapist trained to help children and adolescents manage stressors and make behavioral changes. Child psychologists diagnose and treat a broad range of psychiatric conditions in both children and adolescents.
At HPA/LiveWell, our child psychologists treat a variety of disorders in children and adolescents, including the following:
- Anxiety disorders
- Mood disorders
- ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder)
- Pediatric DSM-V diagnoses
The treatment methods used by the child psychologists at HPA/LiveWell
Our child psychologists use many empirically supported therapies to treat children and adolescents. These methods – supported by medical evidence and research − include cognitive behavior therapy in both individual and group settings. Cognitive behavioral therapy addresses the way someone perceives himself or herself – and the world – and how that perception affects behavior. Plus, some therapists use play therapy as an intervention for some children.
Learn more about our program and treatment options
If you feel your child may need to be seen by a child psychologist, please call us to about the services we provide. The HPA/LiveWell treatment programs get results.


All Saints Primary School Curriculum Statement.
Intent, Implementation and Impact.
At All Saints Primary School, we see ourselves as being at the heart of the community. We aim to build lifelong learners who celebrate our community, each other and difference. This will be promoted in a welcoming environment of mutual respect, ensuring each child feels safe, secure and valued.
Our curriculum has been designed with our children at the very centre of its ‘intent’. We start with the child and build upon their skills and knowledge progressively, gradually building in small steps to enable them to achieve the very best that they can. Learning in each subject is carefully planned and we aim to include parents/carers, as partners, in the process as much as we can.
We promote the use of good communication at all times and actively model what this looks like for our children; providing specific support if necessary. We have a strong focus on developing basic skills in all subjects. We have clear expectations of what we want our children to achieve year upon year. We have carefully designed our curriculum to be broad and rich; we understand the importance of first-hand experiences for our children and build this into each half terms learning.
Central to our curriculum is the use of quality texts, the local area and restorative approaches. These three aspects of our curriculum and our behaviour policy are designed to prepare our children for the world of work and later life. We celebrate Gorton and our community. We place reading at the heart of our curriculum.
Our curriculum is carefully planned from the Early Years Foundation Stage Framework and the National Curriculum from Years 1 to Year 6. Each year we aim to build upon skills and knowledge whilst maintaining a familiar framework to scaffold the learning. Each half term ‘Knowledge Organisers’ and ‘Science Mats’ capture the key learning for families and promote the knowledge and vocabulary that will be essential. We advocate quality texts to enrich children’s learning. This structure runs through every year group from EYFS to Year 6 enabling a smooth transition from the end of each key stage; supporting children and families in their learning journey.
We promote life skills through ‘Empowering Learning ‘; a celebration of learning behaviours for example ‘effective participation’ and ‘reflective learning’. We are a Rights Respecting School and involve the School Council in leading and monitoring learning.
Our subject leaders actively monitor their subjects to ensure that our plans are being implemented consistently. The team are encouraged to learn from each other through weekly ‘Book Looks’ and regular ‘Learning Walks’. Any scheme or resource has been audited against National Curriculum objectives. Our subject leaders attend training in order that they are aware of current legislation and ‘good practice’.
We have established a consistent classroom culture with high expectations for our children. There is an established protocol across the school for behaviour and display which supports this which is monitored every half term.
We provide extra-curricular activities, in the form of clubs, for the children in order that they experience first-hand a breadth of experiences. Visits and visitors are facilitated every half term in order to make the children’s learning come alive.
As an inclusive school we aim for ambitious outcomes for all pupils, to achieve the standards set out in the Early Years curriculum by the end of Reception and in the National Curriculum for Years 1 to 6 in reading, writing, mathematics and science. In other subjects, we have clearly defined expectations of pupils’ learning for Years 1 to 6 to enable pupils to learn, recall and utilise the knowledge, concepts and skills that will make them successful learners and prepare them for adult life. The curriculum is designed to spiral upwards through the school in order that children revisit key learning to enable ‘mastery’ of their skills and embed their knowledge.
Assessment, both formative and summative, is used to inform teaching and learning and to ensure that all pupils are building on their prior learning and make progress appropriate to their ability. Feedback is provided in three ways: immediate feedback at the point of teaching, summary feedback at the end of a lesson and review feedback away from the point of teaching. Regular assessments are undertaken in core subjects to gauge pupils’ progress and to adjust the curriculum and teaching and learning. In non-core subjects, low stakes quizzes are used to inform progress.
We regularly monitor lessons, books and undertake pupil voice to see children’s learning journeys.
Impact on pupils’ learning is measured by:
- Summative tests in reading and mathematics
- Teacher assessment in writing
- ‘Tapestry’ evidences children achievements and progress in EYFS
- Oracy assessments to enable judgement in foundation subjects.
- Pupil progress meetings are undertaken each term, to evaluate the progress each pupil in making in their learning and to identify those pupils/ groups who need to accelerate their progress to meet national/ school expectations.
- Attendance and behaviour data to demonstrate the impact of the school’s behaviour and attendance policies on pupils’ attitudes and enjoyment of school.
- Pupil voice surveys, which demonstrate pupils’ attitudes to, and views of, their learning
- Staff voice surveys, which enabling the identification of CPD needs in relation to the curriculum model.
- A structured and coherent model of monitoring and evaluation, including classroom visits and work scrutiny, which enables senior, curriculum and subject leaders to evaluate the impact of the curriculum and knowledge progression models


How could artificial intelligence transform eye care?Posted: Wednesday 11 January 2023 at 00:00
Chief executive of Action Against Age-related Macular Degeneration Dr Wen Hwa Lee, will be joining our first webinar of the year to discuss the advances being made in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and its potential in ophthalmology and research.
According to Lee, AI has the potential to diagnose eye conditions earlier and earlier and could help free up the precious time of optometrists and ophthalmologists, to deliver better care.
Lee, who will join the online event at 7pm on Tuesday 17 January, said: “Despite the fancy term, AI is basically maths and statistics, applied in a clever way to determine information, connections and correlations from a vast amount of data.
“This data is then used to train algorithms, which simply means a process or set of rules to conduct a function.
“Just as search engines have democratised instant access to knowledge, AI-derived algorithms trained on large sets of ophthalmic images (such as OCT scans) can mathematically narrow down on subtle nuances, patterns and features – and use those to identify certain diseases.”
Lee is excited about the future of AI and its potential to diagnose eye conditions such as macular disease earlier and help to prevent any unnecessary sight loss.
However, Lee said many of the existing eye scans being used come from people already visiting hospital, who have existing eye conditions.
At the first Macular Society webinar of the year Lee will be discussing the future of AI and plans from research charity Action Against Age-related Macular Degeneration (AAAMD) to encourage the public to donate their eye scans for research.
He said: “What we really need is data from people who do not have an existing condition, to really harness the power of AI and understand what early changes are happening behind the eye.
“We will also be encouraging the public to donate their data for research, whilst ensuring that the data will be stored safely and securely – and that requests to access the resulting data for research will be meticulously scrutinised by an independent panel.
“I’m looking forward to talking to the Macular Society community about this exciting project and how they can get involved and support us in our mission.”
Register for the event to find out more.


We can use a variety of formulas to round numbers in Excel depending on the situation. We have ROUND, ROUNDUP, ROUNDDOWN, MROUND, INT, TRUNC, CEILING, FLOOR, FIXED, EVEN, ODD and few more. To know how to use all these formulas and how to round numbers based on any criteria, just read on.
Rounding Formulas in Excel
Before learning the tips, first lets understand various rounding formulas & what they do. Look at this:
|Formula||What it does?|
|ROUND||Rounds a number to specified decimal points (or multiples of 10)|
|ROUNDUP||Rounds up a number|
|ROUNDDOWN||Rounds down a number|
|MROUND||Rounds to nearest multiple of specified number|
|INT||Rounds down to nearest integer|
|TRUNC||Gives you only integer portion|
|CEILING||Rounds up a number to nearest multiple of 1,10,100…|
|FLOOR||Rounds down a number to nearest multiple of 1,10,100…|
|EVEN||Gives next even number|
|ODD||Gives next odd number|
|FIXED||Rounds and converts to text format (with commas if you want)|
18 Rounding Formula Tips
1. Round to 2 decimal points
Example: 1.2649 to 1.26
2. Round up to 2 decimal points
Example: 1.2649 to 1.27
3. Round to nearest integer
Example: 1.2649 to 1
4. Round to nearest multiple of 10
Example: 544.234 to 540
5. Round up to nearest multiple of 10
Example: 544.234 to 550
6. Round to nearest thousand
Example: 312789123 to 312789000
7. Round to nearest million with one decimal point
Example: 312789123 to 312.8
8. Round to nearest multiple of 2
Example: 43 to 44
9. Round to nearest multiple of 5
Example: 93 to 95
10. Round down to hundred
Example: 301 to 300
11. Get only the integer portion of a number
Example: -23.34 to -23
12. Round a number to 2 decimals and convert to text
Example: 312789.26921 to 312,789.27
13. Get next even number
Example: 42.1 to 44
14. Get next odd number
Example: 44.93 to 45
15. Round to nearest quarter ($0.25)
Example: 19.14 to 19.25
16. Round to next 9 (ie 19,29,39 etc.)
Example: 23 to 29
17. Round up to next 1000
Example: 124567 to 125000
18. Get only decimal portion of a number
Example: 23.345 to 0.345
Download Rounding formula example workbook
Click here to download example workbook & understand these formulas better.
What about .2 tips?
Well, those are for you to fill down. Go ahead and write formulas for both these situations & you have the .2 tips!
18.1 Waiter friendly pricing
Lets say you run a hotel where customers usually tip 15% of bill amount. Now, to make it easy, you want to price your items such that when 15% is added, the total amount becomes a round number like $1.00, $2.00 etc.
For example: If a dish’s current price is $2.50, then 15% tip on it would be $0.37. This makes the total $2.87.
If you modify the price to $2.60, with tip the total would be $3.00.
Assuming current price of a dish is in A1, what formula will give you new price?
18.2 Rounding to nearest Monday
Lets say you have some dates in a list and you want them to round to nearest Monday. Assuming you have a date in A1, what formula gives nearest Monday?
Go ahead and figure them out. Post your answers using comments.


Backyard to the Universe
Small Group Ministries
And there are several subsets of the usual Small Group Ministry activities.
Second, Small Group Ministry adds a relational dimension to groups that do not fully follow the guidelines for a Small Group Ministry or covenant group. For example, Small Group Ministry adds the ‘relational’ component to ‘religious education for lifespan faith development’. ‘Relational’ includes:
Third, Small Group Ministry is an effective tool for focusing on an issue or topic within the context of a larger educational program or meeting. For example, Small Group Ministry can be used in as part of Teacher Development or ongoing Religious Education Committee meetings. Taking time for a session on feeling safe and contributing to a safe environment brings the discussion around safe congregation policies to a depth beyond the requirements for ‘two adults with children or windows in doors’. Or focusing on gifts and giving and receiving enhances how people work together from their respective strengths, from religious education to committee work. Or discussing leading and following may change perceptions of dynamics and interactions.
But in all of these uses of Small Group Ministry, the underlying principles must be preserved:
Small Group Ministry is a dynamic process that enriches our lives, our congregations and out denomination at a variety of levels. We have not even begun to realize its impact on Unitarian Universalism.
Rev. Helen Zidowecki


Four very old plants: Gosslingia, Sawdonia,
Drepanophycus and Zosterophyllum
Plants from the Early Devonian (410 - 380 million years ago) didn't
grow very high. They didn't get much taller than 50 cm. Yet they were much
more complicated than Silurian plants, like Cooksonia. The latter
plant was mostly much shorter than 10 cm, didn't have leaves, was bifurcating
and bore sporangia at the top of the little stems. The plants presented here
showed already much more differentiation.
Devonian plants are usually only fragmentarily preserved. This is on the
one hand a consequence of the age and on the other hand because
the circumstances for fossilisation were unfavourable. And even if somewhere
many plant remains are found, they are generally heavily damaged. This is
certainly the case for the first plant below.
This plant is found in several places in the world, but it was described
by Heard in 1927as a result of finds in a quarry in the Brecon Beacons (Wales):
this explains the species name. In 1970 Prof. Dianne Edwards of the Cardiff
University described it again very extensively.
and I have visited this quarry several times and we found out that there
are vast amounts of plant remains, but hardly any pieces with structure,
like branchings or sporangia. Most of the remains are thin stems with a maximum
length of 20 cm. Often they are embedded more or less parallel which
is an indication for flowing water during the sedimentation.
Still we found some branched stems and also a couple of coiled tips.
But the most wanted sporangia, which are of vital importance for identifying
Devonian plants, remained hidden.
When I went through the crates with fossils from the quarry again, some
big slabs appeared which I had taken along because they looked promising.
From these slabs two very fine specimens appeared, showing bifurcations,
sporangia and coiled tips.
Click on the
photo on the left to see a reconstruction and a photo of one of these plants.
Click on the right hand one to see the other specimen. The quality is not
comparable to the preservation of e.g. plants from the Coal Measures but
by Lower Devonian standards the fossil is very complete. The sporangia are
clearly visible along the stems and also some curled tips (a characteristic
of many primitive plants) are present.
The stems branched bifurcating with alternately a left hand branch being
thicker and a right hand branch being thicker. In this way a kind of main
stem came into existence. This kind of branching is called 'pseudomonopodial'.
It can be regarded as a transitional stage between bifurcating (like
Cooksonia) and a main axis with side branches.
As far as I know only less complete fossils of this plant have been
found at other sites (e.g. in Belgium).The age of the plants is Siegenian
(about 400 million years).
I saw this plant for the first time in an abandoned quarry near Glasgow.
Nowadays it is a protected area, but at the time it (luckily) wasn't yet.
The quarry was very wet and overgrown, but there was still a vertical face
where the rock was accessible. This face was crumbling off under the plentiful
rain, causing pieces of sandstone regularly to fall down. In these soaked
fragments were black stems with spines. These turned out to be stems of the
species Sawdonia ornata.
This is also a fossil with a history. Dawson named the plant in 1871
Psilophyton princeps var. ornata because he regarded it as
a spiny form of Psilophyton princeps. The latter plant bears sporangia
in pairs at the end of the stems. Later on it was found out that the sporangia
of the spiny plant were not terminal, but that they were placed
laterally at the side of a stem (as a loose spike). Then in 1971 Hueber placed
the plant into a new genus and he named the plant: Sawdonia
Click on the photo to see a reconstruction and a photo.
The function of the spines is not clear. They could have had a repelling
task against arthropods, which were already present at the time. It is also
possible that the plants could hold dew with the spines.
The tips of the stems,
the growing points, were coiled. In between the fossils of the spiny axes
such spirals are sometimes found. They have not yet been found attached to
a stem, but the cell structure of the cuticle, the waxlike layer which
protects the plant, proves that they certainly belong to this species.
Sporangia of this plant are very rare: Rayner (1983) wrote that in this
quarry only four specimens of Sawdonia ornata with sporangia had been
found. After reading this I have worked through my crates with fossils again
and the first specimen I took in my hands turned out to be such a typical
spike: a stem with black spots alternating left and right of the stem.
on the photo on the left. The preservation is not very good, but the same
can be said of the plants of Rayner. In spite of the fast find I had no more
specimens in my crates.
The sporangia are round or oval and are placed, like the side axes,
alternating on the main axis. The bad preservation is likely to be due to
the coarse basic material of the sandstone of the quarry.
Sawdonia ornata is also found in many other places, but not often
as complete as in this one. The age is Emsian (395 million years).
is also a spiny plant, like Sawdonia, but yet there is a difference.
In Drepanophycus the spines are called leaves. This is because a vascular
bundle is running through. Also the 'spines' do have a different shape compared
with those of Sawdonia: they are broad at the base and are tapering
to the apex and often they are somewhat bent (more or les sickle-shaped).
They can reach a length of 2 cm, but the average size is 1 cm. Click on the
photo on the right to see a larger photo and a reconstruction of the
the leaflets are missing in most cases. This has to do with the
circumstances during the process of fossilization. At some sites,
like in New Brunswick in Canada, near Dave in Belgium and in the quarry near
Glasgow mentioned before, better and more complete specimens have been found.
Fossils with sporangia, however, are extremely scarce.
We have found Drepanophycus spinaeformis at several places in
Belgium, Great Britain and Germany, but in most cases it was only the main
axis without leaflets. This axis can be recognized by its diameter (up to
4 cm) and by its irregular, bubbled surface (click on the photo on the left).
In fact there are no other plants from the Lower Devonian showing these
characteristics. When the axes are thinner, confusion with Sawdonia
is very likely. In that case attached spines, if any, must give clarification.
sporangia are attached with a small stalk directly to the axis. Finding,
however, a specimen with sporangia is like winning a jackpot in a lottery.
Still we have won a smaller prize in the Glasgow quarry, namely a piece of
the cuticle of the plant. After a chemical treatment I made a microscopic
slide, on which the cell structure is clearly visible. Click on the
Probably the plant was growing on planes along the river which became
inundated periodically. The parallel embedding of the stems at some places
indicates that some vegetations were fossilized in situ. In these cases the
quality of the fossils is often very good.
There has been a lot of discussion about the question how this plant
must be classified, but nowadays it is assumed to be an early lycopod.
genus Zosterophyllum serves as a model for a large group of plants,
the Zosterophylls, into which also the first two plants of this chapter,
Gosslingia and Sawdonia, are included. This group was in existence
from the Late Silurian until the Late Devonian and is narrowly related to
the lycopods, which includes Drepanophycus. An important characteristic
of the Zosterophylls is the fact that the sporangia are laterally borne along
the stem (and not at the end like in Cooksonia). In many cases they
form a kind of a spike. Furthermore the growing tips of the stems are coiled
(like young ferns). Click on the photo to see a larger photo and a reconstruction
of the plant.
The name Zosterophyllum comes from Penhallow, who gave it in
1892 to plant remains resembling sea grass (in Latin:
Zostera). The meaning of the name is therefor: plant with sea
We made our own finds mainly in the old quarries in het region of Forfar
in Scotland. The rock in some of the quarries is full of long, bent plant
stems. Sometimes they lie more of less parallel, but mostly they in a jumble.
There is little structure to see and branching stems are very rare. I know
from the literature that the plant is named Zosterophyllum myretonianum,
but identifying one yourself is hardly thinkable. As so often in Lower Devonian
plants, scientists need the very rare , complete specimens to know more about
a plant. That's why I was very happy to find the spore cone on the photo
I have found the coiled tips of the stems only as loose spirals.
Striking are the H- and K-shaped branchings. It is assumed that these
are part of a ground network of horizontally growing stems, which are attached
to the soil by hair roots. Such branchings are not present in upright stems,
moreover the vertical stems branch very rarely. Click on the photo on
Within the genus Zosterophyllum eight species have been described,
differing from each other in details.
Reconstructions of Lower Devonian plants are generally achieved with
difficulty because the fossils are usually fragmentary. Often many paleobotanists
were involved and their insights have changed in the course of 150
years or in any case they have become more specific. Collecting this kind
of plants is difficult and time-consuming but by the same token it gives
a lot of satisfaction when you manage to get an image of the complete plant.
It provides a glance at a world of plants which is quite different from the


Avian flu causes concern ahead of Chinese New Year
BEIJING – Confirmed cases of H7N9 avian flu infections have spiked, prompting officials in China to ban live poultry sales ahead of the Chinese New Year. In Hong Kong, public health officials culled 20,000 birds, mostly chickens, at the country's wholesale market.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said there is no evidence of sustained human-to-human transmission, and the organization is not recommending travel or trade restrictions. Cases of H7N9 began in an initial wave from February to May 2013, the agency noted, but a second wave of human cases has been occurring since October. WHO reported 74 cases of H7N9 as of Jan. 21. China's official Xinhua News Agency has reported 96 known infections and 20 deaths from the virus.
The jump in cases is particularly troubling because the increase comes during the busy Chinese New Year. The Associated Press reported that the Chinese are expected to take 3.6 billion trips during the holiday, which officially begins Jan. 31. People will be traveling on crowded trains and buses, often with live chickens, according to AP. Evidence indicates that people become infected following close contact with infected live poultry, primarily in live-bird markets or when slaughtering birds at home.


The tiny organisms that travel along the ocean currents and drift along in bodies of fresh water are known as plankton, which comes from a Greek word meaning "drifter" or "wanderer." The two main categories of plankton are zooplankton and phytoplankton. Although they are similar in size, inhabit the same bodies of water and are both essential to the marine ecosystem, the two types of organisms each have their own defining characteristics.
The most significant difference between zooplankton and phytoplankton is that zooplankton are protozoans and animals, whereas phytoplankton are photosynthetic organisms, including algae (protists), blue-green algae or cyanobacteria (bacteria), and organisms such as dinoflagellates, which do not fit neatly into a single group. The most common phytoplankton are diatoms, photosynthesizing dinoflagellates, and blue-green algae. Zooplankton include protozoans such as foraminiferans, radiolarians, and non-photosynthesizing dinoflagellates as well as animals like tiny fish and crustaceans such as krill.
What Eats What
As phytoplankton are plants, they obtain their energy through the conversion of sunlight in photosynthesis and pull nutrients from the water around them. Zooplankton generally feed upon other plankton, including phytoplankton and zooplankton, along with bacteria and various types of particulate plant matter. Phytoplankton are the primary food source for the zooplankton.
Where They Live
Because phytoplankton depend on the sun for their food, they tend to live near the surface of the water where there is plenty of sun. Zooplankton, on the other hand, often remain in the deeper parts of the water where there is little sunlight and travel to the surface during the night to feed. Both forms of plankton can be found in oceans around the world and in many bodies of fresh water such as lakes and ponds.
Plankton are the basic food source for a variety of marine species, from tiny fish larvae such as cod all the way up to giant baleen whales. Both zooplankton and phytoplankton not only play a vital role in the stability of the marine ecosystem, but they also serve as an indicator of water health, since they are affected by slight changes in the environment. Changes in temperature or acidity or an increase in nutrients from farm runoff and pollution can all have dramatic effects on plankton. Often, changes in plankton can reveal early warning signs of a problem in the environment.
Signs of Trouble
One sign of imbalance is termed a red tide. Red tides, also known as harmful algae blooms, are an overgrowth of algae, a type of phytoplankton, that can cover the surface of the water. In severe cases, the massive overgrowth of the algae can release sufficient toxins to cause a die-off of fish and marine animals in the area, creating what is known as a dead zone in the water.
Phytoplankton, which release oxygen through photosynthesis, are responsible for producing half of the world's oxygen. As well as forming the basis of marine food chains, these tiny organisms safeguard the Earth's atmosphere.
About the Author
Niki Fears has been a writer and editor for more than four years and has written for a number of major sites. She specializes in natural health, nutrition, herbalism, environment, religion and spirituality, traditional medicine, culture, folklore and myth, and alternative news.


Coffee also brings to my mind about decaffeinated coffee…. decaffeinating is the procedure where caffeine is removed from coffee, tea, cocoa, etc. In other words a coffee without caffeine, the main components which gives coffee its bitter, acidic flavor. It is noteworthy that Coffee is not just as a vehicle for caffeine but also supposed to contain 1,200 different chemical components, the properties of which is yet to be unmasked. However, more than half of them are supposed to contribute to the flavor of coffee. Since I am not a scientist & even if I am one, I don’t think I could understand even a little bit of the chemical composition in my life time. Caffeine is the inbuilt property/character of coffee so if you remove that then you have to add something to make it taste similar like the fat free milk or sugar free sweetener. The question is how good is the added material whatever it is to our health? Sometimes I wonder why anyone would want to do experiments on removing something from the object created by Mother Nature. What a waste of time, energy & funds!! If someone is sensitive to caffeine then simply avoid drinking it. When coffee is decaffeinated, the coffee flavor becomes milder so you end up adding extra powder too. There are various methods to remove the caffeine from coffee from the fresh green beans. Still it is also said that the so called decaffeinated coffee still contains a smaller percentage of caffeine!! So technically no coffee is caffeine free? Arabica coffee naturally contains much lesser caffeine compared to Robusta coffee. See Mother Nature is even giving us a natural choice!! So why don’t we switch to that.. or better still is to drink water… genetically altered beans contains different levels of caffeine… I am afraid of any GM products & I feel knowingly or unknowingly we are all the voluntary guinea pigs. Since I cannot fully avoid GM food as I am not self-sustained, I would rather stick to Arabica original than any fancy variety as much as possible… but the problem is how do we know which powder came from which plant unless we pick, process, roast & powder at home… it is said that over frying or grilling is not good because the food turns into carbon… then I wonder doesn’t over roasting coffee turns bean into carbon?? Since I cannot understand how a rule applies different to different product, I would rather drink the coffee I like & enjoy without much thinking about the plus & minus of coffee. Like I would tell my children, anything in moderate is good so is the coffee… too much of anything including love can kill you!! When we were small, it would rain very heavy for three months (something like 2013 rain but better distributed) called malegala (rainy season). So no matter what everyone would get wet somehow or the other. Sometimes even intentionally we would get wet for fun. So everyone wanted to drink many cups of coffee in a day. Whoever comes & goes wanted coffee. Then in between the busy schedule who would prepare coffee every time? Easy solution is the age old famous Bella-Kapi. Early morning in a big pot light coffee (couple of liters with few table spoons of powder) is prepared with bella (jaggery) & is kept on the kanvole (wood stoves used to have a small opening besides the main opening) which kept it warm as long as there was fire in the stove which was almost throughout the day! So when anyone wants just takes how much Bella-Kapi one needed & add milk. It was consumed practically throughout the year. You might get the privilege of tasting it in some households even today. It would have a unique taste thought of which brings nostalgic memories to me. My late beloved mother Patsy (may her soul rest in peace) was a coffee lover & drank countless cups of coffee per day. She lived up to 98 years & she had no BP, diabetes or any major sickness & had great skin. Till 94 years she would read & her memory was fine too… I am not telling that coffee was her longevity secret but guess coffee does not have very bad effect on human body.
(Part 3 of 9)


data-dispersal: Space-efficient and privacy-preserving data dispersal algorithms.
Given a ByteString of length
D, we encode the ByteString as a list of
Fragments, each containing a ByteString
O(D/m). Then, each fragment could be stored on a separate
machine to obtain fault-tolerance:
Even if all but
m of these machines crash, we can still reconstruct the original
ByteString out of the remaining
Note that the total space requirement of the
m fragments is
m * O(D/m)=O(D),
which is clearly space-optimal.
The total space required for the n fragments is
n can be chosen to be of the same order, so the
asymptotic storage overhead for getting good fault-tolerance increases only by
a constant factor.
> :m + Data.IDA > let msg = Data.ByteString.Char8.pack "my really important data" > let fragments = encode 5 15 msg -- Now we could distributed the fragments on different sites to add some -- fault-tolerance. > let frags' = drop 5 $ take 10 fragments -- let's pretend that 10 machines crashed -- Let's look at the 5 fragments that we have left: > mapM_ (Prelude.putStrLn . show) frags' (6,[273,771,899,737,285]) (7,[289,939,612,285,936]) (8,[424,781,1001,322,788]) (9,[143,657,790,157,423]) (10,[314,674,418,888,423]) -- Space-efficiency: Note that the length of each of the 5 fragments is 5 -- and our original message has length 24. > decode frags' "my really important data"
Data.IDA contains an information dispersal algorithm that produces
space-optimal fragments. However, the knowledge of 1 or more fragments might
allow an adversary to deduce some information about the original data.
Crypto.IDA combines information dispersal with
secret sharing: the knowledge of up to
m-1 fragments does not leak any
information about the original data.
This could be useful in scenarios where we need to store data at untrusted
storage sites: To this end, we store one encrypted fragment at each site.
If at most
m-1 of these untrusted sites collude, they will still
be unable to obtain any information about the original data.
The added security comes at the price of a slightly
increased fragment size (by an additional constant 32 bytes) and an
additional overhead in the running time of the encoding/decoding process.
The algorithm is fully described in module Crypto.IDA.
Suppose that we have
N machines and encode our data as
with reconstruction threshold m =
Let's assume that we store each fragment on a separate machine and each
machine fails (independently) with probability at most 0.5.
What is the probability of our data being safe?
Pr[ at most n-m machines crash ] >= 1-0.5^(log(N)) = 1-N^(-1).
What is the overhead in terms of space that we pay for this level of fault-tolerance? We have n fragments, each of size
O(D/m), so the total space is
O(n D/ m) = 2D.In other words, we can guarantee that the data survives with high probability by increasing the required space by a constant factor.
This library is based on the following works:
"Efficient Dispersal of Information for Security, Load Balancing, and Fault Tolerance", by Michael O. Rabin, JACM 1989.
"How to share a secret." by Adi Shamir. In Communications of the ACM 22 (11): 612–613, 1979.
"Secret Sharing Made Short" Hugo Krawczyk. CRYPTO 1993: 136-146
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Numerous research studies have shown the many physiological benefits of meditation, and the most recent one originates from Harvard University.
An eight week study performed by Harvard researchers at Massachusetts General Health center (MGH) identified that meditation actually rebuilds the brains grey matter in as little as eight weeks. It's the primary research study to record that meditation produces modifications with time in the brain's grey matter.
" Although the practice of meditation is related to a sense of tranquillity and physical relaxation, practitioners have long declared that meditation also offers cognitive and psychological advantages that persist throughout the day. This study demonstrates that changes in brain structure might underlie a few of these reported improvements which individuals are not just feeling better since they are hanging out relaxing."-- Sara Lazar of the MGH Psychiatric Neuroimaging Research study Program and a Harvard Medical School Teacher in Psychology
The research study included taking magnetic resonance images (MRI) of the brain's of 16 research study individuals two weeks prior to taking part in the study. MRI images of the individuals were likewise taken after the research study was completed.
" The analysis of MR images, which focused on locations where meditation-associated differences were seen in earlier research studies, discovered enhanced grey-matter density in the hippocampus, understood to be crucial for discovering and memory, and in structures associated with self-awareness, compassion and introspection."
For the study, individuals took part in meditation practices every day for around 30 minutes. These practices consisted of focusing on audio recordings for guided meditation, non-judgmental awareness of feelings, feelings and frame of mind.
" It is remarkable to see the brain's plasticity and that, by practicing meditation, we can play an active role in altering the brain and can increase our well-being and quality of life. Other research studies in different patient populations have actually revealed that meditation can make significant improvements in a range of signs, and we are now examining the hidden mechanisms in the brain that facilitate this change."-- Britta Holzel, first author of the paper and a research study fellow at MGH and Giessen University in Germany
Researchers from Harvard have also released another study revealing that meditation can have a considerable effect on clinical signs of food poisonings, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and inflammatory bowel illness (IBD). The research study revealed that elicitation of the relaxation response (a physical state of deep rest that alters the physical and psychological responses to tension) is a very big aid.
The research study comes out of the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Health center (MGH) and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC). This is the primary study where the use of the "relaxation response" was analyzed in these disorders, and the very first to examine the genomic impacts of the relaxation response in individuals with any condition. The report was released in the journal PLOS-ONE.
Provided the 2 studies pointed out above, and all of the other documented health benefits of meditation, this should open the door for more research studies to examine the advantages of meditation for a large range of illness.
" Our outcomes show interesting possibilities for additional developing and implementing this treatment in a wider group of clients with gastrointestinal disease. A number of research studies have found that tension management methods and other mental interventions can assist clients with IBS, at least in the short-term; and while the evidence for IBD is less evident, some research studies have suggested prospective advantages. What is novel about our study is demo of the impact of a mind/body intervention on the genes managing inflammatory factors that are known to play a major role in IBD and possibly in IBS."-- Brandon Kuo of the intestinal device in the MGH Department of Medication, co-lead author of the report.
For those of you who are unaware, IBS and IBD are chronic conditions that produce symptoms that include; abdominal pain, and changes in bowel function, like diarrhea. IBD also consists of ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease, which leads one to struggle with serious swelling in all or part of the gastrointestinal system. Science has shown us that stress heightens these symptoms, which is why this study concerning meditation and these illness holds a lot of value.
The relaxation response has actually gone through several studies that plainly show that its regular practice (caused by meditation) straight impacts physiologic factors such as oxygen consumption, heart rate, high blood pressure and once again, tension and anxiety. It was very first described over 40 years back by Herbert Benson, director emeritus of the Benson-Henry Institute and co-author of the paper provided in this post.
The research study had 48 adult individuals, with 19 of them being identified with IBS and 29 with IBD. There was weekly relaxation response training, as well as in their house for 15 t0 20 mintues every day.
The research study registered 48 adult individuals-- 19 of whom had been identified with IBS and 29 with IBD-- who took part in a nine-week group program concentrated on stress reduction, cognitive abilities, and health-enhancing behaviors. Each of the weekly sessions consisted of relaxation reaction training, and participants were asked to practice relaxation response extraction in the house for 15 to 20 minutes every day. In addition to elements included in other group programs offered at the Benson-Henry Institute, this program consisted of a session particularly focused on intestinal health.
" Both in patients with IBS and those with IBD, participation in the mind/body program appeared to have actually significantly improved disease-related symptoms, stress and anxiety, and overall lifestyle, not only at the end of the study period but also 3 weeks later on. While there were no significant modifications in inflammatory markers for either group of individuals, changes in expression were observed in practically 200 genes amongst individuals with IBS and more than 1,000 genes in those with IBD. A lot of the genes with modified expression are understood to add to paths included with tension reaction and swelling."
Ways to Meditate
A typical misunderstanding about meditation is that you need to sit a specific method or do something in particular to accomplish the numerous benefits that it can supply. All you have to do is location yourself in a position that is most comfy to you. It might be sitting cross legged, resting in a bed, sitting on a sofa etc, it's your choice.
Another typical mistaken belief about meditation is that you have to "try" to clear your mind. One important factor I enjoyed reading from the research study pointed out above is that individuals were engaged in "non-judgmental awareness of feelings, feelings and frame of mind." When practicing meditation, you should not try to "empty" your mind. Instead, aim to let your thoughts, feelings and whatever emotions you are feeling at the time flow. Do not evaluate them, simply let them come and go and be at peace with it.
I likewise believe that meditation is a state of being/mind more than anything else. I feel that one does not need to take a seat for half an hour and "practice meditation" so to speak in order to reap the benefits of it, or to be taken part in the practice itself. One can be taken part in meditation while they are on a walk, for instance, or the time they have right prior to they sleep. Throughout the day, one can withstand evaluating their thoughts, letting them stream until they disappear, or simply remain in a continuous state of peace and self awareness. Contrary to common belief, there is more than one way to meditate.
" You will have to think of the most essential features of meditation: that no method leads to meditation. The old so-called strategies and the new scientific biofeedback techniques are the very same as far as meditation is worried. Meditation is not a by-product of any technique. Meditation takes place beyond mind. No method can surpass mind."-- Osho
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Slate has an article discussing Wall Street CEO compensation that advocates binding shareholder votes on pay for company executives. And of course, salary caps for execs at companies that have received federal “bail out” money is mentioned all over the news pages and blogs.
I have a different thought.
Years ago, I read a paper on the role of corporations in the young United States. I can’t find that same paper now, but here’s a quote from The Uncooling of America that is similar to what I read:
“Early American charters were created literally by the people, for the people as a legal convenience. Corporations were “artificial, invisible, intangible,” mere financial tools. They were chartered by individual states, not the federal government, which meant they could be kept under close local scrutiny. They were automatically dissolved if they engaged in activities that violated their charter. Limits were placed on how big and powerful companies could become. Even railroad magnate J. P. Morgan, the consummate capitalist, understood that corporations must never become so big that they “inhibit freedom to the point where efficiency [is] endangered.”The two hundred or so corporations operating in the US by the year 1800 were each kept on fairly short leashes. They weren’t allowed to participate in the political process. They couldn’t buy stock in other corporations. And if one of them acted improperly, the consequences were severe. In 1832, President Andrew Jackson vetoed a motion to extend the charter of the corrupt and tyrannical Second Bank of the United States, and was widely applauded for doing so. That same year the state of Pennsylvania revoked the charters of ten banks for operating contrary to the public interest. Even the enormous industry trusts, formed to protect member corporations from external competitors and provide barriers to entry, eventually proved no match for the state. By the mid-1800s, antitrust legislation was widely in place. In the early history of America, the corporation played an important but subordinate role. The people — not the corporations — were in control.”
I think we need to roll back definitions of corporations toward that early standard, with its emphasis on good citizenship and public interest. And as part of the redefinition of their roles in society, the compensation (not just salary) of the highest level officers in a corporation be expressed as a multiple of the compensation of the employees.
For example, for a corporation to retain its charter, its officers can receive compensation at a rate no greater than…what would be reasonable? No greater than 5times the median compensation paid to employees? 25 times? 100? Average, rather than median?
Well, those are details for econonomic experts and policy makers. But this would do much to rectify the obscene imbalance in salary between the CEOs and workers, and it would also be an incentive for improving employee compensation at all levels.


Being anemic – defined as having lower than 13.5 grams of hemoglobin per deciliter for men, or lower than 12 grams per deciliter for women – happens to most people at least once during their lifetime (women more often than men), and most don't really notice it. However, anemia can become chronic and worsen, which can cause you major health problems such as lethargy, headaches, and fainting if left untreated for too long – but without going and getting your blood checked, how do you know if you may be anemic? If you think you may be anemic and want to know how your body can signal to you that you are, then here are a couple signs you may be anemic.
You Nails Are Pale and Spooned
The appearance and health of your nails are really great signifiers of your overall health, so when they don't look quite right, you should probably start wondering. In the case of anemia, your nails will often develop little spoon-shaped divots, which look like they could hold liquid inside of them. Along with these divots, your nails (especially the half moons at the base of your nails) might also be much paler than usual, or might stay pale for a minute or two after pressing on them (as opposed to going back to their normal color after a few seconds).
Your Hair Is Falling Out
Anemia puts a lot of stress on your body and encourages it to go into survival mode, which means it's going to put all of its energy into keeping you alive and functioning, and very little energy towards relatively unimportant functions – such as keeping your hair on your head. Iron deficiencies are known to cause hair loss, and run-of-the-mill anemia is caused by a severe iron deficiency. Losing a bit of hair every day (especially in the shower) is completely normal, but if you're losing handful over handful, it's a good sign you may be anemic.
You Can't Sleep
A bad night here and there generally isn't anything to worry about, but when the bad nights start stacking on top of each other without an end in sight, it's a pretty good sign that something is rotten in the state of Denmark. Even though anemia causes your body be massively fatigued, the anxiety and heart palpitations that also accompany the anemia can make it impossible to have a night of restful sleep.
You don't have to have all these symptoms in order to have anemia, and only a blood test can tell you for certain – but if you're having these symptoms, it's a good idea to talk to your doctor about testing your blood.


***UPDATED: July 20, 2015*** According to a recent article from the American Dental Association, the United States Senate unanimously approved legislation that would authorize oral health screenings for seniors under the Older Americans Act. “For the first time since the bill’s enactment in 1965, oral health is specifically referenced in the OAA,” the Association said. The new provision allows state aging agencies to use money designated for disease prevention and health promotion activities to complete oral health screenings. “Oral health screenings are an important component of more comprehensive preventive and restorative care necessary to improve and even save lives while reducing long-term health care costs.” The Older Americans Act provides funding to 56 state and 629 area agencies on aging, and supports a wide range of social and nutritional services and programs for nearly 12 million U.S. seniors. The Senate-passed legislation would amend the OAA definition of disease prevention and health promotion to include oral health, making it a part of routine health screenings for seniors.
Did you know that February is National Children’s Dental Health Month? The American Dental Association sponsors the campaign which is meant to raise awareness about the importance of oral health and in developing good habits at an early age. Considering that nearly 1 in 4 kids experience some form of tooth decay by the age of five, this initiative is awesome in its goals. But adults get cavities too, and some dental experts say the risk can even rise as we age. “It’s as much a problem in seniors as it is in kids,” claims Judith Jones, a professor of general dentistry, health policy and health services research at Boston University. According to a recent USA Today article, the threat in aging adults is actually more persistent nowadays, considering more people are keeping their natural teeth. It wasn’t that long ago, 50 years or so, that more than half of people over 65 in the US had lost all their teeth and needed dentures. That number is now near 15%, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But just because people are able to keep their natural teeth doesn’t mean that they’re healthy, with more than 20% of people over 65 having untreated cavities.
Cavities, or dental caries, are the holes resulting from the removal of plaque and tartar that build up over time. They can cause pain, infection, and if left untreated, eventually tooth loss. And surprisingly, they can come as quite a shock to some aging adults. Many individuals who do not experience excessive amounts of decay in their younger years might find themselves with cavities later in life. These are some of the factors that might be contributing to this oral health deterioration:
- Diet: If you consume excessive amounts of sugar, whether you’re a child or grown adult, bacteria in your mouth produce acid. This acid can break down the enamel on teeth, which allows for decay. Consuming acidic foods, like citrus fruits, can have the same effect.
- Dry mouth: A common side effect to more than 500 medications, many of which are taken by older adults, is dry mouth. Saliva has a cleansing effect, and without it, particles are left to cause damage to teeth.
- Recessed gums: Without the protection of healthy gums, decay has a much easier time reaching tooth roots.
- Delayed care: A lot of older Americans lose their dental benefits when they retire, and therefore stop going to the dentist. It doesn’t help that dental care is not covered by Medicare or Medicaid, in certain states.
- Cognitive and health challenges: Individuals suffering from dementia may forget to brush, or simply don’t care about it anymore. Other physical conditions, like loss of dexterity, can also make it difficult to reach the back teeth, resulting in poor oral hygiene.
Cavity prevention includes brushing your teeth twice a day, for at least two minutes, flossing regularly, and visiting the dentist twice a year for professional cleanings and exams. Additionally, overall and oral health will benefit from eating and drinking a healthy diet. This includes limiting sugary beverages and foods, avoiding sticky foods, cutting back on acidic foods, increasing calcium intake, and drinking plenty of water. Cavity-causing bacteria don’t care about how many candles are on your birthday cake, and will cause oral problems in any mouth that isn’t practicing a good oral hygiene routine.
Written by Mark Paulsort
Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MPaulsort78


China becomes the main market for most of the wildlife products from Southeast Asia, every year the demand for wildlife products in China has increased rapidly along with the development of traditional Chinese medicine which uses a lot of ingredients from wild animal products as medicines [1, 3, 4]. According to CITES Trade Database 1997–2016, about 72% of legal wildlife products in China are imported from several Southeast Asian countries (Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia) annually . Geographical proximity and economic dependence with China become determining factors why several countries in Southeast Asia (SEA) such as Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand have a strategic position in the legal and illegal wildlife trade in the Asian region .
According to 2020 report on wildlife trade in the Southeast Asian region from TRAFFIC, it is observed that several legal wildlife product trade activities in the Southeast Asian region have fantastic value. In mid-1998-2007, there were around 180 million to 1 billion wild-caught Asian frogs exported from Indonesia every year. Between 2005–2013, there were 10 million reptile skins from Southeast Asia exported to various parts of the world. Meanwhile, around 225,000 kg of African elephant ivory was monitored from illegal trade in Southeast. Not only that, in 2017-2019 there were 96,000 kg of pangolin scales being smuggled in Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam. It was also reported that in 2018–2019 more than 45,000 songbirds were caught illegally in Sumatra and Java; And, more than 3,000 body parts of protected hornbills found in Asia traded illegally from 2010–2019, with more than 1,100 confiscated carcasses of the hornbill found in Indonesia .
Apart from being sold, the practice of wildlife hunting in Southeast Asia is also carried out for daily consumption. Several local communities in Southeast Asia have limited literacy regarding the threat of extinction of wild animals, so that the activity of wildlife consumptions is still considered a normal activity. Meanwhile, some of them also still believe that consuming wild animals can bring health benefits, this phenomenon is also typical in China. These benefits are usually related to the common belief that wild animal products can be used as medicine to cure certain diseases [5, 6].
The majority of local communities in Southeast Asia, especially from ethnic minorities living in remote areas also do not have sufficient understanding about the dangers of wildlife consumption. The high intensity of interaction with wildlife makes them the social entity most at risk of exposure to diseases from wild animals . About 70% of the diseases that humans have today originate from viruses belonging to wildlife, it is estimated that there are around 1.7 million types of viruses that have not been identified to date in mammals and poultry hosts. Approximately 540,000–850,000 species have the potential to infect humans [7, 8] Cross-species transmission of these viruses from animals to humans occurs when humans have close contact with wildlife, which is obtained from the habits of local communities in hunting, consuming, and trading wildlife.
Until today the transmission of zoonotic diseases across species from animals to humans has always threatened the existence of human civilization. From the level of an epidemic to a pandemic, at any time humans are always vulnerable to exposure to zoonotic diseases. We have just passed the Global Pandemic COVID-19 which can be categorized as the worst pandemic in the history of human civilization. Referring to the WHO monitoring of new cases and deaths due to COVID-19 during 2019-2023 which was published via the ourworldindata.org channel, there were around 672 million global cases which caused the death of 6.85 million people worldwide .
Recently, the threat of transmission of zoonotic diseases has re-emerged, now the threat arises from a virus that causes severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome (SFTS). Scientists revealed that the virus that causes severe fever with thrombocytopenic syndrome (SFTS) was originally transmitted by tick-bites. In the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses 2020, the SFTS Virus is classified as coming from the Phlebovirus genus and is designated as Dabie bandavirus .
The STFS virus transmission to humans was initially discovered in Henan Province, China, in 2009. The STFS virus then spread rapidly to several countries in Asia including Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Taiwan and Pakistan. In China, there were 7721 confirmed cases of SFTS virus infection in humans which caused 810 cases of death in 2012 to 2018. Recently STSF virus became a concern of scientists from all over the world when Japan and Korea updated the latest information on STSF virus infection to In humans, the cumulative cases for this virus infection in Japan have reached 763 cases while in South Korea it has reached 1089 cases with 214 reported deaths .
Research on the SFTS virus shows that this virus has a fatality rate of up to 30% in humans, the fatality rate is very high for diseases that are transmitted through vectors in humans. High fever, vomiting, indigestion are symptoms that accompany patients infected with this virus which, if left untreated, will be followed by thrombocytopenia syndrome, leukopenia, and multiple organ failure . Most cases of transmission of the SFTS virus from animals to humans occur in patients who have direct contact with pets and cattle, transmission occurs through scratches or bites from infected animals or tick-bites [10, 12].
- Van Asch, E., The illegal wildlife trade in East Asia and the Pacific. Transnational organized crime in East Asia and the Pacific: a threat assessment, 2013: p. 75-86.
- UNODC, World Wildlife Crime Report 2020: Trafficking in Protected Species. 2020.
- Korenblik, A., T. Leggett, and T. Shadbolt, World wildlife crime report 2016: Trafficking in protected species. 2016: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.
- Jiao, Y., P. Yeophantong, and T.M. Lee, Strengthening international legal cooperation to combat the illegal wildlife trade between Southeast Asia and China. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 2021. 9: p. 645427.
- Zhang, L. and F. Yin, Wildlife consumption and conservation awareness in China: a long way to go. Biodiversity and Conservation, 2014. 23(9): p. 2371-2381.
- Tien Ming Lee, A.S., Miguel Pinedo-Vasquez, Robert Nasi The harvest of wildlife for bushmeat and traditional medicine in East, South and Southeast Asia: Current knowledge base, challenges, opportunities and areas for future research. . CIFOR Occasional Paper 115, 2014.
- Keesing, F. and R.S. Ostfeld, Impacts of biodiversity and biodiversity loss on zoonotic diseases. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2021. 118(17): p. e2023540118.
- Shivaprakash, K.N., et al., Mammals, wildlife trade, and the next global pandemic. Current Biology, 2021. 31(16): p. 3671-3677. e3.
- Ourworldindata.org, Daily new confirmed COVID-19 deaths per million people. 2023: ourworldindata.org.
- Chih-Ying Kuan, T.-L.L., Shan-Chia Ou, Shih-Te Chuang , Jacky Peng-Wen Chan, Ken Maeda, Tetsuya Mizutani, Ming-Pin Wu, Fan Lee, Fang-Tse Chan, Chao-Chin Chang, Rui-Ling Liang, Sue-Fung Yang, Tsung-Ching Liu, Wu-Chun Tu, Hau-You Tzeng, Chia-Jung Lee, Chuen-Fu Lin, Hsu-Hsun Lee, Jhih-Hua Wu, Hsiao-Chien Lo, Kuan-Chieh Tseng, Wei-Li Hsu, Chi-Chung Chou, The First Nationwide Surveillance of Severe Fever with Thrombocytopenia Syndrome in Ruminants and Wildlife in Taiwan. Viruses 2023, 15, 441. , 2023.
- Xiao-Lei Ye, K.D., Qing-Bin Lu, Yan-Qin Huang, Shou-Ming Lv, Pan-He Zhang, Jia-Chen Li, Hai-Yang Zhang, Zhen-Dong Yang, Ning Cui, Chun Yuan, Kun Liu, Xiao-Ai Zhang, Jiu-Song Zhang, Hao Li, Yang Yang, Li-Qun Fang & Wei Liu Infection with severe fever with thrombocytopenia virus in healthy population: a cohort study in a high endemic region, China. Infectious Diseases of Poverty volume 10, Article number: 133, 2021.
- Mark Anthony Casel, S.J.P.Y.K.C., Severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome virus: emerging novel phlebovirus and their control strategy. Experimental & Molecular Medicine 53, pages 713–722, 2021.


Pluto is one of the nearest planets to the sun. This is an attribute of the said planet, despite of being a dwarf. This is how it has been called for quite some time now. This started in the year 1930 during its year of discovery. In 2006, studies were still conducted for it. From there, it was dubbed as the 9th planet in the whole solar system. Well, this is one of the common interesting facts about Pluto. As said, it is known as a dwarf planet. It places second, with Eris being the first. The latter is considered the massive dwarf planet.
Just recently, on July 14, 2015 to be exact, it was the New Horizons mission which did a flyby to Pluto. This was undertaken so that high resolution photographs may be captured. This was also a way to find data about Pluto and other worlds there are.
Other information about Pluto
The ninth planet in the solar system comes with five moons. These are well known. Of course, they have their own distance from Pluto. In order, these are Charon, the most enormous in the moons which is locked with the given planet, followed by Styx, Nix, Kerberos and the farthest is Hydra.
As said, Charon is really large. As a matter of fact, there are instances when Pluto is perceived as two objects, or a double dwarf because of the Charon.
On February 18, 1930, Pluto was discovered. This was initiated by Clyde Tombaugh who was from Lowell Observatory. It took 76 years prior to its discovery, and then its reclassification. It was called dwarf planet right away. This was the time when every noticed that the planet took one third of orbit just around the sun itself.
The year 2006 was important for Pluto because of the given reclassification. This took place right after formalization of its definition by the IAU. With that, it was given its name based on the underworld Roman god. Pluto was the alternative name for Hades. This said name was given as a proposal by then an eleven year-old pupil who came from Oxford, England. She was Venetia Burney.
The orbit of Pluto around the sun takes 246.04 years on Earth. Being the dwarf that it is, Pluto is even way smaller compared to other moons out there. During its first discovery, the size of Pluto surprised and shocked the entire scientific community. This transpired because the realization from their belief that the planet would be comparable to that of Jupiter in terms of size. Well, it turned out to be really small that it is even larger than the moon of the earth, and other sort of moons such as Callisto, Ganymede, Trion, lo, and as well as Europa.
As for the sunlight of Pluto, it resembles the moonlight on earth. This is the case because of its location from the sun.
These are the facts related to Pluto.


FCC Adopts Net Neutrality Rules
On Dec. 21, 2010, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) adopted net neutrality rules, which largely implement existing Internet traffic and management practices, impose new non-discrimination and transparency rules, but leave room for specialized or managed services and usage based billing. The order is notable for basing jurisdiction mostly on Title I and ancillary jurisdiction, rather than reclassifying broadband as a Title II common carrier service.
As expected, the vote was adopted on a 3-2 partisan vote. Democratic Commissioners justified the order as a compromise necessary for maintaining the Internet as an open platform where innovation may occur without seeking regulatory permission, while providing certainty conducive to investment at the edge as well as in the broadband network core. In vigorous dissent, Republican Commissioners questioned any need for departing from the successful history of building and maintaining an open Internet by leaving it largely free of government regulation.
Net neutrality principles
The FCC rules codify three basic principles for providers of broadband Internet access. The FCC adopted a lighter set of principles for wireless (mobile) than for wireline (fixed) providers, on the premise that wireless is a newer platform which is evolving rapidly. The three principles are:
- Transparency. Wireline and wireless providers must provide transparent disclosure to consumers and third parties of commercial terms, performance, and network management practices. Providers must provide disclosures at point of sale and on the web. Wireless providers must specifically disclose wireless device certification requirements.
- No blocking. Wireline providers may not block lawful content, applications, or services, or the use of non-harmful devices. Wireless providers may not block lawful websites or block applications offering voice and “video telephony” that compete with the wireless provider’s offerings. This does not apply to wireless applications stores or their functional equivalent. This principle is subject to reasonable network management.
- No unreasonable discrimination. Wireline providers may not engage in “unreasonable” discrimination in transmitting lawful traffic over broadband internet access service. This principle is also subject to reasonable network management. Significantly, there is no nondiscrimination requirement that wireless providers carry other content, applications, or services, or permit the use of non-harmful devices.
These rules are directed to providers of last mile Internet access to all or substantially all Internet endpoints, not to peering or backbone arrangements. These principles apply not only for residential use but for services to small businesses, schools and libraries. Excluded from the set of regulated broadband access providers are coffee shops, bookstores, and airlines.
Reasonable network management is broadly defined as “appropriate and tailored” measures for legitimate network management functions.
Specialized (or managed) services are permitted under these principles, meaning that providers are not bound by these rules in shaping innovative IP arrangements which do not include Internet access to all or substantially all Internet endpoints. Providers do not need to seek permission to launch specialized or managed services, but the FCC will actively monitor such offerings (partly through a new Open Internet Advisory Committee), and retain the authority to treat specialized and managed services like Internet access if they become the functional equivalent, or are considered an evasion of the new rules.
Paid prioritization for certain traffic is not forbidden, but the order is expected to recite that many harms could arise, that the FCC majority believes paid prioritization would likely fail the unreasonable discrimination test for fixed services, and that providers who offer such services would, if challenged, have the burden to demonstrate that the arrangement is not harmful and is consistent with an open Internet.
Usage based billing (tiered pricing), is also allowed under these principles.
The FCC will enforce its new rules on a case-by-case basis. Informal complaints may be filed online without charge. Formal complaints may be submitted after 10 days notice to the provider. The rules for the FCC’s “rocket docket” will govern these complaints. The FCC may also investigate and potentially file its own complaints.
Although wireless broadband service is held to a lower bar, wireless providers are cautioned that wireless practices that are not explicitly forbidden have not been endorsed and will be subject to active monitoring.
In an effort to collect three votes, the FCC did not hew entirely to the draft bill that Rep. Waxman had brokered, with which industry had expressed some comfort. In a significant departure from the Waxman framework, the order adopts a presumption against paid prioritization, covers more than residential Internet access, and includes no sunset provision.
The legal justification for the order steers sharply away from this summer’s “Third Way” proposal to reclassify broadband as a telecommunications service. That approach would have subjected broadband providers to the Title II provisions designed for monopoly “Ma Bell” telephony. Instead, the FCC draws on a variety of cable, broadcast, interconnection, wireless, and deregulation provisions of the Communications Act to tether its claim to Title I “ancillary” authority over the Internet. “Ancillary” jurisdiction is an approach which reviewing courts have sometimes used to sustain FCC authority over new technologies. It is an open question whether this approach can withstand appeal any better than the FCC’s Comcast BitTorrent decision fared in the D.C. Circuit earlier this year. In this instance, the dissenting Republicans noted the absence of any limiting principle which would confine the FCC to statutory bounds.
The FCC majority obviously did not defer to the many bipartisan voices of protest that a net neutrality decision should be left to Congress. We should expect a response from Congress, at least through oversight hearings, bills, and efforts to defund enforcement.
The FCC also split on partisan lines over whether this order would encourage or discourage foreign nations from adopting their own restrictions on the Internet.
When the full text of the order is released, we will provide an updated analysis.


Muscle cell transplants
repair damaged heart tissue
Monday, 18 November 2002
Researchers safely transplanted 16
patients' skeletal muscle cells into their own severely damaged hearts in
the first human testing in the United States, according to a study
reported today at the American Heart Association's Scientific Sessions
"We have been able to regenerate dead heart muscle, or scar tissue, in the
area of heart attack without increasing risk of death," says lead author
Nabil Dib, M.D., director of cardiovascular research at the Arizona Heart
Institute in Phoenix. "Our findings will allow us to move forward with
testing if the procedure can improve the contractility of the heart."
The interim results indicate the procedure is safe and feasible, he says.
When patients suffer a heart attack, scar tissue develops, resulting in a
decrease in heart contractility - its ability to compress and force blood
through its chambers. Since heart cells can't repair themselves, this
damage is irreversible and eventually results in heart failure.
Researchers conducted the multi-centre trial, overseen by the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration, in patients who had suffered heart attacks or
heart failure and whose hearts had reduced pumping ability evidenced by
left-ventricular ejection fraction (EF) less than 30 percent. EF measures
the quantity of blood pumped from the heart with each beat. A healthy
heart pumps out a little more than half the heart's volume of blood with
each beat for an EF of 55 percent or higher.
Eleven patients were undergoing coronary artery bypass surgery (CABG) and
five were having a left ventricular assist device (LVAD) implanted. An
LVAD helps a failing heart until a donor heart becomes available for
The patients' myoblasts cells (immature cells that become muscle cells)
were extracted from thigh muscle. Large quantities of the cells were grown
in the laboratory for three to four weeks using a controlled cell
expansion manufacturing process. During the surgery, one to 30 direct
injections - containing 10 million cells each - were made into the damaged
area of the hearts. The dosages ranged from 10 million to 300 million
"We found that the transplanted myoblasts survived and thrived in
patients. Areas damaged by heart attack and cardiovascular disease showed
evidence of repair and viability," Dib says.
No significant adverse reactions were found related to the cell transplant
procedure in either group of patients in follow-up testing nine months
There was one death due to infection of the device in the LVAD group three
months after cell transplantation, and one patient in the CABG group had
non-sustained ventricular tachycardia - a fast heart rate that starts in
the lower chambers (ventricles).
While the trial was not designed to evaluate the effect of cell transplant
on cardiac function, Dib calls the results extremely encouraging.
Examining the heart by echocardiogram, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI),
and positron emission tomography (PET scan) showed evidence of scar tissue
regeneration in the area of the graft, which indicates repair.
EF rates improved, on average, from 22.7 percent to 35.8 percent - a 58
percent increase - after 12 weeks.
"The important finding in the LVAD clinical study, is that we were able to
directly examine and observe histological changes in the heart muscle of
patients after they received a new heart and their old one was removed,"
The results were also compared against a group of historical controls from
a Yale University study, published in the Journal of the American College
of Cardiology (93:22:1411-7) of 83 patients with EF less than 30 percent
before bypass surgery. In the Yale group, there was a 13 percent overall
death rate and an 11 percent heart death rate at one year.
After bypass, the Yale group's EF improved from 24.6 percent to 33.2
percent - a 36 percent increase.
At Scientific Sessions 2000, French researchers described the first human
experience with autologous skeletal myoblast transplantation. The
transplant improved EF in a 72-year-old man undergoing a bypass procedure.
Subsequent procedures in other patients have been reported at other
meetings. Those studies showed similar improvement in viability of dead or
damaged heart tissue, but several adverse reactions, such as
life-threatening arrhythmias also were reported.
No such complications were found in this study, Dib notes.
Other promising cellular and molecular procedures are being explored as
ways to repair and strengthen the damaged heart by replacing dysfunctional
or dead heart cells with cells from other sites and those grown in
laboratories, Dib says. These include embryonic and adult cardiomyocytes,
embryonic stem cells, genetically altered fibroblasts, smooth muscle
cells, bone marrow-derived cells, and adult skeletal myoblasts.
American Heart Association Press Release


"Conflicts That Can't Be Resolved," Wall Street Journal, September 5, 1997.
Peace processes are proliferating all over the world, along with the violence that gave birth to them. There is the Middle East peace process, of course, but peace processes are also at work in the Cyprus conflict between Greeks and Turks, the Northern Ireland conflict between Catholics and Protestants, the Korean conflict between Communists and non-Communists, the Bosnian conflict between just about everyone, and in many other conflicts around the globe. Nor are they limited to international conflicts. In the California Legislature a bill has been proposed authorizing a Peace Process Task Force to oversee truces in gang warfare.
So many “peace processes” and so little peace! What’s going on?
Well, what’s going on is the familiar story of a social science theory being promoted to politicians who find it an attractive and easy option. The theory in question is “conflict resolution,” by now a venerable department of social psychology with some thousands of “experts” who are happy to sell their services to foundations, government agencies or troubled nations. Our State Department is thoroughly under the sway of this theory — aren’t diplomats by training experts at conflict resolution? — and so is the United States Institute of Peace, whose latest bulletin features a summary of a speech by Joseph Duffy, director of the U.S. information Agency. It reads: “The new information technologies are transforming international relations, opening up new possibilities for conflict prevention, management and resolution.”


Full Program »
Electric Vehicle Charging With Fractional Renewable Energy Certificates Using Blockchain Technology
Renewable Energy certificates (RECs), as Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) assets, are growing in value globally, based on the need to solve climate challenges. RECs are also proven viable market-friendly instruments, with carbon markets exponentially growing for trading them since they facilitate measuring and tracking energy from clean renewable sources. However, RECS are error prone due to minimal traceability or certification, double counting as well as green washing, and therefore require worldwide ledgers for its proper management. This article explored RECs tokenisation using blockchain technology to solve its challenges and greenify smaller decentralised physical assets by matching consumption with renewable energy production. A proof-of-concept (POC) was developed around EV charging with three RECs use cases tested in a microgrid demonstrator in Singapore. The prioritized use cases were used to depict scenarios for how individuals and businesses with or without renewable energy assets can acquire RECs to achieve their decarbonisation goals.


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As the previous post suggested, the conflict with society that always results when either of the two leave the river is an important part of Twain's commentary on society. Of course you also have to consider the run-in with the thieves on the river and the danger of that situation. In this case it would appear, if you are assuming that each part of the story has an attached meaning, that the river also takes care of its own problems in a way as the thieves are drowned after Huck leaves the boat with them trapped inside.
Twain's outlook on society in general is cynical and critical almost to a fault. His description of American society is filled with criticisms of the government, of common people and their ignorance, percieved or otherwise. He tends to think of people that are outside of these normal, "civilised" places as being more capable, more interesting, and at times happier, just as Huck and Jim appear to live a happy and uncomplicated life while on the river and get into all kinds of trouble once they go on shore.
The idea of the King being an accepted part of society is a great example of society and civilization being portrayed in a negative light, but so too is the fact that Huck is so often able to outsmart and outwit "civilized" people, demonstrating that his training and education is at least as valid and useful as that of civilization.
I think it is pretty clear that Twain does suggest that civilization (or at least the civilization he describes) corrupts people. I don't know that he thinks you can have an uncivilized life, but I do think he is criticizing society.
I would say this is true because of how much bad seems to happen when Jim and Huck get off the river (freedom) and come to the shore (civilization). They meet all sorts of people who act in ways that are rather despicable (the feud, the King and Duke). These people are accepted by society, so something must be wrong with society.
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The Modern Windmill: Find Out How Wind Turbines Work
In case you live in a remote region that experiences a lot of wind, there is a possibility that you have now seen numerous wind turbines dot the landscape. As you pass the gigantic machines while driving, one thing that pops in your mind is how a wind turbine operates. You are in the ideal place if you are seeking answers to your question. Keep it locked to discover the basics of how wind turbines function to produce renewable electricity using the power of mother nature solely.
Find out how a wind turbine work. The idea revolving around how a wind turbine works is straight forward. The turbine is composed of a couple of blades shaped in such a way that they seize the wind effects. As the wind blows, the turbine rotates with it due to the shape of the blades. The turbine is attached to a shaft inside the machine. When the turbines rotate, so does the shaft and it turns within a generator to produce electricity. The electricity charge is harbored and stored and can be sent to multiple electricity lines to provide power to numerous households.
How do you optimize the efficiency of a vegetable? There are numerous ways in which you can make the most of wind turbine efficiency. The more effective a wind turbine is, the lesser the turbines it requires to release a similar amount of power. In return, it saves the power plant a lot of money. These savings are converted to you as the consumer because click electricity costs will go down. The region where the wind turbine is in plays a significant role in the efficiency of the wind turbine. When the high wind speeds are normal, then short, thin blades will be the best. If on the flip side the region experiences low wind speeds, the wind turbine should have lengthy blades and a big base area. But, if low wind speeds are the norm in the region, then lengthy blades with greater surface area will be the best. The materials which the turbine blades are made out of have a tremendous impact on the turbine. If the material is light, it is easy for the wind to turn the blade and produce electricity. However, make sure that the material is about sturdy to prevent it from bending or breaking whenever they are strong winds.
Renewable energy is the future. If you look at info. how fast the world’s fossil fuels are depleting and the adverse effects of burning fossil fuels on the environment, it is evident that renewable resources of energy are the future. The ideal source of renewable energy is wind turbine because they harness the energy we experience for free each day to power our households in the 21st century. Now that you are aware of these how a wind turbine operates, you can appreciate it even more.


In the game Minecraft, the ores are one of the important and most valuable resources. There are tons of different uses for ores, including crafting tools, armor, weapons, and more. As of version 1.16, there are 11 different ores in Minecraft. Also, a few ores such as emeralds and lapis lazuli cannot be crafted into tools. In the past, ores could only be found in stone in the overworld, but Minecraft has broadened those requirements and allowed ores to spawn in the Nether. Rarest ore in Minecraft
The players have to need to give a look to this post, as this article contains information about the rare ores in the game of Minecraft.
It only spawns between level 8 and 22. With the new addition of Netherite.
A runner-up to the rarest ore in Minecraft would be ancient debris, which can be made into Netherite. Ancient debris can only be found in the Nether, and it is quite hard to come by.
The main use of emeralds is to trade with villagers, not to craft items. The interesting thing about emerald ore is how different it is from its diamond counterpart. Diamonds can be crafted into weapons and armor, but emeralds cannot, despite being rarer. Coming across emeralds is not technically rare, but finding them while mining is. As of Minecraft version 1.16, emerald ore is the rarest ore in Minecraft, despite tons of newer ores being added. Emerald ore is thirty times rarer than diamonds.
And they only spawn in one-block veins, meaning players cannot find multiple emeralds grouped together, unlike other ores. It is quite easy to find a villager who is willing to trade for an emerald, and emeralds can be found in loot chests, which makes the gem seem less rare than it actually is.